NEW Snowden Document Dump - “The Art of Deception" Trolling Websites by Intel Agencies

[Tyger]

How can we counteract this?

particularly watch the episode Hammer into Anvil

Rare and interesting interview with Patrick McGoogan regarding 'The Prisoner' - McGoogan clearly an angry man - and complicated in many ways -

McGoogan's favorite episode apparently: 'Once Upon A Time' -

 

[Tyger]

Frankly, that is an excellent idea. Seriously. The type of thing that can be really interesting, not to mention revealing. I have a notion of a theory about the entirety of the contactee situation. Including the Greys and their doings. It's really a suspicion more so than even a hypothesis. In fact, I would call it literally delusional like most else of what I find depth and fascination with. I simply cannot shake off my personal convictions on this one that mankind itself is the responsible manipulative agent.

Care to say what it is?

Possibly wherein such natural arising causes might be greatly amplified via a technological means.

Consider the following. infrasound - The Skeptic's Dictionary - Skepdic.com

Consider what roughly 75 years of intense highly funded research might have accomplished with respect to the exploitation of such a potential perception centered consciousness interaction. Scary.

Great find, as stated - love the bolded anecdote. Would explain a lot because most 'ghost stuff' makes no recognizable sense for anyone with knowledge of the subtle working of the subtler realms. Lots of fanciful stuff is bandied about as though 'real' when simply akin to urban legends with no basis in fact.

TEXT: "Infrasound refers to extreme bass waves or vibrations, those with a frequency below the audibility range of the human ear (20 Hz to 22 kHz). Even though these waves can't be heard by us, they can be felt and have been shown to produce a range of effects in some people including anxiety, extreme sorrow, and chills. "Loud infrasound in the range of 0.5 to 10 Hz is sufficient to activate the vestibular, or balance system, in the inner ear."* PsychologistRichard Wiseman of the University of Hertfordshire thinks that the odd sensations that people attribute to ghosts may be caused by infrasonic vibrations.* He is not alone.

In 1998, Vic Tandy, experimental officer and part-time lecturer in the school of international studies and law at Coventry University, and Dr. Tony Lawrence of the psychology department wrote a paper called "Ghosts in the Machine" for the Journal of the Society for Psychical Research. They cited infrasound as the cause of apparitions seen by staff at a so-called haunted laboratory in Warwick.

Several years earlier, Tandy was working late in the "haunted" Warwick laboratory when he saw a gray thing coming for him. "I felt the hairs rise on the back of my neck," he said. "It seemed to be between me and the door, so the only thing I could do was turn and face it."* But the thing disappeared. However, it reappeared in a different form the next day when Tandy was doing some work on his fencing foil. "The handle was clamped in a vice on a workbench, yet the blade started vibrating like mad," he said. He wondered why the blade vibrated in one part of room but not in another. The explanation, he discovered, was that infrasound was coming from an extractor fan. "When we finally switched it off, it was as if a huge weight was lifted," he said. "It makes me think that one of the applications of this ongoing research could be a link between infrasound and sick-building syndrome." When he measured the infrasound in the laboratory, the showing was 18.98 hertz--the exact frequency at which a human eyeball starts resonating. The sound waves made his eyeballs resonate and produced an optical illusion: He saw a figure that didn't exist.*

Infrasonic waves can carry over long distances and are less susceptible to disturbance or interference than higher frequencies.

Infrasound may be produced by wind, by some types ofearthquakes, by ocean waves, and by such things as avalanches, volcanoes, and meteors.* Elephants have the ability to emit infrasound that can be detected at a distance of 2 km. Even tigers emit infrasound."

 

[Tyger]

Got me onto 'The Prisoner' tangent. Here is the great reveal of the identity of Number One -

I know this thread is not a philosophical one but this does bring up freewill and the 'who's in charge here' question.

As long as one adheres to an authority driven paradigm - where there are rules and people who 'know' and those who don't, those who are 'sacred' and those who are 'scared', those 'outside' and 'me' inside - 'God' or any idea pertaining to such a concept - remains outside one. It's an existential tape-loop. One remains powerless and the eternal victim/pawn.

