Blue Book turned sightings into statistics
CIA, 1955.
Special Report No. 14 is the big statistical attempt to make sense of Blue Book's pile of sightings. It is skeptical, but not empty: some cases stayed unidentified, and the report tries to measure what that residue means. The important distinction is simple. Unknown cases are real as records, but they are not one explanation.
From the file
It is highly improbable that any of the reports of unidentified aerial objects examined in this study represent observations of technological developments outside the range of present-day scientific knowledge.
The report's importance is statistical: it sorts thousands of cases and still leaves a residue of unidentified reports, without turning that residue into one answer.
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- Blue Book turned sightings into statistics strong linkSpecial Report No. 14 is the statistical backbone of the Air Force Blue Book-era analysis.