Major UFO experiences are specific to the observer

[Duke]

I recall being in the car with my dad when I was a kid and seeing one of these:

Barium is used to study the motion of both ions and neutrals in space. A fraction of a barium cloud ionizes quickly when exposed to sunlight and has a purple-red color. Its motions can be used to track the motion of the charged particles in the ionosphere. The remainder of the barium release is neutral, having a different color, and can be used to track the motion of the neutral particles in the upper atmosphere. A small quantity of strontium or lithium is sometimes added to the barium mixture to enhance the neutral barium emissions, making it easier to track the neutral cloud. Since the observer must be in darkness while the barium cloud is in sunlight, the technique is limited to local time observations near sunset or sunrise.
View attachment 60264

Source: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/sounding-rockets/tracers/metals.html

Sounds like what you describe.

Curious as to where and when you saw this with your Dad?

What I remember reading about was a single large, iridescent blob that eventually faded away. It was originally reported as a UFO, then a couple days later the rocket/chemical explanation was given.

 

[John J.]

Hi Todd Feinman, thank you for your new Farmington link.
The image of the Farmington Times cover there is much easier to read!

The Farmington event had more than a couple of witnesses --the officer being the observer who suggested the cotton balls...
https://www.daily-times.com/story/n...illed-skies-above-farmington-1950/5073795002/

But that doesn't make him a UFO witness, it makes him a seed-dispersion witness!

From your new link:

...the paper reportedly was "deluged" with calls from readers reporting the objects...

But from the copy of the Farmington times in the same link:

Three persons called the Daily Times to report seeing strange objects in the air just before noon.

This doesn't entirely surprise me, having read a fair bit of UFO-related material which isn't internally consistent, let alone consistent with other write-ups.

I was interested to read (in the new linked-to article, here) that Webb, mentioned in the first Farmington article you linked to,

...told the paper he estimated the objects were small, about the size of a dinner plate

But also in the first Farmington article, (here), Harold Thatcher's estimates of the object's height and speed are dependent on them being the size of a B-29 bomber (c. 30m long, 43m wingspan, 11 crew).

-I've just noticed, in the more readable Farmington Daily Times image, it's stated one witness estimated its size as approximately twice that of a B-29.
Even allowing for normal differences in eyewitness descriptions, this is a big difference! A dinner plate, or a 60m x 86m plane.

And depending on whose evidence you put together with whose, we have maybe 15 dinner plate-sized objects in formation or 500 craft each twice the size of a B-29! I don't expect they phrased it quite like that at the MUFON convention, though.

The knowledge that

High winds and a dust storm prevented clear vision

(Farmington Daily Times) doesn't really help the narrative.
(More readable Farmington Daily Times column, Sat. 18 March 1950, click to enlarge).

There are pics from the stadium event from Florence, preserved in the photo of the paper.
The photo of one of the Florence objects Exactly matches a photo taken by an officer two decades later:

These are great pics of the same object or exactly same type of object taken over a decade apart by different people.

Alternatively, two pictures, without any details to provide scale, each showing what appears to be a rough oval shape.
The oval shapes have a similar length-to-width ratio.

The one on the left could be an oblique view of a circular or near-circular object, reflected light glinting off its side,
maybe a photo of a flipped penny or button.
Or it could be a drilled/ routed hole in a matt white tile. Or an "M&M" or "Minstrel"-type sweet (candy).

On the right, a cell seen through an electron microscope. Or a badly-photographed knot-hole on a wood panel.
Or a really badly-photographed key with a round bow, stem projecting to the right.
Or a seal's head sticking out of the water, looking towards the left.

OK, neither picture is likely to be any of those things!
But nor are they clearly pictures of extraterrestrial spacecraft. They're just ambiguous photos.

 

[gabelewis]

OK, neither picture is likely to be any of those things!
But nor are they clearly pictures of extraterrestrial spacecraft. They're just ambiguous photos.

The on the left looks an awful lot like the "shirt button on a pan of glass" optical illusion/hoax technique. A wider angle (if one exists) would be interesting to see. The photo certainly seems to be cropped.

 

[gabelewis]

Hi Todd Feinman, thank you for your new Farmington link.
The image of the Farmington Times cover there is much easier to read!

-I've just noticed, in the more readable Farmington Daily Times image, it's stated one witness estimated its size as approximately twice that of a B-29.
Even allowing for normal differences in eyewitness descriptions, this is a big difference! A dinner plate, or a 60m x 86m plane.

And depending on whose evidence you put together with whose, we have maybe 15 dinner plate-sized objects in formation or 500 craft each twice the size of a B-29! I don't expect they phrased it quite like that at the MUFON convention, though.

There's plenty to unpack in that link, but along these lines, one secondary witness was told that object was an 60 foot upside-bowl with windows in which she saw three people inside wearing striped caps and navy blue uniforms with brass buttons:

In her story, Waybourn recounts that she heard the story at least a dozen times after she returned from college, and a group of her friends took her to a location that was purported to be a landing site of one of the objects. She described it as "a large circle, about 60 feet in diameter, with the sagebrush flattened out and singed weeds around the edge."