The moment one entertains the paradigm that we are God - a lot of the disjuncts in the authority driven paradigm begin to resolve themselves. Were this question - 'Is there a God?' - to be approached in a 'scientific manner' oddly enough - the answer would soon become self-evident. The reasoning of this paradigm goes that: We are in fact God. We do in fact create this world. We have become 'lost' in our own creation - for a purpose. It's an idea. [The basis of manifestation ideas.]

 

[Frank Stalter]

We have to be careful about giving credit where credit is or isn't due. Its enough for the military and the government to suggest that they have all this tech or all theses programmes without actually doing any of this stuff. An official trades on trust. With the US Defence , this has back fired so many times even their counter intel and disinformation can be used against them. Sometimes its just not that complicated and its enough to unsettle, muddy the waters and make people fear you. The results although look negative still install the idea of fear thus creating an even bigger control mechanism. Snowden's leaks about the NSA and CIA data mining and surveillance operation both on the public and high level people were still ultimately leaked by a low level US "clerk". Does no one think this is a little too cataclysmic, that such a small cog in the wheel can cause so much fall out and disruption? If such information was readily available and easily leaked or about to be leaked, you instigate a programme of control of that inevitale info drop i.e. you "massage it" leaking it yourself through a controllable source, adding more information, barium meals and seed data or you destroy or sully the real source if you can or cannot get to him/her and the possibility of martyrdom is removed.

If "they" are collecting so much data, what good is it? Maybe the idea of collecting and using it is greater than the practical nature of such an endeavour. There's this idea that if you store detailed enough data you are able to virtually time travel through this meta data when at first none of it meant anything, The other idea is because there is so much of it it, it becomes useless so you need to create sophisticated data mining programmes based on key words or phrases, known associates and pseudonyms etc.. Again useless as real criminals, spys and terrorists do not send each other emails saying "hey doing that bombing later?" , "yeah for sure". So instead you use it to collect personal meta data that you can use to effect the physical world, bank account numbers, passwords, phone numbers etc.. pretty much what internet phishers do, so the threat doesn't isnt about the nefarious people like terrorists in society but the threat seems to be society itself.

The real questions that people forget to ask themselves are the simple ones. What do "they" fear about ordinary citizens? Why would they target differently UFO sites or conspiracy sites separately from general data mined social media and mass main stream sites?

The counter intelligence and spy craft that was once used clandestinely has since the 40s been used now on the general public and its own people. We have to be up to speed with these things and tactics particularly if you are interested in UFOS.

How can we counteract this?

particularly watch the episode Hammer into Anvil

Some solid points and questions without the insults and "nothing-to-see-here" arrogance/ignorance spread through the thread.

Firstly, it's our tax dollars at work and just what is the benefit? Swaying internet opinion? That only raises more questions: How much can this opinion reasonably be swayed? In what direction? Who sets this agenda? How do you know it works? What's the cost/benefit?

The whole thing raises more questions than it answers, especially the use of the UFO photos.

 

[Tyger]

Last bit on 'The Prisoner' - and the way we forget social history. The 60's was one heckuvva violent time here in the US. Nothing close to the cerebral safety currently.

There were chants in the streets: "Hell, no, we won't go!"

CAUTION: Very violent (historical) images present in video:

 

[Tyger]

Some solid points and questions without the insults and "nothing-to-see-here" arrogance/ignorance spread through the thread.

Firstly, it's our tax dollars at work and just what is the benefit? Swaying internet opinion? That only raises more questions: How much can this opinion reasonably be swayed? In what direction? Who sets this agenda? How do you know it works? What's the cost/benefit?

The whole thing raises more questions than it answers, especially the use of the UFO photos.

I wouldn't go so far as to say the opinions voiced are arrogance/ignorance - that's missing the point.

Nameless' post [that I've supplied below] imo pretty well sums it up. Smoke-and-mirrors. More is achieved by the threat than the deed.

