Cont: UFOs: The Research, the Evidence

[wollery]

I respectfully disagree. Would a cloud fool you or anyone else here except maybe GeeMack ( he said he was fooled by a mountain top once )? Clouds have never fooled me into thinking I was looking at an airplane. My house faces west and I watch airplanes and clouds daily. I've viewed both through binoculars many times and at many different times of day, including sunset. I've seen so many it would be pointless to guess how many. Yet never once ... including the dozens and dozens of lenticular clouds I've seen have I ever confused one with an aircraft.

How would you know?

If you had been fooled then you wouldn't know it, because you would believe that your identification was right. It really doesn't occur to you that being fooled by an illusion means that you don't know that what you thought you saw wasn't what was really there, does it.

If you saw an airplane and thought it was a lenticular cloud then you'd think you'd seen a lenticular cloud, not that you'd been fooled by an aircraft that looked like a lenticular cloud.

Similarly if you saw a lenticular cloud that looked like an aircraft then you'd think that you'd seen an aircraft, not a lenticular cloud that looked like an aircraft.

THAT'S THE WHOLE POINT OF BEING FOOLED BY AN ILLUSION!

So to argue that you've never personally been fooled by such an illusion is both arrogant and presumptuous, and utterly without evidence.

 

[Stray Cat]

Not to change the subject, but I found another case of "UFO evidence" at the NUFORC website.
http://www.nuforc.org/
These are photographs of an object that supposedly overtook an airplane. When I originally saw them, I felt they were in the following order
http://www.nuforc.org/S86794_b.jpghttp://www.nuforc.org/S86794_a.jpg

However the photographer states they were the other way around indicating the object overtook the airplane. The EXIF data shows they were taken at the same time, which is no surprise considering how short the time was between photos. The passage of the scenery indicates it was a and then b. So, the question is, what did they photograph?

To me, the object looks blurry but not the kind of blur one would expect from motion right to left. It looks like an out of focus blur. That indicates something close to the camera. The wing is in focus, so could it be a hoax of something on the window? Thoughts?

Apart from the things already mentioned. I'm brought to mind on viewing the photos in Photoshop of the plethora of apps for iPhones that allow the easy addition of semi blurred UFOs to your photos.

What makes me suspicious of this is the slightly sharp edge of the blur (as odd as it sounds) And looking at the range an iPhone camera can focus at (basically very close to very far), It doesn't look to me like it's something stuck on the window.

I'm at the moment trawling the App store to see if I can get a match for any of the 'ready to use' content (that has happened on this forum in the past with similar apps that add ghosts onto photos).
But it could also be the users own "ufo" as there are some apps that allow you to add your own content too.

An Example of the kind of app:

 

[GeeMack]

Apart from the things already mentioned. I'm brought to mind on viewing the photos in Photoshop of the plethora of apps for iPhones that allow the easy addition of semi blurred UFOs to your photos.

What makes me suspicious of this is the slightly sharp edge of the blur (as odd as it sounds) And looking at the range an iPhone camera can focus at (basically very close to very far), It doesn't look to me like it's something stuck on the window.

The GPS info shows a point directly above Bend, Oregon, almost exactly 24 miles from South Sister Mountain, the large mountain near the center of the photos. The lake in the center there is Three Creek Lake. If we draw a line east from the peak and along the edge of the lake, it will pass very near the location indicated by the GPS. So that seems okay.

And the change in view from shot A to shot B appears to work. At 200mph the plane would have traveled almost 4/10 of a mile in that 7 seconds. None of my GPSs are so sloppy that they wouldn't register that much change in 7 seconds, but I'm not familiar with the ones in the iPhones. But leaving all that aside for a moment...

The guy is a pilot, has been for 40 years. He sees something flying very fast. Oddly enough he noticed it coming from a position off his right flank. He takes a photo of it at more than 90° over his right shoulder. He takes another photo of it just about 90° off the starboard. Supposedly there was one more photo in the sequence, one with the object hidden by the wing. But that was all? He didn't take any when it got out ahead of him?