Waybourn also quoted a Farmington resident named Pauline McCauley who said she was a little girl at the time of the sighting. McCauley said she was herding sheep south of town that day in the spring of 1950 when she heard a sound above her, looked up and spied a circular object that looked like an upside-down bowl. McCauley told Waybourn the object had windows, and she could see three people inside wearing striped caps and navy blue uniforms with brass buttons.

Waybourn heard various other stories over the years, many of them from people who didn't want their names used for fear of being ridiculed. She said the incident sparked a great deal of curiosity at the time and remains a topic of discussion for older folks today.

Also interesting that at least 2 of the witnesses said that while it was a peculiar experience, it doesn't bother them, they haven't thought about it, and/or assume there's a prosaic explanation they couldn't workout (https://www.daily-times.com/story/n...illed-skies-above-farmington-1950/5073795002/):

"I know how easy it is to be deceived by something in the sky," he said.
In fact, when he was contacted by The Daily Times last week, Webb said he had no idea the 70th anniversary of the incident was approaching and insisted he couldn't remember the last time he had thought about it.

"I can tell you everything I know about it in five seconds because I don't know much," he said.

Webb said he was working at his stepfather's Chevy dealership across the street from the Totah Theater on March 17, 1950, when someone told him they had seen some saucer-shaped objects in the sky. Webb went out to have a look, and when he turned his eyes to the north, he said he could make out 12 to 20 objects. He said they were loosely arranged, certainly not flying in formation, but moving steadily from east to west.

"They were darting around almost like leaves in the sky being blown around," he said.

Webb watched the objects for approximately 10 to 15 minutes, then went back inside to work.

Webb seems to have given a slightly different version to David Marler, UFOlogist that did the primary research for the Daily Times write-up (https://davidmarlerufo.com/farmington-nm-1950):

After observing these things for 5 to 10 minutes, the objects disappeared behind a group of trees that were situated behind the garage. Mr. Webb then proceeded back into the garage where he had to resume his job duties. Since then, he has steadfastly maintained over the decades that he doesn't know what he saw and makes no claims otherwise. However, he firmly rejects any suggestion that these objects were simply leaves or other debris blowing in the wind.

Like other witnesses, he stated he was interviewed by government agents on more than one occasion concerning what he observed that day. However, it must be stated that Mr. Webb was in no way intimidated or told not to speak of the event. He has spoken openly about this over the passing decades as have other witnesses without any negative repercussions.

Interesting that Marler claims Webb told him it could not have been leaves, but tells the Daily Times they were "blowing around almost like leaves." He also doesn't mention being interviewed by agents to the times.

Seems like we need a Farmington thread!

 

[gabelewis]

There are pics from the stadium event from Florence, preserved in the photo of the paper.
The photo of one of the Florence objects Exactly matches a photo taken by an officer two decades later:

View attachment 60257View attachment 60258

These are great pics of the same object or exactly same type of object taken over a decade apart by different people.

That Florence case interesting, and I was about to write something up, but it looks like this has been discussed here: https://www.metabunk.org/threads/cl...the-stadio-artemio-franchi-in-florence.11578/

A few relevant points for this thread:
1. This was a true mass sighting (many independent witnesses with contemporaneous news reporting)
2. Witness description vary widely in terms of object shape, speed, number of objects, behaviour. One observer describes it as an egg shape, another as a Cuban cigar
3. I did not see many interviews from stadium witnesses
4. There was physical evidence that was collected and sampled. (Metabunk thread consensus was, "it's all spider webs.")
5. The photo in that article was "lost." (There may be more info on this but it's too late for me to dig in.)
6. Almost every source, including the witnesses themselves mention that the UFO topic was a hot button issue prior to the event.
7. Similar to now, there is at least one prominent UFOlogist who is gassing things up. I have to wonder how this kind of attention effects experiencers. I know for myself that kind of validation can be incredibly intoxicating.
8. I'd never heard of Spider-Web-Ballooning before, and the video shared in that thread is pretty remarkable, but that's mostly off-topic. You can check out the thread if you're curious.

No real conclusions from me on that particular case and that's off-topic anyway. My main takeaways were some of the common themes and interesting details on one of the few cases I've read about with this amount of corroboration.

 

[Ann K]

There's a short video about the Farmington event with what is purported to be a photo taken at the time. On the back it is labeled "BTW Negs #20". It doesn't resemble solid, convex objects in any way, as the lighting is all wrong for that. IF it is genuine, the description of "dinner plates" comes to mind (i.e. something mostly flat but somewhat concave). I think it far more likely to be faked, with drops of water on a pane of glass.
Video:
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40I1C0a7KI8

 

[JMartJr]

Curious as to where and when you saw this with your Dad?

I was pretty young, we saw it in Davidson, NC, would have been late 60s probably but I can't be more exact than that. My memory is also of s single glowing blob that very slowly expanded and faded. The news the next day (or possibly that night) said it was a "barium flare," a term that stuck in my mind, and your post led me to recall the incident and look online for the phenomenon.

