Great One Sided Debates

Friedman

Shostak

Great One Sided Debates
by Alfred Lehmberg

Speaking recently (Thursday, July 23, 2015)  of debates where Stan Friedman regularly dusts up on Seth Shostak: though long delayed due to an alleged and unsubstantiated illness reportedly short-stopping Seth Shostak, his much anticipated debate with Stanton Friedman took place on the "Coast To Coast" radio show, George Noory providing limited sequencing and orchestration, on Wednesday, July 21st of 2004...

Let it be said that Friedman rode Shostak like a rented mule and found him just as stubborn, sullen, and recalcitrant in a debate scored nationally at 57% for Friedman, 33% for Shostak and 10% undecided.

Still... I was all set to give Dr. Shostak the benefit of the debated doubt until he used Kal Korff as a citation, and then all of his air went out for me.  Kal K. Korff compared against Stanton T. Friedman is like warped and wormy lumber compared against hardened steel beams. Dr. Shostak is in oxygen debit if he thinks "triple-K" is remotely relevant, is in any way conversant with ufological reality, or has demonstrated, in any way, an unbiased and un-canted balance regarding what happened at 'Roswell'. Great suffering ZOT, Dr. Shostak!

Beyond that, Dr. Shostak was a willing poster child for mainstream ufological denial, pretended ignorance of ufological fact, and mainstream unwillingness to think out of the box of the suspect status quo. His defeat, I suppose, was inevitable.

"Where is the evidence," Dr. Shostak plaintively wailed. "Why don't we see the evidence in a museum"? Well, why don't we see evidence of corporate chicanery in high school history textbooks? Why don't we see evidence of alternative archeology in these open-minded and tolerant museums alluded to by Dr. Shostak? Why don't we see the acceptance, by the mainstream, of the ufological evidence, extant? Reactionary and unlearned denial of the ufological is the Doctor's only hole to hide in. He has a lot of conciliatory, albeit conflicted company in that dank and shallow hole...

Dr. Shostak demonstrated only that he was oblivious to the huge volume of extant ufological evidence of an excellence that cannot be forever ignored... Verily, the quality anecdotal evidence, compounded with the vetted photographic evidence, and then added to the documented historical evidence, gives every indication that a ufological contention regarding that phenomena must be taken seriously...

Moreover, when the preceding is framed by the serious artistic evidence, qualified by the ~available~ physical evidence, and then compellingly buttressed by the conclusively personal evidence, I can only be annoyingly astonished by the continued reluctance of people like Dr. Shostak to face the highly strange music that just cannot be forever marginalized... Does the information available justify respect from the mainstream that is not forthcoming?

Yes! The 'evidence' he cries for is a fact to which Dr. Shostak remains, stubbornly, oblivious. Evidence does not cease to be evidence merely because it is denied.

Additionally, and well fleshed out in Dolan's "UFO's and the National Security State," (which Dr. Shostak was blissfully unaware of) are the ongoing and well-referenced programs of ufological denial, dismissiveness, and derision that the aforementioned National Security State has prosecuted for the last 57 years with regard to UFOs! Fifty-seven years of cover-up, patent misdirection, and obvious conspiracy has denigrated, destroyed, or degraded science's ability to embrace this new challenge or to reasonably credit the available evidence in any way.

It's not lack of evidence. It is lack of willingness to pursue the evidence that is there!

This readily explains the reluctance of the mainstream to come on board! That 'evidence' for which the doctor wailed so plaintively cannot come to light if it inconveniences those who dictate to the mainstream, those who officiate the conduits of funding and grants, and those who oversee the maintenance of an 'official' giggle/discouragement factor... also denied by the good Doctor!

Astonishing!

Dr. Shostak was very plain that the "giggle factor" did not really exist, and that a ufological reality would be embraced by the scientific community if it had but a "single percentage point" of verity to it. Shostak says it would be the biggest thing in a scientist's life. Ironically He's right about that!

Museums would LOVE to display the Ray-gun or star-drive he demands as 'evidence' (?), as he blissfully disregards the abundant evidence that is there. What bald cultural naiveté is this? This is in direct opposition to Dr. Michio Kaku who gave an opposite assessment to Art Bell just a few weeks ago on the same program, and who said that the scientific community was very fearful regarding serious interest in the ufological, even today.

Dr. Shostak's final point was that Mr. Friedman argues his ufological case from ignorance with regard to 'facts' and so his assertions cannot be taken seriously for that reason. Flap-doodle, forgetting he's the errant pot calling the stalwart kettle black!

Mr. Friedman might be arguing his case from ignorance, true enough, but Dr. Shostak certainly argues his case from reactionary denial, scientistic (sic) inertia, and knee-jerk self-interested obstinacy. Some things in this multidimensional continuum of undetected reality won't hop into Dr. Shostak's test-tube for him. Most of reality won't, I suspect.

Dr. Shostak lost this debate by a healthy margin, anyway... as it turned out, but when one takes into account the faulty assumptions the Doctor made, the facts the Doctor demonstrated that he was unaware of, or the outdated 'conventional wisdoms' that he employed to arrive at his conclusions... he didn't make point ONE, reader! He was Mr. Friedman's "crushed opponent driven before him", after all... and if you listen carefully you can still hear the lamentations of the Doctor's fanboys.

Read on!

PS -- Kal K. Korff?!?