Major UFO experiences are specific to the observer

[Scaramanga]

I came across this illusion on Facebook, and I think it's closely related to the discussion of interpreting giant triangular craft from three lights in the sky (discussed in this thread e.g. here):

I think it's more profoundly absurd and basic even than that. I think a segment of the population simply don't realise that 3 lights will produce a triangle by default. I mean, there is no other shape that 3 lights can produce ( except in the rare case of all being in a straight line ).

 

[Mendel]

I mean, there is no other shape that 3 lights can produce ( except in the rare case of all being in a straight line ).

Generally, yes, but e.g. the 3 lights on the MH370 "portal" circle.

 

[Edward Current]

I think it's more profoundly absurd and basic even than that. I think a segment of the population simply don't realise that 3 lights will produce a triangle by default. I mean, there is no other shape that 3 lights can produce ( except in the rare case of all being in a straight line ).

These people remember seeing much more detail than just 3 lights. I don't think that phenomenon should be dismissed.

The thing is, if there are three lights in the sky, most people will see three lights and get on with their evening. A very few people see something in addition to three lights that changes their lives, and it seems like those folks are the most hardcore UFO believers out there ("I know what I saw!"). That experience is what's specific to the observer.

 

[Ann K]

A very few people see something in addition to three lights that changes their lives, and it seems like those folks are the most hardcore UFO believers out there ("I know what I saw!"). That experience is what's specific to the observer.

Agreed, but I'm not sure about a single event that "changes their lives" thing. We have seen examples in these pages and elsewhere (sorry, don't have the references at my fingertips) of people who report the sighting of UFOs multiple times. That suggests to me that either they are already strong believers who see a "UFO" every time they spot a light in the sky or a bug on the lens, or they are simply people who like getting their names in the papers. It's hard to distinguish between the two.

 

[John J.]

(Continuing discussion about Farmington, 1950, from "The Ariel School, Zimbabwe UFO sighting" thread).

Possibly it was cottonwood tree seeds? In my experience, cotton seeds don't fly much. Just mentioning it as it might aid in finding the source to include "tree?"

Quite possibly, I'm not familiar with either.
(A few minutes later) Ah, found this, a NICAP article dated 08 November 2013, by Fran Ridge, https://www.nicap.org/reports/500316farmington_report2.htm

Thatcher emphatically denied an earlier report that the objects could have been small pieces of cotton fuzz floating in the atmosphere.

"It was not cotton," he said, "I saw several pieces of cotton fuzz floating around in the air at the time, but I was not sighting on any cotton."

The "cotton" report was started by State Patrolman Andy Andrews, who quoted several Farmington Residents as asserting it was cotton they saw. The residents denied Andrew's report.

The article also says

High winds and a dust storm prevented clear vision.

As at Ariel school, the accounts contain perhaps more variation than we might reasonably expect from witnesses seeing the same things;

One witness did a triangulation sighting on one of the objects... ...and estimated its size as approximately twice that of a B-29.
... ...
Marlow Webb... ...said the objects to the naked eye appeared to be about eight inches in diameter as seen from the ground. He described them as about the size of a dinner plate."

I've already speculated that floating spider silk (from ballooning/migrating spiders) is a better fit than cottonwood fluff in this case.

Maybe. I'm starting to wonder if people were just seeing any windblown debris, and due to the "spirit of the time" some thought, flying saucers.
The various online summaries all seem to use the same handful (well, perhaps 10 - 12) witness accounts, some given many years after the event, though there were supposedly many hundreds of witnesses. Even those accounts differ substantially; and one is from a then- 8 year-old boy who was at school in a different town; UFOs "from horizon to horizon"... but no-one else in Aztec noticed, it seems.*

A guy working at a car dealership in Farmington was told by someone they had seen "saucer-shaped objects",

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.

"Farmington reaches 70th anniversary of mass UFO sighting", Mike Easterling, Farmington Daily Times on Bearswire website https://bearswire-eu.usatoday.com/s...illed-skies-above-farmington-1950/5073795002/

If the objects were observable heading in the same direction for 10-15 minutes, that might be hard to reconcile with other estimates (altitude 2.000 feet, 15,000 feet or 20,000 feet; speed "more than 1000 miles an hour", "10 times faster than... jet planes" (NICAP article).

