4 ms·

> What I don't get is the arrogance of every side about this subject. We have no answers. We have no understanding. The government seems to be about to admit as

by badRNG 5y ago

> What I don't get is the arrogance of every side about this subject. We have no answers. We have no understanding. The government seems to be about to admit as much. But the true believers are sure, and the true debunkers, yourself included, are sure. To me, you're both just tin foil hat flunkies clinging to your own special precious version of the coming apocalypse. Your own special cult. Generally speaking, it seems like good epistemology to withhold belief in propositions until evidence exists to support them. There aren't "two equally unreasonable cults" on the issue; it's unreasonable to believe in aliens absent evidence and it is reasonable to be skeptical of the former group's claims.

Swenrekcah 5y ago
I want to add that I think we should make a clear distinction between (1) “believing” in aliens and (2) believing aliens have visited us. I am for instance virtually certain that life in general and intelligent life in particular abounds in the Universe. I am even more certain that any accounts people tell and have told of alien sightings are lies or misunderstandings.
- mensetmanusman 5y ago
  How many thousands of people would have to agree on a sighting (that you were not a part of) for you to consider?
  - Swenrekcah 5y ago
    Not so many if any of them were working at any of the many companies and institutions that would detected such a thing and had measurements to support it. A 100 years ago if a few thousand people all swore they saw a flying saucer over Stonehenge it would be rather convincing. Nowadays, such a sighting is impossible to witnesses without the object also being caught on any number of detectors around the globe, so if they don’t support the eyewitnesses I’m inclined to believe the sensors.
    - graderjs 5y ago
      But I suspect you've convinced yourself with explanations that the sensors of the Navy around those released UAP videos were somehow invalid, or the many, if you search, nightvision UFO video, are also invalid. it would be cool if humans really had silent anti-gravity triangles, and if people see those or have an experience with them I think it's wrong to say well given that one of the possibly interpretations is aliens therefore this evidence must be discounted in these people must be crazy. I'm not saying you're saying that but I think there's definitely an incorrect trend in that direction Something interesting about this stuff is that there's not perfect cover across all sensors always. Maybe sometimes you have people seeing something that's not on radar. Or you have something that's on radar but not on other types of sensor. Or you have something that's in the infrared but not in the visible. I'm not asking you to believe anyone interpretation just to be open and consistent I think that if you're willing to believe the sensors are malfunctioning and creating ghost tracks it's also reasonable to consider that the sensors are not capable of picking up some sorts of technology. I understand that depending on your pliers there's different takes have different probabilities to you but I don't think it's okay to rush to certainty and discount any of those interpretations and say that anyone who suggests as much or obvious for those is out and out crazy. that's offensive and abusive to people and not I think in the spirit of investigation and curiosity.
      - Swenrekcah 5y ago
        I never said people are crazy. And I don’t know about the examples you mentioned because I haven’t looked into it. My point is basically that explaining an anomaly by “visiting aliens” is quite a leap of faith. I also highly doubt that a credible sighting would not be picked up by the general scientific public. So given the immense vastness of space and the resulting difficulties in colonising it, I remain unconvinced.
        graderjs 5y ago
        That's good to know, because I find that abusive, and disrespectful to people who are just trying to discuss things. But people on the "believer" side are no better. I'm sorry to seem to falsely accuse you of that, I really wasn't. I'm just sort of waxing in all directions to share my views, taking as a starting point the inspiration from people's comments here. It needed to be said, anyway :P ;) xx I agree with you that it's a leap of faith. I'm not asking you to make that leap. Seems you have an open mind. All I'm saying is all these experiencer testimonies I think means something is happening. I'm not sure if by picked up you mean "detected in their telescopes" or "the story picked up and discussed". Case 1 is I think unlikely unless there were sightings everywhere at once. But there have been multiple things seen in the sky over a number of places, like Mexico City, Phoenix, Belgium, etc, that got lots of press, and have videos and hundreds of witnesses. Case 2 I think is a result of stigma. For the same reason that, even tho > 50% of people believe in aliens and psychic abilities, you are not allowed to research into those things, and if you do, people will call you crazy. It's changing a bit now...but I agree with you on the vastness making it difficult. But I think it's arrogant to say, "Well, it looks difficult. Nah, can't be done." because that assumes that other civilizations would be unlikely to achieve more than us. I think the vastness of space and time, and our civilization's minuteness, is its own counter example to that take. It permits an alternate take which suggests there has to be somebody else out there, and they had plenty of time to do stuff. In terms of why there's no "open contact" I like to fall back on the Star Trek Prime Directive.
mensetmanusman 5y ago
I thought the reasonable approach was to believe in aliens (not here per se) due to the law of large numbers.
- graderjs 5y ago
  Yeah it's funny that we don't even have an agreement as to what the logical reasonable stance on this topic is. I think that's maybe an indication of how far out this topic is in terms of how far away it is from our human faculty of logic and understanding to be able to make sense of it. That alone I think is reason enough to just basically distrust a lot of things about this and keep an open mind.
graderjs 5y ago
I would agree with you if I accepted your framing of this. I think the framing is too narrow and doesn't do justice to the issue but within this frame your logical argument definitely makes sense. I'm sure you may object that your frame is simply a semantically equivalent restating of what I was saying. So I would counter that that's simply your interpretation. by the way I love your phrasing two equally unreasonable cults that's exactly what I think. the reason I think your framing is wrong is because there's not an equivalence, which I think you are assuming, between people's individual experience and people without that experience. So I'm not asking you to be a member of either of those unreasonable cults I'm not asking you to believe in aliens and I'm not asking you to believe that experiences fabricate their stories. I'm just asking you not to discount people's experiences and upon hearing those to keep an open mind.

