You guys ruined me!

M

MaxisMad22

Member
I was an avid "hopeful" regarding the UFO/UAP subject.
I was always interested to see what new videos, pictures came up each day on reddit, youtube, but I have found "intelligent disclosure" to not really exist.
Even on the sites where the host or OP on reddit claims to be a skeptic, there is always an assumption that gets treated as fact to carry the conversation forward.

I have had issues with those assumptions, where most people seem to not want to dwell on them and just move along for the ride.

I have been reading different posts on here for the past 2 days, and though I never thought I would lean heavily on the debunking side of things, I see now how necessary it is.

If the "evidence" being presented each day wasn't misused, misrepresented, and then monetized, there might be room for intelligent and fair discourse. I have learned unfortunately, that by the time it gets posted to reddit or youtube, it's most likely not what is claimed due to the nature of both reddit and youtube.

Then...add in the government, the military, the grifters and.....you end up here. I dig it. I never thought I would, as "debunkers" are seen as close minded, hateful people, according to reddit ufo sites, and many ufo believers on youtube.

Glad to be here, feels a bit more real than the noise out there.
 
MaxisMad22 said:
I was an avid "hopeful" regarding the UFO/UAP subject.
I was always interested to see what new videos, pictures came up each day on reddit, youtube, but I have found "intelligent disclosure" to not really exist.
Even on the sites where the host or OP on reddit claims to be a skeptic, there is always an assumption that gets treated as fact to carry the conversation forward.

I have had issues with those assumptions, where most people seem to not want to dwell on them and just move along for the ride.

I have been reading different posts on here for the past 2 days, and though I never thought I would lean heavily on the debunking side of things, I see now how necessary it is.

If the "evidence" being presented each day wasn't misused, misrepresented, and then monetized, there might be room for intelligent and fair discourse. I have learned unfortunately, that by the time it gets posted to reddit or youtube, it's most likely not what is claimed due to the nature of both reddit and youtube.

Then...add in the government, the military, the grifters and.....you end up here. I dig it. I never thought I would, as "debunkers" are seen as close minded, hateful people, according to reddit ufo sites, and many ufo believers on youtube.

Glad to be here, feels a bit more real than the noise out there.
Click to expand...
The best reason to be here is that when there is something there, it will be here! We will be able to know!
 
MaxisMad22 said:
I never thought I would, as "debunkers" are seen as close minded, hateful people, according to reddit ufo sites, and many ufo believers on youtube.
Click to expand...

Hopefully as you see, that's a bit of a trope. Like any group we can get frustrated and occasionally offer up some snark, but Mick insisted on being polite, and having open and honest discussions, backed up with evidence. If anything, it's encouraged to be extra polite and respectful, even in the face of the accusations you mentioned.

I've often thought, if one was really searching for the "real alien UFO", the first thing to do is weed out the claims that don't cut it. I would think UFO people would be the biggest skeptics. Some certainly are, but in the public arena it seems to be very tribal with an "us vs them" mentality.

I think for many, it becomes a slippery slope fallacy. If this latest UFO claim isn't a "real" UFO, then maybe the one last week wasn't either. And if those are not real, maybe the big cases like Roswell aren't real. If that's the case, maybe none of the claims are real. That means no evidence of alien visitation and that's untenable. So, nearly every claim is embraced until totally and completely debunked, maybe not even then.

Welcome aboard.
 
One approach to skepticism is that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. This is the natural counterpart to Occam's Razor where the simplest and most reasonable explanation is probably the most correct, unless proven otherwise.

Credibility of UFO research continues to be damaged by fantasists and grifters. Some with a saviour complex try to "blow the whistle" hunting for evidence of conspiracies, with more hearsay than credible evidence. "Disclosure" is always "imminent".

Ufology is largely a pseudoscience as most practitioners ignore or distort the scientific method, and label skepticism as "the enemy". Ironically skeptics and skeptical forums like Metabunk are closer to what "real" ufology should have delivered.

