Tag: alien contact

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Aliens or Artillery? Shocking UFO Study from Ukraine Sparks Heated Debate!

Are UFOs over US airspace allowed to travel at superfast speeds, but it’s not allowed over European airspace? A Ukrainian UFO raises questions.

Update Feb 24, 2024 (Newsweek).

Mystery disk-shaped UFO spotted by recon drone in Ukraine
“I’m telling you, it’s a UFO, for sure. It is staying in place, on the screen,” a Ukrainian soldier can be heard saying in the video.

A groundbreaking UFO study published by Ukrainian astronomers has stirred up speculation with claims of mysterious flying objects captured on radar, leaving both skeptics and believers buzzing.

Half a year after the onset of the Russian invasion, these researchers unveiled striking evidence of unidentified aerial phenomena soaring across the skies, clocked at astonishing speeds of up to 54,000 km/h!

But as renowned astronomer Avi Loeb throws cold water on the findings—asserting they could simply be artillery shells—the debate over what truly lurks above Ukraine intensifies. Is it extraterrestrial life, or are earthly conflicts warping our perceptions? Buckle up as we dive into this cosmic controversy!

SETI pope Avi Loeb claimed that Ukrainian astronomers mistook Russian artillery shells for UFOs. The UFOs were clocked at 54,000 km/h.

But this cannot be artillery shells: the world’s fastest artillery shell travels at 2,977 km/h. The world’s fastest missile (Avangard) reaches 37,044 km/h. That’s well short of the reported 54,000 km/h.

Avi Loeb then asserted that the astronomers had only estimated the distance, resulting in a ten-fold error in both distance and speed. (Even then, the objects photographed would still too fast to be artillery shells.) It’s not true that the astronomers only estimated the distance: they computed the distance by triangulation. That’s a scientific method with very precise results!

Then Avi Loeb claimed that no HUMAN-MADE objects can travel at these speeds in Earth’s atmosphere, as otherwise, there would be a fireball around them due to intense air ionization and friction.

Case In Point: the objects were not HUMAN-MADE.

And why does Avi Loeb initially dismiss the observations of the Ukrainian astronomers as being wrong, but then later argues that if the observations were valid, it wouldn’t be possible due to air friction?

54000 km/h vs. 74000 km/h? Whaaat?

Avi Loeb disregarded the observations of a team of Ukrainian astronomers over Ukraine airspace as unlikely, because the UFOs traveled at 54 000 km/h. His theory being that at these speeds the air molecules surrounding the UFO would ignite by friction (air resistance), creating a huge flaming fireball. This was clearly not the case. Hence, Avi Loeb says, the speed must have been wrongly deduced.

However, the Pentagon TicTac video shows a UFO that traveled at a top speed of 72,000 km/h. How is it possible for UFOs over US airspace to travel at superfast speeds, but it’s not allowed over European airspace?

Here is the in-depth TicTac video analysis by Dr. Kevin Knuth from the Entropy Magazine, estimating the TicToc UFO top speed at 46,000 mph (74,000 km/h):

Estimating Flight Characteristics of Anomalous Unidentified Aerial Vehicles
Several Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAP) encountered by military, commercial, and civilian aircraft have been reported to be structured craft that exhibit ‘impossible’ flight characteristics.

And here is the non-scientific version from Meer.com, by Dr. Tim Mounce (though he got the speed wrong: its 46,000 mph and not 45,000 mph).

USS Nimitz Tic Tac UFO: unveiling inexplicable physics
Physics analysis reveals astonishing maneuvers beyond human understanding

And here, now, is the story of Ukraine UFOs:

The Ukraine UFO study

Half a year after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in spring 2022, the Ukrainians published a UFO study.

It was claimed that not one but two meteorite-observing stations had discovered something extraordinary at the same time:
flying objects moving faster than the unaided human eye can see.

“The eye does not fix phenomena lasting less than one-tenth of a second,” the paper said. “It takes four-tenths of a second to recognize an event. “ — Ukrainian UAP study

One observing station was based in the capital of Kyiv and the other in the village of Vinarivka, 132 km to the south.

The Ukrainian astronomers detected the UFOs with specialized meteorite detection equipment:

“Ordinary photo and video recordings will () not capture the [unidentified aerial phenomena]. “ — Ukrainian UAP study

Triangulation

The equipment was 132 km apart, meaning that they could triangulate the speed, position, and size of the objects really well.

Triangulation is a technique that astronomers do all the time. For instance, it’s used to determine the distance of stars.

The objects measured between 3 and 12 meters and were clocked at speeds up to 54,000 km per hour (33,554 mph)!

Publication

The Ukrainians first published their findings on a preprint server named Arxiv:

“Unidentified aerial phenomena,
I. Observations of events”

written by B. Zhilyaev, V. Petukhov, and V. Reshetnyk https://arxiv.org/pdf/2208.11215.pdf.

Scientists use Arxiv to receive feedback from peers before publication. Arxiv also provides public access to papers that might otherwise be hidden behind paywalls.