We have to be careful about giving credit where credit is or isn't due. Its enough for the military and the government to suggest that they have all this tech or all theses programmes without actually doing any of this stuff. An official trades on trust. With the US Defence , this has back fired so many times even their counter intel and disinformation can be used against them. Sometimes its just not that complicated and its enough to unsettle, muddy the waters and make people fear you. The results although look negative still install the idea of fear thus creating an even bigger control mechanism. Snowden's leaks about the NSA and CIA data mining and surveillance operation both on the public and high level people were still ultimately leaked by a low level US "clerk". Does no one think this is a little too cataclysmic, that such a small cog in the wheel can cause so much fall out and disruption? If such information was readily available and easily leaked or about to be leaked, you instigate a programme of control of that inevitale info drop i.e. you "massage it" leaking it yourself through a controllable source, adding more information, barium meals and seed data or you destroy or sully the real source if you can or cannot get to him/her and the possibility of martyrdom is removed.

If "they" are collecting so much data, what good is it? Maybe the idea of collecting and using it is greater than the practical nature of such an endeavour. There's this idea that if you store detailed enough data you are able to virtually time travel through this meta data when at first none of it meant anything, The other idea is because there is so much of it it, it becomes useless so you need to create sophisticated data mining programmes based on key words or phrases, known associates and pseudonyms etc.. Again useless as real criminals, spys and terrorists do not send each other emails saying "hey doing that bombing later?" , "yeah for sure". So instead you use it to collect personal meta data that you can use to effect the physical world, bank account numbers, passwords, phone numbers etc.. pretty much what internet phishers do, so the threat doesn't isnt about the nefarious people like terrorists in society but the threat seems to be society itself.

The real questions that people forget to ask themselves are the simple ones. What do "they" fear about ordinary citizens? Why would they target differently UFO sites or conspiracy sites separately from general data mined social media and mass main stream sites?

The counter intelligence and spy craft that was once used clandestinely has since the 40s been used now on the general public and its own people. We have to be up to speed with these things and tactics particularly if you are interested in UFOS.

"Does no one think this is a little too cataclysmic, that such a small cog in the wheel can cause so much fall out and disruption?"

No. We assume omniscience on the part of 'the government' - when, from what I have been able to observe - its a lumbering shambles of parts that know not what any other part is doing. 'Government' is dumb. You may as well talk about a 'them' orchestrating our conversation here on this chat site. While admin may be able to caution, ban and delete - individuals will remains 'omnipotent'. One plays the game or walks away. Inattention is a powerful ploy.

It's the machine that will attain power of a kind that we are not understanding at this point - when a machine, a computer program - sends off the robot/drone because of a 'pattern' in a sequence of chats/conversations on-line - that will be the tipping point. It's the 'law' of 'unintended consequences'. Hell, no - you won't go? We'll send a drone. Hell, no - you wouldn't spy even if coerced? We'll have the machine do it. For our safety - and we can agree - it's a reasonable line of thinking. There's oodles of 'unintended consequences' in the whole scenario spinning down the road.

 

[Tyger]

Some solid points and questions without the insults and "nothing-to-see-here" arrogance/ignorance spread through the thread.

Firstly, it's our tax dollars at work and just what is the benefit? Swaying internet opinion? That only raises more questions: How much can this opinion reasonably be swayed? In what direction? Who sets this agenda? How do you know it works? What's the cost/benefit?

The whole thing raises more questions than it answers, especially the use of the UFO photos.

I didn't address the bolded. Excellent questions.

What's interesting is I do believe I read here on one thread or another someone question why in all the leaks that have happened over recent years, why has there been nothing to do with UFO's? Now here there is something - were 'the gods' listening? Or is it just happenchance? Odds are 50/50, I'd say.

We have already been powerfully controlled all through the 20th century by the tenets of the 'father of public relations', Edward Bernays, the nephew of Sigmund Freud. If no one knows this story, its worth a look-see - Freud's Nephew and Public Relations | Psychology Today

TEXT: "Bernays is known for inventing a number of the public relations and advertising techniques that revolutionized marketing in the early decades of the 20th century. For example, Bernays was a pioneer in creating what Daniel Boorstin would later call "pseudo-events:" staged happenings that were covered as news. One of his most famous stunts was to hire a number of young women to march in New York's Easter Parade in 1929 while smoking cigarettes-at that time public smoking by women was still widely regarded as taboo. He made sure photographers and reporters were on hand, and had encouraged the women to refer to the cigarettes as "torches of freedom." The women were thus depicted as fashionable rebels against the discrimination that forbade public smoking by women.

