[extropy-chat] The NSA's disclosures on UFOs

Fri Apr 28 04:49:14 UTC 2006

>
> Well the evidence in support of these "fantasies" is
> staggering:
>
> 1. There are 375 photographs of UFOs quite a few
> dating from BEFORE the invention of technology to
> alter photographs. There are also a handful of videos
> of UFOs. http://www.ufoevidence.org/

I spent several years as a professional photographer and I can assure you
that such a time never existed.
>
> 2. There are newspaper articles about them.

This is your argument? Surely you can do better.
>
> 3. There are 4000 eyewitness accounts of people both
> reputable and not including two US presidents who
> claim to have seen them as well as people who claim
> "abduction".

And there are even more who hear voices, see ghosts, and see Jesus and Mary
in the strangest of places.
>
> 4. There are government reports on them and sworn
> affidavits attesting to them.
>
No doubt, the fact that someone swears that they saw something means it's
true. I'll have to remember that while approaching the closet after my kid
sees another monster in there.

> 5. There are alleged landing sites that are
> radioactive according to geiger-counter wielding
> "experts".
>
Huh? areas of higher radioactivity are landing sites? Now why would that be?
If I were traveling the universe, the last way I want to go about it is
through conventional nuclear fission. There can't be any other explanation
for this at all?

> 6. There are numerous non-profit organizations devoted
> to their study.

Now that did it. I'm convinced. Since some non-profit groups study it, that
means it's true. How could I have ever doubted it. I'm so blind! I should
have known that flat-earth group was right!
>
> 7. There was a historic military confrontation with
> one or more UNIDENTIFIED FLYING OBJECTS during World
> War II:
> http://www.militarymuseum.org/BattleofLA.html
>
Are you listing individual incidents now? Doesn;t this belong up above?
> 8. At least 2 extropes on this list have personally
> seen a UFO.

OK. Now you have really done it. It must be true.
>
> If even 99% of these are hoaxes, this still amounts to
> on the order of 100 solid data points in FAVOR of the
> existense of UFOs.
>

Come one. Can;t you do better? How about alternate explanations? Maybe a
percentage of all human brains are just twisted. How many serial killers are
there?
>
> On the other hand there is one piece of evidence that
> seems to indicate that extra-terrestrial intelligence
> doesn't exist:
>
> Fermi's Paradox. There has been no radio
> communications of extra terrestrial intelligence
> detected. Of course if this is sufficient NEGATIVE
> EVIDENCE to rule out the existense of
> extra-terrestrial intelligence then I suppose every
> girl that I have left messages for that did not call
> me back ought to be construed to be either
> non-existent or non-intelligent.
>
> In the world of scientific inquiry (and legal
> proceedings for that matter) hear-say does not cut the
> mustard. So with all due respect to Eliezer and the
> other fanatically skeptical people on this list, your
> OPINION and clever quotes are irrelevant when weighed
> against mountains of EVIDENCE.
>
> > For centuries people were visited by incubi and
> > succubi, or talking
> > animals.  Since the "space age" starting in the
> > 1920s, people have
> > been visited by aliens.  It's the same archetypical
> > psychological
> > phenomenon with culturally-specified manifestations.
>
> The ancient Greeks believed the sun to to be a chariot
> driven across the sky by Apollo. The ancient Egyptians
> believed the sun was rolled across the sky by a giant
> dung beetle. Just because these people believed in
> culturally specific manifestations of the sun does not
> mean that the sun is merely a psychological
> phenomenon.
>
> > I haven't seen the data on this (perhaps you know?),
> > but it seems that
> > the height of UFO sightings was the period 1950 -
> > 1980.  Some
> > psychologists have suggested that this hysteria was
> > a result of Cold
> > War anxiety mixed with Sci Fi culture.
>
> Here are websites that shows the frequency of
> sightings by year.
>
> http://www.larryhatch.net/50YEARS.html
> http://faculty.maxwell.syr.edu/amazur/hatchufodata.html
>
> But the earliest known photo dates back to the 1890s
> and strange flying objects have been reported since
> ancient times. For example Elijah being carried away
> to heaven in a "chariot of fire" according to
> Judeo-Christian myth.
>
> >
> > Or maybe the aliens just lost interest?
>
> I am not going to speculate on the motives of beings I
> do not understand. But if the frequency distribution
> of sightings is accurate it seems that their interest
> in us seems to wax and wane in cycles. This may be
> indicative of travel times or study cycles (maybe they
> have to apply for grants to study us like Earth
> scientists.) Sightings do seem to peak during war time
> for whatever reason. Maybe the increased radio chatter
> or all the explosions are to blame. Who knows.
>
> In any case my gut tells me this. Things that happen
> only once are anomalies. The skeptics would have one
> believe that intelligent life only happened ONCE in a
> universe of literally BILLIONS AND BILLIONS of
> opportunities. Thus according to the Drake Equation,
> the reason the Great Silence is a paradox is not
> because it is unlikely that extra-terrestrial
> intelligence exists but that it is almost certain to.
> So why haven't they contacted us? Is it because we are
> the only intelligent beings in the vast universe? Or
> is it because they have chosen to snub us? Do the
> babes I have left messages for exist? Or have they
> chosen to snub me? These are difficult mysteries to
> solve.
>
>
>
> Stuart LaForge
> alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu
>
> "A human being is part of the whole called by us 'the universe,' a part
limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and
feelings, as something separate from the rest - a kind of optical delusion
of consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us
to our personal desires and affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our
task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening the circle of
understanding and compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole
of nature in its beauty."
>
> -St. Einstein
>
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