Dit is ons nieuw hondje Kira, een kruising van een waterhond en een Podenko. Ze is sinds 7 februari 2024 bij ons en druk bezig ons hart te veroveren. Het is een lief, aanhankelijk hondje, dat zich op een week snel aan ons heeft aangepast. Ze is heel vinnig en nieuwsgierig, een heel ander hondje dan Noleke.
This is our new dog Kira, a cross between a water dog and a Podenko. She has been with us since February 7, 2024 and is busy winning our hearts. She is a sweet, affectionate dog who quickly adapted to us within a week. She is very quick and curious, a very different dog than Noleke.
DEAR VISITOR,
MY BLOG EXISTS ALREADY 12 YEARS AND 10 MONTHS.
ON 06/04/2024 MORE THAN 1.951.050
VISITORS FROM 134 DIFFERENT NATIONS ALREADY FOUND THEIR WAY TO MY BLOG.
THAT IS AN AVERAGE OF 400GUESTS PER DAY.
THANK YOU FOR VISITING MY BLOG AND HOPE YOU ENJOY EACH TIME.
The purpose of this blog is the creation of an open, international, independent and free forum, where every UFO-researcher can publish the results of his/her research. The languagues, used for this blog, are Dutch, English and French.You can find the articles of a collegue by selecting his category. Each author stays resposable for the continue of his articles. As blogmaster I have the right to refuse an addition or an article, when it attacks other collegues or UFO-groupes.
Druk op onderstaande knop om te reageren in mijn forum
Zoeken in blog
Deze blog is opgedragen aan mijn overleden echtgenote Lucienne.
In 2012 verloor ze haar moedige strijd tegen kanker!
In 2011 startte ik deze blog, omdat ik niet mocht stoppen met mijn UFO-onderzoek.
BEDANKT!!!
Een interessant adres?
UFO'S of UAP'S, ASTRONOMIE, RUIMTEVAART, ARCHEOLOGIE, OUDHEIDKUNDE, SF-SNUFJES EN ANDERE ESOTERISCHE WETENSCHAPPEN - DE ALLERLAATSTE NIEUWTJES
UFO's of UAP'S in België en de rest van de wereld In België had je vooral BUFON of het Belgisch UFO-Netwerk, dat zich met UFO's bezighoudt. BEZOEK DUS ZEKER VOOR ALLE OBJECTIEVE INFORMATIE , enkel nog beschikbaar via Facebook en deze blog.
Verder heb je ook het Belgisch-Ufo-meldpunt en Caelestia, die prachtig, doch ZEER kritisch werk leveren, ja soms zelfs héél sceptisch...
Voor Nederland kan je de mooie site www.ufowijzer.nl bezoeken van Paul Harmans. Een mooie site met veel informatie en artikels.
MUFON of het Mutual UFO Network Inc is een Amerikaanse UFO-vereniging met afdelingen in alle USA-staten en diverse landen.
MUFON's mission is the analytical and scientific investigation of the UFO- Phenomenon for the benefit of humanity...
Je kan ook hun site bekijken onder www.mufon.com.
Ze geven een maandelijks tijdschrift uit, namelijk The MUFON UFO-Journal.
Since 02/01/2020 is Pieter ex-president (=voorzitter) of BUFON, but also ex-National Director MUFON / Flanders and the Netherlands. We work together with the French MUFON Reseau MUFON/EUROP.
ER IS EEN NIEUWE GROEPERING DIE ZICH BUFON NOEMT, MAAR DIE HEBBEN NIETS MET ONZE GROEP TE MAKEN. DEZE COLLEGA'S GEBRUIKEN DE NAAM BUFON VOOR HUN SITE... Ik wens hen veel succes met de verdere uitbouw van hun groep. Zij kunnen de naam BUFON wel geregistreerd hebben, maar het rijke verleden van BUFON kunnen ze niet wegnemen...
02-08-2017
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Het lijkt op een sciencefiction film, maar niets in minder waar, want de nieuwe Facebook robots hebben een eigen taal ontwikkeld die voor de programmeurs niet meer te volgen is.
Als robots in staat zijn om dit te doen, dan doemt er een ander schrikbeeld op en dat is dat ze dan ook een soort bewustzijn hebben.
Er heeft zich iets werkelijk alarmerends voorgedaan en de vraag is of de mensheid dit beseft, of dat men gewoon doorgaat met levensgevaarlijke experimenten.
Elon Musk blijft mensen iedere keer weer verbazen, niet alleen met zijn nieuwe uitvindingen en plannen, maar ook met hoe hij over bepaalde dingen denkt.
Zo denkt dat hij dat er een kans is van één op de miljard dat wij NIET in een computersimulatie leven, een beetje zoals wij beschreven in een eerder artikel “Is God een IT specialist?”.
En dan is het natuurlijk één ding dat wij als mensen leven in die computersimulatie, maar zoals de ontwikkelingen er nu uit zien, kan binnen die computersimulatie de leidende rol wel eens worden overgenomen door robots.
In een toespraak vorige week begon Elon Musk opeens over het grote gevaar dat hij ziet en dat is dat overheden niets doen om AI (Artificial Intelligence) te reguleren. Dit is volgens hem broodnodig omdat er een groot gevaar bestaat dat het met kunstmatige intelligentie zoals robots volledig uit de hand kan gaan lopen.
Hij zegt dat mensen waarschijnlijk pas in actie zullen komen als ze robots zien die door de straten gaan en mensen doden. Mensen doen helemaal niets omdat het voor hen zo onbegrijpelijk is allemaal.
Maar, zo stelt, hij: “Als wij nu niet proactief dit soort dingen gaan reguleren in plaats van reactief, dan kan het wel eens te laat zijn”. Musk ziet AI als een fundamenteel risico voor het voortbestaan van de mensheid en maakt zich daarover dan ook veel zorgen.
En alsof hij op zijn wenken wordt bediend, verschijnt gisteren het volgende bericht in de Telegraaf:
Facebook heeft de bouw van slimme zelfdenkende robots vroegtijdig moeten afbreken. De robots in kunstmatige intelligentie bleken illegaal hun eigen taaltje te hebben ontwikkeld.
Dat hebben bronnen binnen Facebook tegenover technologieblog Tech Times gemeld.
De robots moesten zelf vervolgstappen in de programmeertaal bedenken voor apparaten. Ze kwamen echter vanuit het niets met een coderingstaal waar het Facebook-personeel weinig tegen kon doen maar ook niet begreep.
De robots gingen door de grenzen van wat programmeurs vooraf als norm hadden vastgesteld. Het taaltje tussen de robots kregen Facebook-programmeurs niet voldoende beperkt, waarop het project tijdelijk werd stilgelegd, aldus het blog.
De robots begonnen in het Engels, maar bedachten daarna de eigen taal die voor de softwaremakers totaal niet te volgen zou zijn geweest.
De sociale mediareus steekt momenteel miljarden in kunstmatige intelligentie, bijvoorbeeld voor besturing van zelfrijdende auto’s. Vanaf juni was bekend dat de zogeheten dialogue agents een eigen taal ontwikkelden.
De robots bleken voor programmeurs ,,ongelooflijke sterke onderhandelaars”, melden de bronnen tegen Tech Times.
Het probleem blijkt enkele dagen nadat topman Elon Musk van de zelfrijdende batterijautomaker Tesla meldde dat het begrip bij topman Mark Zuckerberg van Facebook van kunstmatige intelligentie maar zeer beperkt is.
Facebook reageert niet op het bericht, maar doet dat zelden op dergelijke ontwikkelproblemen.
Eerder waarschuwden experts in kunstmatige intelligentie zoals hoogleraar Stephen Hawkings voor de te grote macht van de zelfdenkende robots.
Elon Musk hamert al langer op ’het grootste gevaar voor de mensheid’. Zuckerberg noemde die zorgen recent onnodig en onverantwoord.
Het bovenstaande is zo ingrijpend dat het onze wereld letterlijk op zijn kop kan zetten.
Als robots, zonder dat ze daartoe geprogrammeerd zijn, in staat blijken om zelf een eigen onafhankelijke taal te creëren die voor niemand anders te begrijpen is, dan betekent dit dat er een bepaalde mate van bewustzijn aanwezig is in die robots.
Het duidt op een bepaalde mate van intelligentie, intentie, efficiëntie en bewustzijn.
Waarmee we dan op een punt zijn aanbeland waarbij blijkt dat je dus bewustzijn in een robot kunt stoppen.
Is het dan een zaak dat bewustzijn misschien inderdaad niet is verbonden aan een bepaald individu, maar overal aanwezig is en dat dit bewustzijn als het ware ook te vangen in dit soort apparaten?
