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FBI looks into dead or missing scientists tied to NASA, Blue Origin, SpaceX

fortune.com

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Re: FBI looks into dead or missing scientists tied to NASA, Blue Origin, SpaceX

#161

Post by platinumrad »

ineedasername wrote: post #149
platinumrad wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of them disappeared while hiking with friends. Another two were last seen walking away from home.

Roughly half the people you'd see walking are "walking away from home". It's not a known risk factor. In fact unless they live near "nature" then being seen walking anywhere at all near their home is pretty reasonable evidence that their disappearance, whatever the cause, is less likely to be "Got lost hiking" or similar.

Okay but one of them literally got lost hiking. Two, if you count the cancer researcher that a lot of people online seem to be bundling in for some reason.

Re: FBI looks into dead or missing scientists tied to NASA, Blue Origin, SpaceX

#162

Post by yencabulator »

pj_mukh wrote: post #32
nickandbro wrote: post #19

A lot of people are saying it’s disconnected, but even if it was, if a string of your country’s top rocket experts started disappearing, you wouldn’t just sit idly by

Could be nothing, or could be a new Havana Syndrome: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Havana_syndrome What's sad is, 5-10 years ago, no adversary would think simply off-ing American scientists was effective strategy, America was a new scientist generation machine . Now thanks to Research funding falling off a cliff and massive immigration restrictions, this is no longer true.

> simply off-ing

What if they're interrogated in an attempt to extract something very specific? The deaths could be kidnappings gone wrong.

Re: FBI looks into dead or missing scientists tied to NASA, Blue Origin, SpaceX

#163

Post by Lord-Jobo »

himata4113 wrote: post #8

This appears to be for investigating how many scientist have left the US sponsored by state powers. But this also seems like bad communication on the FBI and perhaps poor publishing. I think there is some confusion that there are more people going missing and dying in the sector while not outlining that there are more people going missing AND dying. Or I'm just completely wrong, the only reason why I am making such a…

The decline in quality of both investigations and information/studies by the FBI over the past year and a half has been extremely noticeable.

This is just not a serious organization anymore, and the lack of such a thing at the federal level leaves us insanely vulnerable to our own criminal operations.

The same thing happened with the IRS even earlier, multiple rounds of intensive they just cannot pursue criminals of a certain type, and the criminals know it. So they can run basically unchecked, looting all of us for billions.

Re: FBI looks into dead or missing scientists tied to NASA, Blue Origin, SpaceX

#164

Post by vasac »

trhway wrote: post #137
vasac wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Germany would have to quickly get nukes No shit? Why would they have to? Is someone ready to nuke them if it turns out they’re no longer under the U.S. nuclear umbrella, or are they some special snowflakes who should have them while Iran (and most other countries) shouldn’t?

>Is someone ready to nuke them No. The nukes prevent the aggression even by a conventionally armed aggressor. Nukes ins't to win a war, it is to prevent one. Lets say Germany has successfully repelled Russian tank-and-soldiers invasion - it would still be a devastating thing for Germany which the nukes would help prevent from starting at all. >are they some special snowflakes who should have them while Iran (and most…

> Iran's situation is obviously very different.

Yes, very different as in 'Our blessed homeland vs their barbarous wastes' meme.

We (and our allies) should have nukes because we want to prevent wars. But no one else should have them, since the situation is obviously very different (we wouldn’t want them to be able to prevent wars).

And I used to think that Little Rocketman was a crazy bastard, but it looks like I was wrong.

Re: FBI looks into dead or missing scientists tied to NASA, Blue Origin, SpaceX

#165

Post by redleader55 »

bawolff wrote: post #47

11 people over 4 years doesn't seem like that much. Its not clear to me how big a population that is out of but if its government scientists i assume there are tens of thousands of those if not hundreds of thousands. Still, FBI should be investigating every suspicious death of people with high level clearence.

Statistically, I would look at deaths from that age group among space flight science and compare this "blip" to the p50. I don't think it's easy to say if 11 deaths/disappearances over 4 years is high or not, without looking at the problem this way.

Re: FBI looks into dead or missing scientists tied to NASA, Blue Origin, SpaceX

#166

Post by contingencies »

krapp wrote: post #158
cucumber3732842 wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Being able to see the evidince presented by the alternatives, the degree to which they're grasping at straws, the scope of their criticism, etc. you can get a handle on the general degree of legitimacy of the original reporting. When some source says something and backs it up with numbers and everyone on the other side attacks the conclusion but not the numbers that says something about the numbers.

