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There are widespread concerns that deep-sea mining for metals will damage fragile ecosystems. But if mining ever goes ahead, hydrogen plasma could shrink the carbon footprint of smelting the metal ores

Analysis of the DNA and proteins of a range of animals has revealed that sperm’s molecular toolkit arose in our single-celled ancestors, perhaps more than a billion years ago

As the impact of global warming becomes more obvious, you might expect countries to step up climate action and preparation, but we’re seeing the opposite happen

The 194 countries still taking part in UN climate negotiations reaffirmed the Paris Agreement following the US withdrawal, even if they agreed on little else

The CDC webpage about vaccines and autism now misrepresents the science and lies to the public about vaccines and autism. It's just part of HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. continuing war on vaccines.

The post The CDC is lying to you about vaccines and autism first appeared on Science-Based Medicine.

Two orbiters and a rover captured images of the interstellar object — from the closest location any of the agency’s spacecraft may get — that could reveal new details.

Blue Origin announced a series of upgrades to New Glenn designed to increase payload performance and launch cadence, while enhancing reliability. The enhancements span propulsion, structures, avionics, reusability, and recovery operations, and will be phased into upcoming New Glenn missions beginning with NG-3.

Here we go…again. Another documentary film about how disclosure of alien contact is imminent. It’s a claim I’ve been hearing for over three decades, albeit this one is of a higher quality than the dozens of similar such docs available on Amazon Prime (and hundreds more on YouTube).

With The Age of Disclosure, filmmaker Dan Farah (Call Jane, Ready Player One, The Phenomenon) has lifted the genre to a higher level than the others (James Fox being the exception, with The Phenomenon—credit shared with Farah—well worth watching). I was tempted to offer a snarky “I watched it so you don’t have too,” but if you are relatively new to the UFO/UAP topic, I recommend investing the twenty bucks Amazon Prime charges to rent the film for 30 days ($25 to buy it). The artfully edited trailer hints at what is to come in the full film.

0:00 /2:47 1×

The Age of Disclosure is packaged and produced so well that naïve viewers may come away thinking that something strikingly original, shockingly new, and world-shaking is about to be loosed among the world, everywhere the ceremony of innocence drowned (Yeats, of course).

Alas, it is not to be. Every fact, opinion, or anecdote in the film has been rehearsed elsewhere in recent years, and a good deal of the footage is from Congressional hearings, media reports, and stock interviews that have been circulating for years on CNN, Fox News, News Nation, and even the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times, along with other mainstream media sources and large-audience podcasts. But the fusillade of statements, interspersed with the familiar UAP grainy videos and UFO blurry photographs, leaves no doubt about the film’s conclusion:

“We are not alone in the universe.”

“Humans are not the only intelligence in the universe.”

“They’re real, they’re here, and they’re not human.”

“Non-human intelligences are here and have been interacting with humanity for a long time.”

“We are not the only intelligent life form on the planet. There’s something else here.”

“This is the biggest discovery in human history.” 

Wow, can we see these aliens and their spaceships?

Nope.

Why not?

The opening credentialing sequence gives us a clue: when you don’t actually have concrete evidence that we can all see, your case depends on eyewitness accounts so you must establish that their words are trustworthy and reliable. For example, the intrepid UAP proponent Lue Elizando says:

“If you could be in my shoes and see what I’ve seen, there would be zero shadow of a doubt that these things are real and they are not made by humans.”

The problem is that we can’t be in anyone else’s shoes, so we depend on evidence that does not depend on a single eyewitness. “If only you could have been in my shoes that night when I saw Bigfoot—there would be zero shadow of a doubt….” In science, such anecdotes do not count as evidence; you need to be able to show actual physical evidence—in this case a body of a Bigfoot.

Continuing my biological analogy, in order to name a new species you have to present a type specimen—a holotype—that everyone can see, examine, photograph, analyze, etc. If you gave a talk at a biology conference about how you discovered a new species of bipedal primate, no one would take you seriously if you did not also present unmistakable evidence. If all you had were stories about what you saw, and maybe a couple of out-of-focus videos and grainy photographs, no one would believe you…and for good reason!

What scientists and skeptics are asking of the UFO and UAP community is to, at long last, show us the evidence.

