9 ms·

IMO, the fishy part of the article is the cronyism involved in this program: "The shadowy program — parts of it remain classified — began in 2007, and initiall

by volgo 9y ago

IMO, the fishy part of the article is the cronyism involved in this program: "The shadowy program — parts of it remain classified — began in 2007, and initially it was largely funded at the request of Harry Reid, the Nevada Democrat who was the Senate majority leader at the time and who has long had an interest in space phenomena. Most of the money went to an aerospace research company run by a billionaire entrepreneur and longtime friend of Mr. Reid’s, Robert Bigelow, who is currently working with NASA to produce expandable craft for humans to use in space." So... Harry Reid's friend is absolutely convinced there are aliens, gets Reid to convince congress to fund the program, and all the money goes back to his own company? Not fishy at all.

frankquist 9y ago
Say that you are interested in investigating puzzling phenomena, and you have the money. What more logical step is there than to approach your senate majority leader friend? Such oddball connections are probably the only the way such a program would ever get funded. Edit: well, obviously he didn't have the money. Misspoke. I meant the means (a company with the required infrastructure).
- volgo 9y ago
  No, the logical step is to stop and think whether or not you should use public money to do this. If he raised some VC funding, he can go hunt Minotaur for all I care. But this is my money he's using to do this. No thanks
  - dawnerd 9y ago
    I’d rather my tax money go towards huntin aliens than fighting wars TBH. I mean yeah, there’s lot of other things I’d like to see funded but this seems like a drop in the bucket when we’re talking the grand scheme of things.
  - golergka 9y ago
    > No, the logical step is to stop and think whether or not you should use public money to do this. People in first-world countries are usually OK with spending public money on science. So, if you consider it legit science (and he does), it makes perfect sense for him to lobby spending public money on it.
    - harry8 9y ago
      Legit science. More likely for the money to go to MIT than a politician's friend? No really, show us the public tender and the evidence that the money was well spent by tender won on merit alone. Or we are going to assume it is totally corrupt. Onus of proof used to be the other way around but Washington, yeah, it really does stink like that. This is why outsider populists like Sanders and Trump are popular. Everyone has had enough of this garbage.
      - piyh 9y ago
        The merit is researching potentially existential threats against humanity. It's not testable science, but if it leads to the next manhatten project, we discover that another country has advanced tech, that we aren't alone, or get a null result I am OK with it.
  - loblollyboy 9y ago
    Hunt Minotaur lol
- nerdponx 9y ago
  Or it's a giant graft program.
- glenstein 9y ago
  For me, the logical next stop would be to pause and think very long and very hard about why the subject isn't treated as legitimate by mainstream science.
  - pmarreck 9y ago
    Fallacious appeals to shame, in all likelihood
  - almost_usual 9y ago
    What’s there to think about? Scientists are not credulous people and that’s a very good thing. There are plenty of research projects dedicated to searching for other forms of intelligent life and none of them have yielded any evidence. This is unexplained phenomena which could be the result of diminished mental acuity or other unexplained physical events. I’m not sure how these theories should be made anymore legitimate without more evidence?
  - putlake 9y ago
    What we often fail to realize -- esp. in our tech bubble -- is that science is now mistrusted by the mainstream in society.
    - maksimum 9y ago
      Using "science" makes your statement too broad.
    - duckMuppet 9y ago
