You continue to jump to false conclusions about me, obfuscate things I’ve said, and ignore other things entirely. Disingenuous argumentative tactics.

The experts I’m referring to are not armchair individuals. I’m referring to the scientists from France, the UK and US who participated in the studies on UAP. Also the scientists in the Galileo Project, UAPx, as well as independent scientists who have been studying the topic.

I’m also referring to the individuals within our government who have participated in the programs or other roles within the intelligence community and have become whistle-blowers (like Luis Elizondo and Christopher Mellon–not referring to David Grusch).

I was completely skeptical and always dismissed UFOs as crazy Dale Gribble nonsense. But when I started to actually look into it, I found enough reason to believe that a percentage of Category D UAP may represent crafts possessing breakthrough/disruptive technology. That’s not such a wild belief.

This is a view held by many members of our government, from elected officials to those within our intelligence community privy to information neither of us have access to.

You, on the other hand, are claiming that all of these individuals and government agencies are all completely wrong, you’re dismissing the declassified records, and dismissing the clear patterns represented in credible eyewitness accounts (some of which have corresponding data from radar and across multiple sensors).

“If these things didn’t fit patterns, then there’s no way of studying it. But when you get reports from Australia, Japan, France, then you have to say: ‘Well either there’s a virus going around that’s causing everybody to become crazy at the same time, or there’s something to it.” - Dr. Alen J Hynek

ODNI stated that there exists concern that a percentage of UAP represent disruptive/breakthrough technology. They also stated that some most likely do represent physical objects (not simply instrument malfunctions as you continue to assert).

I’m not basing my beliefs off crackpots. No matter how much you try to misframe my argument and gaslight, it’s not going to work.

My beliefs are based off of declassified government records and the statements made by credible experts and government officials, not bogus abduction stories. It’s categorically different from my brother who is unable to discern credible sources.

Even if you disagree with my views, the sources I cited were not some wild QAnon level nonsense. The documentaries I cited were for direct quotes from primary sources. Also, I stayed the hell away from History Channel big-haired nonsense. You’re trying to frame it along those lines.

I actually thought that I could approach my QAnon crazy brother with this, thinking it was something he’d like to talk about. But lo and behold it wasn’t crazy enough for him… He began to drone on about all these ridiculous conspiracies about different alien races working within world governments, and also god somehow…

You’re wrong to misframe my argument in line with the QAnon conspiratorial mindset. You also just keep repeating the false claim that there are no experts taking it seriously.

Our governments believe there may be validity, seeing as how they have continued to monitor/study UAP. Same for some scientists and even Harvard University. And again, NASA has advocated against people stigmatizing the subject as you are doing here.

No matter how many times you falsely claim that there are merely crackpots and no experts, it doesn’t make it true. That is blatantly false.

Easy, get a physics degree. I already pointed out how the data was clearly incorrect.

Ha, all you did is assert it’s invalid without any supporting information. Explain how it’s wrong and I will consider your argument.

I already discussed Harvard’s Galileo Project lead by experts. Or UAPx, which is a scientific organization studying the subject. NASA is also gearing up to study study UAP, and have argued against stigmatizing the subject as you are guilty of here. Source

Let’s not ignore Project Blue Book, AATIP, and now currently AARO, which are/were US government agencies/projects devoted to studying/monitoring UAP.

There’s also the UK’s historical government UAP investigations, as well as France’s studies by GEIPAN (essentially their NASA). And if you want to criticize their legitimacy, consider how NASA regarded the COMETA Report.

Just because all experts aren’t taking it seriously doesn’t mean none are. So if your criterion for validity is experts investigating the subject, it is met.

This is exactly why I use Semmelweis’s discovery of handwashing as analogous to this situation. He couldn’t explain why there was such a significant reduced mortality rate from handwashing prior to surgery, and he was ridiculed for his findings by the medical community, and he was eventually institutionalized in an asylum where he died.

His findings were rejected on the basis of preexisting beliefs; not lack of validity or ability to study the subject. This is where we currently are with UAP, where there is a growing number of scientists and experts beginning to lend the subject credence, but there is an overwhelming toxic stigma perpetuated by closed-minded individuals which discourages experts from jeopardizing their career/credibility.

This is also seen in both commercial and military pilots, but more and more are coming forward to share their testimonies. Ryan Graves, one of the whistle-blower pilots, founded the Americans for Safe Aerospace organization to provide a confidential means for pilots to report their encounters.

I’m not ignorant of my ignorance in regard to technical understanding of aircraft and physics. That is why my request for you to actually expand on your argument is sincere.

I want to test my beliefs and modify them in the face of new and valid information to maintain congruence. I am a skeptic after all, whether or not you believe it.