What scientists and skeptics are asking of the UFO and UAP community is to, at long last, show us the evidence. We have been hearing of pending disclosure for half a century and are always left wanting. We don’t need to know your credentials, how many years you worked for the U.S. government or military, or how strongly you believe that what you saw was aliens or alien craft; just show us what you claim is here and we will all believe. QED!

But no. Here is parapsychologist, remote viewing researcher, and UFOlogist Hal Putoff: 

“The classified data that we had access to when we joined the program was indisputable.”

Here is astrophysicist and UFOlogist Eric Davis:

“There is 80 years of data that the public isn’t even aware of.”

Here is Jay Stratton, prominently featured in the film as one of the defense officials who first investigated UAP:

“The things that I’ve seen, the clearest videos, the best evidence we have that these are non-human intelligence, remains classified. I have seen with my own eyes non-human craft and non-human beings.”

He saw it himself! No FOAF (Friend of a Friend) urban legend. O-kay, but can I see it with my own eyes? No? Then I remain skeptical, as it should be in science.

The film then reviews most of the standard UAP pilot accounts, such as this from Navy pilot Ryan Graves: “They [UAPs] were ubiquitous. We were seeing them almost daily.” If true, given that nearly every commercial airline passenger has a smart phone with a high-definition camera at the ready, there should be thousands of clear and unmistakable photographs and videos of these UAPs. To date there is not one. Nada. Zilch. Here the absence of evidence is evidence of absence.

Where were the aliens in 1945 to stop the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki?

A key message of the film is that there are political and even military ramifications of UAPs. Here is Stratton again: “They [UAPs] have both activated and deactivated nuclear weapons in both the U.S. and Russia.” In the category of “If this were true, what else would be true?”… where were the aliens in 1945 to stop the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki? Why did they allow us to detonate the first atomic bomb in New Mexico? Why didn’t they curtail the hundreds of nuclear explosions in the Nevada desert and the South Pacific? The answer is classic hand-waving rationalization, as in Stanford University professor and UFOlogist Gary Nolan’s answer: “They [the aliens] were willing to let us see the consequences of our actions.”

To add urgency to the film, Elizondo tells us that “It [UAP sightings] is happening all over the world and it is happening with greater frequency.” The Bayesian reasoner in me asks: can we see some data on the base rate of sightings over the decades to make an assessment if, in fact, there has been an increase in frequency? No such data is provided.

 Another standard theme throughout the film is explaining why—despite the unmitigated confidence that alien contact has been discovered (but not yet disclosed)—the evidence is not readily available. Several reasons are on offer, such as this one from Elizondo: “religious fundamentalists in the Pentagon who had a severe adversity to this topic…put their religion above national security.” Among the fundies, apparently, were those who told Stratton “these were demons and we were messing with Satan’s world.”

The documentary has attracted wide attention, including coverage from Bill Maher on HBO and Joe Rogan.

As for the larger issue of the consequences of disclosure on religious faith, numerous surveys over the years have consistently found that the vast majority of religious people would not find the discovery of extra-terrestrial intelligences (“non-human biologics” in the newfangled UAP jargon meant to legitimize an otherwise fringe movement) in any way a threat to their religious beliefs. Theologian Ted Peters, for example, queried 1,300 people on the matter, finding that most people do not think the discovery of extraterrestrial intelligence would shake their faith. The reason is as obvious as it is logical: If an omnipotent deity can create life on Earth, he could do it elsewhere in the universe. In a cosmos with a sextillion planets (1 followed by 21 zeros, or 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000), what a terrible waste of space it would be (echoing Carl Sagan) to create a cosmos so vast as to house so many planets, only one of which would contain sentient consciousness beings worthy of saving.

What are these UAPs, exactly? Here the film segues into a chalkboard lecture by Elizondo, who explains that there are four hypotheses on offer:

1. Foreign adversary technology that we simply don’t understand.
2. A robust counter-intelligence program to cover-up a U.S. program.
3. Interdimensional or extraterrestrial.
4. A combination of the above.

Unfortunately, left off the list was…

5. Ordinary terrestrial phenomena. 
6. None of the above.

For #5, I am fond of quoting from Leslie Kean’s 2010 book UFOs: Generals, Pilots and Government Officials Go on the Record, in which the UFOlogist admitted that “roughly 90 to 95 percent of UFO sightings can be explained” as:

weather balloons, flares, sky lanterns, planes flying in formation, secret military aircraft, birds reflecting the sun, planes reflecting the sun, blimps, helicopters, the planets Venus or Mars, meteors or meteorites, space junk, satellites, swamp gas, spinning eddies, sundogs, ball lightning, ice crystals, reflected light off clouds, lights on the ground or lights reflected on a cockpit window, temperature inversions, hole-punch clouds, and the list goes on!

