Note: the term UFO in the context of this thread is synonymous with "alien spacecraft unless otherwise noted.
It has been suggested on many occasions in many threads by many posters her in the Pseudoscience sub-forum (as well as in the Parapsychology) that sheer quantity of eyewitness testimony is enough to support a wild claim, such as the notion that extraterrestrial intelligences are responsible for the sightings of UFOs in the world.
Oft mentioned is the so-called Disclosure Project'shttp://www.disclosureproject.org/ 400 witnesses of UFOs. These mentions are usually accompanied by citing the "credentials" of the witness (airline pilot, Army general, law enforcement officer, etc.) and making the assumption that these people are somehow more "credible" than the rest of society. Never mind that they are Homo sapiens, constructed of the same materials as the rest of the species.
The UFO believers would have the rest of society believe what they do: that people with a higher station in life do not fall victim to the same fallibilities that the rest of society does and that their memories and observational abilities are somehow more reliable. With regard to observational ability within the scopes of their professions, I've no doubt that experts and professionals can be considered more reliable. I would expect a doctor, for instance, to notice something about health care that I might not. I would expect a law enforcement officer to recognize a crime in progress or suspicious behavior of another person much faster than myself. I would expect an airline pilot to be more observant than myself with regard to atmospheric conditions, the condition of his aircraft, and the behavior of other aircraft than I.
That last example is where the UFO believer hopes to grasp a bit of witness credibility with regard to UFOs. But the third hand accounts of UFO believers re-telling the anecdotes of these pilots has a flawed methodology aside from the fact that the accounts are often not even secondary but tertiary -the UFO believer posts an account of another UFO believer who alleges to have taken an account from the original observer and the primary source of the interview (the full transcript) is often not available. The additional flaws in the methodology include confirmation bias, lack of appropriate contexts, inconsistent and leading interview techniques, etc.
Confirmation bias is when the researcher begins with a desired outcome and organizes all of his questions to support this outcome. UFO believers rarely ask skeptical questions and criticize those that do.
The contexts that are ignored include the environment of the event, the circumstances surrounding the event, sometimes the observations of others regarding the event, the physical condition of the observer(s), etc. There are as many separate contexts as there are events and observers of events.
Ruling out other possibilities is important as well. Ask skeptical questions. In a crime, investigators will develop a list of suspects and people of interest. If there is DNA evidence, DNA samples get collected from anyone connected to the case (including investigators). These samples become the controls and are used to rule out the possibilities –even if there is a primary suspect.
But the thing that I wanted to comment on the most is the fallibility of human memory when a person, regardless of their status or station in life, is faced with an event that is unusual to them, even if it isn't unusual to the universe.
Human memory is fallible. To suggest otherwise is to be ignorant. I had a biology teacher that said once, "everyone has a photographic memory; it's just that most people are out of film." It is this "film" that is the problem, because the film that is our memory isn't the best quality for the majority of the human population. A recent article in Science News (4/19/2003) discusses how researchers have concluded that people recall more of what they hear if the speaker communicates with relevant hand gestures. This is audible observation being coupled with visual signals.
Seeing is believing
... it just isn't necessarily what happened. Scientists researching the fields of criminalistics and cogitative abilities have determined in recent years (Wells & Olson, 2003; Wells, Olson, & Charman, 2003) that eyewitness accounts are far less reliable than many people may think. They also believe that major changes need to be instituted in how law enforcement and criminal investigators do things such as conduct line-ups and obtain testimony. They've discovered that even the most innocuous questions can be leading and influence the witnesses memory of the events.
For example, suppose a woman who observed a fatal traffic accident is rehearsing her testimony with a lawyer. The lawyer says, “How fast was the car going when it went through the red light?” At the time, she didn’t notice the color of the light, but the way the lawyer phrased the question plants the suggestion in mind that the car ran a red light. As a result, the woman may form an image of the traffic light in her mind’s eye—an image she didn’t really see at the actual event.
