Mexican government releases New Mayan Alien Artifacts for Documentary

Every once in a while, I have to try. Either to get them to get out of the "But it's XYZ, obviously!" assumption they take for their arguments - or, hey, if they can convince me, who will most *definitely* argue my own viewpoint I'll take that, too.

I used to be where the "believers" were. (I don't mean that term derogatorily, in case anyone's reading that wrong.) Erich von Daniken (or however his name was,) all the "project blue book discrepancies," the Bermuda Triangle (obviously linked in!) and the like, I ate it up.

In a way, it's much like religion. It links you into "something bigger." For some people, it gives a sense of hope (the "space brothers" will save the human race!) or just a sense of being in an "in" crowd on a secret (that, for bonus points, the government is trying to hush up.)

But, just like religion... the cracks and inconsistencies just started adding up to the point where I couldn't ignore them any more. I *had* to go looking - "obviously" this was happening, there must be some evidence (add "the government hadn't squirreled away in a warehouse" for more fun.) But... there wasn't. And the more I'd look, the more these really *did* have a simple explanation - the person was wrong about what they saw, sometimes fabricating things deliberately, but most often just not being aware of what they saw and leaping to the conclusion of "aliens."

It also doesn't help their case that they're always "alone" or with just another buddy or something. I mean, there's a highway patrol, and other drivers - if you get zapped out of your car (leaving it abandoned on the side of the road,) nobody notices? Nobody (pre-cell phone) drives into town and flags down a policeman? They don't sit there with their car also dead from UFO-beams or whatnot until you arrive back?

Basically, people were saying they put one and one together and came out with lemon meringue pie. It just doesn't work that way. And so, yes, I'm solidly skeptical until someone has physical, scientifically tested and verified proof. And I'll be honest - I really, really hope someone does in my lifetime. But I'm not going to take fairly sketchy accounts and conspiracy theories as anything more than a basis for someone's book.

See my Guides and Tutorials

As advanced as they are you might think that they would have some form of a prime directive around the "don't make yourself public knowledge" rule

-however-

what some people have been saying...

about certain interactions with the military...

regarding the whole "shooting down test rockets, and disabling nukes while still in the silos no more than 100 yards away from the staff on hand as early as the 1050's"

I'd say that's debatable.

Then again, with the developments of technology <and camcorders> I'm betting they learned a thing or two about the importance of secrecy.

not that it's a valid issue anymore...

The governments of the world probably secrety ordered all the cellphone companies to add a special device to their products so that no matter how many millions of people now own a cellphone, and no matter how sharp their pictures and videos now are, the special device will make them always go blurry the moment they get within a certain distance of any aliens.

They don't have to.

On the night that encounter happened, I had one of the first mp3 players available on the market. It took one "AA" battery.

The battery life was 8 hours on a full charge. Being the tech nut that I am I always left the house with fully charged batteries and spares.

We weren't gone any longer than two hours before that encounter and right before the blue light special my Mp3 player's battery died. That light hit us as I was reaching in my pocket for the spare.

They have the ability to disable electronics more specifically discharge batteries if they feel they need to.

Not sure if serious...

I am quite serious.

Really, says who? Who's to say that Stephen Hawking's possible types of aliens* are any less valid? Or, really, (a little historcal allusion aside) more valid - making guesses about things we have no evidence for is futile, might as well make guesses about how many fairies can live in one toadstool or how many ATs the devs are working on creating next.

*Hawking posited that being visited by aliens might not be such a great thing, much like how the "less advanced" cultures of the Americas fared poorly when they met Western explorers; see http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/0...=Charlie_Rose_

...and where would Stevie be without the media?

His ideas are just that. Ideas. Theories.

his take on ET's are not based on experiences, or at least he isn't saying anything about it.

Me? I'm sharing an actual experience.

If his version of ET's are out there they weren't the ones we encountered.

