371–380 of 401 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're right, some random guy on the internet definitely knows better than the first hand witnesses and U.S. Navy! Actually, it was probably swamp gas. Case closed.
"Some random guy" did the research, showed you other examples of glare, did all the maths, but hey, you DO know better! Well done!
Earlier quoted context omitted.
No. Because you have to consider: 1. Current or future means of intercepting hypersonic missiles. 2. The ability to disable or reduce the enemy’s ability of launching hypersonic missiles, or of pinpointing and accurately tracking the exact location of aircraft carriers.
We don't have the capability currently to intercept Russia's hypersonic missiles. We also have no defenses against 100 megaton underwater torpedo nukes that can be detonated miles from a carrier group and still wipe it out. In an all out war with Russia, our carriers would be big, slow, sitting ducks against Mach 20 missiles with variable speed and high maneuverability as well. https://www.military.com/equipment/weap…
Say hello to SM-3. It has successfully intercepted hypersonic RVs in testing. Is it perfect? No. But if it done anything, the last month has made me feel more confident in what the US claims their weapons can do and dismissive for the Russians.
>We also have no defenses against 100 megaton underwater torpedo nukes that can be detonated miles from a carrier group and still wipe it out.
No such weapon exists. And if it did it would be wildly impractical. The largest nuke ever made was the Tsar Bomba and it was only 50 megatons and too large to be practical.
And we do have a counter to nuclear torpedoes. Its called the West's nuclear deterrence. Using a nuke on a carrier means nuclear war and nobody wants that.
Well, the only reason they were scrambled to begin with is that they had been tracking these objects for weeks using advanced radar. As I understand it, the radar is based on multiple resolutions. The active radar can point in the direction of objects of interest and get very very precise measurements. It's not just the video, its the radar data. The thing that pushed me over the edge in believing these things is the…
I listened to maybe half of that interview, and I really really do not buy the response to Lex's question of "Why didn't this cause more commotion in the ranks?"
Fravor said because he was the commander of 17 airmen and 300 sailors and has the weight of that command on him. I get it, but this is also his job, and we all tend to acclimate to our jobs. I don't think this guy and all other witnesses were so burdened with the idea of being a CO that they weren't able to process a potentially world-changing event. If this was in the middle of a real war and real combat - of course that's different. But this was just during the millionth training exercise of this guy's career.
He was also quick to move on from this question, and did so without any prompting from Lex. He went on to what sounded like a rehearsed talking point (I'm sure because he's said it so many times) about how he doesn't get paid for these appearances, but there's no way to know what other outside incentives he may have to go on these shows. That Lex doesn't push back on this at all is disappointing, but I get that he's not there to interrogate him.
The final sticking point - Fravor admits that he's an apologist for secrecy and the US government hiding things for reasons of "national security". Clearly someone with this belief would welcome the idea of lying repeatedly, very publicly, to help cover something up. What I'm implying is that something did happen that day (that is much more mundane), but we're not getting the honest story, and Fravor outright suggesting it was something we know to be impossible with currently technology is likely obfuscating the truth of something that is probably an embarrassing mistake/leak/something that the US government doesn't want there to be public clarity on.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Oh and I forgot to address your ridiculous comment about winning every engagement in the Ukraine. Tell that to the 7K dead Russians. How about the 400+ destroyed MBTs, and 4K IFVs? If you think that Russia is winning this conflict currently, you've been listening to Tucker Carlson too much. Russia lost this war on D Day, when they failed to establish an air bridge at Hostomel when the VDV got smoked.
How many Russians are dead? Who counted the bodies and how did they do so during an active engagement? How many Ukrainians have died by comparison? Do you have complete information or do you have incomplete information during a literal fog of war situation? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Russo-Ukrain... Russia says they've lost 400 men, USINT says 7K. Who's telling the truth? They're both known to li…
So the anomaly that the carrier group tracked, then scrambled fighter jets for. The object that four different pilots saw visually, and was confirmed on multiple different sensors. That was camera glare? The video is only one piece of the evidence. The pilots are trained, and other sensor systems confirmed what the camera was showing. This analysis is pretty flimsy.
USAF and reitred officals have gone on record to say that they actively release doctored footage and/or false narratives, sometimes via pop culture figures, to muddy waters on current technology or to sow discourse among enemies. This reeks of n example of that, and not aliens.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Have you read the plaque on the statue ? Do you know the text? You can put up a statue to say someone did something meaningful or historical, not that they were a good or noble person.