Elizondo then ticked off six characteristics (“observables” because, well, it sounds more scientific) about UAP:

1. Hypersonic velocity (40,000 mph or faster).
2. Instantaneous acceleration (would kill pilots; even a drone would disintegrate).
3. Low visibility (no contrails, no sonic boom, no thrust, no exhaust).
4. Transmedium travel: (space, air, underwater).
5. Anti-gravity (without any obvious means—no wings, rockets, etc.).
6. Biological effects (energy weapons, getting too close to UAPs, burned, inflammation, orbs).

What’s more likely? That all of physics and aerodynamics needs revising, or that someone has misinterpreted a low-resolution video?

All of these assumptions are based on highly questionable interpretations of grainy videos and blurry photographs of UAPs/UFOs. For example, an incredibly grainy video apparently filmed from the USS Omaha off the coast of San Diego in July 2019, shows a dark blob appear to segue from above the waves to below. This, we are told, is clear and unmistakable evidence that UAPs can seemingly transition from the air into the ocean where, the speculation continues, can move through the water at hundreds of miles per hour. What’s more likely? That all of physics and aerodynamics needs revising, or that someone has misinterpreted a low-resolution video?

An unidentified anomalous phenomenon (UAP) was filmed from the USS Omaha off the coast of San Diego in July 2019. CREDIT: Jeremy Corbell/WeaponizedPodcast

I was surprised—even shocked—to see that the film included accusations that Lue Elizondo was not completely honest about his role with the U.S. government in the UAP program. To wit, we are told that Pentagon spokesman Christopher Sherwood said:

“Mr. Elizondo had no responsibilities with regard to the AATIP program”

And Pentagon Spokesperson Susan Gough revealed:

“Luis Elizondo did not have any assigned responsibilities for AATIP.”

So included, I fully expected Elizondo to offer an explanation, or the filmmakers to include proof that Elizondo worked at AATIP. Surely they could have provided a contract or pay stubs or some employment paperwork for Elizondo and AATIP, but no. Did Elizondo work for AATIP? It’s hard to believe that he didn’t, given how much information he reveals about what was going on in that department. And why would anyone lie about something so easy to check? Who knows, but UFOlogist Bob Lazar (who said he worked at Area 51 and back engineered alien spaceships) lied when he said he graduated with degrees in physics from MIT and Caltech when, in fact, he didn’t attend either such institution. Lazar’s lie was exposed by UFOlogist Stan Friedman, and the explanation on offer is that “they” erased all traces of Lazar’s academic record.

The film includes several high-profile interviews, among them Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

Another theme in the film that almost everyone I’ve ever engaged with on this topic is confused about, is articulated by former CIA Director John Brennan: “I think it’s a bit presumptuous, if not arrogant, for us to believe that there’s no other form of life anywhere in the entire universe.” 

 Of course, but that is not what any of this is about, or else the filmmakers would have interviewed SETI scientists, who have been listening for ETI signals for decades. The question “are they out there somewhere?” is a different matter entirely than “have they come here?” My provisional answers are “yes” and “no”, although as a good Bayesian I am willing to update my priors and flip my credence from skepticism to belief…with sufficient evidence.

What do the featured experts in this film think the aliens are? Elizondo suggests that they might be “cryptoterrestrial” (whatever that is—never explained) or some “proto-human” that branched off the family tree long ago and is “as natural to this planet as we are.”

“They’ve been operating here for a very long time.” How long? We are not told.

That’s the sanest of the explanations. Hal Putoff suggests that the UAP aliens might be time travelers, or some ancient civilization hiding here on Earth or on the seabed. Well, they must be hiding exceptionally well, because explorers (and satellites) have covered nearly every square meter of the planet and there is no sign of such an ancient civilization. (Maybe they have a cloaking device, like the one the Starship Enterprise used to monitor primitive civilizations on other planets.)  “Whoever it is and wherever they are,” Putoff concludes, “they’ve been operating here for a very long time.” How long? We are not told.