He said it was 70 to 80 feet long and 1000 feet away. He said it was going so fast it was a blur. Take the apparent distance traveled in the 7 seconds, and it looks like it's only gained a couple hundred feet plus the distance the pilot witness traveled, or barely faster than he is. So far, without doing more than back of the napkin geometry, Photoshop overlays, and some Google map comparisons, it sort of stinks like a hoax.

 

[Stray Cat]

The guy is a pilot, has been for 40 years.

Then perhaps we should ask ufology what it was. He's good at second guessing pilots.

He sees something flying very fast. Oddly enough he noticed it coming from a position off his right flank.

Through his rear view or wing mirror no doubt?

He takes a photo of it at more than 90° over his right shoulder. He takes another photo of it just about 90° off the starboard. Supposedly there was one more photo in the sequence, one with the object hidden by the wing. But that was all? He didn't take any when it got out ahead of him?

You'd think he would... unless the picture he's superimposed only came as a one angle clipart. It would be tough explaining how the object didn't alter in perspective or aspect after it'd got infront... I've just had a thought... I'll go check when I've finished this.

He said it was 70 to 80 feet long and 1000 feet away.

Patently wrong by the looks of the blur.

He said it was going so fast it was a blur.

I agree with you that it looks like focus blur, not motion blur.
I'll see if I can work out how fast something would have to be travelling to blur on a photo that's got a shutter speed of 1/1700th of a second at 100 feet distance.

Take the apparent distance traveled in the 7 seconds, and it looks like it's only gained a couple hundred feet plus the distance the pilot witness traveled, or barely faster than he is. So far, without doing more than back of the napkin geometry, Photoshop overlays, and some Google map comparisons, it sort of stinks like a hoax.

Yes, it sounds more the relative speed like if you were on the highway doing 55 and someone blasts past at 70... They are hardly bluring as they go past (not withstanding that our eyes don't see motion blur anyway).

It sounds like a crock of crap to me too.

 

[Astrophotographer]

I smell something fishy on this but I can't find anything at the moment that cries "hoax" other than the object being too blurry. I still think it was something very close to the lens. Maybe it was actually on the lens. I also noticed that you can see reflections off the window that appear to show the interior of the aircraft. However, it is hard to say what you are looking at.

 

[John Albert]

How would you know?

If you had been fooled then you wouldn't know it, because you would believe that your identification was right. It really doesn't occur to you that being fooled by an illusion means that you don't know that what you thought you saw wasn't what was really there, does it.

If you saw an airplane and thought it was a lenticular cloud then you'd think you'd seen a lenticular cloud, not that you'd been fooled by an aircraft that looked like a lenticular cloud.

Similarly if you saw a lenticular cloud that looked like an aircraft then you'd think that you'd seen an aircraft, not a lenticular cloud that looked like an aircraft.

THAT'S THE WHOLE POINT OF BEING FOOLED BY AN ILLUSION!

So to argue that you've never personally been fooled by such an illusion is both arrogant and presumptuous, and utterly without evidence.

I have to say, he might make a good straight-man in a comedy duo, so long as he didn't try to tell any jokes himself.

 

[ufology]

No, you've provided a theory that shows the object moving a full eight miles across Johnson's field of vision. Or did you miss this helpful graphic? Or are you now simply dismissing all of Johnson's testimony in favour of the airplane crew alone?

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=7990430#post7990430

Here you go:

This video sure doesn't look like it takes 8 miles for a B-52 to make a turn ... even at takeoff. But regardless, the answer is that if we suppose it was an aircraft that had made a turn leaving a smoke trail, then the trail would just be hanging there ... not moving. Quote: "I do not know how long it was there before my attention was called to it." So by the time he saw it and went outside with the binoculars and got them focused on the spot, most of the smoke may have been gone, leaving only the magnified aircraft that had already made the turn heading directly away as a distinct and object in the distance that "disappeared, in a long shallow climb".

 

[Stray Cat]

I smell something fishy on this but I can't find anything at the moment that cries "hoax" other than the object being too blurry. I still think it was something very close to the lens. Maybe it was actually on the lens.