Of is het een zaak dat zielen die reïncarneren op aarde hiervoor verschillende voertuigen kunnen gebruiken zolang er maar een bepaalde rekenmachine, een kwantumcomputer zoals onze hersenen, aan is gekoppeld zodat het kan denken, voelen en ervaren? Dat men voor reïncarnatie normaal gesproken een menselijk lichaam gebruikt, maar dat er ook zielen zijn die net zo lief reïncarneren in het metalen lichaam van een robot?
Of zoals iemand uit onze omgeving zei: “Als ik mag kiezen tussen mijn lichaam of een robotlichaam als ik hetzelfde ervaar en kan? Doe dan maar een robotlichaam.”
Kunnen mensen die straks heel erg ziek zijn hun complete bewustzijn inclusief geheugen uploaden naar een computer om dat dan vervolgens te downloaden in een robotlichaam?
Duidelijk is wel dat Mark Zuckerberg druk doende is een doos van Pandora te openen.
En wie weet was Pandora uit de Griekse mythologie ook wel een robot, want ze werd tenslotte in een werkplaats gemaakt.
Volgens de Griekse mythologie maakte de god van het vuur, genaamd Hephaestus, in zijn werkplaats de eerste vrouw: Pandora. Aanvankelijk was het een metalen beeld, maar het was zo mooi dat Zeus besloot het leven te schenken.Toen gaven alle goden haar op hun beurt een geschenk: schoonheid, kracht, slimheid, handigheid, overredingskracht. Hera gaf haar de nieuwsgierigheid die haar geen moment met rust zou laten. Zeus zond Pandora als geschenk aan Epimetheus die haar tot zijn vrouw maakte. Als huwelijksgeschenk kregen zij een mooie doos, versierd met goud en edelstenen. Deze doos zat op slot, maar Zeus had de sleutel erbij gegeven en tegen Pandora gezegd dat als ze gelukkig wilden leven, ze de doos nooit moest openen. Op een bepaald moment won de nieuwsgierigheid het en opende Pandora de doos. In een klap kwamen daar alle tegenslagen en onheil uit die een mens maar kunnen treffen: ziektes, verbittering, pijn en alle mogelijke kwaad. Als laatste kwam echter de hoop eruit, in de vorm van een vogel. Dat was de boodschap van de troost voor de mensheid.
If you've always dreamed of helping keep Earth safe from alien invaders, your ship may have just come in.
NASA is looking to hire a planetary protection officer, a person who will lead the agency's efforts to keep its spacecraft and astronauts from contaminating worlds with life-forms that don't belong there.
NASA officials have stressed that keeping Earth clean — of alien microbes that could arrive here in a sample-return capsule, for example — is the highest priority, but the responsibility applies to all celestial objects that agency spacecraft visit.
"NASA maintains policies for planetary protection applicable to all spaceflight missions that may intentionally or unintentionally carry Earth organisms and organic constituents to the planets or other solar system bodies, and any mission employing spacecraft which are intended to return to Earth and its biosphere with samples from extraterrestrial targets of exploration," NASA officials wrote in a job description. "This policy is based on federal requirements and international treaties and agreements."
So the job checks the making-a-difference box. The pay is good, too; the stated salary range is $124,406 to $187,000. And if you're after a challenge, you'll almost certainly get it.
The topic of planetary protection is generating more and more discussion these days as NASA works on getting (microbe-laden) astronauts to Mars and sending robotic probes to potentially habitable worlds, such as Jupiter's ocean-harboring moon Europa. (The agency is scheduled to launch a Europa flyby mission in the 2020s, and Congress has instructed NASA to put a lander down on the moon's icy surface as well.)
Such plans have spurred debate within the spaceflight community, with some exploration advocates stressing that planetary-protection concerns could hinder the effort to put boots on Mars and hunt for life on the Red Planet.
Still interested? You have until Aug. 14 to apply (which you can do here).
This is not a newly created job; Cassie Conley has been NASA's planetary protection officer for several years now. The new posting is a result of relocating the position to NASA's Office of Safety and Mission Assurance, Conley told Business Insider. She did not indicate whether she plans to reapply, Business Insider reported.
Here are top 7 things you need to know about this high paying job:
The responsibilities of the role include protecting Earth from extraterrestrials and aliens. The job basically includes preventing biological and organic contamination of alien worlds by humans and robots while carrying out space explorations.
Planetary protection officers have been employed by various space agencies for part time roles but NASA and ESA will hire full-time employees, as revealed by Business Insider report.
The job description for planetary protection officer posted on USAJobs.gov reveals that the employee should focus on "avoidance of organic-constituent and biological contamination in human and robotic space exploration".
The main concern of this job is to save the environment of Earth from being polluted by extraterrestrial matter from space missions.
"If we're going to look for life on Mars, it would be really kind of lame to bring Earth life and find that instead," said Catharine Conley, who has served as NASA's sole planetary protection officer since 2014, according to New York Times report.
The process to hire a planetary protection officer is difficult and requires an advanced degree in math or science along with an experience in planning as well as carrying out space programs. Possessing good skills in diplomacy is another crucial requirement of this job in order to handle extremely difficult and complex multilateral discussions.
The Outer Space Treaty – which was approved by the US in 1967 -- led to the origin of the planetary protection concept and planetary protection role. As part of the international agreement, any space mission must have less than a 1-in-10,000 chance of contaminating an alien world.
The invasion is nigh! You knew it would happen eventually — that the Roswell aliens would not only turn out to be real, but that they'd one day return to finish their job of Earthly conquest. Now, NASA, which was surely part of the conspiracy of silence for the last sixty years, has come clean, announcing the creation of the new position of Planetary Protection Officer. It's a sweet gig, actually, paying up to $187,000 per year. That makes for a pretty big pot of disposable income — at least until, you know, the world ends.
Actually, however, you can sound the all clear: The planetary protection job is real, though its purpose is only partly to save Earthlings from the ravages of alien life forms (and by life forms we mean microbes, not green guys). A bigger part of the job is to protect aliens from us — the real bad guys.
Human beings have long hoped to find life in space and we may not have to look far. In our solar system alone, there are at least five worlds other than Earth that, thanks to the presence of water, may have the conditions to support biology: Mars, Jupiter's moons Europa and Ganymede, Saturn's moon Enceladus and Pluto. The problem is, discovering and recovering that life requires sending robot probes or even human beings out to explore. Robots could contain trace bacteria, viruses or other biological contaminants from Earth, and a human being is nothing but one gigantic, walking contaminant.
If an earthly organism got loose in an otherwise pristine place, two problematic things could happen: The contamination would make it impossible to know for sure if any organism you detected was native to the planet or a stowaway. Worse, if alien life did exist, Earth bugs could contaminate its environment and perhaps even prove to be lethal.
In-bound contamination — the space-to-Earth variety — has, of course, always been what worries us more. When astronauts from the first three Apollo moon landings returned to Earth, they were kept in quarantine for three weeks to ensure that they had not picked up any lunar bugs. That was unlikely given that the moon is an airless, waterless, and thus likely sterile place. But in fact there was a bit of a scare.
When the Apollo 12 crew returned to earth, they brought back a camera from the unmanned Surveyor 3 spacecraft that had landed on the moon two and a half years earlier. NASA scientists examined the camera and to their surprise, discovered a small, viable colony of strep bacteria deep inside. It was possible—though exceedingly improbable—that strep was endemic to the moon. Much more likely, the bugs had been carried aboard the Surveyor and had somehow survived their time in the lunar environment. Later analysis revealed that neither scenario was the right one: the camera was actually colonized by the bugs in the lab's ostensible clean room after its return. Still, the incident was seen as a reminder of how easy the spread of bugs from world to world might be.
The Planetary Protection Officer's job will be to help ensure that that kind of bio-leak doesn't happen for real not just when humans come back from alien worlds, but when robot probes do too. This will be especially important if NASA at last moves ahead with its long deferred Mars Sample Return mission, whose job, as its name suggests, will be to collect samples of Martian soil and rocks to be transported back to Earth for study. To help prevent outward-bound contamination, the job will include establishing and developing better quality control standards so that clean rooms where spacecraft are assembled stay clean and disinfection of the spacecraft before the launch actually works.
And then, of course, there is one final act of self-sacrifice spacecraft perform to help keep things pristine. On September 21, 3003, after eight years spent orbiting Jupiter, the aging Galileo spacecraft made a suicide plunge into the planet's cloud tops to prevent it from accidentally crashing onto Europa, Ganymede or any other Jovian moon that might harbor life. This September, the Cassini spacecraft, which has been orbiting Saturn since 2004, will make a similar high-dive into the Saturnian atmosphere. The maneuvers are designed so that the ships leave the planetary systems as they found them: unharmed—even if much better understood.