      I think it's more to do with the those claiming things in the name of science that puts many people off. Science is a process, a method by which we can answer certain types of questions. To often people hear things like settled science, or the science is crystal clear, not up for debate.. These are political posturing and have little to do with actual science. It's absurd, and some people realize this. As with any science, data comes in late, or sometimes not at all. There are quite a few FDA prescription drugs that were approved and later recalled, some with devastating effects on their consumers. The truth is, science is done by people, people who are infallible. People who make mistakes, who see things from a certain point of view, or who don't have all the data yet. Additionally, prediction models can be tweaked to say exactly what you want to, with devastating effect on our community. You can't say anything though. Even in grad school labs, to make certain statements or even hint about things can lead to problems with your advisor, or research, or worse yet, peers.. Academia is a great place, at least it has been for me, as long as you keep your head down and focus on research.. i dont think it's the best place now if you truly want to question everything. I wouldn't even venture where you could go for that now. I think this has led to a generalized mistrust, and it falls on all of us. The reality is that data is always changing, models change, etc.. People who put policies into legislation need to balance not only the aspect of the science, but the overall big picture; cultural, societal, expectations, desires etc. as well. That's politics. I think it was Russ Roberts who said you can engineer a bridge, but you can't engineer society in the same way. And i think that's right, too Often we miss that.
- eplanit 9y ago
  Or, say you are a major donor to your senate majority leader friend. What more logical step than the senate majority leader getting millions of taxpayer dollars funneled to your company to investigate puzzling phenomena. With your income increased, you're more able to keep donating to the friend in the senate.
  - garmaine 9y ago
    Bob Bigalow actually is a hard core ufologist for the record. No need for cynicism here I think. He just wanted access to DoD information on the subject.
- sandworm101 9y ago
  >>>Say that you are interested in investigating puzzling phenomena, and you have the money. What more logical step is there than to approach your senate majority leader friend? You spend your own money rather than ask taxpayers to fund your fantasy. There is more than enough open source intel on atmospheric phenomena out there. And plenty of "UFO researchers" willing to work.
  - richardknop 9y ago
    I guess that as a private citizen he would not have access to a lot of tech and information Pentagon has, no matter how much money he can spend. So spending money lobbying to get Pentagon create a program like this might be better approach rather then trying to carry out investigations on your own.
openasocket 9y ago
I doubt it was a no-bid contract. And there are far more lucrative programs which raise far less eyebrows than this.
- fapjacks 9y ago
  This completely. For example, if you approach the US government through a solicitation with really any half-reasonable suggestion for processing enormous amounts of data, and you'll get a contract. Go take a look through the US government's business solicitations: Every agency wants an AI because they're being buried by data they can't process. If you wanted to collude with elected officials and funnel government dollars into your business, these kinds of solicitations will get you the funding with few questions. And if you fail, well, so has almost every other business that's tried to solve this problem.
  - nl 9y ago
    As someone who has put in well qualified bids with university consortiums for multiple US government research contracts, including DARPA and other similar groups I can confirm that this is completely false.
    - fapjacks 9y ago
      As someone who has put in well qualified bids with university consortiums for multiple US government research contracts, including DARPA and other similar groups I can confirm that this is completely false. What is the size of your organization? How are you submitting bids, and where are you getting your solicitations? Does someone in your company network with the government liaisons beyond just the one you've submitted a bid to? Has your company hired someone to work this network for solicitations that aren't on FBO? Do your PIs have experience outside academia in contracting? I've been a part of several (successful) bids and -- operating under the assumption your claim was made in good faith and not just a lie -- I wonder at your approach. This is work that pretty much every organization in the US government needs.
