14 hours ago, birdguy said:

I was thinking while they were scanning the sky thry would have accidentally come upon one.

Noel

 

Astronomers scan the sky at night, of course, and helium filled balloons are invisible at night, I would have thought.

I think most observations of balloons, until now, were probably ignored. You can actually buy your own helium balloons online. Chris Lehto (former F16 pilot, now UFO researcher) launched a helium balloon that went up the 110,000 feet. The most expensive thing was the helium, at $900. So all manner of organizations launch balloons for all manner of mundane purposes. 

I bet you the military classified satellites up there, looking down at the Earth, have seen some very interesting things. 🤔

 

  I hope they checked to see if there was a lawn chair with a 6 pack hanging underneath  one of those ballons before they fired a missile at it.

On 2/16/2023 at 12:08 PM, martin-w said:

I think they all were balloons. No aliens this time. 

On the one hand there's this notion that aliens have already been among us for quite some time, zipping across the sky with unfathomable maneuvers. But another scenario I could imagine is we some day really actually get 100% definitive, no more doubt whatsoever as to what it might be, signals (i.e. light or radio) from a far off civilization. But they're still very far off. We'd most likely be looking at multiple generations where we knew of their existence, yet due to the tremendous distances still no direct contact, still mysterious. Not sure if that would really change much of the squabbles we have down here on planet Earth though.

2 hours ago, Antipodeslonghaul said:

But they're still very far off. We'd most likely be looking at multiple generations where we knew of their existence, yet due to the tremendous distances still no direct contact,

 

If they are far off, a tremendous distance, then our radio signal from them would have been sent in the past.

If they are a great distance away, their civilisation might no longer be in existance, or their species changed so much, that they have no memory or interest in contact. 

6 hours ago, Antipodeslonghaul said:

But another scenario I could imagine is we some day really actually get 100% definitive, no more doubt whatsoever as to what it might be, signals (i.e. light or radio) from a far off civilization.

If we receive a signal from what we believe to be intelligent aliens, what would be the sequence of events after that? 

I imagine that, no matter how far away the source, we would try to respond. If the source is less than, say, 20 light years away, we would hope to develop meaningful communication, even though we would have to wait 40 years for a reply. 

Rather than just waiting for 40 years, we would send a variety of signals periodically, hoping they can deduce something about our language in the meantime.

The ultimate goal in this fantasy of mine would not be developing warp travel to visit the alien planet. It would be the less ambitious goal of establishing a video link, even with a 20 year delay.

If we received a communication from an inhabited planet 20 light years away they would be responding to what they had been receiving from Earth 40 years ago.

WKRP in Cincinatti

Mort and Mindy

Fantasy Island

Taxi

Three's Company

And news reports about Argentina invading the Falklands.

Noel

 

 

Who's Mort?  Mork from Ork??

30 minutes ago, charliearon said:

Who's Mort?  Mork from Ork??

Mork's brother, I believe.

13 minutes ago, dmwalker said:

Mork's brother, I believe.

Nope.  Mort is short for Mortimer Snerd, Charlie McCarthy's buddy.  He was back-dooring Mork with Mindy.

Noel