While I can and do understand the considerations about consequences of the existence of advanced extraterrestrial intelligence, I feel like this post gets it backwards and tries to find reasons why it’s reasonable to take UFOs seriously instead of arriving at that conclusion after careful deliberation.
Edit to make my point clearer: This feels like an instance of Pascal’s Mugging. You can claim vast potential moral importance for anything by postulating it to be an indication of extraterrestrial intelligence which makes it arbitrary to me. I admit that the connection UFO <-> extraterrestrial intelligence is more immediate than in other cases, but I think that ignores the priors.
Also I’m very unconvinced by and skeptical about underlining the credibility of the “serious” UFO discourse by providing a list of prominent people engaged with it; I’m positive you can do similarly impressive lists for exactly the sort of discourse of paranormal phenomena you’re trying to distinguish from.
Deeply personal and maybe overly poignant opinion, but: This is my stop on the train to CrazyTown.
I feel like this post gets it backwards and tries to find reasons why it’s reasonable to take UFOs seriously instead of arriving at that conclusion after careful deliberation.
The starting point of the post is that there are sufficient grounds for curiosity in light of existing reports/evidence. So to be clear, the initial and main motivation I present for taking UFOs seriously is that evidence, which I claim crosses the bar for “worthy of taking a closer look”.
I admit that the connection UFO <-> extraterrestrial intelligence is more immediate than in other cases, but I think that ignores the priors.
FWIW, I’ve written some posts related to priors, outlining some reasons why I don’t think they should be that low:
Also I’m very unconvinced by and skeptical about underlining the credibility of the “serious” UFO discourse by providing a list of prominent people engaged with it; I’m positive you can do similarly impressive lists for exactly the sort of discourse of paranormal phenomena you’re trying to distinguish from.
This seems to misunderstand what I tried to do with that list. The point is not simply to list some prominent people, but rather to give examples of, and direct readers to, the content of the serious UFO discourse. That is, my hope is not that readers will just look at that list of people and find it impressive or so, but instead that readers will check out the content of what these people have said: the data they provide, how they reason, and so on.
Sure, it is in itself somewhat interesting that a physicist like Daniel Coumbe has researched the topic and written a book about it, but what is far more interesting is the actual content of that book. So too for the books written by J. Allen Hynek.
Also, is it really true that you can find nuclear launch officers (or the like) who have claimed that some other paranormal phenomenon interfered with their nuclear weapons (or a similarly consequential system)?
While I can and do understand the considerations about consequences of the existence of advanced extraterrestrial intelligence, I feel like this post gets it backwards and tries to find reasons why it’s reasonable to take UFOs seriously instead of arriving at that conclusion after careful deliberation.
Edit to make my point clearer: This feels like an instance of Pascal’s Mugging. You can claim vast potential moral importance for anything by postulating it to be an indication of extraterrestrial intelligence which makes it arbitrary to me. I admit that the connection UFO <-> extraterrestrial intelligence is more immediate than in other cases, but I think that ignores the priors. Also I’m very unconvinced by and skeptical about underlining the credibility of the “serious” UFO discourse by providing a list of prominent people engaged with it; I’m positive you can do similarly impressive lists for exactly the sort of discourse of paranormal phenomena you’re trying to distinguish from.
Deeply personal and maybe overly poignant opinion, but: This is my stop on the train to CrazyTown.
The starting point of the post is that there are sufficient grounds for curiosity in light of existing reports/evidence. So to be clear, the initial and main motivation I present for taking UFOs seriously is that evidence, which I claim crosses the bar for “worthy of taking a closer look”.
FWIW, I’ve written some posts related to priors, outlining some reasons why I don’t think they should be that low:
Can we confidently dismiss the existence of near aliens? Probabilities and implications
Particularly this section
From AI to distant probes
See also Hanson’s post “On UFOs-As-Aliens Priors” and these comments by Jacob Cannell.
This seems to misunderstand what I tried to do with that list. The point is not simply to list some prominent people, but rather to give examples of, and direct readers to, the content of the serious UFO discourse. That is, my hope is not that readers will just look at that list of people and find it impressive or so, but instead that readers will check out the content of what these people have said: the data they provide, how they reason, and so on.
Sure, it is in itself somewhat interesting that a physicist like Daniel Coumbe has researched the topic and written a book about it, but what is far more interesting is the actual content of that book. So too for the books written by J. Allen Hynek.
Also, is it really true that you can find nuclear launch officers (or the like) who have claimed that some other paranormal phenomenon interfered with their nuclear weapons (or a similarly consequential system)?