Losing My Faith

Originally posted by skept!cal
Ive been an avid reader here for a long time, and poster for that matter...but im getting to the point now where i really am starting to think the phenomena is bunk...ive spent MANY o nights gazing into the stars looking for ANYTHING out of the ordinary...researched many subjects, and i dont know its hard 2 explain, but im really just starting to get down on the subject.....ive considered myself a skeptical believer for a longtime i think im more or less starting to lean more and more towards just straight Skeptic....i dont know what to think anymore....just growing more and more frustrated w/ the topic...you know what im saying?

Good Day
Skept!cal

Just because something out of the ordinary hasn't happened to you yet doesn't mean that it hasn't happened to other people, or that things along those lines don't exist (paranormal in general). I believe because i have went through a breath-taking, life-changing experience myself, you feel this way because you haven't been able to experience yourself something similar. Don't get down, you might see something soon, whoknows?

reply to post by skept!cal


You know what I find odd?
Someone made a thread in bts that asked what would you do if there was no more ats...I didn't post but my answer was I would go back to looking at ufo cases and try to figure them out on my own like I used to.
Since I have been on ats I don't even bother with the subject anymore and have become very skeptical as well even tho I know what I have seen with my own eyes.
I feel you...I don't look for ats to verify or debunk things I can do myself.
Keep looking man,the truth is out there somewhere.

Thank you everyone for your kind words, and advice to help me further my search....i will definitley try some of these techniques which have been provided by some of you....appreciate your time, and effort in to answering my questions....i think ill be taking a break for awhile, and just kind of rebooting i guess so to speak....take care and ill see everyone when i come back to these boards...just need a break

Good Day
Skept!cal

READ: If you are starting to wan in your belief I would suggest go to your library, or amazon and begin to read every book you can lay your hands on.

Then research the authors and then check their research, check their sources to the best of your ability. Never take on faith the printed word, because anyone can print an unknowing lie.... or a knowing one.

Case in point: "Grass is Blue. The sky is Green. Gravity is a myth - the Earth sucks."

To me the skeptical belief in aliens brings a small element of "magic" into our lives - we shall not give up people! Even unto the end of our journey may bring us to the conclusion that we are alone in the universe - we have each other for company on the way!

reply to post by Blanca Rose

I guess some people have differing opinions as to what the truth is. What is true for you might not be true for another person.

I don't accept this concept, and I have never understood how some people can find it a logical and defensible position to say there are different versions of the truth. Yet this idea is rampant on this website, and in at least American culture. I recall seeing Bill O'Reilly try use it against Richard Dawkins, I think. Pretty sure it was just before that whole Kirk Cameron/Ray Comfort debacle where they told everyone they'd scientifically prove God existed.... which of course they didn't.

There are only three versions of the truth. Yours, everyone else's, and then there's reality. The problem is, your truth and my truth are subjective to interpretation of observation - making them completely irrelevant since they are just mental constructs built on sensory data. The only truth which actually exists - is reality - because it is objective and not subject to interpretation or error. We will never know the real truth, because once we see it, it's subject to our subjective construction and interpretation.. The only thing that matters is how closely we are to getting our truths to match the actual truth of reality. For this we use a methodology called the scientific method which was detailed in my above. post.

Check out the movie "Rashomon" sometime, as it describes the concept rather well. The ability for several witnessess to recall truthful accounts of the events of surrounding a murder they all played a part in - yet each tell a very different story.

reply to post by skept!cal


As cheesy as it sounds : "Been there, done that." My recommendation to you, coming from my experience? Disconnect yourself for a while from all subjects related. When one reaches the point where one thinks is "losing faith" in matters of UFO and other related subjects, it is usually a sign that one is still processing alot of information from both sides: believers or debunkers. I usually take a couple of days off searching.

On the other hand, maybe your beliefs are changing based on the evidence you've found on your research. I do believe that there's no wrong choice regarding these subjects. I also believe one can debate in a civil way with people that may share one's beliefs or not. The only undeniable "wrong" is when one tries to impose or defend one's views by either insulting or disrespecting a person.

Reading your post makes me think you are a balanced person interested on finding the truth about the many subjects presented on ATS. You may have reached a crossroad, my friend. Remember, there's no right or wrong choice.

Hope this helps a bit.

[edit on 5/7/2009 by DarkElvis]

[edit on 5/7/2009 by DarkElvis]

I'm actually in the same boat, and I can see the same trend with my reaction towards religion. At first I was a true believer of religion, then I started to question it more, and actually research it. Afterwords, I made a decision that its just not my thing, and have turned away from it. Sure, I'll still debate my points here and there, but I don't seek out these debates, in fact, I try my best to avoid them at best. I feel I'm at my last leg with research towards Ufology, and I'm about to make up my decision and just avoid it, but still give my two-cents if it ever comes off in discussion. See, I've seen a real UFO, and it was EXTREMELY close to me, and I also had 3 other witnesses with me. I do think there is something, but I don't know if its an extraterrestrial, and I'm just sick of even thinking about it. I have an open mind to intelligent life out in the universe, but I just don't think they're visiting us right now. And if something is disclosed, and shows actual proof of visitation, then I'll change my mind. But until then, I'm just getting sick of trying to prove something that is impossible to do.