"The event was front page news in papers all across the country on the following day, and in many cities women took to the streets with their cigarettes to show their support. What didn't come out until much later was the fact that Bernays had been under contract to the American Tobacco Company to expand the market for cigarettes among women.

"In everything he did, Bernays began with the basic principles of the psychology of his time, and not only his uncle's. He felt that it was not reason but emotion and instinct that moved the common man, and throughout his long life he held onto the elitist view that those who understood this could and should control the masses. As he said in the first paragraph of his influential book Propaganda. "Those who manipulate [the habits and opinions of the masses]...constitute an invisiblegovernment which is the true ruling power of our country."

"In saying that there is an important relationship between psychotherapyand such institutions as public relations and advertising I am, of course, neglecting one very important fact. This is that the goal of psychotherapies, very broadly, is not to control people but in some way to free them. Whereas the goal of advertising and public relations is to persuade people to behave in a particular way or--if you want to put it in the way Bernays would have--to control them.

"Nevertheless, both endeavors strive to harness what we know about human mental processes, cognition and emotion, to change people's lives. And it is interesting and important to understand that this attempt to effectively manipulate human minds is one of the fundamental building blocks of our way of life."

If you can ignore the ott dramatics at the beginning - and generally - this little video pretty well tells the tale -

TEXT: "Nowadays Edward Bernays, often called "the Father of Public Relations," remains a relatively obscure historical figure. His legacy, however, is thriving around the globe, and his techniques are found in everything from the food we eat to the things we believe. But who was this man, and how did he get his start? How did a nephew of Sigmund Freud use psychology to bend the will of the masses -- and how does his legacy affect you today?"

 

[Frank Stalter]

I wouldn't go so far as to say the opinions voiced are arrogance/ignorance - that's missing the point.

I'd rather miss the point than act too hip for the room and say there is no point.

 

[Tyger]

Caution: Disturbing images - but the fears of being controlled is part-and-parcel of thinking of life as soulless, as machine-like, as 'dead'. Paranoia goes hand-in-glove with a mechanistic world-view (oddly enough).

TEXT: "Human Resources: Social Engineering in the 20th Century explores the rise of mechanistic philosophy and the exploitation of human beings under modern hierarchical systems. Topics covered include behaviorism, scientific management, work-place democracy, schooling, frustration-aggression hypothesis and human experimentation.

"Please go to the producers site and get additional info. etc. about this film as well as others. Metanoia Films

"Scott Noble, the filmmaker behind the extraordinary and informative documentary "Psywar" has made another revelatory and important documentary, available free to the public, called "Human Resources: Social Engineering in the 20th Century".

"Essentially", says Scott, "this film is about the rise of mechanistic philosophy and the exploitation of human beings under modern hierarchical systems." The film includes original interviews with: Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, Rebecca Lemov (World as Laboratory), Christopher Simpson (The Science of Coercion), George Ritzer (The McDonaldization of Society), Morris Berman (The Reenchantment of the World), John Taylor Gatto (Dumbing us Down), Alfie Kohn (What does it mean to be well educated?) and others.

"Read David Ker Thomson's review of the film. He writes: It answers the significant events of the last century the way a glass answers the implicit questions of a man who peers into its reflective surface, point for point. It corresponds, in short, to reality."

For those so inclined and able to devote yet another close to 2 hours - and this with an audio lecture - Noam Chomsky is always a page-turner (so to speak) -

I am well aware that most here are savvy about all this stuff, but it just seemed relevant to the idea that the Snowdon UFO leak suggests 'control and this would be a 'surprise'. .

 

[nameless]

This is why it bugs me when you get someone like former CIA Derrel "the slick" Simms Alien hunter playing Hee Haw with the fuckaround gang. He should be helping us and showing us what they do and know, not empowering them and using Ericksonian induction techniques on of all people Chris O'brien.?!!!

