Philip J Klass - who is this guy?

Where did he come from ?

Philip J. Klass, the world's leading UFO skeptic, has been writing about the UFO enigma since 1953.

Philip Klass was born in Des Moines, Iowa
Graduated from Iowa State University in 1941 with a BSEE
Avionics engineer for General Electric
Started with Aviation Week in 1952
Lauren D. Lyman Award for a career distinguished by "the qualities of integrity, accuracy and excellence in reporting." In 1998,

Co Founded the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal (CSICOP) in 1976

He has been described as a noted UFO researcher and an expert on the Roswell Incident.

You may wonder how an electrical engineer becomes a UFO expert in three weeks.

Did he take a crash course at the NSA?

Could this man be a government installed disinformation agent ?

Aviation Week Guy, hired by the CIA to debunk everything and anything on Ufology research and its researchers !
He did pretty good too.

Dallas

Who is this guy" !!!!!

Geez, it just goes to show how little some people know.

Why dont those who know so little just use Google to sort of "educate" themselves.

Save an awful lot of embarrasment.

This guy, debunker or not ( who knows) is one of the most important investigators in post war Ufology.

And people come on here and say "Who is this guy". !!!

Shakes head, goes for a walk.

Originally posted by JayKew
Geez, it just goes to show how little some people know.

Why dont those who know so little just use Google to sort of "educate" themselves.

I suggest you "educate" yourself by reading the Term and Conditions of this forum.

If you had bothered to read my post and the link, then perhaps you would understand the underlying meaning of my post, Mr JayKew.

However,

Since you insist that I spell it out for you here it is.

We all know that Klass is the most successful UFO debunker of all time.
He has written several books on the subject including UFO's: Public Deceived, The Flying Saucers are Real (1950), Flying Saucers From Outer Space (1953), The Flying Saucer Conspiracy (1955), Flying Saucers: Top Secret (1960), and Aliens from Outer Space (1973) most of which I have read.

He co-founded CSICOP in 1976 (more on this later)

My question is this.

How does Philip Klass the electrical engineer become Philip Klass the de facto UFO expert in 3 weeks?

In an article titled Conversations with Donald Keyhoe by Bob Pratt

In January 1957, Major Keyhoe became director of the newly formed National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena (NICAP). (now defunct)

KEYHOE: Well, do you know Klass?

PRATT: I’ve talked to him on the phone. I’ve never met him in person.

KEYHOE: Well, I know him and I can tell you this. When I was director of NICAP, he came up there one day and said, “Well, you can close up shop pretty soon because I’ve got all the answers.” And I said, “WHAT?” And he said, “I took three weeks off and I worked it out and I’ve got all of them.” And I thought, “This is a lunatic.” Then he came along with several statements on cases and there wasn’t a damned thing in there that would stand up. And I said, “Look, I’m busy. If you want to write this down and put it in a letter to me or the board of governors, OK, but I don’t think you know what you’re talking about.” Well, he’s a very nasty bastard . . . Did I tell you about my encounter with him?

PRATT: I don’t think so.

KEYHOE: He once jumped in front of a television camera down at the Press Club in Washington. I was having an interview. And of course they stopped the camera, and the head cameraman looked at me. I said, “Look, Klass, you were not invited here,” and he said, “Well, I’m a member of the press.” And I said, “No, you are not. You are an editor for an aviation magazine. You can stay here if you keep your mouth shut. Don’t try any more of this monkey business or I’m going to have you put out.” And all the newsmen said, “Sit down or get out.” And he shut up. But how Reader’s Digest swallowed that, I don’t understand.

DID KLASS GET SECRET HELP FROM PENTAGON?

PRATT: I don’t know except that they went to him first, you know, and figured that was the truth. I do know that he apparently is a good friend of Dave Williamson over at NASA, who had something to do with that decision over there, and on the Tehran case, what really annoys me about – do you remember the Tehran case, September 1976, the two jets over Tehran?

KEYHOE: Yeah.

PRATT: OK, a fellow over in Berlin named Charles Huffer, who’s an American teaching school over there, he went after that through the Freedom of Information Act. We had heard there was a government report on that incident. Well, he went after this from last April until August, when they finally released a two and a half page, it’s like a telegram, from Tehran describing the incident. And the Pentagon finally declassified that and released it with several deletions. And later on Klass was bragging to Stan Friedman in a letter that he had a copy of that several weeks BEFORE the thing was declassified and released but he got an UNEXPURGATED version of it. That’s a little annoying that he has access to classified documents that the rest of us don’t have.

