Why is the skeptics OPINION given any weight?

Your opening post is flawed in several different ways.

1. There's a fundamental difference in collaborating testimony about a crime that several people witnessed where law enforcement has been gathering evidence in support of those allegations....and people who notoriously misidentify natural phenomenon with alien spacecraft, which there is no known or tangible evidence of. Big difference.

2. The burden of proof is on the person making the claims. When someone is taken to court for a crime, as much as you'd like to believe that the boss of the Genovese crime family is extorting money....without evidence, it continues to be a claim & nothing more. Unlike with aliens & UFO's, verifiable evidence of mob activity is abundant and provable.

Show me actual proof and not anecdotal evidence or "witness accounts" that are not supported by physical evidence of any kind....and maybe you won't be ridiculed for blindly believing in something just because you want to believe in it.

Skeptics are the sane ones. While many have no issue with making assumptions about alien origins of strange phenomenon, abductions or lights in the sky...skeptics are open-minded enough to accept the possibility that something strange happens from time to time....and that it is unexplained...BUT are willing to entertain the more rational explanations.

Thread fail.

Originally posted by DJW001
reply to post by neoholographic

 

I'm not dodging.

I told you that I look at the totality of the available evidence. I would never look at a single case too reach this conclusion.

So I don't go over any steps or process on each case. I look at the totality of the available evidence to reach the conclusion that it's more likely that extraterrestrials exist and it's less likely that they don't exist.

Perhaps you do not understand the question. What Dru is asking is this: Someone on ATS starts a thread titled: "What is this?" They go on to describe a brilliant flashing white light they saw in the West around sunset. What questions do you ask to determine whether or not it was piloted by extraterrestrials?

that might be the majority of stuff posted on ATS, but that is certainly not the stuff that you would be looking at to conclude or accept the e.t. possibility.

i think debunkers spend to much time debunking grainy lights in the skies that most cannot comprehend there is other evidence or have convinced themselves there is actually NO other evidence out there apart from what you find on a YOUTUBE VIDEO.

Originally posted by Druscilla

Riiiiiight. Because your papa use to be Sheriff of this town and when the Dalton gang up and shot him to death, that left you with the tin star to sort such out? */sarcasm*

I have no idea what you're saying here.

Originally posted by Druscilla

Your attacks are entirely irrelevant. Fitness in drawing any objective conclusion regarding any aspect of the UFO phenomenon?
Really?

To point out that you willfully pursue ignorance of the UFO subject by refusing to read any of the literature on the actual historical cases is far from irrelevant. Whether or not one has actually performed thorough research on any subject is actually the single most relevant fact regarding their fitness to make an informed, scholarly conclusion.

Originally posted by Druscilla

Can you get any more full of yourself?

That's a perfect example of an ad hominem attack. Notice also how it attempts to draw attention away from the very issue at hand, by focusing on my character.

Originally posted by Druscilla

One needs never to have seen or even heard of the UFO phenomenon to be able to look at a balloon in the sky and say, "Hey, that's a balloon", or to be able to Identify Venus, a Satellite, a meteorite, a Bolide, a comet, a Lenticular cloud, a helicopter, CGI, or any number of other objects or phenomenon which are entirely relevant to the Y variable where X may very well equal Y.
Anyone with Inductive or Deductive reasoning, especially as is applicable to the Y variable, is entirely qualified.

The problem is that your inductive and deductive reasoning skills are highly suspect, to say the least, as should be apparent to everyone by now. But the main problem is that, how are you going to apply any kind of reasoning if you don't have the historical and statistical data to apply it to? We actually wouldn't even be having this conversation if you had actually read, say, Project Blue Book Special Report #14, which already rules out all of those prosaic explanations in its strongest cases.

Originally posted by Druscilla

Your fallacy lies in your claim that if I've never read a book about some unknown variable that no one has any conclusive data to quantify, a subject that is ridden with speculation, that my fitness to see the planet Venus and call Venus for what it is, is questionable?

