Ask an Amateur Scientist: The Roswell Rock

By Brian Thompson

I. The Setup

Let’s get this out of the way right now: I have no idea where the Roswell Rock came from.  This isn’t going to be the usual attempt at debunking but instead an examination of what’s so often wrong with reporting on topics about aliens, UFOs, Bigfoot, lake monsters, homeopathy, and every other corner of Castle Nonsense in which most of the world sadly makes its home.  (On a nearly related note, Castle Nonsense also houses Dracula’s corpse in its basement, though only a Mr. Belmont knows the way down there.  Don’t ask me.)

I’m using this recent Roswell Rock story as an example.  There may be some problems with this approach, however.  As ridiculous as this story is, it probably isn’t the most ridiculous I could find.  And since it’s so recent (as of this writing), it’s bound to change as new information comes in.  But it’ll have to do.  For one thing, I don’t have time to go digging through the archives of bad science reporting when I’m busy watching Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog over and over again.

For another, this story is really, really stupid.

II. The Findings

“Strange rock raises questions,” reads the headline.  Already, Roswell Daily Record staff writer Frank Levine falls into the mystery-mongering trap.  You should always be wary of any headline containing a variation on the phrases “scientists baffled” or “thingamajig has doctors scratching heads” or “what-the-hell-ever defies explanation”.  Often, as is the case here, the only questions raised are from people too ignorant or complacent to do actual research.  Any story’s more interesting when a mystery’s involved (unless that mystery is dragged out for nine seasons and replaces Mulder with a Terminator), and these reporters are just trying to make their stories more compelling.  But when entertainment trumps reality, you end up with bad journalism.  You’ll often read headlines about mystery diseases or strange new species or blurry alien photos that no one has explained, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be explained.  And after these stories are written, there’s rarely ever a follow-up about how they have been explained.  Case in point: the autism/vaccine myth.  Jenny McCarthy marching on Washington with her rubber-faced boyfriend will make the front pages (or, in the case of online news outlets, the frontpages), but the articles about every scientific study showing there’s no link between vaccines and autism goes either unwritten or unnoticed at the bottom of the health section.  One story is more entertaining (and has Playboy bunny boobs), but the other more accurately reflects reality.

On to the lead: “A strange rock with unusual magnetic properties – deeply scored, with what appears to be moon phases, a solar eclipse and the depiction of a supernova — has been unearthed on the outskirts of Roswell.  Its discovery has startled researchers, scientists and all who have examined it.”  Later on in the article, the “magnetic properties” are described by UFO researcher Chuck Zukowski as a retention of “magnetic polarity”.  In other words, the thing’s magnetic.  This doesn’t really mean anything, however, since it’s not uncommon to find magnetic rocks.  The Earth itself is a giant magnet (which, if the claims of the magnetic wrist band manufacturers are true, means that all of us should have amazing golf swings), and iron-bearing minerals in rocks retain some of the Earth’s magnetic field.  Of course, we have no way of knowing whether this rock really is magnetic, because the reporter decided to take a UFO researcher’s word over actually contacting a laboratory that may have analyzed the rock.

And what’s all this about the symbol carved on the rock’s surface?  I can see phases of the moon, perhaps, in the crescent and circle shapes.  Although, the artist may have simply been a fan of pie and Croissandwiches.  But a solar eclipse and a supernova?  Just because you say things about what an image represents, that doesn’t make it true.  (Thus, the entire field of abstract expressionist criticism is rendered moot.)

So let’s look at who has examined the rock.  According to the article, it was found by Roswell businessman Robert Ridge, who found it while deer hunting in late 2004.  He showed it to some family and friends before locking it in a safe deposit box until last year.  Putting aside the relative weirdness of locking away a pretty rock you found in a safe for three years, Ridge reveals a believer’s bias when he says that he gave the rock to UFO investigators so he could satisfy his curiosity about it.  What about this rock would lead someone to believe it was alien?  It’s a rock with pictures carved on it!  Why not give it to a geologist or an anthropologist?  This is like consulting tea leaves about that growth on your thigh.  Regardless, the reporter doesn’t bother to probe Ridge’s motivations any further.

Zukowski claims the UFO researchers did take the rock to experts who “claimed they had never seen anything like it”, but again, none of these alleged experts are quoted in the article themselves. I understand that scientists are very busy pouring chemicals into glass tubes and playing god on the taxpayers’ dime, but there has to be at least one willing to glance at a rock and provide a quote for the Roswell Daily Record.  Zukowski goes on to marvel at how the carving could only have been achieved with modern tools.  Even assuming this is true, how can this fact possibly be impressive to anyone who knows that the planet is littered with rocks, modern tools, and people who use modern tools to carve rocks?  Apparently this man has never been to a college-level sculpting class.  (Which is fine with me, by the way.  I don’t need any competition from sexy, rough-handed liberal arts majors.)

But wait, it gets dumber.  The reporter goes on to parrot the UFO investigators’ claims that the rock’s carvings mirror patterns in crop circles from Liddleton, England, indicating an extraterrestrial origin.  This would only make sense if crop circles were known to be of extraterrestrial origin instead of guys-with-boards-and-rope origin.  It’s also posited that if the rock is an alien artifact, its finding would mark the second time Roswell received communications from space.  I’ve covered the nonsense that is the Roswell myth in this column before, so I won’t go into it again.  Suffice it to say, there’s no evidence that aliens were in any way involved in the so-called Roswell incident.  But even if they were, how would a few drunken E.T.s crashing their sports cruiser into the New Mexico wilderness constitute “communications” from space?  It wouldn’t be interstellar dialog so much as an insurance claim.

III. The Conclusion

To sum up, the problem with most reporting on paranormal subjects simply boils down to poor journalistic standards.  A reporter could never get away with quoting second-hand sources and simply repeating the assertions of unqualified opportunists when, say, writing about politics.  I’ve heard several times via e-mail that Barack Obama is a Muslim, the Antichrist, and can blow up your car when you use him at the gas station, but none of these claims will make the top stories on CNN.com because they don’t stand up to journalistic standards of research.  For some reason, when it comes to ghosts, free energy, or UFO sightings, all bets are off.

Instead of taking the rock to a scientist and quoting said scientist’s findings, this reporter chooses instead to throw in a paragraph about how some Native American woman with “powers” claimed to feel the rock’s “vibrations”.  And instead of questioning the reliability of Mr. Ridge, he chooses instead to simply relay this quote: “After I had [the rock] a few months, I began to think about it and began to think that it may be a beacon of some kind, or a message.  And I believe the message is that if we don’t learn to get along with each other, we will be destroyed.”

Either that, or no one was interested in buying an oversized paperweight.

Never miss an update. Subscribe to Pink Raygun by Email or subscribe via RSS

About The Amateur Scientist: Brian Thompson is a professor of amateur science at a major imaginary university and a regular blogger at CHUD. He has been able to read and write for over seventeen years.

Can’t get enough amateur science? Join Brian for The Amateur Scientist Podcast.

Related Stuff: