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Fermi Paradox

casquilho said:
I reject your sound logic and valid science. Rather, I like the setting where we find an alien planet where Disco is considered the songs from the gods and Donna Summer is the godess of love....


Sorry Aramis, I have to be silly once in a while or my head explodes. :LOL:
Click to expand...
Ok, now there's a challenge!
We did a visit to the Tiki-bar planet (@robject 's take on Rangent/Vilis).

Now, to seek out the Disco World! Maybe it's a space station...

Edits: put Rangent back into the correct subsector, minor typoes.

For the record (pun unintended, but why not?) I had that on (secondhand) vinyl back in the day.
 
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Vargr Breath said:
If we were to receive a message today, what are the chances that the civilization that sent it would still be around.
Click to expand...
Depends... mostly upon how close.
Anywhere that it wouldn't be a century-long megaproject, pretty good. It would pretty much have to be within 30 LY, so it's quite likely they'd be arround with the reply. At the century-long mega-project level, maybe 100 LY, so the culture might no longer be recognizable... past that... the odds of successful transmission drop off, and the level of megaproject needed increases...
 
If anything on Ancient Aliens is true, we've already been visited. Close Encounters of the Third Kind was based on a UFO that landed at a military base. The Fourth Kind was based on hypnotic regression of people who had a bunch of problems in Alaska. I don't think they even said they were abducted. The Hypnotist found it all, if I remember right.

The U.S. Navy has video recorded by Jet Fighters. I can see the government lying about not having evidence, I can't see them lying about having evidence.

It's a bit crazy that 3 witnesses can get someone convicted of Murder. But 3 witnesses can't convince people they saw a UFO or Aliens.
 
Spinward Scout said:
If anything on Ancient Aliens is true, we've already been visited. Close Encounters of the Third Kind was based on a UFO that landed at a military base. The Fourth Kind was based on hypnotic regression of people who had a bunch of problems in Alaska. I don't think they even said they were abducted. The Hypnotist found it all, if I remember right.

The U.S. Navy has video recorded by Jet Fighters. I can see the government lying about not having evidence, I can't see them lying about having evidence.

It's a bit crazy that 3 witnesses can get someone convicted of Murder. But 3 witnesses can't convince people they saw a UFO or Aliens.
Click to expand...
The Navy is very clear: They don't know what it is. The audio of the pilots is also clear - they saw it with the Mk0 Eyeball, the camera also saw it,, and the radar got a weak hit... so the camera was able to track it.

It's far more scary that they don't know than if they were certain it was an alien. If we knew it were aliens, it would be a comfort, but also change entirely the DoD response.

It's interesting that the debunkers I've seen are flatly ignoring that one of the released vids is aircraft-cam footage, but with radio & intercom voice over it. The vid has the pilot confirming that what's on the screen is also seen by eye out the window, and with a wingman, who also confirms video and visual contact. 4 people, 2 planes, 2 very different systems (eye vs camera) with different refractive indices and fstop/lens configurations... and the debunkers, all 3, claiming it's purely camera artifacts. The debunkers debunk themselves...

But that vid, despite confirming visual recording in IR, and noting visual sighting of the recorded object by 4 people, is evidence there are transsonic objects being observed in flight... but nowhere near to being evidence of aliens.

What could it be?
  • Per DoD spokespeople, potentially a european nation¹ with an unannounced advanced drive.
  • It could be aliens.
  • It could be terran non-human intelligence which fled earth and returned
  • It could be some loon with a gift for engineering who made a super drive and is hiding from the gov't to avoid it becoming a tool of war
  • It could be a sensor of a Von Neumann machine - be it of the Earth or not.
  • It could be mass hallucination caused by camera error... but that's not really that likely, since the USN has hundreds of similar sightings. The mass is just too many bodies to have a significant chance of being the correct solution...
  • It could be a time travel experiment. (Possibly from the other end. Thanks, Michael Crichton...)
  • It could be a huge disinformation campaign...
    • If it is, sooner or later it will turn up in federal records
    • if it is, sooner or later one of the principals will recant.
Occam's razor only gets us to "it's probably a real phenomenon"... because the conspiracy and mass hallucination triggered by malfunctioning gear are a bit too far out.
... and if real, we don't have enough to know which nations are in possession, nor if those nations are modern and terrestrial Terran.

