I`ve found it! what makes a ufo skeptic!

Originally posted by rabbigoldstein
I was having a debate with a cab driver the other day about how the world started, we discussed two things, the big bang and God.
(snip)

As I understand life and the human brain/mind, the brain is hardwired to do one thing, obey conditioning. If no conditioning - as in my case - a free brain able to consider all there is. A conditioned brain, OTOH, behaves as conditioned. Hence the religious behave as the religious authorities tell them to. Or a cult leader tells them to. Same thing.

God is strictly a human construction. There are no gods, there were never any gods. If there were, tell me where did the Greek, Roman, Egyptian, Aztec, etc., gods go? The only reason that the jewish/christian god continues to influence people is the fear that has been instilled from Columbus' arrival in the "new" world and what followed where if you didn't accept the christian god, you met your "maker"!

No human is able to understand these topics to satisfaction. The big bang has a lot of holes and I don't mean "black" ones. So to have a meaningful conversation with anyone about it is doomed to failure. No one knows!

Skepticism is not associated with UFOs, aliens, or anything. It is strictly a mental state not subject to conditioning so a skeptic has an open mind and all a skeptic can do is ask for evidence. If no evidence is forthcoming all claims will be filed under "hearsay". A skeptic who hasn't witnessed a UFO, a good solid sighting not a nightime light, should keep an open mind when evaluating claims since with UFOs the available circumstancial evidence in the form of non-hoaxed photos/films/videos is too great to dismiss. However, aliens are another story and you can't blame a skeptic of being closed-minded on the subject. I'm a UFO-seeing natural skeptic so I don't dismiss all claims of sightings. But don't talk to me about aliens, alien abductions, etc., 'cause they will fall on deaf ears until irrefutable evidence is provided. That hasn't happened, no matter who claims it.

Originally posted by Xtraeme
Even though your question didn't have much to do with the above linked article or what I was arguing,

I'm glad you brought it up.
What exactly are you arguing?

Originally posted by traditionaldrummer
I'm glad you brought it up.
What exactly are you arguing?

That as a skeptic you're doubting the validity of the UFO issue not due to any factual analysis, but rather due to a lack of knowledge of the subject. This isn't a bad thing mind you. I, myself, thought the whole thing was just peoples active imaginations getting the better of them. That changed after researching radar/visual/spectrographic cases. If you want to have a firm opinion on the subject I'd recommend reading over some the 20 year of investigatory material by BlueBook/USAF/DOD (1), the UK's MoD (2), and other governmental organizations. Assuming of course you care to make an informed judgment rather than simply engage in the group think mentality, "it can't be therefore it isn't."

Originally posted by Xtraeme
Assuming of course you care to make an informed judgment rather than simply engage in the group think mentality, "it can't be therefore it isn't."

The skeptic's properly informed judgment lies solely on the existence of tangible, testable evidence. The condition you described as group-think mentality that "it can't be" is not skepticism in the least. However, my standards of proof are a lot higher than assuming something's existence based on some government reports or the investigative bureaus that generate them.

Originally posted by traditionaldrummer

Originally posted by Xtraeme
Assuming of course you care to make an informed judgment rather than simply engage in the group think mentality, "it can't be therefore it isn't."

The skeptic's properly informed judgment lies solely on the existence of tangible, testable evidence. The condition you described as group-think mentality that "it can't be" is not skepticism in the least. However, my standards of proof are a lot higher than assuming something's existence based on some government reports or the investigative bureaus that generate them.

While it's admirable to want to test everything ones self, do you then not believe transient luminous events (TLEs) like sprites and trolls are an actual atmospheric phenomena? Very few people have observed these things firsthand. What would be your basis in this case for saying such a thing is real? This could even be extended to astronomic planetary studies. Do you or don't you believe there are gas giants in other solar systems? What's your basis for this opinion? If you base it off current scientific technology you're basing your belief on the data results from multi-object spectrometers and our knowledge that CO2 has a unique infrared spectral signature.

In many ways this is even more speculative than the proof provided by radar / visual data, because there's an important added data point. There's human testimony to verify the radar was working properly and to fill in details that couldn't be ascertained by the radar. Likewise the radar allows us to determine whether or not the witness is confabulating details and to ascertain the accuracy of the persons' guesstimates.

Inductive sciences can be just as useful as deductive sciences.

Originally posted by WalterRatlos
reply to post by rabbigoldstein

 

The Big Bang Theory does not say that something (the universe) came from nothing. Instead it says that in the beginning there was a singularity (imagine all matter and energy of the known universe compressed into a tiny speck, like the head of a needle). Then this singularity exploded and created the Big Bang and subsequently over billions of years the whole universe.

so where did the singularity come from? what created the singularity?

i would like to know because i do not know, i do not think the point is the universe came from nothing, but more a case that there was once nothing, then something happened which led to a process of the universe being created. so basically the universe came about from nothing but not directly from nothing. which seems impossible.

or can things just exist? no beginning no end? which seems crazy to.

we have to go against the norm's of belief to explain the universe starting, things that are impossible in our minds because it does not exist in our reality(this world), things do not magically appear from nothing and everything has a beginning and end.


but either the universe started and came about from what was once nothing, or some things have always existed and always will, they are not born and do not die and caused a reaction/process, which is hard to get your head around.

reply to post by Xtraeme


You provided examples of discoveries done by scientific testing. I have less reason to be skeptical of such things than UFOs. Evidence of the scientific variety provides us much more accurate information than say, inferences based on speculation about government reports or first hand interpretations of UFO videos.