However, the findings of the Ukrainian study were quickly published in mainstream journals, for instance, by the “American Military News”: https://americanmilitarynews.com/2022/09/ufos-spotted-everywhere-over-ukraine-say-scientists/

Everybody assumed (without basis in fact) that the Ukrainian UFO sightings were somehow related to the raging Ukraine—Russia conflict. — Erich Habich-Traut for the Contact Project

Press coverage

At one stage, “The Jerusalem Post” wrote:
“Are there UFOs, UAPs in the skies of Ukraine? Study says yes”:
https://www.jpost.com/science/article-717346

But not everyone agreed.

Criticism

Harvard astronomer Avi Loeb, who had gained worldwide fame in 2018 with his theory that comet Oumuamua was an extraterrestrial probe, was aware of the Ukrainian study.

But he hadn’t looked at it closer until he was asked by the director of the new UAP office in Washington, DC, to write a short paper about it.

The Contact Project first heard of Avi Loeb’s “debunking” of the Ukrainian study from his email:

Quote:
“You might enjoy the essay and related paper below.
I was reluctant to even read the Ukranian paper, but on Monday night I was visited at home by the director of the new UAP office in DC and he asked me to write a short scientific paper on UAP. So yesterday morning at 4.30AM (before my routine morning jog) I had a look at the Ukrainian paper and within an hour figured that they got the distance to their dark objects wrong by a factor of ten (or else there would be a huge fireball around each of them as a result of the friction with the air). After correcting that everything falls into place, with the parameters of artillery shells As Feynman noted, there’s a great pleasure in figuring things out.
There is no way out of this argument because they claim the objects are dark, meaning that they block light. The cross-section with photons implies that the objects must interact with air molecules.” — Avi Loeb

Morning Jog at 4:30 am

According to his email, Avi quickly reviewed the “Ukranian” paper before starting his daily morning jog at 4:30 am. Within one hour he had already concluded that the objects could not move at the speeds claimed by the Ukrainians (because the air would burn around them from friction), and they were, in fact, artillery shells:

“UAPs or Russian shells? Israel-born astronomer, Ukraine nix UAP study” https://www.jpost.com/science/article-719773

Avi Loeb contended that the Ukrainian astronomers had failed to exercise due diligence, resulting in a ten-fold miscalculation of the UFOs’ speed. He said that was because they had not triangulated the distance of the objects and only estimated their distance.

Then Avi Loeb said the UFOs were in reality (Russian) artillery shells.

From that point on, the “debunking train” rapidly gained momentum, leading nearly every publication that had previously supported the story to criticize the Ukrainian astronomers’ findings as inaccurate Russian artillery.

I scratched my head.

When were the observations made?

How did Avi Loeb know that the UFOs were artillery? The Russian bombardment of Ukraine had started after the 24th of February 2022. There was not a single mention in the Ukrainian UAP paper of when the observations were actually made. Only a vague reference in the footnotes to an Astronomical Schools Report from 2021.

Clearly, that was an omission. To find clarity on the matter, I wrote two letters to the Ukrainian astronomers:

Quote
“Dear Mr. Zhilyaev, Avi Loeb has made a comment regarding your paper on Arxiv, that your observations are those of artillery shells. Do you believe this to be a possibility?”
— The Contact Project

That first letter got no reply.
Avi Loeb’s comments about artillery shells became the de facto explanation for UAP in Ukraine.

A few weeks later, I decided to write a second letter to the Ukrainian astronomers, being more precise in my question. I also put Avi Loeb in the BCC, in case he wanted to clarify his argument:

Quote
“Dear Mr. Zhilyaev,
writing on behalf of the Contact Project, (https://contactproject.org) I’m curious about your UAP sightings.

Arxiv: “Unidentified aerial phenomena I. Observations of events,”
by B. Zhilyaev, V. Petukhov, and V. Reshetnyk
https://arxiv.org/pdf/2208.11215.pdf

I would like to note that your preprint archive paper does not say precisely WHEN your observations took place, and I am curious about that date.

In your references (2) regarding “phantoms,” you quote a publication from 2021, a date well before the Russian invasion in 2022.

(2) Zhilyaev B.E., Vidmachenko A.P., Petukhov V.N., et al., 2021, Astronomical Schools Report, 17, N 1–2, 1–8

Is it correct then to assume that at least some of the observations that are the basis of your preprint paper are from a time when there were no artillery shells flying through Ukrainian skies?

From my reading of your paper, I understand that you had access to two observation stations. You probably triangulated the object distance from that?

What do you say?” — The Contact Project

This time I did receive a short reply from the lead astronomer of the Ukraine UAP study:

Quote:
“We have been watching UAP since 2018.
We do not associate their activity with the war in Ukraine.
Observations from 2 points are carried out for the purpose of triangulation.” — B.E. Zhilyaev

It was as I thought: the Ukrainians had claimed nowhere to have made their observations in 2022 during the war.

Instead, the UFO/UAP sightings date back to the year 2018. Furthermore, the Ukrainian astronomers had not “estimated” the distance of the objects; instead, they had used two observation posts to triangulate the distance scientifically. This also made it possible to calculate their size.

