Alex_Krycek

I'm reading about these now, hadn't heard of them. Quote from the article: “All we can do is make it as safe as possible, and if they decide that they want to give up, then we will immediately direct them to addiction support services.” My proposal is slightly different. Addicts would be in a safe, supervised environment, however they would not have a choice if they want to keep using or get clean. Once they're in the camp, they would be on a mandatory detox program, where they would have access only to substances that help them reduce their dependency. Of course food, water, sanitation, etc is all provided. But it wouldn't be an optional program. I disagree. Those policies you're referencing were intended for the entire population. This plan is targeted at a small but very problematic subset of the population. I don't think most people would have a problem removing homeless drug addicts from their environment.

If you live in a big city in North America these days, you probably encounter homeless drug addicts on a regular basis. Cities like Seattle, Portland, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Vancouver are dealing with escalating crimes waves due to policies that are soft on crime and drug addiction. Addicts shoot up in broad daylight, leave their needles on the sidewalk in public areas, treat public spaces as their own personal toilet, and assault citizens in brutal stranger attacks. Stranger attacks are becoming increasingly prevalent, jumping 39% in Vancouver, with a probability that 1 in 4 Vancouverites will be victimized by such attacks. So far the corrective approach has been sorely lacking - one of tolerance and non-intervention, to allow the homeless addiction issue to propagate and expand across the urban areas that it afflicts. I believe that some cities are fast reaching a breaking point, and will need to take more meaningful action with respect to this problem. The most effective solution I can see for this crisis, since it has gotten so out of hand, is to remove homeless drug addicts from cities and place them in rural, government supervised camps. These camps would be in rural areas where proper supervision and medical treatment could be administered to those with addiction issues. The camps would be made up of large portable dwellings with bunk beds, AC/heating units, with fully working toilets and sanitation facilities. On site medical and security personnel would supervise the day to day operations of the camps, with detox and recovery programs offered to help the addicts get clean. An addict would not be able to leave the camp until they get clean. My view is that drug addiction is a disease, and consequently widespread drug addiction is a public health emergency. Those with a contagious disease that threatens the health and wellbeing of society should be quarantined. There is already legal precedent for placing citizens in camps if there is a declared public health emergency. Covid quarantine camps are one example. I think there is a strong argument that the homeless addiction problem in major cities presents a public health emergency, regarding both the addicts and members of the public themselves. Is it really responsible and humane to let addicts kill themselves via drugs with no intervention or treatment? It is responsible or humane to the general public to let addicts leave diseased needles and human waste on public streets, or attack strangers in broad daylight? From a logistical and operational standpoint, government camps would be much cheaper than building bricks and mortar homeless shelters in downtown areas, which could be reserved for those who do not have addiction issues. The housing facilities in the camps would be cost effective to establish, and since they are on rural government land, the costs could be kept low. They would be scalable and portable; easy to establish, move, or expand. Homeless addicts would be transported in buses to the camps after a clearing operation of homeless affected areas is carried out by police. Ultimately the homeless addiction problem (which I believe is a disease) needs a concerted, government mandated solution, and shouldn't be allowed to escalate further, due to the threat to the health and safety of the public.

If you're referring to UAPs, they have been. There's a lot of photographic evidence of UAPs.

So, all the King’s Horses and all the King’s Men and all the King’s cameras and electronic recording devices could not document anything paranormal occurring at the Skinwalker Ranch, in spite of scientists spending several years onsite trying to do so. NIDS never did document anything much happening anywhere, so Bigelow shut down NIDS in 2004. In 2016 he sold the ranch to Adamantium Real Estate, LLC, whose once-anonymous owner has just revealed himself to be Brandon Fugal, a wealthy real estate investor from Salt Lake City. Fugal had previously been involved in weird science projects, like “an attempt to create a gravitational reduction device that could produce clean energy”. (....) Not only was the yearslong monitoring of “Skinwalker” by NIDS unable to obtain proof of anything unusual happening, but the people who owned the property prior to the Shermans, a family whose members lived there 60 years, deny that any mysterious “phenomena” of any kind occurred there. The parsimonious explanation is that the supernatural claims about the ranch were made up by the Sherman family prior to selling it to the gullible Bigelow. Many of the really bizarre alleged incidents described in Hunt for the Skinwalker were witnessed only by Terry Sherman, who stayed on the ranch as a caretaker after it was sold to Bigelow. This isn't an accurate report of what has happened at Skinwaker Ranch. The History channel investigators have filmed UAPs emerging from, and disappearing into a fixed area of the property above a cliff (mesa). Terry Sherman, the previous owner before Robert Bigelow, reported seeing a UAP emerge from the same area at night, however on the other side of the opening there was daylight and a clear blue sky. Sherman also reported luminescent glowing orbs floating around the property that attacked his livestock and pets, as well as many other bizarre events. Regarding the NIDS team, they are on record about witnessesing the same type of phenomena. @Moontanman Suggest you watch a few episodes because all this phenomena is captured on camera during the show. Too many paranormal events to name - truly a mysterious place.

