[William87]

You stated: "LANL, for example, is managed by a company called Triad" - Can Triad decide to expand their business to the pornographic film industry and get away with filming a pornographic movie on publicly funded Los Alamos National Laboratory facilities? Absolutely not. It is not their facility and they are likely operating with oversight. So I recommend that you just keep quiet about this.

Do you even know how contracts work?  They have a Scope of Work that contractors agree to and the buyer can't require anything beyond. Contractors aren't indentured servants who have to blindly follow orders when they agree to work for the government.  If you agree to build widgets they can't arbitrarily decide that should start makng gadgets instead. And of course there is oversight.  There should be, especially when tax dollars are involved.  It's strange that you think there is something fishy about the government making sure a contractor is doing what they are getting paid to do.

Triad can "get away" with doing anything that is included in the SOW of their contract and the government can't "get away" with requiring them to do anything that isn't in the SOW, which you can find here https://www.energy.gov/sites/default/files/2024-04/contract-no-89233218cna000001_Redacted.pdf

The SOW for the contractors on the CLPS program is to " provide all activities necessary to safely integrate, accommodate, transport, and operate NASA payloads using contractor-provided assets, including launch vehicles, lunar lander, lunar surface systems, Earth re-entry vehicles, and associated resources.  That's straight from the on-ramping award notice, which you can find here https://sam.gov/opp/e0670ab07ac44fc5b8149fbe04201f64/view

You should really read the whole thing.  You might learn a few things.

Another interesting thing I found is that part of the on-ramp solicitation was a sample project that required the offerors to produce a User's Manual, which would be made publically available.  It's really odd that NASA is not only allowing, but requiring these companies to make this super secret  technology that could be used by our enemies to make ICBMS public.

https://spaceflightnow.com/2018/11/29/nasa-picks-nine-companies-to-compete-for-commercial-lunar-lander-missions/

https://docslib.org/doc/8544219/new-glenn-payload-users-guide

[William87]

William69 did a whole lot of writing claiming the contract is public, but mysteriously failed to directly link said contract.

Second, for being such a smart guy, he should understand that if a cargo van had a 2-cylinder, water-cooled engine, it is possible for it to win such a race.

Third, everyone knows rockets do not go to the moon.

It's not about being smart. Its about having information.  There's nothing wrong with believing you are right based on the information you have.  But it is arrogant and lazy to assume that the information you have is all you need to know to be right.

[William87]

I've wondered about this.  Did every person who claim to be a Zetetist personally test the COVID vaccine before they got it?  Have they performed all the research and experiments for Global Warming before they accepted it as true? 

I've come to realize that Zeteticism means that information that I already believe is true, or that I want to believe is true, is true.  If I don't believe it, then there's no reason to investigate further.  The mere fact that I don't believe something is evidence that it is not true.  It isn't a philosphy of believe what you see, it's a philosophy of see what you believe and ignore everything else. 

It's very child-like, almost magical thinking.

[AATW]

I've wondered about this.  Did every person who claim to be a Zetetist personally test the COVID vaccine before they got it?  Have they performed all the research and experiments for Global Warming before they accepted it as true? 

I've come to realize that Zeteticism means that information that I already believe is true, or that I want to believe is true, is true.  If I don't believe it, then there's no reason to investigate further.  The mere fact that I don't believe something is evidence that it is not true.  It isn't a philosphy of believe what you see, it's a philosophy of see what you believe and ignore everything else. 

It's very child-like, almost magical thinking.

Firstly, it's just bizarre that Tom thinks it's in some way fishy that NASA would award contracts to 3rd parties and then want some oversight or governance on what they're doing. Does he think they just go "here's 200 million dollars, tell us when it's on the moon!". Of course there's some governance on what the contractor is doing with the money.
My point was it's another set of people who have to be "in on it", people who don't work for the government, even if they're working on government contracts. My old company used to work on government contracts so I'd be doing work on those. That doesn't mean I was in any way working for the government, they just happened to be awarding some of our contracts.