One segment of the film stands out, and that is the so-called “Legacy Program” that is a “crash retrieval program” to “back-engineer” alien spaceships. Now, to be sure, the U.S. government (along with other governments) have such programs to study downed/crashed airplanes, jets, drones, and spacecraft of other nations, because obviously we’d like to know what the other guy is up to technologically, and that, apparently, has been going on since the First World War (“what kind of altimeter are those German biplanes using, anyway?”). But if you Google search “Legacy Program” this is what you find:

Department of Defense Legacy Resource Management Program: This is a real, long-standing government program that funds projects to protect natural and cultural resources on military installations. Its mission is to balance military readiness with environmental stewardship.

According to this site:

The mission of the Legacy Resource Management Program is to provide coordinated, Department-wide, and partnership-based integration of military mission readiness with the conservation of irreplaceable natural and cultural resources.

When pressed to explain this Legacy crash-retrieval program, the Pentagon's All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) concluded in a 2024 report that “there is no evidence of such programs, attributing the claims to misidentified real events or circular reporting.”

Why the lacuna? Here is Lue Elizondo’s explanation: “The ‘Legacy Program’ was so secret that it was withheld from the Secretary of Defense, Congress, and even the President of the United States.” And: “We had a choice: keep silent while keeping Americans in the dark, or resign my position in protest and fulfill my obligations to the American people by telling the truth about what I know about UAP.”

Elizondo quit. How noble. It must fill one’s ego with massive pride to know that you have made the greatest discovery in the history of humanity and no one around you has any idea of this monumental event.

Throughout the film nods are made about UAPs as a “national security threat,” for example: “It could be China. It could be Russia.” Former Director of National Ingtelligence James Clapper: “any unexplained phenomena could pose a national security threat.” Stratton: “Violation of all nations sovereign airspace presents a safety of flight concern for all military and commercial aviation.”

Well, sure it could, but does it in fact? And why include all these admonitions about national security threats to our nation from other nations, when none of these people think that is the origin of UAPs. As stated at the beginning, they all thing they’re space aliens.

An amusing (and to UFOlogists, irritating) question that skeptics such as me like to ask, “Why do they keep crashing?” If the aliens are so advanced, so sophisticated, and have engineered anti-gravity propulsion systems that can use relativistic quantum space-time bubbles to jet about the galaxy in the blink of an eye, why can’t they seem to land in New Mexico (and elsewhere) without slamming into the ground?

The film’s experts have a ready-made answer: They’re not crashing at all! These are intentionally left “gifts” to humanity. Or they’re a giant IQ test. Or, as in the film 2001: A Space Odyssey, it’s the aliens’ way of imputing superior intelligence into one species of hominin, namely us.

Why can’t we all see the evidence that the film’s experts have seen with their own eyes? Because it would freak everyone out: the stock market would tank, economies would collapse, governments would fold, and religions would abandon their faith beliefs. That’s what we’re told, anyway, and the filmmakers insist that the coverup is so extensive and powerful that “99.99 percent of all scientists are skeptical.” Perhaps, but could it be that 99.99 percent of scientists think like scientists who demand extraordinary evidence for extraordinary claims?

Then there is the assertion that “they” are silencing people in the know with threats to their jobs, careers, and lives. Elizondo: “Historically, every time a military member had a UAP encounter, it was very quickly swept under the rug and they were discouraged from talking about it.”

Right, so then why are all these military eyewitnesses going on CNN, Fox News, and Joe Rogan to tell millions of people about their UAP encounters? If “they” are so effective at covering up the existence of aliens, how is it that there are thousands of articles and news stories, hundreds of books and documentaries, and endless podcast discussions ongoing, without a single person (that I know of) fired or killed for telling us all what they know about these programs?

Another tell in the film about the lack of actual photographic or video evidence of said alien spaceships (aside from the half dozen UAP videos that have been recycled endlessly for years—TicTac, Go-Fast, Gimbal, etc.) is the inclusion of artistic representations of hovering spaceships over U.S. military bases. If there are any photographs, videos, or security camera footage of any kind available—as surely there must be if these events happened as reported—they were not included.