 

[Duke]

I was pretty young, we saw it in Davidson, NC, would have been late 60s probably but I can't be more exact than that. My memory is also of s single glowing blob that very slowly expanded and faded. The news the next day (or possibly that night) said it was a "barium flare," a term that stuck in my mind, and your post led me to recall the incident and look online for the phenomenon.

Great, thanks. What you saw was probably launched from the NASA Wallops Island (Maryland) facility. We could be talking about the exact same event. I recalled what I read about being in the early 70s, but could have been the late 60s. The source would have probably been our local (Dayton, OH) newspaper, and/or TV news. Wouldn't have had access to much else in the late 60s/early 70s.

In any event, the UK sighting @Scaramanga described in his earlier posts does sound similar to what was produced as a result of this type of testing/research. Given that he has a specific date (31 Jan 77) for his sighting, and if he's interested enough to do the research, a good place to start might be the UK Met Office. I'd also look in local newspapers for the week before the sighting, and the week after. Might find an announcement made before any such test, and/or coverage of what others saw.

 

[gabelewis]

There's a short video about the Farmington event with what is purported to be a photo taken at the time. On the back it is labeled "BTW Negs #20". It doesn't resemble solid, convex objects in any way, as the lighting is all wrong for that. IF it is genuine, the description of "dinner plates" comes to mind (i.e. something mostly flat but somewhat concave). I think it far more likely to be faked, with drops of water on a pane of glass.
Video:
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40I1C0a7KI8

View attachment 60268

FWIW, the person who has done probably the most research on this case and believes it to be genuine also *does not* believe this photo to be a real photo from Farmington - and that the photo may be hoax in itself: (https://davidmarlerufo.com/farmington-nm-1950)

In my humble opinion, I feel confident in saying the photographs were NOT taken in Farmington, NM in March 1950. I make this decision based partly on the clouds in the photographs not matching clouds seen over Farmington on the days in-question. But also, I make this decision based on the complete absence of the photographs appearing in the Farmington or Durango newspapers during this time period.

For that matter, after reviewing the vast majority of newspapers across the country around this period, I found no appearance of these photos anywhere. The only source of the photos ties back to Dublin, Ireland and the Teenage-Times newspaper. This is just a bit of a distance from Farmington, NM! Unfortunately, attempts to investigate this short-lived newspaper further has gone nowhere. It is possible the original photographs and, more importantly, original negatives have long since vanished.

But, due to the timeframe in which these photos surfaced (i.e., March 1950) and the inherent characteristics shown in the photos that are strikingly similar to reports from Farmington, NM, it leads me to a carefully-worded conclusion:

If (the operative word here) these photos are genuine UFO photographs (not a hoax), it is suggestive (not conclusive) that these may be photographs of the same (or similar) objects that were observed over Farmington, NM on the three days in March of 1950, but taken elsewhere around the same general timeframe.


Update: Most recently, I was in communication with veteran Spanish UFO researcher, Vicente-Juan Ballester Olmos. To my delight, he shared with me details on what information he has uncovered regarding this enigmatic photograph from the 1950s. For details of his work, please consult his blog at:

https://www.academia.edu/35977269/DECONSTRUCTING_A_1950_UFO_FAKE

Questions remain surrounding these mysterious photographs, but so too do questions still surround the UFO events in March of 1950. What was observed by hundreds, if not thousands, of eyewitnesses in Farmington, NM and other parts of the southwestern United States and Mexico? Like the majority of cases in this field, we are short on conclusive answers but this should not deter us from investigating things further.

As this case illustrates, despite the passage of time and what we thought we knew regarding a UFO incident, even decades later new material can be uncovered. New material leads to new insights. Perhaps, these insights will be the foundation stones for the eventual understanding of this most enigmatic UFO subject.

I haven't dug into the details in that link he shared yet.

 

[Edward Current]

However, he firmly rejects any suggestion that these objects were simply leaves or other debris blowing in the wind.

This kind of firm rejection, a negative bare assertion, is seen again and again with regard to sightings. Within the past year I have seen photos of contrails near the horizon, with the firm rejection "that's not a plane." Within the past year I have seen videos of mylar balloons at sunset, creating fiery colors and occasional flashes, with firm rejections that "that's not a balloon." Same with flashing LED-equipped kites, photographed badly enough to border on the LIZ, "that's not a kite." As Hitchens' razor says, that which is asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.

 

[Mendel]

This kind of firm rejection, a negative bare assertion, is seen again and again with regard to sightings

We had someone here on metabunk with a putative demonic sighting who insisted "that's not a butterfly" even after @jarlrmai had pinned down the species, Libytheana carinenta. It's just how human minds work.

 

[gabelewis]

This kind of firm rejection, a negative bare assertion, is seen again and again with regard to sightings. Within the past year I have seen photos of contrails near the horizon, with the firm rejection "that's not a plane." Within the past year I have seen videos of mylar balloons at sunset, creating fiery colors and occasional flashes, with firm rejections that "that's not a balloon." Same with flashing LED-equipped kites, photographed badly enough to border on the LIZ, "that's not a kite." As Hitchens' razor says, that which is asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.

I tend to start feeling deja vu when I read a story that begins with a long list of "could-not-have-beens" with little to no justification for coming to that conclusion.

