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The Pentagon’s U.F.O. Program

nytimes.com

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Re: The Pentagon’s U.F.O. Program

#161

Post by valuearb »

mrspeaker wrote: post #116
madaxe_again wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s totally anecdotal, and I’m just some guy on the internet, but I’ve seen these, or at least something similar, twice - once above Bath, UK, in 2012 - the first hint something was up was a pair of sonic booms as two typhoons hurtled into the airspace over the city. Needless to say, ran out of the office to gawp, and the fighters were circling a thing hovering at about 20,000 feet - bulky ovular object with greeble…

Doesn't sound the same as yours, but I saw the "triangles in the sky" in the late 90s in Australia. I came home from work at about 1am, and noticed three lights up in the sky moving at the same slow speed in a triangle-ish formation (For a while I thought they were connected, but then seemed to move independently, and just looked... odd). I watched them for a couple of minutes go across the sky, then had to go and wa…

I saw the lights in Phoenix, they hovered in the sky far too long to be parachute flares, but guess what, they were parachute flares.

Re: The Pentagon’s U.F.O. Program

#162

Post by valuearb »

_gutd wrote: post #73
valuearb wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Squared away people don’t have magic eyesight. It’s easy to get fooled.

Except the object is clearly visible on the F-18's IRST camera footage. It was also picked up on radar by a surface cruiser and a nearby E-2 Hawkeye. See: https://fightersweep.com/1460/x-files-edition/

Looks like a drone to me.

Re: The Pentagon’s U.F.O. Program

#163

Post by nl »

fapjacks wrote: post #113
openasocket wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I doubt it was a no-bid contract. And there are far more lucrative programs which raise far less eyebrows than this.

This completely. For example, if you approach the US government through a solicitation with really any half-reasonable suggestion for processing enormous amounts of data, and you'll get a contract. Go take a look through the US government's business solicitations: Every agency wants an AI because they're being buried by data they can't process. If you wanted to collude with elected officials and funnel government dol…

As someone who has put in well qualified bids with university consortiums for multiple US government research contracts, including DARPA and other similar groups I can confirm that this is completely false.

Re: The Pentagon’s U.F.O. Program

#164

Post by valuearb »

swendoog wrote: post #145

From the article: "A 2009 Pentagon briefing summary of the program prepared by its director at the time asserted that “what was considered science fiction is now science fact,” and that the United States was incapable of defending itself against some of the technologies discovered" Wait, what? What are the "technologies discovered"?

This director is the sane crazy nut working with Tom DeLonge now.

Re: The Pentagon’s U.F.O. Program

#165

Post by gfodor »

haZard_OS wrote: post #138
madaxe_again wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s ludicrous if you assume they’re using diesel engines and air screws or something. If they can snap accelerate with essentially infinite jerk, as observations seem to suggest, then they’re not playing by the same rule book as us, and have fancy inertialess tech that’s beyond our ken. I’m not some true believer in little green men, just a scientist who won’t rule out what seems impossible just because it seems so.…

As a scientist myself, I don't care nearly as much about possibility as I do about probability. At present and without extraordinary evidence to the contrary, I see human error as vastly more probably than "inertialess technology".

For which case(s), specifically, and how does human error resolve the issue?

Or do you not know any specific credible cases of unexplained UFOs, and just dismiss the entire phenomenon because of its "low probability."

(I'm being facetious because many or all of the interesting cases easily rule out human error as the source of the phenomenon. Simultaneous human (and radar!) hallucination maybe, but not error.)

Re: The Pentagon’s U.F.O. Program

#166

Post by nl »

api wrote: post #77
gfodor wrote: post #50

It's been pretty clear for some time now for those who study the facts that there is a very good chance there are real objects in the sky that maneuver in ways that conventional aircraft are unable to and cannot be explained adequately as other observed phenomenon. The taboo around this subject due to the common hypothesis they are due to extraterrestrials is a shame because there's been plenty of documented evidence…

Part of the problem is all the crazy mythology around the subject. But strip that off and it has always seemed to me that there is an interesting residue of facts. It's not enough to prove anything but it's enough to be intriguing. One possible answer to the Fermi paradox is that they are here but are just not making overt obvious contact. If this were true we'd probably be talking about a "post-singularity" super in…

There's a great article called something like 'a biologist's take on the Fermi paradox'. Worth reading because it challenges some core assumptions.