Skeptics may also be falsely labelled as illogical types who "don't believe" in extraterrestrial intelligence, implying that if you "do believe" then you should be ready and open to accept just about any claims that are being peddled as "evidence".

As a skeptic I "do believe" in ETI, I just haven't seen anything resembling real credible evidence that any ETI civilization is in simultaneous existence within our neighborhood, is aware the human civilization even exists, and can reach this planet.

Averaging one tenth the speed of light, to travel from one side of our Milky Way spiral galaxy to the other will take roughly a million years. It has taken 300,000 years for humans to develop our civilization, radio astronomy is not even 100.

Our ability to render our civilization instantly extinct with intercontinental nuclear weapons is roughly 50 years old. Our ability to pollute ourselves to extinction is ongoing. Will our civilization survive long enough to even be detected?
 
Welcome aboard friendo!
MaxisMad22 said:
I was an avid "hopeful" regarding the UFO/UAP subject.
Click to expand...
I think many of us here would consider ourselves "hopeful" that one day we will have incontrovertible evidence of something extraterrestrial, whether here on Earth or even just an undeniable sign of life on a distant planet.
MaxisMad22 said:
Even on the sites where the host or OP on reddit claims to be a skeptic, there is always an assumption that gets treated as fact to carry the conversation forward.
Click to expand...
The skeptic subreddit is such a disappointment. It's just a circlejerk for skeptics to dunk on (sometimes truly insane) believers. There is rarely, if ever, any original research or debunking like you'll see here.
 
Welcome aboard!
MaxisMad22 said:
I never thought I would, as "debunkers" are seen as close minded, hateful people, according to reddit ufo sites, and many ufo believers on youtube.
Click to expand...
Most of us are super passionate dorks who like the folklore behind the bunk as much as we like finding the rational truth behind the bunk. I get so nerdy about paranormal stuff as a skeptic that people often think I'm a true believer, because I know the factoids and find it fascinating. It's like how some kids like to listen to the radio and some kids like to take radios apart. The fun thing about being a skeptic, or even being vaguely skeptically minded, is that you can still enjoy content about bunky stuff. If anything, I get more joy by watching Ghost Adventures as a skeptic than I ever did when I was a believer. :)
 
@tinkertailor This is my favorite ghost story, alleged to have occurred in February 1953. Last known interview with the witness is below, originally released on DVD in 2008 titled "Ghosts of York" (full video):
External Quote:
Harry Martindale, the man who saw the ghosts of the Roman Soldiers in the cellar of The Treasurer's House in York, is interviewed by Richard Felix on the exact spot in the cellar where he had is experience all those years ago! Enjoy!!!

Source: https://youtu.be/G1pNXYw3V4M?t=370

Article:

Ghosts of Roman soldiers haunt ancient city of York

United Press International, January 19, 1977

Harry Martindale, a tall, handsome man in the traditional bobby uniform, is a vegetarian, a teetotaler and a nonsmoker.

He also is becoming a legend in his own time, written up in books, interviewed on British radio and television, and all because when he was 18 he saw not one ghost, but a whole army of them.

"I heard a sound the only way I can describe it is the sound of a musical note. It was just like a trumpet blaring out no tune, just a blare. At the same time, a figure came out of the wall. And the head of the figure was in line with my waist, with a shining helmet.

"I knew that it shouldn't be here and when I say that I was terrified, I mean that I WAS terrified," Harry said, speaking in a rich Yorkshire accent. "I fell off the ladder and scrambled into the corner... and from there I got a bird's eye view of what it was. It was the head of a Roman soldier."
 
eleggua said:
Stone Tape Theory, echoing the Stoned Ape Theory name, tho not the 'theory'.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stoned_ape_theory
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@eleggua we are way off topic here!

Using my overactive imagination, the above two theories can be integrated with the quantum mind theory to produce a "metaphysical" explanation that can give the usual suspects a run for their money.

