Freak waves are real: A lesson in objectivity

[zoobyshoe]

As I asked earlier: Where are the scientific papers from ten, or twenty, or even fifty years ago?

This is quite comparable to the microburst situation, where pilots were getting knocked out of the sky, but "science" hadn't caught up with it yet: the phenomenon was rare enough to make it very difficult to collect any data. Verification has only been quite recent.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

This is quite comparable to the microburst situation, where pilots were getting knocked out of the sky, but "science" hadn't caught up with it yet: the phenomenon was rare enough to make it very difficult to collect any data. Verification has only been quite recent.

I think so. I am sure that some scientists have always been interested in all of this, but the same is true of UFOs, ghosts, ESP, etc, etc. This does not indicate a general level of acceptance though.

I'm not sure what Bystander thought applied here but if this was the same thing then poeple wouldn't be trying to explain all of this right now. This is not understood to any signficant degree, at least with any degree of certainty.

 

[zoobyshoe]

I think so. I am sure that some scientists have always been interested in all of this, but the same is true of UFOs, ghosts, ESP, etc, etc. This does not indicate a general level of acceptance though.

I'm not sure what you're saying. My point is that in spite of any potential interest no breakthrough can be made till someone figures out a way to collect data. Till then, even open minded scientists are hamstrung, and reduced to saying: "As far as science is concerned, no such phenomenon exists." "No praise, no blame", here, as it says in the I-Ching. Science runs on data.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

You only elucidate why I found the maritime courts as a unique point of reference in the first place. Also, it is not a black and white issue as to when something is considered real or not by the scientific community. For example, there are still serious scientists who argue for the aether, as opposed to GR. Is relativity accepted or not?

I can also point to numerous arguments from respected scientists that ET is here. Is ET considered to be here or not? If ET lands at the White House tomorrow, can we then claim that ET was recognized as real by scientists all along, we just didn't have good data?

If you are saying that we had no phsical evidence, I don't agree. We had ships of known sizes and construction that were damaged or destroyed by a wave of an approximately known size, and usually the direction of travel. This gives us some baseline numbers like mass, speed, span of origin, orientation wrt the existing swells, local islands or land masses that might influence the behavior of waves. We might experiement and predict situation where Rogue waves are likely, and then look for evidence of such locations. This is just shooting from the hip on a moments notice.

 

[zoobyshoe]

You only elucidate why I found the maritime courts as a unique point of reference in the first place.

This sentence could mean that I elucidate why you consider the maritime court situation uniquely applicable to your case, or it could mean I elucidate why the maritime court situation is the single instance that you could find about this. I think that sometimes in haste you write things that you aren't aware are ambiguous to the reader.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I mean because of the difficulty in identifying the "official scientific position" on a subject - a spectrum of beliefs with no absolute point of reference. UFO people often refer to the "giggle factor" as another measure.

 

[zoobyshoe]

I mean because of the difficulty in identifying the "official scientific position" on a subject - a spectrum of beliefs with no absolute point of reference.

Hmmm. Let's see how long you can remain ambiguous. You realize this is an incomplete sentence don't you? All I get from it is an impression of what you're talking about without knowing your actual thought.

UFO people often refer to the "giggle factor" as another measure.

Another measure of what?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

You seem to be missing the basic point of the conversation: The measure of acceptance of a concept or claim, and how we measure that acceptance.

I think you are just being contrary. You get like this sometimes. You start nitpicking

 

[zoobyshoe]

I mean because of the difficulty in identifying the "official scientific position" on a subject - a spectrum of beliefs with no absolute point of reference.

I'm sorry. I really don't believe it is warranted for you to call me nitpicky because I don't know what this sentence fragment means. Don't burden your readers with impressionistic half thoughts, and ambiguous whole thoughts. Just write clearly.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Zooby you need to understand that I don't understand why my meaning is unclear. You then take a much more aggressive posture and I have no idea why.

Why do you start with the insults?

Hmmm. Let's see how long you can remain ambiguous. You realize this is an incomplete sentence don't you? All I get from it is an impression of what you're talking about without knowing your actual thought.

This is what puts me on the defense. Honestly, on rare occasion you seem downright insincere to me. This is one of them. This has happened from time to time ever since you first showed up at this forum. I assume that this is not the case but I certainly don't understand why you start getting nasty with me.