Exactly. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
Friedman is a mainstay of the cable channel shows about UFOs, so while I can't claim to be a reader of his books, I've certainly listened to hours of his discussions on the topic. From that, and his comments today, I think we both can say that he's not staking any claims that can ever be proven false. No amount of physical and testimonial debunkings will ever, ever change his mind. Such is normally the case with conspiracy theories and UFOology's cousin, cryptozoology.
What extraordinary claim did Friedman make? You may not BELIEVE the claim, but that doesn’t make it extraordinary.
I know he’s a showman, BTW, and I don’t like to watch him too often because of that. But his books have verifiable information.
As for the whole conspiracy theory thing, that’s the debunker’s red herring. If you look at the possibilities from a scientific and technological perspective, and leave out Mulder, Scully, and the Cigarette Smoking Man, there is a lot to consider. :)
I’m going to expand on something that irritates me to no end: the debunker’s call for “Show me the evidence!”
Gawd.
In the kind of work I do, there are few (read NO) people who could give you chapter and verse on every system, subsystem, flight mode, energy requirements, and who knows what else on an entire terrestrial spacecraft. Imagine what it would be like to be asked to do the same for a technology much beyond current human experience? Actually, I don’t HAVE to imagine, as I know what you do in that case - you send people to references to dig deeper. Quix has done that time after time, as have others over the years. It is a debunking technique to insist on encyclopedic personal knowledge (and instant recall of it) of an entire technology and/or sociological phenomenon. If you haragued someone like that in a business setting, you’de get your ass thrown out of the conference room with your attitude.
What balderdash.
How convenient.
Again, murderers are sent to execution on FAR, FAR, FAR LESS evidence and far far far fewer witnesses and expert testimony.