How would you know that there's no "conclusive data to quantify" if you shun the entirety of the literature on UFOs? This is, once again, the methodology of the denier/debunker - make highly opinionated proclamations while ignoring the historical and statistical data. And please don't feign having read something like the COMETA report again. In any case, if you had read it and properly understood it, you would have realized that it offers compelling evidence for the existence of UFOs.

Originally posted by Druscilla

Your argument is invalid, irrelevant, and trivial.

Yet you haven't shown this. You're just proclaiming it.

Originally posted by Druscilla

You need some help. Your sense of self importance is concerning as it borders on Grandiosity and if you talk to a physician now, it could save you some trouble in the future.

This is another example of an ad hominem attack. Once again, the idea is to draw attention away from the real issues, and focus on someone's supposed character. It's generally the last-ditch effort of someone who's realized that their position has been revealed to be groundless.

Unfortunately, I can't continue this conversation with you. The knowledge gap is just far too wide to have any kind of intelligent give and take regarding the subject.

By refusing to properly educate yourself about an issue, while at the same time constantly trying to engage others in conversation regarding it, is itself quite an interesting behavioral pattern. I feel as though this lack of appreciation for the amount of work it takes in proper research to arrive at an educated conclusion is becoming more and more prevalent. Everyone considers themselves an expert if they have access to Google or Wikipedia. When you combine that attitude with a psychological predisposition to contempt prior to investigation, you end up with some very uninformed, yet highly opinionated individuals.

reply to post by Arbitrageur


First off, that's just Tyson's opinion. For instance Stephen Hawking has reached the conclusion that Aliens almost certaintly exist.

This is a statement of probability based on the available evidence. What Tyson and others have to accept is there opinion is subjective. You can't decide what conclusions others can reach based on the available evidence.

Secondly, I think both the ET Hypothesis and Interdimensional Hypothesis can be true. Just because you accept one doesn't mean you have to exclude the other.

Lastly, Governments throughout the world don't think it could be just anything or they wouldn't be spending billions looking for extraterrestrial life. This gives even more weight to the extraterrestrial hypothesis.

What I take away from the last post is that in the mind of some people if you have a "conclusion" instead of an "opinion" your position is apparently automatically more acceptable and likely.

reply to post by neoholographic

Originally posted by neoholographic
Secondly, I think both the ET Hypothesis and Interdimensional Hypothesis can be true. Just because you accept one doesn't mean you have to exclude the other.

They are alternative hypotheses. Are you saying one sighting might be ET and another sighting might be interdimensional? How do you know which is which? And what about the other possibilities on the list? What about time travelers? You are kind of making the skeptic's point here. Why exclude any of those possibilities?

Lastly, Governments throughout the world don't think it could be just anything or they wouldn't be spending billions looking for extraterrestrial life. This gives even more weight to the extraterrestrial hypothesis.

Sorry this isn't a personal attack, but I have absolutely no idea what point you are trying to make here.

I doubt the government spending on sending probes to look for life on Mars, or telescope observations looking for Earth-like planets depends on the UFO phenomenon, if that's what you're suggesting.

If you're suggesting most people think it's possible ET life may exist, I don't think that's really in dispute. Of course that's why governments spend money on looking for ET life.

reply to post by Brighter


Let me repeat:

No one needs read the barest speck of UFO literature to conclusively identify Venus.
No one needs read the barest speck of UFO literature to conclusively identify a helicopter.
No one needs read the barest speck of UFO literature to conclusively identify Lens Flare.
No one needs read the barest speck of UFO literature to conclusively identify a Balloon.
No one needs read the barest speck of UFO literature to conclusively identify any Y variable that falls within the category of known objects and phenomenon.

If anything, I posit exposure to UFO literature INCREASES the risk for probability bias in favor of X=0 where misidentification of, or willful refusal to properly identify Y variable objects and phenomenon becomes more common.

Prove me wrong.

Your argument is invalid, irrelevant, and trivial. You are in error and ignorantly blind to it.

Further, you flagrantly ignore on-topic debate regarding points relevant to the actual topic in favor of arguing semantics and debate craft nomenclature.

