Talk:Roswell incident/Archive 2

message: I've done some major editing, first adding the 1997 Air Force report. I still have to complete the critique, and a follow-up on how many of the UFO researchers have been discredited (Scmitt; Alien film; Majestic, etc)
I've also taken out a lot of stuff that was a) redundant (like the FBI transcript, stuff on the Ramey photo, etc.,) b) stuff which was not about Roswell (general stuff about UFOs don't speak to Roswell itself) and c) stuff which will be dealt with briefly later (or in the case of the "strange experiments theory already in the later developments section). Most of the stuff gone is stuff that has been established to be hoaxes - like the Alien autopsy. They will be afforded brief mentions.
Thanks for the patience, folks, I am nearly done.
Canada Jack 22:01, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Major Edits

message: I just wanted to take a minute to say hello and let the folks who regularly watch this article know that Wikproject Paranormal has selected this article as our collaboration of the month. So don't be surprised if you see some new faces sprucing up the article and speaking up here on the talk page. We'd ideally like to get this article up to snuff to have it featured on the main page, so if we do something too drastic or that you disagree with please just let us know. Thanks — ripley\talk 17:17, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm a bit late to the party I guess... but I'd figured I'd lend a hand. The article actualy looks quite good.  Just some ruff edges. ---J.S (t|c) 20:05, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yup. Check the ToDo list and the discussion at the bottom; we've only got a little bit to go before we've got ourselves as GA! --InShaneee 00:03, 2 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wikiproject Paranormal 

message: I've split off the main body of text for the Air Force report to a separate page, and drastically shortened the text here on the same subject.
Canada Jack 17:45, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: That's great, Canada Jack. The new Air Force page is good. Kosmocentric 01:39, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: New page for Air Force reports

message: Could users please reframe from using ibidem (ibid) as a citation mark. I know that it's proper reference form in research papers, but sections get moved around so much on pages like this that it is not always clear what is the original citation being referenced actually is (if indeed it has not been changed or deleted by another user). Instead just use a named reference tag < ref name = ABC > ref details < / ref> and then < ref name = ABC / > there after. If you do this, it will automatically Ibid for you. If you want to include the page number, just put it in brackeds after you close the reference tag.
Thank you
perfectblue 18:58, 14 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Ibid

message: I'm about to undertake what will probably be a fairly major precis of the article, trimming extraneous information where I can (without removing significant content -- for instance we can just say "at another ranch" instead of "at the Foster Ranch 70 miles away from Roswell" without removing much significant information). But, I have little personal knowledge of the story so if I end up inadvertently removing something you feel is significant to lay readers' understanding, please let me know. — ripley\talk 18:42, 18 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm not convinced this is a good move. If you change "at the Foster Ranch 70 miles away from Roswell" to "at another ranch" you are likely to be asked for details. Removing informative text is not helpful IMMHO. Moriori 20:08, 18 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Saying "Foster ranch" begs the question of who "Foster is," and that means more information that adds nothing. That it was a ranch 70 miles from Roswell I think is enough, but I'm open to hearing others' opinions. Or is it important in a non-obvious way whose ranch it was on? — ripley\talk 22:22, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

text: I couldn't make it through the whole thing today, but did do most of the article. I've also moved off what amounts to block quotes from various primary witnesses into its own article, Witness accounts at Roswell. It may also be a good idea to move the secondary witnesses there too, but I don't want to be too hasty. — ripley\talk 19:51, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

text: Personally I agree, but I wanted to give people time to adjust to the idea of moving any of the statements at all -- if nobody objects today then we should go on and complete the move I think. — ripley\talk 15:27, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Precis 

message: Just redid the "Air Force" section, just to more properly summarize what the new page says. (What was there didn't really speak to it) The "witness" sections, just moved, should get a similar rewrite on both the "Roswell" page and on the newly created page. I'll do it eventually if you guys don't.
Canada Jack 19:18, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Go for it!  Thanks CJ. — ripley\talk 21:17, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Rewrites

message: Well, in the spirit of WP:NOT a collection of links and WP:EL, lets evaluate the external links section.
Here's the criteria I'd like to use:
:# Does the website linked provide useful information not already available on wikipedia?
:# Does the website infringe on any one's copyrights?
:# Is the website a "mushroom"? (Ie, springs up over night and all it has to stand on is bullshit)
:# Is the link redundant to a link already in the references section?
If no to 1 and/or yes to any of the rest, then it's time to remove it. ---J.S (t|c) 00:42, 2 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: P.S. This is an invitation for discussion... I'm not trying to own the page:) ---J.S (t|c) 00:46, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