Example: Vandenberg Air Force base, where Elon Musk’s SpaceX launches its rockets, appears to be a hotbed of alien surveillance. A former employee there says that there are over 60 cameras that record everything that ever happens during a rocket launch. And yet, mysteriously, on October 14, 2003, there was an “incursion” in which there was “a red square object hovering in the air above the launch pad at low altitude, making no noise, it had no obvious signs of propulsion, and it was just hovering silently. It was a security breach of the area. (…) It was massive. The size of a football field, almost rectangular in shape, it was just floating there, no propulsion system, no windows. It was flat black. Then it shot off thousands of miles an hour up the coast.”

Surely the filmmakers managed to wrangle from SpaceX or the base commanders at Vandenberg actual footage of this sighting? Nope. As usual we are left with our (and an artist’s) imagination.

The film wraps up with speculations about how, exactly, these UAPs manage to pull off such feats of propulsion and maneuverability, going full science fiction mode with the pantheon of experts speculating about space-warping bubbles in which spaceships can zoom off in an instant because space itself is being warped so it doesn’t need to move through normal space (or ocean). Putoff: “So time moves differently for people inside the bubble versus people outside the bubble. (… )This could be the key to interstellar travel.” Hopefully Elon and his SpaceX engineers are taking notes.

On this matter I am reminded of the comedian Mitch Hedberg riff on why photos of Bigfoot are blurry: “It’s not the photographers, it’s the subject. I think Bigfoot is just fuzzy. You know, I think there’s a large, out-of-focus monster roaming the countryside. Run, he’s fuzzy!”

In UAP circles, life imitates art. Radar signals, we are told in the film by Eric Davis, cannot detect UAPs “because the signal just moves around the bubble and doesn’t reflect back to the radar operator.” Here is Hal Putoff in full Hedberg mode: “This explains why people who take a photo of a UAP get a fuzzy and distorted picture because they’re actually taking a photo through a spacetime barrier.”

Once you convince yourself that this is all real, it is natural to ask, “what is their energy source?” Continuing in full science fiction fantasy, Eric Davis calculates that “UAP performance implies the use of 1,100 billion watts of power. This is 100 times the daily electrical utility power generated in the U.S.” Where do the aliens find such energy? “Vacuum energy. Zero-point energy. Quantum entanglement.” The film ends with speculation that when disclosure of this technology comes online it will solve all our energy demands and replace oil, natural gas, and coal.

This is all very entertaining. Who doesn’t love science fiction? But The Age of Disclosure claims to be science fact. The evidence for it remains as elusive as it ever was, as I explained in my $1000 bet on the Long Now Foundation’s Long Bets site that “Discovery or disclosure of alien visitation to Earth in the form of UFOs, UAPs, or any other technological artifact or alien biological form, as confirmed by major scientific institutions, will not happen by December 31, 2030.”

Since posting this, Harvard astronomer Avi Loeb has accepted the bet and we each donated $500 to the Long Now Foundation, the proceeds of the winnings to go to the Galileo Project. I am reasonably confident I will win, but I am hoping to lose because I agree with the experts in The Age of Disclosure that this would indeed be the greatest discovery in the history of humanity.

Take a gander at my hand in the the photo below, and then tell me what happened. Be as specific as possible, but if I have already told you (a few people know), do not post it.  You have to guess. And do not say that I got injured: you have to be specific  If you know about my doings, you will be able to make a more informed guess.

Answer will be up tomorrow a.m.

About 4.5 billion years ago, a colossal impact between the young Earth and a mysterious planetary body called Theia changed everything—reshaping Earth, forming the Moon, and scattering clues across space rocks. By examining subtle isotopic fingerprints in Earth and Moon samples, scientists have reconstructed Theia’s possible composition and birthplace.

UPDATE: See the review of this movie that reader Dan links to in comment #5.

I’ve recently heard a lot about UFOs, mainly because I have a friend who seems to think they’re real. I’ve watched the videos taken from planes supposedly showing alien craft, and I’ve read various explanations for them, both involving and not involving aliens. I’ve seen people swearing that actual UFO craft are in the possession of the U.S. government, which is “reverse engineering” them to see how they work, and I’ve heard people who are considered “reputable” espouse belief in UFOs.

But in the end I remain deeply skeptical. Where did these aliens come from: a star light years away? Most of all, I think that if there’s credible evidence for UFOs—evidence including remains of alien vessels themselves—then why is the press ignoring such a big story? It would be the biggest news story of our lifetime, by far. Yet the press doesn’t seem that eager to sniff out the hard evidence for UFOs—the supposedly extant captured flying saucers.   The people who spread these stories seem to me to be conspiracy theorists, like the Q-Anon people.

