NSA UFO Documents Index • Hacker News Board

Re: NSA UFO Documents Index

#21

Post by ghostbrainalpha » Wed, Jan 13, 2021, 6:29 PM UTC

INTPenis wrote: post #6

ghostbrainalpha wrote: post #3

The redactions on some of these documents are absolutely ridiculous. What is the point for releasing documents in a state that leaves them completely useless.

Just a wild stab in the dark here but those redactions might have to do with SIGINT. Or in other words, how the UFO report came to be. Because when I saw this headline "NSA UFO Documents Index" hosted on nsa.gov, I realized why I don't care about UFO theories. Because even the NSA has given up. No sane person cares about this stuff. They will readily index it on their website to shut those lunatics up.

I don't know how you can't at least find this document interesting. It's a first hand account of what was basically a dogfight between a US pilot and a UFO over Iran.

https://www.nsa.gov/Portals/70/documents/news-features/decla...

Even if you assume that whatever he encountered was made on Earth, its hard not to have questions or be interested in the account.

Re: NSA UFO Documents Index

#22

Post by imustbeevil » Wed, Jan 13, 2021, 6:29 PM UTC

mikewarot wrote: post #11

The next to last was the most interesting to me... it's gotta be an old April Fools in the NSA Technical Journal. It flatly states we've received signals from outer space, and posits a decoding of them.... https://www.nsa.gov/Portals/70/documents/news-features/decla...

It's more likely just a prompt for teaching these concepts.

Re: NSA UFO Documents Index

#23

Post by at_a_remove » Wed, Jan 13, 2021, 6:30 PM UTC

anewaccount2021 wrote: post #18

If you say there are civilizations thriving somewhere in the galaxy, you're Carl Sagan. If you say our solar system may have had aliens pass by, you're an eccentric. If you say aliens landed on earth, you're a crank. Why is the sanity of the claimant inversely proportional to the distance of aliens from Earth?

Briefly put: the speed of light.

It takes a long, long time to get anywhere, because light moves at a relative crawl compared to the distances between stars, so it would be a long and energy-intensive process to visit another planet, especially given how hard it would be to detect a civilization there before you departed. The Earth didn't emit much of a signal on radio waves until about 1900, so even if the aliens were only sixty light years away and could move at the speed of light, they'd have had to launch just as soon as they got some signals.

Ah, but FTL, you say. But nothing. FTL implies Closed Timelike Curves: time travel, or the informational equivalent, with all of the logical paradoxes that can entail. I'd sooner believe in breaking the conservation of mass-energy than beating the speed of light.

Re: NSA UFO Documents Index

#24

Post by Rebelgecko » Wed, Jan 13, 2021, 6:31 PM UTC

uhtred wrote: post #16

cookiengineer wrote: post #8

It's dangerous to go alone. Take this [1] and this [2] and especially this [3]. Area 51 was a radar testing site due to the unique properties of the salt on the ground. And they just tested a "silver shiny UFO" which was the prototype for the SR-71. And yes, this was exactly the same date when people first called radio stations and the police for UFO sightings. The Skunkworks A-12 OXCART research project led to the f…

None of those planes look like UFOs and they wouldn't move in the same reported ways, either. I don't agree that it makes someone stupid to be open minded.

What does a UFO look like?

Re: NSA UFO Documents Index

#25

Post by mech422 » Wed, Jan 13, 2021, 6:31 PM UTC

cookiengineer wrote: post #19

uhtred wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

None of those planes look like UFOs and they wouldn't move in the same reported ways, either. I don't agree that it makes someone stupid to be open minded.

> None of those planes look like UFOs and they wouldn't move in the same reported ways, either. Yet today's pop culture conspiracy theorists tried to raid Area 51 for their beliefs. Don't get me wrong: I believe in alien life. But I don't believe in conspiracy theorists that are blind to the obvious in correlations of evidence. Scientific theory is about bayesian reasoning, not about proving to yourself that you're r…

If by 'today's you mean last year or so...