How much of SWR have you watched? I didn't find it to be a fiasco at all. Erik Bard and Travis S. Taylor are legit scientists running experiments to gather data and observe the phenomena at is occurs. The theory about the "portal" or wormhole on the property seems to be the best explanation of the phenomena that is manifesting, especially considering the UAPs they have filmed seeming to enter and leaving said portal. As for their purpose being financially driven, Brandon Fugal, the current owner of the ranch, is already a multi-millionaire commercial real estate investor. I doubt he's trying to scam his way to his next million via a public TV show. On the contrary, everyone on that team seems 100% genuinely interested in investigating the unexplained events that occur there. Also highly recommend the book Hunt for the Skinwalker, by George Knapp, if you want to do a deep dive on whats occurred there. The book documents the experiences of the previous owners of the ranch: the Shermans and also Robert Bigelow of Bigelow Aerospace, and the NIDS (National Institute of Discover Science) team he had working out there. Fascinating book.

What "major points" are you referring to? I thought I responded to your main argument already with my counter points. The points I received from your argument are: the eye witnesses can't be trusted because they're either stupid or lying (for financial reasons) the creator of the documentary or any material on UFOs is an opportunistic huckster merely out for financial gain Brian Dunning has the real facts on what happened eye witness testimony isn't real evidence (due in large part to point number 1) What did I miss? (genuine question)

In the Varginha case contact was unintentional. The craft was either shot down or crashed. The beings that were sighted were attempting to evade capture, not interact with the townspeople. Intriguingly, one of the military policeman who allegedly captured one of the creatures died from an unknown infection 2 weeks later. The doctor who treated him was interviewed in MOC. What you'd expect if your immune system came into contact with an extraterrestrial bacteria. As for other encounters where there was seemingly intentional interaction: the Ariel School landing, the Greater Barrington abductions, Betty and Barney hill, etc. Probably some attempt at either communication or closer study of our species, for the same reason human scientists occasionally lift an animal out of its natural habitat. Could be they're slowly making themselves known, so as not to cause panic amongst us paranoid apes. Slowly pulling back the curtain until the new reality is entrenched. With the Ariel school case I think that was an attempt to communicate via the culture, letting the story of the encounter filter down through the years, gaining greater and greater credibility. Of all the cases that has the potential to tip the scales in terms of convincing the general public about the veracity of their existence, the Ariel School would be it. If the secondary and tertiary effects of that encounter were indeed orchestrated, then we're dealing with a being of formidably high intelligence.

I think they're interested in the planet, not us. We're part of the scenery - a nuisance for the most part. As for playing hide and seek, the dark forest theory is a logical answer why they'd want to stay quiet. Human beings are quite dangerous, even normal ones who aren't armed to the teeth.

Let’s set some conditions. We’re estimating the probability that an intelligent life form in the universe has: achieved interspecies sustainability (i.e. they’ve moved past, or never encountered, the challenge of blowing themselves up exists at the same time as humanity has solved the distance problem by harnessing a physical principle that human beings have yet to actualize. Using this physical principle and the technology built upon it, they are able to traverse the galaxy efficiently. By efficiently, I mean physical distance is basically irrelevant to them. They have understood how to manipulate spacetime in such a way as to go where they want, when they please. So in other words this species is a type 3 (galactic civilization) as defined by people like Michio Kaku. For the sake of this thought experiment we can apply the extremely conservative percentage of .000001% that these three conditions would be met in a particular dataset. I think the odds are much higher than this, but for the sake of argument let’s say there’s only a .000001% chance of these conditions arising. So based, on .000001%: The SETI Institute estimates that there are 300,000,000 habitable planets in the Milky Way. Of these, if we assume that .000001% of these planets has produced the species fulfilling the conditions above, there would be 3 species within the Milky way that are capable of visiting Earth. If we move beyond the Milky Way, the odds are even more favorable. Mario Livio, an astrophysicist at the Space Telescope Science Institute estimates there could be between 100 billion and 200 billion galaxies in the universe. Let’s assume 100 billion galaxies. 100 billion galaxies multiplied by 300 million habitable planets in each galaxy is 3e19. With a .000001% chance of meeting the 3 conditions stated above (remember this species has solved the distance problem), there would be thousands of species capable of reaching Earth. With 3,000,000,000,000,000,000 (3e19) planets capable of supporting life in the Universe, it's highly possible at least 1 of those has met the three conditions stated above, if not more.