Maybe he is just taking a military point of view instead of a civilian and I can see how the existence of ET's would pose a "threat" ... to the -military-

Because from what I -experienced- they would be absolutely powerless and unable to use mindless destruction in their favor.

Like a child on a short leash.

Whats that old saying about military and intelligence?

edit: FWIW I feel more threatened by Earth's military that I do ET's also see: Nuclear Weapons, Nuclear Testing

Uh, what the actual year is in our calendar is so irrelevant as to be nonsense. The Mayans had no knowledge of European calendars and they didn't write something like "in the year 2012 of a calendar used by a culture we've never encountered our calendar will end." A calendar's year ends when that calendar says it ends. Some calendars are lunar, some are solar, others could be based on an arbitrary number the creators found aesthetically or culturally appealing. The only assertion present is that Mayan cycle of date keeping will reset in the year 2012 of the Gregorian calendar. We could have arbitrarily decided to make our calendar reset 827 years ago. If we had it would be 827 by our calendar and the Mayan would still end this year.

Okay, the term theory when used in science has a very different and rather precise meaning from what it has in popular usage. So when you use "theory" while referring to a scientist's work i strongly suspect you're not saying what you think you're saying from the viewpoint of actual scientists.

Personally i agree with Memphis Bill on this matter.

As for the Mayan calendar ending... Eh, i don't panic when my calendar runs out of days every year. *shrug* Whether from self-fulfilling prophecies or not i do hope something entertaining happens in Mexico later this year. Besides massive gang violence, of course.

...

Again, none of that is of any relevance to when the Mayan calendar ends. We could use the Hebrew calendar and say that the Mayan calendar ends in the year 5773 (that is to say later this year by our calendar since the Hebrew calendar year of 5772 rolls over to the year 5773 on September 16th). It still happens later this year. You're doing the timekeeping equivalent of running a perfectly valid sentence through assorted Babelfish translations until it becomes gibberish and then asserting that it proves the original sentence was gibberish.

What's funny is that since they didn't have an actual image of Apophis they substituted a picture of a comet in its place. But yeah, something like Apophis or similar chunks of rock present the greatest nonhuman threat to the planet's biosphere.

Is... Is that Space Jesus giving Space Buddha a head massage as a giant pink bunny eats the Moon?

That's my great God, WeeTheoFlop...devouring a non believer planet as depicted by the nearby moon. The captain of the ship is trying to quiet the ensign so WTF doesn't take notice and decide to fry them with his lasersnots, <capable of vaporizing a galaxy at full power>

One of the first things I noticed as well.

Still, it's fun if you don't take it seriously.

I also noticed how the speaker was saying "no recording" ... and there was recording anyway.

I shared my experience, there's no hype behind it, it doesn't change who I am or deeply impact my life whatsoever. I'm not out in the streets screaming "omg alieeenzzzz" or hammering hotdogs into the cracks of the pavement.

I had an encounter, it was unexpected, strange, awesome and fun.

If I had it to do all over again I'd be sure to say thank you for the memory.

Chance of Apophis getting its orbit changed enough in 2029 so that it hits Earth in 2036: 1 in 135,000

Chance of winning that $640 million lottery on 3/30: 1 in 175,000,000

Someone won that lottery, so less probable things have occurred. There are reports of some people being hit by multiple lightning strikes; a very improbable occurrence as well. I personally don't feel that Apophis will hit us, but it's in the realm of possibility.

As for government conspiracies:

I personally don't believe that aliens have visited us. However, there have been events that occurred that we didn't know about until after the fact. One example I can think of are the Tuskegee experiments, which went on for 40 years before a whistle-blower brought it to light. So, just to my mindset, the government is willing to cross the line, and is willing to not pass on crucial information that it deems "national security".

Is it possible that extraterrestrials have visited us? Yes. Do I think it likely? No.

And, as for the Mayan Apocalypse: I'm scheduled to work that day. So, either it's gonna suck or it's really gonna suck.

<takes aspirin>