NASA and Biggie Solidify Their Relationship

[Christopher O'Brien]

[OK, let me see if I have this correct... When you call the FAA to report a UFO, they tell you to call Bigelow Aerospace (BASS). Bigelow has owned the former Sherman ("skinwalker") ranch for over 16 years and has conducted extensive scientific monitoring of the ranch. Hmm. This official establishment of a public relationship w/ NASA certainly suggests that someone, somewhere is taking notes and thinks he may be on the right track—whatever track that might be... I wonder if and when other agencies will ever officially acknowledge their relationships w/ biggie? --chris]

Article HERE:

MEDIA ADVISORY : M13-011
NASA, Bigelow Officials to Discuss Space Station Expandable Module

WASHINGTON -- NASA has awarded a $17.8 million contract to Bigelow Aerospace to provide a new addition to the International Space Station. The Bigelow Expandable Activity Module will demonstrate the benefits of this space habitat technology for future exploration and commercial space endeavors.

"The International Space Station is a unique laboratory that enables important discoveries that benefit humanity and vastly increase understanding of how humans can live and work in space for long periods," NASA Deputy Administrator Lori Garver said. "This partnership agreement for the use of expandable habitats represents a step forward in cutting-edge technology that can allow humans to thrive in space safely and affordably, and heralds important progress in U.S. commercial space innovation." REST of Article HERE:

 

[Muadib]

I don't think NASA deferring to Bigelow on UFO's necessarily proves that he's on the right track. It may be that NASA, like several other government agencies, has decided that the investigation of UFO's will yield no useful scientific knowledge and sending those reports to Bigelow Aerospace just means one less thing that they have to deal with. While I don't completely agree with that position, I can see a government agency adopting it. In any case, I'm pretty sure that Bigelow Aerospace isn't the only private company that NASA has ever awarded a contract to, I'm sure they do have an official relationship, just like they've had with many private aerospace companies in the past.

 

[exo_doc]

I also think that when the Government sub-contracts something like this to a private firm, then the information the firm has or collects isn't subject to Freedom of Information requests, essentially releiving any Government responsibility for supplying information about UFO's/UAP's.

 

[ProphetofOccam]

It's what the company does. It's an aerospace company. They have interest in commercial space travel. They're doing something to facilitate that. Why is that even remotely weird or suspicious?

While Muadib doesn't hold the position regarding UFO investigation referrals that he mentioned, I do. If you think something is essentially useless and nonsensical, as you believe you've established forty to fifty years ago, and you know it will be a pain in the ass to straight up ignore it, you'd be tripping over yourself to hand it off to the nearest voluntary party (that you don't have to pay for).

The government gave a shit decades ago, but now they don't. They don't as a direct result of the prior giving a shit yielding nothing of any value. UFO investigation is a money pit. It's a money pit that they can/could easily cut away, as it has nothing to do with sociological or economic issues and the fringe groups who might cause a fuss are small in number -- also there is a group who offered to throw their own money into the pit, so the government gets a clean break.

Suggesting that Bigelow wouldn't continue to set his money on fire if he'd found nothing of interest suggests a misunderstanding of the way people work. The problem is that there is no clear marker for when to stop this kind of research -- there are no falsifiable hypotheses.

For instance, how would anyone here, Chris included, know when to stop throwing money into the pit? When would you decide that some of these things you're now emotionally invested in are garbage? When would you know to wrap up at the ranch, given almost unlimited resources? It's a subjective decision; some may say "never," so long as they have the money to keep looking.

He has an interest in the UFO/paranormal stuff. It's essentially his really expensive hobby. He has the money to spend, so he does. It's exactly the same way any other millionaire spends tons of money on any other hobby.

Aerospace is part of his business. It is where he gets his almost unlimited resources. How could it ever be weird that he would work with the one of the only organizations in the world with direct access to a space station?

 

[ProphetofOccam]

I guess I should add that, if I had unlimited resources, I would probably spend money on this stuff too -- and I don't think any of it is real. Further, I'd have no idea of when a good time to end the research would be, provided the likely scenario that I spend years finding nothing. If I was already spending the money, I'd just continue to spend the money until I found something or I died. Why wouldn't I?

I wouldn't do it because I was embarrassed that I wasted a money -- it's a very strong probability going in. Also, it's my money to waste. Neither would I do it because I was too emotionally involved. I would do it simply because there's no clear, objective point at which you know to stop the research, regardless of your personal bias.

 

[Muadib]

I should have been more clear in my posting, what I meant was a lot like what ProphetofOccam said in regards to UFO research with a slightly different take. Just to clarify, while I do agree that nothing of any scientific value whatsoever has come from past UFO investigations, I don't think that we can necessarily determine with 100% accuracy that nothing will come of them in the future. It's possible, however unlikely, that someone will get extremely lucky at some point in the future and actually get some data or a photo or video of a real UFO that stands up to scrutiny. Even if it's just a photo of secret military technology that isn't widely known, like the TR3-B (which I'm not saying exists or doesn't exist) or something, useful scientific knowledge about how it operates could be gleaned by a video of it in action, or finding its wreckage or well, who knows what could happen? That's my point, the future is never a 100% extrapolation of what happened in the past, things change and while it may be safe to assume that nothing scientifically useful will come of UFO investigation, we may be surprised one day.

The rest of what he said I agree with, I find nothing strange or confirming about NASA having a relationship with Bigelow Aerospace. I have to admit I don't see where Chris is coming from on this one at all. I mean, NASA had a relationship with Hughes Aircraft in the past, does that mean NASA approved of everything Howard Hughes ever did? Of course not, the logic used to reach that conclusion just doesn't stand up to scrutiny. NASA sees value in Biggies aerospace company, not Biggie himself. I'm sure they probably couldn't give a rats ass about what he does when it comes to paranormal investigation, if his aerospace company is sound then why wouldn't NASA do business with them like any other well established aerospace company?