UFO help needed!

[Sledge]

No. Just no, Rramjet. I don't care how you try to pad it out, you cannot expect to get away with saying "We don't know what it was, therefore aliens." There's already one thread where no one will support you on this, I have no idea why you'd think it would work better here. Prove that alien spacecraft exist and they'll become an acceptable possible explanation for UFOs. Until then, knock it off.

 

[Frying Dutchmen]

No. Just no, Rramjet. I don't care how you try to pad it out, you cannot expect to get away with saying "We don't know what it was, therefore aliens." There's already one thread where no one will support you on this, I have no idea why you'd think it would work better here. Prove that alien spacecraft exist and they'll become an acceptable possible explanation for UFOs. Until then, knock it off.

I think this quote from Rramjet sums up my reply

I could not have put it better myself.

 

[carlitos]

Basically it's all about knowing that one doesn't know and that it's okay.

It seems people are simply scared of "I don't know. I would need more information to come to any conclusion."

Rramjet, no one is afraid of saying "I don't know." THAT'S WHY WE'RE SAYING THERE ISN'T ENOUGH INFORMATION TO COME TO A DEFINITE ANSWER. Please refrain from misrepresenting what people say. At best, you appear unable to understand what people are saying. At worst, you appear to be lying to support your own beliefs.

\
Does anyone else see what I see?

 

[Sledge]

I think so, but what if Michael J. Fox doesn't own a wetsuit?

 

[kittynh]

well the person was very happy with the suggestions given. So thank you very much.

 

[Trent Wray]

Sure, you can speculate all you want about such things but you cannot therefore conclude that it was an airplane. The logic many here seem to be working on is ‘It might have been an airplane – therefore it was an airplane.’ And make no mistake, that is the intent behind such speculations here. It is to falsify the UFOs as ET explanation – nothing more, nothing less.

I personally don't have much vested in either proving or disproving the existence of ETs.

With that being said, today I saw some strange lights in the night sky I couldn't easily identify. They were unlike anything I had ever seen, and I've seen a lot because I was in the military, I've lived near a major international airport for most of life, and I know how to accurately identify (more so than the average person) everything from birds to various civilian and military aircraft, and I've logged a lot of flight time hours in planes. It was dark when I saw the lights. There were three of them, and they were very bright.

With that having been said, and not telling you anymore information beyond what I said right there ..... will you please tell me, in your opinion, what is the following percentage of possibility that you would give each possible explanation I list here as to what it was that I saw (and I'm being quite serious):

* airplane
* helicopter
* hobby craft
* bird
* man made satellite
* meteor/shooting stars
* other man made craft
* alien space craft
* bioluminescent pterosaur
* god's disco ball
* a Shamwow covered in Xmas lights
* a traveler from an alternate reality briefly crossing over into our dimension

 

[I Ratant]

.
from 10 to 0..
* airplane 9
* helicopter 3
* hobby craft 7
* bird 2
* man made satellite 2
* meteor/shooting stars 2
* other man made craft 2
* alien space craft 0
* bioluminescent pterosaur -1
* god's disco ball -infinity
* a Shamwow covered in Xmas lights 9.9
* a traveler from an alternate reality briefly crossing over into our dimension <-infinity

.
Roughly, within a few orders of magnitude.

 

[Ron_Tomkins]

You've got it in one Ron. There is simply not enough quality information in the OP to decide what the observations were. Many have speculated mundane hypotheses, but they might as well have claimed ET for all the good it will do them or us in the understanding what occurred. To claim veracity in any explanation without the quality of information to enable a conclusion is "woo" and certainly not sceptical. It seems people are simply scared of "I don't know. I would need more information to come to any conclusion." And the reason why they are scared of that is because they erroneously see it opening the door for "woo" explanations (such as ET) - when in fact it closes the door on any explanation except "insufficient information".

Thank you, Ramjet. Although I regret to tell you you're partially agreeing with something I did not say. My argument is actually the opposite from your conclusion: I said people in this thread have shown an ability to admit they don't know for certain what was it that the person saw in the sky. Real skeptics are okay with admitting they don't know for sure what something was.

 

[SOdhner]

will you please tell me, in your opinion, what is the following percentage of possibility that you would give each possible explanation I list here as to what it was that I saw (and I'm being quite serious):

I'll be honest, I'm terrible at assigning arbitrary percentages to things. I've listed them in rough order though, in case that helps.

* hobby craft - This covers a lot of ground, and some can be hard to identify.
* helicopter - Common, and can play tricks on you due to the way they move.
* airplane - Common, but alomost too common. Higher chance that you would have been able to identify it.
* meteor/shooting stars - Always a possibility.
* other man made craft - Obviously.

--- LINE OF INCREASED DOUBT ---

* a Shamwow covered in Xmas lights - I would expect more than three lights and it would need to only APPEAR to be flying, but this one makes me laugh due to its specificity so I'm still putting it high on the list.
* man made satellite - I wouldn't expect this to look like three lights.
* bird - rarely well-lit.
* alien space craft - vanishingly unlikely.
* a traveler from an alternate reality briefly crossing over into our dimension - likely to be flat-out impossible.
* bioluminescent pterosaur - This would, to me, imply the presence of one of the two above and so must be ranked below them.
* god's disco ball - I've seen it, and you wouldn't mistake it for anything else.