Also from the Farmington Daily Times anniversary article,

Zang Wood, former president of the San Juan County Historical Society, was a Farmington High School student in the fall of 1950 and said he never saw a thing.

"A lot of kids said they did," he said. "I don't know if it was mass hysteria or what."

*Maybe the people of Aztec were a bit more blasé about UFOs, having experienced a blatant hoax by con men flying saucer crash in 1948, Wikipedia, "Aztec crashed saucer hoax" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aztec_crashed_saucer_hoax

 

[NorCal Dave]

*Maybe the people of Aztec were a bit more blasé about UFOs, having experienced a blatant hoax by con men flying saucer crash in 1948, Wikipedia, "Aztec crashed saucer hoax"

The problem here, is that Aztec NM has failed to capitalize on this supposed "mass sighting". The wife and I were just checking on the schedule for this years McMinnville UFO festival to see if we wanted to do a repeat visit. Far from a mas sighting, McMinnville's UFO claim to fame is a couple of likely hoaxed photos from the '50s that were found under the couch. Like Roswell or the Mothman festival, Aztec needs to step up their game.

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

From reading the thread I think @Edward Current's theory is possible for some cases, but if so, then it's an undiscovered phenomenon.
I don't know if that could be caused by the DMT produced in the brain, that would have to be demonstrated in some way.
Let's forget the "distant dots" misinterpreted by many inexperienced skywatchers (and some experienced ones) for a second.
If we take those "incredible experience" cases, with lots of details that seem "alien" or "high strangeness", then we have the following prosaic explanations already:
- hallucination due to stress
- hallucination due to psychosis
- hallucination due to mind altering drugs
- "genuine/good faith" hoaxes, and simply embellished memories (people who want to believe so desperately that convince themselves they've seen something extraordinary when they didn't)
- real hoaxes (liars, for money, notoriety, being accepted on a community)
- real weird planes and experimental classified aircraft (no anti gravity here, just unusual planes)

I've met some people with crazy experiences who do not believe in aliens, stories, and generally don't care about the subject (but note, they're not usually skywatchers either).
If those people were not hallucinating and were not totally inaccurate with their description, then I don't know in which category of the above they could fall in, as some of them really seem genuine in their experiences.
I see why some FBI reports in UFO cases say "the witness was credible", because some witnesses are credible.
But then there is almost no way to debunk and figure out exactly what they saw.
Especially if there's not real evidence to corroborate their sighting, like videos and photos.
My personal idea is that unless you're dealing with a crazy religious alien believer, then a single "hallucination" in the brain has to be explained and somewhat taken more seriously if they never experience anything similar again in their lives.

 

[Todd Feinman]

If those people were not hallucinating and were not totally inaccurate with their description, then I don't know in which category of the above they could fall in, as some of them really seem genuine in their experiences.

In my case, I've taken drugs in the past and I can assure you it was not a hallucination. Others saw them later. Almost identical descriptions. It happened, but there's nothing physical left to test.

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

In my case, I've taken drugs in the past and I can assure you it was not a hallucination. Others saw them later. Almost identical descriptions. It happened, but there's nothing physical left to test.

Sadly, no amount of weed made me see UFOs.
Should I upgrade to something heavier?
(JOKING)

 

[Todd Feinman]

The Sadly, no amount of weed made me see UFOs.
Should I upgrade to something heavier?
(JOKING)

Yep. LSD won't do it, etc. I've tried to see physical hallucinations under the influence and I just can't see them. It's very clear what is drug-induced hallucinations and what isn't. If I wanted to make up UFO stories for skeptics, I could have come up with more convincing ones, too..

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

Yep. LSD won't do it, etc. I've tried to see physical hallucinations under the influence and I just can't see them. It's very clear what is drug-induced hallucinations and what isn't. If I wanted to make up UFO stories for skeptics, I could have come up with more convincing ones, too..

Yeah some people assume that if you take LSD then you become delirious, which isn't the case.
Psychedelic hallucinations are generally incomparable to psychosis, there are however other drugs such as Stramonium which can make you see people that are not there, and why not aliens and demons.
The problem is that you can become oblivious to the fact that you're under the influence, and cannot distinguish real from fantasy anymore until the effect wears off.
Can happen with LSD and massive doses, but that doesn't generally translate to UFO reports.

 

[Todd Feinman]

It's also interesting that many folks on this forum seem to have had a long and deep interest in UFOs; I haven't. I haven't read all the books, etc. I occasionally picked up books of cases just for fun. I posted nothing about UFOs online before 2011.

