Why Ufology is not a science?

originally posted by: DJW001
a reply to: jordan77

I just wish skeptics and scientists would accept "I don't know" as an answer. That doesn't happen often enough. And that's a criticism of ufologists all the time, but it applies to both sides.

Here's the difference between skeptics and most self proclaimed ufologists. A skeptic will say: "I'm not sure, but it's probably..." whereas "ufologists" will too often say: "This can only be ETs, what more proof do you need?"

The end result is still the same. Neither one has an conclusive answer. A lot of the time, the "probably" is just based on what's possible. Even then, no real scientific study is given to it.

a reply to: jordan77

The end result is still the same. Neither one has an conclusive answer. A lot of the time, the "probably" is just based on what's possible. Even then, no real scientific study is given to it.

All too often, conclusive answers do not exist in real life. One solution based on the known and probable is more scientific than considering an improbable one that would confirm one's bias.

originally posted by: DJW001
a reply to: jordan77

The end result is still the same. Neither one has an conclusive answer. A lot of the time, the "probably" is just based on what's possible. Even then, no real scientific study is given to it.

All too often, conclusive answers do not exist in real life. One solution based on the known and probable is more scientific than considering an improbable one that would confirm one's bias.

That doesn't inherently make it a good, or even likely, conclusion though. It's perfectly acceptable to say "science can't answer this".

But again, the lack of scientific energy and resources expended on investigations makes the whole discussion moot, because neither side is using much science. We're arguing what's more scientific over two not really great options.

originally posted by: jordan77
I tend to think skeptics often don't bother investigating using the scientific method either. Science neither proves or disproves anything in the field because they dont want to be bothered with it. The lack of scientific investigation by anyone on either side of the issue is obvious.

No one said that all skeptics are scientifically minded, but I'm sure many more skeptics are scientifically minded than believers are.

Many skeptics, such as myself, started out as believers, had an open mind but saw that the evidence wasn't there. Even now we don't necessarily disbelieve, we just don't think the idea is as sound as it used to be. But if you can show us the conclusive evidence then we'll be back on board.

The problem is that believers can tend to have a more relaxed idea of what "conclusive evidence" is, but conclusive evidence has to be objective evidence. Eyewitness accounts are great, but humans lie. Hell our own memories lie to us. That is a proven scientific fact. This is why we cannot rely solely on eye witness accounts as evidence.

Shermer, for one, is big on that. He leans on ufology not being science quite a bit. Or he'll say something like people can have mass delusions, people mistake planets for ufos, so that must be the explanation. That kind of thing. I think that's where the "explain away" comes from.

Those are called alternate possibilities. How science works is that it doesn't say something is true until ALL other possibilities are determined to be unlikely. When Shermer says things like that, you can't say that he is wrong. After all, you don't know what happened either. And that's the point, the ufologist could very well be correct or Shermer could be correct. The result then is inconclusive.

At this point we default to Occam's Razor. The idea with the least amount of assumptions is likely the correct one. This is where you'll get scientists and skeptics saying these things don't exist. Because the evidence isn't there; the solution with the least amount of assumptions would be non-existence. Technically the result is still inconclusive, so in this case non-existence and inconclusive mean the same thing. Now Occam's Razor could very well be wrong, but the onus is on you to produce the credible evidence to overturn the idea of non-existence. Once you get Occam's Razor to work in your favor, then we have to accept existence.

Question, why do we know an aardvark exists? Because we've seen them in the wild, captured them, taken pictures of them, and studied them. Do unicorns exist? We don't know. No one has captured one, taken a picture of one, or had a chance to study them, so they probably don't exist.

I know this can look like explaining things away, but it is actually trying to keep an unbiased look at the situation. We don't want to accidentally confirm any biases we may have. If we could get objective and reproducible evidence of it being a ufo or even better, an alien then Shermer's possibilities are impossible. We HAVE to accept that ufos and/or aliens exist.

I just wish skeptics and scientists would accept "I don't know" as an answer. That doesn't happen often enough. And that's a criticism of ufologists all the time, but it applies to both sides.

Actually that is the answer we do accept. "I don't know" is the answer to literally most of skeptics' and scientists' questions.

a reply to: jordan77

That doesn't inherently make it a good, or even likely, conclusion though.