It's a problem I noticed when my friends showed me Loose Change way back when. So many things are stated as fact, but the filmmakers move on before they actually prove each claim. They just assume you agreed with the last point and offer no further evidence.

 

[Eburacum]

Edward J. Ruppelt mentioned the Farmington event in his book The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects. He has some interesting comments on the event.

I've talked to several people who were in Farmington and saw this now famous UFO display of St. Patrick's Day, 1950. I've heard dozens of explanations — cotton blowing in the wind, bugs' wings reflecting sunlight, a hoax to put Farmington on the map, and real honest-to-goodness flying saucers. One explanation was never publicized, however, and if there is an explanation, it is the best. Under certain conditions of extreme cold, probably 50 to 60 degrees below zero, the plastic bag of a skyhook balloon will get very brittle, and will take on the characteristics of a huge light bulb. If a sudden gust of wind or some other disturbance hits the balloon, it will shatter into a thousand pieces. As these pieces of plastic float down and are carried along by the wind, they could look like thousands of flying saucers.
On St. Patrick's Day a skyhook balloon launched from Holloman AFB, adjacent to the White Sands Proving Ground, did burst near Farmington, and it was cold enough at 60,000 feet to make the balloon brittle. True, the people at Farmington never found any piece of plastic, but the small pieces of plastic are literally as light as feathers and could have floated far beyond the city.

Content from external source (pdf)
https://ia801304.us.archive.org/22/...The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects.pdf

I think many people have seen, in YouTube clips, the way high altitude balloons burst and explode into a shower of fragments. It may be that a fragmentation of this kind produced a rain of fluttering shards. But it would be a fairly short-lived event, unless it were a very large balloon.

 

[Ann K]

I make this decision based partly on the clouds in the photographs not matching clouds seen over Farmington on the days in-question.

The reports are of high winds and limited visibility due to dust storms. I'm not aware of any descriptions of clouds.

 

[DaveG]

This kind of firm rejection, a negative bare assertion, is seen again and again with regard to sightings. Within the past year I have seen photos of contrails near the horizon, with the firm rejection "that's not a plane." Within the past year I have seen videos of mylar balloons at sunset, creating fiery colors and occasional flashes, with firm rejections that "that's not a balloon." Same with flashing LED-equipped kites, photographed badly enough to border on the LIZ, "that's not a kite." As Hitchens' razor says, that which is asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.

And it's to be expected, because there a far more unqualified, inexperienced observers than there are qualified, experienced observers. I've come across people who haven't seen a single meteor in their life. There a millions of people who only live in smog filled cities, who have barely seen stars and light pollution is increasing globally 9.6 per cent per year, doubling every seven years.

As Scaramanga said in post #53 "Personally I've become sick and tired of the entire 'I know what I saw' trope. in response to some people not being able to recognize the moon being obscured by clouds.

But this is what's know as a hasty generalization, or an unrepresentative or biased sample. There is a flood of misidenifications now everyone is carrying a smartphone. If you draw conclusions based solely off of poor observers, you're going to misinterpret the data and draw the wrong conclusion.

 

[Scaramanga]

This kind of firm rejection, a negative bare assertion, is seen again and again with regard to sightings. Within the past year I have seen photos of contrails near the horizon, with the firm rejection "that's not a plane." Within the past year I have seen videos of mylar balloons at sunset, creating fiery colors and occasional flashes, with firm rejections that "that's not a balloon." Same with flashing LED-equipped kites, photographed badly enough to border on the LIZ, "that's not a kite." As Hitchens' razor says, that which is asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.

I've seen cases where people simply cannot mentally conceive that a contrail moving downwards means a plane travelling away from them, and not an object 'falling' from the sky. I've seen cases ( I mention one in this forum ) where people mistake what is clearly the Moon for a 'UFO'. I mean...the Moon of all things. I've had the experience myself of a dandelion seed ball being caught in the sunlight over my recliner and appearing to be a 100 foot wide orb shooting across the sky. I've seen videos of planes with fireworks for a display mistaken for UFOs. And so on...the list is endless.

These instances happen so often that I have lost all faith in the ability of people to accurately convey what they saw. And when you throw in some psychological need some seem to have that their experience 'must' have been a UFO, and refusal to countenance any other explanation...that's the point where I think the subject died a death a long time ago.

 

[DaveG]

These instances happen so often that I have lost all faith in the ability of people to accurately convey what they saw. And when you throw in some psychological need some seem to have that their experience 'must' have been a UFO, and refusal to countenance any other explanation...that's the point where I think the subject died a death a long time ago.

Again, this is making a sweeping generalization. that there's an inability in all individuals to accurately communicate their observations. While the majority of observers may exhibit poor observational skills, it does not imply that all observers possess the same deficiency.

 

[Ann K]

Again, this is making a sweeping generalization. that there's an inability in all individuals to accurately communicate their observations. While the majority of observers may exhibit poor observational skills, it does not imply that all observers possess the same deficiency.

