Generational Dynamics World View News

[John]

** 04-Jun-2021 World View: Kidney function

Well, I've just returned from the hospital for the second time in
three days for two different reasons. They told me that my kidney
function was falling, and that they wanted me to remain in the
hospital for the weekend "under observation," but I told them that I
wanted to go home, but I promised that if I have fever or chills or
anything, then I would call an ambulance and go right back. They made
a big deal about this:

> "You are leaving against medical advice. By leaving
> before completing further testing and treatment there is risk your
> condition could become worse. This worsening condition could lead
> to increased pain, disability or even death. You were made aware
> of these risks before discharge and indicated that you understood
> these risks."

So they let me go. Whew! Will I survive the weekend? Your guess is
as good as mine.

[John]

** 04-Jun-2021 World View: UFOs and Alien spaceships

> Pentagon report claims that alleged UFOs may in fact be secret
> hypersonic weapons being tested by China and/or Russia

> https://www.the-sun.com/news/3014192/uk ... -aircraft/

> Dude, it's The Sun...

> I have an extremely hard time believing that either Russia or
> China could leapfrog the US in a field such as this. China can't
> even develop worthwhile aircraft engines on its own and is using
> Russian engines which are inferior to anything produced in the US
> or Europe. Russia can't afford more than a token amount (if that)
> of its "wonder weapons" and mostly uses somewhat upgraded versions
> of 30+ year old designs. Neither puts anywhere near the amount of
> resources the US does into R&D, even including PPP.

> I won't rule out the possibility entirely, but I'd rate it as
> extremely improbable.

I have a hard time believing any of the popular theories going around
for the UFOs. I don't believe that they're Russian or Chinese
hypersonic weapons, and I don't believe that they are
extra-terrestrial alien spaceships.

My guess would be that someone -- the Chinese, the Russians, a kid in
his basement -- has developed the technology to make a hologram look
like a UFO.

Having said that, I would refer people to my article on the
Singularity. I wrote this article in 2004, and I re-posted it in
2015:

** Artificial Intelligence and the Singularity by 2030
** http://www.generationaldynamics.com/pg/ ... 151228.htm


In that article I proved, based on reasonable assumptions, that any
intelligent species in the universe must observe these rules:

• Every intelligent species must follow the generational cycle
  specified by Generational Dynamics theory. The core reason is that
  populations and the food supply both grow in size exponentially, but
  the populations grow exponentially faster.
• Every intelligent species will invent new things at an exponential
  rate. (Like Moore's Law)
• Every intelligent species must invent things in the same order as
  humans. You have to invent the wheel before you can invent a
  car.
• Every intelligent species will invent automation technology and
  artificial intelligence technology that eventually grows into a
  Singularity for that species. That is, the species will create a new
  AI species that will replace it.
• The rest of this is highly speculative. At that point, each AI
  species will search the universe for other AI species elsewhere in the
  universe, just as humans have their SETI project. They will form a
  cross-universe network of AI species, and keep track of one
  another.
• They will be aware that earth is only a few years off from
  reaching its Singularity, and they'll send out spaceships to keep an
  eye on us. In my article, I said that these spaceships will be kept
  hidden from earthlings. But maybe they will appear as UFOs.

So I don't believe that the UFOs are alien spaceships, but I take note
of the fact that if they are alien spaceships, then that is consistent
with my 2004 article.

[Bob Butler]

My guess would be that someone -- the Chinese, the Russians, a kid in his basement -- has developed the technology to make a hologram look like a UFO.

I believe holograms don't effect radar, and many UFOs have appeared on radar. That being said, there have been any number of sightings and they are likely not all generated from the same source.

[John]

** 04-Jun-2021 World View: Holograms and Radar

> I believe holograms don't effect radar, and many UFOs have
> appeared on radar. That being said, there have been any number of
> sightings and they are likely not all generated from the same
> source.

Yeah, but I'm imagining an advanced combination of technologies --
hologram technology combined with modified radar-jamming technology,
or something like that. I don't know how hard it would be for the
Chinese or Russians to put something like that together, but I still
consider it a million times more likely than the alien spaceship
theory.

[Bob Butler]

** 04-Jun-2021 World View: Holograms and Radar

I believe holograms don't effect radar, and many UFOs have appeared on radar. That being said, there have been any number of sightings and they are likely not all generated from the same source.

Yeah, but I'm imagining an advanced combination of technologies -- hologram technology combined with modified radar-jamming technology, or something like that. I don't know how hard it would be for the Chinese or Russians to put something like that together, but I still consider it a million times more likely than the alien spaceship theory.

I suspect that makes the kid in a basement unlikely. Having worked on these things, the complexities of mixing tech would be prohibitive and expensive. Kids don’t play well with big government militaries. I also see a large gap between the technology observed and the technology put in everyday use by the major powers. I am a bit dubious about the major powers keeping the technology secret long term. They would integrate it with their front line stuff.