Imagine ancient mycelium (known to survive for thousands of years) buried in combination with the surviving archaeology, both present at the time of the historical event. The resultant mushrooms and spores produced could have "quantum psychoactive" properties, inhalation of which may induce a quantum connection in the mind to trigger perception of a time in the past.

Harry Martindale was halfway though his second day chiseling through a concrete ceiling of a basement that was apparently several feet thick, and likely poorly ventilated. If there was anything psychoactive in that room, he would likely have inhaled it. Even if there wasn't, the exhaustion alone may have been enough to trigger a hallucination with no metaphysics required.

Unfortunately there is at least once recent scientific paper which is hell-bent on spoiling my metaphysical theory:

Article:
Dr. Gavassino's findings, published in Classical and Quantum Gravity, present a strikingly different picture of time travel. They reveal that traveling through such time loops would prevent many classical time travel paradoxes, including the infamous "grandfather paradox."

Dr. Gavassino's study reveals that any system traveling through a time loop experiences a reset in entropy and memory, ensuring that causality remains intact and preventing contradictions like the grandfather paradox from arising.

One of the study's most remarkable discoveries is the erasure of memories for individuals or systems traveling on a CTC.
 
MaxisMad22 said:
I was always interested to see what new videos, pictures came up each day on reddit, youtube, but I have found "intelligent disclosure" to not really exist.
Click to expand...
you would likely enjoy The Black Vault. He doesnt get into the nuts and bolts of debunking to the extent of MB as he doesnt entertain every "look i saw a ufo!" (ie a blurry "light" in the sky) video put out on twitter or reddit or youtube, but for cases that have some potential to actually BE a UFO, he is intelligently skeptical in his examinations while always giving the benefit of the doubt -as he is a believer himself.
 
deirdre said:
you would likely enjoy The Black Vault. He doesnt get into the nuts and bolts of debunking to the extent of MB as he doesnt entertain every "look i saw a ufo!" (ie a blurry "light" in the sky) video put out on twitter or reddit or youtube, but for cases that have some potential to actually BE a UFO, he is intelligently skeptical in his examinations while always giving the benefit of the doubt -as he is a believer himself.
Click to expand...
I'll have to take a look....thank you for pointing me in his direction!
 
I'm somewhat in the same boat @MaxisMad22

When I was in my late teens into my early twenties, I was obsessed with religion and I spent an exorbitant amount of time in various message boards online arguing with people about the subject, primarily believers. Eventually I pretty much sorted that topic out for myself and found it pointless to continue the discussions I was often participating in; people will believe what they want to believe. I spent countless time discussing it, read many books including numerous religious texts cover-to-cover and ultimately was comfortable with my conclusions on the matter.

Fast forward 20+ years, I dove headfirst into the UFO topic, something I'd always found really fascinating, beginning with the first Grusch hearing in 2023. I was all over Reddit, in numerous discords, watching documentaries, etc. I even read Elizondo & Coulthart's books (don't judge me). The more I got into it and the more I discussed the topic I began to realize that it felt exactly like it used to feel when I would discuss religion with those believers. It was mostly that realization that checked me out.

I still find the topic fascinating, it is the primary reason I'm here, but I don't think aliens are here. I would LOVE to be wrong, though!
 
Dad_SB_83 said:
I even read Elizondo & Coulthart's books (don't judge me).
Click to expand...

I bought and read through Skinwalkers at the Pentagon (Kindle version) and have a small collection of UFO books I find at thrift and antique stores on occasion. I've often said, many skeptics are better informed about various cases and incidents than many UFO folks. In the UFO world, many people learn what I call canonical versions of various UFO events or stories, and take them as fact. It's often skeptics that dig into these claims and tease out as much information as possible.