 

[Charlie Prime]

using Ericksonian induction techniques on of all people Chris O'brien.?!!!

When did he do that? I missed it.

He seemed to me like nothing but a bully in dire need of a good old-fashioned courtesy reminder azz beating.

 

[nameless]

Chris described when they first met he held his gaze by closing in on him unexpectedly and went right up to his face then shaking his hand probably hard and two handed(fnarr), thus instigating a flight or fight sub routine, whilst Chris was distracted he was able to attach pocket electrodes to his hand and gave him an impromptu lie detector test.

 

[Charlie Prime]

Ahh. Thanks. I didn't know that was an NLP technique.

I always just called it "bullying", and told the person they need to take two steps back, out my space.

 

[nameless]

same difference.

 

[RU_Insane]

The document is a very curious artifact. It exists but exactly what relevance does it have? How serious were the ideas entertained? At what level? It's very different from other Snowden reveals - or just leaks in general. This creates suspicion - makes someone already inclined to paranoia more so inclined. Simple human nature - people being people (which means sometimes being jerks) - gets elevated to stealth espionage. I dunno.....

Let me tell you, we have more to fear from Common Core Standards coming into the educational system nationwide (in the US), and the introduction of testing via computer with answers shooting to a 'mainframe' (in the US) than we have about government trolls in the comments section of a Daily Mail article. It could be argued reasonably that we are all trolls one way or another: the Buddhist who brings their Buddhist pacifism to a conversation, a Christian who tempers political debate with last week's sermon heard in Church, an atheist who argues every hint of background chatter to do with a godhead, etc. The whole 'woo science' and 'pseudo-science' accusations stuff has been enough to silence real debate here, I have observed.

Chat sites - except for the very young, people in their early to mid-teens (who are 'at risk' in a way others are not) - would be an odd place to try to shape public opinion. Chat sites as a whole are a dying breed - edged out by social media. The hey-day of chat sites was a mere 8 years ago or so, I'd say. Now they sit idling, falling into disrepair, unless there is a single focus. Watch any chat site - the actual participation is far, far less than the membership numbers. Sometimes consisting of only a handful of posters. Which makes me wonder how old is the document?

You cut straight to the point. I was suspicious of the social "analyses" described in the document. Firstly, people obtain their news/info from other sources besides online news. While it's true that mass media can frame public perceptions of certain issues, it's not hard to think critically about them. And I don't think psy-ops on fringe Internet forums are very effective, since a good slice of the audience is already steadfast in their beliefs.

Trolling for the government on JREF forums has literally no visible effect on how people perceive issues. You go on Reddit, and a popular, seemingly plausible comment will get ripped to shreds by someone who knows about the topic. I see it happen all the time. Bottom line, people aren't dull sponges in a vacuum. People are thoughtful, have a wide range of sources to access, and it's not guaranteed that you'll convince them of any desired conclusion.

I think the document is from 2008+ since it mentions Facebook. FB has had NSA-backdoors installed on their servers since 2007 (when FB officially joined PRISM).

As to the document's relevance and how serious it is...it's a prime example of the "mechanistic philosophy" mentioned here before. The idea that people can be guided through a predetermined process, like machines, is absurd. This is why systems based on force fail conceptually. You can reduce the person as a concept, but that doesn't translate well to reality. I'm not saying "collectivism bad, individual good" or some claptrap like that.

So I suspect that these "social analyses" serve another purpose. That purpose is to abuse sociology as a tool to control people. It's a self-corrective mechanism for hierarchies. If you convince the "patient" something's wrong with him, rather than the system, you induce conformity. Any behavior which deviates from the expected norm is punished as a "disorder". ADHD as a learning disorder is a perfect example of this.

This video by Ken Robinson explains how the current schooling system arose, and the ideology along with it. "Learning disorders" are a consequence of children failing to conform. There may be something wrong, but it's not because the child can't "learn", at least not under the present system.

 

[Tyger]

You cut straight to the point. I was suspicious of the social "analyses" described in the document. Firstly, people obtain their news/info from other sources besides online news. While it's true that mass media can frame public perceptions of certain issues, it's not hard to think critically about them. And I don't think psy-ops on fringe Internet forums are very effective, since a good slice of the audience is already steadfast in their beliefs.