text: Yeah... ok, removed.  I should have included it in this list, but silly section edit threw me off:)  ---J.S (t|c) 21:11, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Evaluation of External Links 

message: Who are these anonymous skeptics that the article keeps talking about?  Seems a bit of a weasel word in context.  I marked a few with  but I decided that wasn't realy a good way to do it it. ---J.S (t|c) 21:57, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, I wrote most of the article. And a lot of those "anonymous skeptics" are in fact fully cited elsewhere. I'm not sure what to do here. If the consensus here is that I should add citations, I could supply multiple sources for each instance of "skeptics say". Exactly how should this be cited? By specific multiple references? or by the name of the skeptic alone?
Canada Jack 15:40, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It would be helpfull to replace "skeptics" with the name or names of notable skeptics who hold the view. ---J.S (t|c) 15:54, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Perhaps (where overlap exists) it would be possible to restructure the wording a bit so that near the beginning it can say, "Skeptics such as X and Y", and then refer back to that. --InShaneee 16:21, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

text: Excellent.  This is one of the hard fixes... but it can be a major blockade in the way of FA status. ---J.S (t|c) 19:20, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

text: Excellent! This article will make GA in no time and well well-prepared for peer-review for FA. ---J.S (t|c) 18:32, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm pretty well done now. I tried to match the reference formatting, but someone better at this better take a look. If there are any more references you need, let me know.
Canada Jack 20:49, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Awesome job! We've just got two more links in "Arguments from Authority" that need to be made in-line, and that's all of 'em! --InShaneee 20:56, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I meant the ones labeled '2' and '3' in the third paragraph. --InShaneee 21:08, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  skeptics 

message: I'd like to combine 
Further reading (Skeptics)" & "Sources (generally "pro-UFO" explanations)".  They seem redundant and judgemental... thoughts or objections? ---J.S (t|c) 21:16, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I never was a fan of those titles...I'd like to know what purpose those links serve before anything is done. Are the 'sources' actual sources? If any are, I'd remove the 'generally' and make everything that isn't (including the skeptics) 'further reading'. If they're not, just merge 'em all into a 'further reading' section, although if that's the case, we may need to evaluate whether they belong there at all. --InShaneee 21:28, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I can see the value of such a list... but I haven't read any of those books so I I can't relay judge them on an individual basis. I'll combine the lists and see if I can fix the formatting some. ---J.S (t|c) 21:39, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Combining sections... 

message: I made an appeal on the colab page to extend the collaboration for this article. I think major progress has been made and I'd like to see this submitted to FA before we move on. ---J.S (t|c) 21:18, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  extend colab... 

message: Just a note here about the secondary pages, specifically the Witness page and the Air Force Report page. Is it necessary to tackle those as well?
I bring it up in particular because one of the strong advocates of one side of the debate on Roswell has in the past few days decided to transform what I felt was a fairly balanced, NPOV presentation of the various witness accounts to the Roswell UFO incident into a fairly slanted POV presentation, IMHO.
Canada Jack 20:12, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Secondary pages

message: Some of the bigger points brought up on the peer review:
*"Other theories" section too long (perhaps another sub-article candidate?) (My thoughts: Is Timothy Printy really a reliable source? If not, we can remove his objections)
*Reorganization may be needed; suggestion was 'background', 'materials found', 'theories', 'recent developments', and 'in popular culture'
*Use quotation templates to make the one or two very long quotes look more presentable.
*All instances of "X claims", "X alleges", "X asserts" need citation.
*In "Contemporary accounts of evidence found", it says "A telex uncovered in the 1990s". How was it uncovered?
*News section doesn't really talk much about how the press initially believed it was a flying saucer, or what impact that had. (While this would be nice, and possibly necessary for a FA, I wouldn't make this a top priority)
*In "Conspiracy theories", the alternative account recounted there is quite long, and feels awkward in context. (I'd suggest making it into a summary rather than a blow-by-blow)
--InShaneee 17:52, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Peer Review

message: Well, I reformatted the section. Combined both lists, sorted by authors last name and found ISBNs for everything but one book.
:Thomas R. Morris & Theresa J. Morris, with Sally Hester "Roswell Connection", 2006
I'm not sure who listed it, but if you have it on hand can you grab the ISBN from the front cover? Anyone have any comments on the reorganisation?---J.S (t|c) 21:03, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I went ahead and removed all of the books that were also listed as citations. --InShaneee 21:25, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Further reading... 

