Let me guess. You're going to leave BAUT yet again?

Not necessarily. You tought me a lot and I appreciate it. Learned to seperate speculation from what is provable by physical proof. Also learned there is nothing wrong with applying logic and skeptical thought to speculation. Had to get past my knee jerk reactions and ask myself some hard questions. And that only physical proof moves it from speculation to fact.

Maybe you learned something as well.

However now that I have found a speculation that pretty much covers the bases there is not a lot more to say is there. Months ago when I started this study I assumed ET a given. Now assume it as an unproven speculation till found otherwise. Not sure I could have grasped all the implications had I not made that important distinction.

I am not even sure he can pay attention to the discussion anymore. He posts a link to a "Classic" UFO case and I discover that the film is not what it is presented to be. Since his "classic UFO" is exposed to be potentially false, he ignores it. Now he goes into some vague incoherent rambling. Darned if I can understand his point. This is like fighting the hydra. Chop a head off and two more spring in its place. Anybody have a torch?

You sound like you're coming unwrapped lately.

LOL Who says I was ever sane to begin with? Actually I think it pretty sane to place speculation and truths in seperate boxes.

Et is speculation. Glast and CERN are truths. Do you find that grounded enough?

That makes more sense to me than anything Bart has been saying lately. Just don't get him going on elves, please. No offense intended Bart. I think you are probably a great guy and I am cetainly in no position to talk down to anyone, but frankly, you lost me a long time ago and it is blatently clear to me that your respondents have shown a consistent level of patience and good will beyond anything I thought possible. Take a step back and consider the possibility that you may have some unreasonable expectations here. I do not understand why you persist in this failed line of reasoning and logic. You make me dizzy--(dizzier maybe?)--joe

It is not wrong.

So when you dismiss our unwillingness to buy your speculation, calling our objections "standard debunking methods," that's just hogwash on your part?

The dough ball is really getting a workout tonight.

Even in speculation one has to adopt some logic and skepticism. So conclude that this speculative ET fits the model of a user.

But to identify it as a workable conclusion on that basis alone is blatantly circular reasoning. So much for logic.

It would be remiss of our defense industry to not consider the implications of such an application of technology. Have to assume they are bright.

They are bright but not delusional.

Sorry, at this point you're just yanking chains.

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"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base

Had to get past my knee jerk reactions and ask myself some hard questions.

Sorry, heard it all before from you. You keep flip-flopping between semi-rational and mostly-foaming. Please choose a persona and stick with it.

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"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base

The new ET.

http://video.aol.com/video/tv-the-hasty-hare/1813945

They are bright but not delusional.

So you consider it delusional to consider a brain capable of controlling a machine? There is now research going on to use thought control of a microchip to bypass nerve damage.

The hand is a machine.

This thread is beginning to resemble a bad episode of the "Adams Family". Something like a family reunion featuring my in-laws! Truth stranger than fiction. What are the chances that you would bring up "hydra" in an astronomy forum within whispering distance of a guy who used to work in a research lab that tried to mass produce them under controlled conditions!!??! We raised them in various treated solutions that were meant to replicate their natural environment. The 70's had a bit of everything huh? Go figure--joe

So you consider it delusional to consider a brain capable of controlling a machine?

No, I consider it delusional that your notion of space aliens has anything to do with this.

And I'm sick of you putting words in my mouth. Stop it.

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"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base

No, I consider it delusional that your notion of space aliens has anything to do with this.

My notion of space aliens is that they are pure speculation. As such I would assume that any technology such beings might possess would be within the bounds of known physical laws carried to a logical conclusion of longer research time.

It is their ethics that come to be questioned. Chimps and gorillas are pretty smart. Look at Cooco, who learned sign language. History records that we have been rather unkind to their species.

I think the potential of human machine interface would be of keen interest to defense, irregardless of source.