The Stephenville TX case is a good example. On most UFO TV shows or discussions of this case, one of the often cited claims is that "hundreds of witnesses saw a Walmart or bigger sized UFO" one night in TX. It turns out it's 1 guy claiming a Walmart sized UFO. That same guy got his statement into the local newspaper the next day and TV a few days later. He is still the guy TV producers go to when talking about the case. His Walmart sized UFO is just an un-evidenced anecdote about lights in the sky he thought were all part of a single craft. As for the "hundreds of witnesses", again the same guy claimed he talked to a lot of people in town that he says saw what he saw. None of them are ever presented, at least none that back up his giant UFO story, it's just his claim. There was in fact a lot of F16 activity that night in a nearby training range that likely accounted for what many people did see, but none claimed a Walmart sized UFO. One guy's unsubstantiated claims became an integral part of the story and it takes skeptics becoming well versed in the claims to show this.

Elizondo's book is almost required reading.
 
I'm a shiny newbie, so forgive me for excitedly jumping around and commenting on random posts at the moment. I've heard the Roman Legionnaires ghost stories since I was a kid. Though fascinating, I wondered, albeit facetiously, if there was cut-off or 'best before' date for ghosts. I mean, has anyone ever reported seeing the ghost of a neanderthal or similar archaic human?
 
Carling 4737 said:
I mean, has anyone ever reported seeing the ghost of a neanderthal or similar archaic human?
Click to expand...

Funnily enough the issue of prehistoric ghosts cropped up on BBC Radio 4's Uncanny recently.
Uncanny series 5 episode 6, broadcast 02 December 2025, from approx. 13 mins 54 secs into the programme
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m002n111
(Not sure how accessible this is outside UK).

The host, Danny Robbins, says
External Quote:
One question I get asked all the time is "If ghosts exist, how come we don't we see the ghosts of cavepeople"...

A woman in her 30's, Tasha, recounted seeing a deer and "...a stone-age man, with a spear in his hand" when she was aged 8, on a football field behind her home in Stockport, England. She had been asleep in bed and was awoken by an "animal noise" (which she ascribes to the deer).
Evelyn Hollow, the show's resident "believer", mentions timeslips or something, resident sceptic Dr Ciaran O'Keeffe talks about local homeless people / vagrants who have been known to temporarily camp in local caves.

The possibility that Tasha was dreaming or might have experienced some minor parasomnia isn't really discussed.

Hey, maybe the Loch Ness Monster is the ghost of a plesiosaur. This would explain the lack of physical evidence...
 
Tasha sounds like she has a wonderfully vivid imagination! Such tales from kids are great, it's when grown-ups peddle them uncritically as fact that it begins to grate a bit, especially on YouTube. Wittier souls than I could have fun designing a ghost/cryptid hunter decision making tree, something along the lines of 'You heard an animal noise in the bushes, was it a) a cryptid, b) a ghost, c) an alien time-slipping, d) undefined occult phenomena, etc, etc.

Now I'm wondering about the upper size limit of a ghost. From the ghost of a flea to...a plesiosaur

Talking of timeslips, UFOs and cryptids, here's the definition of a good walk ruined:


Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ZCO3mltwxI
 
Carling 4737 said:
I'm a shiny newbie, so forgive me for excitedly jumping around and commenting on random posts at the moment. I've heard the Roman Legionnaires ghost stories since I was a kid. Though fascinating, I wondered, albeit facetiously, if there was cut-off or 'best before' date for ghosts. I mean, has anyone ever reported seeing the ghost of a neanderthal or similar archaic human?
Click to expand...
And what abut the ghosts of all those Flying Saucer pilots who have been crashing into the planet? Some of them should be among the more recently dead, if length of being un-alive counts. And their distinctive appearance, as reported, would presumably make meeting them a more memorable encounter?

Of course alien ghosts might not be interested in haunting such a primitive planet as this.
 
There do seem to be an awful lot of flying saucer crashes, if the 'claims' are anything to go by, so possibly quite high E.T. casualties. I found this Reddit discussion on the nature of the Greys, and whether or not they might be mere avatars, e.g. some sort of meat puppet for a higher intelligence. This begs the question: if they weren't truly 'alive' to begin with, then could they even become ghosts? That's some rabbit hole to be stuck in.