Does "scientific rigor" mean concocting self serving alternative explanations, rather than giving credence to the actual eye witness reports of people who were there? Did Dunning visit Varginha or otherwise corroborate his theory with people who actually claim it was Mudhinho or whatever else he is positing? If not, that doesn't sound very rigorous to me; it sounds more like confirmation bias - i.e. "I'll fabricate whatever convenient explanation I can to fit these unusual events into my narrative." If you start out with a conclusion that something must be false, and then ignore anything to the contrary, that isn't a scientific approach. No, I'm not trolling. Kind of insulting that you would insinuate that but I'll let it go. There have been too many credible reports lately to dismiss these events. In my view they have to be taken seriously at this point. You seem to fundamentally believe that the possibility of aliens visiting Earth is nonsense, that anyone reporting such events is engaged in "hucksterism", and people who give credence to them are either gullible or trolls. You've said as much in your previous posts. As established I have a different outlook - I think the odds of visitation by an intelligent extraterrestrial species are incredibly high given the number of habitable planets and the age of our universe. I don't see alien visitations as abnormal - it was always only a matter of time. Further - the denial of the probability of aliens is actually very dangerous for our species, but that's another topic. This is how you choose to frame it: "all of the witnesses of the Varginha incident are deluded idiots who have been caught up in mass hysteria, or are making up this story to attract tourists to make money." Then you ridicule it further by comparing it to giants and Paul Bunyan - again because your anchoring belief is that this must all be nonsense. Sure, when you frame it like that, it doesn't sound very authentic. But you have to establish first that those witnesses really are deluded or self serving opportunists before your theory has any weight. When you have this many credible witnesses who have no interest in lying, who corroborate each other in a logical way despite not knowing one another, taken with all of the other cases (such as the Ariel School and many, many others), combined with the statistical inevitability that intelligent beings will eventually visit Earth, such information should be taken seriously and not dismissed, that's all I'm saying.

On the other hand, in legal circles, our society places enough trust in eye witness testimony to allow the rendering of a verdict capable of either exonerating or convicting those accused of a crime, however serious it may be. Eyewitness testimony cannot and should not be so casually dismissed. In the Varginha case we have physicians, former soldiers, those from the local news media, as well as normal citizens who all reported experiencing something unexplainable that day. I for one find it compelling; those like TheVat do not. We can each cast our own votes as to the veracity of such an event, ideally after taking all the evidence from both sides into consideration.

Yet you didn't post your source. Interesting how you have a convenient explanation for everything at the ready. Perhaps you should do more than just a "cursory search" when looking into matters such as this. I find it equally laughable how you find yourself unable to objectively consider this event as it is reported by the actual eye witnesses. I wonder why that is. And yes, I'm sure the town makes millions off of that UFO museum. Right back at you. Don't allow your confirmation bias and self-ordained skepticism to get in the way of objective observation. And it's not a youtube video, it's a feature length documentary; one that you won't watch, of course, because you already know you're correct.

