# The Phenomenon: What is it? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 20, 2025, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583 "2025-05-20T13:19:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 16
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/301 "2025-05-29T13:36:46Z")
Thread summary: _What if the burden of proof were the other way around?_ ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/302 "2025-05-29T13:43:13Z")
> [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > if a pattern keeps showing up across radically different systems, times, and observers, the signal might be more than just noise. I will 100% agree … modifying only that the _perceived_ signal might be more than noise. Here is the pattern: - across different eras, across radically different systems from naked eye, to photography, to telescopes, to radar …, by different observers, when noisy nebulous data is paid close attention to, there are perceived “things” _seen_, that happen to reflect the mythologies and anxieties of the time and place. That is not a mere coincidence. What can explain it? If there is a pattern of always an apparent spot at ten o clock when I look through my telescope, whenever and wherever I look, what is the probable explanation? A phantom planet that only I observe and that moves to where I look? A ship teleporting? A fairy? Or? ---
**Author:** ![BippityBoppityBoo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bippityboppityboo/32/5745_2.png) [@BippityBoppityBoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BippityBoppityBoo)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 1:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/303 "2025-05-29T13:47:29Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > what is the probable explanation? A phantom planet that only I observe and that moves to where I look? A ship teleporting? A fairy? Or? A scotoma? ---
**Author:** ![Ryan\_Liam](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ryan_liam/32/3965_2.png) [@Ryan\_Liam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ryan_Liam)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/304 "2025-05-29T13:48:40Z")
Uncertainty is the terrain, always has been. The issue isn’t that I’m claiming aliens from the gaps; it’s that you’re treating ambiguity as closure, as if the presence of a likelier explanation shuts the case entirely. I’m not ignoring the Campbellian or sociopolitical angles you’re right, those matter. But reducing the Phenomenon to cultural archetypes or defense industrial noise only is just as premature as declaring it alien. If you really care about what “we should be doing,” then maybe we should stop shutting down the questions before they’ve been asked in full. Some patterns deserve real curiosity before they’re buried under certainty theater. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/305 "2025-05-29T13:55:38Z")
> [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > Uncertainty is the terrain, always has been. The issue isn’t that I’m claiming aliens from the gaps; it’s that you’re treating ambiguity as closure, as if the presence of a likelier explanation shuts the case entirely. Hah, I wish. The question about “who watches the watchmen” does not lead to entire closures. > [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > I’m not ignoring the Campbellian or sociopolitical angles you’re right, those matter. But reducing the Phenomenon to cultural archetypes or defense industrial noise only is just as premature as declaring it alien. Still missing the huge point, The reports I did see were not made in the same year, or coming from the same guys, your premature argument here is the one that was dismissed. In the meantime, more advances in research and tools point to a gross failure from proponents of the phenomenon when they fail to use those new tools. > [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > If you really care about what “we should be doing,” then maybe we should stop shutting down the questions before they’ve been asked in full. Some patterns deserve real curiosity before they’re buried under certainty theater. [Looks at the audience] Heh, he don’t know me really well uh, folks? Sorry to say, this argument that me and others should not shut down the feeble evidence is in reality a demand to keep the ignorance and uncertainty going. It is more popular and convenient. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/306 "2025-05-29T13:57:47Z")
> [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > Puerto Rico? Maybe balloons. But when “maybe balloons” becomes the boilerplate for every unexplained multi-sensor anomaly It’s the boilerplate for every unexplained multi-sensor anomaly in this thread for exactly one reason: **you’ve offered exactly one anomaly to examine**. Is this deliberate on your part? If so, you’ve caused the problem you’re critiquing. If it’s not deliberate, _fix it_. Give us another example to look at. This time, choose an example that’s probably not balloons. ---
**Author:** ![eburacum45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eburacum45/32/8690_2.png) [@eburacum45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eburacum45)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/307 "2025-05-29T14:15:06Z")
> [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > But dismissing radar, FLIR, and visual testimony as just folklore in uniform ignores the qualitative shift in data. Sine we aren’t getting sightings of nearby saucers and aliens on the ground any more, the only reports are tiny lights in the sky many kilometres away and returns at the edge of detectability. The ‘qualitative shift in data’ is always towards more distant phenomena that need detailed examination to interpret. Chas Underwood, who filmed the apparent object in the Princeton/Nimitz event, could not even see it with his own eyes. We should not forget that pilots are trained to interpret sensor readings and tiny data points as threats, even if they can only see them as a blob on a FLIR cam. A couple of years ago they started filming objects off the east coast of the USA, and caught some of them on their own smartphones; these turned out to be small novelty balloons, one with a picture of Batman and another celebrating a graduation. [![](https://www.metabunk.org/attachments/batman-balloon-jpg.70941/) ](https://www.metabunk.org/attachments/batman-balloon-jpg.70941/) ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/308 "2025-05-29T14:18:35Z")
> [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > Some patterns deserve real curiosity before they’re buried under certainty theater. First, you must establish a pattern. You’ve failed to do so. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/309 "2025-05-29T14:18:35Z")