 

[NorCal Dave]

My personal idea is that unless you're dealing with a crazy religious alien believer, then a single "hallucination" in the brain has to be explained and somewhat taken more seriously if they never experience anything similar again in their lives.

I wouldn't discount misinterpretation and memory as possibly more likely than full "hallucinations". Sometimes we see something and aren't sure what we saw, then our memory further complicates the situation. Case in point, Tuesday morning's walk:

We were at the end of our walk, just starting up the last little climb where the road crests in front of us. Maybe 100 yards/~100m or less. To the right of the knoll, it rolls down into the neighbors yard, to the left, there is thick brush. As were heading towards the knoll, we see a critter at the top. Something like this, with red x the location:

My wife said: "That looks like Lucus", the neighbors big black Doberman. It was standing perpendicular to us, so looking straight at us. I thought it looked like Lucus to, with the long head. The sun was to the left in the photo, so he was basically a silhouette. But then I thought, that's a long way from home for Lucus, he would have come up his long driveway and then up the road that's behind the knoll, 5-600 yards/~m or more. And he's getting old.

Then the critter turned and was now in profile as it headed into the brush to the left. Both of us stopped walking and said, "Shit!, That looks like a mountain lion". But that would mean we both perceived the face to be much more cat-like, than dog-like in profile. Then we both commented that the tail was wrong, it was too short and stubby, but still bigger than Lucus' nearly non-existent tail. Bobcat? Seemed too big for that, we've had bobcats around occasionally. As we watched, it headed off into the brush to the left.

Now proceeding slowly, as that's the way home, we continued to look to the left and into the brush trying to figure out what we saw. As we got closer to the top of the knoll, the nearby neighbor's dog, Minni, came up from the right and barked at us, as she does. As I looked at her, I noticed she has a short stubby tail, like a bobcat, but a pointed face like a dog. Had we confabulated the cat-like face in profile for some reason? But she was over here to my right, in her yard and whatever we saw had just headed into the brush the opposite direction.

Now 2 days later, not only do we not know what we saw, we're not sure what we remember seeing. Was it dog-like head on and cat-like in profile? Both? Neither? I just don't know. We don't always perceive things correctly, even at the moment, and then our memories of perception becomes scrambled. I don't think it was a hallucination of some kind, we both saw and perceived something similar, but we're not sure what.

Lucus?

Maybe, but he was further from his home than he usually wonders, going to the left would have taken him further from home and we would have seen him making his way back home as we finished our walk. And as he was looking towards us, he normally would just wait for us to get to him. He's a sweetheart.

Mountain Lion?

Mountain Lions have a distinctive long tail, and we both remember this thing having a short stubby tail. An injured Mountain Lion is possible I suppose.

Bobcat?

I'm leaning that way. We've seen them before at our place. Maybe the angle, with the cat being at the top of the knoll make us perceive it bigger than it was. But it would mean we miss-perceived the snout when it was facing us and we thought it might be Lucus.

One other possibility, is the other dog, Minni. Perhaps we saw her at the crest of the knoll, and for whatever reason, she went into the brush, away from home, then circled back to her own yard on the back side of the knoll out of site to us. As we (in blue) looked to the left, she (in red) had come around and up from the right:

Honestly, we're not sure what it was. It's just the way our brains work, they're not like film or digital recording devices. They often use shortcuts to interpret the visual information that comes in. We don't see, like a camera, we perceive. If at first, the critter resembled Lucus, our brains took a short-cut and filled in Lucus on the knoll. As it turned, our brains were forced to rework that. Not Lucus, but maybe still perceived as the size of Lucus. A cat-like profile the size of doberman equals a mountain lion. Then our brains perceive that the tail doesn't match our notion of a mountain lion, so it starts to fill in bobcat, but still perceived as the size of Lucus. Then the memory of all that gets even more convoluted.

 

[jackfrostvc]

One of the most posted thing you will see on UFO forums goes something like this.
I dont care if this story we are talking about is real or not , it doesn't matter. I've seen a UFO in person and I know because of that the phenomena is real.

Usually, they have no proof (photos etc). But, once in a while they do.
And this is where it gets interesting.

