> In 2020, Justus completed an extensive study of the high-altitude barium release clouds, concluding that what Carter saw was "totally consistent" with what was launched that evening from Eglin AFB.[13] Justus described several physical aspects supporting consistency, and submitted a copy of the report for archival at the Jimmy Carter Library.
And if we look up "Barium Tracer Cloud" on YouTube we can see images of what Jimmy Carter might've seen at the time, which has both a mundane explanation while being exceptionally magical in its own way.
There's also additional images in the report PDF [1].
[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eUAqsxYJtHc
[1] https://figshare.com/articles/online_resource/What_Jimmy_Car...
One of the main reasons why the UFO crowd discredits itself is the way that the crazies in the community are overrepresented, and look at "this flying object is not identified" and automatically jump to the conclusion that not knowing something somehow means it definitely must support an outlandish mythology.
Not really. The UFO community is synonymous with gullible crackpots and conspiracy loons. If the community wants to be take seriously, they themselves need to sort themselves out before they can expect to be taken seriously.
It's the boy that cried alien.
You're right, and it's funny thinking about it in more abstract terms. Being "unidentified" means we can't match it to any known phenomenon, to then jump to being certain it is aliens is silly.
Isn't that a definition of discrimination? That seems to be very silly. Haha! :)
Anyway, analysis focuses on "5 unexplainable observables" like : lift without control surfaces, instant acceleration, low observability, hypersonics without signatures, transmedium travel.
For a more serious introduction, see: https://www.uap.guide/
https://eos.org/science-updates/ionospheric-fireworks-illumi...
A good overview of "state of UAP" right now is: https://www.uap.guide/quotes/introduction
In addition, for fun, here's some other political figures (including some famous ones) and their UFO experiences:
- Democrat presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich admits he saw a UFO during the 2007 debate: https://www.cleveland.com/openers/2007/10/kucinich_at_debate...
- 40th US President Ronald Reagan was initially open about having been part of a group of passengers who witnessed a very fast UFO aboard an aircraft in 1974: https://science.howstuffworks.com/space/aliens-ufos/ronald-r...
- Army Gunner and Canadian parliamentary minister Paul Hellyer said he saw a UFO with his wife and friends: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Hellyer#Extraterrestrial_...
- Arizona governor Fife Symington was among witnesses of the Phoenix lights: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fife_Symington#Phoenix_Lights
- Kirsan Ilyumzhinov President of Kalmykia and head of World Chess Federation said he was show the inside of a UFO by NHIs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirsan_Ilyumzhinov#UFO_experie...
https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/90497/colorful-clou... ("Colorful Clouds Glow Over Virginia" (2017))
https://www.nasa.gov/solar-system/nasa-launches-two-rockets-... ("NASA Launches Two Rockets Studying Auroras" (2019))
- "The AZURE mission is designed to make measurements of the atmospheric density and temperature with instruments on the rockets and deploying visible gas tracers, trimethyl aluminum (TMA) and a barium/strontium mixture, which ionizes when exposed to sunlight. The vapors were released over the Norwegian Sea at 71 through 150 miles altitude."
Can you imagine that someone this clear-headed was ever the President of the United States?
- I am selling my family farm because I don't want there to be a perception of influence.
to:
- I am keeping all of my companies and property and will be charging the Secret Service which has the duty to protect me room and board.
That said, the whole UFO thing is pretty ridiculous --- it's _hard_ to bring an object which is under power and moving at speeds which allow interstellar travel into our solar system at a relative velocity which allows interaction --- witness ʻOumuamua which despite being "just" a dead chunk of rock was detected and photographed.
Wait, which UFO thing are you referring to? Carter never thought it was anything extraterrestrial, he stated that he assumed it was a natural or man-made event. Are you saying it’s strange that some people believe in aliens?
- velocity --- it would need to be moving quickly and would have to decelerate (requires energy) to do more than pass through
- life support/technology requirements and attendant heat signature --- interstellar space is _cold_ and not conducive to either, so requires on-going energy output
- size requirements --- basically, an entire ecological system needs to be moved around --- how many trees does one person require to produce sufficient oxygen for them to breathe? (a quick search has an answer from 1--8)
&c. See Kim Stanley Robinson's recent novel _Aurora_ for a well-researched examination of this.
(I’m on the side of “we will die out before ever interacting with intelligent alien life”, but I still think it’s non-zero.)
I agree.
This isn't anything new, but I suspect it has to do with a much more fractured sense of national identity, and shared core values.
That engenders a "us vs them", "take what is mine" attitude, from top to bottom.
