It seems a moot point somehow.

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"Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of the two has the greater view?" - Hugo

"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened." - Churchill

Recall I find neither the ETH nor the possibility of visiting aliens "extraordinary."

No.

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"Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of the two has the greater view?" - Hugo

"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened." - Churchill

Indeed; I understand but because we don't know the properties of hypothetical ET craft I tend not to apply so low an a priori probability, or likelihood, to what an ET craft might look like.

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"Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of the two has the greater view?" - Hugo

"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened." - Churchill

Yes, but then it becomes "ah well, it's either some ET craft, balloons, stars, planets, etc." and likely much less talked about.


To see Mercury is rare for the layperson; I'm happy to be in the group who have.

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"Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of the two has the greater view?" - Hugo

"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened." - Churchill

Certainly.

I don't find it extraordinary when physics and astrophysics theories arguably suggest Earth should have been visited by now*. Considering the age, size, makeup of the universe, the fact that we ourselves have become a spacefaring species in the blink of an eye evolutionarily, considering what M theory and superstring may offer the ETH, as well what recorded human history suggests (UFOs and beings from the skies abound).
I tend to think applying "extraordinary" to the ETH or visitation is remnant-thinking of 20th century science.

Don't get me wrong though, I don't think UFO cases are "proof" by any means, only that they may be suggestive of visitation.





* "Inflation-Theory Implications for ET Visitation" JBIS, Vol 58, pp 43-50, 2005

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"Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of the two has the greater view?" - Hugo

"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened." - Churchill

I've noticed, and don't disagree.

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"Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of the two has the greater view?" - Hugo

"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened." - Churchill

And that's where your scientific rigour fails you, I'm afraid. Because we don't know what a hypothetical alien spacecraft looks like and acts like, it should require more proof that whatever-it-is happens to be one, because otherwise, you're likely to assign "alien spacecraft" to things bearing no resemblance to one, regardless of what you think. It doesn't matter what you "believe" about the likelihood of alien visitation. It matters what you can provide evidence for. By putting a low standard of evidence to show the possibility of alien spacecraft, you're only hurting your cause every time it's shown that it was something else really.

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Gillian

"Now everyone was giving her that kind of look UFOlogists get when they suddenly say, 'Hey, if you shade your eyes you can see it is just a flock of geese after all.'"

"You can't erase icing."

"I can't believe it doesn't work! I found it on the internet, man!"

That's precisely what makes the ET hypothesis untestable and therefore untenable. In order to attribute an effect to a cause according to evidence, the nature of the cause must first be understood so that its effects can be falsified. You're simply expanding the desired cause to fit almost any supposed effect. That's not science. That's the opposite of science.

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"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base

You're attempting to "tie" these 2 ideas together...they are different.

Given the vastness of the Universe, there are very few people who think that ET life isn't out there, somewhere...however...given the complete lack of credible, convincing evidence that aliens are visiting this planet, there is absolutely no reason to think that aliens actually are visiting Earth.

"Suggestive" is your escape word...your use of it as an obvious "cop-out" for a lack of credible, convincing evidence.

It's as Gillianren posts...it doesn't matter what you "allow" for, A.DIM, or what something "suggests" to you, because without actual evidence, it is all just baseless speculation.

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"The facts gentlemen, and nothing but the facts, for careful eyes are narrowly watching." Isaac Asimov

So, when Stephen Colbert declared "victory" in Iraq, you're good with that?

Just because you don't find it "extraordinary" doesn't mean it just stopped being "extraordinary". Denial doesn't change reality.

No no no Not allowed!

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I was contrasting one statement with another. Not getting into politics. Colbert is a comedy show, after all. Sorry for any confusion.

Following on from my previous post about discrepancies in the accounts of the Tehran incident, it seems that the assumption that Lt Jafari was in the plane that achieved radar lock is a very widespread one on the internet. This may be due to the influence of the possibly fallacious Wikipedia page, but I note that General Jafari (retd) as he now is known, has been appearing for the Disclosure project as a witness. I don’t know the details of his testimony, but one wonders if he has been claiming to have actually been in the plane which achieved radar lock. That might explain the widespread nature of this belief.

If so there are three (or more) possible scenarios which might explain this strange conflict of data.
1/ Jafari was in the second plane which apparently achieved radar lock; this means that the Wiki article is right, and Maccabee and Pratt are wrong.
2/ Jafari was in the first plane, which in fact was the one which apparently achieved radar lock, in which case Wiki, Maccabee and Pratt are all wrong, but in different ways.
3/ Jafari was in the first plane, which did not apparently achieve radar lock, in which case Maccabee and Pratt are right, Wiki is wrong, and many people discussing Jafari’s testimony on the ‘net are wrong too.

