The words Extraordinary Claims needs to be banished when talking Extraterrestrials

I was reading an article that talked about Extraterrestrials the other day and of course at the end of the article the tired line about Extraordinary measures....blah, blah, blah came out towards the end of the article. This needs to stop when talking about Extraterrestrials. It may have been an extraordinary claim 60 years ago but it's not today.

With the scientific evidence we have today, many people including one of the top Scientist of our time has reached the conclusion that Extraterrestrials exist based on the evidence. Hawking said,"Aliens almost certainly exist." These are conclusions reached based on the evidence not extraordinary claims. The article was on a possible signal that could be of Extraterrestrial origin. This signal matches a prediction made in 2012 and it's just science. This is what was said at the end of the article and it's this type of thinking that needs to stop. With things like water found on other planets, exoplanets in habitable zones, extremophiles in places we thought life couldn't exist, building blocks of life found on comets and more, saying Extraterrestrials exist isn't an extraordinary claim but a possible explanation based on the evidence. Here's what was said.

“The one in 10,000 objects with unusual spectra seen by Borra and Trottier are certainly worthy of additional study,” the team said in a statement. “However, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

“It is too early to unequivocally attribute these purported signals to the activities of extraterrestrial civilizations. Internationally agreed-upon protocols for searches for evidence of advanced life beyond Earth (SETI) require candidates to be confirmed by independent groups using their own telescopes, and for all natural explanations to be exhausted before invoking extraterrestrial agents as an explanation.

www.independent.co.uk...

First, the Scientist who are behind this study never said UNEQUIVOCALLY. This is an old tactic that's used by some people on this board from time to time. They can't debate the evidence presented so they try to make it seem as you made a blanket sstatement. The Scientist say "PROBABLY" right there on the updated comments on their published paper. Here's what they said:

But they make clear that further work will need to be done to confirm or deny that hypothesis. That will need to be done by watching for the same signals on different equipment so that all other explanations can be discarded.

Again, NOBODY SAID UNEQUIVOCALLY. I hate it when people do that. This is why I always ask people to quote me where I said this or that because when people can't debate the evidence they try to debate against things that were never said.

They also said this:

ALL natural explanations need to be exhausted BEFORE Extraterrestrials are invoked as a possible explanation. WHAT!!!

That makes no sense. This standard would make it almost impossible to find an Extraterrestrial signal. In most cases ALL natural explanations will never be exhausted so we will have to talk about these things in terms of probability and what's most likely and least likely at least at first. Look, it's easy to cherry pick after the fact. Like I said, an earlier study about the search for Extraterrestrials PREDICTED that we would see these signals and that would be evidence to support the hypothesis. That's just Science.

If you look at the sentence, it says BEFORE you can even invoke Extraterrestrials as a possible explanation. Again, that's absurd. Extraterrestrial existence needs to be looked at as a possible explanation based on the observed evidence not an extraordinary claim.

a reply to: neoholographic

However, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

I have never liked that sentence. Just evidence would do, what is extraordinary evidence anyway?

a reply to: neoholographic

Nice post! Yeah...we pretty much have proven through quantum physics that causality is a myth. And all of reality absolutely depends on an observer to collapse the cloud of possible/probable outcomes ( read: collapse the probabilty waves), into what actually happens.

Eventually, all of science and all of intuition...or maybe faith-based observations... will have to be reconciled in whatever "reality" actually is. Solving that seeming paradox, is what we are bere for, IMO.

In regards to observing other planets to seek out signs of ET civs, its pretty straight forward. anything clearly artificial will be a likely suspect for civilizations (hense why that dyson array thing is still being hmm'ed at.). But you got to knock out possibilities (just because a star goes dim doesn't mean aliens..could be a gas cloud, a massive asteroid belt, etc)

As far as potential Ets being spotted on earth..the distance travelled between solar systems is prohibitively large. It goes against a lot of understandings in regards to physics, so yeah, its still an extraordinary claim that will require sufficient evidence.

originally posted by: midicon
a reply to: neoholographic

However, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

I have never liked that sentence. Just evidence would do, what is extraordinary evidence anyway?

you live with a child.
one morning you wake up and notice someone ate a ton of cookies.
logical conclusion is that the child ate the cookies.