      - 9y ago
Teever 9y ago
Robert Bigelow has been interested in aliens and UFOs for most of his life and has essentially dedicated his life to amassing the resources to start an aeronautical company. Hiring him to do this is like hiring Robert Ballard to find the Titanic.
- volgo 9y ago
  I've been into finding magical unicorns my entire life too. Can I get start a company and get $600 million from the Pentagon for my research too?
  - gf263 9y ago
    Hyperbolic.
    - arkades 9y ago
      Oh, was their budget smaller than that?
  - tzs 9y ago
    Are there numerous creditable sightings of unidentified animals that are consistent with unicorns? And if there are, are unidentified animals something the military has an interest in? There are numerous creditable sightings of unidentified things in the air. Are they aliens? Almost surely not. But no matter what mundane phenomenon is responsible for unidentified things in the air, it is of interest to the military.
- krapp 9y ago
  >Hiring him to do this is like hiring Robert Ballard to find the Titanic. No, because the Titanic could be proven to have existed before Robert Ballard tried to find it.
  - fapjacks 9y ago
    To deny that something unexplainable has been happening in the skies is really disingenuous. We have very expert, specialist organizations whose primary responsibility it is to know what's happening in our skies. You take these two things and remove the context of "UFOs" and suddenly it's not crazy that they're doing something about it, but crazy that they're not doing something about it. The context of "UFOs" is laden with plenty of bad rap, but that doesn't absolve these organizations from their responsibilities.
gwern 9y ago
Also note the timing. The program began in 2007. What else happened in 2007? The Democrats got control of the Senate, turning Minority leader Harry Reid into Majority leader.
- sigmar 9y ago
  2007 budget gets passed in 2006 though.
  - gwern 9y ago
    OP doesn't say it was part of the official 2007 budget, being a black program and all, and given how complicated US government & military budgeting is, I don't know what any dates involved really mean anyway. OP merely says it was started in 2007.
twblalock 9y ago
It's no surprise that successful business people and politicians know each other. There is no perfect world where every decision to spend government money is a transaction between complete strangers. If this situation constitutes corruption, then almost every venture between government and private business would also need to be considered corrupt.
- ianai 9y ago
  Way I see it, the economy is failing to properly employ and provide society. So either society finds another way to provide for everyone or society needs government projects to employ people. Just because the economy doesn’t need every eligible worker doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be able to find something for them to do.
- zzzeek 9y ago
  Not as much if you do open bidding which is pretty common in local and state government
- eksemplar 9y ago
  Well that is why you have a public bidding process where you throughly document why the winning bid won. If they had nothing to hide, that part of the equation would be perfectly transparent. I work in the public sector in Scandinavia and while I realize our laws are a little different, I would be in jail if I did something similar. Getting contracts to friends/family is a huge issue in most countries, which is why you document the reasoning even harder to make sure its absolutely bulletproof legally when they happen to have the best bid.
vadimberman 9y ago
This. Also, may I add, what was the aerospace research company paid for exactly? Wasn't the project just filing reports and talking to people?
jrjf940 9y ago
it was pretty funny how the article had only passing mention of that part.
- honestshitpost 9y ago
  Bigelow is a billionaire. The contract was for $22 million, chump change -- not just for Bigelow, but for almost anything. Hang around Wall St and government for even a little bit and you'll realize how small 22 million is. The money is a non story.
honestshitpost 9y ago
Bigelow is a billionaire. The contract was for $22 million, chump change -- not just for Bigelow, but for almost anything. Hang around Wall St and government for even a little bit and you'll realize how small 22 million is. The money is a non story.