He was not the president we deserved, but he was the president we needed.
‘The term “October surprise” was originally used by the Reagan camp to describe its fears that Mr. Carter would manipulate the hostage crisis to effect a release just before the election.
To forestall such a scenario, Mr. Casey was alleged to have met with representatives of Iran in July and August 1980 in Madrid leading to a deal supposedly finalized in Paris in October in which a future Reagan administration would ship arms to Tehran through Israel in exchange for the hostages being held until after the election.’
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/18/us/politics/jimmy-carter-...
In US politics it really is true with one political party that every accusation in a confession.
Carter is straight up the best individual person we have elected in 100+ years. Glad to see at least HN agrees that he was based.
Meanwhile, Reagan was wealthy, the Bushes were oil wealth, Romney was a very wealthy Bain founder and CEO, and Trump obviously.
One of our known scientific facts is that we know our understanding physics is incomplete (namely, QCD and GR are incompatible), so obviously we can never put 100% confidence into Carter's negative claim.
This is just Epistemology 101, and totally uncontroversial.
For all people, our perceptions are influenced by what we expect to see. European explorers attributed "lost white tribes",[0] and native people saw dragons instead of sailing ships. No doubt many of their people said those who saw dragons were the "clear headed" ones!
Maybe (just maybe!) we should remember our history, and think twice before being hasty with confident-sounding "End Of History / End Of Knowledge" style pronouncements.
By this line of thinking we can never put “100% confidence” into anything at all.
But our understanding of physics will never be “complete”, therefore this is just a cheap argument to say we must assign every claim a non-zero chance of being true.
> This is just Epistemology 101, and totally uncontroversial.
You’re mincing claims, jumping from obscure physics to “Epistemology 101” and trying to lump it all together as “totally uncontroversial”, but it’s really just an attempt at moving the goal posts with fancy language and big words.
It doesn’t change the fact that the original claim clearly has some factual inconsistencies, such as the way the date of the encounter doesn’t even match other records of the event or even appear to be in the same season at which the event occurred, or that none of the other people present appear to have come away with similar observations.
Talking about physics and GR and QCD and Epistemology 101 doesn’t change anything. It’s just superfluous jargon.
>But our understanding of physics will never be “complete”
You (and all others) conflated my argument with the tired old trope that all knowledge 'might' be wrong. Yes I agree: yawn.
However in this case we actually have positive knowledge that our current physics must be incorrect. This is a far far stronger epistemic claim, of course.
Funny how for something so uncontroversial, it can be so controversial to remind people of it!
>fancy language and big words
>the original claim clearly has some factual inconsistencies, such as...
That is not an "end of knowledge" style pronouncement, merely shorthand to avoid having to tack an "as far as we know" onto every single statement we make. Because we can known next to nothing with certainty. I don't know I'm speaking to a person and not an automaton for example, nor do I know I'm not a brain in a vat. It'd be very tedious if I had to caveat everything I said, however.
Carter explained that he is not using the word to describe racism, but the desire to acquire, occupy, confiscate and then to colonize Palestinian land.
Source: https://www.brandeis.edu/now/2008/january/cartervisit.html
The problem is that that is not apartheid. Apartheid “separateness” is explicitly a racist ideology and about forcing people to live in separate lands, not about colonizing.
> "The crime of apartheid" means inhumane acts of a character similar to those referred to in paragraph 1, committed in the context of an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group over any other racial group or groups and committed with the intention of maintaining that regime;
So yes it is a racist ideology, but it doesn’t need the perpetrators to be explicitly racist. The fact that the oppressed Palestinians are of a different racial group as the oppressors, and the policy is to maintain a domination of one racial group over the other, that means this counts as apartheid.
“I didn’t mean to be racist” is not an excuse admissible to the ICC
That said, The Rome statute would not become international law until 22 years after Carter was no longer President. And would never be ratified by neither the USA nor Israel. Though interestingly Palestine has ratified it.
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/12/1979-vela-in...
...of our contemporary civilization. If you think objectively about it, there is no reason for the technological level of any potential alien visitor to be in a range that we can understand - solely for the act of traveling great distances that are required to reach a distant star, they would need to have discovered physics paradigms far beyond our understanding today.
Us trying to 'interpret and judge' the technological level of such a civilization today would be akin to a never-contacted tribe seeing a helicopter and deducing that it cant be real because 'people cant fly'.
No, they wouldn't. Modest progress in engineering and cultural adaptation, would produce generation ships large enough to sustain a human colony capable of traversing the galaxy on the scale of thousands of years. On the other hand, we could launch a ChatGPT-enabled* probe to arrive at Proxima Centauri in about a century with today's technology.
