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PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   2941 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for July 11, 2025

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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[comic sans]UAP DISCLOSURE UPDATES[/comic sans]

The mood in the UFO community has been rather dour lately due to a string of disappointments and setbacks, but Rep. Eric Burlison of Missouri dropped some promising indications this week that Congress has not forgotten about the topic and full disclosure may very well still be in the works:

"We're pursuing a hearing date. We've got a list of people that we're looking at. We're actually looking at potentially doing two. One with some people that are direct whistleblowers, who have had direct, and when I say direct, they had eyes directly on or have personally encountered UAP. In their formal operations."

"Not somebody out and about like Joe Blow out there that saw something. There's thousands and thousands of people like that. We're talking about people that worked for the Pentagon, worked in a government program, where they worked in and around this technology. Whether it was through crash retrieval, or through reverse engineering, that's what we're pursuing right now."

"The next hearing after that, once we're able to get information, we're looking at doing some interrogatories, which is where you take some of the things that have been said in these briefings, in these open hearings under oath. And then we send a formal letter as a committee, asking for answers from, whether it's Tulsi Gabbard, or whomever it is that we need to be asking these questions of. And then which would send up the potential second hearing, which would hopefully be able to clear people like Tulsi Gabbard to come forward."

"And I've been told she's very... friendly when it comes to this topic. That she wants disclosure. She wants to help bring about disclosure on this topic."

I want to believe, but also there are no aliens in the classical “beings from outer space” sense.

I rate this news 5 Nothings out of 5 Ever Happens.

You are correct that Comic Sans is the appropriate font for this.

Do you think there's no alien life anywhere, or do you just believe that it's implausible that it's a) intelligent and b) has the means and desire to get here?

Strongly B.

I have no stance one way or the other on whether there is intelligent life elsewhere in the universe. Sure, it’s a bit implausible that we’re the first, but also someone has to be so why not us? It’s just unknowable at the moment.

If there is intelligent life and it developed further away than Mars, I think it is impossible for it to have the means and desire to reach Earth, and then spend the last 80 to 8000 years apparently mostly focused on pranking us. They would have conquered us to work in the unobtanium mines, or coldly and amorally reshaped the planet to their liking, or just moved on, or something.

There's no reason there can't be life elsewhere, it's a big universe. Even intelligent life. Even intelligent life at, or above, our present level of technological advancement.

Where the big, improbable jump lies is from "aliens exist" to "aliens exist and visited/visit our planet".

I could imagine alien scientists examining specimens of humans; we do it with animals (see monitoringbirds) and with anthropologists turning up to bother the last 'undiscovered' tribes that won't immediately kill them. But that has to first get over the hurdle of "space is very big and there's no evidence they ever got here". I went through my Ancient Astronauts/von Daniken phase in my late teens/early twenties. All the 'look here is an Egyptian tomb painting of what can only be a circuit board with transistors!' is convincing - when transistors are cutting edge tech. Twenty years later, that's not convincing any more because now we've moved on and we'd expect aliens with spaceships to be even more advanced than we are, not using tech that's outdated within twenty to fifty years.

I don't believe in the advanced tech all the wishful thinking here engages in:

"We're talking about people that worked for the Pentagon, worked in a government program, where they worked in and around this technology. Whether it was through crash retrieval, or through reverse engineering, that's what we're pursuing right now."

What I'm starting to think is that UFO rumours were great propaganda during the Cold War. The USA is a global superpower but it's not the only one. Russia (and to a much lesser extent China) are there breathing down their necks. The USA had the atom bomb first, but they weren't able to remain sole possessors of the technology. Everyone is working to have the best, newest, most kaboomy big-kaboom! first.

What better way to muddy the waters than to let hints slip out about amazing new tech? Even better - Russia and China can console themselves "okay their scientists got there first but our guys are smart, too, and it's just a matter of some light spying and a lot of hard work to catch up or even pass them out", but how can they do that if the rumours about the tech are that it's not human, it comes from advanced alien civilisation that crash landed in the desert? How will you catch up then, unless you get an alien UFO of your own?

Yeah, they're not going to believe random "Joe Blow says he saw something in the sky" but if you have all the dedicated True Believers talking about secret bases? my cousin knows someone who knows someone who swears he saw bodies being carried away? here's a leaked report of a military pilot talking about the mysterious craft that shadowed them on this flight?

Now you've got them chasing shadows trying to catch something that doesn't exist in the first place. And again, if they do catch wind of anything advanced you really built using your own human scientists working hard, then that is just more bait for "and what about the stuff we're not seeing? what if they really have something even better under wraps?"

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