As it stands, I am basing my beliefs off of an overwhelming body of government documents and government/military whistle-blowers, as well as expert testimony.

On the other hand, you are a random internet stranger who has been overly hostile and not countering so much as blanket dismissing what I have stated and cited.

If you want me to take you seriously, you’ll have to do a better job explaining how all of the historical international UAP monitoring programs, experts, government/military officials, and pilots around the world are all wrong.

Are you purposefully dodging the obvious difference between actual research and “doing your own research”?

What I was citing is an example of how “doing your own research” (colloquialism) can yield something productive and valid when I was sharing my article. I was using that as a example, and comparing it to my brother who “does his own research” (again, we’re talking about the colloquial meaning…) and believes QAnon insanity and conspiracy theories about everything.

That is what the original post topic is referring to. Not literal scholarly research as you appear to be stuck on.

What I wrote on UAP is not the equivalent of QAnon crazies. I cited declassified documents from the National Archives and quoted various pilots/military/government personnel.

Your retort here just tells me you read snippets of my UAP article and are not acknowledging most of the information. Kevin Day was the Cheif Radar Operator, and this is a direct quote:

"…Immediately we were thinking: ‘Are these things real? Are they some type of glitch?’ So when we ran a bunch of diagnostic tests and we brought all our systems back up, the contacts were stronger now. That’s when I became concerned about these things and I strongly recommended that we take one of the aircraft that just launched off the Nimitz and go intercept one and go see what it is.”

The pilots witnessed the object/its movements with their own eyes, which corroborated the data from their sensors and radar data on the Princeton. I’m going to trust the concerns of the Cheif Radar Operator, multiple Top Gun pilots from a world famous squadron, and their weapons systems specialist over you and your arrogant condescension.

I guess I should have specified that what I am referring to is the category D UAP (see the COMETA report). I believe that some percentage of category D UAP could be possibly explainable by more conventional explanation.

I’m also not arguing that there is evidence of extraterrestrials; I’m only arguing that a percentage of category D UAP represent intelligently controlled physical objects, which represent disruptive/breakthrough technology.

That does not mean the technology could not be of human origin. But this technology represented in the Nimitz Event outperformed our F/A-18F Superhornets, and that same type of craft was identified on a mass scale beginning in 1947.

The sightings were so prevalent in the 50s that the US Air Force issued a public address on UFOs to the nation.

The reason I don’t rule out the possibility of non-human technology myself is because this kind of technology being invented and concealed since 1947 somehow seems even less reasonable to me.

You can disagree with me, the expert individuals’ accounts, and refuse to acknowledge the documents from the National Archives, but it doesn’t make my argument crazy.

I am simply arguing there is breakthrough/disruptive technology represented in a percentage of the category D UAP. That is supported by ODNI’s report as well, in which it states a potential national security concern is that they could represent breakthrough/disruptive technology by an adversary.

Of the 510 total UAP reports studied by ODNI, 171 remained “uncharacterized and unattributed,” and “some of these uncharacterized UAP appear to have demonstrated unusual flight characteristics or performance capabilities, and require further analysis."

I am up for debating the subject. If I am wrong about anything and you have expertise and can share it/information, I’m all ears. Unlike most people, I want to challenge my beliefs and will gladly shift my beliefs in the face of compelling evidence.

There’s more supporting evidence of disruptive/breakthrough tech represented in category D UAP than there is evidence of any religion.

And if this is a bogus area not worhy of study, why is Harvard’s Galileo Project so invested in studying UAP? Or UAPx? And why was there such unprecedented unanimous bipartisan support passing UAP related bills in the least productive House in history?

You have no clue what my opinion is of myself. You’re just jumping to conclusions. You talk down to me about being stupid, yet your argument against me is juvenile and half of it is just ad hominem (not valid criticism).

I never claimed to be anything either, so what exactly are you accusing me of being fraudulent about?

What’s wrong with the information I have cited within my articles on radicalism and on violence and mental illness? Do you not like the information? Do you have a complaint about a particular source?

As far as your criticism about my UAP write-up, are you referring to the section on the Nimitz Event in which I mentioned some UAPs’ movements reminded me of the quantum locking and quantum levitation of super-cooled superconducting? The part where I say that is out of my depth?

Yeah, admitting something is beyond my education/comprehension screams fraud, genius…

The vast majority of my UAP write-up is reporting information. I speculate a few times, but I make that clear and do not make wild claims like you’re misframing it to be. I reported information and expert testimony.

Kevin Day is the one who said the radar was confirmed by Fravor’s (as well as others’) visual observations that day. The pilots said that it wasn’t visual instrument malfunctions, because they saw it with their naked eyes.

If you have a problem with their accounts, take it up with them. I truly don’t care what you think of me or your petty criticism and insults.

