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from the Why-couldn't-they-say-that-before? dept.
On September 6th, the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA) and the National Science Foundation (NSF) made the decision to temporarily vacate the Sunspot Solar Observatory at Sacramento Peak, New Mexico as a precautionary measure while addressing a security issue. The facility closed down in an orderly fashion and is now re-opening. The residents that vacated their homes will be returning to the site, and all employees will return to work this week.
AURA has been cooperating with an on-going law enforcement investigation of criminal activity that occurred at Sacramento Peak. During this time, we became concerned that a suspect in the investigation potentially posed a threat to the safety of local staff and residents. For this reason, AURA temporarily vacated the facility and ceased science activities at this location.
The decision to vacate was based on the logistical challenges associated with protecting personnel at such a remote location, and the need for expeditious response to the potential threat. AURA determined that moving the small number of on-site staff and residents off the mountain was the most prudent and effective action to ensure their safety.
http://www.aura-astronomy.org/news/news.asp?newsID=389
(Score: 5, Insightful) by takyon on Monday September 17 2018, @03:42PM (24 children)
Sure, that statement will mollify the journalists, conspiracy theorists, and dank memers.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 4, Informative) by ikanreed on Monday September 17 2018, @03:50PM (11 children)
Literally nothing in the world mollifies conspiracy theorists. That's practically their defining characteristic: evidence and arguments against the conspiracy are, in fact, more conspiracy.
As to memers: I think I'm only concerned about the opinions of the sapient. Merely responding to their environment and repeating back everything they hear is more parrot than human.
(Score: 2) by zocalo on Monday September 17 2018, @04:51PM (7 children)
I have no idea where that leaves the few that actually are on to something, but I suspect it involves those black helicopters that you occassionally see overhead...
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 17 2018, @04:59PM (5 children)
Reminds me of GR and dark matter/energy.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 17 2018, @08:44PM (4 children)
Well, you clearly don't understand anything about GR if that's what you get out of it because that's one of the best-tested models of all time. When you're verifying predictions today that were made many decades ago because only now you have the precision to make the measurements, that's a pretty damn impressive theory.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 17 2018, @08:49PM (3 children)
Yep, the predictions are all perfect (if you allow for otherwise undetectable matter anywhere the predictions are wrong)... how can anyone say this seriously?
The fact is there is still zero evidence for dark matter besides GR making the wrong predictions. ZERO, and its not for lack of trying.
(Score: 1) by DECbot on Monday September 17 2018, @09:56PM (2 children)
You're correct. There is no such thing as dark matter. The actual solution is simple, Hawkins Radiation emits more mass than astrophysicist are ready to admit.
cats~$ sudo chown -R us /home/base
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 17 2018, @10:20PM (1 child)
I woudln't have the slightest clue about if your favorite explanation is correct. But, make a prediction about something and then we can see.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 18 2018, @07:02PM
nothing to see here, just your ol' interstellar squid feasting off some solar prominence-to-be before warping to better, less radioactive pastures. suns with orbiting planets having active neutron generation mechanisms don't make for tasty meals, it is understood ...
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Monday September 17 2018, @05:07PM
Re black helicopters: I was gassing up by the airport this morning and saw an osprey take off(not VTOL, just off a runway).
Because I have a half-remembered news story that they're deathtraps and were discontinued, I'm going to conclude that it was a secret government organization intent on impairing my god-given right to order chicken sandwiches from sheetz for breakfast. They're no doubt now hovering out of sight watching me eat my lunch I brought from home.
(okay, maybe I just saw something strange and wanted to talk about it)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 17 2018, @05:49PM (1 child)
Sorry to the one, but you meant sentient, right? Just fits better. Sorry.
(Score: 4, Informative) by ikanreed on Monday September 17 2018, @05:53PM
I recently learned the distinction between sentient(as it's commonly used) and sentient(psychological jargon) and shied away from it.
So, sentient as we commonly understand it means "intelligent and self-aware", but in psychology, the scientific meaning is just "possesses senses" which is exactly what I didn't want to say. So I chose the less common, but technically accurate term sapient.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by urza9814 on Tuesday September 18 2018, @01:25PM
The problem is that this is literally a conspiracy regardless of the facts. Because there must be some group of people who know what actually happened, and they must be working together to keep that information out of the media. That, by definition, is a conspiracy. The only alternative to "conspiracy theories" is that every single person involved is completely incompetent and literally doesn't have any idea what they're doing up there. Doesn't seem very plausible.
So by definition, any attempt to battle a conspiracy theory generally means proposing an alternative conspiracy theory.