If you think objectively about it, "physics paradigms far beyond our understanding today" do not necessarily exist. Or if they do, they will not necessarily contribute significantly to our ability to traverse interstellar distances. While it is hubris to assume that we know everything; it is foolhardy to assume that there is gold at the end of the rainbow.
* note that ChatGPT is rather pathetic compared to intelligent life; but it's what we can ship today
This is an excellent example of 'thinking inside the boundaries of our paradigm'. Other civilizations may have discovered paradigms that allow them to traverse the galaxy in days, and even in seconds.
> If you think objectively about it, "physics paradigms far beyond our understanding today" do not necessarily exist.
That's what was said in the mid to late 19th century. Then quantum physics was discovered. It was already 'outside' our understanding then, and it still is. We take some things 'just as they are' and accept them, like quantum entanglement. We think we explain them through some unproven theories to avoid admitting the fact that they upended our earlier paradigm of how things are.
A lot of the things that are observed in the ufo phenomenon can be similar things if they are actual extraterrestrial civilizations 'observing' us. 'Shape changing' ufos, ufos that travel in a speed that no creature can withstand etc.
But overall, a pretty middling presidency in terms of actual accomplishments.
- "I know I saw something that violated my laws of physics, but my knowledge of physics prevented me from believing it (was a physical object/ was real/ was actually behaving in the physics-violating way I saw)." or
- "From my knowledge of physics it was clear that aliens could not get here, so whatever I saw could not have been their craft."
or something else?
I think your take is fair, but it's just another interpretation like mine. Otherwise how it's taken or presented could be totally different to how it's intended.
> I don't think he deeply considered how different alien physical objects could behave with far advanced science, then decided how to feel about that.
No but he could have considered more on reflection then provided an answer that was the result of that. Hahaha! :) This discussion between us is like proof of why it's important to consider.
We don't want Jimmy Carter to be a puppet for whatever ideology or theory, we want to know what we thought. Hahah! :)
But I also reflect that maybe these sort of statements where it's ambiguous isn't that important to consider, because you can't really know, ya know what i mean? :) Hahah. So funny you say over analyzing but then we get down into analysis of it hahahaha! :)
I think the way that the Republican party treated (both then and now) a southern, small family farmer who served in the military and taught Sunday school is one of those ironies that shows what values the Republican party actually believes in. And this has obviously only accelerated massively since Trump.
"I really like Carter's presidency because he was a good person."
"Oh so you must hate Clinton."
"Well, you can't judge a president based on his personal life."
"..."
If you have something like, right-angle change of direction, or high-res details it gets better.
It’s the “the spaceship landed next to me in my farm field and aliens came out” claims that have faded away.
I've witnessed quite a few odd lights in the night sky, myself! And an equal or greater number of military aircraft flying overhead, between bases, by day. None of which I've ever managed to get a good photo of, even when it's a bomber passing over low and slow, much to my disappointment.
> It’s the “the spaceship landed next to me in my farm field and aliens came out” claims that have faded away.
I recall quite of lot those stories also included electronics behaving weirdly, which would make for quite a convenient excuse. Though I suppose a phone might preserve some evidence of that. But surely enough of those prone to making more outlandish claims aren't thinking of that?
I've had one of those experiences.
I was very young - maybe 12 or so - and my memory of those events makes little logical sense. I had a friend with me who saw the same things, so I'm sure it's not a completely false memory... but I was also suffering from sleep paralysis at the time.
I don't even recount the story any more. It's counterproductive - why bother analyzing an old memory like that when I know my experiences at the time weren't reliable and none of it makes sense from a scientific perspective? There's nothing to be gained.
I personally put zero faith in them, because quite a few are obvious fakes, and the rest are just completely unverifiable, so they are not worth thinking about.
But there's no shortage of modern-day pictures and videos...
I don't think you got the point.
Before camera phones were ubiquitous, the bulk of reports were very elaborate and fantastic tales where the so-called witness played a central role in the story.
Once everyone started carrying a camera, all we see is questionable light shows taken from a very long distance.
Strange, isn't it?
It would be incredibly unlikely for humanity to be the first civilization potential aliens make contact with. They'd probably have a lot of knowledge about interactions with lesser developed civilizations, which would inform the risk they can take based on the developments made. A civilization without broadly available personal cameras would logically allow for much closer interactions.
Let me just add that I don't believe the sightings are real, and I don't believe aliens are visiting earth - I just really dislike using faulty logic to "disprove" this stuff.
