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Dr. J. Allen Hynek, astronomer, foremost proponent of UFOs, and  the one who came up with the expression "close encounters of the third kind," defines a UFO as:

The reported perception of an object or light seen in the sky or upon land the appearance, trajectory, and general dynamic and luminescent behavior of which do not suggest a logical, conventional explanation and which is not only mystifying to the original percipients but remains unidentified after close scrutiny of all available evidence by persons who are technically capable of making a common sense identification, if one is possible.

These mystifying words seem to say that when you see something which intelligent people cannot rationally explain, then you are seeing a UFO. Witnesses to such sightings often claim that what they saw could not be explained by the known laws of physics.  They claim to have witnessed a violation of a law of nature, i.e., a miracle .

What Hynek considers to be "all available evidence" may be much less than what a skeptic would require. For example, the evidence appealed to by UFOlogists consists of (1) the testimony of people who claim to have seen aliens and/or alien spacecraft; (2) facts about the type of people who give the testimony; (3) the lack of contrary testimony or physical evidence that would either explain the sighting by conventional means (weather balloon, prank, meteor shower, reflection of light, etc.) or discredit the reliability of the eyewitness; and, (4) alleged weaknesses in the arguments of skeptics against the UFOlogists. The last item is irrelevant to the issue, yet it plays a disproportionately large role in UFOlogy.

Attacking an opponent's arguments or motives, instead of presenting positive evidence in defense of one's own view is common among defenders of the claim that UFOs are alien spacecraft. Of course, there is nothing wrong with attacking an opponent's argument and exposing weaknesses and faults thereby. But refutation is no substitute for support. It is simply faulty logic to assume that because an opponent's reasons are flawed, one's own reasons are valid. One's own reasons may be just as flawed as an opponent's, or even more flawed.

Another common tactic of UFOlogists is to claim that the skeptic cannot prove that what was seen was not an alien craft. One is supposed to infer from this fact that the perception probably was of an alien craft. This kind of reasoning is known as the argumentum ad ignorantiam. A claim does not become true or reasonable if a contrary claim cannot be proved to be true. With arguments for UFOs there are two distinct moves here. One is to claim that no logical explanation is possible because some scientist, pilot, Air Force Colonel, or Ph.D. cannot think of one. The other is to point to the lack of contrary evidence: no counter-testimony of other eyewitnesses, no proof that there were not aliens or alien spacecraft. Here, too, there is a logical error. The fact that some genius cannot come up with an explanation for something is irrelevant to deciding whether the correct explanation should be couched in terms of  visitors from outer space. The choice is not either (A) we know this conventional explanation is correct , or (B) we must conclude that  aliens have visited us.

It seems more reasonable to believe that the only reason we cannot explain these sightings by conventional means is because we do not have all the evidence; it not because these sightings are probably due to alien visitations. If we had all the evidence, we would probably be able to explain the sightings by some conventional means.

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Originally posted by furshur

These flying V objects are probably geese or cranes. The lights of the city reflecting off of the bellies of the birds is the most likely explanation. I suppose that if the humidity was high the birds feathers may have been wet which would enhance the reflections. The most telling is the description of the events; a V formation that is moving slowly with no sound. Of course geese and cranes frequently migrate at night.
I would be willing to bet that for most of the sightings in the fall the 'UFOs' move to the south and in the spring the 'UFOs' move to the north. The Hudson valley is on the so called Atlantic Flyway.
It may not be geese but it is more likely geese than Extra-terrestrials looking for there next abduction victim.

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Got to say, furshur, that the geese or cranes idea is one of the dumbest I've ever heard. The Valley is filled with people who have watched decades of geese and crane flocks migrating southward. How did they suddenly get fooled? Don't know about cranes, but geese make lots of noise when they migrate. Very distinctive, unmistakable noise. Lots of it. Like the UFO and little green men idea more than the geese migration notion.

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