CONCLUSION

The observations made by the Ukrainian astronomers were from 2018, not during the war. In fact, they had been monitoring UFO sightings since then. Furthermore, the team used two observation posts to triangulate the distance of the objects scientifically, which allowed them to calculate their speed and size.

This information raises questions about Avi Loeb’s conclusions. Given that the observations were made before the war, it becomes unlikely that the objects were artillery shells. The ability to triangulate the objects also contradicts Avi Loeb’s argument.

The truth, in this case, requires persistence and the ability to interpret ambiguity.

#aviloeb #uap #UFO #ukraine #contactproject #SETI #astronomy

Reference: “Unidentified aerial phenomena I. Observations of events,”
by B. Zhilyaev, V. Petukhov, and V. Reshetnyk

Addendum

(the authors published further papers, clarifying and doubling down on their findings):
arXiv:2211.17085  [pdf, ps, other]  physics.pop-ph astro-ph.IM
Unidentified aerial phenomena II. Evaluation of UAP properties
Authors: B. E. Zhilyaev, V. N. Petukhov, V. M. Reshetnyk
Abstract: …sky led to the detection of two luminous objects at an altitude of 620 and 1130 km, moving at a speed of 256 and 78 km/s. Colorimetric analysis showed that the objects are dark: B – V = 1.35, V – R = 0.23. The size of objects is estimated to be more than 100 meters. The detection of these objects is an experimental fact.
Submitted 13 November, 2022: 13 pages,34 figures, Kinematics and Physics of Celestial Bodies

arXiv:2306.13664  [pdf, ps, other]  physics.pop-ph astro-ph.IM
Unidentified aerial phenomena. Observations of variable objects
Authors: Boris Zhilyaev, David Tcheng, Vladimir Petukhov
Abstract: NASA commissioned a research team to study Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAP). The Main Astronomical Observatory of NAS of Ukraine conducts an independent study of UAP. A research team from San Diego also decided to conduct a study of UAP. Observations of events that cannot scientifically be identified as known natural phenomena established the existence of the UAP.
Submitted 11 June, 2023: 5 pages, 9 figures, Kinematics and Physics of Celestial Bodies

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Notes about time travel

The Grandfather Paradox / How Does Time Travel Work? / How to Travel Into the Future / 1. The Waiting Game / 2. Time Dilation / 3. Suspended Animation / 4. Traveling as a Time Tourist / 5. Changing History Through Time Dilation

The Grandfather Paradox

The grandfather paradox raises a troubling question: What would happen if you traveled back in time and killed your grandfather? In that scenario, your grandfather would indeed be dead, just as he would be if you killed him in the present. However, this creates an inconsistency—you would still exist, since you’ve already been born. Essentially, you cannot simply “unborn” yourself. This is a basic question when considering how does time travel work.

How Does Time Travel Work?

To travel back in time, you would need a superluminal vehicle, which is capable of moving faster than the speed of light. To reach your intended destination, you must aim it at specific coordinates in both space and time. It’s important to note that Earth and the solar system are constantly moving at high velocities through the cosmos. Fortunately, superluminal vehicles can match these speeds.

To successfully arrive at your destination without incident, precise timing is essential. As you plan your journey further back in time, the calculations become increasingly complex. To ensure safe arrival, it’s advisable to target the space surrounding Earth rather than the planet itself to avoid collision. Ultimately, you would need to use a smaller ship to land. You would approach Earth from outer space.

How to Travel Into the Future

There are several methods to travel into the future—specifically, five intriguing ways, explaining different aspects of how does time travel work.

1. The Waiting Game

The simplest method is to simply wait. All of us are constantly moving into the future at a steady pace of one second per second. While our mental states can influence how we perceive the passage of time, the rate at which time moves remains consistent for everyone. However, time does flow differently depending on gravitational conditions. For instance, at sea level, time passes more slowly than it does at the top of a mountain, where gravity’s influence is weaker.

2. Time Dilation

Time dilation offers another fascinating approach. If you’re inside a moving object, such as an airplane or a rocket ship, time slows down for you relative to those who remain stationary. If you were to accelerate that rocket ship to the speed of light, time would effectively come to a standstill for the occupants. Upon returning to the launch site after traveling at near-light speed, you would find that everyone left behind has aged significantly. If the journey lasted for many centuries, those back on Earth would have experienced the full passage of that time. Meanwhile, you remained unchanged. This principle is critical in understanding how time travel works in theory.

3. Suspended Animation

Another method involves suspended animation. Our bodies age and progress through time at a constant rate due to our metabolism and the Brownian motion occurring within our cells. By slowing down or halting these processes, one could enter a deep sleep and awaken decades or even centuries later, having aged not a moment.

Returning from Your Past After Time Travel
When it comes to returning to the future after time travel, there are two scenarios to consider, depending on your intentions. One involves traveling as a tourist. The other, aiming to change history.

4. Traveling as a Time Tourist


In this scenario, you commandeer a faster-than-light spacecraft. Direct it toward the approximate position in space where Earth will be after a millennium. Since you can’t perceive where Earth will be in a thousand years—because it hasn’t reached that point yet from your current perspective—you must rely on your knowledge of the timeline. If you traveled to the past using a faster-than-light spacecraft and then returned, you would find that, despite any previous changes, like hypothetically killing your grandfather, the course of history remains remarkably unchanged. Your grandfather would still be alive. You’d walk away with a fascinating story to tell.