The child says it wasn't him, it was aliens who ate it.
...
unless the kid can produce some amazing video or an actual cookie stuffed alien under his bed, then the simple evidence points to the child as a cookie thief and quite imaginative.

originally posted by: midicon
a reply to: neoholographic

However, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

I have never liked that sentence. Just evidence would do, what is extraordinary evidence anyway?

Exactly, it just requires scientific evidence. Extraordinary evidence is just subjective. One person can see extraordinary evidence while another sees insufficient evidence. It makes no sense.

a reply to: SaturnFX

You're not making any sense. You said:

The child says it wasn't him, it was aliens who ate it.

This makes absolutely no sense in the context of this discussion. This is exactly what I was talking about when I showed in the article they said UNEQUIVOCALLY when nobody said anything like that.

We're talking about 60-70 years of scientific research in these areas not:

The child says it wasn't him, it was aliens who ate it.

originally posted by: neoholographic
a reply to: SaturnFX

You're not making any sense. You said:

The child says it wasn't him, it was aliens who ate it.

This makes absolutely no sense in the context of this discussion. This is exactly what I was talking about when I showed in the article they said UNEQUIVOCALLY when nobody said anything like that.

We're talking about 60-70 years of scientific research in these areas not:

The child says it wasn't him, it was aliens who ate it.

But saying "aliens" is like saying anything else unproven..why not look at those systems and say gods? or unicorns?
there is no proof of aliens (although I would be hard pressed to accept the universe, or even galaxy, is without other advanced civilizations just waiting to be observed), but you got to knock out any other possibility as I said.

60-70 years of science doesn't mean jack when you have no baseline on how to spot a alien civilization...and we are just now..just in this decade starting to come up with tools that can sort of very inefficently look for signs that may one day lead to a positive result.

Until then, anyone claiming aliens is just like that child and its up to the scientists to work through and debunk the claims and instead seek out a more rational and likely answer. Once that is exausted, then you can start entertaining other ideas.

I was being simple in the example, but it fits.

a reply to: SaturnFX

amazing video

Just a video would do. Or some other evidence. The evidence itself need not be amazing or extraordinary.

a reply to: SaturnFX

What??? This makes absolutely no sense. You said:

But saying "aliens" is like saying anything else unproven..why not look at those satellites and say gods? or unicorns?

When you equate Extraterrestrials to unicorns you have just lost all credibility. You can't debate the evidence so you make silly statements like this.

Anyone who has a shred of common sense and whose debating the issue honestly would never equate these things.

Hawking didn't come to the conclusion Aliens almost certaintly exist because there's no evidence to support.

Theoretical Physicist Dr. Kaku didn't reach a similar conclusion because there's no evidence.

You may not agree the evidence supports this conclusion but when you act like these things are just like unicorns your being intellectially dishonest because it's about your personal belief not Science.

And there appears to be no obvious explanation for what is going on, leaving the scientists behind the paper to conclude that the messages are coming from aliens.

www.independent.co.uk...

That sounds sciency.

I honestly dont think the issue is whether ETs exist in the universe. Thst's an argument I think even skeptics can accept. It's are they visiting Earth, is what's at issue. In that case, it's getting the scientific community to treat whatever evidence there is as "evidence". That's frustrating to me, that evidence is dismissed out of hand without being studied. Then when it is, it's usually inconclusive.

I'm a true believer in visitation, but I have to admit that when I hear ufologists talk about "trace evidence", I roll my eyes a little. That's not gonna get it done.

originally posted by: midicon
a reply to: neoholographic

However, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

I have never liked that sentence. Just evidence would do, what is extraordinary evidence anyway?