That's all a bit obvious of course, but consider where that gets us in a situation like in TFA. The people who officially know what happened won't say, they won't provide any evidence to support THEIR conspiracy theory, but they expect us all to blindly accept it. Meanwhile, the "conspiracy theory" folks are out there presenting their own "evidence", which doesn't have to be all that convincing to be more compelling that the absolutely nothing that the official theory has put forward. Why should we criticize people for gravitating towards the theories that are actually supported by some amount of evidence?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by HiThere on Monday September 17 2018, @05:20PM (7 children)
The real problem is they've blown their credibility so thoroughly that it's quite reasonable to doubt any explanation they give.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by VLM on Monday September 17 2018, @08:34PM (6 children)
.... any REASONABLE explanation.
The problem with this unreasonable explanation is I have first hand experience where some ex-husband down the street got really freakin drunk, broke into ex-wifes house (technically, he paid for it and is still paying for it, so not sure how its her house, but using the pronouns the newspapers use for convenience if not honesty). He wasn't really a threat, he literally broke the door down and passed out on the couch, cold. So the cops evac'd everyone from the house and locked down the neighborhood and sent in the SWAT attack APC (because they have it and need to use it to justify the budget, not because and unconscious drunk is a real threat). They waited around literally for hours to see if he'd wake up, then they got tired of waiting and rushed the house "Taze first ask questions later" literally. At least they didn't shoot him with pistols while he was unconscious, although it seems kinda brutal to taze an unconscious drunk apparently for the sheer hell of it.
Anyway everything was back to normal, aside from the smashed door lock, in about six hours.
So naturally, some nutcase on a mountain would take a week because, um...
I MIGHT give them credit if it was some nutcase claiming in writing he's gonna go for a high score with his rifle collection then runs off into the woods until he's caught or they find his body. That would be a reasonable explanation.
Its just a crappy press release anyway. I wonder if its fake news and someone on /b/ is just pulling journalists legs for the LOLs. For example of how crappy it is, they even call out in a paragraph something paraphrased to "we didn't want to draw any attention so we went all x-files on the town because we were SURE that would not provide any attention, LOL" I mean, come on, if you're making shit up, /b/, at least try harder not to be so silly.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 17 2018, @08:51PM
Well, don't write off the fact that sometimes those astronomer-types are pretty high-strung and take it out on the telesope [astroanecdotes.com].
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday September 17 2018, @09:42PM
Not to police. Especially ones who would even use ex-military gear. And it depends on what part of the body the taser strike hits.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Monday September 17 2018, @09:49PM (2 children)
No, that's not what I meant. Even when they give reasonable explanations, their credibility is so shot that it's unreasonable to put any trust in their explanation. It *might* be correct, but their saying it doesn't give it any significant increase in plausibility. Every time I've been able to check out an official story it's been significantly wrong. Often, admittedly, it appears that the wrong was because of laziness or (nearly benign) CYA, but it's still a reason to doubt the explanation.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Tuesday September 18 2018, @01:29PM (1 child)
Explanation means nothing without evidence.
The "conspiracy theory" folks are providing some pretty crappy evidence, but the officials aren't providing a single damn thing, so it's not hard for crappy evidence to win that battle...
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Tuesday September 18 2018, @07:37PM
That's a reasonable point, but it can't stand in the face of information overload. The problem is that there isn't anyone trustworthy. Nobody has time to reasonably evaluate the evidence (assuming it were available) for even the news stories they judge important, so you need to rely on trustworthy spokesmen for those who honestly evaluate the evidence in some particular area. But there aren't any. The officials aren't trustworthy, and the rest don't have access to most of the evidence.
OTOH, I've almost gotten to the point of considering something less likely when an official states that it's true, because they've been caught lying so frequently, and usually you can't catch the lies because the evidence is hidden, so you wouldn't expect to be able to catch them most of the time.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 17 2018, @10:15PM
Landlord/tenant relationship - he can't enter unless she allows it.
(Score: 3, Funny) by shortscreen on Monday September 17 2018, @06:45PM (1 child)
The cops thought a serial killer might be on the loose and personnel were going to start turning up dead, one after another.
Eight little scientists, staring at heaven
one ate a Tide Pod, and then there were seven...
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday September 17 2018, @10:05PM
It sounds like the one scientist wanted a near death experience, but got too near. Like a black hole.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday September 17 2018, @09:31PM (1 child)
In a cross between Alien and Contact, a coded message received in the observatory planted a seed in the retina of the analyst which matured into a face-hugger, they had to irradiate the entire complex to be sure they got all the alien germ-material.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 17 2018, @10:18PM
But just that isn't enough to be sure.