message: As noted above, please draw your attention to the "Witness accounts of the Roswell UFO incident" page where one ufo-advocate has been reverting the POV contributions of his I have been editing into NPOV.
I just fixed up the page again, and I feel if we let the page get "taken over" by one side than a great deal of effort here may be for naught.
Canada Jack 21:57, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think some of his material does have merit; since it doesn't appear he's reading the article talk page, you may want to try contacting him on his user talk page. --InShaneee 22:42, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

text: ...As I just said, I think some of his insertions have merit. That doesn't mean I agree with all of it, and it doesn't mean I condone his attitude. However, wholesale reversions solve nothing. Talk to him about the SPECIFIC parts you have a problem with and why, and see how things go from there. --InShaneee 23:00, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Do we even need this article? It seems alot of that goes into a level of detail we don't need to go into. ---J.S (t|c) 23:02, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No comment on that either way, but for the record, it was split off from this article in an attempt to shorten it. --InShaneee 23:05, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Revert War on "[[Witness accounts of the Roswell UFO incident]]"

message: Comment about the "Arguments from authority" section -- When describing the contents of Randle and Schmitt's two books, we shift from the past tense to the present tense. "Kevin Randle and Donald Schmitt initially focused on Marcel and the ranch as the main crash site in their 1991 book UFO Crash at Roswell. (past tense) Then, in their next book, The Truth About the UFO Crash at Roswell, the crash happens several days later and at a location far from the Foster ranch. Marcel and Brazel are relegated to a lesser roles and, as The Roswell Files notes, the new accounts contradict the old accounts." (present tense). I think we should rewrite this section and stick to one tense (whichever would be most appropriate). Any thoughts? Zagalejo 19:11, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Past, definitely. The crash isn't happening as we write this. --InShaneee 19:47, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Grammatical tense

message: I've added what I intended to include in the article originally (and which I feel needs to be here for additional context). And that is some of the detail behind prominent UFO researchers concluding that there were no aliens involved (mentioned in the intro), the revelation of shoddy research and split between two major Roswell authors (alluded to earlier), and the discrediting of several prominent witnesses.
I think this adds more to the article, but if you guys don't, well, do what you will.
Canada Jack 21:40, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: While the prose is fine there seems to be a bias in the selection of events that make up the story being told... were there not "positive" developments happening at the time? (I can't answer that as I'm not an expert in the subject)  If not... then the section is great. (Except we have 10 new citations to fix;))  ---J.S (t|c) 21:54, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Added post-1995 developments

message: Dr Fil has gone completely overboard now, he's probably tripled the size of this once-manageable article and ignored my comments and critiques on what he has done.
At first, He seemed confused about the way I structured it, complaining that "primary" witnesses were taken off and put elsewhere, and inserting various POV comments about witnesses who saw this as a balloon or whatever while leaving witnesses with testimony of claimed sinister goings-ons at face value.
Realizing this stemmed from a lack of clarity about what was meant about "primary," I reworded everything so as to make it clear the intent of the sections - the first part focussed on witness accounts to the debris as described in 1947; the second part to accounts of aliens and cover-ups etc.
I also reiterated my intent here to present witness statements at face value. Since the vast majority of these statements could be considered "pro-ufo," I thought this was a balanced approach.
Perhaps now realizing my intent, he has ceased to keep reinserting irrelevant stuff and stuff into the wrong section, but has turned into the Sorcerer's Apprentice, burying the page with endless accounts.
I also asked him to clarify a quote he inserted. He says Brazel Jr described a gouge of specific dimensions. While this quote may exist somewhere, I think it was important to a) supply the actual quote or b) say who claims he said this. Which is what I am led to believe wikistyle. He refuses to do either, saying the source at the end of the quote that is there has it. I've put a "citation" mark up three times and simply omits it without seriously responding to my request for a proper note on this.
Worse, in a section on Cavitt, a witness who supplied an account which suggests explicitly no alien craft was involved, he seems determined to discredit the account by saying some researchers said he denied ever being there. I repeatedly have omitted it asking why it is relevant, since NO ONE disputes he was in fact present. To me, if one doesn't know this person was in fact there, the comment may discredit the account which, no doubt, is the POV insertion's intent.
But the biggest problem now is that he has ignored my main entreaty - to resist the temptation to load the page down with extraneous material and limit the various sections to several preferabbly first-hand accounts, and to have a link like "for more, see here." Instead, he has now expanded the "alien" part to 21 quotes, including quotes which only remotely suggest anything (like Zimmerman's) and, again, ignoring and not responding to my requests to keep the article length reasonable.
My attempts to simply apply the standards to the page I, after all, created, have been met with cries of "censorship" etc.
I'd appreciate someone else going in there are weighing in on what I see as a hijack of the page by a strong pro-UFO advocate. He was a major cause of why the original Roswell page was a complete one-sided mess, he is well on the way to doing the same on the "witness" page.
Canada Jack 03:20, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You might want to take this to Mediation, since this goes farther than just an editing concern, and none of us are really neutral anymore. --InShaneee 15:57, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Someone PLEASE help out at [[Witness accounts of the Roswell UFO incident]]

