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From: Bruce Maccabee <brumac@compuserve.com>
Date: Tue, 17 Feb 1998 23:10:58 -0500
Fwd Date: Wed, 18 Feb 1998 09:25:41 -0500
Subject: Re: UFO Sphere/Orb' over Brooklyn, NY


>From: Brian Straight <brians@mdbs.com>
>To: "'UFO UpDates - Toronto'" <updates@globalserve.net>
>Subject: RE: UFO UpDate: Re: 'UFO Sphere/Orb' over Brooklyn, NY
>Date: Mon, 16 Feb 1998 12:42:33 -0500

>>Date: Fri, 13 Feb 1998 22:59:35 -0500
>>From: Bruce Maccabee <brumac@compuserve.com>
>>Subject: UFO UpDate: Re: 'UFO Sphere/Orb' over Brooklyn, NY
>>To: UFO UpDates - Toronto <updates@globalserve.net>

>>There _is_ science in ufology.... although it is not always
>>obvious. However, to see wat I mean, consider the "reverse
>>Situation."

><snip>

>>However, rarely _if_ever_ does a skeptic "test" the explanation'
>>against the available sighting data.  Instead, what usually
>>happens is that the skeptic finds an explanation for one part of
>>th sghting and then "publishes"  (I can cite specific examples in
>>my own experience if anyone is interested.) The general
>>public/press/scientific community  then assmes the sighting has
>>been explained and goes on its merry way.

>I've experienced this first hand.  While living in the UK, I
>investigated a sighting made by a reliable witness (a
>coastguard), who saw, in al clear evening sky, a bright light
>over the sea.  Its reflection in the water could be clearly seen,
>and occasionally a beam of some sort seemed to strike tha water's
>surface.  The local college physics prof. dismissed it (rather
>predictably) as the planet Venus.  The problem? Venus was not at
>elongation and therefore not visible.  Add to that the fact that
>the witness was looking due east, and the explanation falls
>apart.  When I politely tried to point this out to the prof, he
>told me to stop wasting his time with crackpot nonsense.

Ah, yes. Don't look through the telescope because you might see
something you don't like.

I investigated sightings that occurred in late December, 1978 in
New Zealand.  Thse sightings were big news 19 years ago because a
TV film crew saw the unexplained lights and filmed them.  I
don't have space to go into all the details of this sighting
which involved an airplane crew of 2, two reporters, a cameraman
and a sound recordist, a radar operator and a radar technician.
The sightings occurred between 1 AM and 3 AM on Dec. 31.
Because a reporter was involved and he got his story out
immediately, the sighting was reported on that same day in
morning papers in NZ.  Theories proliferated like the funny
mushrooms after a spring rain.   I think some of the explainers
had been eating those mushrooms!

An astronomer in Christchurchn N.Z., was 99% certain that what
they saw and filmed was Venus.

Problem: Venus didn't rise until after 3 AM

OK, go back to astronomer who is now confident that what they saw
was Jupiter (nowhere near as bright as Venus, of course).
Jupiter was up, but at such a high angular elevation that the
cameraman couldn't film it and besides the lights were reported
as at the altitude of the aircraft or lower.  Another explanation
was that one of the lights was a squid boat.  This was no good
because bright lights on squid boats create reflections in the
water which appear immediately beneath (from the point of view of
the observer at some altitude) the bright lights.  Yet the film
clearly shows no reflection (squid boat had to be at least 3000
ft high to have its reflection out of the field of view of the
camera). Sir Bernard Lovell of Jodrell Bank Radio Observatory
identified the lights as "unburned meteorites," ..... a dumb
comment if there ever was one in that one light, in particular,
was seen for over 10 minutes.

Anyway,  SCIENCE IN DEFAULT:
In May 1980 a Canadian scientist, Wm. Lehn, published a paper in
the Journal of Atmpspheric and Terrestrial Physics in which he
argued that the lights were mirages of other distant lights.

He stated:"  notably absent from all the reported theories was
any consideration of atmospheric refraction phenomena."  He based
his opinion and analysis solely on newspaper reports  of the
sighting.

In July 1980 I responded with a 6 page paper that criticized Lehn
for using only a few Canadian newspaper accounts and also pointed
out a  number of reasons for rejecting atmospheric refraction
(mirages). I also pointed out that New Zealand newspaper HAD
carried discussions of refraction phenomena.

The journal editor sent my paper to a referee who wrote:

".....This article unlike that of Lehn, contains no real science
and as such cannot be accepted for the journal. Sightings of
unidentified objects are unfortunately often vague and imprecise
and sometimes contradictory.  I do not consider that this article
contributes in any way towards a true scientific explanation of
the phnomena described.  It may be suitable for a newspaper but
not for a scientific journal."

His second sentence (Sightings of UFOs are often vague....) is,
of course, correct.  But so what?  The only "vagueness" in this
case was in the explanation.  The "hard data" consisted of
eyewitness accounts by good observers backed up by color movie
film,ground radar, airplane radar and something that was quite
unique in ufo history until the Gulf Breezesightings, tape
recordings made during the sightings.

Anyway, I responded in October 1980 by rewriting and
resumitting my paper along with a letter to the editor as
follows:

"I wonder what the referee considers to be 'real science.'  Is it
real science to allow an incorrect explanation to stand
unchallengerfd in a respected, refereed journal?  I dare say that
if a published paper contains errors in logic or mathematics,
experts in the particular field addressed by the paper do not
hesitate to write articles pointing out the errors, and the
journals do not hesitate to publish the articles."

I also pointed out that Lehn's paper seemed to be largely
speculation based on a small amount of information from
newspapers whereas my paper was based on much, much more
information and contained the results of a calculation of
brightness based on photographic data.  It therefore seemed
unfair for the referee to "bestow upon Lehn's paper the accolade
'real science' " and to reject my paper as unscientific.

In December, 1980, the journal editor informed me that a second
referee had rejected my paper.  The second referee had written
that it was unlikely there would be "an agreement on an
explanation of the N.Z. 'sighitngs' and until the experimental
facts are sorted out more clearly, arguments and
counter-arguments should be dealt with by correspondence between
the contestants themselves and not in the open literature...I
support without hesitation the rejection of this paper."

In other words, so what if an incorrect explanation had been
published. The incorrect explanation was "scientific" and it
would be unscientific to publish a counter-argument.

My paper was never published.


SIC TRANSIT GLORIA SCIENTIA............

or something like that!

(There is a lot more to the New Zealand sightings story.  Papers
were published in te journal APPLIED OPTICS... but only "by
accident.")