Secondly, this whole Zetetic thing. Jeran went to Antarctica for TFE and both literally and metaphorically saw the light. He observed the 24 hour sun and has stepped away from FE as a result. I saw a video from...I think Dave McKeegan where he talked about it. He commended Jeran for intellectual honesty - Jeran saw something which contradicted his beliefs and instead of trying to hand-wave it away or reconcile it with his beliefs somehow, he resolved the contradiction by changing his beliefs. That is how progress is made. But Dave did also comment on the fact that Jeran had to see it for himself before he believed it. Which I think is how some people on here operate. The Wiki says:
"using zeteticism one bases his conclusions on experimentation and observation".
OK, but you can't observe everything, you have to have some strategy for forming beliefs about things you can't directly observe. For me that's by assessing how plausible and well evidenced claims are. If NASA were claiming to have teleported people to the moon in 1969 then I'd be raising an eyebrow. Teleportation doesn't exist. But they were using technologies which do demonstrably exist and you can see in the Apollo missions leading up to XI how they tested all the technologies and techniques they would need for the final landing. Apart from the landing itself but even then they had that flying bedstead thing which allowed him to approximate that. Plus it's all on film and many of the protagonists are still alive. Then there's all the 3rd party evidence - I mentioned Jodrell Bank and the Australians before, more recently a Japanese probe took photos of the Apollo landing sites. I'd say the evidence is pretty strong. It just feels like too many FE people just don't bother looking in to any of this and declare it all fake because it contradicts their beliefs without. An example, a thread I posted some years back:

https://forum.tfes.org/index.php?topic=17989.msg236209#msg236209

3 VFX artists reviewing the footage and basically concluding that with the technology available in 1969 it would have been pretty much impossible to fake it. It was way before CGI, now you can basically do anything. Note how the thread immediately devolves in to baseless claims about fakery - how the astronauts behaved in the press conference, the old Van Allen belts thing. All the incredulity and ignorance I mentioned above. No-one comments directly on the video I posted.

[Action80]

There are a multitude of alternative explanations for the existence of GPS.

It is a faith claim to state GPS exists because of space exploration.

RE-adherents have a terrible habit of blatantly ignoring the willful, open disinformation campaigns waged by world-wide governments and corporations since the dawn of time and simply state the space race is real, cause "daddy told me so," or the "New York Times reports..."

Yeah, well... daddy told you Santa was real and the New York Times cosigned onto that lie.

[AATW]

There are a multitude of alternative explanations for the existence of GPS.

OK. And which of those do you believe and what is your evidence for it?
Or is your belief just a different faith claim?

RE-adherents have a terrible habit of blatantly ignoring the willful, open disinformation campaigns waged by world-wide governments and corporations since the dawn of time

I don't think anyone believes that governments or corporations are shining beacons of truth or integrity.
But that doesn't mean they lie about literally everything and I see no reason that multiple countries would claim to be able to launch things in to space. If they are pretending to be able to that then they're making it hard for themselves by publishing so many photos and so much video from the missions which can be analysed. It would probably be easier if they hadn't done all the ISS stuff too, especially as you can see it from the ground. And are the companies providing satellite TV just sending out millions of dishes which don't really point at anything? I know from personal experience that mine is pointing at something - when a neighbour did some work on his house which needed some scaffolding it blocked the signal. I've also observed on work trips to countries near the equator that the dishes there point up at a noticeably steeper angle.
Why are the Japanese publishing pictures of Apollo landing sites? What do they gain from backing up the US narrative? Why are people at Jodrell Bank in the UK and people in Australia saying they were tracking the Apollo craft and relaying signals? Are they in on it? Why? While we're here, why are NASA handing out contracts to 3rd parties anyway? That's another lot of people who need to be in on it and kept quiet.

and simply state the space race is real, cause "daddy told me so," or the "New York Times reports..."

Well, no. I've seen a shuttle launch. I've listed above the other pieces of evidence I've seen and evaluated.
Your turn. What evidence do you have that GPS is ground based or that the space race didn't happen and satellites aren't really orbiting?
What is that thing in the sky if it isn't a space station? Those people who are currently stranded on it - where are they really?

[Action80]

There are a multitude of alternative explanations for the existence of GPS.

OK. And which of those do you believe and what is your evidence for it?
Or is your belief just a different faith claim?

It would be another faith claim.

Are you beginning to get the idea?

RE-adherents have a terrible habit of blatantly ignoring the willful, open disinformation campaigns waged by world-wide governments and corporations since the dawn of time

I don't think anyone believes that governments or corporations are shining beacons of truth or integrity...(and a bunch of other words explaining that satellite dishes absolutely must be pointing at something thousands of miles above our heads).