>You can put up a statue to say someone did something meaningful or historical, not that they were a good or noble person. Yes, but we don't. We don't create statues of Christopher Columbus to place his actions in their proper historical context, or to memorialize his victims, any more than we do the Holocaust with statues of Hitler. We erect statues of Columbus because until relatively recently the entirely Eurocent…
I think that’s more the norm with people, if they even think about Columbus at all.
The problem with contemporary dialogue is the refusal to allow for grey zones, for nuanced and balanced viewpoints. Who is this “we” that you project upon? Do you consider that this presumption and projection may by symptomatic of a neuroticism unique to a overly loud illiberal subculture in the US? I do, it’s all that gives me faith in the survival of the greater whole.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Nothing in this analysis or conclusion contradicts the radar observations - how are they being "ignored"? And it is unclear to me (as an uninitiated person) how "visual" observations lend any more credence to the story when they are just retellings of the exact same kind of footage, except impossible to further analyze/corroborate.
The core claim of this joke of a production is that it’s just lens flare. They use weasel words to hedge their bets, but their intention is pretty clear. The facts are that these pilots also saw these things with their own eyes and got radar locks in addition to IR. These are “targeting” pods remember? It can’t just be lens flare.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
But the claim wasn't about incompetence, it was that these were the Navy's top pilots. Were they the top squadron commanders in the entire Navy?
I don't understand the nitpicking over a minor detail in a comment. Why are you talking about top squadron commanders now? What does top even mean? Top 50%? Top 95%? The point is the main individual was highly trained, in a high position and with years of experience.
> Simply putting your head in the sand or attempting to debunk this documented phenomena with patently absurd explanations like "a lens flare" or "it was only Venus" isn't good enough for thoughtful people.
So yeah I'm nitpicking that the poster inserted an invented fact that these were the Navy's "top pilots" to support their position while being a dismissive jerk.
He or she deserves no better.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
>You can put up a statue to say someone did something meaningful or historical, not that they were a good or noble person. Yes, but we don't. We don't create statues of Christopher Columbus to place his actions in their proper historical context, or to memorialize his victims, any more than we do the Holocaust with statues of Hitler. We erect statues of Columbus because until relatively recently the entirely Eurocent…
You abuse the pronoun “we” - I consider him a heroic figure, highly flawed, plus - for better and worse - symbolic of the opening of the new world, totally acknowledging the negative impacts. ..And have zero problem with statues of the guy. I think that’s more the norm with people, if they even think about Columbus at all. The problem with contemporary dialogue is the refusal to allow for grey zones, for nuanced and…
No. I consider that not everyone in the US is completely culturally detached from the legacy of colonialism, and that some people have perfectly valid reasons to object to statues of people like Columbus.
You seem to understand the negative impacts of colonialism on an intellectual level, as a simple fact of history, but you also seem perplexed as to why anyone would care. Perhaps you should consider why someone would object to a statue of Columbus. Engage with the nuance you're referring to, by not dismissing those with views other than yours as being carriers of a social disease. Examine your own views and ask yourself why you consider it valid to keep a Columbus statue up to celebrate some of his accomplishments, but not to remove it as a statement of opposition to his other accomplishments.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
For all we know, it takes a whole universe banging molecules together before metabolizing self-replicating life randomly arises. If it has only emerged one time in the entire universe, nothing would look different to us than it does right now. Or maybe it happens all the time. But with only one sample, we have no data either way.
> But with only one sample, we have no data either way. Sure we do, that one instance of life pushes the needle in favor of life. A fun exercise is to imagine or visualize the concept of nothingness, as far as you can take it. Eventually you realize even the "idea of nothingness" negates the meaning of "nothingness." You reach a paradox in awareness that you're incapable of resolving because to do so would mean the i…
Given that life exists, here are two possibilities: life is common but we just haven't seen other life yet, or life is unique and necessarily we're it. Since those two possibilities look exactly the same to us, what data can we have to prefer either one?
If we ever did see other life, then we could be confident that it's everywhere. But without seeing it, we don't know. We can only guess, according to our personal preferences.
In fact, I'd go further. Compared to not looking at all, looking for life and not finding it increases the likelihood that we're alone. Maybe not by that much, since astronomy isn't all that good yet, but the more we look without finding, the more rare we'll know life to be.