by badRNG 5y ago

Swenrekcah 5y ago

I want to add that I think we should make a clear distinction between (1) “believing” in aliens and (2) believing aliens have visited us. I am for instance virtually certain that life in general and intelligent life in particular abounds in the Universe. I am even more certain that any accounts people tell and have told of alien sightings are lies or misunderstandings.

mensetmanusman 5y ago
How many thousands of people would have to agree on a sighting (that you were not a part of) for you to consider?
- Swenrekcah 5y ago
  Not so many if any of them were working at any of the many companies and institutions that would detected such a thing and had measurements to support it. A 100 years ago if a few thousand people all swore they saw a flying saucer over Stonehenge it would be rather convincing. Nowadays, such a sighting is impossible to witnesses without the object also being caught on any number of detectors around the globe, so if they don’t support the eyewitnesses I’m inclined to believe the sensors.
  - graderjs 5y ago
    But I suspect you've convinced yourself with explanations that the sensors of the Navy around those released UAP videos were somehow invalid, or the many, if you search, nightvision UFO video, are also invalid. it would be cool if humans really had silent anti-gravity triangles, and if people see those or have an experience with them I think it's wrong to say well given that one of the possibly interpretations is aliens therefore this evidence must be discounted in these people must be crazy. I'm not saying you're saying that but I think there's definitely an incorrect trend in that direction Something interesting about this stuff is that there's not perfect cover across all sensors always. Maybe sometimes you have people seeing something that's not on radar. Or you have something that's on radar but not on other types of sensor. Or you have something that's in the infrared but not in the visible. I'm not asking you to believe anyone interpretation just to be open and consistent I think that if you're willing to believe the sensors are malfunctioning and creating ghost tracks it's also reasonable to consider that the sensors are not capable of picking up some sorts of technology. I understand that depending on your pliers there's different takes have different probabilities to you but I don't think it's okay to rush to certainty and discount any of those interpretations and say that anyone who suggests as much or obvious for those is out and out crazy. that's offensive and abusive to people and not I think in the spirit of investigation and curiosity.
    - Swenrekcah 5y ago
      I never said people are crazy. And I don’t know about the examples you mentioned because I haven’t looked into it. My point is basically that explaining an anomaly by “visiting aliens” is quite a leap of faith. I also highly doubt that a credible sighting would not be picked up by the general scientific public. So given the immense vastness of space and the resulting difficulties in colonising it, I remain unconvinced.
      - graderjs 5y ago
        That's good to know, because I find that abusive, and disrespectful to people who are just trying to discuss things. But people on the "believer" side are no better. I'm sorry to seem to falsely accuse you of that, I really wasn't. I'm just sort of waxing in all directions to share my views, taking as a starting point the inspiration from people's comments here. It needed to be said, anyway :P ;) xx I agree with you that it's a leap of faith. I'm not asking you to make that leap. Seems you have an open mind. All I'm saying is all these experiencer testimonies I think means something is happening. I'm not sure if by picked up you mean "detected in their telescopes" or "the story picked up and discussed". Case 1 is I think unlikely unless there were sightings everywhere at once. But there have been multiple things seen in the sky over a number of places, like Mexico City, Phoenix, Belgium, etc, that got lots of press, and have videos and hundreds of witnesses. Case 2 I think is a result of stigma. For the same reason that, even tho > 50% of people believe in aliens and psychic abilities, you are not allowed to research into those things, and if you do, people will call you crazy. It's changing a bit now...but I agree with you on the vastness making it difficult. But I think it's arrogant to say, "Well, it looks difficult. Nah, can't be done." because that assumes that other civilizations would be unlikely to achieve more than us. I think the vastness of space and time, and our civilization's minuteness, is its own counter example to that take. It permits an alternate take which suggests there has to be somebody else out there, and they had plenty of time to do stuff. In terms of why there's no "open contact" I like to fall back on the Star Trek Prime Directive.

mensetmanusman 5y ago

I thought the reasonable approach was to believe in aliens (not here per se) due to the law of large numbers.

graderjs 5y ago
Yeah it's funny that we don't even have an agreement as to what the logical reasonable stance on this topic is. I think that's maybe an indication of how far out this topic is in terms of how far away it is from our human faculty of logic and understanding to be able to make sense of it. That alone I think is reason enough to just basically distrust a lot of things about this and keep an open mind.

graderjs 5y ago

I would agree with you if I accepted your framing of this. I think the framing is too narrow and doesn't do justice to the issue but within this frame your logical argument definitely makes sense. I'm sure you may object that your frame is simply a semantically equivalent restating of what I was saying. So I would counter that that's simply your interpretation. by the way I love your phrasing two equally unreasonable cults that's exactly what I think. the reason I think your framing is wrong is because there's not an equivalence, which I think you are assuming, between people's individual experience and people without that experience. So I'm not asking you to be a member of either of those unreasonable cults I'm not asking you to believe in aliens and I'm not asking you to believe that experiences fabricate their stories. I'm just asking you not to discount people's experiences and upon hearing those to keep an open mind.