Too bad, I thought you were getting the idea.

Actually, there are so many conclusively demonstrated lies coming from world-wide wide governments, there is no longer any rational reason to believe anything you hear or see released by them.

and simply state the space race is real, cause "daddy told me so," or the "New York Times reports..."

Well, no. I've seen a shuttle launch. I've listed above the other pieces of evidence I've seen and evaluated.
Your turn. What evidence do you have that GPS is ground based or that the space race didn't happen and satellites aren't really orbiting?
What is that thing in the sky if it isn't a space station? Those people who are currently stranded on it - where are they really?

Yeah, you see rockets go up. Everybody either sees it live or a picture or two later of it.

Once it lifts off, there is no independently verified evidence you have indicating it ever travels more than 100km or so above your head.

That's a fact.

[William87]

My point was it's another set of people who have to be "in on it", people who don't work for the government, even if they're working on government contracts. My old company used to work on government contracts so I'd be doing work on those. That doesn't mean I was in any way working for the government, they just happened to be awarding some of our contracts.

Exactly, And that doesn’t even include subcontractors.

Secondly, this whole Zetetic thing. Jeran went to Antarctica for TFE and both literally and metaphorically saw the light. He observed the 24 hour sun and has stepped away from FE as a result

Have to give credit where credit is due.  It’s the intellectual dishonesty that bothers me.  The Zeteticism seems to be selective.  Global warming is a perfect example.  I wonder how many flat earthers that accept it, have done any investigating themselves or have an in depth understanding of the science?   Would they still accept it if they knew that a lot of the data comes from tracking changes in the earth gravitational field to measure how much icecaps are melting?

For me that's by assessing how plausible and well evidenced claims are

That requires a level of reasoning skills I’m not sure some “Zetetics” have.  Never accepting evidence that you haven’t personally verified is the only thing worse than accepting any and all claims without question.  Both extremes are, at best ,lazy, and at worst reflect a lack of critical thinking.

No-one comments directly on the video I posted.

Sometimes you can tell how valid claims are more by what isn’t stated than what is and what questions are ansered and which aren't.  The wiki is a perfect example of that.  Its a lot of selective, cherry picked info.  I mean you’d think that a theory based on special relativity and constant acceleration in flat space would go into more detail than just explaining why it doesn’t mean the speed of light is exceeded.  That’s true, as far as it goes.  But you can’t stop there,   There’s much more to SR that contradicts UA, but none of that is addressed in the wiki and shut down or ignored if brought up in a the forums.  Whether that’s from ignorance or a deliberate attempt to mislead, I don’t know.  I do know that it is hypocritical to disparage people for blindly accepting evidence while also ignoring any evidence that contradicts what you believe.

Firstly, it's just bizarre that Tom thinks it's in some way fishy that NASA would award contracts to 3rd parties and then want some oversight or governance on what they're doing. Does he think they just go "here's 200 million dollars, tell us when it's on the moon!

On the other hand, I bet he’s the type to micromanage the guy he hires to cut the grass.

[Pete Svarrior]

Well, no-one. But I accept the claim.

That's fair, I suppose. I think this might be a cultural difference between you and me. For me, it's genuinely hard to comprehend that you keep coming here and telling others what they should be interested in, or what they should be doing based on your understanding of their interests. It's so far removed from my cognition that even putting this description together took some effort.

Fair point about Zeteticism, but you must have some strategy for coming to beliefs about stuff you can't directly experience.

Sure. I can also cook - I'm far from an expert, but I'm good enough to entertain guests and earn some compliments, maybe even teach some basic knife skills. But I don't post about cooking here, and you don't have an insatiable need to probe my cooking skills.

Mine is to evaluate the evidence. What other option is there?

The problem is that "evaluating the evidence" is extremely vague. You're openly dismissive of people who seem to form their opinions based on YouTube videos, for example, but that absolutely falls under "evaluating evidence". To a more cynical eye, your "evaluation of evidence" is just reading unverifiable claims made by people in positions of power and vibe-checking whether you feel like trusting them.

To be clear - that's FINE. Most people form beliefs without demanding direct proof, and it would be impossible to get by in the world by meticulously investigating every small thing. You probably took my word for it when I said I can cook, unless you chose to fervently question it for comedic value. That's just part of the human condition.