Originally posted by skept!cal
Ive been an avid reader here for a long time, and poster for that matter...but im getting to the point now where i really am starting to think the phenomena is bunk...ive spent MANY o nights gazing into the stars looking for ANYTHING out of the ordinary...researched many subjects, and i dont know its hard 2 explain, but im really just starting to get down on the subject.....ive considered myself a skeptical believer for a longtime i think im more or less starting to lean more and more towards just straight Skeptic....i dont know what to think anymore....just growing more and more frustrated w/ the topic...you know what im saying?

Good Day
Skept!cal

Honestly you might just want to take a break from reading stuff on this site all the time. There are seriously way to many people on here who want to believe anything they see or hear and are just completely paranoid. This has put a big damper on the whole thing for me that is why I decided to just be a big skeptic about everything and only take in the things that I truly cannot explain. To be a believer you have to be a big skeptic first. IMO.

Does anyone here ever consider what it's like to be on the government's side of this problem?

Consider, an alien craft crashes. Your (if you were the government) agencies recover the downed craft and a live passenger. After determining that the visitor is not a threat (because that is always the first priority of the unknowns to humans, 'is this a threat' ) you then want to learn from the obviously more advanced being. Do you share this with the world? No... Why? Because there are other governments out there, who maybe, just maybe, are worse than ours. Maybe who would like to take over the world, but lack the technology. So, you hide this wonder from the world for your, and maybe even the whole worlds safety.

Perhaps one day, years, decades, centuries from now, when technology catches up to the aliens... the government wont have to hide it anymore, and can just come out and say 'oh by the way, this happend way back then..."

As for the OP, don't fret too much man. I have had UFO sightings, and I am still a skeptic. I can't say for sure it was alien, so who knows. I'd like to know, so I keep looking for possible answers; answers to everything. Who we are, why are we here, have we always been here ect ect.

You've not been researching properly then mate.. there is evidence all
over the place. Try reading historic records and disclosed government
information instead of skeptic texts and texts that attempt to debunk,
most skeptic information is just feeble minded rubbish anyway.

Originally posted by Lasheic
reply to post by Blanca Rose

 

I guess some people have differing opinions as to what the truth is. What is true for you might not be true for another person.

I don't accept this concept, and I have never understood how some people can find it a logical and defensible position to say there are different versions of the truth.

...

There are only three versions of the truth. Yours, everyone else's, and then there's reality. The problem is, your truth and my truth are subjective to interpretation of observation - making them completely irrelevant since they are just mental constructs built on sensory data.

Not all subject areas have true or false answers.

I, like you, believe that there is an underlying "truth" that can be known about most subject matter. However I'm not so naive as to believe that we currently know all, if any of the truth, especially as it pertains to contentious topics. Scientific endeavors are typically saved from this sort of thing because the methods are tried, true and universally accepted; a team puts together a series of tests, those tests are executed, the results are compiled, the findings get peer reviewed, and finally the results are disseminated to other experts and the public. Does this mean the results are infallible? Of course not, no test factors in all the variables, but if there's some doubt about the results it gives us a series of data points to make better tests from in the future. The scientific method is for lack of a better comparison Royce's waterfall model.

The fuzzy areas tend to live in the political, historical and philosophical arena. This makes sense since these areas of study measure both qualitative truth as well as quantitative truth. Qualitative truth is the very essence of fuzzy logic.

For example, I doubt you'll agree with me if I say a car traveling at 68 MPH is going fast. Now bump that number up to 336 MPH, at this speed you'll be hard pressed to make a convincing argument the car isn't going fast.

Fuzzy logic and Boolean logic do meet at a certain point. This is one of those instances, a car going 336 MPH is definitively fast and verifiably true. The current top speed of a dragster is 336.15 MPH. The record was set by Tony Schumacher on May 5, 2005. Very few cars can boast these speeds let alone sustain them.

So my point is I could go to the Wikipedia article for the Geo (automobile) and add that the Prizm reaches a "fast top speed of 112 MPH." Then another person could see my modification, call BS, and claim funny cars regularly reach 300 MPH. The person could go further and statistically prove that 112 MPH is slow in comparison to other streetcars top speeds. This disagreement over a single subjective adjective could go on for weeks. Keeping this in mind, now imagine a person went to the Wikipedia entry for Islam and added, "Islam preaches peace." There would be an uproar.

It's a mistake to say subjective interpretations are irrelevant, because through gradation we can form a range that statistically maps qualitative truth to acceptable norms for a particular point in history. If a person says, "car traveling 15 MPH is going fast" I can say that is indeed incorrect by today's standards and prove this through statistical analysis using a sigmoid plot.

I caution anyone anywhere reading anything that contains qualitative "truth" to do so with a grain of salt. Reading past adjectives and checking to make sure factual statements are sourced is one good way to ensure you're getting quantitative truth.

In the instances where qualitative truth severely colors a particular quantitative observation (ie/ the UFO was going fast) assume the worst or get in touch with the person making the statement to get more concrete numbers, relativistic comparisons (the UFO was going faster than a F-22), and make an effort to discern how the person arrived at their calculation.