I doubt it would be on the lens. The lens of an iPhone is only 2mm across at the very most.

I also noticed that you can see reflections off the window that appear to show the interior of the aircraft. However, it is hard to say what you are looking at.

Well looking at photos of an HU16b on the internet, the photo certainly wasn't taken from the cockpit. Looks like it was taken from the 3rd window from the back.

 

[Stray Cat]

Here you go:

This video sure doesn't look like it takes 8 miles for a B-52 to make a turn ... even at takeoff.

No one really gives a stuff about the real performance characteristics of a B-52. The 8 mile travel across Johnson's field of view was calculated against your diagram of the flight path that you drew in.
The fact that a real B-52 can make a tighter turn is irrelevant, that's not what you drew. If you'd have actually done any calculations before getting your crayons out, you'd have realised what you drew was impossible according to the information we have from in the statements.

But regardless, the answer is that if we suppose it was an aircraft that had made a turn leaving a smoke trail, then the trail would just be hanging there ... not moving.

Astrophotographer has shown real weather data that points towards a prevailing wind. How would a smoke trail "hang" in such conditions?

Quote: "I do not know how long it was there before my attention was called to it." So by the time he saw it and went outside with the binoculars and got them focused on the spot, most of the smoke may have been gone, leaving only the magnified aircraft that had already made the turn heading directly away as a distinct and object in the distance that "disappeared, in a long shallow climb".

But he watched it for 3 minutes before his wife got his binoculars (so that he didn't have to take his eyes off it). Where was this smoke magically disappearing to in those three minutes? Or was it "hanging" around, waiting for him to run outside with his binoculars before it dissipated in the record time of the few seconds it would have taken him to open the door and step outside and focus his binoculars on it?

You're really not thinking this through are you?

 

[Puddle Duck]

As for the B-52 ... the XB-52 was flown out of Edwards which isn't that far away. So it's certainly possible that it was a B-52 that was seen, whether or not it actually landed or took off at Point Mugu, maybe it was just making a pass as part of its testing ... who knows for sure ... nobody here. But we do know for sure it existed and flew, which now means we have two examples of terrestrial technology that could conceivably be involved in the incident.

Ufology

For an experimental aircraft which is what those B-52s were (note the X in front of the B) flying out of Edwards, it would not cross the mountains to the coast. It would stay in the area of Edwards, and east and north,where there was very little on the ground and a lot of empty air space to play in, whereas Mugu has a lot of Urban areas and crowded airspace.

It would be a little embarrassing to spread that much debris across a neighborhood or into a shopping center and have Boeing try to explain why its airplane that was still being testing killed so many people on the ground.

So no, there would definitely not been any XB-52 approaches or landings at Mugu that far out of its assigned area.

I think that there would be almost 0 possibility of a large aircraft thre.
PD

 

[GeeMack]

Here you go:

This video sure doesn't look like it takes 8 miles for a B-52 to make a turn ... even at takeoff. But regardless, the answer is that if we suppose it was an aircraft that had made a turn leaving a smoke trail, then the trail would just be hanging there ... not moving. Quote: "I do not know how long it was there before my attention was called to it." So by the time he saw it and went outside with the binoculars and got them focused on the spot, most of the smoke may have been gone, leaving only the magnified aircraft that had already made the turn heading directly away as a distinct and object in the distance that "disappeared, in a long shallow climb".

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And if your fantasy was real it would be real. All your "if" conjectures have failed because they're nothing but unsupported guesses. Your conclusion has been rejected as unlikely. And that "unlikely" has been determined quantitatively and objectively, using real math like real scientists do. Not only have you failed to make a compelling argument here, the USAF came to a different conclusion than you, and none of the witnesses agree with your conclusion, either.

Constructive contribution: Be honest for a change and admit your failure. Shake it off. Knuckle down and learn something about critical thinking. And move on.

 

[ufology]

How would you know?