[1]: If potential alien visitors wanted their existence to be widely known, it would be easy to do so through conventional news mechanisms (e.g. media or politicians). Since that hasn't happened it leaves two options: there are no alien visitors (the incredibly likely solution), or they exist and want to stay hidden, for whatever reason that may be.
To be clear, I don't believe we're being visited by aliens.
If we are, though, they're obviously extremely advanced. To put it mildly. So clearly they would know that relatively high quality cameras are now ubiquitous, and adapt their behaviors accordingly if they preferred to remain unknown to the general public.
...of things that turn out not to be aliens, which is the OP's point.
https://www.theverge.com/2023/3/13/23637401/samsung-fake-moo...
[1] https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vague_belge_d%27ovnis [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7psGj4M1ZI
HN is better when politics are discussed elsewhere.
> Please don't use Hacker News for political or ideological battle. That tramples curiosity.
But admittedly he was better than the current candidates we have available to us in November.
> In 2016, the hosts of episode #561 of The Skeptics' Guide to the Universe podcast read a letter forwarded by a member of the Carter family from Carl G. "Jere" Justus, giving his explanation of Carter's UFO sighting:[12]
After recently reading the book Georgia Myths & Legends, by Augusta Chronicle columnist Don Rhodes, specifically Chapter 5, "Jimmy Carter and the UFO", I am virtually certain that I have identified the source of what it was that President Carter saw. In the 1960s and early 70s, I worked on an Air Force sponsored project that studied the upper atmosphere using releases of glowing chemical clouds, produced by rockets launched from Eglin AFB rocket range in Florida. Some of these chemical clouds, notably sodium and barium, were visible by the process of resonance scattering of sunlight. Clouds of this type had to be launched not long after sunset or not long before sunrise. This was due to the fact that the cloud had to be in sunlight at high altitude, while it was still dark enough at ground level for the cloud to be visible against the dark sky. In Carter's official 1973 UFO report, as given in the Rhodes book, he stated that he had seen the phenomenon in October, 1969, at 7:15 pm EST. However, it has been determined from Lions Club records that Carter must have seen the "UFO" when he spoke to their Leary, GA Chapter on January 6, 1969. The report "U.S. Space Science Program Report to COSPAR, 1970" (QB504.U54, Appendix I, page 154) documents that there was a barium cloud launched from Eglin AFB (Rocket Number AG7.626) and released on January 6, 1969 at 7:35 pm EST (January 7, 1969, 0035 UTC) [COSPAR stands for Committee on Space Research]. The reported altitude for this cloud was 152 km. With a distance between Leary, GA and Eglin AFB, FL of about 234 km, this cloud would have appeared in the sky at an elevation of 33 degrees (consistent with Carter's estimate of a 30 degree elevation). Carter's report notes that stars were visible, so the night must have been clear. I can verify from personal experience that under clear skies, a barium cloud such as this would easily have been visible from the distance of Leary, GA. Carter reported the UFO "appeared from West". The direction of Eglin AFB from Leary, GA is approximately WSW. Thus this barium cloud at Eglin is consistent with Carter's reported "UFO" as to time, elevation, and direction. Furthermore, the appearance reported by Carter is totally consistent with a high-altitude barium cloud. His report stated that it was "bluish at first, then reddish, luminous, not solid". A neutral barium cloud would initially glow bluish or greenish, with parts of it taking on a reddish glow as some of the barium becomes ionized in the high altitude sunlight. The size and brightness, reported as being about that of the moon, would also be consistent with a barium cloud at Eglin, as viewed from Leary, GA. Carter has been reported as saying that he never believed that he had seen an alien spacecraft, but that he had no idea exactly what it was. I'm interested in exploring if this information could be relayed to President Carter, so that if he wishes to, he can better understand what it was that he saw back then.David Grusch is not some random whistleblower we should be ignoring. He was a GS-15 intel officer read into over 2000 special access programs. He handled the presidential daily briefing, which they do not give to just anyone. Take a look at his resume to see how highly cleared he was https://docs.house.gov/meetings/GO/GO06/20230726/116282/HHRG....
And let me just clarify - this is not just one person's claims. His work in the UAP Task Force had 40 people with direct, first hand knowledge of the programs. Some of whom worked on the NHI craft. He had these people testify to the ICIG, providing documentation, imagery, and other evidence.
Listen, I know this sounds insane to most folks. The meat of his claims, beyond the craft, are that factions of the USG have *not* been properly giving congress(and even some presidents) oversight of these alleged Special Access Programs. The ICIG has most likely referred this case to the justice department, and his claims have started a congressional UAP Caucus in the house.