We can assume ET does not exist. However speculation as to capability would amount to speculation of our own abilities in say a thousand or a million years. Technology increases at an exponential rate. The tools to make the tools kind of thing.

The more I come to realize this the more I see that proof of ET being here or not being here has little relevence. It is not of much importance to me now. As soon as we leave our planet we are ET.

It seems bart5050's posts are becoming more unintelligible over time. I'd reply to them but it's hard to tell exactly what they mean, due to diffuse structure and internal/external (i.e. post-to-post) contradictions.

This has a ring of familiarity to it, as in "Haven't I read a series of posts like this, say, not too long ago?"



But the end result is it's really getting tiresome.

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So Bart, are you just saying whatever pops into your head? Is there some coherence waiting in the wings, or should I just let the train wreck continue?

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"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base

So Bart, are you just saying whatever pops into your head? Is there some coherence waiting in the wings, or should I just let the train wreck continue?

I don't think you have much control over my train.

Do you find speculation of our own future technologies and how that might compare to some other civilization uncomfortable?

Someone was posing to me on another post that ET was our future selves stepping back in time. I pointed out that rate of progression through time is a variable as proven by relativity, but the universe dictates that it must have a positive value. Discontinuity and conservation of energy.

This gives the possibility for sleight of hand tricks in the now, but eliminates changing history.

Frame of reference I find to be very relevent here as well.

Why? You haven't accepted any limits on your speculation so far, why wouldn't you consider time travel?

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I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?

Disclaimer: Avatar is not an official NASA image and does not imply any specific interplanetary or interstellar capability.

The Leif Ericson Cruiser

Why? You haven't accepted any limits on your speculation so far, why wouldn't you consider time travel?

Because there is one limit. Speculation must remain within the physical laws of the universe or it ceases to be a speculation and becomes fantasy. I might describe my possible train wreck in detail though it has not occured, it still could. If I describe the train becoming a winged whale and flying away it becomes fantasy.

Consider that you are right now traveling in time. Change your rate of progression and you may travel slower or faster, but you still travel, and it is a one way trip. If I managed to slow my rate of progression through time to a fraction of yours, for a few seconds, I might move from here to there and the motion would be a blur to you. You would ask how I managed to get from here to there without generating a sonic boom.

I also no longer care about looking for proof of ET. Arguing the merits of a particular sighting is irrelevent because it still remains proof of nothing. Until ET moves into my neighborhood and starts borrowing cups of suger it will remain so.

Supercool a magnet and it will float above another magnet until it warms. A very few decades ago it would be magic to you. Isn't science wonderful.

As to a speculation of ET farming us and crying out in horror of the vision. Recently people were arrested for trafficking in stolen human organs. And that is mild compared to what we are capable of. For a few dollars we heap more terror on ourselves than any hypothetical ET could imagine.

I always wondered if Brownian motion could be reproduced in prose. Now I know it is possible.

Sorry, Mr. Joyce.

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Do you find speculation of our own future technologies and how that might compare to some other civilization uncomfortable?

No. Do you find facts uncomfortable?

__________________
"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base

Hey guys this object in sky and I do not what is bert please tell me what its.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7pYgtnKi9o

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If it's just us, it seems like an awful waste of space.
Contact Carl Sagan

http://davidsuniverse.wordpress.com/

(Still unanswered despite 4 reminders. My point about evading now well established.)

Ignoring questions that make you uncomfortable eh? Since you refuse to answer we can only conclude that you are indeed baffled by the responses you get. If you don't understand an answer, just say so, and you'll get an explanation. Don't complain later that the answers were too difficult.

Brownian, indeed. *tips hat*

__________________
"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge" -- Charles Darwin
"Your right to hold an opinion is not being contested. Your expectation that it be taken seriously is." -- Jason Thompson
Meet the OOONG TOE.

He deftly justifies answering questions by saying there is no proof.

Suddenly, in the present incarnation, is no longer interested in proof of ET (sour grapes...) and stalwart defender of science (against time travel).