Re: The Pentagon’s U.F.O. Program

#167

Post by gfodor »

vadimberman wrote: post #149
api wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Part of the problem is all the crazy mythology around the subject. But strip that off and it has always seemed to me that there is an interesting residue of facts. It's not enough to prove anything but it's enough to be intriguing. One possible answer to the Fermi paradox is that they are here but are just not making overt obvious contact. If this were true we'd probably be talking about a "post-singularity" super in…

> One possible answer to the Fermi paradox is that they are here but are just not making overt obvious contact Exactly. There's simply no reason to, except maybe sheer curiosity or some legal issues. What would we want from an uncontacted Amazonian tribe? But even if they wanted, from the political point of view, who would you even talk to? People of the planet Earth, bypassing their governments? Every government of…

I'd imagine it just would try to maximize utility -- remaining undetected in all scenarios may come with its own costs and risks.

Alternatively, maximizing utility may require a certain minimal level of detection. It's hard to predict what cost function is being optimized.

Given what is now common knowledge about AI game theory, it's super hard or impossible to actually ascribe any form of motives, ethics, intent, etc to the underlying system or intelligence that is controlling these objects if they are not natural and have no association with human culture or intelligence.

Re: The Pentagon’s U.F.O. Program

#168

Post by fapjacks »

nl wrote: post #163
fapjacks wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This completely. For example, if you approach the US government through a solicitation with really any half-reasonable suggestion for processing enormous amounts of data, and you'll get a contract. Go take a look through the US government's business solicitations: Every agency wants an AI because they're being buried by data they can't process. If you wanted to collude with elected officials and funnel government dol…

As someone who has put in well qualified bids with university consortiums for multiple US government research contracts, including DARPA and other similar groups I can confirm that this is completely false.

As someone who has put in well qualified bids with university consortiums for multiple US government research contracts, including DARPA and other similar groups I can confirm that this is completely false.

What is the size of your organization? How are you submitting bids, and where are you getting your solicitations? Does someone in your company network with the government liaisons beyond just the one you've submitted a bid to? Has your company hired someone to work this network for solicitations that aren't on FBO? Do your PIs have experience outside academia in contracting? I've been a part of several (successful) bids and -- operating under the assumption your claim was made in good faith and not just a lie -- I wonder at your approach. This is work that pretty much every organization in the US government needs.

Re: The Pentagon’s U.F.O. Program

#169

Post by api »

valuearb wrote: post #154
passwordreset wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When we (biologists) study other species, we travel long distances to examine them in their habitat. We try to hide so we can see them in their natural state, without our interference. If one suggested that this were 'dumb' or 'grandiose', then they would be ridiculed, as they would have exposed their own ignorance through that comment. The thought that a species might travel far to investigate another species in sit…

Except that biologists always are seen when in the field. Now imagine a biologist traveling to view a species using a vehicle which uses more energy than humankind has ever created. How easy is that to hide, and why would they hide from their equivalent to ants?

It would be easy to hide such a vehicle. Just do your final deceleration burn in the outer solar system. The gravity of Jupiter or Saturn would be useful for an interstellar capture maneuver anyway. At that distance we'd be very unlikely to see anything, especially if it happened in 1940.

The little things sighted as "UFOs" would not be interstellar craft. They would be probes or local runabouts. The interstellar transport might resemble the craft depicted in the film Avatar (which was actually a realistic design), or maybe a hollowed out meteor. The latter would look natural when not executing a major engine burn.

As far as hiding: if they knew they were here to observe an intelligence with conceptual thinking ability and language (even one much less intelligent than they) they would know any overt contact would radically and permanently alter the subjects behavior.

This is all incredibly speculative. I'm just saying that it can't be ruled out by easy superficial arguments. It can't really be ruled out at all. We just don't have enough evidence to rule it in either.

Re: The Pentagon’s U.F.O. Program

#170

Post by pluto9 »

api wrote: post #159
pluto9 wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The object in the video is hot. Most military FLIR devices can be toggled between "white hot" and "black hot". If you look in the lower left corner of the video, there's an indicator that says "WHT" and the object appears white. At about 12 seconds into the footage, the coloring is inverted and the indicator changes to "BLK" because the pilot toggled it. The halo is an artifact of the FLIR device. Every FLIR I've eve…

Hot is consistent with artificial. The second law of thermodynamics says if you are using energy you must dissipate heat. As far as we know this would still apply even with some kind of hypothetical exotic propulsion system.

> Hot is consistent with artificial.

I never said it wasn't.

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