But: why would you go online and try to force others to follow your unevidenced belief? It's the fervour and zealotry I don't understand.

Most FE people seem to just put it all in one big box marked "FAKE" and leave it at that.

Right, you really like saying that, but that's just not what's happening. And, tbh, you know that. It's just easier for you to hand-wave things away, because you're lazy.

It’s the intellectual dishonesty that bothers me.  The Zeteticism seems to be selective.

No fucking shit. I hope you're not claiming to apply the scientific method to every single aspect of your life, at all times, with no exceptions. It would be very funny if you did.

Global warming is a perfect example.

Since it's such a good example, could you recall a few of the statements this society made about climate change, and explain why they led you to this conclusion?

[William87]

Since it's such a good example, could you recall a few of the statements this society made about climate change, and explain why they led you to this conclusion?

What the Zetetic considers "overwhelming evidence" is pretty selective.  My point isn't about what they believe or don't believe, its about consistency, also known as having intellecutal honesty.  Part of the overwhelming evidence for global warming is that the gravitational field of the earth shifts as the ice caps are melting.

[Action80]

Global warming being linked to magnetic pole shifting is about as likely as you posting a working link.

[William87]

What link doesn't work?

[Pete Svarrior]

What the Zetetic considers "overwhelming evidence" is pretty selective.  My point isn't about what they believe or don't believe, its about consistency, also known as having intellecutal honesty.

Ok. Now, read what I said immediately above the part you're responding to.

Part of the overwhelming evidence for global warming is that the gravitational field of the earth shifts as the ice caps are melting.

How have you concluded that the author was referring to this phenomenon as their evidence?

[Action80]

The link you posted. I receive a tab labeled "about:blank#blocked".

[William87]

How have you concluded that the author was referring to this phenomenon as their evidence?

The phenonemn happens whether someone uses it as evidence or not.  Anyone who accepts that the ice caps are melting and tha the sea levels are rising and ocean temps are dropping accepts that there are changes to the earth's gravitational field whether they realize it or not.  They track how much the ice caps are melting and the effect it has on the ocean levels by monitoring changes in the gravitational field.

[William87]

The link you posted. I receive a tab labeled "about:blank#blocked".

I don't know what to tell you.  If you want info on the CLPS program, just go the SAM.gov and in the "Opportunites" link just search for CLPS.  When you get  "no result, do you want to include inactive opportunities?", click yes.  I explained that before.  A direct link won't work.

If you're looking for info on the Triad contract at LANL, just google it.  If you are using a VPN or something like that, it might be blocking you.

[Pete Svarrior]

I don't know what to tell you.

What he's telling you is that you made an error when pasting the image in this post, which resulted in your entire message appearing as a malformed URL. You can see this if you go back and edit your post and preview the BBCode - there's a random [url] tag chilling there for no reason.

What you could tell him is "Oh, thanks, didn't notice that. Fixed." (After you've fixed it, or asked someone to help you, of course.)

The phenonemn happens whether someone uses it as evidence or not.

Irrelevant. Please focus on the subject at hand. You can't just move from "they're selectively using this evidence, how intellectually dishonest" to "it doesn't matter if they're using this as evidence". It absolutely does matter, it's the core of your argument. If you lack the intellectual honesty to appreciate that, then I'd suggest caution the next time you make these sort of accusations against people.

Anyone who accepts that the ice caps are melting [...]

Epic. And how much sugar am I allowed to put on my porridge, again?

[AATW]

For me, it's genuinely hard to comprehend that you keep coming here and telling others what they should be interested in, or what they should be doing based on your understanding of their interests.

On this site I see a set of people who claim to be trying to make sense of the world. Which is commendable, I guess that's what we should all be doing.
But the conclusion they have come to is so different from the mainstream understanding that I would imagine they would be checking their workings pretty carefully.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, as they say.

If I didn't believe kangaroos existed and maintained that all images and footage of them has been faked then I think we could agree that would be a bit of an "out there" view. It would be reasonable of people on the kangaroosarefake.org forum to raise an eyebrow if I'd never bothered to go to a zoo. If someone is going to go around saying that the ISS is fake and they've never bothered to look to see if they can see it then yeah, I think that's lazy. And where have these people been for the last 9 months?

https://news.sky.com/story/crew-arrives-at-international-space-station-to-replace-astronauts-stranded-for-9-months-13329910

Does anyone know them? Surely someone can verify that they've not been around and that, all being well, they soon will be again.