If Jafari does in fact claim to have achieved radar lock, he may either be right, or if Maccabee and Pratt are correct, his recollections are in error. In fact it is possible that Jafari has subconsciously transferred the experiences of First Lt Damirian into his own recollections, a process which could easily happen after three decades.

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Testimony taken years after an event can easily be confabulated/exaggerated. This is especially true if the person recalling the event has a reason to exaggerate. It may be done on purpose or just done through a desire to make a good story sound better. It does not mean the event did not happen. It only means that the event may not have happened as described. The wilder the story, the greater the liklihood of exaggeration.

Those flaws are still there. As for 'early' radar. On the RN ships I served on the Type 965 Air Warning set was first in service in 1955. It was still in use in the 1980s. It was a development of the Type 960 which was designed before the end of the war and came int oservice in 1946. It included MTI (Moving Target Indication) by phase locking the transmission and reception. This removes clutter, in particular from jamming, and shows only contacts with Doppler.
In the Falklands it was unable to detect anything coming in over the land and a lot of ships were 'retro' fitted with type 1022 from the later Type 42 Destroyers.

This is where things start to get modern. It's a pulse doppler set like the current 967. They don't have human readable output, contact information is extracted by computer system. This is where errors can creep in. On a 'raw' PPI display an experienced operator can interpret what he is seeing and discount spurious contacts. Computer systems can't always do it.

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People think that what they see on an air traffic controller's screen is "radar". I get that constantly when debunking Pearl Harbor myths about Opana Point.

Actual radar 'sets' haven't changed a great deal over the decades. How the information is extracted and presented is what changes. Someone still has to look at the display and decide what they are looking at. Type 21 Frigates are fitted with a 992 set ,this is used for both surface and air contacts. It was introduced just after the war on Destroyers and with various upgrades to it's electronics (the biggest being a switch from valves to solid state circuits in the late 70s) it is still in use today.

What I am getting at with all this Radar talk is that just because a UFO report says that a military radar had a contact doesn't mean it's real because the equipment is modern or hi-tech' At the heart of the system is exactly the same gear as used in WW2 with the same limitations and room for errors.

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It doesn't really matter if the equipment is modern or not, though. I mean, imagine sitting in a bath, smacking your hand against the water, then watching the pattern of ripples as the waves bounce off the sides and using that to determine the shape of the tub! If someone told you that you had to do that, you'd say "oh no! that's way to complicated to get anything out of!"

But that's really what radar is doing. These nice cartoons you see of these nice waves being sent out and bouncing off of an airplane is nothing like what happens . Real life is very noisy and complicated, and no matter how careful you are, you can still easily get spurious results.

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This isn't right, this isn't even wrong.
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Not moot, just wrong. The fact that one possible explanation for their vary vague observations is proven to exist does not mean that is what they actually saw. If they were chasing Jupiter, they were chasing Jupiter, no matter whether there is an Independence Day kind of ship hovering over Washington D.C or not.

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"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge" -- Charles Darwin
"Your right to hold an opinion is not being contested. Your expectation that it be taken seriously is." -- Jason Thompson
Meet the OOONG TOE.

For me, even if "alien craft" were a more accepted explanation for some UFOs I still wouldn't think it proven. They'd remain unknown, unidentified: who and what are they? where are they from? what are they doing here?

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"Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of the two has the greater view?" - Hugo

"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened." - Churchill

I don't think the ETH is itself untestable, rather the ETH in regards to UFOs is untestable.
The randomness in time & place as well as their bizarre properties are uncontrollable or repeatable indeed.
Again, this is why I think if some UFOs are ET craft we'll come to know it not by our efforts but by the ETi.

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"Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of the two has the greater view?" - Hugo

"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened." - Churchill

Reality is that our best physics and astrophysics arguably predict we could've or should've been visited by now. I think Fermi quipped for a reason.
Superstring and M theory potentially strengthen the UFOs are ET craft argument; they're not traversing seemingly impossible interstellar distances, they're coming from the next dimension over in our multiverse.
On top of that the fact that humans have claimed visitors from the heavens and have recorded UFOs throughout history resinforces the plausibility, not extraordinary at all.

