Curry Pervert wrote: Sun Jul 04, 2021 6:59 am

A new US military report into UFO sightings presents compelling evidence. But of what kind of life form, if any?

I've read this over and over to the point that I've squandered all of my free reads. It's a good read!

rsmurphy wrote: Mon Jul 05, 2021 12:23 pm

Curry Pervert wrote: Sun Jul 04, 2021 6:59 am

A new US military report into UFO sightings presents compelling evidence. But of what kind of life form, if any?

I've read this over and over to the point that I've squandered all of my free reads. It's a good read!

They dock you a free read if it's the same article again? That's lame.

About these encounters with aliens and who these beings really are... it's instructive to look at Jung's writings on UFO / alien encounters where he noted their similarity with earlier alleged encounters with elves and such. In the middle ages people were sexed by demons in their sleep (incubi and succubi), several people tell of being sexed by aliens in their sleep. Sometimes they have a child with the alien, like some people in peasant society had children with trolls. Trolls also abducted people to their cave, like UFOs abduct people. There are "good aliens" (greys) and "evil aliens" (reptilians).

None of this of course makes anything clearer, but it makes me put aside the "us from the future" hypothesis for a moment.

I've been wanting to read up on this since forever so I'll perhaps return later with better thoughts.

I'm wondering if any of you are familiar with Jared Diamond's thesis on intelligent life in the cosmos? He's a skeptic about a close encounter not just because of the physical distance, but the temporal distance between evolved species on the cosmic timeline. I remember reading his argument and finding it very persuasive.

losthighway wrote: I'm wondering if any of you are familiar with Jared Diamond's thesis on intelligent life in the cosmos? He's a skeptic about a close encounter not just because of the physical distance, but the temporal distance between evolved species on the cosmic timeline. I remember reading his argument and finding it very persuasive.

Back when you originally posted this I found a clip of his on YouTube briefly explaining why he thinks intelligent life capable of broadcasting markers of their existence for us to find is unlikely. I forgot to respond to it then, but I just rewatched it and found his thinking to be logical. However, in that same clip he surmised that being how Earthlings have treated fellow Earthlings, as well as other species on our planet, searching for others out there is a really dumb and harmful thing to do. I really agree with that point. Besides, if we take into account the scores of alien abduction stories, with tales of being poked, prodded, tagged, etc., one could argue that it's been happening all this time. Which brings me to Betty and Barney Hill.

Today marks the 60th anniversary of The Betty & Barney Hill incident - the first major alien abduction story that arrested the nation. An interracial married couple in 1961 was a rare occurrence. Add to that this married couple's tale of alien abduction and experimentation, and you've got a thing that's all the more rare and extraordinary.

Yeah when he layed out geological history, contrasted by relatively minuscule human history, and then human history contrasted by even shorter modern tech history, it made me realize that in the history of our planet, our species flying around and sending radio signals has been, and inevitably will be a quick flash of light on a very long timeline. The notion that two rare, life supporting planets would sync up their eras of intelligent life makes it seem almost impossible to me. I'm not used to thinking in 4 dimensions, so it kinda blew my mind.

I'm not familiar with this guy but that's my feeling as well. You only have to look at how quickly we fucked everything up.

I doubt we'd be any threat to one another, anyway. In the vastly unlikely event that there is another civilisation around in our stellar neighbourhood at this precise moment in time, they'd likely still be way too far away to be anything but radio penpals. Which would be a fantastic stroke of luck for everybody, but even then we'd be talking tens or hundreds of years for a response.

Supposing that they have FTL technology is an awfully big ask IMO. To the best of our knowledge that's not just difficult but impossible. Maybe their advanced science knows better, but given the current weight of evidence it's reasonable to assume the speed of light really is the limit, in which case we are all unavoidably separated by hopelessly vast gulfs of space and time and that is that.

Yeah. The James Webb telescope will extend our reach/sharpen our vision, but to date what's fallen under SETI (detecting radio signals/possible anomalies) has made for an almost primitive/needle in a haystack scenario when it comes to locating extraterrestrial life/technosignatures. Complicating matters is that all of these distant star systems are continually moving away from us.

I try not to get too wrapped-up into vast distances if only because of Einstein and wormholes. Yeah, one hasn't been detected yet, but if in theory such a structure can result from Einstein's equations, then we should take them into consideration when discussing the immenseness of space.

Never heard of this Brazilian incident. From a cursory reading of events authorities claimed the otherworldly brings witnessed by children were merely a homeless man covered in mud and a couple with dwarfism, because why not.