> [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > it’s that you’re treating ambiguity as closure, as if the presence of a likelier explanation shuts the case entirely. The case isn’t even open. You have presented nothing. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/310 "2025-05-29T15:13:30Z")
Ann Leckie has a great series on Bluesky that relates to this thread. Worth reading. > **[Ann Leckie (@annleckie.com)](https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:i4vcsnvkwenmwdkz2vvpx7w5/post/3loiy7rf6vs2i)** > > The idea of the world being "disenchanted" once science and "rationality" take hold has never sat well with me. You want to tell me that people who lived in a time when demons were considered a legit cause of disease somehow felt more mystical about... ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/311 "2025-05-29T15:28:00Z")
The moon is not full of ancient civilizations or weird creatures. It is a barren rock. We know because we have been there. _We have been there_. Working together we can accomplish astounding things and create wonders. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/312 "2025-05-29T15:47:27Z")
Absolutely! But even easier to access: I spent the morning writing a sonnet about watching a couple of mockingbirds and a blue jay mob a red-tailed hawk at my neighbor’s house (I was very, very bored this morning). There’s amazing and delightful shit happening all around us all the time. This world is full of mystery and wonder as is. Slime molds, man–_slime molds_! ---
**Author:** ![74westy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/74westy/32/3950_2.png) [@74westy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/74westy)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/313 "2025-05-29T16:42:31Z")
> [@Ann Leckie quoted by Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > The idea of the world being “disenchanted” once science and “rationality” take hold has never sat well with me. Anne Leckie must hate Walt Whitman as much as I do: > [@Walt Whitman (public domain)](#): > > **When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer** > > When I heard the learn’d astronomer, > When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me, > When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them, > When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room, > How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick, > Till rising and gliding out I wander’d off by myself, > In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time, > Look’d up in perfect silence at the stars. ---
**Author:** ![FlikTheBlue](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fliktheblue/32/10972_2.png) [@FlikTheBlue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FlikTheBlue)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/314 "2025-05-29T16:46:18Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > This world is full of mystery and wonder as is. Slime molds, man–_slime molds_! Yes. As an amateur photographer, I can attest to this. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/315 "2025-05-29T17:33:41Z")
> [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > You’re misrepresenting the point. No one’s claiming every radar ping is proof of aliens. What I’m arguing is that the pattern of multi-sensor anomalies, including radar, FLIR, and trained visual testimony across multiple incidents, deserves more than retrofitted mundane explanations after the fact. You might be overestimating the reliability of the instruments you are referencing. I was on a committee trying to improve the quality of military electronics, and spoke a few times at their big conference. It’s a miracle the stuff works as well as it does. One example was a radar system for a land vehicle which had a mean time to failure of 11 hours, which they thought was good. I’m not knocking them, the stuff has to work in extreme environments. But glitches in the equipment, or in the design of the equipment, are a much more plausible explanation than Vallee’s. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/316 "2025-05-29T17:52:58Z")
> [@74westy](#): > > Anne Leckie must hate Walt Whitman as much as I do: I can’t speak for Leckie, but I don’t mind that poem at all. Find your wonder where you may–and if Whitman didn’t care for the lecture but preferred to touch (leaves of) grass when he found wonder, more power to him. If Whitman interrupted the lecturer to tell everyone how blinkered they were, instead of wander’ng off by himself, I’d get the hate. But he let them live their best lives and went off to live his. ---
**Author:** ![Tzigone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Tzigone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tzigone)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/317 "2025-05-29T18:08:56Z")
> [@Irishman](#): > > Or consider another weirdity - the Bermuda Triangle. This mysterious vague triangle connecting Florida, Bermuda, and the Bahamas. This zone is a powerful vortex of danger for ships and aircraft. It’s so powerful, it’s been purported to have caused the disappearance of ships thousands of miles away. I wouldn’t be surprised to hear about it affecting a disappearance in the Pacific - the _South_ Pacific. Not precisely on-topic, but I loved what I once read someone else say about it - that Lloyd’s of London didn’t charge higher premiums for ships operating in that area, so it (higher incidence of missing ships) must not be real. ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/318 "2025-05-29T18:13:11Z")
Science deniers engaged in pure certainty theater! ---
**Author:** ![74westy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/74westy/32/3950_2.png) [@74westy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/74westy)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/319 "2025-05-29T18:20:10Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Find your wonder where you may–and if Whitman didn’t care for the lecture but preferred to touch (leaves of) grass when he found wonder, more power to him. It’s a fair cop. I took it to be an assertion that science kills wonder but he has a right to that opinion. Also, I really just hate that poem–not all of Whitman. I just said that to be jerk. And I don’t even hate the poem. I disagree with the idea behind it but admit he expresses that idea very effectively. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2025, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583/320 "2025-05-29T18:53:34Z")
> [@74westy](#): > > Also, I really just hate that poem–not all of Whitman. I just said that to be jerk. > > And I don’t even hate the poem. I disagree with the idea behind it but admit he expresses that idea very effectively. Fair enough. You just caught me off guard–I’ve never seen anyone exaggerate for effect on the Internet before. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583.md?page=15) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phenomenon-what-is-it/1018583.md?page=17)