If you had been fooled then you wouldn't know it, because you would believe that your identification was right. It really doesn't occur to you that being fooled by an illusion means that you don't know that what you thought you saw wasn't what was really there, does it.

If you saw an airplane and thought it was a lenticular cloud then you'd think you'd seen a lenticular cloud, not that you'd been fooled by an aircraft that looked like a lenticular cloud.

Similarly if you saw a lenticular cloud that looked like an aircraft then you'd think that you'd seen an aircraft, not a lenticular cloud that looked like an aircraft.

THAT'S THE WHOLE POINT OF BEING FOOLED BY AN ILLUSION!

So to argue that you've never personally been fooled by such an illusion is both arrogant and presumptuous, and utterly without evidence.

Wrong. We're talking about looking at an object, being fooled by it in the first place, then studying it, with the outcome being evidence of being fooled ( initially ) e.g. "At first I thought it was a cloud but after studying it deduced that it wasn't." In this case you would know you were fooled initially, but you discovered the truth. However in my case I've never mistaken a cloud for an aircraft in the first place. In other words I've never had the experience of thinking something was an aircraft that later turned out to be something else, and I've watched thousands of airplanes in my over 50 years on this planet. Neither have I ever watched what I at first took to be a cloud that later turned out to be an aircraft, and I've watched thousands of clouds too. Yes there have been instances where I wasn't sure if something was an aircraft or something else ( a planet ), but observation and study quickly provided a definitive answer in each and every case.

 

[ufology]

Ufology

For an experimental aircraft which is what those B-52s were (note the X in front of the B) flying out of Edwards, it would not cross the mountains to the coast. It would stay in the area of Edwards, and east and north,where there was very little on the ground and a lot of empty air space to play in, whereas Mugu has a lot of Urban areas and crowded airspace.

It would be a little embarrassing to spread that much debris across a neighborhood or into a shopping center and have Boeing try to explain why its airplane that was still being testing killed so many people on the ground.

So no, there would definitely not been any XB-52 approaches or landings at Mugu that far out of its assigned area.

I think that there would be almost 0 possibility of a large aircraft thre.
PD

Unless you can show that the airstrip at Mugu was not capable of facilitating takeoffs and landings or approaches then it's actually 100% possible ( and there are even photos of B-52s taking off from there in later years ). What you really mean is "highly improbable" ... and there is some sense in your reasoning, but not enough to justify "definitely not" as in 100% certain.

 

[RoboTimbo]

There is sufficient evidence that you were fooled by a firefly. Do you still say that the word "sufficient" is objective?

 

[RoboTimbo]

Unless you can show that the airstrip at Mugu was not capable of facilitating takeoffs and landings or approaches then it's actually 100% possible ( and there are even photos of B-52s taking off from there in later years ). What you really mean is "highly improbable" ... and there is some sense in your reasoning, but not enough to justify "definitely not" as in 100% certain.

I think you should continue desperately wishing either a B52 or a flying wing was the answer, ignoring all counter evidence and arguments, to show people the irrational way that pseudoscientists begin with their conclusion and ignore any evidence to the contrary.

It's a good lesson in the dangers of sloppy thinking.

 

[John Albert]

However in my case I've never mistaken a cloud for an aircraft in the first place. In other words I've never had the experience of thinking something was an aircraft that later turned out to be something else

There's no way you can possibly know that. You might have indeed thought you were looking at an aircraft at one point, and simply never realized that it was actually a cloud.

Such is the nature of mistakes. People don't always realize when they've made one.

Neither have I ever watched what I at first took to be a cloud that later turned out to be an aircraft, and I've watched thousands of clouds too.

Again, no way you could possibly know such a thing.

Yes there have been instances where I wasn't sure if something was an aircraft or something else ( a planet ), but observation and study quickly provided a definitive answer in each and every case.

Maybe the wrong answer, but definitive nonetheless.

