The Virtual Classroom of Professor Bowen: This I Believe

Edward R. Murrow once said, in addressing the impossibility of absolute objectivity, "We are all the prisoners of our own experience, of our reading, or our indoctrination, and our travels." This is just as true of teachers as it is reporters. It therefore seems fitting that, in full disclosure, I express something here about my background and beliefs. So, here are a few more things I know to be true.

4. Aliens from outer space crashed in Roswell, New Mexico in 1947 and their remains were autopsied.

How do I know this? I saw it on television.

In 1995, video entrepreneur Ray Santilli revealed 17 minutes of grainy, silent black and white film of what was reputed to be documentary footage of the autopsy of an alien body in New Mexico in 1947.

Fox Television used the footage as the basis of a highly successful television program, “Alien Autopsy - Fact or Fiction,” and Santilli made a small fortune in video sales and by licensing the footage.

Alien Autopsy by CrypticMedia

Several years later, after it had been proven a hoax, Santlli admitted that the footage had been faked. However ....

4A. Aliens from outer space crashed in Roswell, New Mexico in 1947 and their remains were autopsied, but 16mm footage of the procedure was damaged and had to be reenacted.

Santilli claims to this day, and there are still those that believe, that the footage represents an accurate re-enactment of real footage that he witnessed but that became damaged and was never released. He even claims that some small snippets of the original footage exist within the "reenactments."

5. Maurice Jarre, noted film composer, once said “When I die there will be a final waltz playing in my head, that only I can hear.”

How do I know this? I read it on Wikipedia.

When Maurice Jarre, Oscar-winning composer of such films as “Laurence of Arabia” and “Dr. Zhivago” died in 2009, newspapers all over the world quoted his moving words …

“When I die there will be a final waltz playing in my head, that only I can hear.”

What was the source of the quote? Dublin University student Shane Fitzgerald had added this erroneous but obituary-friendly entry to the composer’s Wikipedia profile, thinking it poetic, and dozens of legitimate and respected newspapers had carried it as fact.

6. Beloved and eccentric actor Jeff Goldblum is dead.

How do I know this? I saw it on Twitter.

The Late Jeff Goldblum

On June 25, 2009, the day that both Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett died, media outlets, including “Today New Zealand” reported that actor Jeff Goldblum had died in an accident while filming in New Zealand.