For instance in THIS POST
I stated;

The problem with your argument regarding natural phenomenon is that the length and breadth of natural phenomenon is still turning up new data. What was unexplained before may now, due new discoveries, be quite explainable if the proper sources are queried. For instance: Red Sprites & Blue Jets (to name just a couple)

The next is the matter where it's more convenient at the top for sightings of Need-to-know projects to get tossed into the UFO bucket where also most Air Force personnel that receive/hear reports from the civilian/public sector reporting UFOs don't have Need-to-know clearance and couldn't quantify a report if they wanted to.

Wherein reply you ignore these in totality in favor of a personality attack.

You nit-pick personality driven arguments and go entirely off topic through lawyering rhetoric.

Your bias and failure of reasoning in losing site of the actual topic is glaring as an example of incompetence in maintaining focus on issue and topic.

I suggest you examine your own "fitness" for effectively making any observance regarding the UFO Phenomenon as you seem more concerned about making observations of personality arguments than staying on topic regarding the actual subject of the UFO Phenomenon.

reply to post by Arbitrageur


What could these incidents be? I've seen more than enough to be satisfied something is going on.

ET craft
Interdimensional craft (IDH)
Time travelers
Unknown meteorological phenomenon
Top secret military project

I don't make too much of a distinction between ETH and IDH, they are both not of this planet. The ETH is more probable since travelling between dimensions requires an extra travel step and technology to accomplish this. But both could be possible and one doesn't rule out the other.

Stephen Hawking has said time travel outside the theory of relativity ie backwards is impossible, I tend to agree.

Unknown meteorological phenomenon as far as I know no known hypothesis exists to explain how this could even be possible. Highly improbable in my opinion.

Top secret military project using technology the universities, physics labs and physicists of the world don't know exists. This would require a whole field of physics which is top secret going back decades. Highly improbable.


Excerpt from the Cometa report summary.

"In the same chapter global explanatory hypotheses are studied next. Hoaxes are rare and easily detected. Some nonscientific theories are discarded, such as conspiracy and manipulation by very secret, powerful groups. Also rejected are parapsychological phenomena, and collective hallucinations. The hypothesis of secret weapons is also regarded as very improbable, as is "intoxication" or hysteria at the time of the Cold War, along with natural phenomena.

We are then left with various extraterrestrial hypotheses."

I agree with the report.
These are the conclusions of people who know what they're talking about and should be respected for their scientific and technical knowledge. They probably know a lot more than any of us ever will.
Some people don't want to believe any of it and say where is the evidence etc etc. I can understand that I just don't agree.

Originally posted by Druscilla

No one needs read the barest speck of UFO literature to conclusively identify Venus.
No one needs read the barest speck of UFO literature to conclusively identify a helicopter.
No one needs read the barest speck of UFO literature to conclusively identify Lens Flare.
No one needs read the barest speck of UFO literature to conclusively identify a Balloon.
No one needs read the barest speck of UFO literature to conclusively identify any Y variable that falls within the category of known objects and phenomenon.

I'm not questioning your ability to identify cases in which prosaic explanations are most likely. In most cases of purported UFO sightings, there is a prosaic explanation. However, I am talking about your ability to make an informed conclusion regarding the UFO phenomenon in its entirety, and in order for that, you need to have at least read the major studies such as Project Blue Book, Special Report #14, the COMETA report, the Condon report and hopefully the works of Hynek and McDonald. And if you had actually read this body of work, you would immediately realize that there is a statistically significant number of very strong cases in which all of those aforementioned prosaic explanations (and more) have been ruled out. Cases in which, all we are left with is an aerial craft performing extraordinary maneuvers that is obviously under some kind of intelligent control. Without having read it, you are left with a one-sided and biased picture of the entire phenomenon.

In order to come to an objective conclusion regarding anything, you can't be afraid of looking at the entirety of the data.

reply to post by lifeform11

that might be the majority of stuff posted on ATS, but that is certainly not the stuff that you would be looking at to conclude or accept the e.t. possibility.

The question was posed to establish the methodology used. The question remains unanswered, hence, the methodology remains unknown.

reply to post by JimTSpock

Here's what I don't understand.

You refer to our current understanding of the physical universe and the laws of physics to rule out some of those possibilities or deem them unlikely.