In investigating UFOs, the UFO "investigator" has a predetermined belief that UFOs are real. In addition, so may the witness. A recent poll conducted by Fox News (2003) shows that 34% of all Americans believe in UFOs. With this large a percentage, it is extremely probable that the majority of the UFO witnesses that go on record are already believers in the phenomenon. They already assume that what they saw was a UFO and not something far more prosaic or mundane. The event was unusual to them, therefore they apply the most unusual explanation they can. It doesn't help if the UFO investigator begins a question, "so when you saw the UFO, was it cigar-shaped or classic saucer-shaped?"
Belief isn't restricted to status or station in society either. President Reagan was said to have consulted an astrologer. I know an airline pilot that considers himself a Wiccan and his wife believes she can conduct "spells" in the "craft." They're strange, but fun folks. Our own President believes he is doing God's work and that God wanted him to be President (Bush was quoted to have said as much, though I forget where).
Belief creates bias right off the bat. Another caveat to eyewitness testimony is that witnesses will very often share information, so that in the final testimony, what they actually observed and what they testify to are different. The perceptions as well as the misperceptions of the other witnesses are used to fill in the gaps of their own observations. When they get information from one another and from investigators, their own memory becomes contaminated.
But just seeing an event that is emotionally arousing can interfere with both memory and attention to detail (Hulse, Memon, & Allan, 2003) due to chemical substances released in the brain during states of arousal and stress. I would suggest that when one sees what one truly believes is an alien spacecraft; one is "aroused and stressed."
References:
B.B. (4/19/2003) Gestures help words become memorable. Science News, Vol. 163 Issue 16, p254
Connell, Mary (2002)The Use of Eyewitness Research in the Courts. presented at training seminars for Texas Criminal Defense Lawyers Project
Hulse L, Memon A & Allan K (2003) "Affecting memories: Emotional arousal and eyewitness testimony". Fifth Biennial Meeting of SARMAC, Aberdeen, Scotland
Wells, Gary L. and Olson, Elizabeth A.. (2003). "Eyewitness Testimony," Annual Review of Psychology, Vol. 54, pp. 277-295.
Wells, Gary L., Olson, Elizabeth A., and Charman, Steve D. (2003). "Distorted retrospective eyewitness reports as functions of feedback and delay," Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, Vol. 9, No. 1, pp. 42-52.
It has been suggested on many occasions in many threads by many posters her in the Pseudoscience sub-forum (as well as in the Parapsychology) that sheer quantity of eyewitness testimony is enough to support a wild claim, such as the notion that extraterrestrial intelligences are responsible for the sightings of UFOs in the world.
Oft mentioned is the so-called Disclosure Project'shttp://www.disclosureproject.org/ 400 witnesses of UFOs. These mentions are usually accompanied by citing the "credentials" of the witness (airline pilot, Army general, law enforcement officer, etc.) and making the assumption that these people are somehow more "credible" than the rest of society. Never mind that they are Homo sapiens, constructed of the same materials as the rest of the species.
The UFO believers would have the rest of society believe what they do: that people with a higher station in life do not fall victim to the same fallibilities that the rest of society does and that their memories and observational abilities are somehow more reliable. With regard to observational ability within the scopes of their professions, I've no doubt that experts and professionals can be considered more reliable. I would expect a doctor, for instance, to notice something about health care that I might not. I would expect a law enforcement officer to recognize a crime in progress or suspicious behavior of another person much faster than myself. I would expect an airline pilot to be more observant than myself with regard to atmospheric conditions, the condition of his aircraft, and the behavior of other aircraft than I.
That last example is where the UFO believer hopes to grasp a bit of witness credibility with regard to UFOs. But the third hand accounts of UFO believers re-telling the anecdotes of these pilots has a flawed methodology aside from the fact that the accounts are often not even secondary but tertiary -the UFO believer posts an account of another UFO believer who alleges to have taken an account from the original observer and the primary source of the interview (the full transcript) is often not available. The additional flaws in the methodology include confirmation bias, lack of appropriate contexts, inconsistent and leading interview techniques, etc.
Confirmation bias is when the researcher begins with a desired outcome and organizes all of his questions to support this outcome. UFO believers rarely ask skeptical questions and criticize those that do.
The contexts that are ignored include the environment of the event, the circumstances surrounding the event, sometimes the observations of others regarding the event, the physical condition of the observer(s), etc. There are as many separate contexts as there are events and observers of events.