I've seen someone absolutely sure he filmed UAP'(s). I saw his video, it was clearly fly's buzzying around - you could see their wings. But he was absolutely certain it was UAP's. Another example is the guy that filmed "saucers" in melbourne australia, "knew what he saw". That turned out to be just a blurred pic of the red roulette aircrafts. But he said that was not true as, "he knew what he saw"

This thing plagues UFOology, there is this baseline of people that absolutely believe, because they claim to have seen something. Usually they dont have evidence, but when they do, often it's puzzling to me why they believe what they saw was some alien craft or something.

 

[jarlrmai]

A large number of Reddit UFOs sighting reports are from people who WANT to have seen a UFO (in the sense of an alien spaceship) the language they use, the way they equivocate when the explanation is presented with painstaking detail, the way they often ignore requests for more data.

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

A large number of Reddit UFOs sighting reports are from people who WANT to have seen a UFO (in the sense of an alien spaceship) the language they use, the way they equivocate when the explanation is presented with painstaking detail, the way they often ignore requests for more data.

UFO Redditors =/= credible stories

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

One of the most posted thing you will see on UFO forums goes something like this.
I dont care if this story we are talking about is real or not , it doesn't matter. I've seen a UFO in person and I know because of that the phenomena is real.

Usually, they have no proof (photos etc). But, once in a while they do.
And this is where it gets interesting.

I've seen someone absolutely sure he filmed UAP'(s). I saw his video, it was clearly fly's buzzying around - you could see their wings. But he was absolutely certain it was UAP's. Another example is the guy that filmed "saucers" in melbourne australia, "knew what he saw". That turned out to be just a blurred pic of the red roulette aircrafts. But he said that was not true as, "he knew what he saw"

This thing plagues UFOology, there is this baseline of people that absolutely believe, because they claim to have seen something. Usually they dont have evidence, but when they do, often it's puzzling to me why they believe what they saw was some alien craft or something.

Not all people who saw and reported UFOs are necessarily into ufology and aliens, but soon enough the grifters will contact those people, if they come out publicly, put them on a podcast about aliens, and the whole thing goes on forever.

 

[JMartJr]

often it's puzzling to me why they believe what they saw was some alien craft or something.

..is, I think, the short-form. But it is also going to be a bit embarrassing to admit that your amazing video of aliens from Omicron Persei 8 is just some flies, and such.

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

View attachment 92299
..is, I think, the short-form. But it is also going to be a bit embarrassing to admit that your amazing video of aliens from Omicron Persei 8 is just some flies, and such.

Oh my god that's the Sport Model created by the incredible (non credible) Bob!

 

[NorCal Dave]

Usually they dont have evidence, but when they do, often it's puzzling to me why they believe what they saw was some alien craft or something.

Just me, but I would think there's a number of reasons. One group already, for various reasons, believe in alien visitation, so anything perceived as unusual, is seen as confirmation. Betty Hill famously in later years would comment on all kinds of mundane things like airplanes and even streetlights as alien UFOs. It was so much a part of who she was, she saw UFOs everywhere.

This isn't limited to just UFOs, it's a natural human response. Anthropologist Betty Meggers is a similar example. She was a pioneer, especially for women in the field:

Betty Meggers received her PhD in 1952, at which time women were candidates for a mere 10 percent of the doctoral degrees awarded in the United States.

https://siarchives.si.edu/blog/betty-j-meggers-pioneer-environmental-archaeology

She and her husband went on to due field work in Amazonia eventually concluding that the Amazon river basin could not sustain the type of populations needed to move beyond small bands of hunter-gathers and that any cultural remains must have been from outpost settlements of Andean cultures like the Inca:

Through the examination of soil, which was found to be thin and lacking nutrients, Meggers and Evans concluded the intense climate of the rainforest could not have nurtured the levels of agricultural production necessary to sustain permanent settlements, and proposed residents of the highland areas created only temporary, seasonal habitations on the rain forest floor.

https://siarchives.si.edu/blog/betty-j-meggers-pioneer-environmental-archaeolog

While this may have made sense to them in the '50s, by the '80s and '90s archaeologists like Anna Roosevelt strongly challenged Meggers conclusions. Archaeologist Tim Dillihey and others have shown that Amazonia was full of advanced cultures, with sophisticated agricultural practices they just didn't grow the typical crops or leave large stone monuments. Meggers maintained her office at the Smithsonian for most of her life, and never, ever, gave any credence to the evidence others had produced for decades. She had her theory and no one was ever able to change her mind on it, at least not publicly. This is a scientist that is supposed to follow the data, but her personal beliefs and investment in her previous work caused her to just ignore it.