As Mudinho did live there, and that was his typical behavior, then for the young women to have seen a space creature there would have to have been two such beings — the known one, Mudinho, and the hypothetical one, an alien — but as they reported only one skinny humanoid crouching in the mud, and not two, we are left with no rational support for there having been any beings present other than Mudinho. Today, the three women do still give interviews about their experience. There is one very important detail that has changed since their original story: Today, they say they knew Mudinho well, and had even given him cigarettes in the past; so of course they would not have mistaken him for an alien. However, in their original reports from 1996, they said they didn't know him, and took him for a devil when they saw him. It's one more example of stories changing and growing to fit a changing and growing narrative that gains mass traction in pop culture. Everyone wants to be in on it, and everyone wants to be seen as credible and correct. I agree with @Moontanman that there is a body of cases that do appear to represent truly anomalous and unexplained aerial events, and these may at some point turn out to be some fascinating atmospheric phenomenon that expands our view of things. They should not be dismissed, and should be studied. But these Stanton Friedman generated narratives are mostly self-promoting flapdoodle and just piss poor science. As Dunning notes: Friedman's whole career, in fact, consisted of compiling bits and pieces of poor-quality evidence, mainly unverified eyewitness testimony usually taken years or decades after an event; and then composing an original alien visitation story that incorporates all those bits and is presented as the factual account of what happened. He's best known as the original author of the Roswell mythology, in which he worked with a retired mortician named Glenn Dennis. In 1989 — more than four decades after the 1947 Roswell crash was alleged to have happened — Friedman carefully wove together a string of snippets of Dennis' assorted memories of having worked in that town, and created the story we know today of a spaceship crash and small alien bodies being recovered. It was published in 1991, the first time that story even existed. Friedman couldn't have cared less that the things Dennis thought he remembered actually took place over a span of twelve years and had nothing to do with each other; his goal was to craft an original UFO narrative. That was Friedman's thing. That was what he did professionally... Would Mudinho have necessitated the Brazilian military arriving to Varginha en masse, blocking off roads and pointing rifles at people? I don't think so. Also, I think three teenage girls are able to discern the difference between a human and non-human creature in broad daylight at 3:00 pm.

What I like about Fox's approach is how thorough his investigations are. So for example he will find the original news interviews of the eye-witnesses from 1996, and then locate that exact same witnesses for his documentary in 2022. Their stories haven't changed. Nor are they seeking publicity or fame; quite the contrary. Many witnesses in MOC did not want their identity revealed, due to the inevitable mockery and derision that is so often directed towards people who dare to speak of encounters with aliens. For example, the three girls, who saw the being in 1996, and then came forward again for MOC, were the brunt of years of such ostracism. Regarding the veracity of the witnesses, the argument from so called skeptics seems to be: "If it's just one person, the witness isn't trustworthy, because that person is obviously a lying opportunist. If dozens of people who don't know each other come forward and report the same thing, it's mass hysteria or the result of gossip." The latter argument is a bit far-fetched. For me there have been too many credible witnesses, not only with this case but with numerous other cases, involving people who have no interest in lying, or fabricating stories, or tarnishing their own professional reputations. Finally there's the view that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, but should alien visitations really be considered "extraordinary"? Such a dialogue would loop back into a conversation about the Fermi Paradox, but ultimately I don't think such visitations are really extraordinary, given the nature of our universe. It's only extraordinary within the confines of a very narrow minded, anthropocentric perspective of the universe.

@Moontanman Did you get a chance to watch James Fox's latest documentary? Since you enjoyed Phenomenon, you might like this one also: Moment of Contact (2022). It investigates a case in Varginha, Brazil that happened in 1996, where a tic-tac shaped UFO was shot down (or crashed) on the outskirts of the city, and two living bipedal creatures of an unidentifiable species were sighted by the residents of Varginha hours later. Attached a clip from youtube where one of the witnesses, who was in the Brazilian army at the time, shares his story.

I mean, balloons have been used to infiltrate US airspace as far back as WW2 when the Japanese floated them over. So not exactly a novel tactic.

Could be the case. The cat got out of the bag.

I find it interesting what the US military chooses to show to the general public, and what it chooses not to show. First, we have the incident with the Chinese spy balloon. The spy balloon got significant press coverage: it was tracked flying across the continental US, there was the big debate about whether to shoot it down or not, we had photos of the US Navy recovering it off the coast near Myrtle Beach, SC, the FBI assembling the evidence in a warehouse. You name it - we were shown it. It's been made into a big spectacle and all have been invited to come and see. Now, this Chinese spy balloon could just have easily been kept quiet and classified. There are numerous other incidents of surveillance by foreign adversaries that occur on a regular basis which are not publicized. Why was the public given such a show with this one? The result of all his sensational publicity is that a clear and vivid perception has been created in the minds of the American public about what it is the US Military shoots down when it comes to unknown objects. The idea that these objects are Chinese balloons, adversarial surveillance craft of some kind, has really been hammered home these last few days in terms of imagery, narratives, press coverage, etc. Attention, time, and energy in spades. There is now an anchoring point that the public can revert back to when confronted with future unknowns. Then we have the Alaska object. From what's been described it's markedly different in terms of its size, shape, appearance, and flight characteristics. The US gov also won't attribute it to any country, as they so quickly did with the Chinese balloon. In all of the press coverage I've read about the Alaska object, the Chinese spy balloon story is woven into the same article. I haven't seen a single article about the Alaska object that hasn't in some way referenced the Chinese spy balloon story. It's a tactic of misdirection, the old conjurer's trick - where the idea or perception that you want someone to conclude is the fact is linked, or connected, with an objectively unknown situation. Those without strong critical thinking skills will subconsciously link what you have referenced from the past as the factual explanation for the new unknown scenario. In this case the American public will conclude that the Alaska object is the same as the Chinese Spy balloon; they won't give it a second thought. Meanwhile, whatever was shot down over Alaska can be quietly collected with little publicity or fanfare. I suspect that any future reports of objects being shot down or unknown aerial objects in general will be linked with the Chinese spy balloon story also, since that narrative has been effectively anchored already.