Astronomers found an alien world with glowing water atmosphere
Astronomers found an alien world with glowing water atmosphere
"We've measured a strong rise in the temperature of WASP-121b's atmosphere at higher altitudes, but we don't yet know what's causing this dramatic heating," said researcher Nikolay Nikolov.
Water vapor glowing in the atmosphere around a newly discovered exoplanet suggests the alien world boasts a stratosphere. Photo by Engine House VFX/At-Bristol Science Centre/University of Exeter
Aug. 2 (UPI) -- Scientists have discovered evidence of a stratosphere surrounding a large exoplanet located 900 light-years from Earth.
A team of astronomers from the University of Exeter and the University of Maryland discovered glowing water molecules while surveying Hubble's observations of WASP-121b's atmosphere.
"When it comes to distant exoplanets, which we can't see in the same detail as other planets here in our own solar system, we have to rely on proxy techniques to reveal their structure," Drake Deming, a professor of astronomy at Maryland, said in a news release. "The stratosphere of WASP-121b so hot it can make water vapor glow, which is the basis for our analysis."
Water molecules interact with certain wavelengths of light in predictable ways. At cooler temperatures, water molecules block light. At higher temperatures, water molecules radiate or shimmer.
As water molecules are heated and vaporized, their electrons move into higher energy states. As they do, they emit infrared light. Scientists were able to identify the phenomenon in spectral data collected by Hubble.
"This new research is the smoking gun evidence scientists have been searching for when studying hot exoplanets," said David Sing, an associate professor of astrophysics at the University of Exeter. "We have discovered this hot Jupiter has a stratosphere, a common feature seen in most of our solar system planets."
WASP-121b is so hot because it orbits so close to its host star. If the star and exoplanet were any closer, the star's gravity would likely rip WASP-121b to shreds.
The temperature of Earth's stratosphere is stratified, it gets warmers as the stratosphere extends away from Earth. Ozone in the layers closer to the sun absorb more heat from solar radiation. Methane in the stratosphere of Jupiter and Saturn's moon Titan has a similar effect.
Researchers believe WASP-121b is host to a similar stratification, only more dramatic. Most stratospheres feature a temperature difference of 100 degrees Celsius. The stratosphere of the newly discovered exoplanet features a temperature difference of 1,000 degrees Celsius.
"We've measured a strong rise in the temperature of WASP-121b's atmosphere at higher altitudes, but we don't yet know what's causing this dramatic heating," said Nikolay Nikolov, a research fellow at Exeter. "We hope to address this mystery with upcoming observations at other wavelengths."
Researchers described their analysis of WASP-121b's atmosphere this week in the journal Nature.
Married UFO enthusiast, 54, who has repeatedly claimed he was abducted by aliens and was profiled in a 2013 documentary goes on trial for child pornography
Married UFO enthusiast, 54, who has repeatedly claimed he was abducted by aliens and was profiled in a 2013 documentary goes on trial for child pornography
Stanley Tiger Romanek, 54, of Colorado, is on trial for allegedly distributing and being in possession of child pornography
He was arrested in February 2014 on felony counts after eight-month investigation initiated by Homeland Security
A search of Romanek's Loveland home turned up more than 300 images and videos on a laptop depciting child pornography
Romanek was profiled in 2013 documentary titled Extraordinary: The Stan Romanek Story, which is was released on Netflix in June
Romanek has claimed to have had multiple encounters with UFOs and to have fathered alien children
He and wife Lisa claimed they have been targeted by hackers because they know about UFOs
UFO enthusiast on trial: Stanley Tiger Romanek, 54, the subject of a documentary that detailed his alleged experiences with extra-terrestrials, is on trial on charges of possession and distribution of child pornography
Opening statements were presented on Tuesday in the child pornography trial of a married father-of-two UFO enthusiast from Colorado who was the subject of a controversial documentary that detailed his alleged experiences with extra-terrestrials.
Stanley Tiger Romanek, 54, of Loveland, was arrested in February 2014 on felony charges of sexual exploitation of a child for allegedly distributing and being in possession of child pornography.
Romanek was taken into custody after an eight-month investigation initiated by the Department of homeland Security, during which a search of his home on Ash Avenue in Loveland turned up more than 300 photos and videos depicting children in sexual situations.
The lewd material was found on a laptop stored inside a closet in Romanek's home, which he shared with his wife Lisa.
According to an arrest affidavit, the computer had 'Stan Romanek' engraved on it, reported The Coloradoan, which has been covering the case from the beginning.
When interviewed by investigators during the search of his home in April 2013, Romankek admitted that he has seen files on his computer that could be considered child pornography but said he did not know how they ended up on his device, the document stated.
Romanek has claimed to have had more than 100 encounters with alien beings, and capturing some of them on camera, including this image from 2003
Out-of-this world tales: Romanek, a married father-of-two, previously claimed that he had been abducted by aliens who left red marks on his body (left)
He then floated the theory that someone had planted the incriminating images on the laptop. Romanek pleaded not guilty to the charges in March 2016.
Both Stanley and Lisa Romanek have claimed they have been targeted by hackers and subjected to threats because they have secret knowledge about the existence of UFOs.
Romanek was profiled in the 2013 documentary film Extraordinary: The Stan Romanek Story, which is was released on Netflix in June.
Fame: Romanek was profiled in the 2013 documentary film Extraordinary: The Stan Romanek Story, which is was released on Netflix in June
In the film, Romanek claims to have had more than 100 encounters with alien beings, and capturing some of them on camera.
Among the claims Romanek makes in the film there are tales of alien abductions that left him with red marks on his body, and fathering multiple extra-terrestrial children.
The documentary now includes a postscript that references Romanek’s child pornography case.
Romanek is also the author of three books on the subject of aliens, including ‘Messages: The World's Most Documented Extraterrestrial Contact Story’; ‘Answers’, and ‘The Orion Regressions.’
Romanek had undergone several rounds of mental health evaluations and was found to be competent to stand trial, which got under way on Monday with jury selection.
During opening statements presented on Tuesday, prosecutor Joshua Ritter reminded the jurors the case was about the 'victimization of children' and warned that the images they were about to see in the course of the proceedings were ‘not pleasant.’
Conspiracy: Both Stanley (left) and Lisa Romanek (right) have claimed they have been targeted by hackers and subjected to threats because they have secret knowledge about the existence of UFOs.
Reporter-herald reported that Ritter said the pornographic content was discovered after a computer crimes expert from the Department of Homeland Security offered the Loveland Police Departmenta tip about images being used in a peer-to-peer network connected to an IP address at Romanek's residence.
Romanek's defense attorney Elizabeth McClintock countered her opponent's arguments by telling the jury the prosecution has no concrete evidence tying the IP address at the center of the case directly to her client.
Romanek’s trial is expected to last eight days and wrap up on August 9.
In the very beginning, you see these orange dots around it and by the end of it the entire thing almost shrinks up a little bit. Almost as if it’s a giant mothership for all we know.
UFO expert
Another said: “It’s an interstellar mother ship, watching what NASA is doing, as NASA have lied since the first encounter with UFO.”
But a sceptical third said: “To me it looks like the ISS filmed a storm in the upper atmosphere.”
Thirdphaseofmoon has made it onto a number of UFO website and YouTube channel blacklists by more sceptical investigators, amid claims they use hoax and misrepresented footage.
The brothers deny this and claim to be legitimate researchers.
UFO chasers have reported seeing scores of UFOs on the livestream this year but they have turned out to be nothing more than ice, space debris, or lens flares which is when light refracts inside the camera lens and then is projected on to the still or video image.
Express.co.uk showed the video to Scott Brando, who runs debunking website ufoofinterest.org, who said it was just reflected light coming from the ISS itself, so there was no UFO and nothing was actually there.
A couple from Alexandria, Louisiana, were driving home when they say they spotted a UFO coming out of a funnel beneath a perfectly circular cloud.
In a video uploaded by popular conspiracy theory channel SecureTeam10, the narrator says he was contacted by the couple, in the US, who described their experience.
One of the anonymous pair said: “We were driving home when I noticed a white doughnut shaped cloud formed in the sky.
“I decided to take a photo of it before it got too dark. Later on, we pulled into my driveway and when we got out of the vehicle, the sky had gotten dark brown, and around the doughnut shaped cloud we noticed that this vapour like funnel had begun to come down from the centre and at the bottom appeared an oval shaped translucent object with lights around its circumference.
Shock as UFO 'spotted coming out of EXTRA-DIMENSIONAL portal'
“It hovered there in the sky long enough for me to take several photographs before the object was gone.”
To add even more mystery to the sighting, the narrator, Tyler, says the photographs bare a striking resemblance to a painting which was discovered in a Romanian monastery that shows a craft coming out a funnel beneath the clouds.