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"Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of the two has the greater view?" - Hugo

"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened." - Churchill

Well, I wouldn't say it's wrong to determine if a pilot is mistaken, just irrelevant to the masses if it is known there are ET craft in our skies.

Why would people care if some pilot was chasing Jupiter while ET craft hovered over D.C.?
Unless you worked for the FAA it would seem irrelevant, moot.

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"Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of the two has the greater view?" - Hugo

"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened." - Churchill

Right then, there is no CT here. This was a "thoughts" thread in the wrong place.
The incidents in the OP are IMO, interesting and noteworthy, not easily dismissed.

I'd like to think pilots and others know what they see, whether on radar or with their own eyes, that when multiple eyewitnesses say they saw a craft it really was a craft, especially if radar/visual is involved, but I know misidentifications are made.
I think some UFO cases could be ET craft but even allowing this possibility they remain unknown, unidentified; Who /what are they? Where are they from? What are they doing here?

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"Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of the two has the greater view?" - Hugo

"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened." - Churchill

You seem to have missed the point by a wide margin. The point is that even if we know there is a huge alien ship unmistakably hovering over Washington DC, that doesn't make every other UFO sighting automatically another alien craft. Mistakes and misidentifications will still be made, and a pilot reporting chasing down a UFO doesn't automatically get his story accepted as another alien sighting without proper rigorous examination of his circumstances.

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"The very powerful and the very stupid have one thing in common: They don't alter their views to fit the facts, they alter the facts to fit their views." The Doctor, Doctor Who: The Face of Evil.

I'm sorry, you seem to have missed where I didn't say if ET craft in our skies are known every UFO case can be assumed to be ET craft.

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"Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of the two has the greater view?" - Hugo

"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened." - Churchill

It does nothing of the sort, no matter how many times you post it...

As an example, do you believe ghosts to be real simply because people have reported them throughout history? Do you think that ghosts are an extraordinary idea? The same flawed reasoning applies, so would you deny that ghosts are an extraordinary idea?

Sure sounds like you are advocating the "visiting aliens" idea...oh, wait...I see you gave yourself an "out" in the last sentence so you wouldn't have to provide evidence.

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"The facts gentlemen, and nothing but the facts, for careful eyes are narrowly watching." Isaac Asimov

I don't think the ETH is itself untestable, rather the ETH in regards to UFOs is untestable.

That's the only context in which I'm speaking.

The randomness in time & place as well as their bizarre properties are uncontrollable or repeatable indeed.

Repetition is not necessary. If the behavior of some cause is known a priori, it can be measured against the observations of a happenstance occurrence. Since you cannot tell me ahead of time what the behavior of an extraterrestrial spacecraft is, you cannot falsify any observation according to that hypothesis. That is why it is untestable, not because of the mechanics of empiricism.

Again, this is why I think if some UFOs are ET craft we'll come to know it not by our efforts but by the ETi.

And until then it is useless to try to inflate the validity of "our" efforts, which are clearly and blatantly illogical as undertaken by UFO "investigators." No matter how you dress up the speculation, it's still just wishful thinking.

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"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base

That's lovely, but it misses my point entirely. In fact, on further reflection, it doesn't have anything to do with my point at all. My point was that you don't get to put "alien spacecraft" on a list of probably explanations for anything until you have some evidence for how alien spacecraft work. Until you know that, you're just guessing. You're throwing out any chance of a reasonable investigation, because "alien spacecraft" can, without greater knowledge, cover everything.

"Arguably" and "potentially" doesn't mean "does." I don't think we can use astrophysics to predict anything of the kind, and quite a lot of people will tell you that our best physics argues that it is impossible. Speed of light and all, you know. As for "coming from the next dimension over," what makes you imagine that to be easier?

Eeesh. So you believe, as has been pointed out, in the reinforced plausibility of ghosts, dragons, fairies, and so forth? People want to believe in visitors from the heavens. Heck, I do, too! However, some people don't use the right filters, and they assume that, if they want it to be true, it probably is.

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Gillian

"Now everyone was giving her that kind of look UFOlogists get when they suddenly say, 'Hey, if you shade your eyes you can see it is just a flock of geese after all.'"

"You can't erase icing."

"I can't believe it doesn't work! I found it on the internet, man!"

Oh, please! Shall we take at face value every silly superstition that has been perpetuated over the course of human history, some others of which are still believed today? Just because some cave man's superstition happens to resonate accidentally with our latest scientific speculation doesn't mean the two must be connected.

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"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base