Are UFO Sightings Just Misidentified Natural Occurrences?

[nismaratwork]

What's up with the amount of early 50's flying saucer reports describing an emission of red and green flames?

Flying cows, lighting their burps to propel themselves through the starry night. The occasional crash accounts for cattle mutilations.

edit: Sorry, I just realized how implausible that is. Still, it's hard to explain a lot of what happened in the early fifties; Transorbital Lobotomy for instance, peaked in the late 40's and early 50's... should we look at that and conclude that an outbreak of unique mental illness occurred, or was it mostly a social phenomenon driven by a few "true believers"?

[PLAIN]http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a0/Reviews-lobotomy.jpg

 

[jreelawg]

That's the best thing since 'The Flake Equation'.

Except that the Flake equation sits pretty low on that triangle, arguably on the first level (name calling). What you have in the "Flake Equation" is a fancy humorous equation which offers nothing except a complicated way of saying some people are flakes.

 

[nismaratwork]

Except that the Flake equation sits pretty low on that triangle, arguably on the first level (name calling). What you have in the "Flake Equation" is a fancy humorous equation which offers nothing except a complicated way of saying some people are flakes.

Ooooooh... well when you put it that way:

It's the best thing since 'The Flake Equation', and your disdain for it.


edit:
evidence for my cow-theory?!

YOU decide!

 

[FlexGunship]

Except that the Flake equation sits pretty low on that triangle, arguably on the first level (name calling). What you have in the "Flake Equation" is a fancy humorous equation which offers nothing except a complicated way of saying some people are flakes.

Is that actually how you view it? Yes, it is kind of funny. But, is there a SINGLE variable that you would adjust? I really mean that. I want to know which number you would change.

I think of it as an incredibly powerful explanatory device. Yes, it's sad that it's called the "Flake Equation" but that's more because of its parallel to the "Drake Equation" than because people are flakes.

 

[nismaratwork]

Is that actually how you view it? Yes, it is kind of funny. But, is there a SINGLE variable that you would adjust? I really mean that. I want to know which number you would change.

I think of it as an incredibly powerful explanatory device. Yes, it's sad that it's called the "Flake Equation" but that's more because of its parallel to the "Drake Equation" than because people are flakes.

Me likey.

 

[jreelawg]

Flying cows, lighting their burps to propel themselves through the starry night. The occasional crash accounts for cattle mutilations.

edit: Sorry, I just realized how implausible that is. Still, it's hard to explain a lot of what happened in the early fifties; Transorbital Lobotomy for instance, peaked in the late 40's and early 50's... should we look at that and conclude that an outbreak of unique mental illness occurred, or was it mostly a social phenomenon driven by a few "true believers"?

[PLAIN]http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a0/Reviews-lobotomy.jpg[/QUOTE]

These type of practices don't surprise me for the time given the type of people who ran the mainstream psychology show back then. Explaining the phenomena might be a matter of a lack of ethics within the field rather than a few believers. A lobotomy was a crude inhumane solution.

Canadian experiments
The experiments were exported to Canada when the CIA recruited Scottish psychiatrist Donald Ewen Cameron, creator of the "psychic driving" concept, which the CIA found particularly interesting. Cameron had been hoping to correct schizophrenia by erasing existing memories and reprogramming the psyche. He commuted from Albany, New York to Montreal every week to work at the Allan Memorial Institute of McGill University and was paid $69,000 from 1957 to 1964 to carry out MKULTRA experiments there. In addition to LSD, Cameron also experimented with various paralytic drugs as well as electroconvulsive therapy at thirty to forty times the normal power. His "driving" experiments consisted of putting subjects into drug-induced coma for weeks at a time (up to three months in one case) while playing tape loops of noise or simple repetitive statements. His experiments were typically carried out on patients who had entered the institute for minor problems such as anxiety disorders and postpartum depression, many of whom suffered permanently from his actions.[32] His treatments resulted in victims' incontinence, amnesia, forgetting how to talk, forgetting their parents, and thinking their interrogators were their parents.[33] His work was inspired and paralleled by the British psychiatrist William Sargant at St Thomas' Hospital, London, and Belmont Hospital, Surrey, who was also involved in the Intelligence Services and who experimented extensively on his patients without their consent, causing similar long-term damage.[34]
It was during this era that Cameron became known worldwide as the first chairman of the World Psychiatric Association as well as president of the American and Canadian psychiatric associations. Cameron had also been a member of the Nuremberg medical tribunal in 1946–47.[35]
Naomi Klein states in her book The Shock Doctrine that Cameron's research and his contribution to the MKUltra project was actually not about mind control and brainwashing, but about designing "a scientifically based system for extracting information from 'resistant sources.' In other words, torture...Stripped of its bizarre excesses, Dr. Cameron's experiments, building upon Donald O. Hebb's earlier breakthrough, laid the scientific foundation for the CIA's two-stage psychological torture method."[36]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MKULTRA#Canadian_experiments