message: Below the image of 2 men posing with some of the balloon, it says "see below for an enlargement", yet there is no enlargement below. Was there? Should there be? If not, the text should be removed. 81.77.11.237 17:24, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: There was... not sure what happened to it. Ummm weird. ---J.S (t|c) 20:07, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Image text

message: I've noticed that one of the advocates of the ufo interpretation has decided to declare the article "biased" and, without discussion, start inserting pro-ufo interpretations into the section describing the skeptical viewpoint.
I've dealt with this guy for a long time in other venues and while his point of view is clear and he is entitled to it, he tends to seek to counter every view that might cast doubt on the ufo interpretation.
It took me a long time to clean up the mess that was largely his creation and let stand a fairly balanced NPOV article, he seems to think otherwise and is at it - again.
Canada Jack 15:29, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Let's not start talking like he's a vandal just yet. As I said when I reverted him, since the current version of the page is based on broad consensus, he needs to bring any large scale changes here before implementing them. Additionally, dispute tags should not be applied when a single editor is challenging consensus. --InShaneee 15:48, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

text: We shouldn't be making any accusations whatsoever. Let's just see how this plays out. --InShaneee 17:16, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Possible revert war

message: I've been doing a bit of an expansion of the case for UFOs at Roswell as it evolved via the various books published over the year, including more specific quotes for the cases etc. I feel it needs a bit more detail (not tons), and I think I will rewrite the skeptic section. As it stands, the article is almost there but not quite. Canada Jack 15:48, 12 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I've just redone the "New witness accounts and Roswell UFO books" section to better expand on the development of the "UFO" story. Accordingly, I've moved some accounts - the Rudiak "photo" account and the General Exon account to "new developments" as they came later. I will follow-up with a redo of the skeptical response section to more closely follow the sequence in the preceding section. Canada Jack 20:45, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Rewrite of UFO Books and Skeptics sections

message: I watched a program on National Geographic that said Roswell was nothing more than a weather balloon experiment, and the "alien bodies" were just crash test dummies.
But is there a connection between dummies and Mogul, which is seems to be the most popular explanation of the debris?  Were dummies on the Mogul aparatus, and what were they for if it was just for listening?  Or was the debris more than one experiment that crashed in the same place?
:No, no dummies with Mogul. Mogul was assigned to detect possible Soviet atomic blasts and was equipped with microphones. In their Report on the Roswell incident in 1994, the USAF bypassed the alien aspect, but in their publication "Case Closed" in 1997 they deal with it contending much later crashes of devices with dummies had misled people to think they saw alien bodies. The USAF "evidence" is based on the home-made speculation that all the eye witnesses had memory deficiencies (leading to mixing up things or substituting earlier memories by later ones or even invent "memories"), what surely CAN happen once in a while but hardly with ALL witnesses regarding ONE single event (besides, these alleged deficiencies were not at all checked with the involved). -- Bwilcke 15:35, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Dummies and Mogul?