And no photos will emerge of this incident whatsoever. Interesting.

The Alaska object is described to be significantly smaller than the Chinese spy balloon with an elongated "tic tac" oval shape, and cannot be attributed to any country. Unlike recent days, I doubt we'll be seeing images of the Alaska object's debris broadcast all over the media...

True, but greed and selfishness by violent groups of people are omnipresent anyway in human society. The early middle ages, which was without question one of the worst times to be alive on this planet, was governed by such a power structure. I'm not entirely optimistic that such a tribalistic order wouldn't re-emerge should the world balkanize itself down into disparate, isolated societies again. What factors would prevent a regression to the dark ages of petty tribalism?

Russia seems to be making baby steps even with their mobilized forces. Then they get pushed back. Only so many times they can do that before they run out of soldiers. They need some sweeping, decisive gains pretty fast I think.

Then why hasn't it worked for Russia this far?

Yeah, "throwing bodies" at the problem may have worked during WW2, but warfare has changed quite a bit since then. Sending wave upon wave of troops makes no difference in the face of superior weaponry, positioning, tactics, etc.

Yes, and the point that many seem to be missing is that we take the myriad benefits of globalization for granted. None of us have any first hand experience living in a non-globalized system. As you point out, it's the interconnectedness of globalization, the ease with which goods flow between nations over long distances that affords us everything from sophisticated technology to food security to rising income levels and access to higher standards of living. Regarding food security, it's scary to understand just how fragile many countries are in the world when it comes to basic nutrition and sustenance. Vast swaths of Africa and middle east are net importers of food. The slightest disruption to global supply chains or shortages in commodities like wheat or rice cause widespread famine in these regions. Food insecurity was one of the trigger points of the Arab Spring uprising back in 2010. Turns out when people can't eat, they get pretty angry. This report from UNICEF has some good data on the current state of food security: https://www.unicef.org/media/72676/file/SOFI-2020-full-report.pdf What will happen to these countries when they get hit with the 1-2 knock out punch of climate change (which already exacerbates food security) and supply chain disruptions due to collapsing populations? Unless countries that are net importers of food rapidly, rapidly undergo revolutions in sustainable food production, they're toast. As a side note, most of the world's phosphorous for use in fertilizer comes from Russia and Ukraine, the flow of which has been severely disrupted due to the war. We've mentioned here how technology will come to the rescue in the form of robots, renewable energy, etc. We should acknowledge that advanced technology is massively energy intensive to produce, and can only be done with relative ease in a globalized system. If we want a global "green transition", this will require a globalized system to facilitate. Zeihan points out here how much energy it takes to create a product such as a lithium battery, or solar panel, or electric vehicle. Most of the world's steel for example comes from China and Russia, the two countries which are disintegrating fastest in terms of demography. Finally there is the argument that once the global system breaks in several key places it will be increasingly difficult to fight the avalanche of entropy that will follow. When critical infrastructure goes offline and there's nobody there to fix it, it's gone for good. Without an ability to produce advanced technology to save the day, the lights go out and stay out. Without an ability to make enough food to feed everyone, people begin to starve and then fight for what's left. Anarchy ensues. Then we're back to the stone age rather quickly indeed. But that's the pessimistic view. I'm sure we'll adapt, somehow. Hopefully... His latest book is worthwhile even if just to understand how technology has lifted humanity out of pure misery and suffering, and just how excrutiatingly long that process took. Most human decisions have been driven by pure practicality - how to move something in a way that doesn't use up too much energy (enter deep water navigation), how to stop the neighboring tribe from coming and killing everyone, how to get enough to eat, etc. For practically all of human history, more people meant a better life. More hands on the farm, more soldiers in your army, more workers in your factory, more consumers for your products. Now we're diverging from that trend in unprecedented fashion with no real understanding of what will come next.