KEYHOE: Right. I don’t know whether that’s true or not because–

PRATT: He claims this anyway.

KEYHOE: – I wouldn’t believe a damned word he says . . .

What other evidence is there that Klass is on the 'inside' of the UFO/ET enigma?




[edit on 5/12/05 by Divergence]

And where did I even come close to breaching the terms and conditions of this web site ?

Maybe your question wasnt a question after all, maybe it was just a statement that you did nt trust the views and opinions that Klaas has or maybe as I originally surmised you really didnt have any idea who Klaas was or his importance in the Ufology field.

I am sure you would agree that we must have skeptics and doubters who can disprove lots of cranky ideas and sightings....these people do a valuable job in narrowing down what is worth reviewing and investigating.

Klaas played an important part in debunking the original MJ12 documents, without him and his like we would probably be believing every UFO story we are told.

You wouldnt be happy with that surely.

Keyhoe ?? am I allowed an opinion ??

None of his stories have passed the test of time, a latter day Phillip Corso.

Maybe you should read up on Klaas and his work my friend, insetad of just believing what one mans opinion was.

Ohh I forgot !!!

You wrote this ....

"We all know that Klass is the most successful UFO debunker of all time.
He has written several books on the subject including UFO's: Public Deceived, The Flying Saucers are Real (1950), Flying Saucers From Outer Space (1953), The Flying Saucer Conspiracy (1955), Flying Saucers: Top Secret (1960), and Aliens from Outer Space (1973) most of which I have read. "


WHAT !!!!!!

Jaykew, have a chill pill man.

To be a "successful debunker" on UFOs and aliens does not necessarily mean promoting an accurate perspective on the subject

Phil Klass is a fraud who was paid off by the feds to serve as a governmental disinformation agent, a number of which I have debated in the FTTOUFO forum.

[edit on 13-5-2005 by Paul_Richard]

Originally posted by JayKew
He has written several books on the subject including UFO's: Public Deceived, The Flying Saucers are Real (1950), Flying Saucers From Outer Space (1953), The Flying Saucer Conspiracy (1955), Flying Saucers: Top Secret (1960), and Aliens from Outer Space (1973) most of which I have read. "

I think Divergence had a copy and paste mistake, some of these are Keyhoe's books. No big deal.

But I think the question is, what are Klass's credentials for being a debunker? I suppose it was his experience in aviation, but the government backed him because he was cynical, not skeptical. I too am starting to look into him, because of some of his explanations IMHO are incomplete. If you claim a phenomenon is something natural, then the same rules should apply and show evidence of it.

Phill Klass is a double-edged sword....

On one hand, he and his organization sometimes bring evidence to light that allows us to dismiss cases that don't hold up to scrutiny, at least regarding "best case" evidence. Often they don't carry the investigation further than to suit their needs, but they provide some other excellent sources to check the facts in a case.

On the other hand, he often is guilty of using the same "what if" statements as evidence that he convicts UFOlogists of, in order to make his case for a particular incident. As I've mentioned, csicop's page on the Hill Case is a prime example of a use of this "what if" logic and presenting it as evidence that (in their opinion) debunks the case. What if they saw this episode?, what if they saw this movie? etc., and then tries to use it to weigh against solid evidence.

He's both friend and foe to UFOlogy imho...but largely the latter. His ability to often obtain formerly classified documents, and seemingly surmounting the red tape of FOIA, could certainly lead one to conclude a cooperation as a disinfo agent...but there's still not enough evidence imho, to fully state that theory. One really does have to wonder his vehemence for his stance though...certainly mirroring some of the early pro-silly debunk crowd, often seizing on even the least likely mundane explanation, even when the body of evidence outweighs it.

Originally posted by Hal9000
I think Divergence had a copy and paste mistake, some of these are Keyhoe's books. No big deal.

You are correct sir, I apologize for the error and thank you for your understanding.

Originally posted by Gazrok
One really does have to wonder his vehemence for his stance though

If nothing else Mr. Klass' tenacity must certainly be admired, He never backs down. He really does a great job balancing right on the edge of credulity at times with some of his more outlandish remarks, but he always seems to bring the point back into focus just at the right moment.

Considering that he and CSICOP has managed to push UFOlogy as far into the 'paranormal' as it possibly will go, would indicate that he is either a genius or he has had abundant help along the way.

Mr. Klass is rather an enigma himself, there doesn't seem to be any sort of detailed biographies and it would seem that, as indicated by JayKew's post, that he as attained a sort of 'untouchable' status.