I’ll readily admit I’m not educated in avionics, which is why I quoted all of those individuals who were in various roles of expertise.

If your critism is that all of my arguments/beliefs are bogus because it’s out of my depth, then surely you concede on the grounds of expert testimony, as in the Nimitz Event?

Or do you think you know more than our greatest pilots and military personnel?

Edit: Just took more notice of this:

Weird that you would showcase a vacuous article as an example of “research”.

I would not consider my articles legitimate research, which was not being discussed in this thread. “Doing your own research” is a common saying, and that’s what was being discussed here.

I don’t know if you’re doing it intentionally or unintentionally, but you certainly misconstrued the colloquialism to try to make fun of/discredit me, which is dishonest and a disingenuous argumentative tactic.

If you think I’m such an idiot, you can surely make a stronger case than this disingenuous argument full of ad hominem. You argue like a poor man’s sophist.

Doing your own research being good/bad depends entirely on one’s ability to scrutinize reliable sources. When I “do my own research” it looks like this.

When my brother “does his own research” he presents horrendously false information from terribly bias and debunked sources. He’s the primary family member which influenced my writing that piece on radicalism.

If someone is unable to comprehend/recognize valid from invalid/biased sources/information, “doing their own research” is very dangerous in fueling further extreme/conspiratorial beliefs.

QAnon and covid/anti-masking are great examples in which people “doing their own research” resulted in a lot of unnecessary suffering and stupidity.

People should learn how to effectively scrutinize sources before they attempt to “research” something themselves. “Doing your own research” can be productive or unproductive, and it depends entirely on the individual.

I’m not going to a community college hahaha. I’m working on my Master’s in counseling.

Just thought that a critical thinking course may help you with your 4th grade level logic/arguments.

It’s false to consider the userbase on lemmy.world and Threads to be analogous. I have documented the very real problems with Threads in this comment here.

Keep living in denial of what has already been happening on Threads haha.

If the “vast majority of lemmy users” start demand things from their admins while excusing themselves from contributing in any meaningful way, yes, I’d disregard their opinions as well.

Boy, you really ought to consider taking a critical thinking class at your local community college or something…

You’re still trying to build a strawman argument. When your foundation is compromised, you don’t keep building on it…

It’s clear you’re going to use disingenuous argumentative tactics and fallacies. If your next comment is just as juvenile, I’m not going to bother responding. Again, these arguments are invalid upon arrival, being logical fallacies and all…

I disagree on user support. Look at the posts heavily discussing the matter, and also pay attention to the vote counts.

Also, it’s not a hypothetical when there is already a systemic issue and the company has a notorious history. Look at my comment here for my fleshed out argument on this subject with citations.

I wasn’t intending on debating the issue here; I was only looking for recommendations on alternative instances.

Nice strawman attempt! There’s no reason for me to even argue with you when your argument is a fallacy and automatically invalid.

Using your ridiculous logic, you must think the vast majority of lemmy users don’t hold any value or merit? Because the vast majority of us are not hosting our own instances.

Being an active and constructive user, creating and moderating communities, and fighting misinformation are positive qualities for online communities.

Edit: I’ve also been donating to Ruud since my first week on this platform, so that’s yet another reason your argument is totally incorrect. But I’ll definitely be stopping my donations if Threads ends up being federated with.

I disagree that they aren’t selling out.

I consider it to be as such when this move isn’t supported by most of their userbase, they misframe that blocking Threads is a viable solution for the rampant issues with hate/extremism, and the decision puts their users at risk (both in the form of extremism/harassment and exploitation by Meta).

It’s an inch towards becoming mainstream, but the costs outweigh the benefits IMO. I believe it’s hypocritical to defederate from exploding heads and then turn around and federate with Threads.

I think misleading users into believing they can block Threads (only the posts), making a decision against the majority of their community’s wishes, and instead subjecting them to potential harassment, misinformation and exploitation is selling out.

Except for time, money, and technical knowledge…

Also *blackjack and hookers!

I created !vans@lemmy.world and have been planning on trying to revive my efforts to grow the community, but I’m sure hell not doing that if Threads is being incorporated. I’m instead going to strip the community of all of the content I posted.

I also want to create a community for my city, but I’m never going to do that on an instance that allows Threads/Meta incorporation. Also have wanted to recreate r/OldSkaters from reddit.

If I wanted to deal with Meta, I’d make an account on one of their privacy/rights-infringing platforms.

As established already, blocking Threads does not block user comments from showing up. Even if it did, I still would not host a community on an instance federated with Threads unless there was a way for the communities themselves to fully block Threads interaction.

But the only way to fully block Threads is by defederating from it.