To quote Harry Price, "people don't want the debunk, they want the bunk'.


Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/aliens/comments/jjnyad/grey_aliens_are_avatars/
 
Carling 4737 said:
...if they weren't truly 'alive' to begin with, then could they even become ghosts?
Click to expand...

Ghosts usually wear clothes, which claimants sometimes describe in detail, so inanimate things can (reportedly) have a ghostly existence.
Roman soldier ghosts talked about elsewhere had a trumpet and a chariot.
I guess a "ghostologist" would say these inanimate accoutrements are associated with/ somehow caused by the impression that the (then living) person, who is now represented by a ghost, had of their own appearance/ immediate environment, but it's hard to understand how a person going about there business at any given time can subjectively have a detailed mental impression of their appearance and that of the objects they're using as seen from all angles. A 2nd Century (or whatever) Roman trumpeter on the march is unlikely to be thinking in great detail about all items of their clothing and kit, somehow simultaneously, as seen from an exterior viewpoint
(a soldier on parade might be thinking about their appearance, and hope that they "project" a certain visual impression, but even then it seems unlikely that they can attend to every aspect of their appearance, as seen from different exterior points of view, at any one time).

The pseudoscientific stone tape theory might, in some interpretations, have explained ghosts as being literal recordings of what was happening at some time in the past, but IIRC it was often assumed that the state of mind of the "recorded" person was an important factor, that strong (negative) emotions might make "recording" more likely. Few ghosts seem particularly happy or carefree.
Reports of ghosts of mundane inanimate objects seen in isolation (not associated with a human ghost) seem rare, but why would a "stone tape" discriminate, unless there were some important role played by the biological status or mental activity of the person being recorded?
-How such a recording could then generate a focussed image centuries later is a problem; maybe the (presumably) electromagnetic record is perceived because of direct effects on the brain of the observer (i.e. there's no objective exterior image to be photographed), but this requires stone walls or whatever to not only be capable of recording focussed images (or, somehow, detailed mental impressions) but to be able to send detailed telepathic footage as well. And only at certain times. To a small minority of people.

There are reports of ghost dogs and other animals, Gef the talking mongoose is a favourite of mine, brief description on the "Ghost hunters' equipment quality" thread https://www.metabunk.org/threads/ghost-hunters-equipment-quality.13274/post-306814) .
There might be some doubts about the accuracy of the Gef stories, as indicated by this shock newspaper exposé
John J. said:
Fortean Times 440, January 2024, quotes the Isle of Man Examiner:
"Doubt Cast on Talking Mongoose Story"
Click to expand...
:)

Believers in ghosts seem to accept that non-human animals can create ghosts. I don't know if they have any theories requiring a certain level of sentience on the part of the animal to enable a ghost to be formed. I'd guess many of us have been annoyed at some time by the whine of a mosquito that we can't see, or which appears fleetingly but disappears before it can be dealt with, only to reappear later...
Maybe people receive inappropriate medical treatment because path lab staff see ghost bacteria through the microscope (please don't tell RFK).

Whether an artificially engineered organism can be the cause of a ghost, or if (perhaps a different issue) a certain level of sentience is required to form a ghost (could a theoretical semiconductor-based general AI qualify?) might be problems for believers.
Consideration of one woo paranormal issue often seems to lead to consideration of other paranormal issues and explanations.

But at the present, it is probably safe to say
(1) It is unlikely that ETI are visiting Earth, and that some have expired in flying saucer crashes
(2) It is unlikely that ghosts exist as an objective phenomenon
(3) ...so it is very unlikely that there are ghosts of UFOnauts bimbling about in New Mexico or elsewhere
(4) We might need better evidence for the existence of (a) ETI visitors and (b) ghosts, and an understanding of what they are, before we can have informed opinions about whether ETI-manufactured creatures can become ghosts.
 
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