Documents / Hearing transcript
This is the printed record of a July 29, 1968 symposium on unidentified flying objects held by the Committee on Science and Astronautics of the U.S. House of Representatives, chaired by Rep. J. Edward Roush. The committee heard statements from six scientists: J. Allen Hynek, James E. McDonald, Carl Sagan, Robert L. Hall, James A. Harder and Robert M. L. Baker. It also printed papers from Donald Menzel, Stanton Friedman, Frank Salisbury and others. Hynek argued that puzzling UFO reports from competent witnesses deserve serious scientific study.
“Harder”17 pages
193Dr. HARDER. This was done by a neutralization analysis on a very tiny slicer. It would be hard to say to what extent over the interven- ing 9 years there might be some territorialization, but certainly it would not have taken out aluminum or copper. It might have added zinc or barium, although that seems somewhat unlikely. Dr. SAGAN. So some comparison analysis has been made for exampleof the magnesium flares. A magnesium flare has an abundance of im- purities? Dr. HARDER. It would hardly be 99.9 percent purity. Dr. SAGAN. That is what I meant. Dr. HARDER. Yes, that is right. Mr. RousH. Dr. McDonald. Dr. MCDONALD. Both Dr. Hall and Dr. Sagan remarked in different contexts on the intense emotional factors that predispose some people to certain systems of belief, and I would like to remark on that to be sure that some perspective is maintained on that part of the problem. In the witnesses I have interviewed—I have intentionally stayed away from those who immediately show a very strong interest in a salvation theory, or something like that—so I have cut down my sample right at the start. I would want to leave the point strongly emphasized that though there are a few people, and some of them rather visible and vocal, who are emotional about the problem and tie it to almost religious beliefs, the body of evidence that puzzles me, that bothers me, and I think demands much more scientific attention, comes from people who are really not at all emotional about it; they are puzzled by it, they are reliable, a typical cross-section of the populace. They have not built any wild theories on it. In fact, let me mention one important sighting in New Guinea. I didn't interview the witness in New Guinea, - but in Melbourne, Australia. An Anglican Missionary, Rev. William IL Gill, was teach- inx the school in New Guinea, and when he and some three dozen mission personnel saw an object hovering offshore with four figures visible on top of it, even this minister didn't begin to put any religious interpretation on it. He said this is what he saw, and he wrote very careful notes about it. It is that kind of evidence, and not evidence, that comes from people with emotional factors predisposing them to sys- tem beliefs that impress me. Mr. RousH. Let's have the psychologist speak here for just a moment. Dr. HALL. Thank you. I welcome that clarification. The point I was making was not that the witnesses generally are emotional and precommitted to a position at all, but that the people who are interpreting the evidence after it has been gathered are usually precommitted beyond the point of rationality, and it is a very im-portant distinction that you brought out. The primary problem of witnesses, it seems to me, is this reluctance to report based apparently on a feeling that they will be ridiculed— that their evidence is not welcome—and I guess I can't resist telling the little story from the Wall Street Journal, quite recently, of a man who had five pet wallabys in Westchester County. A wallaby
Hearing transcript, from the govinfo collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 256 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.