Quadibloc wrote:

The trouble is that people like Velikovsky and von Daniken can spin
pretty impressive and convincing arguments to a naive layperson. To a
person otherwise helpless against them, while authority may be a weak
reed, it is better than having no defense at all.

The devil has all the best tunes. Showing where their claims conflict
with the known laws of physics is the way to do it and not by appeals to
authority. It should not matter who constructs the refutation, although
it helps if they are sufficiently articulate to win the argument.

Velikovskys interplanetary billiards is risible, but there are plenty of
credulous nutters who buy his books and believe every word

I find it very annoying when some nutter who claims to be an alien
abductee is given exactly the same credulity in a TV interview as a
scientist pointing out that the claims are bogus.

A huge number of UFOs have the same configuration as the triangular
landing light pattern on civil airliners.

Regards,
Martin Brown