I do recognize that in the second episode that lawyer guy was like "we view eyewitness testimony as crucial in the legal world" which, sure... but we really shouldn't.
Lots of research has been done into human psychology over the years that shows that people's memories, especially over the long timeframes that are discussed by so many in these films, to be very suggestible and prone to mis-remembering details. People have what are called "flashbulb" memories where they remember key details that they believe stood out to them when the event happened. However, in plenty of cases, these memories never actually occurred. A common example of this is 9/11, where thousands of people have reported they remembered being in New York witnessing the planes crash into the towers, when in fact they were not in a position to do so.
Having studied Psychology, the vast majority of the people inside of this documentary (with the exception of a few of the Japanese people) seem to have had an experience that triggered a flashbulb memory experience for them, whether it be some kind of dream or nightmare, or in the case of that Navy Cryptologist guy, sleep paralysis. Most of the people didn't appear to have even an ounce of credibility as they discussed connections of their experiences to other parts of their lives, like one guy in the Zimbabwe incident who connected it to finding his "african-ness," the guy from Texas who kept connecting it to the bible and teaching his kids that angels were actually UFO's, to some of the Welsh kids who gave off the appearance that they were simply repeating what their fellow students were saying in order to fit in and look cool.
It really didn't help their case that they didn't offer a shred of evidence in any of these videos besides eyewitness testimony. The only one was the video of "lights" over Fukushima in the final section, but that video was debunked as fake back at the time of the actual accident occurring. It's not hard for a random person to make that kind of simple animation inside of AfterEffects and post it to YouTube.
I believe these people believe they experienced something. Whether that experience was a pure fabrication of their minds and memories or something that really happened is a purely open question. I don't find many of them very credible and the fact that the entire series is just hours of eyewitness testimony of people talking about events that happened decades ago does not make me feel inclined to believe them given what I know about how fallible human memory is. I came into this with an open mind prepared to learn more about this subject, but I was sorely disappointed.
Lots of research has been done into human psychology over the years that shows that people's memories, especially over the long timeframes that are discussed by so many in these films, to be very suggestible and prone to mis-remembering details. People have what are called "flashbulb" memories where they remember key details that they believe stood out to them when the event happened. However, in plenty of cases, these memories never actually occurred. A common example of this is 9/11, where thousands of people have reported they remembered being in New York witnessing the planes crash into the towers, when in fact they were not in a position to do so.
Having studied Psychology, the vast majority of the people inside of this documentary (with the exception of a few of the Japanese people) seem to have had an experience that triggered a flashbulb memory experience for them, whether it be some kind of dream or nightmare, or in the case of that Navy Cryptologist guy, sleep paralysis. Most of the people didn't appear to have even an ounce of credibility as they discussed connections of their experiences to other parts of their lives, like one guy in the Zimbabwe incident who connected it to finding his "african-ness," the guy from Texas who kept connecting it to the bible and teaching his kids that angels were actually UFO's, to some of the Welsh kids who gave off the appearance that they were simply repeating what their fellow students were saying in order to fit in and look cool.
It really didn't help their case that they didn't offer a shred of evidence in any of these videos besides eyewitness testimony. The only one was the video of "lights" over Fukushima in the final section, but that video was debunked as fake back at the time of the actual accident occurring. It's not hard for a random person to make that kind of simple animation inside of AfterEffects and post it to YouTube.
I believe these people believe they experienced something. Whether that experience was a pure fabrication of their minds and memories or something that really happened is a purely open question. I don't find many of them very credible and the fact that the entire series is just hours of eyewitness testimony of people talking about events that happened decades ago does not make me feel inclined to believe them given what I know about how fallible human memory is. I came into this with an open mind prepared to learn more about this subject, but I was sorely disappointed.