You've mis-stated his comments. He didn't say "all people". He said "all faith". I think none of us here want to take a verbal account of a UFO "on faith"; on Metabunk, we want to ask a lot of questions when people present unusual claims, and that's as it should be.

 

[DaveG]

You've mis-stated his comments. He didn't say "all people". He said "all faith". I think none of us here want to take a verbal account of a UFO "on faith"; on Metabunk, we want to ask a lot of questions when people present unusual claims, and that's as it should be.

You think I don't feel dejected too when I constantly see people posting bugs, birds and balloons? If we focus on those examples of people with poor observational skills, and draw conclusions based on those, natually we'll conclude they're all rubbish. And I agree, when an exrtodinary claim is put forth, we should ask as many questions as possible to be certain there was no misidentification.

 

[chrismissal]

I wonder what percentage of major UFO experiences happen when someone is staring at the night sky? Are there cases where someone is going about their normal evening but sees something out a window and rushes outside, to find a giant triangle hovering above?

In my personal experience it's 3 for 3! Two siblings and I saw something visible in the sky some evening in or around 1999 when we were looking up in the evening. At the time we were quite certain it was something large and physical. We're all grounded rational people, and now we all just think it was some strange circular rainbow or refraction of some sort. I would love an answer, but I'm sure it's not new science.

 

[JMartJr]

While the majority of observers may exhibit poor observational skills, it does not imply that all observers possess the same deficiency.

Though it DOES demonstrate the important point that an extraordinary phenomenon is not necessary to generate an extraordinary report.
Which leaves open the possibility -- just the possibility, this is not proved -- that all of the extraordinary reports are being generated by mistaken observations of mundane phenomena, while the accurate observations of "I saw a Batman balloon" or "I saw a bunch of satellites flaring" are not being entered into the body of evidence for UFOs.

 

[Mendel]

while the accurate observations of "I saw a Batman balloon" or "I saw a bunch of satellites flaring" are not being entered into the body of evidence for UFOs.

It's the same reason we don't have clear pictures of UFOs.

 

[Ann K]

Though it DOES demonstrate the important point that an extraordinary phenomenon is not necessary to generate an extraordinary report.
Which leaves open the possibility -- just the possibility, this is not proved -- that all of the extraordinary reports are being generated by mistaken observations of mundane phenomena, while the accurate observations of "I saw a Batman balloon" or "I saw a bunch of satellites flaring" are not being entered into the body of evidence for UFOs.

We've been around the petunia patch with this before, but it bears repeating (and no, I don't remember on which particular thread): the claim has been made that "the accounts can't all be wrong", but IF THERE ARE NO extraterrestrial visitors, then it necessarily follows that EVERY such claim is incorrect/mistaken/a hoax. The same is true of "time travelers" or whatever other entities are postulated. And until shown otherwise, I'd venture to say the same is true of any claim of behavior that breaks our current understanding of the physical capabilities of solid objects in our atmosphere.

 

[DaveG]

Though it DOES demonstrate the important point that an extraordinary phenomenon is not necessary to generate an extraordinary report.

Obviously, and both skeptics and UFO researchers would agree on this point.

Which leaves open the possibility -- just the possibility, this is not proved -- that all of the extraordinary reports are being generated by mistaken observations of mundane phenomena

If that's what you want to hang your hat on, fine. I can tell you from personal experience though, that's not the case.

Though I'm a little confused as to what you mean by "the accurate observations of "I saw a Batman balloon" or "I saw a bunch of satellites flaring" are not being entered into the body of evidence for UFOs." Usually these would be the ones we discard no? as the majority of UFO reports turn out to be mundane, why include them?

 

[Mendel]

Though I'm a little confused as to what you mean by "the accurate observations of "I saw a Batman balloon" or "I saw a bunch of satellites flaring" are not being entered into the body of evidence for UFOs." Usually these would be the ones we discard no? as the majority of UFO reports turn out to be mundane, why include them?

Yes, that's the idea: accurate observations are being discarded, inaccurate observations become UFO evidence. UFO reports self-select for unreliable witnesses and blurry pictures.

 

[DaveG]

Yes, that's the idea: accurate observations are being discarded, inaccurate observations become UFO evidence. UFO reports self-select for unreliable witnesses and blurry pictures.

I understand your perspective, but by solely focusing on unreliable witnesses and blurry pictures, we unintentionally overlook the possibility of accurate observations.

 

[Edward Current]

I understand your perspective, but by solely focusing on unreliable witnesses and blurry pictures, we unintentionally overlook the possibility of accurate observations.

The whole topic of this thread is reports that are not misinterpretations of mundane objects (which "experiences specific to the observer" would preclude).

 

[John J.]

I've been thinking something similar specifically regarding the black triangles for a while. People are convinced they saw them (they "know what they saw"), but it's never corroborated by photos or independent testimony.

I've been wondering if the triangle shape has a specific neurological cause, like suddenly being able to see your blind spot, or something like is theorised with DMT geometric visions reflecting the actual shape or physical connections in the brain.

I think that's an interesting idea, but it must be unlikely that the majority of "black triangle witness" reports are due to a neuropharmacological or neurophysiological cause that the witnesses have in common.