 

[nismaratwork]

These type of practices don't surprise me for the time given the type of people who ran the mainstream psychology show back then.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MKULTRA#Canadian_experiments

Well that's either missing, or ignoring my point, but then again I gave you flying cows so, OK.


The UFO craze of the 50's is no less surprising given the post-war reality of undiagnosed (and barely defined) PTSD, and other issues. Once again, under mass sightings see Flex's post regarding the miracle of the sun. Blue and Green is not a strange thing to see in the night sky, but how a country full of people interprets it?... another matter.

Maybe a better question is: Why have the descriptions of "UFO's" changed to keep pace with expectations of upcoming technology, or the best of the day? Are we being visited by FLEET of ETs? Can the military keep amazing secrets about programs, but they forget to turn off the big flashing lights at night?

OR... do we just go back to what we KNOW, which is that eyewitness reports SUCK. Look at that photo... that is what you get when zeal, ignorance, and arrogance gets you; it's what happens when even bright and (some) well intentioned people make assumptions and abandon science. ist Klar?

 

[jreelawg]

ENGINEER CLAIMS 'SAUCER' PLANS ARE IN SOVIET HANDS; SIGHTINGS IN AFRICA, IRAN,
8-18-1953

http://www.foia.cia.gov/

Just for fun go to the CIA freedom of information website and search unidentified flying object and read some of the declassified documents. Some reports worth reading can be found under this title,

SIGHTINGS OF UNIDENTIFIED FLYING OBJECTS OVER SPAIN AND AFRICA, JULY - O CTOBER - 1952
http://www.foia.cia.gov/

After all the subject changing pointless ramblings and bad jokes, I still haven't heard any responses to the content of the information presented. Nisimar had some fun ridiculing me, flex posted some kind of pyramid, and ever since it seams clear there is very little interest in having a quality discussion or debate about UFO claims. I understand that by now Nisimar is probably just being a little sarcastic, overtly occupying level one of the pyramid.

 

[nismaratwork]

After all the subject changing pointless ramblings and bad jokes, I still haven't heard any responses to the content of the information presented. Nisimar had some fun ridiculing me, flex posted some kind of pyramid, and ever since it seams clear there is very little interest in having a quality discussion or debate about UFO claims. I understand that by now Nisimar is probably just being a little sarcastic, overtly occupying level one of the pyramid.

I'd love to refute your central point (top of the pyramid) if you offered one... oh wait, now we're back at burden of proof, and you prefer to just throw out a link and say, "discuss" in a rough voice. :tongue:

So, if you have a case, make it and we can actually START on the pyramid: right now you're still at the "footsie" stage, hence the deeply serious response you garner.

 

[jreelawg]

I'd love to refute your central point (top of the pyramid) if you offered one... oh wait, now we're back at burden of proof, and you prefer to just throw out a link and say, "discuss" in a rough voice. :tongue:

So, if you have a case, make it and we can actually START on the pyramid: right now you're still at the "footsie" stage, hence the deeply serious response you garner.

I brought up the commonality of 50's reports describing saucers with red and green flames. Your response had something to do with flying farting cows.