Perhaps there are some tool using tentacular Terran intelligences hiding deep under the water... think something between octopus and sliug... with human level intelligence and coöperation... I doubt that idea, but man it would make a fun episode of some conspiracy shows.

-=-=-=-=-
¹ Remember: Russia is also European. Technically, so is Turkey. Even as both also count as Asian nations...
 
The US formerly experimented with Lenticular reentry vehicles for Nuclear warheads.
If the US or some other nation was working on weaponization of space as a Black Program, they might revive the lentucular reentry vehicle program. Like the flying wing, the GREAT thing about it was fantastic maneuverability. Like the flying wing, the PROBLEM with it was innate instability making it hard to control.

We don't need aliens when we have Skunkworks (or the foreign equivalent).
 
Mad Scientists learn what MAN WAS NOT MEANT TO KNOW. :eek:

Mad Engineers build what MAN WAS NOT MEANT TO HAVE. :cool:

It's the difference between Pure and Applied insanity.
A subtle difference, to be sure ... but a difference nonetheless. ;)

The main difference between applied and pure is that applied is practical and uses knowledge to solve real-world problems, while pure is theoretical and focuses on expanding knowledge.
Click to expand...
 
aramis said:
The Navy is very clear: They don't know what it is. The audio of the pilots is also clear - they saw it with the Mk0 Eyeball, the camera also saw it,, and the radar got a weak hit... so the camera was able to track it.

It's far more scary that they don't know than if they were certain it was an alien. If we knew it were aliens, it would be a comfort, but also change entirely the DoD response.

It's interesting that the debunkers I've seen are flatly ignoring that one of the released vids is aircraft-cam footage, but with radio & intercom voice over it. The vid has the pilot confirming that what's on the screen is also seen by eye out the window, and with a wingman, who also confirms video and visual contact. 4 people, 2 planes, 2 very different systems (eye vs camera) with different refractive indices and fstop/lens configurations... and the debunkers, all 3, claiming it's purely camera artifacts. The debunkers debunk themselves...

But that vid, despite confirming visual recording in IR, and noting visual sighting of the recorded object by 4 people, is evidence there are transsonic objects being observed in flight... but nowhere near to being evidence of aliens.

What could it be?
  • Per DoD spokespeople, potentially a european nation¹ with an unannounced advanced drive.
  • It could be aliens.
  • It could be terran non-human intelligence which fled earth and returned
  • It could be some loon with a gift for engineering who made a super drive and is hiding from the gov't to avoid it becoming a tool of war
  • It could be a sensor of a Von Neumann machine - be it of the Earth or not.
  • It could be mass hallucination caused by camera error... but that's not really that likely, since the USN has hundreds of similar sightings. The mass is just too many bodies to have a significant chance of being the correct solution...
  • It could be a time travel experiment. (Possibly from the other end. Thanks, Michael Crichton...)
  • It could be a huge disinformation campaign...
    • If it is, sooner or later it will turn up in federal records
    • if it is, sooner or later one of the principals will recant.
Occam's razor only gets us to "it's probably a real phenomenon"... because the conspiracy and mass hallucination triggered by malfunctioning gear are a bit too far out.
... and if real, we don't have enough to know which nations are in possession, nor if those nations are modern and terrestrial Terran.

Perhaps there are some tool using tentacular Terran intelligences hiding deep under the water... think something between octopus and sliug... with human level intelligence and coöperation... I doubt that idea, but man it would make a fun episode of some conspiracy shows.

-=-=-=-=-
¹ Remember: Russia is also European. Technically, so is Turkey. Even as both also count as Asian nations...
Click to expand...
I would like to speak up on military equipment detecting aliens: The first thing to consider is that this sensor gear is made by the lowest bidder. Radar gear, at the best of times, is subject to any number of weird electrical phenomenon, and when you get weird interference going on, you can probably see aliens. Unidentifiable interference andfalse targets are super easy, and the moreso when the computer is allowed to make the call rather than having a human ID the radar blob. Radar blob identification is a very hairy topic at the best of times and while modern electronic are better, they're far from perfect.