No, that’s a half-measure at best… It only blocks Threads posts from showing up in your feed. It does not block Threads users comments from showing up on federated instances, even if the individual user personally blocks them.

I am legitimately fearful for LGBTQ+ users, as their community members have already been harrased on Threads by the far-right.

That’s such a misinformative false ‘solution’ people keep peddling…

No, blocking Threads on the individual user level does not stop comments made by Threads users from showing up on federated instances, even for users who block Threads.

That means users who block Threads will still see hate/extremism and are still subject to potential harassment by toxic Threads users.

Most instance admins are federating with Threads/Meta. Even if you block the instance yourself, it doesn’t prevent you from seeing Threads users’ comments and the hate, harassment, and extremism on that platform from spreading throughout federated instances.

Edit: Since so many people are misinformed: No, blocking Threads on an individual basis is not a solution. This only blocks posts from Threads showing up in your feed. It does not block Threads users’ comments from spreading hate and extremism throughout federated instances, and lemmy users will still be subject to potential harassment from Threads users. (See the harassment of the LGBTQ+ community on Threads for examples…)

Here’s a comment of mine that states my argument against federating with Threads.

Also, I was not trying to debate the issue here. I was looking for recommendations for alternative instances… I’d appreciate anyone actually responding to my comment.

Original comment: Anybody have recommendations on a decent instance that won’t be federating with Threads? Maybe one that allows community creation but isn’t full of tankies?

I’m jumping ship from .world if they go through with federating with Threads. Such a shame to see the effort put into building this great instance come undone.

This place decided to disregard what the majority of their users want and turn the neighborhood to shit way faster than reddit. I thought we’d at least have a couple years before instance admins started selling out to such a shitty company that’s going to make the fediverse a less safe place for their users.

Meta will also do anything they can to EEE and I’m not convinced the fediverse is as invulnerable to such exploitation as some users seem to be.

A get out of jail free car.

I implore you to read the article I just published regarding how people become radicalized. Your decision is ultimately going to affect the well-being and safety of the users of Lemmy.World.

I see the suggestion of personally blocking Threads purported as a solution, but that is limited to a personal level. That does not solve the problem of radicalization of the user-base in general. Users who have not blocked them or people viewing without a profile will be potentially exposed to misinformation and extremism.

As documented in my article, radicalization happens through a social contagion effect, in which repeated exposures reinforce the radical beliefs. People who otherwise would not believe such things become radicalized through repetition, and social media websites (including reddit and lemmy) serve as catalysts for radicalizing such vulnerable people.

Incels were spawned through their echo-chamber on reddit, and slowly radicalized to the point in which they have committed mass murder and acts of domestic terrorism. Read sources The_Donald on reddit was originally a satire subreddit that became a pro-trump echo-chamber, which snowballed into real-world extremism and had to be banned.

Threads has been subject to mass amounts of radicalizing, extremist content, and there have also been instances of users having personal information doxxed on Threads due to Meta’s information-harvesting practices. [1]

Threads was marketed to be open to ‘free speech’ and encouraged the Far-Right movement to join, who have spread extremism, hate, and harassment on Threads already. [3] Threads has been a hotbed of Israel-Palestine misinformation/propaganda. [4]

They fired fact-checkers just prior to Threads’ launch [1], however they claim they will have 3rd party fact-checkers next year. [5]

Meta/FB has a rampant history of illegal and unethical practices, including running experiments on their users which affected their moods and induced depression in many uninformed, non-consenting subjects. [6]

Meta/FB/Instagram also have a strong history of facilitating the spread of misinformation and extremism, which contributed to the January 6th insurrection attempt. [7]

If exploding heads was defederated with because of this sort of toxic extremism, why would you want to federate with a platform plagued by that same content? One known for shortcomings moderating it? And one which comes from a company with a long history of unethical practices regarding users?

With their rampant history of unethical and illegal business practices, I encourage you (the Lemmy. World team) not to federate with Threads for the well-being of the users in this instance. I have consistently seen a larger consensus of Lemmy.World users opposing federation than being interested in it.

A significant portion of Lemmy (in general as well as Lemmy.World) users migrated here from reddit after being disappointed in the reddit administration’s failure to represent their users’ interests. Unlike most of the users on reddit, a significant proportion of the users on Lemmy.World are the active users who cared enough about their principles to leave and start over here.

I have really valued the leadership of Lemmy.World thus far and have donated to you since my first week here, because I believed in this instance and our community. And I still do.

But I will be cancelling my donations and likely finding a different instance whose ethics are more aligned with my own, should you choose to federate with Threads. I have tried to be an active user and promote discussion and sharing content on Lemmy.World. But in federating with Threads, I believe you will lose a lot of active community members like myself.

I sincerely hope you will take this into consideration in making your final decision.