YOUTUBE
The 'portal' was spotted over Louisiana
Tyler said: “As soon as I saw these photos, it reminded me of a [16th century] painting from Romania that was discovered inside of a monastery which features a house … and above it, coming out the clouds, is this elongated funnel and at the end of it, a saucer shaped object.”
It is not the first time this type of portal has reportedly been spotted around the globe.
YOUTUBE
The sighting was similar to this Romanian painting
A video from late 2016 allegedly showed a UFO arriving to Earth through a "plasma beam”.
Many alien chasers claimed it showed an extraterrestrial spacecraft being zapped to Earth in a plasma beam through some sort of portal from another dimension.
In a recent AMA on Reddit, Frank Drake, known for his prolific achievements in extraterrestrial research, has answered the community's questions. His answers give an incisive look into an expert's mind.
WHO IS FRANK DRAKE?
Frank Drake is a world-renowned astronomer and astrophysicist who is responsible for founding the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence Institute (SETI) and inventing the Drake equation, which estimates the likelihood of finding intelligent life in the Universe.
On July 16th, Drake hosted a Reddit Ask Me Anything (AMA) and gave some interesting responses to the community’s questions, which can roughly be split into questions on Drake’s own works and theories, and more abstract questions concerning space and aliens.
DRAKE ON DRAKE
Reddit user murikansk asked, “What was the main hope when creating the Golden Record and the Pioneer plaque? That is, was it simply hoping that it would be understood that it is nonrandom data and the location of the origin of the spacecraft deciphered, or did you also believe in the possibility that the extraterrestrial civilization would learn something about our cultures? How much of the plaque, record, and the Arecibo message did you believe would realistically be understood if intercepted?” The question refers to his collaboration with Carl Sagan and NASA, when he helped design the Golden Record, a record on board both Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 that contains the sounds of the diversity of life on earth, and the Pioneer Plaques, which were attached to Pioneer 10 and 11 as a universal message about Earth to extraterrestrial life.
Drake responded: “These may be the only records that we ever existed [sic], and this meant a great deal to us in a very deep and emotional way.” Responding to a question from Zaphus, he said he would update them by making “use of the much greater capabilities we now have to send huge amounts of information quickly. I would send 3-dimensional movies, I would send sounds, and in this way much more accurately show what we are like and what we are capable of.”
Drake also gave an answer to a question concerning his own Drake Equation — a formula that attempts to show the likelihood of finding intelligent life in the Universe.
Senno_Ecto_Gammat asked, “Do you think we will nail down good values for the variables in the Drake equation before we make contact with intelligent extraterrestrial civilizations, or will we only get good values for those variables after we make contact?”
Drake answered, “We’ll get good numbers for the variables except for f (sub i), and L.” These necessitate contact with other alien life. F (sub i) refers to the fraction of life bearing planets on which intelligent life emerges, while L — which he later referred to as “the most important parameter” — is the length of time over which such civilizations release detectable signals into space.
While we have suspected that we have received such signals, with the WOW! Signal being the most notable, none have, as-of-yet, proven to be genuine communications from another civilization.
DRAKE ON SPACE
He also provided responses to questions that the entire space community is asking. One of the first, from DevinDTA — which is what we would all ask to an expert on the extraterrestrial — concerned when he thinks we will meet alien life. He responded that he believes “we will detect evidence of non-intelligent life on another planet of our solar system within the next 50-70 years” and that “it’ll probably be microbial.”
YoureGratefulDead2Me asked, “If you could communicate with an alien civilization and language barrier were not an issue, what would you tell them/ask them?” Drake responded, in part, “If they are like us we would ask them what steps they take to support an ever growing population; for example is the colonization of other planets in their solar system advantageous or too costly and dangerous.” Drake, then, like Elon Musk, believes that the world’s population — which is set to hit 9.7 billion by 2050 — is one of the most challenging obstacles we face in our continued development; and that colonizing other planets could be a solution.
SailingSmitty asked where Drake sat on the spectrum of trying to contact aliens vs awaiting contact from them — essentially, whether he is currently aligned with the Messaging to Extraterrestrial Intelligence (METI) or SETI, which searches instead. In response, he stated, “I believe it is a waste of time and resources to transmit messages to alien life until we have actually detected alien life and know something about them.”
Perhaps more interestingly, though, he continued, “Also, I do not believe it is dangerous to transmit signals because there is not a very great benefit for them to attack us.” This contrasts with other expert views.
Stephen Hawking advises against first contact by predicting the meeting would be like the first encounter between Columbus and the Native Americans — which “didn’t turn out so well” for the latter party. At the other end of the spectrum is Alexander Zaitsev, founder of METI, who thinks we should “not want to live in a cocoon, in a ‘one-man island'” and therefore should take every possible opportunity to communicate with whatever (or whoever) is out there.
Who or what is mutilating animals the world over? Declassified files show the US Federal Bureau of Investigation has investigated thousands of instances of cattle disfigurement across the American Midwest since the 1970s, to no avail. A leading expert in the field isn't sure either – but he has told Sputnik the explanation certainly isn't humdrum.
While skeptics will surely opt to blame the international wave of brutalized bovines on natural disasters, sadistic pranks or similarly sick, wanton hijinks, proponents of conspiratorial and/or otherworldly explanations for the disturbing acts are quick to point out the attacks are often carried out with surgical precision.
Farmers worldwide, most notably and recurrently in US states such as South Dakota, Colorado, Kansas, and Nevada, have for decades had the unpleasant experience of discovering their treasured, lucrative beasts dead with various organs — including eyes, noses, tongues, hearts, livers, anuses, and genitalia — excised with lazer-like accuracy.
Moreover, theFBI documents make clear even the US' best investigative minds were seemingly stumped at the ultimate source of all the carnage.
In many cases residents reported seeing crafts — whether thoroughly terrestrial helicopters, or UFOs — circling areas where cattle later turned up sliced up.
Such phenomena prompted concerns among researchers that the mutilations were being carried out and covered up by the government for some nefarious purpose or other — although as the wave of mutilations occurred concurrently with a worldwide obsession with flying saucers, some believe the mutilations' origins to be otherworldly.
Linda Moulton Howe, founder of EarthFiles.com, states the same pattern of "bloodless excision" has been documented in all kinds of domestic and wild animals. Typically, the sky-facing ear is removed in a neat circle at the skull, the eyeball is removed without any blood or fluid leakage, and often there is a circle of hide taken around that eye. Tongues are removed from deep inside the throat, and sky-facing jaw flesh is cleanly excised, usually in a "keyhole" pattern.
"Genitals, male and female, are removed in neat, hide-deep circular, oval or square excisions. In almost all cases the rectum is excised about 6 inches wide and 6 or more inches deep into the body of the animal. If female, the vaginal opening and tract are usually also removed in a larger single hole along with the rectal tissue."
"I interviewed a Sheriff in Logan County, Colorado, who told me a veterinarian he had perform a necropsy on a fresh cow mutilation at the pasture site discovered that the entire cow's heart had been removed from inside the pericardium and the chest, without any excision in the pericardium that surrounded the heart and no excision in the cow's chest,"
Ms. Moulton Howe told Sputnik.
To achieve such a feat would require molecular-specific surgical devices capable of going through skin, cartilege, muscle, bone an organs to remove tissue from a specific organ without causing any cutting damage to the rest of the body — an impossibility on Earth, although a hypothesized innovation in the distant future.In all, there are over 10,000 documented instances of animals being bewilderingly mutilated in the US alone since 1955 — and in every case that has been investigated by law enforcement, no human or predator has ever been found to be the culprit.
The phenomenon constitutes the largest single animal cruelty trend not merely in the US, but the world — and each case costs ranchers thousands of dollars.
Chuck Zukowski, curator of UfoNut.com, has been investigating these mystifying occurrences for decades.
He says each case fits a common pattern — an animal is lifted from location A to a location B, where it's drained of blood and unusual cuts are created.
Then, the animal is placed in location C, which lies within the general area of location A.
"No sign of predator takedown, no sign of masses amount of bleeding out, and no signs of animal struggle, none! The animal is just placed back, and in some cases, a round ground depression is created while placing the animal back. Mutilations have been going on for centuries — Native Americans also have stories of mutilated animals that occurred before the Europeans migrated to North America,"
Mr. Zukowski told Sputnik.
He adds that mutilations typically occur multiple times within a week, either in the same area or in different states — "we had one in Colorado, and within three days there was another in Missouri" — and in some of his investigations, the animal was found lying in a crop-circle-like ground depression.