5. Changing History Through Time Dilation

5. **Changing History Through Time Dilation**
Conversely, if you choose to travel from your past into the future via the time dilation method—perhaps by orbiting Earth at near-light speed—you would arrive in a timeline drastically altered by your actions. In this case, you might find yourself in a “beta universe” where your grandfather never existed. Consequently, neither would you. While you could observe this altered reality, it doesn’t pose a problem since you hail from a different branch of the multiverse (the “alpha universe”). Thus, even though you have no place in the beta universe, your past experiences in another universe endow you with a unique perspective. It’s a critical aspect when debating how time travel works across different realities.

By understanding and leveraging these methods, the concept of time travel transcends mere science fiction. It invites us to explore the mysteries of our existence and the nature of time itself. This essentially answers the question: how does time travel work?

Quantum time travel: The experiment to ‘send a particle into the past’
Time loops have long been the stuff of science fiction. Now, using the rules of quantum mechanics, we have a way to effectively transport a particle back in time – here’s how

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Become like children…

I’m excited to share a fresh perspective on the Contact Project. While many gaze into the vast expanse of space, searching light-years away for evidence of extraterrestrial life, I believe we should look closer to home. Yes, radio astronomy may one day unveil the whispers of alien civilizations beyond our solar system, but in my view, Earth is already a crossroads for extraterrestrial visitors.

We don’t need to venture far to find “ET.”

THE E.T. MOVIE PHONE

Radio amateur Henry Feinberg explains the communicator he built for the movie “ET: The Extraterrestrial.” Have you ever wondered how quickly the mothership responded to ET’s call? The E.T. movie phone can transmit actual messages into space to orbiting saucers. Doesn’t that sound ludicrous?

E.T.’s mothership wasn’t actually very far from Earth. That’s how he was rescued so quickly.
The banner for the Contact Project embodies this very idea. What many see as a simple child’s toy, reminiscent of the beloved movie “E.T. The Extraterrestrial,” is, in fact, a working communications device capable of sending signals into Earth orbit.

I’m not saying that we should build this contraption. But the idea that it may be possible to contact ETi by sending radio signals is the core idea of this website, the “ContactProject.Org.”

In the world of science and technology communication, Henry Feinberg (call sign K2SSQ) shines brightly. A true innovator at heart, he crafted the remarkable communicator featured in the film “E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial.”

How to built a ET communicator, according to a radio ham

Using everyday household items, Henry pieced together an ingenious device that could transmit E.T.’s iconic “phone home” signal. The communicator consists of three distinct components. At its core lies a modified Speak and Spell, with its keys reconfigured to form an entirely new alphabet.

From each key, Henry connected wires to another pivotal piece—the programmer. This unconventional programmer is built atop a turntable, but instead of a record, it features a saw blade adorned with multiple coats of insulating spray paint.

Henry crafted openings in the saw blade that correspond to specific letters. As the turntable spins, the saw blade passes under a row of Bobby pins, which contact and activate the Speak and Spell just as if one were pressing the buttons directly. Adding to the complexity of this creation, Henry ingeniously fashioned a ratchet system using a knife and fork hinged together. As the turntable rotates, the knife and fork pivot back and forth, precisely indexing the saw blade to generate the next letter of the message.

To further enhance his creation, Henry attached a rope to a nearby tree branch in the forest. As the wind rustled through the trees, it pulled the branch back and forth, gently advancing the saw blade tooth by tooth. With this setup, he not only programmed a message but also needed to transmit it across the cosmos.

For the transmission, Henry utilized a speaker-microphone from a CB walkie-talkie that belonged to Elliott. He ingeniously routed the signal to a UHF TV tuner—an ingenious piece that E.T. had “borrowed” from Elliott’s mother’s television set. This tuner elevated the signal from the CB frequency into the microwave range, channeling it into a coffee can that vibrated to amplify the transmission.

Finally, the message was funneled through an umbrella lined with a reflective coating, which directed the signal outward into the vastness of outer space. Each component harmonized beautifully, showcasing not only Henry’s talent as an inventor but also the enduring possibilities of communication across galaxies.

How to create a satellite dish using an umbrella

From: “Creating a Satellite Dish Using an Umbrella”
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Why I am coming forward now

During April 2020 I had a lot of time on my hands. It was the first Corona lockdown in Germany. I decided to sort through old 35 mm negatives in an old drawer in our basement. The drawer serves as a storage box.

As I was pulling the film strips through the scanner, I came across negatives from England, where I had lived in 1995. Between those negatives were two frames of particular interest.

Ilford XP2 35 mm film, 1995

Ilford XP2 film frames 7 and 8 showed an UAP. I was not prepared to find these pictures. I had completely forgotten this UFO sighting for 25 years. The only other two people who knew about it were my girlfriend and her father who were with me when the sighting took place.