Originally posted by traditionaldrummer
reply to post by Xtraeme

 

You provided examples of discoveries done by scientific testing. I have less reason to be skeptical of such things than UFOs. Evidence of the scientific variety provides us much more accurate information than say, inferences based on speculation about government reports or first hand interpretations of UFO videos.

I'm not talking about "speculation." I'm talking about radar data, confirmation between several different radar posts, and visual confirmations by an airborne group. Government reports are just icing on the cake. Do you not trust radar?

Also science is conducted by people who have strong motivations to get their research published. This is why we had the whole stem-cell hub-bub. Science isn't a magic process that performs itself. It involves people. So the question is why do you trust something that's a spectrographic study with no visual observations as empirical proof of a planet, but not a visual observation with numerous independent radar confirmations? Once you can answer that for yourself you'll realize you not only have a bias, it's an irrational one.

Originally posted by Xtraeme
Do you not trust radar?

Trust it for what?
Tracking aircraft?
Sure.

reply to post by Xtraeme


you make a huge assumption that radar technology is perfect & infallible. We know this is not true but you seem to want to view it that way.

Anomoly reports including UFOs alot of the time caused by coincidence. Someone may see a light in the sky and at the same time there are anomolous radar returns and becuase our brains are programmed to look for confirming factors we join these events together when thats not necessarily true.

Originally posted by yeti101
reply to post by Xtraeme

 

you make a huge assumption that radar technology is perfect & infallible. We know this is not true but you seem to want to view it that way.

Actually I've spent significant time researching radar to understand its limitations and functionality. The technology back in the 50 and 60's was pretty rough-shod, but the primary difference between then and now is that in the past FPS-10s, CPS-6Bs, the older ALA-6 D/Fs, GPX-6 IFF sets presented more information with less filtration.

In contrast today, almost every monitoring system setup by the USAF / USN / NORAD / ADC / NASA / etc, whether for defense or scientific purposes has built-in selectivity to prevent radar operators from being snowed in with data.

That said you do not see what you're not looking for.

Consequent­ly, the fact that we don't repeatedly turn up what appear to be similar to UFOs, whatever we define that to be, is not quite as conclusive as it might seem.

Anomoly reports including UFOs alot of the time caused by coincidence. Someone may see a light in the sky and at the same time there are anomolous radar returns and becuase our brains are programmed to look for confirming factors we join these events together when thats not necessarily true.

I'm not sure if you're being facetious, or perhaps just having a little fun, but the way you can typically determine if there's spurious feedback from failing equipment is by employing numerous other radar sites. For example, back in April 1971 (after radar technologies had undergone significant advancement) UK wing commander Alan Turner dispatched a Canberra bomber to deal with what looked like 35 unidentified aircraft flying south over Sopley. He issued this order because seven technically different radars were all seeing exactly the same thing. (more here).

Outside of equipment malfunctions there's really only one other class of anomalous radar return. These types of radar propogations occasionally pop up when atmospheric conditions cause signals to bounce off ground targets, but these can typically be identified fairly easily because they don't move. Usually the signal is also somewhat diminished. Radar operators are trained to recognize these types of false echos.

To assert "anom[a]ly reports including UFOs alot of the time caused by coincidence" is to basically say, "radar operators are incompetent and the people visually confirming the observation are liars." Frankly that's a much more ridiculous assumption when one considers that reporting something of this nature usually calls in to question the persons mental stability, jeopardizes the persons livelihood, and compromises the individuals public standing.

Also, I've said it before and I'll say it again, this type of dismissive thinking has embedded in it an inherent logical contradiction ...

"Why do you trust something that's a spectrographic study with no visual observations as empirical proof of a planet, but not a visual observation with numerous independent radar confirmations? Once you can answer that for yourself you'll realize you not only have a bias, it's an irrational one."

reply to post by Xtraeme


well i remember one investigation in the early 80s in australia/new zealand. A radar station was getting mysterious blips. They decided to investigate and put a plane on standby. When a blip appeared they scrambled the plane to check it out. everytime they went to the location they found turbulance or other weather anomolies. Radar can see things we cant and also be tricked by temp inversions etc, Just becuase a radar gets a blip it doesnt necessarily mean a solid craft is there

reply to post by Xtraeme

"Why do you trust something that's a spectrographic study with no visual observations as empirical proof of a planet, but not a visual observation with numerous independent radar confirmations? Once you can answer that for yourself you'll realize you not only have a bias, it's an irrational one."

planet detection is repeatable testable evidence all day everyday. There has been false positives in planet hunting but becuase the evidence is testable & repeatable we can find out if its legit or not. You cant do that with transient radar signals.

