>>> Part 1 of 3...
 
-=> On 12-18-97  15:00, Ron Taylor said to All,<=-
-=>"About evidence...,"<=-
 
Hi, Ron;
...
 RT> I cut and pasted the following from my Microsoft BOOKS CD:
 RT> 
 RT> skepticism also scepticism; noun:
...
 
 RT> If the above defines skepticism then a skeptic is one who possesses
 RT> or holds to a skeptical attitude.
 
A degree of skepticism is good, however many people are so skeptical
that they wouldn't believe the facts if the facts hit them over the head
with a brick bat.  :-}
 
 RT> It seems to me that this definition is not the commonly accepted one
 RT> in UFOlogy.  Rather, it seems that the skeptic, to UFO believers, is
 RT> one who believes that aliens do not exist and that "believers" and
 RT> "skeptics" are diametrically opposed.  True believers, it seems, feel
 RT> that skeptics are calling them liars, frauds, or idiots.
 
All of the above!  I base my OPINIONS on UFO's upon several things.  I
was an open-minded skeptic at one time.  I read both sides with an open
mind.  I also had in-depth discussions with good friends who had either
observed "strange things," or been abducted themselves.  These were not
people who wanted to profit or get their names in the paper.  In fact,
they were quite reticent about discussing these "strange things" until
they were convinced that I would not go spreading their names around,
telling the things they had told me.  These were people who were not
the type who spun yarns or exagerated.  In fact, I got the impression
that, if anything, they were uncomfortable discussing such things.  Then
_I_ saw some UFO's myself.  I know darn well that what I saw was _NOT_
anything made by anyone on THIS planet... not even in Area 51!
 
 RT> Please do not impose that definition upon me.  I am not a UFO
 RT> believer.. yet I do not believe that aliens do not exist. Simply, I
 RT> neither believe nor disbelieve.  From my experience, the majority of us
 RT> who are deemed "skeptics" indeed fit that philosophy, not the one
 RT> described in the preceding paragraph.
 
There are some who believe as you do, and there are others who flatly
state that there is NO intelligent life anywhere in the universe, and
that anyone who believes otherwise is either lying or off their rocker.
 
I think the late great Carl Sagen said it best when he said,
(paraphrased), that the odds of there being intelligent life somewhere
"out there" are so high that it's virtual certanty.  And by the law of
averages, half of them would be more advanced than we are... if they had
managed to survive without killing themselves off with wars.  But are they
"visiting" us?  The common wisdom - as understood by _OUR_ science - is
that, since nothing can travel faster than light - 186,000 MPH/300,000,000
Meters/Sec, "they" couldn't get here because it would take too long.
 
However our science does NOT know everything about the laws of physics!
Gravity is not understood by our science, but a weak form of antigravity
has been produced in a labratory!  There IS something that travels faster
than the "universal speed limit": Tachyons cannot travel SLOWER than
light!  It MIGHT be possible to "hitch a ride" with tachyons.  Or it may
be possible to "fold" space as some have suggested.  It may be possible to
use black holes to cross the galaxy - or the universe - in an eyeblink.
We don't know if this is possible, but _IF_ such a mode of hyper-
lightspeed travel is POSSIBLE, why could not a more advanced civilization
have discovered it and why couldn't they be using it to travel the
uncomprehensable (to us) interstellar and intergalactic distances?  These
are questions which have answers, but they cannot be answered by OUR
science AT THIS TIME.
...
 
 RT> Believers tell us that we refuse to accept the evidence, even when
 RT> faced with it... that for some reason, we are denying the "truth".  To
 RT> the best of my recollection, the only residual physical evidence
 RT> reputed to be associated with a UFO event is the alleged wreckage from
 RT> the Roswell incident.
 
Oh, physical evidence, huh?  Can you show me physical evidence of the
supposed vacuum of outer space?  Or stars going nova/supernova?  Can you
prove to me that men have walked on the moon?  (There are plenty who doubt
that it happened!), or of the existance of bacteria & viruses?  Did we
really put a lander with a rover aboard on Mars last July 4th?  How about
chromosomes?  Sure, I have seen pictures that were supposedly taken through
powerful microscopes and telescopes, and tinker-toy MODELS of chromosomes,
and the pictures supposedly sent the billions of miles from Mars, but are
they real or faked?  I have no _concrete_proof_ that these things exist!
Can YOU show me your valued _CONCRETE_PROOF_ of any of these things?  Or
do I have to rely on these supposed images which come to me over the TV
airwaves - images and descriptions which could easily be faked?
 
The point I am trying to make here is that sometimes we MUST take things
with a grain of faith... taking into consideration eyewitness reports,
comparing the stories of "expert witnesses," such as doctors, law
enforcement officers, astronomers and others who are trained to observe
and report their observations accurately.  When many reports are received
from different parts of the world, submitted by such trained observers
who have had no prior interest in the subject and who never heard of each
other - particularly when they do not attempt to gain profit or publicity
from their reports, and there is great similarity between these isolated
reports, then a thinking person must began to suspect that there just
MIGHT be some grain of truth in the reports.  If I were to see a UFO
hovering overhead and it dropped a small piece of "something," which I
picked up and later handed to you and said, "This fell from a UFO," would
you believe me?  Probably not.  You might take it to a lab and have it
anyalized, and the anyalisis only says that it contains some of the known
90-some elements we know of on Earth.  The non-believer would probably
say, "This doesn't have anything 'unknown' in it, therefor it is of
earthly origin, case dismissed."  They would not consider that any ET's
would have the SAME 90-some elements which we have here on this planet.
They may use them in different combinations, but those combinations could
just as well be made right here.  So what has been proven?  Nothing!
So your "something I can see, touch and feel" still won't convince you!
 
 RT> While there are several witnesses who report
 RT> having seen various pieces of this array, and some of them attest to
 RT> the most unusual properties of the material and the unusual
 RT> disappearance of it, there is still nothing I (figuratively speaking)
 
 >>> Continued to next message...
 
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