Exactly so.

Trolling for the government on JREF forums has literally no visible effect on how people perceive issues.

So that's your part-time job? Ha! Lordy, if there was money in trolling, can you imagine the free-for-all!

Plus there is a tendency to see any pov that smacks of not 'playing the game' - take your pick, don't believe in pixies, do believe in pixies - as 'disinformation', as being a 'plant'. The paranoia is extreme. But it goes further: excessive use of the internet (of a kind - chat sites, for one) foments paranoia imo. The government doesn't have to do a thing - just let the ball roll and people pretty well drive themselves crazy with it. Unintended consequences.

You go on Reddit, and a popular, seemingly plausible comment will get ripped to shreds by someone who knows about the topic. I see it happen all the time.

Quite so. An example: I have an acquaintance with Roman History and it's clear that the depravities of the Roman Colliseum 'games' were numbing the ancient Romans to their humanity. (It's why the teachings about love by the Rabbi Jesus were like a ground fire that spread - love, compassion, empathy - this was an elixir to the Romans still sane). The 'games' were undermining the sensibilities of the populace. I have a similar hunch about the internet 'games' - that it blunts our humanity. It requires intellect but suffers from being all intellect.

Bottom line, people aren't dull sponges in a vacuum. People are thoughtful, have a wide range of sources to access, and it's not guaranteed that you'll convince them of any desired conclusion.

Agree - but one can also pick up some mighty strange intellectual 'viruses' along the way. I wouldn't say one is totally beyond being influenced. I myself have learned an awful lot (in a good way, I hope) - and been exposed to a wider breath of resources and of thinking than I would have been otherwise.

I think the document is from 2008+ since it mentions Facebook. FB has had NSA-backdoors installed on their servers since 2007 (when FB officially joined PRISM).

Interesting. I have of course heard about these things - but what does it actually mean? Posting pictures of flowers and the latest knitting pattern and perhaps an inspirational quote or two - NSA interested in that? What is NSA really culling?

 

[RU_Insane]

Exactly so.
So that's your part-time job? Ha! Lordy, if there was money in trolling, can you imagine the free-for-all!

Heh. I have a few beliefs that your typical skeptic would call "insane". Whether they coincide with the official version of events is...well, a coincidence. But we all have questionable beliefs, so I'm not special. That's another thing that I don't get about "skepticism". It has its own brand based on "rationality" and "free-thought". But I've seen some dogmatic skeptics. I'm not a fan of sanitized "skepticism", where the limits of acceptable discourse are predetermined. It feels so artificial.

One reason is that we can never genuinely progress in science if we simply stick to outdated and/or ill-informed assumptions. And why do hard skeptics think that only their view is the rational one? Why can't a belief in alien visitation be rational? The modern brand of skepticism promotes banality, rationalization that disenchants, and closed-minded cynicism. This article here:

[UFOs] should be evaluated with the attitude that alien spacecraft cannot exist. This is not closed mindedness. It is facing the reality of the constraints that time, stellar distances, and available energy place on interstellar space travel.

It's the arrogant presumption that science is agreed on a credible answer. But that's only one (plausible) conclusion drawn from scientific knowledge. You can argue the opposite case that spacecraft have visited, and it wouldn't be any less rational. There are other issues which deserve honest treatment rather than scorn.

Plus there is a tendency to see any pov that smacks of not 'playing the game' - take your pick, don't believe in pixies, do believe in pixies - as 'disinformation', as being a 'plant'. The paranoia is extreme. But it goes further: excessive use of the internet (of a kind - chat sites, for one) foments paranoia imo. The government doesn't have to do a thing - just let the ball roll and people pretty well drive themselves crazy with it. Unintended consequences.

Yeah. The problem solves itself.

Agree - but one can also pick up some mighty strange intellectual 'viruses' along the way. I wouldn't say one is totally beyond being influenced. I myself have learned an awful lot (in a good way, I hope) - and been exposed to a wider breath of resources and of thinking than I would have been otherwise.

We can be influenced, but it's not blind acceptance of propaganda (like the document seems to think...?). I would hope not, at least.