Probable = likely.

PLEASE DELETE THIS POST

originally posted by: Krazysh0t

originally posted by: jordan77
I tend to think skeptics often don't bother investigating using the scientific method either. Science neither proves or disproves anything in the field because they dont want to be bothered with it. The lack of scientific investigation by anyone on either side of the issue is obvious.

No one said that all skeptics are scientifically minded, but I'm sure many more skeptics are scientifically minded than believers are.

Many skeptics, such as myself, started out as believers, had an open mind but saw that the evidence wasn't there. Even now we don't necessarily disbelieve, we just don't think the idea is as sound as it used to be. But if you can show us the conclusive evidence then we'll be back on board.

The problem is that believers can tend to have a more relaxed idea of what "conclusive evidence" is, but conclusive evidence has to be objective evidence. Eyewitness accounts are great, but humans lie. Hell our own memories lie to us. That is a proven scientific fact. This is why we cannot rely solely on eye witness accounts as evidence.

Shermer, for one, is big on that. He leans on ufology not being science quite a bit. Or he'll say something like people can have mass delusions, people mistake planets for ufos, so that must be the explanation. That kind of thing. I think that's where the "explain away" comes from.

Those are called alternate possibilities. How science works is that it doesn't say something is true until ALL other possibilities are determined to be unlikely. When Shermer says things like that, you can't say that he is wrong. After all, you don't know what happened either. And that's the point, the ufologist could very well be correct or Shermer could be correct. The result then is inconclusive.

At this point we default to Occam's Razor. The idea with the least amount of assumptions is likely the correct one. This is where you'll get scientists and skeptics saying these things don't exist. Because the evidence isn't there; the solution with the least amount of assumptions would be non-existence. Technically the result is still inconclusive, so in this case non-existence and inconclusive mean the same thing. Now Occam's Razor could very well be wrong, but the onus is on you to produce the credible evidence to overturn the idea of non-existence. Once you get Occam's Razor to work in your favor, then we have to accept existence.

Question, why do we know an aardvark exists? Because we've seen them in the wild, captured them, taken pictures of them, and studied them. Do unicorns exist? We don't know. No one has captured one, taken a picture of one, or had a chance to study them, so they probably don't exist.

I know this can look like explaining things away, but it is actually trying to keep an unbiased look at the situation. We don't want to accidentally confirm any biases we may have. If we could get objective and reproducible evidence of it being a ufo or even better, an alien then Shermer's possibilities are impossible. We HAVE to accept that ufos and/or aliens exist.

I just wish skeptics and scientists would accept "I don't know" as an answer. That doesn't happen often enough. And that's a criticism of ufologists all the time, but it applies to both sides.

Actually that is the answer we do accept. "I don't know" is the answer to literally most of skeptics' and scientists' questions.

Quoted for agreement.

I stared out believing in UFOs, the bemuda triangle, the moon hoax etc...then i got interested in science and studied physics at university and became an amateur astronomer and realised that there was zero proof for all these things.

I still believe in life elsewhere and i dream of the day we get confirmation of that. More than anything, i want to see that before i die. The thing is that im fairly grounded and i can accept the dissapointment of thinking none of these things are real. Clearly...not everyone is the same and in my opinion, their desire for ufos to be real outweighs their common sense.

Maybe its because of my deep interest in science and space that i feel the universe is incredibly interesting already.

But be clear, i am 100% open to aliens and ufos. It would be a turning point for humanity and i hope i see it.


EDIT: can i also add that all you people who have a looser understanding of the word "evidence" and "proof"...thank god scientists are not like that or we wouldn't have quantum mechanics (and therefore no transistors and no computers), we would not have sent a probe to pluto and we not be able to build things like the A380. So, if you wonder why us skeptics stick to our guns with regard to proof, its because proof and factual information have served humanity very well the last 200 years.

a reply to: 3danimator2014

Good points, however there is no reason not to believe in ufo's. As long as you cannot identify an object that is flying in the air, you are seeing a UFO. It could very well be a lightning bug, but if you don't know what one of those is, it is a UFO.

I'm willing to believe quite easily that many people see objects flying around in the sky that they cannot identify. It's when they assign extra attributes after declaring the object "unidentified" that I start to have a problem.