The blurry camera images are not as good as what I saw with my own eyes that night in 1995. I got two exposures of the same object driving in a straight line at 70 mph on the motorway. That made it possible to actually triangulate distance, speed and size of the object:

Triangulation of distance to UAP, frames 7 & 8

It has been suggested that what I saw was an advertising blimp parked near the motorway. I don’t think so, because it had no advertising or any markings on it. Also, the object became 25% smaller as we drove towards it for approx. 15 seconds at 70 mph.

To get smaller the blimp would have to have traveled faster than 70 mph. But a blimp top speed is only 55 mph.

UAP?

That leaves me with the question: what did I see?

This is the reason I am stepping forward, now.
I know how to answer this type of question, once and for all.


—–

The Mission of ‘The Contact Project’:
to investigate UAPs/UFOs using real-time tracking, radio, video, gigapixel images and passive radar, so that this type of question can be answered without doubts.

The engine of this initiative will be an app designed to coordinate real-time reporting, alerting, documenting and contacting efforts.

The goal of the ‘Contact Project’ is to discover whether or not humanity is equipped to respond to extraterrestrial contact.

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1. THE CONTACT INITIATIVE

Left: Kenneth Arnold with UFO sighting in June 24, 1947
Right: first official UFO/UAP footage from the USG, 2021

A Proposal To Contact UFOs/UAPs by Radio
Keywords: crowdsourced, open source, automated alert system, distributed, public and specialized observers, smartphone app, passive radar operators, proactive HAM radio operators, gigapixel camera operators, megapixel telescope operators, CETI, METI, SETI

Erich Habich-Traut, https://contactproject.org
27. October 2021

1. INTRODUCTION
2. IS ALIEN CONTACT A GOOD IDEA?
3. A BIT OF UFO HISTORY
4. WHAT IS A UFO?
5. HOW TO OVERCOME THE ‘LIGHT BARRIER’
6. HUMAN PROGRESS
7. WHY UFOs/UAPs?
8. CHANCES OF CONTACTING UFOs/UAPs
9. DESCRIPTION OF THE “CONTACT PROJECT APP”10. FUNDING: THE ALIEN MARKETPLACE

1. INTRODUCTION
After more than 70 years the US Government recently confirmed the existence of UAPs/UFOs. There is a possibility that some of these objects or phenomena are not of earthly origin. To find out where they are from we want to try and talk to them by radio,

The Contact Initiative (CI) believes that UAPs/UFO’s are under the control of some form of intelligence and non-hostile.

SETI has been trying for decades to find signals of alien radio communications by pointing radio telescopes often at random at nearby stars in the hope that they may harbour intelligent life.

SETI faces three difficulties:
1. It has to find a planet that is populated by intelligent life
2. The alien life must be using radio waves to communicate
3. Any alien signals detected will be decades or centuries old and will take twice that time for a reply.  (If we receive a message from ET in 25 light years distance, and we respond with a message immediately, then it will take 25 years to send signals to ET and another 25 years before we can hear a response. Hence, a human lifetime of 75 years will have passed.)

Point three shows the difficulty of trying to use radio waves for interstellar communications. Very often the participants of such a communication die of old age before they have even exchanged first welcomes..

In the movie “Contact” Carl Sagan tried to circumvent this inconvenience by speculating that ET could send instructions for a wormhole transporter that doesn’t rely on slow radio waves.

Even in the idealized world of the Hollywood movie “Contact” this approach didn’t prove the existence of extraterrestrial intelligence to all sceptics, because the resulting exchange between human and ETI left no convincing physical evidence.

The premise of SETI, the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, is that we are not alone in the universe and that Alien life somewhere has developed radio technology just like us.

We expect the Aliens to be friendly or at least impartial to our existence. That is by no means a certainty, looking at the example of our own species.

The Contact Initiative (CI) has as its goal to implement “active SETI”, or ‘CETI’ as it is known (communication with extraterrestrial intelligence).

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2. IS ALIEN CONTACT A GOOD IDEA?

Definition
contact /ˈkɒntakt:
1. the state of physical touching.
2. the action of communicating or meeting.

By definition, merely receiving an extraterrestrial transmission does not fulfill the criterion of “Contact”.
Doug Vakoch, President of METI

It was in 2015 that scientists Douglas Vakoch, David Grinspoon, David Brin, Seth Shostak and others discussed this issue at the American Association for the Advancement Of Science (AAAS): is it a good idea to transmit messages to possible intelligent extraterrestrials in the Cosmos?

Within a week of this discussion a statement was signed and released, together with 24 other SETI experts, declaring that a “worldwide scientific, political and humanitarian discussion must occur before any message is sent”.

Illustration of an AAAS conference

Read: (STATEMENT REGARDING MESSAGING TO EXTRATERRESTRIAL INTELLIGENCE (METI)

When the statement was signed, SETI by radio telescopes was humanity’s best hope to contact Aliens.

A then 68 year old phenomenon titled by the public as “UFOs” was known about at the time of this statement in 2015. But UFOs were not considered to be connected in any shape or form to Extraterrestrial Intelligence. Neither were “UAPs”.

Even though there is no proof of it, some people have always believed that UFOs/UAPs are somehow connected to extraterrestrial intelligence. Those people were not necessarily represented at the AAAS conference in 2015, but they express their beliefs at other venues.

