James Fox: “One of the things I’ve learned over the years is to suspend judgement and at least listen to the testimony.”

This is an excerpt from Jesse Michels’ interview with James Fox.

Fox went on to conclude;

One of the summaries I would give, that I feel quite comfortable, the conclusion that I have reached, is that the phenomenon has the ability to manifest itself, it's ubiquitous, and it can manifest itself in, like, a physical form, like technologically, like an engineered craft, but also has a psychic ability as well.

Jesse Michels put it well, “Extraordinary evidence requires extraordinary investigation.”

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Testimony is a kind of data, and when we have enough corroborating testimony we can form a hypothesis. Hypotheses are speculative explanations based on observation. More importantly hypotheses can be tested. There’s no need to draw conclusions based on testimony and fuzzy videos, but we can certainly base further investigative efforts off the themes we observe in testimonies.

If someone doesn’t want to admit testimony as evidence that’s fine, it’s a personal choice. People can believe what they want about the veracity of an individual’s claims, but in the absence of irrefutable evidence it would be a mistake to dismiss testimony outright. That’s not science, that’s dogmatism.

Honest investigation, especially of a phenomena that has demonstrated a marked ability to evade detection, requires the examination of even the most tenable evidence. Without the capacity to seriously consider testimony under an impartial investigative framework, progress would be –and is– extremely slow.

Honest investigation requires us to rise above the stigma and bias we hold toward such things. Much of the language that experiencers use to describe contact events is informed by their respective worldview. Terminology will be replaced as we come to better understand the mechanisms behind the phenomena’s operation.

Just as yesterday’s “Alien” is today’s “Non-Human Intelligence”, so too might words like “Psychic” and “Spirit” yield to more accurate terms in the course of serious investigations.

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A professor of mine once told me that it’s important to ask ourselves three questions when presented with new information; What is this really saying? What are the implications if it’s false? What are the implications if it’s true?

Answering those three questions, regardless of what we initially think of the claim, helps us better understand our own position and how it might conflict with or integrate any new knowledge that might come our way.

Again, as James Fox said, “suspend judgement, and listen to the testimony.”