Concur!! Basic common sense evidence. Nothing special needed.

originally posted by: neoholographic
Hawking didn't come to the conclusion Aliens almost certaintly exist because there's no evidence to support.

Mathmatically speaking, there is certainly alien civilizations out there.

The question is, are we seeing them through the satellites in these anomaly systems

also, another question is are they visiting here.

If a astronomer notices some oddities when viewing a system, that is not evidence of aliens..that is evidence of unusual behavior that needs further studys
your premise is that the scientist can simply say "aliens" to anything unknown or unusual making that equally plausible is foolishness.
Possible, sure, but only should be considered after ruling out normal celestial possibilities.

Occams razor and such.

a reply to: neoholographic

This needs to stop when talking about Extraterrestrials. It may have been an extraordinary claim 60 years ago but it's not today.

Totally agree

If you're looking at the E.T. UFO hypothesis, those who have studied the thousands upon thousands of unexplained reports and still been left with no plausible explanation, then those reports are usually discarded by most professionals because quite obviously most scientists can't accept what the reports are saying without evidence, and in most cases, there isn't any.

Hawking's statements must be shared by some people, who possibly know more than what they say in public.

originally posted by: RP2SticksOfDynamite

originally posted by: midicon
a reply to: neoholographic

However, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

I have never liked that sentence. Just evidence would do, what is extraordinary evidence anyway?

Concur!! Basic common sense evidence. Nothing special needed.

In the cookie ate the alien scenario, evidence would be only 2 people in the house. the parent and the child. cookies went missing, the parent can note the simple evidence that there is only 2 people in the house and the child likes cookies.
extraordinary evidence would be a film of a alien beaming down to the kitchen and stealing cookies, then beaming back up.
the video would be the extraordinary thing as it shows something unlikely

originally posted by: jordan77
I honestly dont think the issue is whether ETs exist in the universe. Thst's an argument I think even skeptics can accept. It's are they visiting Earth, is what's at issue. In that case, it's getting the scientific community to treat whatever evidence there is as "evidence". That's frustrating to me, that evidence is dismissed out of hand without being studied. Then when it is, it's usually inconclusive.

I'm a true believer in visitation, but I have to admit that when I hear ufologists talk about "trace evidence", I roll my eyes a little. That's not gonna get it done.

How do you explain the ancient statues and carvings of astronaut suited beings that look very similiar to today's astronauts? Time travel may explain this but it is possibly trace evidence.

Mathmatically speaking, there is certainly alien civilizations out there.

I disagree. I think you can speculate that there exists the possibility of alien civilizations being out there, but I can't see where it's any sort of mathematical certainty.

originally posted by: Zcustosmorum
a reply to: neoholographic

This needs to stop when talking about Extraterrestrials. It may have been an extraordinary claim 60 years ago but it's not today.

Totally agree

If you're looking at the E.T. UFO hypothesis, those who have studied the thousands upon thousands of unexplained reports and still been left with no plausible explanation, then those reports are usually discarded by most professionals because quite obviously most scientists can't accept what the reports are saying without evidence, and in most cases, there isn't any.

Hawking's statements must be shared by some people, who possibly know more than what they say in public.

Exactly,

Many people have reached this conclusion based on the evidence.

There is plenty of evidence. Official evidence.

vault.fbi.gov...

vault.fbi.gov...


But won't change **** 'till our President get a press and tell everybody:

Yes, we've been visited since the dawn of men, and yes there are lots of planets out there and guess what? They have people living in there wondering if they are alone. They are not, and neither are us. Now stop paying your taxes and watching TV because life is just so much more then we thought it was.

Of course it will never happen because no one wants to see the world collapse.

This is (read slowly and carefully) the b i g g e s t and most i m p o r t a n t discover in the h i s t o r y of the men on Earth. You won't just woke up and see it on the newspaper "WE ARE NOT ALONE".

Unless we engage on a new Nuclear War, I don't think aliens will reveal themselves to us, at least not while we still live.