Roswell Parade

Are UFOs connected to Aliens?
The Contact Initiative wants to find this out by trying to make radio contact with UAPs. To do this we’ll develop an open source app which is now on Github https://github.com/contactproject.

We, the Contact Project & Initiative, hope that the Contact app will be downloaded by many millions of people worldwide.

Once deployed, every one million app users will contribute to about 1 sighting per week that has absolutely no reasonable explanation. This estimate is based on the Allan Hendry study and a US UAP sighting survey.

We believe we have better chances of finding extraterrestrials or their technosignatures by targeting UFOs/UAPs than by targeting distant stars.

It doesn’t compute to intercept or attempt interstellar Alien communications with light-speed radio waves. At this stage in technological development, even we have a better outlook of building faster-than-light spaceships (Dr. Erik Lentz), than to generate impossible faster-than-light radio waves.

Why should Extraterrestrials be any different? It makes more sense to search for superluminal objects (UFOs) that can travel interstellar distances in days, rather than to listen for relatively snail-paced radio beams, taking years to cover the same distance.

Radio waves can only carry information.
Objects on the other hand can carry more than information, such as passengers, but… objects can also carry much more information.

For instance, to physically store the information of all books ever written on Earth (Ref. 1) it requires the volume of 10 stacked 3.5 inch HD drives (175 terabytes of data (Ref. 2), HD capacity in 2021 (Ref. 3)).

Illustration of information density for all the World's books in 2021 on 3.5 inch HD storage devices.

In other words, in 2021 the knowledge from all books ever written on Earth fits inside a cube measuring 15 cm each side, weighing 6.7 kg (Ref. 4). To download the same amount of data by radio through space, considering our current data transmission capabilities between Mars and Earth (Ref. 5), it would take about 7.4 years (Ref. 6) of continuous transmission.

The Contact Project is about the reception and transmission of signals,
as well as the possibility of physical contact. The gold standard for evidence is physical evidence. In a matter of such importance and possible consequence to human civilization as the existence of extraterrestrial intelligence, nothing else may be sufficient to prove it.

References:
1: How many books in the world
2: How much storage each book
3: Seagate IronWolf Pro 18 TB HD
4: HD size
5: Current maximum bandwidth between Mars and Earth?
6: Broadband download time and speed calculator






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8. CHANCES OF ENCOUNTERING UFOs/UAPs

Reconstruction by author, MUFON #82139, Ireland, 1986

Based on personal experience the author of “The Contact Initiative” estimates the chance to spot an UFO/UAP in any one day to be approx. 1:10.000.

UAP photographs on 35mm negative film, frame 7 of 2. MUFON #111680, UK, 1995,
The UAP was grayish without markings as seen here. Photograph by author.

You may have a chance to take pictures or video of an UFO once every 50 years, as I did in 1995.

More impartial data than personal experience about the frequency of sightings comes from surveys. There are not a lot of surveys on the subject of UFO/UAP. More surveys should be carried out.

But there is one:

STUDY ON PUBLIC UAP SIGHTINGS
One available survey comes from Century Fox Home Entertainment. They did a poll for a promotional campaign of the Ridley Scott movie “Phoenix Forgotten“.

Reconstruction of “Phoenix Lights” by eye witness Tim Ley, USA TODAY, 1997

The “Phoenix Forgotten” plot was inspired by the “Phoenix Lights” UFO phenomenon from 1997. (Ref.: 1, Ref.: 2)

Over 1700 Americans were asked if they had ever seen an UFO:
16.74% responded positively (Ref.: 3).

If that percentage is any guideline, then we can say that 16.74% of 258.3 million adults (Ref.: 4), about 43 million Americans, had a UFO sighting.

MISIDENTIFICATION OF UFOs
 According to author Leslie Kean, “roughly 90 to 95 percent of UFO sightings can be explained”. (Ref.: 5)

The chief investigator of CUFOS in 1979, astronomer Allan Hendry, concluded from 1307 cases that 91.4% had a clear and simple prosaic explanation. 8.6% were classed as “UFOs” and 1.5% of those cases had no possible plausible explanation. (Ref.: 6)

This leaves us with 645,000 unexplained sightings from 43 million. This covers a time-span of 38.4 years, it being the median age of the US population (Ref.: 7).

If there are 645,000 completely unexplained UAP sightings in 38.4 years, we get 16,796 (sixteen thousand seven hundred ninety six) sightings per year. That’s 46 UAP cases without possible plausible explanation daily in the USA.

I believe this to be a fairly high number.

The Contact Initiative doesn’t want to wait around to get results. To maximize the chances of spotting UAP/UFO a large number of volunteer UFO/UAP spotters are needed.

And the method of spotting and forwarding a report of a sighting must be as simple as taking a photo or video.

The “CONTACT APP” (name may be changed) will be designed for this purpose, to be as simple as possible. But it will be the most powerful civilian use flying object identification program on the market.

One of its appeals will be that it provides near instantaneous identification of objects and phenomena commonly mistaken as UFOs: celestial objects, meteors, planes, blimps, military training exercises, satellites. The app gives feedback to the UFO spotter if what he/she saw is a known phenomenon.