How much more so for those invested in UFOs for any number of reasons.

Then there are those that have perceived something that they feel is greater than what's presented as the evidence. The experience was greater and more profound that what the video relates. Thus, pointing out the video is just an identified aircraft, isn't just an explanation, is an undoing of an experience, possibly a profound one. It's not just debunking a video, it's debunking a personal claim.

Obviously, some just want their video to be a UFO. One doesn't generate clicks and engagement with a video of an old Cessna buzzing around. UFOs do.

 

[Smythe Bacchus]

Just having some fun devising pithy statements.

The various online summaries all seem to use the same handful (well, perhaps 10 - 12) witness accounts, some given many years after the event, though there were supposedly many hundreds of witnesses. Even those accounts differ substantially; and one is from a then- 8 year-old boy who was at school in a different town

Both children and adults can be susceptible witnesses. Shoddy investigators need it.

In my case, I've taken drugs in the past and I can assure you it was not a hallucination. Others saw them later. Almost identical descriptions. It happened, but there's nothing physical left to test.

Testimony with date, time, location and direction may lead you to testable evidence.

It's also interesting that many folks on this forum seem to have had a long and deep interest in UFOs; I haven't.

Interest is to enthusiasm as skepticism is to science. They are better paired together.

Sometimes we see something and aren't sure what we saw, then our memory further complicates the situation.

Humans are instinctive pattern recognition, interpolation, and extrapolation engines.

it's puzzling to me why they believe what they saw was some alien craft or something.

"Possession is nine-tenths of the law", implies that perception is nine-tenths of reality.

A large number of Reddit UFOs sighting reports are from people who WANT to have seen a UFO

When perception is nine-tenths of reality, then belief is nine-tenths of your perception.

Not all people who saw and reported UFOs are necessarily into ufology and aliens, but soon enough the grifters will contact those people, if they come out publicly, put them on a podcast

Clickbait was the grifters hook long before the term existed. To name it is to know it.

But it is also going to be a bit embarrassing to admit that your amazing video of aliens from Omicron Persei 8 is just some flies, and such.

People rarely welcome questioning of their beliefs, because it questions their reality.

This is a scientist that is supposed to follow the data, but her personal beliefs and investment in her previous work caused her to just ignore it.

Science that does not follow all evidence without fear or favor ceases to be science.

 

[Kyle Ferriter]

UFO Redditors =/= credible stories

I think there's fundamentally no difference.

There is very little real difference between someone on Reddit saying they watched the sky and saw many unexplained anomalous craft flying over some night, and Jake Barber or Lue Elizondo or some other person who happened to have some government job title saying a similar thing.

Over and over I see appeals to credentials or incredulity like "there's no way X person could make Y mistake". And I literally just discard it out of hand. This same argument is used over and over again and we keep seeing it being laughably wrong, but it keeps being invoked. We see pilots and members of the US Air Force and coast guard and navy make foolish mistakes. Job titles are worth very little. But many people seem to put immense weight in them sometimes, and zero or negative weight in them other times. The title is not a useful metric. The evidence being referred to is what's valuable.

We see people who literally live next to one of the world's most busy airports, literally under one of the busy approach paths, look at and film an large passenger airliner, and think it's anomalous technology. Then they say oh I live near an airport so I know what an airplane looks like. But clearly they don't!

This sort of incredulity about errors can and should be ridiculed and discarded.

If you have an "incredible" story to tell you should bring something compelling to the table or you should accept that you will be ridiculed, justifiable so. "I know what I saw wasn't mundane" is essentially worthless.

Edit:

I'll add that there's a guy in X popular in ufo twitter who says he worked in meteorology for the USAF who continues over the course of multiple years now to film satellite and distant aircraft and think he's filmed something incredible or spiritual responding to his mental prayer or some sort of summoning technique.

Then there's the Skywatcher "psionics" discussed extensively elsewhere here. These are people with weighty credentials who have managed to convince many others including people with higher public profiles like Garry Nolan and Ross Coulthart, that their storoes are real. But they simply aren't. And a very basic level of critical thinking and investigation applied to the raw facts and data of their claims very easily proves that.

 

[Fritzkquzerk]

I think there's fundamentally no difference.