Ruling out other possibilities is important as well. Ask skeptical questions. In a crime, investigators will develop a list of suspects and people of interest. If there is DNA evidence, DNA samples get collected from anyone connected to the case (including investigators). These samples become the controls and are used to rule out the possibilities –even if there is a primary suspect.
But the thing that I wanted to comment on the most is the fallibility of human memory when a person, regardless of their status or station in life, is faced with an event that is unusual to them, even if it isn't unusual to the universe.
Human memory is fallible. To suggest otherwise is to be ignorant. I had a biology teacher that said once, "everyone has a photographic memory; it's just that most people are out of film." It is this "film" that is the problem, because the film that is our memory isn't the best quality for the majority of the human population. A recent article in Science News (4/19/2003) discusses how researchers have concluded that people recall more of what they hear if the speaker communicates with relevant hand gestures. This is audible observation being coupled with visual signals.
Seeing is believing
... it just isn't necessarily what happened. Scientists researching the fields of criminalistics and cogitative abilities have determined in recent years (Wells & Olson, 2003; Wells, Olson, & Charman, 2003) that eyewitness accounts are far less reliable than many people may think. They also believe that major changes need to be instituted in how law enforcement and criminal investigators do things such as conduct line-ups and obtain testimony. They've discovered that even the most innocuous questions can be leading and influence the witnesses memory of the events.
For example, suppose a woman who observed a fatal traffic accident is rehearsing her testimony with a lawyer. The lawyer says, “How fast was the car going when it went through the red light?” At the time, she didn’t notice the color of the light, but the way the lawyer phrased the question plants the suggestion in mind that the car ran a red light. As a result, the woman may form an image of the traffic light in her mind’s eye—an image she didn’t really see at the actual event.
In investigating UFOs, the UFO "investigator" has a predetermined belief that UFOs are real. In addition, so may the witness. A recent poll conducted by Fox News (2003) shows that 34% of all Americans believe in UFOs. With this large a percentage, it is extremely probable that the majority of the UFO witnesses that go on record are already believers in the phenomenon. They already assume that what they saw was a UFO and not something far more prosaic or mundane. The event was unusual to them, therefore they apply the most unusual explanation they can. It doesn't help if the UFO investigator begins a question, "so when you saw the UFO, was it cigar-shaped or classic saucer-shaped?"
Belief isn't restricted to status or station in society either. President Reagan was said to have consulted an astrologer. I know an airline pilot that considers himself a Wiccan and his wife believes she can conduct "spells" in the "craft." They're strange, but fun folks. Our own President believes he is doing God's work and that God wanted him to be President (Bush was quoted to have said as much, though I forget where).
Belief creates bias right off the bat. Another caveat to eyewitness testimony is that witnesses will very often share information, so that in the final testimony, what they actually observed and what they testify to are different. The perceptions as well as the misperceptions of the other witnesses are used to fill in the gaps of their own observations. When they get information from one another and from investigators, their own memory becomes contaminated.
But just seeing an event that is emotionally arousing can interfere with both memory and attention to detail (Hulse, Memon, & Allan, 2003) due to chemical substances released in the brain during states of arousal and stress. I would suggest that when one sees what one truly believes is an alien spacecraft; one is "aroused and stressed."
References:
B.B. (4/19/2003) Gestures help words become memorable. Science News, Vol. 163 Issue 16, p254
Connell, Mary (2002)The Use of Eyewitness Research in the Courts. presented at training seminars for Texas Criminal Defense Lawyers Project
Hulse L, Memon A & Allan K (2003) "Affecting memories: Emotional arousal and eyewitness testimony". Fifth Biennial Meeting of SARMAC, Aberdeen, Scotland
Wells, Gary L. and Olson, Elizabeth A.. (2003). "Eyewitness Testimony," Annual Review of Psychology, Vol. 54, pp. 277-295.
Wells, Gary L., Olson, Elizabeth A., and Charman, Steve D. (2003). "Distorted retrospective eyewitness reports as functions of feedback and delay," Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, Vol. 9, No. 1, pp. 42-52.