The app records with high accuracy the position and time of the sightings and the number of users who see the same thing.

POSSIBLE UAP/UFO YIELD PER MILLION APP DOWNLOADS
If the Contact app is downloaded one million times (corrected), then the chances are that we will see 65 UAP cases without possible plausible explanation in a year.

That amounts to a bit more than one really, really, puzzling UFO case per week. This should be enough to engage and keep the attention of the public. Because, what good would be an UFO app that doesn’t spot UFOs?

PEACE OF MIND
On the other hand, incorrect identifications of common or explicable phenomena as UFOs should become less with the Contact App. This way the great majority of witnesses would feel less stress.

EDUCATIONAL VALUE
A large number of participants serves to raise the awareness of the possibility of Extraterrestrial Contact. What does it mean to be a part of a greater community of diverse intelligences in the Cosmos?

GOAL OF THE CONTACT INITIATIVE (CONTACT PROJECT)
The goal is to prepare for and meet a technological superior non-human species. That we’re not the most advanced technological species in the Universe is logical:

THE SAGAN
The Universe is billions and billions of years old. In it there are billions and billions of habitable planets. Modern human technology only exists since a few hundred years and we left the stone age just about 5000 years ago.

The development of life and intelligence is most likely not a one-time miracle confined to an infinitesimal speck of the Cosmos, the Earth.

BENEFITS OF FRIENDS
The potential benefits of contact to an advanced intelligent extraterrestrial species are incalculable to the future and destiny of the human race.

It may be that we don’t have much in common with each other except curiosity. But that alone would be a driving force of human determination and progress, geared at finding out more about the other.

DON’T BE AN OSTRICH
Should it turn out that UAP/UFOs are otherworldly emissaries of non-friendly intent, then it would also be important to find out. It could be fatal to stick our collective heads into the sand.

ULTIMA R̶A̶T̶I̶O̶ RADIO
These are the reasons why the Contact Initiative proposes to contact “UFO sightings in progress” by radio waves.

References:
1.: Kurt Russell claims he saw — and reported  — the ‘Phoenix Lights’,
https://eu.azcentral.com/story/news/local/phoenix/2017/06/14/kurt-russell-claims-reported-phoenix-lights-ufos/394749001/

2.: Ex Arizona Governor saw a UFO during the 1997 Phoenix Lights, https://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Former_Arizona_Governor_says_he_saw_a_UFO_during_the_1997_Phoenix_Lights

3.: New survey shows nearly half of Americans believe in aliens,
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/new-survey-shows-nearly-half-of-americans-believe-in_b_59824c11e4b03d0624b0abe4

4.: U.S. Adult Population
https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2021/08/united-states-adult-population-grew-faster-than-nations-total-population-from-2010-to-2020.html

5.: UFOs, UAPs and CRAPs
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/ufos-uaps-and-craps/

6.: Identification studies of UFOs
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Identification_studies_of_UFOs

7.: US MEDIAN AGE
https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2020/65-older-population-grows.html

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9. DESCRIPTION OF THE “CONTACT APP”

Realtime data feed about in progress UAP sightings

Creation of Adam / Earth Rise
Michelangelo / NASA

With the app named “UFO Alert!” (or “Contact Project App”) the Contact Initiative wants to engage with others who also think that they aren’t alone in the universe.

That includes not just our neighbors on planet Earth, should they exist. By that I mean neighbors on other planets.

We, the Contact Initiative, believe that there is a non-zero chance that UFOs/UAPs have an extraterrestrial origin. In other words and more precisely: we believe that UAP may be of extraterrestrial origin.

But we can’t be 100% certain.

In the past we may have seen something unexplained in the sky and wondered what it was… We never found out about it because no one told us and we didn’t have the tool to tell us.

We are the casual UFO/UAP witness.
We are 46 million people in the USA alone.
We wanna know what’s going on!

The UFO Alert! app

An tool to identify the identifiable and investigate the unknown.

click image to enlarge

Currently the flowchart of the app is not hewn in stone. No godly instructions were received on a mountain to create this.

This is a project in the brainstorming stage. To make it a reality compromises may have to be made.

That is possible because the app has a modular design. The app is composed of modules. Each module is desirable, but not essential to create the app.

For instance. the “Identified Flying Object Databanks” can be left out. They can be added at a later stage, or never. Omitting them would make the app programming much easier and faster.

How much can be realized at the first try?

That depends on
a) funding or
b) the selfless support from the open source community.

UFO Alert! is an open source UFO/UAP real time reporting tool. Every user who downloads the app is a “Search partner”. Users CAN register to use the app. During the registration users CAN enter their profession, such as pilots, air traffic controllers, military personnel, and age and hobbies.

Search partners can be anyone with a smartphone, radio operators, videographers, gigapixel camera operators, Unistellar telescope operators and (passive) radar operators, which are a subset of radio HAM enthusiasts and people that are close enough to have visual or audible contact with an UAP/UFO.