Still, the story won’t go away—its persistence being yet another reason why people find UFOs credible. Well, creationism hasn’t gone away, either, but that doesn’t mean it’s right. Like creationism, UFOs just appeal to people with certain points of view: in the case of creationism, religious views. In that sense the UFO-believers are like religionists, for a lot of their beliefs in aliens rests on our failure to yet understand those high-velocity specks photographed by some aircraft.  It’s the Argument from Ignorance. Goddies like Ross Douthat think that if we can’t explain phenomena like the “fine-tuning” of the Universe,or human consciousness, it points to God. Likewise, if the UFOers can’t explain those high-velocity specks, well, it points to aliens.

Now the NYT has an article about a new documentary showing “credible” government officials espousing belief in UFO. Click below to read the article, or see it archived here.

Excepts (indented):

The long government shutdown had left a secret screening in limbo. But Monday on Capitol Hill, a handful of House members filed into a committee room to watch a new documentary featuring nearly three dozen government officials and others discussing what they can disclose about unidentified aerial phenomena, long known as U.F.O.s.

The unusual bipartisan mix of Republicans and Democrats had gathered to watch “The Age of Disclosure,” which had its high-profile debut at South by Southwest earlier this year. In the film, 34 former and current senior members of government, military and intelligence groups claim that they have knowledge of advanced nonhuman intelligence and contend, among other things, that there’s been an 80-year cover-up of the reverse engineering of technology retrieved from crashes.

Perhaps the biggest name in “The Age of Disclosure” (in theaters Friday and on Amazon Prime), is Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the former senator whose participation helped open the door for other top officials to go on record when he served as the vice chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. In the film, he cites “repeated instances of something operating in the airspace over restricted nuclear facilities, and it’s not ours. And we don’t know whose it is.”

. . .Representative André Carson of Indiana, a Democrat from the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, praised the documentary, saying it “pieces everything together that we’ve seen on television, on film and on social media.” Carson, a host of the screening who also appears in the film, added, “There is a section in here that will bring context to all the fuzzy photos that we’ve seen.”

One attendee, Representative Eric Burlison, Republican of Missouri, said he hoped “The Age of Disclosure” would help make the U.A.P. issue a priority for the Trump administration.

“I think we’ve had enough hearings” and it is now time for hard evidence or “receipts,” he said in an interview while waiting for his colleagues to arrive. “I’m trying to find the receipts. In private conversations, I’ve been given enough information to find them, I just don’t have access.”

. . . . The Pentagon’s All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office, tasked with investigating U.A.P., has said it has no verifiable information to support reports of a government program to reverse-engineer extraterrestrial materials.

. . . . The controversial documentary has drawn mixed reactions from critics, with several reviews questioning unproven statements.

The showing was held in part to mobilize support for the U.A.P. Disclosure Act, legislation proposing a path to undoing government secrecy on this topic that has been introduced by Senators Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York, and Mike Rounds, Republican of South Dakota. Rounds was interviewed in the film.

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, Democrat of New York, did not attend but sent a statement calling for greater transparency and saying she would work in Congress to “reduce the stigma around reporting, strengthen our national security, and ensure U.A.P. records are being properly disclosed.”

Well, yes, if the government has files that attest to the existence of UFOs, it should release them, unless there are pressing national security concerns, but I can’t imagine what those would be. (Could the Russians steal our reverse-engineered mechanisms for why UFOs go so fast?)  And if we have actual spacecraft from aliens that are in the process of being reverse-engineered, I can’t believe that the entire American press corps would not be sniffing it out as hard as they could, and that eventually they’d find them—IF they existed. Documenting their reality would make the reputation of any reporter or newspaper. Sadly, there has been no credible documentation.

Right now I’d put my money on their non-existence, but of course I was a career scientist and my mindset is one of doubt, especially about extraordinary claims. Show me a flying saucer and I’ll change my mind.

Here’s Bill Maher’s latest comedy-and-politics bit from “Real Time,” called “New Rule: The Banishing Act.” It is part of a series he’s made asking for comity between people on opposite ends of the American political spectrum. This time, he argues, banishing people from your life if they voted for Trump, or are even anti-Trump Republicans, is not going to help anybody, much less the Democratic Party.

