But … but …
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I’m continually surprised by the credibility people give Mick West. Yes, he seems like a smart guy, is good at communicating his ideas, and lots of people are attracted the calm “rational” voice of a sceptic, but there’s absolutely nothing in his background that suggests his analysis of this video should be taken seriously. He doesn’t have any formal training, experience, or education, in any of the subject areas he’s talking about, yet his analysis is accepted while that of people who are experts in those subject areas, like the Navy personnel involved in the incident, are completely discounted. I think the reasons why people accept West’s various debunkings of the Gimbal video are broadly similar to people accept videos explaining why Covid is a hoax. The arguments fit into their preexisting beliefs and biases about the subjects, their own world views, preconceptions that shape how they evaluate sources and presentations of information, etc.
I don’t think debunking UFOs (or rather that they are not just unidentified flying objects and are actually mysterious alien objects) and covid denial conspiracy are alike AT ALL. I’m not denying the possibility that there may be life outside earth. But I’m extremely skeptical that it would fit our preconceived notions of intelligent life that can travel light years or teleport in in flying ships.
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No, but multiple people came to the same conclusion. I’ve seen a lot of analysis that essentially says, “It’s actively embarrassing that anyone on the government side is acting like there’s anything interesting here.”
Problem is, what they’re seeing is a) from instruments, or b) not reliable anyways. I’m constantly reminded, in these situations, of pilots who reported being “chased” by a light that turned out to be… the Moon (or Mars, etc.). What the instruments recorded is a big nothingburger, disappointingly.
You need to rewatch the video. Because the opposite conclusion is what is suggested.
[responded to wrong post]
I was talking about West’s debunking of the Gimbal video, specifically, not UFOs in general. People generally accept ideas that fit or confirm their existing biases, and I think this applies to why most people accept Mick’s analyses of the Gimbal video and why most people accept Covid hoax theories. It’s not because the authors are experts - they definitely aren’t. It’s also not because of the content of their arguments, because the vast majority of people also are not experts in those subjects and don’t have the necessary background or experience to evaluate the technical aspects of these arguments. It’s because these arguments match what they already think about how the world works, whether the presentation of the arguments match up with preexisting notions of what truthful presentations look like.
I do see some similarities between West’s debunking of the Gimbal video and Covid hoax theories: (1) the authors of each have zero experience or training in the subjects they’re talking about (2) even though they themselves are decidedly non-experts, the authors heavily discount the opinion or analysis of actual experts if they disagree with their conclusions (3) not only did both authors knew their conclusion before they started their analysis (which doesn’t necessarily discredit their analysis), both authors ONLY EXIST to make the kinds of claims they do in their videos. Mick West’s paying job is to come up with reasons why the Gimbal explain video doesn’t show a UAP, just like conspiracy theorists exist to come up with conspiracy theories.
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Previously:
Then there’s another one called “Gimbal,” which looks really impressive, and people said it’s the most impressive UFO video. And it seems to show a flying saucer that’s rotating. But I think, and the evidence seems to show, that it’s actually just a rotating infrared glare. It’s kind of an artifact of the camera. The camera has this gimbal-mounted system, the way that rotates… The Navy called it “Gimbal,” like they already knew what was causing this rotation.
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This UFO aside, most UFOs are: Polaris, Venus, an airplane, a weather balloon, drunkenness, sleep deprivation, eye strain.
But as for this UFO: I wager the manufacturer of this classified fighter-plane camera mechanism would have alot to say about this. Are seeing the one malfunction that slipped through the cracks and, pareidolia-like, is an “alienish” UFO? Were there other video glitches (now or in the development process of this camera) that the manufacturer (or a layperson) could easily identify as such?
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Interesting that you choose to attack West’s background instead of addressing his analysis (which is, by the way, essentially unassailable). Pro tip: critical thinking doesn’t require credentials.
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Or that they can read rhe pilot’s mind, and so exactly know where and when to turn to stay at the same spot in the canera, in order to trick humans into thinking they were an artifact.
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The interesting part is that it’s apparently a real object, or at least it appears on thermal, visual, and radar.
You need to rewatch the video. Because the opposite conclusion is what is suggested.
Huh?
The (fairly long) analysis concludes that indeed, it likely is a real object, but its shape is likely IR glare modified by the jet’s gimbal IR lens that results into it appearing to rotate – sometimes quite abruptly.
Furthermore, it is also suggesting in the video that the most likely explanation for the image is the IR glare of a jet about 30 miles away (see comment starting at ~2:30 in the video).
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This is just my reading of the situation, but it seems like a bunch of UFO ‘true believers’ got senior enough in the US government to kick off their own research projects, which resulted in the “Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program”. Whence came this video and a few others.
It’s all couched in terms of “the US military needs to be aware of possible advance threats!”, but the vibes I get are that it’s a bunch of people who grew up believing in UFOs, who found themselves in a position to go through the government archives to see what they could find.
You’ll probably like this then:
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Case in point: Mick West determined that the “triangle ufo” video was in fact a camera lens / iris artifact, while people in the Navy didn’t realize this …
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What experts? In what area of expertise? I have not yet seen an “expert” in a relevant field (which, in this case, is not what what you seem to think it is) successfully refute West’s arguments. This is where your comparison of West to a covid denier fails.
How about you do that, then? Why are West’s conclusions in the video incorrect? Show your work. He did.
Yeah, the “experts” trotted out by true believers in UFO flaps are almost always anything but.
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Worth a watch …
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This FLIR gimbal camera video is the first of its type that I and 99.9% of people have ever seen. The pilots, on the other hand, see these moving images every flight. I wonder how much of the internal workings of the camera are known to the pilots. Does the training include a description of the glare characteristics? Are the pilots clued into the different mirror servo systems?
One thing is certain, the people who understand the workings of the camera are not permitted to talk about it.
Military secrets are the number one cause of UFO reports, as far as I can see.
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The “Navy personnel involved in the incident” are experts in flying high-powered jet aircraft and (presumably) dealing with other aircraft that are considered hostile. They are not automatically experts in figuring out random patches of light that may or may not be anything at all. Certainly the actual Navy experts are not going to jump to the conclusion that if they can’t figure out what causes a random patch of light, the cause must obviously be alien spacecraft.
Among all the other possible explanations, ranging from equipment malfunction to bugs on the lens to weather balloons to commercial aircraft to classified hypersonic Russian spy planes to …, based on prior probability “space aliens” are among the least likely to actually be the correct one, so there would really have to be overwhelming evidence in favour of the hypothesis and not just “meh, we don’t know, therefore aliens”.
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I can say with 100% assurance that other than a couple of the nerdier types the pilots have no idea how the cameras actually work, nor do they care for the most part. They dont know about the myriad optical effects induced by the system. They know what the camera in their phone can do and view all features of their targeting system through that lens, so to speak.
They are well schooled in the effects of general FLIR performance, such as thermal crossover, the effect of atmospheric absorbtion, weather effects and surface effects.
The targeting system they were using ATFLIR. There’s quite a lot of public domain literature on it. Not so much for the optical design of course.
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I don’t think the Navy’s alien fans have a problem with this, glaring or otherwise.