The problem is that "evaluating the evidence" is extremely vague. You're openly dismissive of people who seem to form their opinions based on YouTube videos, for example, but that absolutely falls under "evaluating evidence". To a more cynical eye, your "evaluation of evidence" is just reading unverifiable claims made by people in positions of power and vibe-checking whether you feel like trusting them.

YouTube videos are definitely evaluating the evidence, but if that's all someone does - and if the YouTube channels they watch are spouting obvious bollocks, then yes I'm going to be scathing. Obvious is in the eye of the beholder of course, but if someone is getting their views from the YouTube FE mob saying that gravity doesn't exist and objects fall because of "density", and they haven't bothered to learn enough basic physics to understand why that's bollocks, then they need to give their head a wobble.

Your characterisation of the way I evaluate evidence isn't that unfair. But isn't that what everyone does? I believe you about your cooking prowess on the basis that being good at cooking is a fairly common skill and it would be a silly thing to lie about. I can't directly verify your claim unless you're inviting me round for dinner, I don't think we're quite at that stage of our relationship yet.
I'd suggest a lot of claims are unverifiable. With space travel yeah - most of it is me reading and watching stuff and deciding what I find credible. There's no way of me directly verifying claims about events which occurred before I was born. You could say that about any historical event. Don't most people check claims against their overall model of reality? Famously, people can't fly. So when I see David Copperfield flying around, I might not be able to see the wires, but at some level I know they must be there. I know I'm being tricked, I don't think "oh ok, so I guess some people can fly then".
With the moon landings - I've said this before, they're not claiming to have teleported there. If they did claim that then I'd probably want to see some pretty good evidence. As it is, they claimed to use technology which I know exists, it's all well documented by the protagonists, may of whom are still alive. It's all on film. There's plenty of documentation of it all. There's lots of 3rd party evidence - what interest do all those people have in lying? Did the Japanese fake their pictures of the Apollo landing sites? Why would they be bothering to do that? And literally all the hoax theories are based on complete ignorance - the "BuT wHy CaN't YoU sEe ThE sTaRs?" sort of thing. Or it's just incredulity - see my sig for further details.

But: why would you go online and try to force others to follow your unevidenced belief? It's the fervour and zealotry I don't understand.

Fervour is overstating it, I just find it odd. People on here have come to such a radically different view of reality from most that I would have thought they'd want to check their workings, so to speak. If I saw a dog out the window I'd think nothing of it. If I saw a dragon I'd probably want to look in to that a bit.
Investigating space travel is one of the ways to check your workings because it's a claim which, if true, would show the FE model that many people hold to be false. And there's space missions going on all the time. I agree that it's hard to verify some of these things directly but if A69 hasn't even bothered to see if he can see the ISS and use some fairly inexpensive optics to see its shape then I think that's a bit weird/lazy.
Say what you like about TFE and Jeran, but at least he got off his arse and went there. He saw something which contradicted his worldview and as a consequence changed that view. The fact he had to see it for himself before believing it is still a bit weird, I don't know why he thinks anyone would have faked all the other timelapses of the 24 hour sun in Antarctica, but at least he did it.

[Action80]

Once again, AATW offers the real existence of a terrestrial-based land marsupial as a comparative thought experiment to the visual land-based sightings of the ISS as equivalent in form. Pro-tip: They are not.

He also lies again when he claims I haven't bothered to see the ISS, when I am on written record in this forum as having done so.

It is sad he needs to resort to these type of posts. He should pay heed to his own words and just leave.

[AATW]

Once again, AATW offers the real existence of a terrestrial-based land marsupial as a comparative thought experiment to the visual land-based sightings of the ISS as equivalent in form.

The thought experiment wasn't about whether kangaroos exist or not, or whether the ISS does.
It was more about the level of effort a person puts in to examining their beliefs.

He also lies again when he claims I haven't bothered to see the ISS, when I am on written record in this forum as having done so.

Do you know what the word "if" means? 
I don't know what you have or haven't done, I can't remember every post you make.
OK, so you've seen it. Great, so you acknowledge it's there. Why are you still a flat earther then?