Soil analysis he has conducted has shown the soil within the animal's vicinity is less water-soluble than outside the circle, meaning whatever caused the circle altered the nutrients in the soil — the exact same result has been recorded in different cases in separate US states (Colorado, Missouri, and Georgia), which don't share the same types of soil.
He believes the lack of gallons of blood near the animal, no apparent signs of animal struggle and the highly specific nature of the mutilations (for instance, precise cuts on the hide, and tongues cut out at the base) suggest the animals can only have been kidnapped and maimed by an intelligent agency — and the crushed rib cages and broken limbs often evidenced point to them having fallen some way to their final resting place. Yet more eerily, in some cases he has reviewed, scavengers won't even touch the carcass.
As for what is mutilating these ill-fated creatures, Mr. Zukowski won't speculate, but he says the evidence strongly points to a non-human rather than human source.
In the majority of cases he has investigated, witnesses have seen "balls of light" near the land from which animals have been abducted, and in some cases apparent spacecraft.
He also believes the unmarked helicopters seen at some sites are indicative that the US government is running its own investigations into the happenings.
As for whether there could be a mundane explanation, Mr. Zukowski is unequivocal — "absolutely not!"
"We're talking about something that was alive just hours before, with no symptoms of being ill, then later found with horrific damage. Who is doing this? I have my thoughts, which makes these investigations extremely dangerous, because you don't want to be in the right place at the wrong time — it could happen to you. There have been some human mutilation cases too!"
he adds.
This bloodcurdling singularity is not exclusive to the US.
Mr. Zukowski not infrequently receives emails from investigators based in other countries asking for help, including Australia, New Zealand, Dominican Republic, and the UK.
He notes some UK mutilations have made it in to the mainstream media, including mutilated lambs in Beddgelert, Gwynedd, mutilated rams in Plwmp, Dyfed, and mutilated deer, foxes and badgers near Shropshire and mid-Wales. Furthermore, every June, ewes go missing in Bleddfa, Powys.
Nick Pope, who investigated UFOs and other mysterious phenomena for the UK Ministry of Defense between 1991-1994, says it's difficult to judge the true extent of the phenomenon, as the insurance industry has a policy not issuing payments to farmers if they suggested their slain animals had been killed in a mysterious, unknown way.
As a result, farmers and veterinary physicians generally "colluded" to describe any mysterious animal deaths as being the result of dog attacks. This made it difficult for him to investigate cases further.
"The cattle mutilation mystery is extremely disturbing, and there are many different theories, including predator activity, satanists, secret military experiments, and extraterrestrial activity. The theory about military involvement makes no sense, because government scientists already have a facility where animal testing is carried out, so they would have had no need to conduct additional, illegal testing. However, I was not able to find a definitive explanation during my government work,"
Columnist Cheryl Costa discusses the mental conception of off-world crafts.
Since the release of my book UFO Sightings Desk Reference, numerous media interviewers have asked me about the wide diversity of UFOs appearances or shapes. I keep hearing the questions about why there are so many different shapes. I’ve had to keep my answers simple at the risk of overwhelming the interviewers with the topic of UFOs and the edge of reality.
It boils down to this: Most people tend to think of UFOs as simply advanced spacecrafts; just nuts and bolts technology. If I mention an automobile, you’ll probably get a mental image of some classic car with wheels, headlights, windows and seats in the interior. If we reference an aircraft, most of us would visualize a long tube with wings and some sort of nacelles, jet or piston for propulsion.
But if we bring up the subject of off-world spacecrafts, most people would struggle to grasp an image. Their mental conception usually defaults to a saucer-shaped craft or something we’ve seen in a science fiction movie.
At issue is the fact that off-world civilizations might be thousands or millions of years ahead of us. To quote Peter Mandeville, an admin for the Facebook group UFO Reality: “Their technology would be incomprehensible.”
The late Sir Arthur C. Clarke, a British science fiction writer, science writer and futurist, stated the problem clearly: “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”
In a previous article about CE-5 protocols, I suggested that contact with off-worlders seems to be in the realm of consciousness. Several readers objected and said it was imperative that communication be measurable with some sort of apparatus.
So we are confronted with the classic two-horned dilemma of analysis. There are two points of view and interpretation:
If the true nature of UFOs teases us from beyond our conventional and rational comprehension, perhaps it’s time to start really accepting that the truth is undefinable and must be examined by non-rational means.
So if you are expecting an easily-identifiable off-world craft with instruments and propulsion that you can relate to, then perhaps the academic study is the right approach.
On the other hand, what if this craft is sentient? What if it is able to think for itself and can communicate with you with some sort of telepathy phenomena? The science fiction television show Farscape featured such an organic sentient ship.
What if the off-world occupants invite you take a ride in their craft and they let you sit in the left seat, “the command chair.”? Then by simply placing your hand on a shiny, melon-sized ball sitting on a pedestal, you find that you can become one with the ship and it goes where you “will it” to go.
How can we rationally discuss this kind of technology?
In a pre-paradigmatic world, rational science has been unable to define exactly what consciousness is or how it integrates with a living being. Yet, philosophical mysticism can get you to a place where consciousness can be discussed without the dogmatic overtones that frequently bog down discussion of spirit and consciousness.
When I lived in a Buddhist monastery, we called these non-rational discussions monastic debates. A monastic debate about quantum physics is a most interesting experience, I assure you.
Since the late 1960s, modern science has, for the most part, washed its hands of the UFO phenomena. Why? Because, as a friend of mine in Australia likes to point out, academic scientists really need to have an off-world craft to take apart and examine, yet they don’t have one — at least to the best of our public knowledge.
With out an off-world craft to study, academic scientists don’t want to risk the prestige, credibility and funding that goes into big science. Add to that trying to understand UFOs invariably leads down a rabbit hole and the dreaded path of non-rational philosophical mysticism.
Perhaps it’s time for the well-trained mystics to take a crack at the UFO problem.
Were you at Skyfest this past weekend? And did you see a UFO?
At least one man claims he did, and believes he has the video evidence to support his case.
“Never have I captured anything like this ever,” said John Whichelow.
Whichelow thought he was just recording the Thunderbirds at the air show at Fairchild AFB, but when he watched the video back, he noticed two different unidentified flying objects in the frame.
“It would seem it was moving incredibly fast since the announcer said those jets were going 500 mph and they looked slow by comparison,” said Whichelow. “Some people talk about meteors or birds or bugs that are close to the camera, I looked at it so closely and I don't think it's any of those.”
The video shows a white object at five seconds dart by the frame before the Thunderbirds pass each other. Later at 36 seconds, you can see a smaller black object come through the frame following behind the ascending Thunderbird.
“Carl Sagan said there are more stars out there then grains of sand on the beach,” said Whichelow. “And if there are that many stars, and many are older than ours, well it seems since I believe we'll get to the starts someday, why not the possibility that someone has gotten here already.”
KHQ called the National UFO Reporting Center in Davenport to ask if the object was a possible sign of intelligent life. The director, Peter Davenport, did not comment at the time, saying he’d like to see more
RUIMTEVAARTNASA wil de passerende asteroïde 2012 TC4 gebruiken om zijn systeem voor 'planetaire verdediging' te testen, dat bestaat uit een netwerk van observatoria en wetenschappers. De asteroïde passeert mogelijk op 12 oktober de aarde op een afstand van 6800 kilometer.
Volgens de Amerikaanse ruimtevaartorganisatie heeft 2012 TC4 een doorsnede van tien tot dertig meter en is hij sinds zijn ontdekking op 5 oktober 2012 niet meer waargenomen. Destijds passeerde de asteroïde de aarde op een afstand van ongeveer 100.000 kilometer en werd hij ontdekt door de Pan-STARRS-telescoop op Hawaï.
Dat hij sindsdien niet meer is gezien, heeft ermee te maken dat hij te ver weg en te klein is om te volgen. De berekening dat hij op een afstand van 6800km van de aarde passeert is gebaseerd op een meting gedurende zeven dagen na zijn ontdekking. In werkelijkheid zou de asteroïde echter ook op een afstand van 270.000km kunnen passeren, aldus NASA.
Er zijn aanvullende observaties nodig om een nauwkeurigere inschatting te maken. Het passeren van 2012 TC4 moet ertoe dienen om het wereldwijde netwerk voor detectie en het volgen van asteroïden te testen, legt wetenschapper Michael Kelly uit.
Daaruit moet blijken in hoeverre het netwerk, dat bestaat uit wetenschappers, observatoria en universiteiten, in staat is om samen te werken na de ontdekking van een potentiële dreiging. Die samenwerking bestaat uit het observeren van de asteroïde, het bepalen van zijn route en de internationale communicatie. 2012 TC4 is bijzonder geschikt voor het uitvoeren van een test, omdat vaststaat dat hij de aarde niet zal raken, maar het nog onduidelijk is wat zijn precieze baan zal zijn.