What I would have expected from a proper skeptic would be some insight on a phenomena which might be responsible or something of that nature. At some point you stopped being a proper skeptic and started burying topics and subjects in ridicule.

 

[nismaratwork]

I brought up the commonality of 50's reports describing saucers with red and green flames. Your response had something to do with flying farting cows.

What I would have expected from a proper skeptic would be some insight on a phenomena which might be responsible or something of that nature. At some point you stopped being a proper skeptic and started burying topics and subjects in ridicule.

I'm sorry, what was your point in bringing up those cases?

 

[FlexGunship]

What's up with the amount of early 50's flying saucer reports describing an emission of red and green flames?

What about 'em?

I'm sorry, what was your point in bringing up those cases?

Jreelawg, we've gone in circles. Please explain the historical significance of these reports. Why are these more important that, say, a modern mass-sighting? Because of the age? This stuff just isn't compelling. It's more of the same.

 

[alt]

There is a sect of people who make ET theories part of a religion or alternative interpretation of religious origins. What does it really have to do with UFO reports though? It helps if your advocating the disbelief in UFO report credibility to shift focus from a serious discussion stemming from the best extent of info you have to work with, to the area in which you have nothing to work with except sarcasm and cynicism.

In Roswell, wasn't it the Airforce which initially claimed they recovered a flying saucer and then retracted the statement? If nothing else, there must be some explanation for why they reported what they did, all you can do I guess is wonder?

It isn't hard however to introduce variables which could be consistent with most conclusions and allow for multiple people to think they found wreckage at different supposed crash sites without them being inaccurate or dishonest in their accounts.

I think maybe the trouble is that too many UFO skeptics rely on circular logic or fallacies as arguments when attempting to broadly debunk UFOs in general. Probably based primarily on the fact that attempting such a feat is futile. The best a person has is their own experiences, iffy information and their own intuition, not much else. People get lazy or just like to just BS or have a shallow superficial conversation about the issue sometimes forget the meaninglessness of the fruits of that conversation.

The most appropriate response to the UFO phenomena in terms of skepticism is just that there is no solid proof of any broad conclusion. Playing an adversarial role in a personal battle against people of different beliefs is fine, but not good or useful skepticism. Especially if your advocating other specific beliefs which are without proof. Are some who claim to be really skeptics? Do they just have a contradictory belief system to protect, or are they just doing it for spite?

Re bolded; I've always wondered about that. Perhaps it was deliberate confusion ?

 

[nismaratwork]

Re bolded; I've always wondered about that. Perhaps it was deliberate confusion ?

Given the institutional paranoia at that time, the post-war environment, it could have been NOTHING, and still I think the government would have led with hysteria, then shut down all info.

It could have been a balloon carrying a payload they didn't want known (remember, this is after Japan tried to use LTA craft as weapons during WWII), or just the left hand not knowing what the right is doing.

For example, when you see a death toll rise and fall as a crisis is being examined 'LIVE' on the news... you don't assume people are coming back to life and dying, you probably assume that the news is getting poor initial info. Given the media of the day, it WAS a pretty fast retraction/correction.

So, could it have been a lie? Sure... but there's no reason to believe it needed to be, or even malicious. After all, if the USAF told the COMPLETE truth as they saw it, until they realized they were bozos for an hour or two, and then told the truth again, but accurately this time... it would be what you see from people, AND groups.

edit: Of course, having "flip-flopped"... who believes then now, right? I think in the end, that's why Roswell just isn't a good example of UFO... in part because it didn't "F" much, and wasn't "U" for very long.

 

[jreelawg]

Well, according to the declassified CIA document, it was reported by a German engineer that flying saucers were developed by the Nazis, claiming that the first experimental flight took place in 1945. This report could have been disinformation or something, who knows? But, if it is true, then the reported recovery of a flying saucer crash in 1947 by the Air Force would make chronological sense. Perhaps the Air Force initially reported it because they weren't privy to knowledge of a secret flying saucer project?

On the other hand, maybe they just wanted to use the opportunity to make people think they had the so called "flying saucer technology", and so reported it?

Or, maybe they were just confused and hysteric and thought a spy balloon or weather balloon was a flying saucer until things got cleared up?