If it's mass hallucination caused by camera error, and the USN has hundreds of similar sightings, of what significance is a few more? Cameras are made by the lowest bidder also, and as gear gets more and more computerized, it's more and more subject to weird, incomprehensible electronic glitches. The news is filled with glitches that testing failed to catch before a system was put into service. (Example: https://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/f22-squadron-shot-down-by-the-international-date-line-03087/)

As for eyewitness testimony, in the court of law, that's the highest level of evidence. In the court of science, it's the lowest.
 
It's odd how there are far fewer sightings of aliens, Bigfeet, and lake monsters even though almost everyone constantly carries a networked megapixel digital camera these days.
 
Badenov said:
The first thing to consider is that this sensor gear is made by the lowest bidder.
Click to expand...
Get tired of this line.

Pretty much everything I buy (or most anyone) is purchased from the lowest bidder.

Just because something is bought from the lowest bidder does not mean its not made to the HIGHEST STANDARDS.

I'm guessing that you bought whatever car you recently purchased from the lowest bidder. The motor for my current motorcycle was "designed in Germany, manufactured in China". Turns out that the CNC machines they use in China work just as well as the machines they use in Germany. The German company has to accept product to THEIR standards, not "chinese" standards. My motor runs like a top.

Now, far for me to say that Govt and DoD purchasing and engineering is perfect, flawless, etc.

But the folks designing this spectacularly complicated equipment are doing their best to design and build to the mission at hand, as efficiently as possible given the complexities of the whole process.
 
Grav_Moped said:
It's odd how there are far fewer sightings of aliens, Bigfeet, and lake monsters even though almost everyone constantly carries a networked megapixel digital camera these days.
Click to expand...
There are fewer sighting of Florida Panthers ... does that make Panthers now a MYTH? ;)

Clearly, the Aliens came, met us and gave the Earth a 1-star rating. :ROFLMAO:
Word has spread.
 
whartung said:
Get tired of this line.

Pretty much everything I buy (or most anyone) is purchased from the lowest bidder.

Just because something is bought from the lowest bidder does not mean its not made to the HIGHEST STANDARDS.
Click to expand...
While this is true, that choice is not available to the government. You can choose which car to buy. People didn't buy the Yugo even when it was the lowest cost car around, because the other aspects of the car did not meet standards. The government does not have the abilitry to select the best product because of the way contracting law is written, and corporations have a vested interest in offloading a piece of junk for cheap, and the government generally has to pay more to fix a thing, even if the original procurement promised it to be working.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pentagon_Wars is real.
 
Badenov said:
While this is true, that choice is not available to the government.
Click to expand...
Of course it is.

They get to choose the contractor. (Price is not the only consideration.) They can change contractors (this has certainly happened more than once). They can cancel contracts. (DIVAD, anyone?)

They also set the initial standards for the project. There's a reason things like Trijicon sites for rifles are so expensive. They have to survive really bad conditions, conditions most civilians don't find themselves in. Heck, conditions most soldiers don't find themselves in. But for those that are in those conditions, the equipment has to stand up and perform.

To quote the lawyer in Jurassic Park: "Is it heavy? Then it's expensive."

Are they as lithe and nimble as going to the local automall?

No, government procurement is its own life form. But they're not at the blind mercy of the contractors either.
 
whartung said:
Of course it is.

They get to choose the contractor. (Price is not the only consideration.) They can change contractors (this has certainly happened more than once). They can cancel contracts. (DIVAD, anyone?)

They also set the initial standards for the project. There's a reason things like Trijicon sites for rifles are so expensive. They have to survive really bad conditions, conditions most civilians don't find themselves in. Heck, conditions most soldiers don't find themselves in. But for those that are in those conditions, the equipment has to stand up and perform.

To quote the lawyer in Jurassic Park: "Is it heavy? Then it's expensive."

Are they as lithe and nimble as going to the local automall?

No, government procurement is its own life form. But they're not at the blind mercy of the contractors either.
Click to expand...
All very true...

Reputation within the government acquisition system really matters. Prior bid completion, prior budget compliance, prior quality of work, etc...

To the point that some companies will intentionally bid the absolute minimum they think they can, and then eat minor overruns, simply to get a rep for on time on budget.
 
The US military procurement system frequently blackballs companies for "frequent failure to perform to contract"... especially when their failure involved not meeting contractual minimum quality and performance.

Their name is removed from the "List of Qualified Bidders".
 
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