Talk:Aligned, Multiple-transient Events in the First Palomar Sky Survey

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Did you know nomination

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The Palomar Observatory in San Diego
The Palomar Observatory in San Diego
Created by Chetsford (talk). Number of QPQs required: 2. DYK is currently in unreviewed backlog mode and nominator has 170 past nominations.

Chetsford (talk) 16:57, 4 November 2025 (UTC).[reply]

  • The section on "ufology" has no *direct* bearing on the article content, is clearly biased against the content, and I would not pass this without it being removed. I also do not see anything that rises the to the hook claim that this is "generally attributed" to plate defects. The ref on the section that does mention this states it as "were often", and I would hesitate to say "often" is a synonym for "generally" and the context suggests the "were" is in the sense of "in the past" as opposed to "is". The section at the end, which purports to report on these concerns, doesn't mention plate defects at all. The SciAm article does offer a very good summary of the various concerns, and one of the statements fits the bill, that of Nigel Hambly, but there are many other interesting ones as well. So I'm uncomfortable which this claim. Further, for an article about UFO claims, which would be sure to generate oodles of clicks, it seems odd that the hook fails to mention this at all. If the goal of this article is to inform people that this work is controversial, then it only serves that purpose if people actually read it, and this hook would seem to do the opposite. Instead:
"for an article about UFO claims..." / "The section on "ufology" has no *direct* bearing on the article" -- I'm having difficulty reconciling these two statements.
"If the goal of this article is to inform people that this work is controversial" It is not. The goal of the article is to chronicle what reliable sources say about a notable topic. In the spirit of NPOV, our articles should not be evangelically motivated. Chetsford (talk) 18:24, 4 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The goal of the article is to chronicle what reliable sources say about a notable topic - precisely, and this section says nothing whatsoever about this paper. "our articles should not be evangelically motivated" - I couldn't agree more, which is why this section should be removed, as it appears to be included simply to bias the reader without any RS actually making these statements. Maury Markowitz (talk) 18:43, 4 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Background sections to explain unusual terminology later introduced are extremely rote on articles, and are a proper application of WP:MTAU and WP:PLA. Let me think about this for a period of time, however. "as it appears to be included simply to bias the reader without any RS actually making these statements" I completely reject this indictment in both form and fact. Chetsford (talk) 18:56, 4 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
explain unusual terminology later introduced - the terminology is not used anywhere else in the article. Argument fails. You can reject my opinion and argue with me ad nauseam about this "indictment", or we can move forward with the nom. Which will it be? Maury Markowitz (talk) 12:11, 5 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
"the terminology is not used anywhere else in the article" The terms "UAP" and "UFO" are used at least 11 times outside that section. "Argument fails. You can reject my opinion and argue with me ad nauseam about this "indictment", or we can move forward with the nom. Which will it be?" As I said in my previous comment,[1] I'd like some time to properly consider your feedback. Thanks, again, for your patience. Chetsford (talk) 14:44, 5 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]


criticism on arxiv is editorialization

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Only relevant if the paper does not make it into peer review. The preprint, when public, are accesible to peer reviwers and so are the comments. They were deemed insufficient and the article was accepted and published. Stop the editorialization of scientific evidence against your personal beliefs ~2025-31304-68 (talk) 20:34, 4 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Background

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Journal Article: On the nature of apparent transient sources on the National Geographic Society–Palomar Observatory Sky Survey glass copy plates N C Hambly, A Blair RAS Techniques and Instruments, Volume 3, Issue 1, January 2024, Pages 73–79[2]

"We find that (i) the image profiles of the transients are significantly sharper than typical stellar images on the plates; (ii) that an ML decision-tree classifier badges the images as spurious with high probability; (iii) that similar examples of apparent transients are present on the copy plate of the adjacent field; and finally (iv) that there are many hundreds of similar images on both plates in the overlap region between the two fields.
We suggest one likely mechanism for the origin of at least some of these apparent transients as being emulsion holes on the intermediate positive plates used during reproduction of the copy sets. We therefore caution that digitized all-sky survey catalogues derived from the POSSI glass copies are likely peppered with these isolated false detections and that great care must be exercised when interpreting the publicly available digitized images or when making samples of unpaired catalogue records derived from them."

--Guy Macon (talk) 15:30, 6 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Recommendation to replace UFOlogy section with background on SETI and technosignatures.

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A more neutral and contextually appropriate background would focus on the scientific search for techno-signatures.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technosignature

The search for techno-signatures is recognized as a legitimate scientific endeavor, and the papers were published in peer reviewed scientific journals.

As is the background insinuates without credibility that the authors are UFOlogists and thus pseudo-scientists. This raises concerns about WP:UNDUE since the research is not based in UFOlogical methodology, WP:SYNTH since the framing around UFOlogy extrapolates an association between UFOlogy and pseudoscience and the authors published papers, and WP:NPOV for obvious reasons. AccurateBarometer (talk) 00:37, 7 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