Interesting. I have of course heard about these things - but what does it actually mean? Posting pictures of flowers and the latest knitting pattern and perhaps an inspirational quote or two - NSA interested in that? What is NSA really culling?

The data can be used to black-mail opponents and influence business deals. Sensitive data is transmitted all the time through e-mail. Gmail is secure, but the original encryption keys can be used to decipher the message. I don't know why surveillance is on a such a large-scale. Maybe it's to intimidate potential enemies (i.e. the public). -shrug-

 

[Burnt State]

More RSA Animate please! I use these in class all the time and Robinson's one figures prominently along with this look at time. Life really is about perspective and these are often supplied to us in advance as a result of socio-cultural conditioning. Trying to extract yourself from these influences really is quite a process.

 

[Tyger]

Heh. I have a few beliefs that your typical skeptic would call "insane". Whether they coincide with the official version of events is...well, a coincidence. But we all have questionable beliefs, so I'm not special. That's another thing that I don't get about "skepticism". It has its own brand based on "rationality" and "free-thought". But I've seen some dogmatic skeptics. I'm not a fan of sanitized "skepticism", where the limits of acceptable discourse are predetermined. It feels so artificial.

I've seen it applied selectively, as well. "Sanitized skepticism" - new term for me - for pink pixies, but for green pixies, not so much.

In the end, for me, it's about having interesting conversations. I want to listen, but I also want to be heard - and who knows, in the spaces in between I sometimes learn something. Happens.

One reason is that we can never genuinely progress in science if we simply stick to outdated and/or ill-informed assumptions. And why do hard skeptics think that only their view is the rational one? Why can't a belief in alien visitation be rational? The modern brand of skepticism promotes banality, rationalization that disenchants, and closed-minded cynicism. This article here:

IMO the jury is always out until it's in. The way mechanistic science has modeled the universe, however, in mechanistic terms, it is unlikely. That's my opinion. But I don't think the mechanistic model of the universe is complete - or is the only way to view how the universe works. Not being complete, who knows what is possible?

I also don't see humanity at the top of any curve - rather I see humanity at it's merest beginnings. We have 'only just' reared up on our hind legs, so to speak. As the model indicates, we are at the first minutes of human existence. We have a far ways to go yet imo.

It's the arrogant presumption that science is agreed on a credible answer. But that's only one (plausible) conclusion drawn from scientific knowledge. You can argue the opposite case that spacecraft have visited, and it wouldn't be any less rational. There are other issues which deserve honest treatment rather than scorn.

It's arrogant because the assumption is that we are 'advanced' when we have only just begun. In order to advance, however, we must have a thorough understanding of the mind - of consciousness. We are aware, but our awareness is wasted on inconsequential things. Look at the world - look at humanity. The intellectual capacity is at it's beginnings. Just my opinion.

We can be influenced, but it's not blind acceptance of propaganda (like the document seems to think...?). I would hope not, at least.

Because we're not machines, I agree. It's because we are spiritual beings - that are free. These two facts make every mechanistic model doomed to fail, until the spirit is reckoned with.

The data can be used to black-mail opponents and influence business deals. Sensitive data is transmitted all the time through e-mail. Gmail is secure, but the original encryption keys can be used to decipher the message. I don't know why surveillance is on a such a large-scale. Maybe it's to intimidate potential enemies (i.e. the public). -shrug-

Hmmm....

 

[Charlie Prime]

Paul Bennewitz

As a newb to UFOlogy, I was ignorant of what this cultural reference meant.

Last night I watched this documentary Mirage Men. Now I know! (plus what is Sarpo, Richard Doty, and why I see that name Linda Howe a lot.)

MIRAGE MEN


Since Snowden this week admitted he is a CIA agent, it's worth reading Dr. Webster Tarpley's exposure of him as a Limited-Hangout again:

HOW TO IDENTIFY CIA LIMITED HANG OUT OP ? | CounterPsyOps


For even more fun, watch Dr. Pieczenik explain why the U.S. Intel douchebags are a bunch of nest-building bureaucrats only interested in soaking taxpayers for fat paydays...