There is very little real difference between someone on Reddit saying they watched the sky and saw many unexplained anomalous craft flying over some night, and Jake Barber or Lue Elizondo or some other person who happened to have some government job title saying a similar thing.

Over and over I see appeals to credentials or incredulity like "there's no way X person could make Y mistake". And I literally just discard it out of hand. This same argument is used over and over again and we keep seeing it being laughably wrong, but it keeps being invoked. We see pilots and members of the US Air Force and coast guard and navy make foolish mistakes. Job titles are worth very little. But many people seem to put immense weight in them sometimes, and zero or negative weight in them other times. The title is not a useful metric. The evidence being referred to is what's valuable.

We see people who literally live next to one of the world's most busy airports, literally under one of the busy approach paths, look at and film an large passenger airliner, and think it's anomalous technology. Then they say oh I live near an airport so I know what an airplane looks like. But clearly they don't!

This sort of incredulity about errors can and should be ridiculed and discarded.

If you have an "incredible" story to tell you should bring something compelling to the table or you should accept that you will be ridiculed, justifiable so. "I know what I saw wasn't mundane" is essentially worthless.

Edit:

I'll add that there's a guy in X popular in ufo twitter who says he worked in meteorology for the USAF who continues over the course of multiple years now to film satellite and distant aircraft and think he's filmed something incredible or spiritual responding to his mental prayer or some sort of summoning technique.

Then there's the Skywatcher "psionics" discussed extensively elsewhere here. These are people with weighty credentials who have managed to convince many others including people with higher public profiles like Garry Nolan and Ross Coulthart, that their storoes are real. But they simply aren't. And a very basic level of critical thinking and investigation applied to the raw facts and data of their claims very easily proves that.

What I meant is that reading random reports on Reddit is practically useless.
The government videos are most likely all prosaic but at least there's something to analyze, sometimes.
And generally we don't expect official military videos to be hoaxes.
Can't be said for just stories on the internet, whether they come from Reddit or Twitter.
I'd much rather read a report from AARO than stories from Reddit.

 

[Smythe Bacchus]

I'll add that there's a guy in X popular in ufo twitter who says he worked in meteorology for the USAF who continues over the course of multiple years now to film satellite and distant aircraft and think he's filmed something incredible or spiritual responding to his mental prayer or some sort of summoning technique.

The common theme with "experiencers" is poor or zero effort to use date, time, location, and direction to objectively try and identify what they saw. It is replaced by a mental leap into "I know what I saw was not natural or human" territory.

Testimony of experiencers often mixes what was observed with speculation and emotions in a way that can make it difficult to interpret. The clue is in how these witnesses describe themselves as "experiencers", and that is what makes it real.

An experiencer may ask others to do the work to find a prosaic explanation. The thought process appears to be "I don't have to investigate it, because I know it was otherworldly. I challenge you to prove otherwise, since I expect you to fail",

The implication being the allegedly otherworldly phenomenon will defy all conventional methods of investigation so skeptics can go waste their time.
(And maybe become converts to a new reality in the process)

There appears to be consistency to this behaviour, regardless of whether the experiencer has a background in art, humanities, science, or engineering.

 

[JMartJr]

And generally we don't expect official military videos to be hoaxes.

We probably need to be aware, though, that after a call went out to send on your strange videos this may have changed a bit. This encourages a subtle sort of hoaxing, or at least something that is hoax-adjacent -- that is, it incentivized sending in something, including things that were recognized but look a little odd, so might a well send it in, or even to play "this tethered surveillance balloon looks weird i this video, let's see if the 'experts' can figure this one out!" That is, not hoaxed in the sense of having been faked, but hoax-ish in terms of sending video of known objects to the UAP investigators.

 

[MapperGuy]

We probably need to be aware, though, that after a call ent out to send on your strange videos this may have changed a bit. This encourages a subtle sort of hoaxing, or at least something that is hoax-adjcent -- that is, it incentivized sending in something, including things that were recognized but look a little odd, so might a well send it in, or even to play "this tethered surveilance balloon looks weird i this video, let's see if the 'experts' can figure this one out!" That is, not hoaxed in the sense of having been faked, but hoax-ish in terms of sending video of known objects to the UAP investigators.

When you ask for 'odd looking things' you should expect to receive at least a few videos that the sender knows exactly what it is, but is not telling you what it is.