 

[Trent Wray]

* god's disco ball - I've seen it, and you wouldn't mistake it for anything else.

Oddly enough, this probably sums up the ideology of quite a few people

 

[Rramjet]

No. Just no, Rramjet. I don't care how you try to pad it out, you cannot expect to get away with saying "We don't know what it was, therefore aliens."

LOL. You still don’t know what I am saying do you - and have to make up something (lie about what I am saying) that parallels what you think I ought to be saying to make my statements conform to your belief systems??

I am stating that we have manifest phenomena that defies plausible mundane explanation but just because we do not have a plausible mundane explanation for it does not mean that we cannot observe and describe the characteristics of that phenomena.

Moreover, Just because we cannot explain the phenomena, does not mean that ET is the correct explanation. In fact I keep pointing out that we do not have the direct evidence to be able to draw that conclusion at all.

And of course by “alien” I mean something foreign to our current understanding of the natural and technological world.

And of course by defying plausible mundane explanation I mean that we do not have the natural or technological knowledge that would allow us to explain the phenomena. For that we need new knowledge.

There's already one thread where no one will support you on this, I have no idea why you'd think it would work better here. Prove that alien spacecraft exist and they'll become an acceptable possible explanation for UFOs. Until then, knock it off.

“Knock it off”? Oh poor you. I am sorry my statements offend and confront your belief systems – but then you do have the option of ignoring them you know.

 

[Squeegee Beckenheim]

And of course by defying plausible mundane explanation I mean that we do not have the natural or technological knowledge that would allow us to explain the phenomena. For that we need new knowledge.

Yes, you do. This is why you are wrong to apply it to UFO sightings as, as of yet, the best we can say is that we know of no mundane explanation. This is very different to claiming that there is no mundane explanation.

 

[Sledge]

LOL. You still don’t know what I am saying do you

All those people who think I've misprepresented Rramjet's position speak now.

 

[RoboTimbo]

I am stating that we have manifest phenomena that defies plausible mundane explanation...

No, you are wishing that were so. You've just made an unfounded assertion which we are correct in dismissing.

How do the lights that kittynh described "defy mundane explanation"? Or are you again trying to avoid the moderated thread so you can get your agenda into this one?

 

[Rramjet]

Yes, you do. This is why you are wrong to apply it to UFO sightings...

Oh, there are definitely UFO cases which defy plausible mundane explanation (For example this case: http://www.brumac.8k.com/Rogue/RogueRiver2.htm - or this one: http://www.brumac.8k.com/WhiteSandsProof/WhiteSandsProof.html - or this one: http://www.brumac.8k.com/IranJetCase/ - or go see the UFO thread for others).

...the best we can say is that we know of no mundane explanation.

No, those cases simply defy plausible mundane explanation. Nothing more. Nothing less.

This is very different to claiming that there is no mundane explanation.

Those cases simply defy plausible mundane explanation. Nothing more. Nothing less.

 

[Rramjet]

How do the lights that kittynh described "defy mundane explanation"?

They don’t. There is simply not enough information to determine what they were. The case should be classified as “insufficient information”.

 

[RoboTimbo]

They don’t. There is simply not enough information to determine what they were. The case should be classified as “insufficient information”.

So you're trying to use this thread to push your agenda so you can avoid the other moderated thread.

In this thread the OP asked for some suggestions about what might be going on in a specific instance not related to your agenda.

 

[Rramjet]

So you're trying to use this thread to push your agenda so you can avoid the other moderated thread.

In this thread the OP asked for some suggestions about what might be going on in a specific instance not related to your agenda.

I did not start the thread, nor have I replied or initiated a post that was not directly related to an issue raised by others.

 

[mike3]

It is not reasonable to suggest an alien spacecraft might have been what was seen. We don't know what alien spacecraft look like. We don't know they exist. There is no evidence for their existence. Therefore they are not an acceptable explanation for lights in the sky.

I'm curious about this. If we were to suppose for a moment that alien spacecraft really did exist, and really did fly by and left a "UFO" report, this makes it sound like we could never actually know that, and we would bar the explanation even if it were right. How can knowledge advance with stuff like that? And you can also substitute "unknown [i.e. not mundane] but non-intelligent [i.e. not aliens] phenomena" for alien spacecraft as well. That is, if there do exist some kind of new phenomena, then how would we be able to ever gain any knowledge of them, or even admit to their existence, when we would never consider that explanation? As it seems you're saying that unless we have prior evidence of unknown non-mundane phenomena, then we can't consider the possibility. But what if the UFO was a real instance? Then it it seems we are in a trap: we don't have prior evidence, so nothing can be considered as evidence to establish that base. Or is there something that could? What would we need for a UFO event to be actual evidence of some previously unknown phenomenon of some kind if it really were an actual instance of such?

 

[Sledge]

So how would you determine that the lights in the sky are an alien spacecraft? What does an alien spacecraft look like, sound like and move like? See, I'm not ruling out the possibility that alien spacecraft exist, I'm ruling them out as an explanation for this event. It strikes me that this is similar to the reasons for refusing God as an explanation for anything: you can't prove it exists, so how is it an answer to the question? You might as well respond "Squirty flinge blab" to the question "What was that?" for all the sense "an alien spacecraft" makes.