The Area51 raid was an imgur joke...I think Chuck Norris and Shaggy were supposed to lead it. (The 2 most powerful memes on the internet...)

Re: NSA UFO Documents Index

#26

Post by shiftpgdn » Wed, Jan 13, 2021, 6:31 PM UTC

cookiengineer wrote: post #19

uhtred wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

None of those planes look like UFOs and they wouldn't move in the same reported ways, either. I don't agree that it makes someone stupid to be open minded.

> None of those planes look like UFOs and they wouldn't move in the same reported ways, either. Yet today's pop culture conspiracy theorists tried to raid Area 51 for their beliefs. Don't get me wrong: I believe in alien life. But I don't believe in conspiracy theorists that are blind to the obvious in correlations of evidence. Scientific theory is about bayesian reasoning, not about proving to yourself that you're r…

You should relax and learn how to communicate without coming off like an asshole. No one actually intended to raid Area 51, it was obviously a joke.

Re: NSA UFO Documents Index

#27

Post by nickelcitymario » Wed, Jan 13, 2021, 6:31 PM UTC

avl999 wrote: post #14

At this point the existence of the UFO phenomenon is undeniable. The fact that congress attached to the covid relief bill that the intelligence services must present a report of everything they know about ufos within a 180 days tells you that something is up and they are trying to force the hand of the intelligence service. I also find it interesting that since retiring Harry Read has openly talked about the existenc…

> congress attached to the covid relief bill

They did? Got a link? I tried a Google search but found nothing.

Re: NSA UFO Documents Index

#28

Post by stretchcat » Wed, Jan 13, 2021, 6:34 PM UTC

uhtred wrote: post #16

cookiengineer wrote: post #8

It's dangerous to go alone. Take this [1] and this [2] and especially this [3]. Area 51 was a radar testing site due to the unique properties of the salt on the ground. And they just tested a "silver shiny UFO" which was the prototype for the SR-71. And yes, this was exactly the same date when people first called radio stations and the police for UFO sightings. The Skunkworks A-12 OXCART research project led to the f…

None of those planes look like UFOs and they wouldn't move in the same reported ways, either. I don't agree that it makes someone stupid to be open minded.

Those planes have very unusual forms by the standards the public was accustomed to decades ago. In the time since, those planes and ones even more exotic have appeared countless times in popular media, changing the public's perception of what airplanes might look like.

Re: NSA UFO Documents Index

#29

Post by jasperry » Wed, Jan 13, 2021, 6:34 PM UTC

anewaccount2021 wrote: post #18

If you say there are civilizations thriving somewhere in the galaxy, you're Carl Sagan. If you say our solar system may have had aliens pass by, you're an eccentric. If you say aliens landed on earth, you're a crank. Why is the sanity of the claimant inversely proportional to the distance of aliens from Earth?

The larger the volume of space considered, the higher probability there is that a thing exists somewhere in it. Plus, if aliens have landed on earth, you also need to postulate a cover-up that has successfully prevented almost everyone from finding out.

It's not about sanity, it's just about understanding how much evidence certain claims require to be considered likely.

Re: NSA UFO Documents Index

#30

Post by jerf » Wed, Jan 13, 2021, 6:34 PM UTC

mikewarot wrote: post #11

The next to last was the most interesting to me... it's gotta be an old April Fools in the NSA Technical Journal. It flatly states we've received signals from outer space, and posits a decoding of them.... https://www.nsa.gov/Portals/70/documents/news-features/decla...

Intelligence agencies have internal decoding competitions and trainings. This sounds like one of them, simply framed around an alien transmission, and you're just looking at the answer key where it's assumed the reader is familiar with the frame.

The entire "transmission" is at the end. To be honest, of all the things we could receive from an alien source, "They transmitted basic set theory and a periodic table at us... and that's it..." would almost be the weirdest possible outcome.