"Can you figure out what this is???" challenge puzzles, to be solved by the uninitiated.
So the sender can have a good laugh at all of the wrong answers.

Given that the senders know a lot more about the events surrounding the capture of these video than are being passed on, I would suspect that many senders do know what is being shown. Or have a very good and informed opinion.

 

[Gary C]

We probably need to be aware, though, that after a call went out to send on your strange videos this may have changed a bit. This encourages a subtle sort of hoaxing, or at least something that is hoax-adjacent -- that is, it incentivized sending in something, including things that were recognized but look a little odd, so might a well send it in, or even to play "this tethered surveillance balloon looks weird i this video, let's see if the 'experts' can figure this one out!" That is, not hoaxed in the sense of having been faked, but hoax-ish in terms of sending video of known objects to the UAP investigators.

When you ask for 'odd looking things' you should expect to receive at least a few videos that the sender knows exactly what it is, but is not telling you what it is.

"Can you figure out what this is???" challenge puzzles, to be solved by the uninitiated.
So the sender can have a good laugh at all of the wrong answers.

Given that the senders know a lot more about the events surrounding the capture of these video than are being passed on, I would suspect that many senders do know what is being shown. Or have a very good and informed opinion.

IOW we have a more or less permanent subpopulation who will troll anyone for lulz. As they get bored with one topic, they move on to whatever is 'trending' to entertain themselves, said mental engagement being their only real goal. The trick is to recognize one early in any encounter and not waste too much time if they cannot or will not provide data that can actually be analyzed.

 

[Todd Feinman]

Not all people who saw and reported UFOs are necessarily into ufology and aliens, but soon enough the grifters will contact those people, if they come out publicly, put them on a podcast about aliens, and the whole thing goes on forever.

I suppose it depends! I've been on a bunch of forums, and no one wants to interview me. My career involved providing good information to people. I think my first case, with corroboration, is actually pretty good, and one of the more interesting cases. People just want attention. Especially some UFO believers who will take a pic of anything and claim it is alien.

What I've seen was so unambiguous and close enough that I know it couldn't be debunked, but I am of course open to it. I'm familiar with optical illusions and atmospheric phenomena and distant aircraft.

Regarding the fallibility of witness testimony without getting into how it is indeed used with circumstantial evidence to prove cases in court, I think it depends on the specific circumstances. If I am confronted while alone by five initially stationary objects at relatively close range without attractive distractions around, I could get a pretty good look. And have time to decide to take a really good look rather than waste time trying to find a camera.

 

[Todd Feinman]

Yep. LSD won't do it, etc. I've tried to see physical hallucinations under the influence and I just can't see them. It's very clear what is drug-induced hallucinations and what isn't. If I wanted to make up UFO stories for skeptics, I could have come up with more convincing ones, too..

The nature of LSD hallucinations is that they are always shifting, and are atmospheric. You can have a psychological issue, but folks just don't meet entities as solid object-constant visions. I've heard some other drugs do. This is exactly what LSD hallucinations are like:

Source: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DgPaCWJL7XI&list=RDDgPaCWJL7XI&start_radio=1&pp=ygUMR3JvY2VyeSB0cmlwoAcB&ra=m

 

[Eburacum]

What I've seen was so unambiguous and close enough that I know it couldn't be debunked, but I am of course open to it. I'm familiar with optical illusions and atmospheric phenomena and distant aircraft.

If only we had a time machine! We could go back together and look at it again.

I think there would be two possible outcomes;
1/ it would not look quite the same as you remember it, and/or with your increased experience of atmospheric phenomena and/or mundane aerial craft you could explain it to yourself. Or I may be able to explain it instead.
2/ You would convince me that it was an exotic phenomenon. I would have to accept that exotic phenomena do exist which resist explanation, and that this was one of them.

Of course even if 2./ happened we could both be wrong. It may be the case that this phenomenon, whatever it was, would be easily explained it we could only see it from another angle and another distance; it seems very likely to me that every misidentified phenomenon in the sky can be explained, if it can be observed at the right viewpoint.

But there certainly are phenomena which resist explanation, even when observed in detail; this is likely to continue indefinitely, due to the nature of perception.

 

[Todd Feinman]

If only we had a time machine! We could go back together and look at it again.

Or if you were with the pilot and police officer a bit later near Roseburg and had a good look at them too! I saw them in broad daylight. You have to be open to all possibilities! That's where I slither in