this post was submitted on 10 Apr 2024
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Hey guys, what are your thoughts on the existence of extraterrestrial life and the potential involvement of governments in concealing or studying such entities.

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[–] intensely_human@lemm.ee -4 points 7 months ago (4 children)

Duh. Have you not seen the mountains of high definition video of the alien craft buzzing around our atmosphere?

Nobody demands this level of evidence for the asteroid belt. They tell us there’s an asteroid belt, we just believe it. No problem. Big ring of rocks.

But there’s hundreds of high definition videos every day of people’s cell phones recording machines floating in the sky, literal news stories of these things, pilots, government officials, scientists all talking about them, FLIR, radar, visual, etc data and we’re all like “Nah bro it’s a spontaneous conspiracy of strangers to perpetuate a hoax across multiple continents, centuries, and walks of life”

The reason is simple: we’re in denial because it’s absolutely terrifying.

Why do these tens of thousands of people participate in the Alien Hoax Conspiracy? Why, for attention of course.

Please don’t understand me wrong. I am saying the claim that aliens are a “hoax” implies the largest and most well-coordinated conspiracy ever theorized to exist. If there is a conspiracy to perpetuate the alien hoax, it dwarfs every other conspiracy many orders of magnitude over.

Yes there’s fucking aliens. Each and every one of us has seen more evidence for aliens than we’ve seen of the existence of Osama Bin Laden, the Harlem Globetrotters, or spear fishing.

“Oh all those spear fishing videos are all CGI”

Yeah whatever bro. All those vast networks of people just cranking out CGI footage of aliens on a daily basis. You know, for the lulz. Gimme a break.

[–] stembolts@programming.dev 3 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (1 children)

I actually agree with parts of your underlying idea, but your tone is so awful that you're convincing people to disagree with you.

You could be like : "I believe in cats because of cat videos."

But instead you're like : "What are you? Some kinda ducking idiot? You never seen a cat video? You scared of cats bro?! Small minded population can't accept cats!"

Surely you understand tone? I hope you are only like this on the internet.

[–] intensely_human@lemm.ee -1 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Do you understand tone? Do you comprehend that there’s more to my message than “I think aliens exist”?

[–] stembolts@programming.dev 2 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (1 children)

Yes. Like I said I agree with a lot of your points. My examples are intentionally oversimplified to avoid diluting the idea I want to demonstrate.

I hope you understand that I'm trying to help you communicate more effectively, because i think that what you are communicating is valid.

Not everything is an argument. It's important to understand when people are helping you, or you end up attacking allies. We are likely on the same side.

[–] intensely_human@lemm.ee 1 points 7 months ago (1 children)

You’re helping me with the goal you assume I have.

It’s condescending because instead of inferring my communication goals from my message, you assume the message is poorly crafted because it doesn’t effectively reach that goal.

I was hoping to lead you do this realization indirectly, but I’ll just come out and say it: my goal with that comment was to express my feelings. Do you feel that you know how I feel about this topic, having read my comment?

That’s why I asked whether you understand what tone is. You seem to think tone is a lubricant that makes manipulating others’ opinions go easier. I disagree. I think tone is an expression of emotion.

Ask yourself honestly. Did you get a good sense of how I feel about this, from reading my comment? If you did, then I succeeded in my communications goal.

Since we’re doing unsolicited advice, I’d say take it easy on the assumptions of others’ incompetence when you’re encountering them for the first time.

[–] stembolts@programming.dev 1 points 7 months ago
[–] PizzasDontWearCapes@sh.itjust.works 3 points 7 months ago (2 children)

I can't tell if you're being satirical or serious

[–] intensely_human@lemm.ee -2 points 7 months ago

I guess you’d have to come to your own conclusions about the logic instead of reading my intentions.

[–] Magnetar@feddit.de 2 points 7 months ago (1 children)
[–] intensely_human@lemm.ee 0 points 7 months ago (2 children)

Says the man named after protomolecule tech

[–] Magnetar@feddit.de 1 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Was supposed to be the cosmic phenomenon, but sure, why not.

[–] intensely_human@lemm.ee 1 points 7 months ago

So which part is bullshit?

[–] CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org 2 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Duh. Have you not seen the mountains of high definition video of the alien craft buzzing around our atmosphere?

A single example please. Since that's a drop in the ocean of the amount you've stated exists, only half points will be awarded if there's a chance someone could have altered or faked it, or it's not definitely alien, and could be natural or a secret human technology instead.

I'm not afraid if they are here. They should stop dicking with cows and say hello. Clearly they don't want us dead, so they seem nice enough.

[–] bastion@feddit.nl 1 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (1 children)

The Phoenix Lights. This isn't hi-def video, because that didn't really exist commonly, but it was witnessed by literally tens of thousands of people (whoever was out at the time, and it was during a pretty busy period).

But of course, there will be handwaving and 'disproofs' or things like 'but we can't trust nineties people to see.' Fact is, it is seen by everyone, news channels do pieces on it, and then.. ..meh. Too big to comprehend, and I've got work tomorrow.

[–] CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org 2 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (2 children)

So, half point. Definitely not fake, but don't look much like aliens, as opposed to angels, spirits, a Chinese or American research program, natural plasma objects or something else entirely we haven't even thought of.

They're UFOs, with an emphasis on U.

[–] bastion@feddit.nl 2 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

Fair.

Well, minus 'A Chinese or American research program'. The ability for the US or China to keep an active, capable project like that a secret for over two decades is incredibly unlikely. More unlikely than anything else postulated.

..but still, definitely unknown.

[–] bastion@feddit.nl 1 points 7 months ago (1 children)

The really interesting part, though, is that it demonstrates the ability of the populous to see something with immense implications - then just shrug it off, forget, and get back to the 'normal' things.

[–] CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 7 months ago (1 children)

That is interesting. The human capability for apathy is astounding. I was just talking about this in another thread on idiot-proofing things.

[–] bastion@feddit.nl 1 points 7 months ago

I think it's a trauma-avoidance mechanism. If someone doesn't register a major event, and can just continue living their known pattern, there's something (biologically) good in that, when the other option is to disrupt the pattern you use to survive.

Now that survival isn't by-and-large the issue, and we have the capacity to register and process things of great magnitude, some of us can and do. But, it's up to those who do to create an actionable course, if they want others involved. It's just not enough to shout and make sure people know - there must be an actionable course for it to truly register.

It can be hard to watch that apathy, though.