Take a look at this interview with Marco Rubio, the ranking member of the Senate Intel Committee, as he's talking about the 40 whistleblower's claims https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4hmaflNoKU
Rep Jared Moscowitz, after a SCIF meeting with the ICIG, said "Based on what we heard many of Grusch claims have merit!" https://twitter.com/JaredEMoskowitz/status/17458524006304566...
If you haven't watched the HOC hearing, or any of his other interviews, I highly recommend you do so. Or at the very least, read his opening statement he was giving to the HOC
* HOC opening statement https://oversight.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Dave_...
* HOC hearing https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TSCEWo2yjds
* Initial interview with Ross Coulthart https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLZzDhDYMcw
* Initial article https://thedebrief.org/intelligence-officials-say-u-s-has-re...
* Interview on JRE https://open.spotify.com/episode/6D6otpHwnaAc86SS1M8yHm
* Interview with Tucker Carlson https://twitter.com/TuckerCarlson/status/1735083523050975277...
I'm not saying the claims are true. I'm just saying, the allegations are worth investigating and should not be dismissed outright.
Edit: One final note. After Grusch's claims released, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer introduced an amendment to the NDAA 2024 titled "UAP Disclosure Act" which would've set up a presidential panel to declassify and release information that the USG has on the subject. It references the terminology "non-human intelligence" 27 times. The amendment was gutted by certain house members and unfortunately did not make it through in its initial form, but it's worth the read. https://www.democrats.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/uap_amendment...
BTW this was a really good summary!!! :)
I think people in power should just come clean and say "We have no idea what's going on." But how can people in power admit something more powerful is toying with them?
It's pretty hard, but I think their honesty would build credibility and begin the path not just of healing but of figuring out: what it is, do we need to respond, and how to respond. And getting away from the tired narrative of relying on government for "disclosure", that only recenters their authority in the face of a threat to it, and disempowers people. But I think we need to be empowered to deal with this: whether it's militarily, scientifically or studied in other ways.
I think this is something that we need to deal with together, as a country or even world. I don't think some group of people working in the shadows can handle it. Hasn't it been 100 years already? But their reactions are still some reflection of "run, deny, hide". Not a great look for leaders and systems we are supposed to depend on!! So I think it can be better handled for sure.
There is no real discussion to be had on the topic. People choose to believe Grusch and others because of their own faith in the ET/UFO narrative as a first principle. People doubt Grusch and others because none of them ever present compelling evidence, and their claims in aggregate are ridiculous. The former camp mocks the latter camp, the latter camp mocks the former. Eventually the discussion splinters into talk of Von Neumann probes, generation ships and the Fermi Paradox. Lather, rinse repeat.
But here we all are still waiting for the "catastrophic disclosure" that should have happened by now. And for what it's worth the government's own investigations have consistently come to the conclusion that no extraterrestrial or physics-defying technologies are involved, and the vast majority of what's been presented as undeniable proof via video and photographic evidence turns out to have mundane explanations. But of course one can simply write that conclusion off as part of the conspiracy.
So yeah. Let us know when there's a there there.
I'm not sure if you've looked into the government's self investigations in the 70s regarding claims the CIA was experiment on their own populace where they also found no evidence. But 20 years later the CIA declassified those documents to show the CIA absolutely was dosing cities with LSD in the water supply.
My point being, the Department of Defense investigating itself is like letting a murderer run his own investigation.
But the Department of Defense investigating this phenomenon is the only basis the UFO community has for considering any of the UAP/UFO stuff credible. It's why they trust David Grusch, because, as they claim, no one would just go in front of Congress and tell lies (or in Grusch's case, because he has no actual firsthand knowledge of anything, repeat someone else's lies.)
You can't have it both ways. You can't say this is real because the government is looking into it, and that the government can't be trusted with its findings.
And it's not "hearsay" He brought 40 people with first hand knowledge to the ICIG. People who worked in the reverse engineering programs - who touched the craft.
Unlike Snowden who just released a bunch of classified information to the public, Grusch went through the proper whistleblower channels and submitted the evidence to the ICIG.
Look at my edit regarding the Senate Majority leader.
https://www.theskepticsguide.org/podcasts/episode-105
This was the podcast referenced on the John Oliver show recently, when Oliver talked about Jimmy Carter's UFO incident.
They also had a bit of followup (decades later) on the latest Skeptics Guide episode.
The current thought is that he saw some aircraft from a nearby airbase.