[edit on 7-5-2009 by Xtraeme]

Originally posted by skept!cal
Ive been an avid reader here for a long time, and poster for that matter...but im getting to the point now where i really am starting to think the phenomena is bunk...ive spent MANY o nights gazing into the stars looking for ANYTHING out of the ordinary...researched many subjects, and i dont know its hard 2 explain, but im really just starting to get down on the subject.....

I'm curious if you "believed" in the past was it because:

1. you "wanted to believe"
   
2. due a belief logic (ie/ the universe is nearly infinite so something else must exist)
   
3. someone you trusted:
   1. that you know personally told you a story that convinced you?
      
   2. or an authority (ie/ FAA chief John Callahan, President Carter, Astronaut Mitchell, etc.) intrigued you.
   
   
4. was it because the evidence (or a specific case) was compelling?
   or,
   
   
5. a combination of all the above (if so which)

If I've missed a reason, please feel free to include an alternate explanation of what originally made you believe in UFOs / aliens.

Thanks!

[edit on 7-5-2009 by Xtraeme]

I think what people fail to understand is this

GOD

this is the problem.. here not aliens just GOD what is GOD? hmm?

some dude in a toga? BUDDa? ALAA?? what everrrr.....

what people lack or at least fail to see is the clue .. and that is US we are the clue the substance so to speak

lets look at this in a logical way

for the people who want to go to heaven... we have god who will grant you infinity..and happyness yea? ok sounds good..

but then we have how many gods? "gets confusing at this point"

then we have OMG aliens, we was all made by aliens "anunaki" ect woo

so we are made by something or someone

dont you understand all of the above has nothing to do with being alive?

do you think aliens put us here? do you think god made a tree and me and you?

what you have to understand is GOD and ALIENS are BOTH real

GOD is the question we all ask "including the little green guys"

WE are dumb "well some are"..

we as humans NEED to get our minds into gear be for its to late..

YOU ME and WHOEVER "and the tree" are all doomed if we do not wake the hell up and understand our place in our universe

IT NEEDS LIFE TO KEEP GOING .. if you fear it then let it pass you by.. if you want to embrace it

WAKE UP

you are IMPORTANT .. and so are stupid aliens who ask the same questions we do

WTF PUT US HERE = GOD

aliens DO NOT KNOW WHO PUT US HERE but they are REAL ..

we live on a rock going round a sun in a infinite universe

HOW Much more PROOF do you need ?

reply to post by symmetricAvenger


Wait.....WTF are you talking about? Are you comparing religion to aliens, and then asking how much proof you need? Isn't that the point? I'm kind of confused, as you went on a rant, and from that, onto many different directions.

[edit on 7-5-2009 by TravisT]

Seriously...

Your username is skept!cal...

Nothing wrong with following the phenomena and being skeptical. In fact I would encourage more people to be skeptics rather than just take things at face value and not ask questions.

Other than that, my advice would be sleep on it.

What can you do? You like Ufology but have yet to get what your are looking for... Clear proof.

We're all waiting for that though.

You are not alone.

[edit on 7-5-2009 by bloodline]

Originally posted by bloodline


What can you do? You like Ufology but have yet to get what your are looking for... Clear proof.

We're all waiting for that though.

You are not alone.

And many are waiting for Jesus to return also. Whats your point?

reply to post by skept!cal



welcome to reality. You my friend are just rational like billions of others. The universe is interesting enough without invoking imaginary beings visiting earth.

reply to post by skept!cal


Go back to what is available in astronomy review what common knowledge of the galaxy and universe is well, do the math and learn that earth is less than a tiny grain of sand in comparison to what is out there. Then do the calculations on if we are alone or not, it's not a mystery it's common sense and logic. Gazing into the stars is nice but it's not probable that you will see something, you don't find them, they find you. Try sending thoughts, prayer is one form, see if something answers. You never know they just might answer but I'm sure there out there and listening.

reply to post by TravisT


do you think aliens are different from the very question?

i mean cmon sir the reason we ask about aliens is because you are alive to do so...

tell me... how did you get here? who put you here and by what method ?


what part of my post did you not understand? i mean we are talking about "faith" faith in what?

faith in something you do not understand? what is your point?

a human who has a question questions his own self in order too feel at ease ? why ask? why ask what you do?

can you tell me why you got so angry at my post?

feel free please.. i look forward to it .. in fact i relish it

reply to post by symmetricAvenger

I didn't get mad at all, I was seriously confused, and asking a real question. Your first comment didn't make sense to me at all, hence, me using the "" smiley. If I was mad or "heated" I would have used a "" or "", followed with a sarcastic "".

So now, i guess you can say I am " + " , .



And I took it that when the OP said he was "losing his faith", that he wasn't believing in the whole alien/UFO/Extraterrestrial phenomenon. You went off on our existence, and god created everything, and even aliens...or something like that? I just read it over again, and I'm still confused( ) by what your point has to do with the original posters. And if I missed it, then I'm sorry....I guess?


[edit on 8-5-2009 by TravisT]