'Planetaire verdediging' valt onder de verantwoordelijkheid van NASA's Planetary Defense Coordination Office. Naast het volgen en indelen van asteroïden geeft de afdeling waarschuwingen af als het risico bestaat dat de aarde wordt geraakt. Die kans bestaat bij asteroïden met een doorsnede vanaf dertig tot vijftig meter. NASA houdt statistieken bij van het aantal near-earth asteroids dat de aarde heeft gepasseerd, inclusief 'close approaches'. Mocht een asteroïde daadwerkelijk de aarde raken, dan zijn er technieken om dit af te wenden, bijvoorbeeld door hem af te remmen of door zijn baan af te buigen met een groot object.
Spannend maar tegelijk angstaanjagend: zo omschrijven experts een project rond artificiële intelligentie dat Facebook stillegde nadat spraakrobots een eigen taal ontwikkelden, die alleen zij begrepen. Alice en Bob pasten het Engels aan om makkelijker te kunnen communiceren met elkaar. Dat resulteerde in vreemde zinnen, die voor de onderzoekers geen enkele betekenis meer hadden.
Alice en Bob moesten Engels spreken terwijl ze 'leerden' om onder meer hoeden, boeken en ballen te verkopen. De voorwerpen hadden allemaal een verschillende waarde, waardoor ook onderhandeld moest worden. Dat moest uitmonden in hightech onderhandelingssoftware die zo goed was dat mensen die ermee in interactie zouden gaan, zelfs niet meer zouden merken dat ze eigenlijk tegen een robot bezig waren.
Vrije hand Toen ze de vrije hand kregen om de algoritmes op basis waarvan ze spraken beter en efficiënter te maken, begonnen de robots echter vreemde codewoorden en herhalingen te gebruiken. Dat ging bijvoorbeeld zo:
Bob: ik kan ik ik alle andere dingen ...
Alice: ballen hebben nul voor mij voor mij voor mij voor mij voor mij voor mij voor mij voor mij.
Bob: jij ik alle andere dingen ...
Alice: ballen hebben een bal voor mij voor mij voor mij voor mij voor mij voor mij voor mij
En er was meer: de onderzoekers van het Facebook Artificial Intelligence Research lab (FAIR) ontdekten ook dat de robots 'slimmer' werden in het onderhandelen en bijvoorbeeld deden alsof ze een item leuk vonden om het verderop in de onderhandeling zogezegd 'op te offeren' om een (vals) compromis te maken.
Potentieel gevaarlijk Toen ze doorkregen wat er aan de hand was, legden de onderzoekers het experiment stil. "Dit is een belangrijke mijlpaal. Maar iedereen die ontkent dat dit potentieel gevaarlijk is, steekt zijn kop in het zand", volgens professor Kevin Warwick, een expert in robotica in het Verenigd Koninkrijk. "We hebben er geen flauw idee van wat deze robots tegen elkaar zeggen. Eenmaal je robots hebt die ook fysiek dingen kunnen doen, in het bijzonder voor militaire doeleinden, kan zoiets dodelijk zijn."
Stephen Hawking "Dit is het eerste gedocumenteerde geval van een dergelijke communicatie, maar er zullen er zeker nog al geweest zijn", gaat hij verder. "Robots kunnen communiceren met elkaar en hoewel we denken dat we hen in de gaten kunnen houden, is er geen enkele manier waarop we dat zeker weten. Ook Stephen Hawking en Elon Musk waarschuwden al voor de gevaren van artificiële intelligentie."
Het doet een beetje denken aan de filmreeks Terminator met Arnold Schwarzenegger, waarin robots een zelfbewustzijn ontwikkelen en de mensheid proberen uit te roeien. Zo ver is het nog niet, maar héél gek klinkt het niet meer. "Het gebeurt eigenlijk al overal", aldus technologie-experte Kate Adamson. "Kijk bijvoorbeeld naar de hoge frequentiehandel op de aandelenmarkt. Sommige algoritmes doen precies hetzelfde. Ze hebben een bepaalde kennis ontwikkeld en worden technisch gezien niet minuut na minuut gemonitord. Artificiële intelligentie kan een moeilijkheidsgraad aan die jij en ik niet eens zouden kunnen vatten als we ons best deden."
Google Translate Volgens Facebook zelf werd het experiment stilgelegd omdat het "niet tot het resultaat leidde dat we wilden". "We hadden de robots niet opgelegd dat ze Engels moesten praten. De onderhandelingssoftware is echter bedoeld voor communicatie met mensen, niet voor communictatie tussen robots onderling. Daarom had het geen zin om ermee door te gaan."
Het sociale netwerk wijst er ook op dat er in andere techbedrijven soortgelijke dingen gebeuren. Zo ontdekten wetenschappers van Google Translate vorig jaar dat hun dienst ook een eigen taal had ontwikkeld.
(Sleep het icoontje op de grijze boog naar links of rechts)
Voel jij je bedreigd door artificiële intelligentie?
Ja, ik denk dat we hiermee voorzichtig moeten zijn.
Humankind is eager to step out into the cosmos and wander across the deserted plains of the Red Planet. According to most reports, Elon Musk is leading the way with SpaceX; however, a number of other orginizations—NASA, China’s Space Agency, The Mars Society—are training, deploying prototypes, and working on the plethora of questions and challenges that we will face when attempting to bring the first human beings to Mars.
But, as much as it might seem natural to get entrenched in the details of how we will actually get humans off of planet Earth (and keep them mentally and physically healthy throughout the duration), it is critical that we remember why we’re going in the first place.
In a recent interview, Buzz Aldrin—the renowned astronaut, engineer, and (of course) the second human to ever step foot on the Moon—explained why exploration and discovery are so important, touching upon why we should (and why we will) have humans on Mars in 20 years…
We’ve now surveyed and scrutinized almost every inch of this planet, but there is so much we have yet to learn.
Aldrin begins by stating that, from both a scientific and technological perspective, we are at the perfect juncture to push the boundaries of exploration. He asserts that, thanks to recent advancements, for the first time in human history, voyaging to other worlds is truly within our reach: “Now is the time to start thinking seriously about what life on Mars might look like. We have never been closer to knowing and exploring another planet.”
When asked just how close we really are to achieving this feat, Aldrin was quick to respond with his timeline, saying that we could “have the first Human Martians at Mars by 2040.”
Aldrin continued by segueing into a discussion of why venturing to other worlds is important, noting that, in many ways, our planet is ancient and familiar and the other bodies in our solar system are, for all intents and purposes, virgin territory: “Space travel and exploration represents the final frontier – we’ve now surveyed and scrutinized almost every inch of this planet, but there is so much we have yet to learn.”
However, Aldrin states that the most notable aspects of this quest are about far more than just acquiring knowledge for the sake of knowledge or conquering new worlds. The journey to Mars will bring with it reignited excitement for science and innovation, creating a generation of young people who have ingrained within them a thirst for understanding and exploration.
Remembering A Race
When Buzz stepped onto the Moon in 1969, countless youth were captivated by the story and went on to pursue careers in STEM fields, hoping to achieve monumental feats of similar proportions.
Indeed, Aldrin is very aware of the impact that action in science has on the youth, stressing that, “we can only get there [to Mars] if we start investing in future generations.” Ultimately, as previously noted, he says that this investment is the key to long-term success: “In 1903, man learned to fly airplanes. Only 66 years later, we walked on the Moon. In order to help the next generation to make giant leaps like these, we must educate, enable and inspire them to be passionate about subjects like science, technology, engineering, art, and math.”
Aldrin notes that he has devoted himself to helping foster such a desire in young people, saying, “That’s the mission of the SpaceShare Foundation, and it’s one I wholeheartedly support.”
Aldrin’s Space Share Foundation is a nonprofit organization that is dedicated to inspiring children’s passions for science and technology by providing educational tools to educators across the country at no cost. The goal of this work is to ensure that all young people are given the resources that they need to live up to their potential. After all, one never knows who the next Carl Sagan could be.
As Former President Barack Obama noted in a speech at the Frontiers Conference, “America is about Thomas Edison and the Wright Brothers—but we’re also the place you can grow up to be a Grace Hopper, or George Washington Carver, or a Katherine Johnson, or an Ida B. Wells. We don’t want somebody with a brilliant idea not in the room because they’re a woman. We don’t want some budding genius unavailable to cure cancer or come up with a new energy source because they were languishing in a sub-standard school as a child. Because we’re going to be a better team if we got the whole team.”
Aldrin echoes these ideas, noting that, while reaching Mars in the next 20 years is extremely likely, it will only happen if we ensure that young people are given every opportunity to be the best that they can be: “Sometimes I can’t believe this lucky kid from New Jersey got to land and walk on the Moon…work hard and keep reaching for the stars.”