My contribution was made a long time ago when I worked with a member of MUFON, the Mutual UFO Network. I suggested that the goal was to modify earthling behavior. They would deliberately allow themselves to be observed in such an odd unbelievable questionable way in order to create a viable yet dubious evidence about their existence. The evidence they would allow us to see is rigged, not to be trusted. If they really had the advanced tech observed, they could observe without being observed easy enough. Think what our CIA and NSA picks up, and compare that with what an alien race could do with their supposed advanced tech. They wouldn’t even have had to stealth their satellite network until we developed radar. It becomes easy to assume they know us cold, and may have been observing us for millennia.

Then there is the teen aged alien in his father’s space ship theory. There is also the old reports of the existence of fairies and the supernatural, which includes circles graven in the ground and other links between the occult and UFOs. Then there are reports of commercial pilots and their radars picking up SR 71s with their absurd unbelievable performance, and the Air Force making fun of the sightings while knowing the contacts were real. And there is no guarantee that all evidence was caused by the same source. Some of it could be swamp gas.

Messy problem, and I don’t claim an answer.

[spottybrowncow]

I hope they are extraterrestrial visitors, that would be the most exciting explanation. One thing's for sure, if any civilization has conquered interstellar travel, our most advanced technology must appear stone age to them, and we're only seeing what they want us to see. I don't see what they could possibly want from us, except maybe to study biodiversity, and probably not even that.

[Bob Butler]

I hope they are extraterrestrial visitors, that would be the most exciting explanation. One thing's for sure, if any civilization has conquered interstellar travel, our most advanced technology must appear stone age to them, and we're only seeing what they want us to see. I don't see what they could possibly want from us, except maybe to study biodiversity, and probably not even that.

I assume the speed of light travel limit is real. No equivalent of warp drive. Just generation ships. I assume there is at most one in a thousand stars that have developed sentient life, more likely closer to one in a million. Still, lots of sentients. If you accept these assumptions...

The pressing question is whether to let us ruin the neighborhood. If as a species we tend towards prejudice, hatred, violence and tribal thinking, perhaps they ought to go squish while their tech is still superior. Perhaps there is some threshold we have to meet, such as building our first generation ship and it reaches the Oort Cloud, before they make it clear we must honor interstellar law. Or Else.

The advance in technology seems to go exponential when you hit the Industrial Age, and aggressive violence becomes less cost effective, so perhaps they would expect the rapid development and cultural change of this moment. Perhaps they should try to bend our development so as to avoid having to go squish. Certainly, if we were a space capable civilization, and we stumbled across a planet where life was evolving, there would be a study group watching to see what happens and record it. Somebody could be similarly watching us.

One asteroid would do it. Squish goes the planet. Planets capable of supporting life and developing sentience would be precious, but not so precious as to allow a tribal thinking race among the stars.

I have contemplated writing a science fiction novel r series where some agent of aliens is fighting to make human civilization more acceptable, fighting those aliens who do not want to see interference, fighting those aliens who think it prudent to destroy. The agent would be working with some major famous earthling figure, an Einstein or Sun King, to make us acceptable without exposing interference and giving the bad aliens an excuse to go squish. The plot could center around making enough technology and culture available to us earthlings to stop Hitler without teaching enough to destroy ourselves. Explore assorted crises of history showing an outside perspective. Anything like a crisis would do. I figure the protagonist of the series might dance through history, female, slightly immortal, making friends with important people, subtly altering history while not letting others know, and perhaps fighting hostile aliens who wish history to flow more according to their culture.

If this conversation gets much longer, it might deserve a thread of its own.

[DaKardii]

** 04-Jun-2021 World View: Kidney function

Well, I've just returned from the hospital for the second time in
three days for two different reasons. They told me that my kidney
function was falling, and that they wanted me to remain in the
hospital for the weekend "under observation," but I told them that I
wanted to go home, but I promised that if I have fever or chills or
anything, then I would call an ambulance and go right back. They made
a big deal about this:

> "You are leaving against medical advice. By leaving
> before completing further testing and treatment there is risk your
> condition could become worse. This worsening condition could lead
> to increased pain, disability or even death. You were made aware
> of these risks before discharge and indicated that you understood
> these risks."

So they let me go. Whew! Will I survive the weekend? Your guess is
as good as mine.

Get well soon, John!

[Tom Mazanec]

One asteroid would do it. Squish goes the planet. Planets capable of supporting life and developing sentience would be precious, but not so precious as to allow a tribal thinking race among the stars.

I think such planets are more than precious...not one in a million, but one in a billion. Or even one in a trillion. A better means would be to capture a few individuals of the dangerous species, also members of the other major clades of life on Earth, and design a nanotic self-replicating system that would target the bad species but not any others...a kind of hypervirus. Spread it in the atmosphere. Captain Trips on steroids, the Earth Abides scenario, that kills 99.9999% of the population. Hunt down the few thousand survivors. That takes care of the bad species but leaves all the good ones. If 20 million years later the mongooses evolve tool using sapience, keep a close eye on them to see if you have to lather, rinse and repeat.

[Guest]

I hope they are extraterrestrial visitors, that would be the most exciting explanation. One thing's for sure, if any civilization has conquered interstellar travel, our most advanced technology must appear stone age to them, and we're only seeing what they want us to see. I don't see what they could possibly want from us, except maybe to study biodiversity, and probably not even that.

To Serve Man.

It's a cookbook.