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Comment by llamaLord | Hacker News Reader

It's interesting that this report seems VERY scoped to specifically looking for things of "extra-terrestrial" origin.

Like, I get that most of the headlines about this stuff get clicks by talking about "zomg aliens", but everything I've read on this topic that ever seemed even slightly credible has tended to lean more towards these UAP's being totally terrestrial phenomena, just utilising one specific technological capability that we are not aware humans have developed (the ability to somehow manipulate the relativistic mass of an object within a given space).

IMO that's a much more likely scenario than reverse engineered aliens.

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I'm not sure why you think that is more likely though?

Real advancements are often zeitgeist: plenty of people discovering things in parallel.

Military doesn't have the money to do every research hidden in parallel.

Alone for the fact that you would need to create a shadow society (to make sure you are not getting sold out

i think thats so futuristic that its basically as likely as aliens

That specific example might be, but the general category of "things which look magical until you know how they work" is broad enough that the general point still applies.

If OpenAI had kept quiet about ChatGPT, people would still be saying that kind of performance was decades away, just like they did with every other AI breakthrough in my life 6 months before they became news.

Hardware is harder, but again, there's a whole modern religious movement founded on the premise that the Douglas DC-8 (IIRC but it doesn't matter which) was too advanced for mere humans to have designed it and therefore aliens.

I've also heard that some of the Japanese leadership in WW2 initially refused to believe the destruction of Hiroshima could have been caused by the successful use of a nuclear bomb.

I'm still surprising people today with Google Translate working on live images.

I guess it could be possible that a key discovery in physics may have been withheld from the general public.

This is kinda my point, we see something like a UAP and we assume it's enormously advanced technology compared to what we know, but the reality is, what we've "seen" is only one major discovery in physics ahead of where we are today.

To someone in 1850, the concept of the atomic bomb, a technology that would give humans the power to end all life on earth, would have seemed unfathomably more advanced than their understanding of human capabilities.

And yet, at the start of the atomic age, the power of a nuclear bomb was not really far beyond what could be achieved with conventional explosives. So an early a-bomb from a distance would not have been that impressive to a pre-nukes farmer.

That seems implausible.

If a government invented the Newcomen steam engine, but kept it secret... what would happen?

(a) There would have been far slower development, because as many ideas wouldn't have been tried, because it was secret.

(b) There would have been mysterious black box engines wherever it was used, or power sheds with big DO NOT ENTER signs.

Point being, you can't have a secret technology AND have it develop at the pace of an open technology AND use it.

Specifically for aerospace/engine applications, the government would use the craft for... what?

Can't fly it where it might be shot down. Can't fly it over populated areas. What the heck do they do with it that's useful?

May I introduce you to a family of little blackbirds, consisting of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_A-12 , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_YF-12 , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_D-21 , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_SR-71_Blackbird the special air refueling fleet supporting them, and all of the other infrastructure enabling that?

Considering the years of first flights, not to mention initial design and construction work, that seems rather advanced for the times, certainly looking inconceivably alien to any outsider. And would continue to do so during their hey-days of operation.

They'd still be useful today, but there are other options availabe now, which can compensate to fill that gap, though there are people saying still not fully.

At the time Oxcart was developed in the early 60s, civilian photo coverage was minimal.

Now? If you're running a secret program, eventually it turns up.

See almost certain RQ-180 photos: https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2021/09/07/americas-ne... https://aviationweek.com/defense-space/aircraft-propulsion/p...

The idea that there's a physics-breakthrough craft / technology out there, in active use, just isn't plausible.

... unless it's invisible?

But the UFO crowd (surprisingly?) doesn't seem too eager to accuse the government of having invisible craft.

> At the time Oxcart was developed in the early 60s, civilian photo coverage was minimal. See almost certain RQ-180 photos

That's just a temporary gap in coveruppage. They will just be tagged 'Do not snap!' cybermagically, and all the locked down gadgets will comply!1!!

Don't you think there'd be more evidence of it in geopolitics/brinkmanship?

US politics don't seem more hawkish/fear mongering than normal. China is hesitantly ready to invade Taiwan. Russia can't win a war against a much smaller power.

I think these things would be different if some people knew I could change mass of objects like that -- Think of the ballistic implications!

I like this breakdown of the observations: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HlYwktOj75A&t=39s&pp=ygUPa2V2a...

Basically, if we are soon able to accelerate at 5000g, then interstellar flight is quite possible. In which case I would like to see the suns set on a world orbiting binary stars, please.

> Can't fly it where it might be shot down. Can't fly it over populated areas. What the heck do they do with it that's useful?

Keep it as an ace up your sleeves?

Two observations:

1. If you keep it very strictly hidden, development will be slow and based on the zietgiest comment above, you are at risk of your enemy discovering the same technology by chance and completing it one unit of time before you. So you must work as fast as possible even if this risks some leakage.

2. If you have worked in secret and somehow perfected a technology, it will manifest itself in your negotiations as your negotiation style or forcefulness will likely change given your perception of comparative position or bargaining power. We have not observed a drastic change in global geopolitical order to support this claim so it is unlikely someone has an ace up their sleeve. Not saying it is impossible, sometimes people do show discipline just saying it is unlikely based on the other comments on this thread.

If you expect that revealing the existence would cause your opponent to seek out and achieve the technology quite quickly, then you wouldn't show it in your negotiations, it'd be something you blindside them with during a war.

As would have smartphones. Or microwave ovens. Etc. etc.

whether or not it's likely, it's worth considering that there could be an Atlantis/Wakanda scenario with a technologically advanced civilisation - human or not - co-existing secretly with us on earth.

given the state of human avarice, I find it hard to believe that there could be technology this advanced being held by the US, or any of the other powers, that wouldn't be being (ab)used to further dominate the world stage

> it's worth considering that there could be an Atlantis/Wakanda scenario with a technologically advanced civilisation - human or not

This is definitely in a bunch of those conspiracy theories. Hollow earth, lizard people, etc.

I want it to be the cetaceans.

The language used in these disclosures is almost too precise.

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