In fact I know several such people who won’t talk to Republicans, and that would make for some unpleasant holiday dinners. (My dad, for example, voted for Nixon—an earlier and less malign version of Trump—but I accepted it and moved on.)

At any rate, Maher notes, correctly, that liberals engage more in this form of ghosting than do conservatives, and Maher shows some of the articles written by liberal discussing it. (Litt’s article in the NYT is here, and, fortunately, his answer is “no”. In contrast, Sarah Jones’s piece says it’s okay to go “no contact with your MAGA relatives”; it’s archived here.)  Maher’s point is that this form of ghosting, accompanied with arrogant pronouncements, can only hurt Democrats. As he says, “Ultimatums don’t make people rethink your politics; they make them rethink you.” (Note that Maher mentions some prominent “wokeisms”, but also blames Republicans for their own missteps.

Note that at 5:50 Maher refers to the social media pile-on he experienced when he related that he had with Trump dinner at the White House—and Trump was actually nice and civil. For that Maher was excoriated by many people with Trump Derangement Syndrome. How dare he say anything good about Trump? That excoriating was  especially stupid because, during the dinner, Maher criticized Trump and his policies to his face. Maher still seems to be defensive about that pushback, but in fact he was right.

Do I have to add that I don’t think Trump is a good person, but admit that in a social situation he could be friendly and civil? Larry David’s NYT piece making the same point, is archived here and is mentioned by Maher.

In the end, I agree with Maher: “Can we please try to remember—especially at this time of year—that ghosting anyone who disagrees with you politically is not the way to fix what’s wrong with the country?”

The guests on the show are said to be “veteran political strategist Donna Brazile and Michael Render,” as well as Neil deGrasse Tyson and Andrew Sullivan, but the only ones I see are Brazile and Render.

Two kind readers sent photos yesterday, so we’re good until Tuesday.  If you’re off work for the Thanksgiving week, why not collect some of your good wildlife photos (if you have them) and send them in?Thanks!

Today we have some lovely butterfly pics from Pratyaydipta Rudra, a professor of statistics at Oklahoma State.  Pratyay’s captions and descriptions are indented, and you can enlarge his photos by clicking on them. (I just found out that he and his wife share a photo website called “Wingmates“).

When birding gets slow during the summer, we often pay closer attention to the insects, especially the pollinators that are quite abundant during the hotter months. Our garden (as well as some local botanical gardens and farms) has plenty of native species that attract a variety of pollinators including butterflies and moths. Below are some butterfly images that I took earlier this year.

Gulf Fritillaries (Dione vanillae) on our Swamp Milkweed (Asclepias incarnata). This plant attracts a huge number of pollinators over the summer, and it is also one of the host plants of Monarch butterflies:

Monarch (Danaus plexippus), caught in flight with an interesting morning lighting:

Variegated Fritillary (Euptoieta claudia) on Indian heliotrope (Heliotropium indicum). This plant is not native to North America, but it is quite widespread in our area, and the flowers are pretty:

Gulf Fritillary (Dione vanillae) coming in for landing on a zinnia. Flight photography of butterflies is way more difficult than birds-in-flight photography, but possible with modern cameras and a lot of patience:

The larval stage of Gulf Fritillary (Dione vanillae), on a purple passionflower (Passiflora incarnata) plant, the host plant for them:

Two generations… This adult Gulf Fritillary (Dione vanillae) might be quite worn, but she stopped by to lay eggs, perhaps one last time, as one of the caterpillars from the next generation keeps munching on the leaves:

Great Spangled Fritillary (Speyeria cybele) on Garden Phlox (Phlox paniculata). A relatively uncommon fritillary for us in this part of the state. In fact, it’s the first time I found one in our county:

Diana Fritillary (Speyeria diana) and Monarch (Danaus plexippus). This is one of my most favorite images from this summer. This was also my first encounter with a Diana Fritillary. This male Diana was nectaring on the Butterfly Milkweed (Asclepias tuberosa) when the Monarch flew in. Mr Fritillary wasn’t happy at all:

There was some kickboxing that took place at this point and there was a clear winner…:

The fritillary was able to hold ground, and the Monarch took off:

American Snout (Libytheana carinenta). Not difficult to see why it is named that way. It’s always fun to find one of these little ones with the long “nose”!:

Eastern Tailed Blue (Cupido comyntas). These so-called tails are parts of their wing which they keep moving. This is theorized to be useful to fool the predators into thinking that these are their antennae. Many butterflies actually have several traits like this that give a “false head” impression. We present a Gray Hairstreak in the second image which has a similar false head:

A recent study found that these traits have evolved in a correlated manner, likely driven by a common selective pressure helping them to develop complex head-like structures on their posterior side.

