I continue to be fascinated with the Swiss farmer who has, in my opinion, been engaged in a many-decade UFO hoax – Billy Meier. My fascination comes from the obviously terrible quality of his hoax and the lameness of his excuses for failure, combined with the fact that there are still those who believe him. It is, if nothing else, a natural experiment in human gullibility with the conclusion that there appears to be no limit this phenomenon.

Here are some examples: Billy Meier produced, among other bits of “evidence” for his alleged ongoing encounter with aliens, photographs of what has come to be known as the “wedding cake” UFO (what Meier calls a “beam ship”).

There it is next to that tree. That’s a remarkable bit of UFO piloting there. The pilot appears to have a wide open field in which to navigate, but chooses, for some reason, to nuzzle up next to the one tree standing in the middle of the field.

I am sure you can invent some absurd ad-hoc explanation for this, even though it seems absurd on its face. The simplest explanation, however, is that the tree is supporting the model of the UFO. Meier has used this technique before. Below is another “beam ship” with an odd affection for foliage.

But let’s take a closer look at the wedding cake UFO. The Independent Investigations Group has done a thorough analysis, and come up with some interesting facts.

Meier claims this is a photo of an actual ship, some 15 or so feet across. Skeptics claim that it is a small model, constructed by Meier or an accomplice. Investigators have noticed the small projection from the base of the UFO – that looks like a detail that just might provide a clue as to the true nature of this object.

It turns out that the little projection, and in fact the entire base, matches exactly with the shape of a particular garbage can lid. From Forgetomori we have this picture of the lid:

Ding, ding, ding! I think we have a winner. The resemblance of the lid to the base of the wedding cake UFO is uncanny. It is so exact, in fact, that Meier himself could not ignore the correlation. Meier produces what he claims are transcripts of conversations he has with his alien visitors, but which can more easily be explained as him making stuff up. Here is an exerpt from one such conversation, reported by both IIG and Forgetomori:

From Meier’s 254th Contact Report, November 28, 1995: Ptaah: “. . . As far back as the 1920s we worked with flying devices you have named the ‘Wedding Cake Ship,’ … we endeavored to transmit all of the necessary data regarding the vehicles’ shape to terrestrial scientists, in the form of telepathic impulses, to assist them in developing flying disks on Earth … We thoroughly investigated the entire situation and discovered that the old, newly re-emerged drawings were used for the design and production of these receptacle covers. … This, then, is how the shape of the container covers came about, which, as I mentioned earlier, strikingly resemble the lower rim section and undercarriage on our flying devices.”

We can tell this an an alien speaking because they say things like “receptacle covers” instead of “garbage can lid.” So the aliens were telepathically beaming the designs for their wedding cake beam ships to German engineers, and these advanced ship designs somehow got confused with a garbage can lid, and that’s why they “strikingly resemble” each other. Got it. It’s a good thing the ship designs require a structure that it is the right place to serve as a handle for the garbage can lid. It’s no wonder the German engineers were confused.

It also seems that part of the telepathically communicated design specs also became confused with Christmas tree ornaments, as the IIG demonstrates the striking resemblance of the balls on the wedding cake UFO to uncapped bulbs.

There is also this photo showing apparently a piece of the model having fallen off and landing on the lower section:

The whole affair is similar to another Meier claim that he encountered and photographed two beautiful female aliens, who had suspiciously 1970s hairstyles. The photos he presented were eventually matched with dancers from a Dean Martin television show.

After years of Meier believers denying the resemblance, and trying to prove the female aliens were not the same as the dancer, Meier eventually admitted that they were, in fact, the same. He had yet another communication from his alien handlers reminding him that Men-In-Black had gotten their hands on the film and substituted photos of American “look-a-likes” for the aliens Meier actually met. Meier had forgotten this fact, until he was reminded.

You see – there was a sensible explanation all along. The Men-In-Black are so incredibly effective that within days they found human females on television that looked so similar to Meier’s alien friends that he would not notice the substitution, and this would set him up for later refutation.

The fact that my 8 year old daughter tells more convincing “fibs” than Meier does not seem to bother the faithful. And that is my real fascination – the human capacity for gullibility, or motivated belief. If it has any limits, they have yet to be documented.