[As the] percentage of the US population carrying cameras everywhere they go, every waking moment of their lives [has gone from “almost none” to “almost all,”] in the last few years, with very little fanfare, we’ve conclusively settled the questions of flying saucers, lake monsters, ghosts, and Bigfoot.
Given the amount of drones that fly around these days the question of UFO is settled. There are plenty of objects that fly around which nobody can accurately identify.
Especially when it comes to hobbist drones there are models that really look like flying saucers.
And yet the best footage of UFOs, ghosts, and Bigfoot still consists of some blurry, hazy, shiny, or darkblob smeared somewhere in a couple of frames of a shaky video at the absolute limit of the camera, exactly the same as forty years ago. Which is exactly what you’d expect to see if these were in fact normal things and optical artifacts that are perfectly explainable when they’re actually close enough to see.
Except some of this footage does in fact record what’s claimed to be flying saucers, lake monsters, ghosts, and Bigfoot. Don’t confuse “there is no evidence despite people looking”, with “there is no evidence but no one has looked”, or worse “I’m so sure there is no evidence I’m not even going to bother checking whether anyone else has found any”.
My impression is that people have expended roughly constant effort searching for Bigfoot from 1960 to now. Based on advances in modern camera technology (especially ubiquitous smartphones), evidence collection is cheaper and easier now than in 1960 (or even 1980).
I understood Monroe to be asserting that easier evidence collection and constant levels of effort imply that we should expect higher quality evidence now than in the past (if Bigfoot exists). In fact, the quality of evidence for Bigfoot is substantially similar now and in 1960. That’s pretty strong evidence that Bigfoot does not exist.
Very very cursory investigation—I went to Wikipedia, and noticed the lack of “Yo stupid, Bigfoot is real” section.
Also this argument applies less to ghosts and UFOs.
The argument applies to any phenomena that can be unambiguously recorded. Given the ease of recording relatively high quality video / audio / IR, assertions of a recordable phenomena without unambiguous recordings implies the assertions are false.
If proponents do not assert recordable phenomena, the rise-of-smartphones argument is not as powerful, but such assertions are much more vulnerable to invisible-undetectable-dragon issues.
I once heard an argument on a skeptical podcast: Why do we never see any Bigfoot roadkill?
That’s easy. Bigfoot must be stronger and more durable than cars. The real question is why we don’t find Bigfoot faeces with traces of partially digested steel, oil and rubber from Bigfoot’s vehicular combat success.
That’s just goverment misinformation. They steal all evidence and mind-wipe the witnesses. Then they use the DNA for top-secret research trying to make a super-soldier. Makes a lot more sense than the ridiculous rubber digestion. Everyone knows its chupacabra that eats rubber.
The argument applies to any phenomena that can be unambiguously recorded. Given the ease of recording relatively high quality video / audio / IR, assertions of a recordable phenomena without unambiguous recordings implies the assertions are false.
There are plenty of recorded sightings of UFOs on youtube. Probably more videos than existed 50 years ago.
Let me expand: I assume Wikipedia would link or discuss the best evidence for Bigfoot. It does link evidence, and the quality of that evidence is poor. As of this writing, the most recent evidence listed in wikipedia is a 2007 photo that forest rangers assert is a bear with mange and a 2008 youtube video link to what pro-Bigfoot groups apparently admit is a hoax.
None of this is higher quality evidence than the famous 1967 film.
Imagine a ten minute encounter with a para-normal / unexplained phenomena. In 1967 or 1980, it is essentially luck whether the observer has decent quality recording equipment and time to get into position to make a good recording. In 2013, the smartphone-per-person density is such that we should expect the vast majority of sighting of Bigfoot, or UFOs, or whatever, to be recorded by smartphone video cameras.
90% or more of those recordings will be crap, but the sheer volume of possible recordings implies that we should expect to see some very high quality evidence by now. And we haven’t (more precisely, wikipedia has no such link, which I think is equivalent in these circumstances).
Further, this analysis ignores the fairly large number of people actively searching for para-normal / unexplained phenomena.
Excellent question—I don’t know the answer. This link is suggestive, and the last picture includes a species discovered via upload to flicker.
In general, Googling “newly discovered species” suggests that many new species are found in relatively exotic locations. Bigfoot is supposed to live in the forests of the NW United States. I don’t consider that location exotic because those forests are heavily populated and very accessible to people (compared to the bottom of the ocean or deep jungle of Brazil or Africa).
xkcd explains that the absence of evidence is evidence of absence .
Given the amount of drones that fly around these days the question of UFO is settled. There are plenty of objects that fly around which nobody can accurately identify.
Especially when it comes to hobbist drones there are models that really look like flying saucers.
There is only an absence of evidence if you ignore all the pictures that are purportedly of those objects.
No, it’s absence of evidence if you notice that we have ready access to high-resolution videos of innumerable rare events and elusive animals.
And yet the best footage of UFOs, ghosts, and Bigfoot still consists of some blurry, hazy, shiny, or dark blob smeared somewhere in a couple of frames of a shaky video at the absolute limit of the camera, exactly the same as forty years ago. Which is exactly what you’d expect to see if these were in fact normal things and optical artifacts that are perfectly explainable when they’re actually close enough to see.
Except some of this footage does in fact record what’s claimed to be flying saucers, lake monsters, ghosts, and Bigfoot. Don’t confuse “there is no evidence despite people looking”, with “there is no evidence but no one has looked”, or worse “I’m so sure there is no evidence I’m not even going to bother checking whether anyone else has found any”.
You think Randall Monroe is making this mistake?
Yes, a combination of this and him suffering from the bias that makes it hard to notice flaws in arguments whose conclusions one agrees with.
My impression is that people have expended roughly constant effort searching for Bigfoot from 1960 to now. Based on advances in modern camera technology (especially ubiquitous smartphones), evidence collection is cheaper and easier now than in 1960 (or even 1980).
I understood Monroe to be asserting that easier evidence collection and constant levels of effort imply that we should expect higher quality evidence now than in the past (if Bigfoot exists). In fact, the quality of evidence for Bigfoot is substantially similar now and in 1960. That’s pretty strong evidence that Bigfoot does not exist.
Have you actually checked this? If so could you describe your procedure. Also this argument applies less to ghosts and UFOs.
Very very cursory investigation—I went to Wikipedia, and noticed the lack of “Yo stupid, Bigfoot is real” section.
The argument applies to any phenomena that can be unambiguously recorded. Given the ease of recording relatively high quality video / audio / IR, assertions of a recordable phenomena without unambiguous recordings implies the assertions are false.
If proponents do not assert recordable phenomena, the rise-of-smartphones argument is not as powerful, but such assertions are much more vulnerable to invisible-undetectable-dragon issues.
I once heard an argument on a skeptical podcast: Why do we never see any Bigfoot roadkill?
That’s easy. Bigfoot must be stronger and more durable than cars. The real question is why we don’t find Bigfoot faeces with traces of partially digested steel, oil and rubber from Bigfoot’s vehicular combat success.
That’s just goverment misinformation. They steal all evidence and mind-wipe the witnesses. Then they use the DNA for top-secret research trying to make a super-soldier. Makes a lot more sense than the ridiculous rubber digestion. Everyone knows its chupacabra that eats rubber.
There are plenty of recorded sightings of UFOs on youtube. Probably more videos than existed 50 years ago.
That doesn’t imply in any way that the evidence that now exist is the same strength as was 50 years ago. It just doesn’t.
Let me expand: I assume Wikipedia would link or discuss the best evidence for Bigfoot. It does link evidence, and the quality of that evidence is poor. As of this writing, the most recent evidence listed in wikipedia is a 2007 photo that forest rangers assert is a bear with mange and a 2008 youtube video link to what pro-Bigfoot groups apparently admit is a hoax.
None of this is higher quality evidence than the famous 1967 film.
Imagine a ten minute encounter with a para-normal / unexplained phenomena. In 1967 or 1980, it is essentially luck whether the observer has decent quality recording equipment and time to get into position to make a good recording. In 2013, the smartphone-per-person density is such that we should expect the vast majority of sighting of Bigfoot, or UFOs, or whatever, to be recorded by smartphone video cameras.
90% or more of those recordings will be crap, but the sheer volume of possible recordings implies that we should expect to see some very high quality evidence by now. And we haven’t (more precisely, wikipedia has no such link, which I think is equivalent in these circumstances).
Further, this analysis ignores the fairly large number of people actively searching for para-normal / unexplained phenomena.
Do we observe this explosion-of-recorded-evidence phenomenon with real but weird things (e.g. some rare, bizarre-looking bug)?
Excellent question—I don’t know the answer. This link is suggestive, and the last picture includes a species discovered via upload to flicker.
In general, Googling “newly discovered species” suggests that many new species are found in relatively exotic locations. Bigfoot is supposed to live in the forests of the NW United States. I don’t consider that location exotic because those forests are heavily populated and very accessible to people (compared to the bottom of the ocean or deep jungle of Brazil or Africa).
Take a look.