by volgo 9y ago

frankquist 9y ago

Say that you are interested in investigating puzzling phenomena, and you have the money. What more logical step is there than to approach your senate majority leader friend? Such oddball connections are probably the only the way such a program would ever get funded. Edit: well, obviously he didn't have the money. Misspoke. I meant the means (a company with the required infrastructure).

volgo 9y ago
No, the logical step is to stop and think whether or not you should use public money to do this. If he raised some VC funding, he can go hunt Minotaur for all I care. But this is my money he's using to do this. No thanks
- dawnerd 9y ago
  I’d rather my tax money go towards huntin aliens than fighting wars TBH. I mean yeah, there’s lot of other things I’d like to see funded but this seems like a drop in the bucket when we’re talking the grand scheme of things.
- golergka 9y ago
  > No, the logical step is to stop and think whether or not you should use public money to do this. People in first-world countries are usually OK with spending public money on science. So, if you consider it legit science (and he does), it makes perfect sense for him to lobby spending public money on it.
  - harry8 9y ago
    Legit science. More likely for the money to go to MIT than a politician's friend? No really, show us the public tender and the evidence that the money was well spent by tender won on merit alone. Or we are going to assume it is totally corrupt. Onus of proof used to be the other way around but Washington, yeah, it really does stink like that. This is why outsider populists like Sanders and Trump are popular. Everyone has had enough of this garbage.
    - piyh 9y ago
      The merit is researching potentially existential threats against humanity. It's not testable science, but if it leads to the next manhatten project, we discover that another country has advanced tech, that we aren't alone, or get a null result I am OK with it.
- loblollyboy 9y ago
  Hunt Minotaur lol
nerdponx 9y ago
Or it's a giant graft program.
glenstein 9y ago
For me, the logical next stop would be to pause and think very long and very hard about why the subject isn't treated as legitimate by mainstream science.
- pmarreck 9y ago
  Fallacious appeals to shame, in all likelihood
- almost_usual 9y ago
  What’s there to think about? Scientists are not credulous people and that’s a very good thing. There are plenty of research projects dedicated to searching for other forms of intelligent life and none of them have yielded any evidence. This is unexplained phenomena which could be the result of diminished mental acuity or other unexplained physical events. I’m not sure how these theories should be made anymore legitimate without more evidence?
- putlake 9y ago
  What we often fail to realize -- esp. in our tech bubble -- is that science is now mistrusted by the mainstream in society.
  - maksimum 9y ago
    Using "science" makes your statement too broad.
  - duckMuppet 9y ago
    I think it's more to do with the those claiming things in the name of science that puts many people off. Science is a process, a method by which we can answer certain types of questions. To often people hear things like settled science, or the science is crystal clear, not up for debate.. These are political posturing and have little to do with actual science. It's absurd, and some people realize this. As with any science, data comes in late, or sometimes not at all. There are quite a few FDA prescription drugs that were approved and later recalled, some with devastating effects on their consumers. The truth is, science is done by people, people who are infallible. People who make mistakes, who see things from a certain point of view, or who don't have all the data yet. Additionally, prediction models can be tweaked to say exactly what you want to, with devastating effect on our community. You can't say anything though. Even in grad school labs, to make certain statements or even hint about things can lead to problems with your advisor, or research, or worse yet, peers.. Academia is a great place, at least it has been for me, as long as you keep your head down and focus on research.. i dont think it's the best place now if you truly want to question everything. I wouldn't even venture where you could go for that now. I think this has led to a generalized mistrust, and it falls on all of us. The reality is that data is always changing, models change, etc.. People who put policies into legislation need to balance not only the aspect of the science, but the overall big picture; cultural, societal, expectations, desires etc. as well. That's politics. I think it was Russ Roberts who said you can engineer a bridge, but you can't engineer society in the same way. And i think that's right, too Often we miss that.
eplanit 9y ago
Or, say you are a major donor to your senate majority leader friend. What more logical step than the senate majority leader getting millions of taxpayer dollars funneled to your company to investigate puzzling phenomena. With your income increased, you're more able to keep donating to the friend in the senate.
- garmaine 9y ago
  Bob Bigalow actually is a hard core ufologist for the record. No need for cynicism here I think. He just wanted access to DoD information on the subject.
sandworm101 9y ago
>>>Say that you are interested in investigating puzzling phenomena, and you have the money. What more logical step is there than to approach your senate majority leader friend? You spend your own money rather than ask taxpayers to fund your fantasy. There is more than enough open source intel on atmospheric phenomena out there. And plenty of "UFO researchers" willing to work.
- richardknop 9y ago
  I guess that as a private citizen he would not have access to a lot of tech and information Pentagon has, no matter how much money he can spend. So spending money lobbying to get Pentagon create a program like this might be better approach rather then trying to carry out investigations on your own.

openasocket 9y ago

I doubt it was a no-bid contract. And there are far more lucrative programs which raise far less eyebrows than this.

fapjacks 9y ago
This completely. For example, if you approach the US government through a solicitation with really any half-reasonable suggestion for processing enormous amounts of data, and you'll get a contract. Go take a look through the US government's business solicitations: Every agency wants an AI because they're being buried by data they can't process. If you wanted to collude with elected officials and funnel government dollars into your business, these kinds of solicitations will get you the funding with few questions. And if you fail, well, so has almost every other business that's tried to solve this problem.
- nl 9y ago
  As someone who has put in well qualified bids with university consortiums for multiple US government research contracts, including DARPA and other similar groups I can confirm that this is completely false.
  - fapjacks 9y ago
    As someone who has put in well qualified bids with university consortiums for multiple US government research contracts, including DARPA and other similar groups I can confirm that this is completely false. What is the size of your organization? How are you submitting bids, and where are you getting your solicitations? Does someone in your company network with the government liaisons beyond just the one you've submitted a bid to? Has your company hired someone to work this network for solicitations that aren't on FBO? Do your PIs have experience outside academia in contracting? I've been a part of several (successful) bids and -- operating under the assumption your claim was made in good faith and not just a lie -- I wonder at your approach. This is work that pretty much every organization in the US government needs.
    - 9y ago