But when it comes to the topic of interstellar travel, a double standard is applied where it's presumed that our current understanding is primitive and advanced technologies we don't yet know of would be able to facilitate interstellar travel. If you use that argument, then why not presume our current understanding is primitive in all respects in which case the reasons you give for citing the unlikelihood of some some of these alternatives don't hold up?

This applies to both what you say as well as what's said in the cometa report.

reply to post by Brighter


Therein lie our differences as I've no interest in investigating the UFO phenomenon as a whole.

It's an interesting subject, sure, but, my concentrations prove more effective value in observance of point data than in drawing assumptions and speculations regarding a whole body of data.

Thus, I have no requirement, need, or interest in such literature as such would have little to no positive impact on my ability to identify Venus, a Helicopter, or any other Y variable, except where such literature may introduce a bias in favor of X=0.

Originally posted by Druscilla
The problem with your argument regarding natural phenomenon is that the length and breadth of natural phenomenon is still turning up new data. What was unexplained before may now, due new discoveries, be quite explainable if the proper sources are queried. For instance: Red Sprites & Blue Jets (to name just a couple)

I'm not holding my breath on the discovery of any natural phenomenon in either the near or distant future of metallic, symmetrical objects hovering, flying, and attaining almost unbelievable speeds with the ability to also stop on a dime and perform 90 degree (or even greater) turns, often with artificial external lighting.

Originally posted by Druscilla
The next is the matter where it's more convenient at the top for sightings of Need-to-know projects to get tossed into the UFO bucket where also most Air Force personnel that receive/hear reports from the civilian/public sector reporting UFOs don't have Need-to-know clearance and couldn't quantify a report if they wanted to.

In other words, UFOs could be some kind of black project. That's of course possible, but in my opinion implausible as an explanation for all of the cases. As I've said before, although the data certainly indicates the existence of such craft, I'm less comfortable coming to any conclusion regarding their origin. Here is at least one line of thought that I've entertained before on that question:

In order to look at this issue objectively, you have to first entirely eradicate from your mind any cultural biases or prejudices regarding the fictitiousness of an intelligence greater than that of humans visiting or on this planet.

Now assume that these craft are black projects run by our government.

This would mean that our government is flying, on a more or less regular basis, its most top secret anti-gravity (!) craft over residential areas, pacing and following airliners, and often doing this in broad daylight. It would imply that our government has had fully functional prototypes, for at least over 70 years, of anti-gravity craft. Judging from the observed behavior of these craft, they appear to be able to move in and out of Earth's atmosphere, and it's not such a great leap to assume that they can travel vast distances through space with ease. In other words, a trip to Mars would be a joke. Now, given that all of this seems highly unlikely - what would be another viable explanation? These things are clearly under intelligent control, and all of the evidence very strongly indicates that they are not 'ours'. But if they're not ours, and they're under intelligent control, then whose are they? And remember, these craft are seen moving freely in and out of water, as though they are enmeshed in their own artificial environment. Does this sound like human technology to you?

Now assume that these craft are controlled by non-human intelligences.

They are often seen over and in public residential areas. A non-human intelligence would not only not care about their technology being seen by the public, but they seem to be in residential areas for the very purpose of studying humans. These craft are also seen to be pacing or hovering around airliners, helicopters or military aircraft. Their behavior strongly suggests that they are actually studying how our technology works. Their apparent disinterest in doing so out in the open also suggests that they simply don't care about their technology being seen out in the open. These craft are also seen hovering over highly protected military bases. This also suggests that they are studying our capabilities, and such overt behavior is also in line with a superior intelligence that knows that it is superior. It is certainly not in any way the behavior of a black project.

Now which explanation seems more plausible? At the very least, the human explanation has got to sound absurd. I mean, why would humans be flying anti-gravity UFOs next to an airliner, or next to a military helicopter? To study these bizarre airplanes and helicopters? It makes far more sense that UFOs are seen pacing our aircraft in order to study them and their capabilities. And why would humans be flying UFOs in residential areas? To get a better look at some new real estate?

When you look at this from a purely objective standpoint, all of these behavioral patterns suggest that humans are not controlling these UFOs, and at the same time, all of these behavioral patterns are consistent with the idea that they are being controlled by a non-human intelligence.