Problems with a neurological factor as cause for "triangle" sightings are:

(1) Neuromedical conditions that affect low- or intermediate-level processing (e.g. a hypothetical "surplus" of a specific neurotransmitter, or simple [neuroanatomically limited] focal seizures) also tend to affect higher-level processing, with effects on behaviour, broader cognition and sometimes level of consciousness.
An observer might notice unusual symptoms, affect and/or behaviour in someone experiencing altered perception due to neuropharmacological/ neurophysiological causes.

(2) The black triangle "flap" in Belgium, around 1989-1992, and some reports of seemingly-similar craft in the USA, are largely geographically and historically isolated. It's unlikely that there is a neurological propensity for seeing black triangles that exists largely e.g. in the Belgian population (and distributed amongst Belgians who are not closely related AFAIK) and in a couple of pockets in the USA, that first emerged in 1989 but abated in two or three years.
(Wikipedia article, "Belgian UFO wave", https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belgian_UFO_wave).

The rapid emergence of black triangle reports in Belgium, November 1989, and their eventual reduction/ cessation in two or three years, is not compatible with any known neuropathology.
It is unlikely that a disparate group, largely in one nation, would experience the onset of a highly specific symptom- seeing a flying black triangle- without any other symptoms or deficits, effectively at the same time, and that this condition would spontaneously disappear within three years.
It must also be unlikely that all the witnesses consumed a recreational drug, or were exposed to a toxin or environmental stressor, that produced this one highly specific result (although illicit drug labs have inadvertently manufactured compounds with unexpected 'targeted' effects, think of the instant Parkinson's disease caused by MPTP- which selectively killed dopaminergic cells in the substantia nigra- in some Californian drug users in the '80s,
Wikipedia article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPTP).

(3) The black triangle witnesses saw their "UFOs" in the sky. They were not troubled by seeing black triangles on the pavement, bedroom ceiling or in shopping malls.
People using (e.g.) DMT can experience hallucinations wherever they look (AFAIK).
I guess we could invoke the vestibular system and theorise that some neurological effect was triggered when the head was tilted upward or something like that, but this seems an inelegant "patch" to the theory (and again, doesn't explain why "witnesses" didn't see triangles indoors, or did see triangles in the sky at apparently low elevations).

(4) The Kanizsa triangle is a figure used to demonstrate how we "see" illusory contours; it shows how our visual system helps us by "filling in the blanks" at a pre-conscious level .
But Kanizsa was not saying that we have a sub-system that preferentially sees triangles, although area V2 of the visual cortex plays a role in processing illusory contours, and V4 "recognises" simple shapes:

Unlike V2, V4 is tuned for object features of intermediate complexity, like simple geometric shapes, although no one has developed a full parametric description of the tuning space for V4.

From Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visual_cortex

We can see illusory contours in Kanizsa-style figures for many shapes, including complex forms.
Our ancestors could see a leopard partly "eclipsed" by tall grass, they didn't have to think about what the separate vertical "strips" of visible leopard represented.

There was some discussion on another thread here about how reports of UFOs have changed over time;
https://www.metabunk.org/threads/how-have-descriptions-of-uaps-changed-over-the-years.12619/

I strongly suspect that most UFO reports (excluding those which are deliberate deceptions) are misidentifications, mistaken recall, or less often, brief perceptual artefacts from sleep disturbance or originating from stress or even expectations.

Just as black triangles were "in vogue" in the late 80's, early 90's, "classic" flying saucers of the late 40's and 50's all looked a bit like how they were supposed to look- exactly like a gas lamp's top cover in some cases, like a hubcap in others.

The reported flying saucers were preceded by their illustrations on the bright SF pulp-magazine covers of the 1920's, 30's and 40's. The term "flying saucer", a journalist's misquote of Kenneth Arnold's 1947 description, seemed to tap into the imagination of (a section of) the public. Lots of flying saucer reports followed, first in the USA, later Canada, Europe and elsewhere.
Metabunker Duke raised the question- if Arnold's journalist had used a different description, would the subsequent UFO reports reflect that?

Black triangles came about not long after the F-117 Nighthawk was revealed, and there had been much speculation about even higher-tech US programs, "Aurora", and "TR-3B" (as mentioned by this thread's OP)

It often has a "TR-3B" description of a black triangle with lights

I'm not suggesting that "black triangle" reports were the result of sighting these aircraft (though maybe some were), more that there was a cultural impression of secret, hi-tech aircraft being black deltas. This might, at some level, have influenced witnesses
(and there's the Star Wars Imperial Star Destroyer- admittedly not black).

I think- as Edward Current suggested, IIRC- that there is a very strong cultural/ social influence on UFO reports.

 

[Ann K]

I'm not suggesting that "black triangle" reports were the result of sighting these aircraft (though maybe some were), more that there was a cultural impression of secret, hi-tech aircraft being black deltas. This might, at some level, have influenced witnesses
(and there's the Star Wars Imperial Star Destroyer- admittedly not black).

I think- as Edward Current suggested, IIRC- that there is a very strong cultural/ social influence on UFO reports.