"insinuates without credibility that the authors are UFOlogists" The principal author states that, in 2021, she decided to focus on "UFO research" and "destigmatizing the UFO topic".[1][2] Her primary hypothesis for her paper is that ""nuclear weapons may attract ... [UFOs]". She stated that the decision by arXiv not to archive her preprint was because of "UFO stigma". She delivered a TEDx talk on UFOs. Every one of her published papers since ~2019 has been about UFOs. She sits on the board of advisors for the Society of UAP[UFO] Studies. [3] She delivered a keynote speech at the 2024 Ufology World Congress. [4] I can keep going ... ultimately though we don't call her a ufologist anywhere in this article, which would require a RS directly affirming that. What we do, though, is provide a clear explanation for the disciplinary niche in which this paper sits, which is ufology, as per WP:MTAU.
Having said that, I have no problem expanding the section to include an explanation of technosignatures. Chetsford (talk) 01:19, 7 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I understand why you chose to do this. But it's not appropriate, and WP:MTAU is misapplied. The correct niche is the search for technosignatures. The NASA independent UAP panel, and Gertz's proposals (from SETI) are may be good background sources to help contextualize the work. AccurateBarometer (talk) 01:28, 7 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Why is it misapplied?
"The NASA independent UAP panel, and Gertz's proposals (from SETI) are may be good background sources to help contextualize the work." This is research to determine if extraterrestrial intelligence might exist at some point in the distant galaxy. The papers that are the subject of this article, by contrast, hypothesize aliens are secretly navigating spaceships in the orbit of Earth; that's the very definition and domain of ufology. Chetsford (talk) 01:33, 7 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
NASA's paper is about looking here, and also Gertz's recent papers and book is largely about SETI shifting focus to look for probes in our solar system.
CONCLUSIONS
We currently perceive a Great Silence, the apparent absence
of alien interstellar EM transmissions deliberately targeting
Earth. This may simply reflect the fact that aliens have deter-
mined that interstellar signaling is not merely a sub-optimal
strategy when compared to sending physical probes for the
purpose of surveilling and making contact with other civili-
zations, but that it may be dangerous and completely unwork-
able due to the astronomical, physiological, psychological, and
intellectual problems enumerated in this paper. ET may then
have determined that its best and, in fact, only viable strategy
for communication would be through a vast galactic network
of communication probes and nodes that might disseminate
its findings among member civilizations. Probes and nodes
might shunt partially analyzed data in the direction of one or
more civilizations with the closest match in compatibility to the
target civilization for deeper analysis as well as, perhaps, for
instructions on how to proceed: (a) initiate contact; (b) remain
passive while collecting more data, or (c) destroy forthwith a
civilization deemed to be dangerous"
https://arxiv.org/pdf/2110.11502
"Reinventing SETI
New Directions in the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence
John Gertz
Description
For millennia, humanity has looked up at the sprawling tapestry of stars and wondered what lay beyond. With time, we learned that each star is not a pinprick point in a domed sky, but a massive plasma sphere so far away that the distance becomes incomprehensible to the human mind, measured in light years of millions and billions. This distance invokes crucial questions. Do we share the universe with other intelligent lifeforms? If so, how do we approach the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI)? Lastly, do we need to examine our assumptions about extraterrestrial intelligence?
Reinventing SETI clears out the cobwebs of outdated or wrongheaded SETI paradigms such as Fermi's Paradox, the Drake Equation, and METI (i.e., proactively sending signals from Earth to putative aliens). It argues that scientists should approach the pursuit of extraterrestrials (ETs) in a more effective manner. Author John Gertz states that ETs, as biological lifeforms themselves, cannot accomplish interstellar travel, but have instead placed robotic probes throughout the universe, perhaps even in our own Solar System. Gertz also warns that humankind is woefully unprepared for the day of First Contact with an alien probe right here in our own backyard. He suggests contingency planning, involving international cooperation as well as broad cross-disciplinary expertise.
Humorous and deeply informative, this book takes the reader through the universe, conventional SETI methods, ideas on future ET exploration, and a discussion on who else shares this space."
https://global.oup.com/academic/product/reinventing-seti-9780197800416 AccurateBarometer (talk) 01:49, 7 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Just to make it clearer: the authors explicitly sourced a UFO sightings database from the Center for UFO Studies, founded by Hynek. So, however much we might need to improve BALANCE or tone, it's not SYNTH to talk about Ufology -- the authors themselves are exploring UFO reports, not just astronomical sightings. Feoffer (talk) 03:58, 7 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
It isn't clear to the reader what UFOlogy is supposed to map to. It reads as insinuating that these papers are Ufology work by Ufologists. And the editor who introduced on adding this section clearly indicated in this talk discussion that was the intent, arging that searching for technosignatures in our solar system is the domain of Ufology. The addition of a technosignatures subsection helps improve regarding WP:MTAU. But, the deletion of the sources which contextualize the scientific search in our solar system, of current interest to credible scientific institutes and academic scientific researchers, e.g. SETIs Gertz paper or book arguing that search for probes in our solar system is a more intelligent and efficient way to look for ETI, and NASAs UAP studying noting that there is a natural continuum between looking for technosignatures in other solar systems, and looking here. If even Chetsford, the person who wrote this article, lacked that knowledge about the scientific context, then surely many readers will. I argue to support WP:MTAU, in addition for other reasons, the background should be revised to reduce emphasis on UFOlogy, and to add back the contextual background knowledge and sources about the credible niche scientific research domain focusing on searching for intrasolar technosignatures. AccurateBarometer (talk) 06:19, 7 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I disagree. Chetsford (talk) 06:27, 7 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
It reads as insinuating that these papers are Ufology work by Ufologists. I noticed that myself and was careful to connect the dots to specify a Ufology dataset was used in the research. Can you think of any other specific changes to the text that that would improve the article? Feoffer (talk) 11:37, 7 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

References

  1. ^ Villarroel, Beatriz (May 22, 2024). "My Personal Journey Through the Unknown". unizin.org. The Pennsylvania State University Open Resource Publishing. Retrieved November 2, 2025.
  2. ^ "Sommarkrönika av Beatriz Villarroel: cancelkultur och trakasserier inom astronomin - fallet Geoff Marcy". academicrightswatch.se. Archived from the original on July 22, 2023. Retrieved 2023-07-22.