Gray Hairstreak (Strymon melinus) – Another common butterfly in our area that has a similar “tail”:

Pearl Crescent (Phyciodes tharos) – A common butterfly, especially during the fall migration. For those of you who are interested in photography, this image was taken at ISO 256000 (by mistake), but the modern noise reduction programs are unbelievably capable of removing such noise due to low exposure:

Phaon Crescent (Phyciodes phaon). This one is relatively uncommon here. I was glad to find several this year:

The crescents are quite small, and Phaon Crescent (Phyciodes phaon) is typically smaller than the more common Pearl Crescent. Here is an image that has my two-year-old daughter’s finger as a reference. I am glad to have this new butterfly-watcher in our camp!:

From woolly mammoths to giant sloths, via some lesser-known ice-age beasts like 'killer koalas', the visuals in this documentary are simply astounding

Scientists flew the XL-Calibur telescope on a high-altitude balloon to measure polarized X-rays from Cygnus X-1. These measurements reveal details about the chaotic, superheated material swirling around black holes. The team also captured data from the Crab pulsar and achieved multiple technical breakthroughs during the 2024 mission. Another flight from Antarctica is expected to expand this cosmic investigation.

Researchers have pinpointed a super-Earth in the habitable zone of a nearby M-dwarf star only 18 light-years away. Sophisticated instruments detected the planet’s gentle tug on its star, hinting at a rocky world that could hold liquid water. Future mega-telescopes may be able to directly image it—something impossible today.

A massive solar storm in May 2024 gave scientists an unprecedented look at how Earth’s protective plasma layer collapses under intense space weather. With the Arase satellite in a perfect observing position, researchers watched the plasmasphere shrink to a fraction of its usual size and take days to rebuild. The event pushed auroras far beyond their normal boundaries and revealed that a rare “negative storm” in the ionosphere dramatically slowed the atmosphere’s ability to recover. These observations offer valuable insight into how extreme solar activity disrupts satellites, GPS signals, and communication systems.

About 4.5 billion years ago, the most momentous event in the history of Earth occurred: a huge celestial body called Theia collided with the young Earth. How the collision unfolded and what exactly happened afterward has not been conclusively clarified. What is certain, however, is that the size, composition, and orbit of Earth changed as a result—and that the impact marked the birth of our constant companion in space, the moon.

The surface of the Earth is finite. We can measure it. If it was expanding, then its size would grow with time. And once again, good ol’ Earth helps us understand what the universe might be doing beyond our observable horizon.

I don’t go to poetry readings, but I read a fair amount of poetry—mostly older stuff. (To me, poetry ceased to be good when it became unrhymed prose with variable line spacing.)  So my title really refers to the three immortal poets whose recorded readings I’ve put in this post.

Ths other day, in connection with something I’m writing, I came upon William Butler Yeats reading aloud one of his great poems, “The Lake Isle of Innisfree.” To me the lyrical beauty of the work was ruined by Yeast’s monotonic, his lack of pauses, and pompous intonation, which you can hear below.

And it’s not just Yeats, but his near contemporaries T. S. Eliot and Dylan Thomas. Here, for instance is Eliot reading another great work, “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.”  He rushes through the poem with the same monotone as Yeats.  It’s almost as if Eliot doesn’t feel what he wrote.

Finally, another favorite, Dylan Thomas reading his great classic, “Fern Hill,” a remembrance of his childhood.  Same issue! All three poets are of different nationality: Yeats was Irish, Eliot American with an adopted accent, and Thomas Welsh. (I have to admit that of all these renditions, Thomas’s is best, as he shows at least a modicum of emotion.)

It’s not that these poems can’t be recited without feeling, as there are examples of better renditions all over YouTube (listen to Jim Meskimem reading “Fern Hill”).  So I’m still baffled by the three readings above, and I’m wondering what Oscar Wilde sounded like when reading his poems (I can’t find recordings).