Do you really think there is a single human being that reads HN and thinks "UFO" means 100% aliens? I sorta doubt anyone here needs such a reminder.

Ctrl-F, "If UFOs are real", someone actually wrote that in this comments section. Yes, the concept of objects that are in the air/flying and you can't identify what they are, is real, and that commenter was using the incorrect definition of UFO=aliens...

Yes, I think the reminder is helpful. In fact I saw a fella on HN argue that because some rocks on Mars looked a bit like faces, we should consider the alien possibility. (This was many months or years ago; HN becomes an orange blur after awhile, but it was surprising enough to stick in my memory.)

Edited to tone down the intro sentence a bit.

> In most cases, you can guess these are probably aircraft from other countries.

From the report: "We currently lack data to indicate any UAP are part of a foreign collection program or indicative of a major technological advancement by a potential adversary."

They also say: "We are conducting further analysis to determine if breakthrough technologies were demonstrated."

Basically, the summary of the report is that there are 10+ incidents that they cannot explain to what they believe is insufficient data, so please give them more money so they can collect and analyze more data to try and identify them.

> I am someone who thinks there likely is alien activity on earth

Can you elaborate on why you think this (or provide some additional detail)?

For example, do you mean "intelligent" life? Or is this more along the lines of panspermia?

Thank you.

No, I don't care to elaborate on my personal opinions about this topic. I only noted that because I habitually remind people on HN that UFO just stands for Unidentified Flying Object and the reason the US government is interested is for national security reasons.

I noted it just to suggest "If you are inferring that I am on your side in thinking only nutters believe in aliens you are wrong."

I have no desire to have that conversation here. Comments on this topic are consistently appallingly bad by HN standards and my only desire is to say "Keep it real people. This is not a government report on aliens. That's not what this is."

Having some views that are out of the mainstream, I sympathize that trying to have a good faith argument can be frustrating, but remember it’s generally bad actors and trolls who are most likely to downvote and reply to a post they think they can easily shame. There’s plenty of people who would appreciate a different perspective even if it’s mostly downvotes.

I recommend the excellent documentary “Behind the Curve” for a good look at what happens to people when their views are marginalized. They dig in and develop tunnel vision. The way the lab leak theory for COVID subtly shifted from conspiracy theory to real theory illustrates how important it is not to be dismissive.

Seconded! I’m one of them too.

(Thanks for posting some encouragement.)

I think if you threw out why you feel there is alien activity with a "not looking to debate it" that would be more interesting than saying you think people are going to argue with you. If you've stated reasoning in the past maybe just link to that?

I, for one, 100% believe that at least some of this is advanced, non-human tech.

Trying to convince HN about the "why" is at best problematic. I could give evidence from my own observations and experiences, but they would be easily dismissed due to lack of evidence.

I'll just say that we, as humans, do not fully understand how consciousness works. I'm certain that there are others in this galaxy who do, and I have personal experience to back that up. What percentage of HN is going to believe that I, for whatever reason, have come into contact with an advanced, non-human intelligence?

Spoiler: near zero. That's why I post about this topic on a burner account.

I mean, I’ll believe that something happened to you that has completely convinced you, and it’s a nice piece of data that helps explain why some people believe differently than I do. The goal of every discussion doesn’t have to be to convince the other person, just acknowledging the existence of differences is enough sometimes.

Was this a conscious contact? Would be interesting to read about this experience.

Since this is the HN crowd, I'll explain it this way: if you assume your brain is a biological machine, what if you could decipher its firmware and hack into it? What if you could remotely exploit it and take over its sensory inputs? It's hard to say if a contact is "conscious" or not because "they" seem to have the power to exploit and control it, to communicate by sending symbolic language and imagery.

Contact is difficult to explain to this crowd; when I turn the tables and imagine someone explaining their experience to me, it would sound like something indistinguishable from magic. Something so unbelievable that you would immediately discount it and look for alternate explanations, or question the person's sanity.

Thank you! But how do you know that your brain did not just make it up? How to distinguish between real and imaginary?

That is exactly the difficulty. I have a picture of an object in the sky (which I reported to MUFON) that occurred before this happened. But I have no evidence, other than the fact that other humans also witnessed the object, that it was real.

Wasn't trying to be confrontational. It just seemed like you might have a contrarian view that might be worth hearing.

I didn't think you were being confrontational. It's just not something I'm interested in discussing at this time.

I'm also not interested in a large number of people inferring I believe the opposite and then acting like I'm "lying" or "did an about face" on my opinion should I ever change my mind and decide I wish to discuss it.

People are really bad about making unfounded inferences no matter how carefully you talk about a thing and then hanging their baggage on you over what they imagined you believe when you never said anything about what you believe.

Government reports about unidentified aerial phenomena aren't motivated by a belief in aliens. Me reminding people of that fact is not motivated by a belief that "aliens don't exist."

Maybe "UFO" will stop getting used in titles and the new term UAP will get popular and these conversations will generally improve.

After I left my comment, the title was changed. That's a good thing and makes my reminder less pertinent. Maybe I will just stop leaving them entirely.

Actually, I really prefer the term UAP (Unexplained Aerial Phenomenon) over the term UFO (Unidentified Flying Object). Using the name object makes everybody assume that it is physical object, which may or may not be true.

Bill Nelson sorta said as much in this interview: https://www.cnn.com/videos/business/2021/06/04/ufo-nasa-navy...