There's also the simpler fact that three things make a triangle. If there were something like four moving lights in the sky, they might briefly look like a rectangle, but small changes in their position could quickly dispel the illusion. But three corners to a triangle gives an illusion that's likely to last longer, as it might just look like a triangle in a slightly different orientation.

 

[Mendel]

I understand your perspective, but by solely focusing on unreliable witnesses and blurry pictures, we unintentionally overlook the possibility of accurate observations.

If that's all what we have, that's all we can focus on.

 

[Ann K]

As Scaramanga said in post #53 "Personally I've become sick and tired of the entire 'I know what I saw' trope. in response to some people not being able to recognize the moon being obscured by clouds.

But this is what's know as a hasty generalization, or an unrepresentative or biased sample. There is a flood of misidenifications now everyone is carrying a smartphone. If you draw conclusions based solely off of poor observers, you're going to misinterpret the data and draw the wrong conclusion.

I will bet that for almost every UFO sighting, there's a person who said "I know what I saw". And as we have debunked a good many of them with solid data and far more plausible explanations, the fact remains that for a good many people, their confidence in their own senses was misplaced.

The only way we have to distinguish between "good observers" and "poor observers" is to analyze the sighting independently without placing 100% confidence in the reporter. That's not an insult to the person who reports a UFO, just a recognition that our senses are fallible.

 

[jarlrmai]

Black triangles are really mostly reported/described by being 3 or more lights in a triangle shape rather than and actual black triangle, my view is they are probably aircraft lights which often form a triangular shape.

We have a whole sticky thread about it

https://www.metabunk.org/threads/identifying-landing-lights-reported-as-ufos.5199/

 

[JMartJr]

Though I'm a little confused as to what you mean by "the accurate observations of "I saw a Batman balloon" or "I saw a bunch of satellites flaring" are not being entered into the body of evidence for UFOs."

The ones which are accurately observed, where the observer says "Oh, look, a Batman balloon!" do not become UFO reports and do not get entered into the lore. The ones which are observed inaccurately, where the observer says "That is an odd looking thing, I wonder what it is, maybe it is a UFO, I think I'll post pictures of it on YouTube or send a video to the local news!" get entered into the lore, and tend to remain there even after us curmudgeonly old debunkers point out the string hanging off the bottom or how you can make out the word "Batman" written across it.

In other words, IF there is no new phenomenon going on, just mis-observed or misidentified mundane stuff, then all the stuff that is not in the Low Information Zone, that can be seen clearly, that is well and accurately observed is not reported as a UFO -- and all UFO reports* are due to observer error, or phenomena unknown to the observer but not to "science." There is, IF this is the case, no signal, it's all noise.

But note the "IF" there, while I suspect that may be the case, I don't know that it is.

*Barring hoaxes or hallucinations, I suppose.

 

[JMartJr]

(2) The black triangle "flap" in Belgium, around 1989-1992, and some reports of seemingly-similar craft in the USA, are largely geographically and historically isolated.

You'd need to consider that REPORTS of seeing a black triangle might not be the same thing as people SEEING a black triangle. A flap is a situation where hoaxers may want to get in on the fun, or distant lights might be assumed to be one of those triangles everybody is talking about. Once a UFO shape becomes a meme, people who make up stories or who use the stories to process what they are experiencing will use that shape. See also: flying saucers, orbs, tick-tacks.

 

[Edward Current]

Problems with a neurological factor as cause for "triangle" sightings are:

(1) Neuromedical conditions that affect low- or intermediate-level processing (e.g. a hypothetical "surplus" of a specific neurotransmitter, or simple [neuroanatomically limited] focal seizures) also tend to affect higher-level processing, with effects on behaviour, broader cognition and sometimes level of consciousness.
An observer might notice unusual symptoms, affect and/or behaviour in someone experiencing altered perception due to neuropharmacological/ neurophysiological causes.

(2) The black triangle "flap" in Belgium, around 1989-1992, and some reports of seemingly-similar craft in the USA, are largely geographically and historically isolated. It's unlikely that there is a neurological propensity for seeing black triangles that exists largely e.g. in the Belgian population (and distributed amongst Belgians who are not closely related AFAIK) and in a couple of pockets in the USA, that first emerged in 1989 but abated in two or three years.
(Wikipedia article, "Belgian UFO wave", https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belgian_UFO_wave).

The rapid emergence of black triangle reports in Belgium, November 1989, and their eventual reduction/ cessation in two or three years, is not compatible with any known neuropathology.
It is unlikely that a disparate group, largely in one nation, would experience the onset of a highly specific symptom- seeing a flying black triangle- without any other symptoms or deficits, effectively at the same time, and that this condition would spontaneously disappear within three years.
It must also be unlikely that all the witnesses consumed a recreational drug, or were exposed to a toxin or environmental stressor, that produced this one highly specific result (although illicit drug labs have inadvertently manufactured compounds with unexpected 'targeted' effects, think of the instant Parkinson's disease caused by MPTP- which selectively killed dopaminergic cells in the substantia nigra- in some Californian drug users in the '80s,
Wikipedia article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPTP).