He speaks of a speculation covering all bases (a potpourri of internet items patched together: alien abductions, traffic in human organs, advances in man-machine interfaces, etc.).

There is no longer any substance to discuss, just incoherent ramblings founded on shifting sands.

Getting involved in a discussion here is to share the fate of Brer Rabbit...

(or is he just pulling our legs??? )

Ain't Poe's Law a ... pain?

__________________
"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge" -- Charles Darwin
"Your right to hold an opinion is not being contested. Your expectation that it be taken seriously is." -- Jason Thompson
Meet the OOONG TOE.

Oh, that's quite good. Excellent description.

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Olsen the moderator.

Why the use of the word 'baffle'?
Because I found it appropriate.

advances in man-machine interfaces, etc.

You use man machine interface in virtually all that you do. It is the level of sophistication of such that advances with technology.

Thus we see why baffle is appropriate. Science and technology are real until there is the slightest possibility they might be connected to any but human civilization. Then they become fantasy and brownian motion. Avoidance of alien at all costs.

You elevate skepticism to the level of religion. Faith requires no proof and demands absolute obedience. Now I finally understand the level of your devotion. It is a subject on which your science fails and blind faith takes over.

Zenophobia

Hilarious. The irony is so deadly here that it should be classified as a WMD.

__________________
"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge" -- Charles Darwin
"Your right to hold an opinion is not being contested. Your expectation that it be taken seriously is." -- Jason Thompson
Meet the OOONG TOE.

Well, what you describe is a 'classic UFO case' as far as Ican see.

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Avoidance of alien at all costs.

No, simply the avoidance of mixing fact and fantasy on the same footing.

You elevate skepticism to the level of religion. Faith requires no proof and demands absolute obedience.

Which is exactly the opposite of skepticism. The problem is that you want to sneak in as proof other things like speculation that simply aren't. You have no idea what proof entails.

Now I finally understand the level of your devotion. It is a subject on which your science fails and blind faith takes over.

Science doesn't "fail" on the question of UFOs. There's simply not enough information to make a reasoned judgement, and that's the way the UFO enthusiasts prefer it. Where information fails, science rightly declines to conclude -- your feeble straw men to the contrary. But where information is scant, UFO nuts have no end of speculation, fantasy, and "can only be."

Zenophobia

Did you miss the part where almost everyone here said they believe in extraterrestrial life and would welcome contact with it?

No, you just found a new stick with which to beat skeptics. And skeptic bashing just about the only consistent activity we've seen from you.

__________________
"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base

I believe it is Xenophobia.

I did not call it that. Bart did.

Did you miss the part where almost everyone here said they believe in extraterrestrial life and would welcome contact with it?

No, you just found a new stick with which to beat skeptics. And skeptic bashing just about the only consistent activity we've seen from you.

On other forums I engage in debate on sujects I do not believe in. I consider others arguments and engage in what if scenerios. I can epress my opinion without trying to attack the character of the debator. All speculation is considered.

It is only here that all consideration is attacked with voracity and character assasination is expected. Discuss advanced technology and the directions it might be taking is ok till there is any hint of alien posibility and it becomes impossible fantasy.

If there really was an open debate with point counterpoint I would believe you. Try to debate and get bashed. You expect that I should not respond in kind?

Someone asked me to describe my sighting, which I merly related and did not offer as anything worthy of merit, and still came under attack.

Other arguments from skeptics I have found quite convincing and cause to re evaluate my own points, because they are not confrontational but logical.

Nor did I feel any need for bashing them. You earn your bashing. The bias is so extreme that it starts to actually foster the opposite belief. no approach, even speculation cannot be made without immediate ridicule.

Suddenly, in the present incarnation, is no longer interested in proof of ET (sour grapes...) and stalwart defender of science (against time travel).

Case in point. Once the believer label has been applied, not even a statement based on solid science can be made without attack.

Guess we are just going to disagree at every level.