UAPs, by the way in which, are the polite government name for what we normal people call UFOs, or unidentified flying objects. I don’t really have an issue with further investigations into UFOs — it looks as if a pleasant jobs program for scientists. But let’s be clear about what’s happening here: it is a government agency that’s noticed UFO boosters are in Congress, and it wants some rattling funding.
Why do I say that? Well, I read the report, and I noticed this tactful bit:
The scientific processes utilized by NASA encourage critical considering; NASA can model for the general public easy methods to best approach the study of UAP, by utilizing transparent reporting, rigorous evaluation, and public engagement.
Uh-huh. So what NASA is proposing is, essentially, for aliens. I hope they do a fun public access show.
Look, I don’t think we’re alone within the universe. I think that, at minimum, there’s probably loads of bacteria on habitable planets. The query of whether there’s life is a trickier one, but I’m somewhat skeptical because I’m not even sure we’ve got intelligent life on earth. I’m that UFOs or UAPs, or whatever we would like to call them, are aliens — I believe it’s likelier there’s some weird shit happening we haven’t yet explained because, folks, (a) the planet itself is weird and (b) so are human brains.
But one thing that’s sustained “it’s aliens!” conspiracy theories is stonewalling. This tends for use as evidence by the true believers that And so once I see stuff just like the Pentagon forming a task force to look into UFOs, I are likely to think that’s a corrective measure: “Hey, you would like us to see if there are aliens? Okay, we’ll look.” That’s a part of what you see in NASA’s news release, too: “NASA will do that work transparently for the good thing about humanity,” NASA administrator Bill Nelson said in a press release.
Most UFO (or UAP, or whatever you ought to call them) sightings don’t have real data behind them. I don’t mean that as a knock — that’s what Nelson said in a press conference. That’s one in every of the challenges here! Lots of military pilots claim to have seen weird stuff while flying. I consider they did! I just don’t know what they saw. It might be anything — secret spy planes from another country, weather balloons, bizarre atmospheric phenomena, or something else we haven’t yet discovered.
And you understand, getting data takes funding, and NASA’s budget is determined by Congress. If Congress is into UFOs, then why shouldn’t NASA get some budget for that? Is smart, great administrative decision, hats off to management. Nelson desires to shift the conversation about UFOs “from sensationalism to science,” he said within the press conference. And you understand what science at all times needs more of? Money.