(3) The black triangle witnesses saw their "UFOs" in the sky. They were not troubled by seeing black triangles on the pavement, bedroom ceiling or in shopping malls.
People using (e.g.) DMT can experience hallucinations wherever they look (AFAIK).
I guess we could invoke the vestibular system and theorise that some neurological effect was triggered when the head was tilted upward or something like that, but this seems an inelegant "patch" to the theory (and again, doesn't explain why "witnesses" didn't see triangles indoors, or did see triangles in the sky at apparently low elevations).

These are great points and make me re-think the neurochemistry hypothesis. Surely at least some of the major, life-changing UFO experiences initiated from ~3 mundane lights in the sky.

There's also the simpler fact that three things make a triangle. If there were something like four moving lights in the sky, they might briefly look like a rectangle, but small changes in their position could quickly dispel the illusion. But three corners to a triangle gives an illusion that's likely to last longer, as it might just look like a triangle in a slightly different orientation.

This is very insightful, and ripe for experimentation. If we have 3 lights in a black field, and 1 or 2 of them move randomly but smoothly, how much more likely are observers to describe them as a triangular object, compared with having 4 lights in a black field, and 1 or 2 of them move randomly but smoothly, being described as a rectangular object?

This effect was one of the undoings of the Twentynine Palms sightings: There were 5 lights, and 1 of them drifted much more than the others, and it became clear this could not be a solid object with lights on it. (Still, that did not stop at least one person from claiming the object had merely changed orientation! Womp womp.)

However, none of this addresses some of the details that I included in the OP, such as the semi-transparency of the black object seen over Los Angeles, or the warping/lensing of the background described in other such sightings, and similar details that go beyond a mere black triangle. Also, some of the black triangle recollections do not include lights.

Which leads me to another hypothesis: memory embellishment. These details, and perhaps even the loss of the lights in the recollections, may be embellishments of the memory over time. Experiencers will declare, "I know what I remember seeing!" but of course a person cannot compare what they remember today to what they remembered 5 minutes after the event (unless there's a narrated video or an immediately written-down account, which is rare).

Thus we'd have cases that are initially rooted in objective reality, while the astonishing details of the experience are indeed specific to the observer.

 

[tinkertailor]

Neuromedical conditions that affect low- or intermediate-level processing (e.g. a hypothetical "surplus" of a specific neurotransmitter, or simple [neuroanatomically limited] focal seizures) also tend to affect higher-level processing, with effects on behaviour, broader cognition and sometimes level of consciousness.

Where is your evidence for this? There are a plethora of neurological conditions that affect very specific actions in the brain. For example, the location of a stroke in the brain generally determines the effect on function, language, cognition, etc. You get a stroke in one part of your brain and expressive language is affected, whereas a similar lesion may affect vision if it's in another place. The brain's functions are highly localized, so smaller lesions will affect more specific functions. A more broad lesion or damage to the brain may affect different functions. Plus, some everyone's brain is wired differently so you never know how they'll be affected by a condition or trauma. The Man Who Mistook His Wife For a Hat is a great time on the general weirdness of brains, I recommend it!

 

[Scaramanga]

Again, this is making a sweeping generalization. that there's an inability in all individuals to accurately communicate their observations. While the majority of observers may exhibit poor observational skills, it does not imply that all observers possess the same deficiency.

It is far more of a sweeping generalisation to use Nick Pope's infamous 'trained observers' as some sort of guideline. 'All' people may not have poor observational skills but 'all' people DO make mistakes some of the time and are prone to inaccuracy. Anyone is capable of making a mistake, even the 'trained observers'. And there only needs to be one mistake for a 'UFO' report to arise.

There is no such thing as an observer who is 100% accurate and reliable all the time. And it is high time the 'trained observers' were laid to rest.

 

[Scaramanga]

However, none of this addresses some of the details that I included in the OP, such as the semi-transparency of the black object seen over Los Angeles, or the warping/lensing of the background described in other such sightings, and similar details that go beyond a mere black triangle. Also, some of the black triangle recollections do not include lights.

Insofar as the ones with lights are concerned....well of course 3 lights are going to form a triangle, by definition. So basically any set of 3 lights can be converted into a 'triangular craft'...even if there is no actual craft there.

Semi transparency is easily explained by the brain 'filling in' the detail. There's numerous optical illusions where the brain fills in details...such as the one below...where there really is no 'triangle' at all....

 

[Edward Current]

Semi transparency is easily explained by the brain 'filling in' the detail. There's numerous optical illusions where the brain fills in details...such as the one below...where there really is no 'triangle' at all....

View attachment 60314

This isn't a fair comparison, though — we're talking about the phenomenology of three lights in the sky, not 3 carefully arranged Pac-Men accompanied by 3 carefully arranged V's.

 

[Edward Current]

Here is a quick attempt to compare 3 lights and 4 lights. On the left side, only 1 "light" moves; on the right, 3 "lights" move. The upper right example creates a strong sense of rotation (which was not my intent) and is considerably more "astonishing" than its 4-light counterpart below it.

More astonishing effects could be created by using actual lights on a black field rather than white dots on a screen: larger dynamic range, introduction of glare, etc.