Originally posted by yeti101
reply to post by Xtraeme

 

"Why do you trust something that's a spectrographic study with no visual observations as empirical proof of a planet, but not a visual observation with numerous independent radar confirmations? Once you can answer that for yourself you'll realize you not only have a bias, it's an irrational one."

planet detection is repeatable testable evidence all day everyday. There has been false positives in planet hunting but becuase the evidence is testable & repeatable we can find out if its legit or not. You cant do that with transient radar signals.

Just like your comment about Shermer being a "scientist," once again this shows either an incredible lack of knowledge or an attempt to distort the truth. Planet detection requires a full circuit of "the planet" around its star and only when it intercepts the star can we get a sense of its spectral signature and a hint of movement. Know what that means? We get about one collection of data points, then everyone looks at that same data-set because it takes years before we get the chance to do it again. These data points are the only thing we have to work with. From this astronomers attempt to form a consensus using their limited information, and the current hunch is must it be indicative of some form of "planet" because of the spectral data (not necessarily a truth more just a best guess). This means the current collection of planets we've got, with all the false positives, are from an extremely small set of data points. Testable "all day everyday" my ass.

Originally posted by yeti101
reply to post by Xtraeme

 

well i remember one investigation in the early 80s in australia/new zealand. A radar station was getting mysterious blips. They decided to investigate and put a plane on standby. When a blip appeared they scrambled the plane to check it out. everytime they went to the location they found turbulance or other weather anomolies. Radar can see things we cant and also be tricked by temp inversions etc, Just becuase a radar gets a blip it doesnt necessarily mean a solid craft is there

I'm happy you draw this parallel. I suppose since there are misidentifications of various exo-planets this means all the data collected about all the other planets is pointless as well, right? See how ridiculous that argument is? No one's arguing that there aren't mistakes. The point is if you have a visual confirmation, with numerous different radar tracks, that's about as real as science gets.

reply to post by Xtraeme


not repeatable unlike exoplanet evidence . This is a problem for all transient phenomenon like the wow signal for seti

Originally posted by yeti101
reply to post by Xtraeme

 

not repeatable unlike exoplanet evidence . This is a problem for all transient phenomenon like the wow signal for seti

Do you even know what repeatable means? You just need six sigma variance to interest actual scientists. That means about 3 or 4 separate confirmations from other posts. If the "wow signal" had been observed by more than just arecibo, NASA would have considered it to likely be a legitimate signal from another civilization. See the criteria there? 3 or 4 separate confirmations. Like 3 or 4 separate confirmations from 3 or 4 different radar stations.

reply to post by Xtraeme

Repeatable is recording the evidence sequentially. Not 1 event from multiple sources.. A temp inversion could affect all radar stations and they would all show the same anomoly.

Just look at the mexico airforce incident with the oil rigs. What was it 11 lights but 5 radar returns. That should of told them something was wrong with connecting the visual with the radar data. But they did it anyway and soem ufo websites still claim the lights & radar are connected

Originally posted by yeti101
reply to post by Xtraeme

 

Repeatable is recording the evidence sequentially. Not 1 event from multiple sources.

I'm not aware of any science journal that has that as a criteria. It's nice, but not necessary.

If that's your personal criteria then all exo-planet data has so far been non-repeatable.

A temp inversion could affect all radar stations and they would all show the same anomoly.

Hence the importance of the visual component. Temperature inversions don't have "visuals." (Menkello, F.G. Report No. 6112, USAF, Environmental Technical Applications Center)

Just look at the mexico airforce incident with the oil rigs. What was it 11 lights but 5 radar returns. That should of told them something was wrong with connecting the visual with the radar data.

From what I recall, could be a little fuzzy on this one, the 11 lights were detected with thermal imaging and airborne radar. However the incident was only detected by a single deployed aircraft. Also there were no eye-visuals. I remember hearing about the incident and almost instantly thinking it was garbage largely because of the single point of observation.

But they did it anyway and soem ufo websites still claim the lights & radar are connected.

When I say UFO I don't mean "alien spacecraft." I mean something that's genuinely unknown that isn't a misidentification of something we would know if given more information. The RB-47 incident, JAL-1628, '56 Lakenheath, and '71 Sopley reports, all of these, fit this criteria where experts couldn't come up with a prosaic explanation and where there were numerous data tracks with most having an eye-visual component.

reply to post by Xtraeme


well think about the investigation in new zealand i told you about earlier. If they had a thousand radar stations they would all show the blip, it still wouldnt alter the fact it was just turbulence in the weather. In those cases there were also claims of lights in the sky at the same time. It would seem those visual witnesses had nothing to do with the radar blips and were something else.

If that's your personal criteria then all exo-planet data has so far been non-repeatable

scientists do expermients then others can recreate them to verify results. You can do this with exoplanets you cant do it with ufos. The evidence is repeatable & testable in exoplanetary science.

on ufos in general there could be phenomenon that are yet to be recorded or understood by science. Sprites were only photographed in the 1990s. I'm saying the evidence for some ufos to be ET spacecraft is very weak thats why skeptics dont beleive. Thats what the OP was talking about.