Teever 9y ago

Robert Bigelow has been interested in aliens and UFOs for most of his life and has essentially dedicated his life to amassing the resources to start an aeronautical company. Hiring him to do this is like hiring Robert Ballard to find the Titanic.

volgo 9y ago
I've been into finding magical unicorns my entire life too. Can I get start a company and get $600 million from the Pentagon for my research too?
- gf263 9y ago
  Hyperbolic.
  - arkades 9y ago
    Oh, was their budget smaller than that?
- tzs 9y ago
  Are there numerous creditable sightings of unidentified animals that are consistent with unicorns? And if there are, are unidentified animals something the military has an interest in? There are numerous creditable sightings of unidentified things in the air. Are they aliens? Almost surely not. But no matter what mundane phenomenon is responsible for unidentified things in the air, it is of interest to the military.
krapp 9y ago
>Hiring him to do this is like hiring Robert Ballard to find the Titanic. No, because the Titanic could be proven to have existed before Robert Ballard tried to find it.
- fapjacks 9y ago
  To deny that something unexplainable has been happening in the skies is really disingenuous. We have very expert, specialist organizations whose primary responsibility it is to know what's happening in our skies. You take these two things and remove the context of "UFOs" and suddenly it's not crazy that they're doing something about it, but crazy that they're not doing something about it. The context of "UFOs" is laden with plenty of bad rap, but that doesn't absolve these organizations from their responsibilities.

gwern 9y ago

Also note the timing. The program began in 2007. What else happened in 2007? The Democrats got control of the Senate, turning Minority leader Harry Reid into Majority leader.

sigmar 9y ago
2007 budget gets passed in 2006 though.
- gwern 9y ago
  OP doesn't say it was part of the official 2007 budget, being a black program and all, and given how complicated US government & military budgeting is, I don't know what any dates involved really mean anyway. OP merely says it was started in 2007.

twblalock 9y ago

It's no surprise that successful business people and politicians know each other. There is no perfect world where every decision to spend government money is a transaction between complete strangers. If this situation constitutes corruption, then almost every venture between government and private business would also need to be considered corrupt.

ianai 9y ago
Way I see it, the economy is failing to properly employ and provide society. So either society finds another way to provide for everyone or society needs government projects to employ people. Just because the economy doesn’t need every eligible worker doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be able to find something for them to do.
zzzeek 9y ago
Not as much if you do open bidding which is pretty common in local and state government
eksemplar 9y ago
Well that is why you have a public bidding process where you throughly document why the winning bid won. If they had nothing to hide, that part of the equation would be perfectly transparent. I work in the public sector in Scandinavia and while I realize our laws are a little different, I would be in jail if I did something similar. Getting contracts to friends/family is a huge issue in most countries, which is why you document the reasoning even harder to make sure its absolutely bulletproof legally when they happen to have the best bid.

vadimberman 9y ago

This. Also, may I add, what was the aerospace research company paid for exactly? Wasn't the project just filing reports and talking to people?

jrjf940 9y ago

it was pretty funny how the article had only passing mention of that part.

honestshitpost 9y ago
Bigelow is a billionaire. The contract was for $22 million, chump change -- not just for Bigelow, but for almost anything. Hang around Wall St and government for even a little bit and you'll realize how small 22 million is. The money is a non story.

honestshitpost 9y ago

Bigelow is a billionaire. The contract was for $22 million, chump change -- not just for Bigelow, but for almost anything. Hang around Wall St and government for even a little bit and you'll realize how small 22 million is. The money is a non story.