 

[nismaratwork]

Well, according to the declassified CIA document, it was reported by a German engineer that flying saucers were developed by the Nazis, claiming that the first experimental flight took place in 1945. This report could have been disinformation or something, who knows? But, if it is true, then the reported recovery of a flying saucer crash in 1947 by the Air Force would make chronological sense. Perhaps the Air Force initially reported it because they weren't privy to knowledge of a secret flying saucer project?

On the other hand, maybe they just wanted to use the opportunity to make people think they had the so called "flying saucer technology", and so reported it?

Or, maybe they were just confused and hysteric and thought a spy balloon or weather balloon was a flying saucer until things got cleared up?

The kind of "flying saucer" technology that was being experimented with (verified, not conjecture) was basic flying-wing design, that naturally failed due to aerodynamic instability, and no fly-by-wire for quite some time to come. Those objects are identified, and AFAIK only one really flew at all... before crashing.

Otherwise, when people start talking about WWII, Nazis, and flying saucers without new evidence, I tend to just tune out. Nothing personal, but you said it,

This report could have been disinformation or something, who knows?

Everything after that is a very interesting, but utterly unsupported conjectures and fantasies.

 

[jreelawg]

The kind of "flying saucer" technology that was being experimented with (verified, not conjecture) was basic flying-wing design, that naturally failed due to aerodynamic instability, and no fly-by-wire for quite some time to come. Those objects are identified, and AFAIK only one really flew at all... before crashing.

Otherwise, when people start talking about WWII, Nazis, and flying saucers without new evidence, I tend to just tune out. Nothing personal, but you said it, "This report could have been disinformation or something, who knows?". Everything after that is a very interesting, but utterly unsupported conjectures and fantasies.

If the report were truthful, then it would not have been those kind of "flying saucers" discussed.

Well, it's technically more supported than your theory that they were just confused.

 

[nismaratwork]

If the report were truthful, then it would not have been those kind of "flying saucers" discussed.

Well, it's technically more supported than your theory that they were just confused.

Neither are supported in the least.

If I give you a hundred anecdotal reports to support my claim, and you give me a workable alternate theory... we're EVEN... or rather we're both losers. Hence:

This report could have been disinformation or something, who knows?

Everything after that is a very interesting, but utterly unsupported conjectures and fantasies.

 

[jreelawg]

Neither are supported in the least.

If I give you a hundred anecdotal reports to support my claim, and you give me a workable alternate theory... we're EVEN... or rather we're both losers. Hence:

Well we have one 1953 claim by a supposed German engineer that the NAZI's developed the flying saucer first experimentally tested in 1945. We have the US air force claiming to recover a crashed flying saucer in 1947. And we have thousands of reports around the world of supposed flying saucer observations. I never claimed any specific level of credibility. Call it what you want, that is the information we have.

 

[nismaratwork]

Well we have one 1953 claim by a supposed German engineer that the NAZI's developed the flying saucer first experimentally tested in 1945. We have the US air force claiming to recover a crashed flying saucer in 1947. And we have thousands of reports around the world of supposed flying saucer observations. I never claimed any specific level of credibility. Call it what you want, that is the information we have.

...And? What do you make of this information?

I feel it's insufficient to support the claims, and of low quality in terms of evidentiary value.

Then again, I'm not presenting it for examination, you are... so what do you conclude upon examination, as the skeptic you say that you are?

 

[Smiley LUVA]

How do people know if there is UFOs? Do they have scientific prof? They would have to show me before they start telling us the exist! They can't. They don't. Only Area 51 does. And if they can't show us how can we believe them. How can they get people to believe them. Nothing is right anymore.

 

[Drakkith]

How do people know if there is UFOs? Do they have scientific prof? They would have to show me before they start telling us the exist! They can't. They don't. Only Area 51 does. And if they can't show us how can we believe them. How can they get people to believe them. Nothing is right anymore.

There is not sufficient evidence that alien spacecraft exist anywhere, even area 51.

 

[Redbelly98]

It looks like this discussion had run its course over a year ago.