UAPs are a very transitory phenomenon. Often a sighting lasts less than a minute. Speed is of the essence to reacquire the target. Because it is in the reacquisition phase that the “UFO Alert!” app gathers most of its data.

The Contact Project

The “UFO ALERT!” app has two modes of operation: ALERT and CONTACT.

App users that report a sighting shall be called Alerters.

HAM radio and other operators that are sent the coordinates of the UFO shall be called Contacters.

What happens when an UFO is spotted?
The user who sees the object/phenomenon presses the “UFO sighting in progress” or “Alert!” button of the CONTACT app:


The app immediately uploads the timestamp and GPS coordinates of the sighting:


The user can also try to take snapshots or video of the UFO sighting with their smartphone. This provides real time additional data: the smartphone’s gravity sensors record the elevation and its magnetic compass records the azimuth:


The data are then sent to an “Identified Flying Object server”.
Here GPS and time data are parsed (and available elevation and azimuth). An astronomical real-time database, the NORAD database and air traffic databases are used to identify known flying objects near the UAP location, such as planets, planes and satellites. (To categorically exclude ship traffic, such as may have been filmed in Kumburgaz, Turkey, in 2007-2009, a marine AIS database should be included). Secret military projects are excluded via NORAD TLEs:


If the object is not identified,
it becomes a “prospective UAP” (PUAP):

GPS coordinates and other data of prospective UFOs/UAPs are forwarded as an ALERT to close-by Contacters using the same Contact app, to be investigated in more detail:

Contacters are selected based on their vicinity to the GPS coordinates of the sighting and their hardware/qualifications/experience. The contacters may be HAM radio operators and others (search partners with CB / HD camera / HD video / telescope / radar):

Should the same PUAP be reported multiple times at different locations a trajectory can be computed and search partners will be notified in advance of a possible PUAP arrival.

Users that spot the PUAP can fill out a standard UFO sighting questionnaire and/or supply more detailed reports that will be attached to the alert.

The presence of a not identified flying object has now been broadcast to users of the CONTACT app in the vicinity of the sighting via multiple routes (SMS, EMAIL, POP-UP APP NOTIFICATION).

Alerted by this notification:

HAM RADIO OPERATORS will be listening for incoming broadcasts from the sighting using multiband radio frequency scanners. Should the sighting be a remote controlled drone it would now be identified via the unique drone radio frequency signature.

If the PUAP is a viable UFO and not a drone → then HAM operators will attempt to make contact using a variety of radio bands. A pre-recorded message or data burst transmission may be broadcast towards the UFO.

TELESCOPE AND CAMERA OPERATORS
Other search partners may try to use the information to get radar or visual confirmation via HD cameras or automatic telescopes (for instance UNISTELLAR / VAONIS STELLINA). 

(PASSIVE) RADAR OPERATORS
A special field of amateur HAM radio is the analysis of passive radar data, often to observe meteor tracks. Sometimes unexplained tracks are recorded, showing flight maneuvers of objects at right angles. In case of these anomalous sightings an ALERT can be triggered with the aim of visual confirmation and radio contact.

VISUAL OBSERVERS
Any search partner who can verify the sighting by eye sight using the CONTACT APP provides real time data to the sighting in progress.

The CONTACT INITIATIVE effort may be coordinated via the members of SETI Institute / SETI LEAGUE / MUFON /  HAM and other organized networks.

All who download the app can make UFO reports.
A sighting by a single person is less convincing than an event that many witnesses report from a distance to each other.

An AI algorithm will analyze live reports coming in in real time to determine if multiple witnesses are reporting on the same thing. This takes into account the position and possible flightpath of an object.
 

To motivate the public to take part in this search,
prizes can be given for successful detections of UAPs, staggered by evidence weight:

less important:
1. confirmed UAP pictures, 2. video, 3. radar images,

more important:
4. reception of radio emissions,  5. verifiable conversation with ETI (CETI), 6. physical alien artifact, 7. actual landing of UAP with ETI.

Alternative to cash prizes, credits may be given, they could be collectible non-fungible tokens (NFT’s), whose value is based on their desirability.

The whole endeavor (and prize money) will be funded by private enterprise through the “Alien Marketplace” advertising space. This marketplace is accessed through the Contact app. To filter out fakes and false identifications AI algorithms and volunteers evaluate the results. The volunteers may be paid cash or NFT tokens that can be traded on the Alien Marketplace.

The Contact App flowchart as PDF: download here,
and as JPG: download here.

What do you think of the Contact Initiative? Join the discussion on https://reddit.com/r/contactproject or friend me on Facebook.

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Donald J. Trump in “The Great Dictator”

Satire, Comedy, Parody
Get ready for a hilarious twist on a classic! This video features the original speech of Donald J. Trump, reimagined through the lens of the iconic 1940s Charlie Chaplin film, “The Great Dictator.”

Join DJT as he plays Adenoid Hynkel, whimsically swooning over the globe and dreaming of taking Greenland and Canada while hilariously considering renaming the Gulf of Mexico.

Don’t miss this unique blend of humor and nostalgia. Like and share!

Magalomania

#satire #Comedy #Parody #Trump #CharlieChaplin #TheGreatDictator #FunnyVideos