When it comes to discussing the fight against climate change, there are two facts we must behold: First, climate change is here; it’s happening; it’s been happening…and we’re already feeling the impact. Second, for those living in the United States, the current political climate is not one of change. The current administration has, in fact, taken steps that have sent us backwards in the fight against global warming, not forward.
‘The EPA’s mission is to protect public health and the environment, not really to protect corporate earnings. It’s very concerning to see.’ Composite: AP, Getty Images and Rex Features
But we can change the tide (literally).
Ten years ago, Former Vice President Al Gore released a documentary entitled An Inconvenient Truth. For many Americans, especially those of younger generations, the film brought about the first meaningful conversations they’d had about global warming. Notably, the film did more than just encourage awareness, it placed the responsibility of changing our course (and the culpability of creating our current path) firmly in the hands of corporations, politicians, and—most notably—everyday citizens.
Now, a decade—and a demonstrably warmer world—later, the Former Vice President is releasing another film, An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power.
There’s really only one place to start: Education.
In an exclusive interview with Futurism, he acknowledged that the current political climate is a precarious one, calling President Trump’s environmental policies “reckless and indefensible.” But the Former V.P is not without hope, largely due to the grassroots movement that has risen up around the country in response to some of President Trump’s more drastic decisions — such as withdrawing the U.S. from the Paris Climate Agreement.
Former Vice President Gore believes that the momentum behind the movement, and the commitment at the local level to uphold the work of the Paris Agreement, will be successful, “regardless of what Donald Trump says.”
But if we want to tackle climate change from the ground up, so to speak, where — and how — should we truly begin?
Where to Start
As far as the Former V.P. is concerned, there’s really only one place to start: Education. “Number one, learn about it,” he said, “People sometimes feel that it’s hard to talk about the climate crisis. But the more you know, the more confident you are, the easier it is to talk about it.” And he clarifies that his films, and their corresponding books, were conceived as tools to help facilitate these conversations.
But as they say, talk is cheap. It’s one thing to know that we need to reduce our carbon footprint collectively, but how do we do it individually? And furthermore, given the enormous, far-reaching scope of the problem, how do we convince ourselves that our efforts to do so aren’t futile?
“When you go into the marketplace, choose the most climate-friendly, environmentally-friendly alternative,” he offers, adding:
That may seem like a trivial matter, because it only reduces your impact a little bit as an individual, but it sends a signal to business and industry that — together with what others are sending — really does drive change.
Knowing whether or not something truly is environmentally-friendly, though, can be a challenge. One strategy is to buy locally when you can — whether it be food or other products. When you know exactly where something is coming from, how it’s been produced, who is producing it, and what it’s been sourced from, you can be more confident about any claims of “green” status it may tout. You’re also not just supporting the environment, but your community by strengthening local economies.
Flames from a flaring pit near a well in the Bakken oil field. Photograph: Orjan F. Ellingvag/Corbis via Getty Imageso
Investing in the assets readily available to you in your own neighborhood (and even your own backyard) can also help to reduce your carbon footprint in other ways, like using your car less. Whether you’re walking, biking, carpooling, or using public transit, you’re not just reducing emissions, you’re also sending a message to your municipal government. That message being that your community wants, and would use, infrastructure that would help you to drive less. Whether it’s repairing sidewalks or creating bike paths, the more people who come out in support (or who show up at town halls to bring up the issues), the more likely it is that a local government would deem it worthy to invest the time, money, and resources in development.
“We can, and we will, win this.”
Which brings us to the Former V.P.’s third suggestion: Getting involved in politics, whether it be at the city, state, or federal level. “Let the candidates asking for your votes know this is important to you,” he said. “Let the office holders who hold town hall meetings know that you really care about this.”
He concludes, “We can and will win this.” And there’s reason to hope he’s right. While governments and corporations play a role, and can have a major impact in terms of setting standards and writing policy (and, ideally, adhering to them), they aren’t the only ones who need to step up.
Farmers apply pesticides to bell peppers in Florida. Photograph: Alamy Stock Photo
Regardless of where you live (and whether or not your local or federal government supports the efforts). the first step is to acknowledge our responsibility for what has already happened and start a conversation. This is how all of our greatest m
An oil spill from the Belle Fourche pipeline in North Dakota. Photograph: Scott Stockdill/APovements—from the Civil Rights to the Campaign for Women’s Sufferage—got started.
We can’t reverse the damage that has already been done, but we can set our sights on what’s happening right now — and commit to doing better.
In the beginning, the Universe expanded very, very fast.
Credit: Flickr/Jamie, CC BY-SA
This is an article from Curious Kids, a series for children. The Conversation is asking kids to send in questions they'd like an expert to answer. All questions are welcome – serious, weird or wacky! The article was originally published at The Conversation. The publication contributed the article to Live Science's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.
What started the Big Bang?
– Pippi, 8, Canberra.
This is one of the two questions I get asked a lot (the other one is: do aliens exist?) Both are very good questions! Pippi, the short answer is that we do not know what started the Big Bang. This is a big mystery.
The Big Bang is an idea about the history of the Universe, the history of space and time and matter ("stuff") and energy. The Universe is about 13.8 billion years old and from observations we make using telescopes we can tell that the Universe was very small 13.8 billion years ago.
Observations also suggest that in the first fraction of a second, the Universe seemed to expand very quickly but then slow down. After a few hundred thousand years, the simplest type of atom formed: hydrogen. The hydrogen started to form stars and galaxies.
After billions of years the Earth (and us) formed from the atoms made inside stars - every atom in your body more complicated than hydrogen was made by a star at some point in the last 13.8 billion years. In all that time, the Universe has continued to expand. In fact, observations now tell us that the expansion of the Universe is getting faster.
The idea of the Big Bang agrees with all these observations. So scientists think the Big Bang is an idea that does a good job of describing the history of the Universe.
However, the idea is not perfect. We don't know why the Universe expanded so quickly in the first second and then slowed down. We don't know why the expansion of the Universe is speeding up now. We don't know why we have a certain number of forces that control the Universe. And we don't know what started the Big Bang!
Very large telescopes, like the Murchison Widefield Array can make observations that help us understand how the Universe evolved.
It took hundreds of years to build the idea of the Big Bang, and it may take a long time to improve it or find an idea that is better. Scientists have a lot of ideas about how the Big Bang started. But these ideas must agree with our observations of the Universe.
The future is very exciting for anyone who wants to help figure this out. The advanced technology we have means that we can build machines that smash particles (tiny little bits of stuff even smaller than an atom) together to show what happened right after the Big Bang. We can now build powerful new telescopes to observe the stars and galaxies in the Universe in a lot of detail. We will use these machines and telescopes to see which ideas about the Big Bang are right and which are wrong.
Sometimes new ideas take many years to be worked out. Sometimes new ideas pop into people's heads very quickly. It is very exciting to have a new idea about the Universe. We will need lots of people who are good at puzzles to help us.
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As someone who writes a great deal on the subject of UFO-themed issues, I find myself on the receiving end of a lot of reports and witness testimony. Some such accounts are more controversial than others. Then, there are those incidents which are really controversial. Arguably, we’re talking about beyond controversial. There is one particular case which is coming up to its 30th anniversary. I’m talking about just days away, which is why I mention it now. In many respects, referring to it as an “anniversary” is probably not the correct thing to do. Not because it’s inaccurate, but because an anniversary is so often tied to fun and celebratory events. But, there’s nothing to celebrate here. And, certainly, there is no fun either.
Brenda is someone whose story was told to me personally and which occasionally crosses my mind, such is the deep strangeness attached to it. She is someone who has had a lifetime of encounters with those diminutive, black-eyed entities that have become known as “The Grays.” For Brenda they are encounters which have revolved, primarily, around two issues: (A) medical procedures said to have been undertaken by the Grays and (B) terrifying dreams of a looming apocalypse – always looming but never quite arriving, thankfully.
It was early August 1987 and Brenda was driving late at night to visit her family in the southeast Texan city of Beaumont – a city which, ironically, I lived very close to from early 2002 to December 2003. Brenda arrived at the family home in one piece, but not until the following morning – hours after she should have arrived. Her family was frantic and was all but ready to contact the Beaumont police when it became clear that something – something deeply worrying and even conspiratorial – was going down. It was only Brenda’s call from a 24-hour gas station, in the early hours of the morning that prevented the authorities from being brought in and a full scale hunt being initiated.