message: Bwilcke redid the intro twice and it's been reverted twice, viz: 
:"Thirty years later, former Roswell AAF intelligence officer Jesse Marcel confessed the crash of a UFO back then. Three UFO researcher teams (Moore/Berlitz, Randle/Schmitt, Friedman/Berliner) confirmed Marcel's testimony on the basis of a great number of witnesses. 1994 the congress had the General Accounting Office (GAO) carry out an archive search for documents possibly related to the incident, whatever it was, with no results except that Roswell AAF documents regarding the period 1947 – 1949 were missing and the obligatory documentation on their deletion not found. The US Air Force at once undertook an own archive search with the result of only one document (teletype) found, and claimed "no indication" of a UFO crash but "most probably" a crash of a weatherballoon train in connection with Project Mogul. 1997 the US Air Force repeated this result in a further publication, adding - especially concerning the "alien" aspect - the memory of the witnesses unreliable, and declared "Case Closed". UFO researcher criticized this as unfounded und incorrect and presented more evidence supporting their case. Some other UFO researchers as well as "skeptics" joined the case of the Air Force and tried to strengthen their stance. There has been a passionate debate ever since about what really happened."
I reverted to the original intro as did InShanee the second time around. I think InShanee and I agree that what was originally there and what we reverted to was the best NPOV intro that we had and seeing that it was the result of a fairly intensive edit process, it should stand. IMHO, there are several problems with the Bwilcke new intro, such as "...Jesse Marcel confessed the crash of a UFO..." which to me is clearly POV and probably not accurate anyway. "Confessed" implies that Marcel revealed the truth that a UFO crashed, a "truth" which is in fact hotly disputed. Further, and I think most of the named pro-ufo authors would agree here, Marcel simply voiced his BELIEF that there had been a cover-up of a UFO, he didn't in fact reveal some secret file that indicated aliens had been recovered. Further, as InShanee indicated in his revert, this information is quite specifically spelled out in the body of the page, the Air Force reports have their own pages which spell ojt their conclusions and the controversies (like the missing documents) which are properly there and not in the intro. Besides, there is a misrepresentation of what the Air Force in fact said in this intro - it was more that witnesses reported what they in fact said WERE dummies but pro-ufo authors had omitted their prosaic descriptions and fixed these often undated occurences with the events as described in July 1947. It didn't simply say the memories were "unreliable." 
As indicated in both the original intro and the Bwilcke intro, "there has been a passionate debate ever since," and I and others here have strived these past few months to give a balanced presentation of the facts which, it seems, has largely been embraced with a few notable exceptions (see above). My take on this leans towards the skeptical, but as long as we present the case for and against in as neutral a way as possible - and as long as we accurately portray the sides in a manner THEY present their side, then we are on stable ground. Canada Jack 16:34, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Intro rewrite and revert

message: This whole article should go.  Its just a list of things people dreamed up out of their own paranoia and lack of education.  You ought to be able to accept the idea that Roswell was the result of a rocket flight from White Sands by former Nazi rocket scientists.  Their existence in this country was secret.  The whole thing flew funny because of ionization during re-entry, and caused von Braun to get together with Hannes Alfven and have him write a textbook about ionization in 1949 - called _Cosmic Electrodynamics_  In the preface Alven says he cant reveal who asked him to do the work.  
The secrecy of White Sands led to the first versions of Dyna-Soar not to be understood.  Even as late as 1962, no one understood that magnetic fields that were causing the X-15 to roll during flight.  Modern Space Shuttles have the same defect - they were designed for hypersonic flight through fluids.  The next shuttle ought to be designed for flight through magnetic fields.  In the meantime, this wiki article documenting everyones paranoid ideas ought to be deleted.  Mr Grant ought to know enough to be able to verify my scientific claims.  And the Help files can tell you that Wikipedia is not designed for documenting things people imagined or were afraid of because they were uneducated.
Conventional Theories/Skeptics
Satellite imagery - Project Corona
It seems possible that the Roswell incident of July 1947 might have been a failed attempt to retrieve film from space. Possibly the Corona Project was named for Corona, New Mexico which is the site of the Roswell incident.
V-2 engineers at White Sands were working on taking photos from space and had perfected a technique for orienting the camera by 1948. http://www.infoage.org/paperclip.html Remember that the existence of German rocket scientists 100 miles away at White Sands was classified. Five flights in April and May 1947 included experiments in photography, but the next published photo flight was not made until December.
It was well known from Eugene Saenger's work that a rotating disk allowed for an even distribution of convective and radiant heat during reentry. What they did not know until around 1949 and the work of Hannes Alfven, was the large amount of re-entry heat due to ionization.
The first photographs from space were successfully returned to earth on July 26, 1948. http://www.wsmr.army.mil/pao/FactSheets/V2/v-2.htm
21:44, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: This article is well sourced and relevant for what it is. Your misunderstanding of wikipedia policy is thorough; the interviews and opinions linked to here were not 'imagined'.  --InShaneee 21:52, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wiki is Not a crystal ball