I think you're making the mistake of assuming the world works like an internet forum. You aren't going to be able to judge reality on the basis of rhetorical tricks or logical contradiction. Your implicit assumption that if "everyone on the other side attacks the conclusion but not the numbers" the numbers must be correct first assumes only two sides, and second doesn't actually say anything about "the numbers," only…

I think a slightly more nuanced view is that while perhaps big name old media of yore had a presumption of authority, morals, and public responsibility and that probably meant some degree of trust was potentially warranted (though no doubt abused at times), with the commercial push toward tabloidism and the internet all of those corrective influences have vanished, such that the presumption of authority no longer has legs. In fact, most of them have effectively turned in to subscriber-only outlets, which makes them directly commercial and capitulates any public service notion.

https://www.amic.media/media/files/file_352_3490.pdf seems to be the best study. It seemingly suggests that public interest media and democracy have non-trivial association. Remove one and the other falls.

Re: FBI looks into dead or missing scientists tied to NASA, Blue Origin, SpaceX

#168

Post by cucumber3732842 »

contingencies wrote: post #166
krapp wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're making the mistake of assuming the world works like an internet forum. You aren't going to be able to judge reality on the basis of rhetorical tricks or logical contradiction. Your implicit assumption that if "everyone on the other side attacks the conclusion but not the numbers" the numbers must be correct first assumes only two sides, and second doesn't actually say anything about "the numbers," only…

I think a slightly more nuanced view is that while perhaps big name old media of yore had a presumption of authority, morals, and public responsibility and that probably meant some degree of trust was potentially warranted (though no doubt abused at times), with the commercial push toward tabloidism and the internet all of those corrective influences have vanished, such that the presumption of authority no longer has…

>I think a slightly more nuanced view is that

Nuanced positions put up a fight. Strawmen keel right over.

>while perhaps big name old media of yore had a presumption of authority, morals, and public responsibility and that probably meant some degree of trust was potentially warranted (though no doubt abused at times), with the commercial push toward tabloidism and the internet all of those corrective influences have vanished, such that the presumption of authority no longer has legs. In fact, most of them have effectively turned in to subscriber-only outlets, which makes them directly commercial and capitulates any public service notion.

Exactly. And once that trust is gone there's no incentive to care.

>https://www.amic.media/media/files/file_352_3490.pdf seems to be the best study. It seemingly suggests that public interest media and democracy have non-trivial association. Remove one and the other falls.

I don't distrust the study on it's face but this is basically industry group saying they're vital to society. Realtors will say the same thing about themselves too.

Re: FBI looks into dead or missing scientists tied to NASA, Blue Origin, SpaceX

#169

Post by contingencies »

cucumber3732842 wrote: post #168
contingencies wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a slightly more nuanced view is that while perhaps big name old media of yore had a presumption of authority, morals, and public responsibility and that probably meant some degree of trust was potentially warranted (though no doubt abused at times), with the commercial push toward tabloidism and the internet all of those corrective influences have vanished, such that the presumption of authority no longer has…

>I think a slightly more nuanced view is that Nuanced positions put up a fight. Strawmen keel right over. >while perhaps big name old media of yore had a presumption of authority, morals, and public responsibility and that probably meant some degree of trust was potentially warranted (though no doubt abused at times), with the commercial push toward tabloidism and the internet all of those corrective influences have…

Fair points though if you view it as a more of cry of desperate help in to the void from a dying industry than a self-promotional activity, then cast around for anyone else who could be reasonably expected to produce such a study and come up blank, then it's easier to take seriously.

Re: FBI looks into dead or missing scientists tied to NASA, Blue Origin, SpaceX

#170

Post by trhway »

vasac wrote: post #164
trhway wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Is someone ready to nuke them No. The nukes prevent the aggression even by a conventionally armed aggressor. Nukes ins't to win a war, it is to prevent one. Lets say Germany has successfully repelled Russian tank-and-soldiers invasion - it would still be a devastating thing for Germany which the nukes would help prevent from starting at all. >are they some special snowflakes who should have them while Iran (and most…

> Iran's situation is obviously very different. Yes, very different as in 'Our blessed homeland vs their barbarous wastes' meme. We (and our allies) should have nukes because we want to prevent wars. But no one else should have them, since the situation is obviously very different (we wouldn’t want them to be able to prevent wars). And I used to think that Little Rocketman was a crazy bastard, but it looks like I was…

>Yes, very different as in 'Our blessed homeland vs their barbarous wastes' meme.

exactly. Iran's policy declaration of destroying whole countries (US and Israel in this case) and conducting of actual proxy-wars in order to achieve those goals make them barbarians from whom the civilization must be defended.

>we wouldn’t want them to be able to prevent wars

they don't even try. They want nukes to be able to conduct wars.

>And I used to think that Little Rocketman was a crazy bastard, but it looks like I was wrong.

absolutely. For all their tremendous faults, NK uses their nukes for deterrence as they want to genocide their own people in the comfort of personal safety. Whereis ayatollahs are hellbent on waging wars and destruction in order to spread their Islamic Revolution.

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