 

[Stray Cat]

Wrong. We're talking about looking at an object, being fooled by it in the first place, then studying it, with the outcome being evidence of being fooled ( initially ) e.g. "At first I thought it was a cloud but after studying it deduced that it wasn't." In this case you would know you were fooled initially, but you discovered the truth. However in my case I've never mistaken a cloud for an aircraft in the first place. In other words I've never had the experience of thinking something was an aircraft that later turned out to be something else, and I've watched thousands of airplanes in my over 50 years on this planet. Neither have I ever watched what I at first took to be a cloud that later turned out to be an aircraft, and I've watched thousands of clouds too. Yes there have been instances where I wasn't sure if something was an aircraft or something else ( a planet ), but observation and study quickly provided a definitive answer in each and every case.

The page hasn't even turned yet and you're repeating the same unsupported nonsense.

You don't know if you've ever been fooled by a cloud that looked like a plane or a plane that looked like a cloud. The thing about being fooled is that you don't know. You only know about the times when you weren't fooled.

What happened in the Johnson/Lockheed case, was that they had first impressions and concluded they didn't know what they saw.

Johnson himself moved through cloud to plane to flying saucer.
His conclusion was he saw a flying saucer.

Now obviously he was fooled because even you agree it wasn't a flying saucer don't you?

 

[Astrophotographer]

Boy, it sure sounds like he claims to be flying this plane. That is impossible because the images were taken from the passenger section as stray cat pointed out. I find it interesting that he was able to take out his I-phone in time to photograph the UFO. This is beginning to sound like a hoax. I wonder if he took a photograph with a glass plate in between the camera and window with his UFO on it? That would explain the out of focus image with all the sharp details elsewhere.

 

[John Albert]

Unless you can show that the airstrip at Mugu was not capable of facilitating takeoffs and landings or approaches then it's actually 100% possible ( and there are even photos of B-52s taking off from there in later years ). What you really mean is "highly improbable" ... and there is some sense in your reasoning, but not enough to justify "definitely not" as in 100% certain.

Strange that you take the word of one, long-deceased expert—that you're reading in a thirdhand account or worse from almost 60 years ago—for things he never even said, but then you completely reject the opinion of another expert with whom you are having a direct conversation in the present time.

How do you account for that inconsistency?

Sounds like confirmation bias: you want to believe what you want to believe, and no facts or anything anyone can say will dissuade you.

 

[ufology]

No one really gives a stuff about the real performance characteristics of a B-52. The 8 mile travel across Johnson's field of view was calculated against your diagram of the flight path that you drew in.
The fact that a real B-52 can make a tighter turn is irrelevant, that's not what you drew. If you'd have actually done any calculations before getting your crayons out, you'd have realized what you drew was impossible according to the information we have from in the statements.


Astrophotographer has shown real weather data that points towards a prevailing wind. How would a smoke trail "hang" in such conditions?


But he watched it for 3 minutes before his wife got his binoculars (so that he didn't have to take his eyes off it). Where was this smoke magically disappearing to in those three minutes? Or was it "hanging" around, waiting for him to run outside with his binoculars before it dissipated in the record time of the few seconds it would have taken him to open the door and step outside and focus his binoculars on it?

You're really not thinking this through are you?

You're still ignoring this part: "I do not know how long it was there before my attention was called to it." If the aircraft had already made it's turn, the smoke trail wouldn't appear to be moving, and at that distance and time it could have seemed to have been quite well defined. Although he says he "ran outside" we don't know for sure exactly how long his eyes were off it while he reached for the binoculars his wife had gotten for him, went to the door, perhaps put his shoes on, opened the door, got in position, and then got the object focused in the binoculars. Consider this statement:

• I ran outside and started to focus the glasses on the object, which was now moving fast on a heading between 240° and 260°. When I got the glasses focused on the object, it was already moving behind the first layer of haze.

So he "started to focus", implying getting in position, locating the object in the field of view, and turning the focusing dial until the object came into focus ... and by then the object was moving "behind the first layer of haze". This haze it was moving behind could easily have been the dissipating smoke trail, now thinned out enough to reveal the magnified receding aircraft. So to answer your question ... Yes I really am thinking it through, and you can park your demeaning innuendo that I'm not.