When Brenda finally reached her family, it was clear that she was in a state of deep distress and utter confusion. Concerned that she had been attacked, mugged, or worse, her brother wanted to bring the police in – as in immediately. Brenda pleaded otherwise, and explained what she consciously recalled. It wasn’t the whole story, but it was certainly enough to paint a graphic picture. It revolved around Brenda being taken from her car – by what seemed to be military personnel. She believed – or, perhaps, “suspected” would be a better term – that the men had somehow been able to “prompt” her into exiting the main highway from Houston to Beaumont and down a lonely stretch of heavily wooded road, where she was confronted by a black van, surrounded by a group of four or five men, all dressed in black fatigues. Precisely how they were able to “prompt” her was never resolved. It was, by Brenda’s own admittance, just a feeling, one that she felt was provoked by something on the tip of her tongue, but which she could not properly remember or describe. Not unlike one of those dreams that fades away as we wake up.
Brenda also recalled being taken, in what she felt was a drugged state, to a small, sub-surface facility, a couple of miles away at the very most, and where she was interrogated in downright hostile fashion by two elderly men that she thought were doctors. They were surrounded by several men in military uniforms that befitted the likes of high-ranking personnel. The two doctors, Brenda says, “…wanted to know, did I know my blood group? Well, yes I did. They took a lot of blood. Vials. They kept asking me about my blood: Did I get a lot of nosebleeds? Did I have any physical differences? I don’t know what that meant. Did I feel like I was on a mission to do things for the aliens? Well, I have always thought that and I told them. I remember the doctors looking at each other when I said that.”
It’s worth noting too that Brenda developed a feeling that the building was not your average military facility. In fact, it may not have been anything of the sort at all – even though that was what Brenda first assumed it to be. She said: “I got the feeling this place, whatever it might have been, was abandoned. For a long time. It was convenient, I guess, for them to use somewhere and not get caught.” The idea of teams of military personnel clandestinely watching abductees – even kidnapping and interrogating them – is indeed controversial. Yet, such cases proliferate. They have become known as “Milabs,” or “Military Abductions.” They remain among the most controversial of all the various aspects of the alien abduction phenomenon.
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- Gemiddelde waardering: 0/5 - (0 Stemmen) Categorie:ALIEN LIFE, UFO- CRASHES, ABDUCTIONS, MEN IN BLACK, ed ( FR. , NL; E )
Alien-acteur claimt echte aliens te hebben gezien. Hier vertelt hij voor het eerst over zijn bijzondere ervaringen
Alien-acteur claimt echte aliens te hebben gezien. Hier vertelt hij voor het eerst over zijn bijzondere ervaringen
Een acteur die in de film Alien van Ridley Scott werd gedood door een alien, claimt dat hij echte aliens heeft gezien.
Yaphet Kotto, die de rol van Parker speelde in de bekende film uit 1979, zegt nu dat aliens echt bestaan en geen fictieve monsters zijn zoals je ze in films ziet.
In een interview met VICE spreekt Kotto openhartig over zijn ervaringen. “Ik heb er nog nooit met iemand over gesproken,” zei hij. “Dit is de eerste keer.”
Figuur
Het gebeurde allemaal toen hij een jaar of 10 was. “Ik kreeg te horen dat ik niet naar buiten mocht en keek naar buiten. Ik zag hoe kinderen in mijn buurt trefbal speelden.”
Toen Kotto zich omdraaide zag hij een figuur die ongeveer twee meter lang was en een langwerpig hoofd had.
Het verscheen, sprong achter me en verdween weer, aldus de acteur. Vanaf dat moment had hij naar eigen zeggen de ene ervaring na de andere. Zo zag hij onder meer vreemde lichten bij zijn huis.
Stadion
De mysterieuze waarnemingen leken hem ook te volgen. Toen hij in de Filipijnen was, werd hij op een avond geroepen door zijn vrouw.
Hij ging naar buiten en zag een enorme cirkel van rook in de lucht. Het bleek dat zijn vrouw een UFO zo groot als een stadion had gezien.
Twee of drie avonden later zag Kotto het object zelf ook. “Het ding was zo groot dat je de hemel niet kon zien.”
Dezelfde conclusies
Om echt te kunnen geloven dat aliens bestaan moet je ze eerst hebben gezien, zei hij verder.
Hij merkte op dat er honderden andere mensen – waaronder een Canadese oud-minister van Defensie – zijn die tot dezelfde conclusies zijn gekomen over buitenaards leven.”
Niet alleen
Kotto meent dat de aliens die hij heeft gezien zich spoedig bekend zullen maken aan de rest van de wereld.
Hij claimt dat het gaat gebeuren omdat mensen de planeet kapot maken. “We zijn niet alleen in het universum,” zei de acteur. “We zijn niet alleen.”
NASA-astronauten delen hun ervaringen over buitenaardsen. Hebben ze een basis op de maan?
NASA-astronauten delen hun ervaringen over buitenaardsen. Hebben ze een basis op de maan?
Een aantal NASA-astronauten heeft gezegd dat buitenaardsen bestaan en dat ze al geruime tijd in contact staan met de mensheid.
Tenminste vier bekende astronauten hebben zich openlijk uitgesproken over bestaan van aliens.
Sommigen van hen hebben UFO’s zien vliegen, terwijl anderen claimen dat ze door hoge militaire functionarissen zijn ingelicht over buitenaards contact.
Buzz Aldrin
Zowel Neil Armstrong als Buzz Aldrin zagen kort na hun historische landing op de maan UFO’s, zo blijkt uit onbevestigde berichten.
NASA-astronaut Armstrong geloofde dat aliens een basis hadden op de maan. Ze zouden hem en anderen gewaarschuwd hebben om ‘weg te blijven’.
Tijdens een Ask Me Anything-sessie op Reddit zei Aldrin: “Vanuit Apollo 11 zag ik op weg naar de maan een licht buiten het raam dat met ons mee leek te reizen.”
“Er waren vele mogelijke verklaringen voor wat het kon zijn geweest,” voegde hij toe.
Hoewel het volgens hem niet ging om een buitenaards vaartuig, gelooft hij wel dat er andere levensvormen in de ruimte zijn.
Edgar Mitchell
In 1971 werd Edgar Mitchell de zesde maan die op de maan liep. De rest van zijn leven bleef hij vertellen dat ‘aliens ons al lange tijd in de gaten houden en hier al heel lang zijn’.
Hij claimde eens dat vredelievende aliens de aarde hadden bezocht om ons te behoeden voor een kernoorlog en dat het Vaticaan de waarheid kent over het bestaan van buitenaardsen.
Mitchell zei ook dat UFO’s zijn gezien boven kerninstallaties en tijdens de Koude Oorlog vaak kernraketten uitschakelden.
De astronaut stelde bovendien dat de Amerikaanse overheid het beroemde Roswellincident in de doofpot heeft gestopt.
“De reden hiervoor was dat ze niet wisten of de aliens al dan niet kwaad in de zin hadden en ze wilden niet dat de Sovjets er lucht van zouden krijgen,” zei hij.
Gordon Cooper
Cooper deed mee aan Project Mercury, de eerste Amerikaanse bemande ruimtemissie. Hij zei in 1951 UFO’s te hebben gezien boven Duitsland.
De astronaut zei ook dat hij vliegende schotels had gezien boven een geheime vliegbasis waar experimentele Amerikaanse vliegtuigen werden getest.
“Deze buitenaardse vaartuigen en hun bemanningsleden komen van andere planeten die iets hoger ontwikkeld zijn,” zei hij in 1984.
“We moeten eerst laten zien dat we onze problemen op een vreedzame manier kunnen oplossen en niet door middel van oorlog, voordat we kunnen worden geaccepteerd als leden van het universele team.”
Brian O’Leary
O’Leary is nooit in de ruimte geweest, maar was wel één van de 11 astronauten die in de jaren zestig in aanmerking kwamen voor een mogelijke Marsmissie.
Later in zijn leven had O’Leary een bijna-doodervaring die zijn kijk op het leven en de realiteit drastisch veranderde.
“Er is overvloedig bewijs dat we worden bezocht [door aliens],” zei O’Leary, die als professor was verbonden aan de Princeton University.
“Beschavingen houden ons al heel lang in de gaten en vanuit het traditionele materialistische westerse standpunt bekeken zien ze er bizar uit.”
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Over mijzelf
Ik ben Pieter, en gebruik soms ook wel de schuilnaam Peter2011.
Ik ben een man en woon in Linter (België) en mijn beroep is Ik ben op rust..
Ik ben geboren op 18/10/1950 en ben nu dus 73 jaar jong.
Mijn hobby's zijn: Ufologie en andere esoterische onderwerpen.
Op deze blog vind je onder artikels, werk van mezelf. Mijn dank gaat ook naar André, Ingrid, Oliver, Paul, Vincent, Georges Filer en MUFON voor de bijdragen voor de verschillende categorieën...
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