Time For An Upgrade

[poliphilo]

Planes fly over the farm occasionally now- and not continuously as they did before covid. Will we ever go back to how things were? I hope not.

Planes are old technology. Primitive. Polluting. We can do better.

I'm all but certain the military have UFO technology in their possession- retro-engineered from crashed saucers or even gifted by ETs. It's very smart, fast, non-polluting. This has been the case since at least the 1940s- and they're sitting on it like dogs in a manger.

Comments

[conuly]

Where is your evidence for your first claim (that the military has this advanced technology) or your second (that, because it's advanced tech, it's both fast and non-polluting)? If you haven't seen it, how can you know that it's emissions free?

[poliphilo]

The evidence for the military having this technology comes from many sources, including- increasingly- official ones. Also there have been whistle-blowers- some of them high-ranking. For instance, Lt Col Philip Corso- who was involved in the reverse-engineering of materials from the Roswell crash.

We know UFOs are fast because they've been clocked by pilots and ground-based radar. I'll concede that the claim that they're emissions-free is a guess.

[conuly]

So the military has this exceedingly advanced tech, which could only serve to enhance US strong and soft power worldwide, and none of these whistleblowers have bothered to smuggle out schematics or prototypes to share with the public, and... wait, does the government know about this? Which legislators and presidents? Any cabinet members?

[poliphilo]

I agree- the secrecy doesn't altogether make sense. I think its a hangover from the Cold War.

But then, consider the effect of full disclosure. Imagine the impact on society as it was in the 1950s of the information that ETs exist, that they have technology that makes ours look primitive- and that they're neither Catholics nor Protestants nor even Muslims. What would the Pope have said? How would Billy Graham have handled it?

Again, secrecy breeds secrecy. Once you've decided to keep this paradigm-shaking information to yourself, how and when exactly do you break it to the public that you've been lying to them for decades?

The whistleblowers have had to be careful. Smuggling stuff out of- say- Area 51- isn't going to be easy. Besides which, anyone in the know will be oath-bound and well aware of the penalties they'll pay if they do much more than drop hints.

It's my impression that the people who run the secret programmes regard democratically elected politicians as unreliable fly-by-nights- and therefore keep them out of the loop. I saw Obama interviewed about UFOs recently. The interviewer challenged him over something he'd said in office about government knowing nothing about ETs and he replied "That's what they tell us to say." He said it with a laugh but I don't think he was joking.

[conuly]

So you're suggesting that the whistleblowers are in more danger if they successfully smuggle out designs or prototypes and then have full public proof than if they just say things?

If they're in so much danger, why say things at all? Why drop vague hints that could mean any number of things?

How many people do you think have access to this information? Just a rough guess.

Edit: And for that matter, why reverse-engineer this tech if you don't intend to use it? Everybody working on the project is another person to intimidate into silence, after all. It seems risky. Do you really think that they could keep all these people quiet, no matter how many they are, for 70 years? You've got people working there now who have no recollection of the Cold War, certainly. Which makes telling easier than keeping the secret - "Mistakes were made, 70 years ago, and none of us here today were responsible for those mistakes, so you can't blame us now for setting the record straight".

[poliphilo]

A few guarded remarks can be overlooked, laughed away. A blueprint not so much.

The whistleblowers are mostly old men- retired and no longer in the swim. They're going to die soon anyway; so what does it matter to them if its emphysema that gets them or the CIA?

But, there are signs that the authorities are beginning to release information of their own accord- dribble, dribble, dribble. Some of the old men may be speaking with permission. One of the guys who recently dropped a hint or two was the former head of the Israeli Space Directorate, Haim Eshed. You might want to google what he said. It's eyebrow raising stuff.

How many people have access? Not so very many. An engineer working for Lockheed (say) who is given a piece of kit and told to make something similar doesn't need to know where it came from. They might very well assume it was Russian or Chinese.

And who's to say they're not using the tech? UFOs are spotted on a regular basis; some of them may be "ours". Besides if it's really advanced they'll be using it off-world.

[conuly]

The whistleblowers are mostly old men- retired and no longer in the swim. They're going to die soon anyway; so what does it matter to them if its emphysema that gets them or the CIA?

You think the CIA, having worked so hard for 70 years, would scruple about going after their loved ones instead?

How many people have access? Not so very many. An engineer working for Lockheed (say) who is given a piece of kit and told to make something similar doesn't need to know where it came from. They might very well assume it was Russian or Chinese.

If this tech is so advanced, how could they think it was Russian or Chinese?

[poliphilo]

Question 1: Of course there's always that danger- and it's why the old blokes are mostly still careful about what they say.

Question 2: Because they're only looking at a part of a whole. They don't know that the piece of tech they've got on the bench is an element of an advanced propulsion system. And, again, because, like you, most people refuse to believe in ETs- and will grasp at any other explanation no matter how far-fetched.

[conuly]

How can "part of an advanced propulsion system" not be as advanced as the rest? Or useful to look at if it isn't?

How is your hypothesis - "totally aliens!" - falsifiable? What evidence would make you reconsider that viewpoint? You're failing on that front. You say that people "refuse to believe in ETs", but it doesn't look like there's anything that will make you reconsider your viewpoint at all.

I can tell you what would make me believe, not in ETs (because it seems probable that there is, indeed, life elsewhere), but in viable travel between the stars - seeing it happen or, at the very least, seeing anything that doesn't have another explanation, because almost any other explanation is less far-fetched than "relativity is totally wrong, and btw, it turns out that a lot of people can keep a secret really well". In my experience, large groups of people are crap at keeping secrets, and I just don't think that the US military is any real exception to that rule. Not a secret like this.

Occam's razor applies here. The simplest explanation for the total lack of verifiable data about alien visits is that there simply isn't any.

[poliphilo]

Not a big fan of Occam's razor. As Donald Rumsfeld taught us, there are unknown unknowns.

But we're not going to agree about this, are we?

[conuly]

I don't think so, but I'll make one more effort - it's not just the DoD that would have to keep this secret for 70 years, but the aliens. And why should they do that? What could the USA possibly have to offer them?

[poliphilo]

You're not going to like this.

The aliens created us- thousands of years ago- by genetically modifying a pre-existing apeman- In a sense they're our parents. And we're their children and also- in the nicest possible way- something of an experiment. They want us to live long and prosper. They'd like to come clean and show themselves- but they don't think we're quite ready yet.

I said you wouldn't like it.

[conuly]

Humans have been around for tens of thousands of years. You're suggesting that these aliens have not undergone significant cultural change in all that time? Why should current ones feel beholden to their distant ancestors? I don't feel distant to mine even two or three generations back!

And even if they are, why, having decided we're not ready on some arbitrary grounds, would they then buddy up with the US military?

And again, where's the evidence? And how is your hypothesis falsifiable?

[poliphilo]

Why are we arguing? I'm not going to convert you. You're not going to convert me. Let's agree to differ on this one....