... [A] further implication of the idea that humans are controlling these craft in some black project would be that, since they are sighted in nearly every country on earth, it would seem that every country on earth's military would be in possession of such technology, which is very difficult to accept.

reply to post by Arbitrageur


We know a few things but not everything obviously. I think this is the best we can do with our present knowledge of the situation. Don't agree fine. What do you think?

A wormhole could theoretically enable faster than light travel, there's also some other ideas on that.

Originally posted by Brighter

I'm not holding my breath on the discovery of any natural phenomenon in either the near or distant future of metallic, symmetrical objects hovering, flying, and attaining almost unbelievable speeds with the ability to also stop on a dime and perform 90 degree (or even greater) turns, often with artificial external lighting.

I suggest you do some reading regarding current investigations into theoretical phenomenon:
Wormholes, for instance
where the appearance of reflective spheres could indicate the manifestation of a natural phenomenon wormhole endpoint interface into local space time where the endpoint disallows local interaction such that it displays high reflectivity where local light/radiation interaction is repelled due the nature of the interface being a nontraversable exit-only interface.

Instances where light or lights may be seen from such an interface could indicate light radiation interacting with the unseen entry-point interface.

A nontraversable end-point interface may appear as a solid reflective object and due noninteractivity with space time locality, such solid appearing spheres could display similar 'abilities' apparently in violation of local physics often attributed to UFO/Flying saucer craft.

Saucer shaped interfaces would attribute to interface lensing.

Such explanation is theoretical speculation supported by mathematical models, but, speculation none the less, though no less relevant than any speculation regarding intelligently controlled spacecraft.

reply to post by Druscilla


That's an interesting idea no doubt but I think it has a hard time explaining complex movements and following aircraft, hovering and then turns and accelerations etc. Apparent intelligent control doesn't match with a natural thing which would be more random in my opinion.

Originally posted by JimTSpock
reply to post by Druscilla

 

That's an interesting idea no doubt but I think it has a hard time explaining complex movements and following aircraft, hovering and then turns and accelerations etc. Apparent intelligent control doesn't match with a natural thing which would be more random in my opinion.

That, of course, is an opinion, to which you are welcome.
Hypothetical End-point phenomenon could very well be attracted to any other sort of phenomenon, such as the electromagnetic field lines produced by a rotating aircraft engine.
As said, however, such would be speculation, but, no less relevant than any speculation regarding intelligently controlled spacecraft.

Click the link posted previously and read some papers regarding WH Geometries, light propagation through geometries, interface point variability, lensing, as well as any other factor.
There's over 900 papers in just that archive alone to peruse regarding the subject.

reply to post by Druscilla


It also has a hard time explaining emission of different coloured lights and appearance of clearly defined saucer shapes staying horizontal as well as radar returns which could indicate a solid object. In my opinion of course.

Originally posted by JimTSpock
reply to post by Druscilla

 

It also has a hard time explaining emission of different coloured lights and appearance of clearly defined saucer shapes staying horizontal as well as radar returns which could indicate a solid object. In my opinion of course.

Different colored lights could be indicative of prismatic effects occurring during transition from entry point interface where end point interface could 'display' transitioning light around its geometry creating the illusion of a craft with running lights.
I've also described an attribution of saucer shapes to lensing of the interface where a solid appearance would be apparent with an exit-only end point due the non-interactivity the end point would observe in rejecting physical interaction with space time locality.
In other words, such an interface would appear to be solid because all light and physical interaction with the interface in this space time locality would be rejected, and reflected, since the interface is exit-only.

You could shoot it, hit it, shine lights at it, bang on it with a hammer and never make a dent because it's exit-only. To all extents and purposes from a layman standpoint, an end-point interface would indeed look, act, and seem solid, where in fact, it's an exit end-point.

A one-way entry-point would/could appear as a black, or even 'invisible' sphere, or saucer/lens shape.

Natural phenomenon occurring entry or end-point interfaces do not by any means necessitate an interface extrusion into local space time is traversable.

Once again, I urge, read the papers provided in the link: Wormholes