Original Lesswrong thread here.
Original tweet here:
Unlinked market with shorter timeframes here: /Joshua/when-will-we-know-that-any-past-ufo
1,000
3.00Here's a new market to see if the new revelations this month will move Manifold's position on this topic:
So, basically, when I did the math I came out with the following:
Polymarket is now rising to 10% on the much stronger resolution criteria of:
"Aliens"
"During 2025"
With "US government acknowledgment"
And that market is using actual money. So there is no way that this market should be above 90%, even if the resolution criteria were the same, which it is not. The extra three years should be worth another 10%, the expansion from aliens to other causes is probably worth 2% (because I don't believe that any other cause is very likely), and the government not acknowledging the scientific consensus but @Joshua resolving the market to common sense is probably worth another 15%.
Going into the next two weeks of video releases and whistleblowers coming forward, I believe this market should be holding around 63%. Therefore, I put another 1000M into NO, which is all I can afford.
As I said below, I plan to reevaluate in two weeks. I believe the most likely outcome is that we're going to have clear, indisputable video evidence and many more first-hand eyewitnesses, but that the government will tell lower-level officials they didn't see what they actually saw - like it did with the "drones" - and the scientific community will write it off as not worthy of investigation.
@SteveSokolowski I've put a limit order for my whole balance at 64%. Fingers crossed that the market adjusts as you recommend. I don't think it will though. Too much competition for YES shares
@SteveSokolowski Strong disagreement on this market being easier to resolve.
This market requires "worldview shattering" proof.
This polymarket market at 11% resolves yes "if the President of the United States, any member of the Cabinet of the United States, any member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, or any US federal agency definitively states that extraterrestrial life or technology exists by December 31, 2025".
Trump or RFK jr. saying aliens exist seems far more likely to me then the 2023 drone sightings being solidly proven to be aliens over the next 4 years.
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I might be missing another market of course, but even then I don't think the results should go anywhere near 63% as long as its requiring actual proof of aliens (as opposed to trump just saying stuff). The only people that will vote pro-alien in this type of market: 1) Believe aliens exist, 2) believe that humans have solid proof of it, 3) and believe that the truth will come out during the Trump administration (the difference between "Trump releases proof in 2025" vs "Trump releases proof at some point over the next years" seems like a fairly minimal difference honestly).
Those that do believe in it are probably going to vote pro-alien as long as the resolution criteria are decent in both cases, and those that don't are going to vote anti-alien.
I'm super skeptical that there are enough people on the border to tip the odds from ~10%->37% no matter how generous the resolution criteria as long as it requires actual proof..
@lemon10 Oh, don't get me wrong. I don't expect this market to ever approach the actual odds that I believe are fair in any way.
That's why I put limit orders even above the current odds. If people want to bet at those high rates, why should I bet down to 65%?
As to your statement about Trump, if Trump admits that non-human intelligence exists, then yes, I believe this market will end up at NO with certainty. It would not move this market if Trump just randomly said that in a vacuum. But we are not in a vacuum, there are now first-hand eyewitnesses coming forward saying they worked on the programs. If he says that, then immediately the journalists know who to interview and everything is going to come out.
@SteveSokolowski This market depends on whether Eliezer is convinced, and he clearly has a very strong prior that it's not aliens.
@TimothyJohnson5c16 What's interesting is that it seems like, if X is to be believed (and on this I believe it), some group of people is going to try to spread rumors of an alien spaceship coming to invade the Earth.
So we could be in a state at the end of the month where there is compelling evidence of a more reasonable truth - that non-human intelligence is present on Earth and doesn't care about humans - and then there are also these ridiculous claims without any further evidence that cause confusion, and everything gets lumped together.
I'm not quite sure why you think a "Aliens exist" from Trump would be enough.
This resolves based on if Elizer wins the bet and nothing else, which based on the LW thread requires strong enough evidence for the LW community to "stop, melt, and catch fire" or for Elizer to do a 180 on his view of aliens (which based on the tweet is something he is strongly against).
I'm certain either would require very substantial evidence. Trump saying Aliens exist and he totally has proof for realizies, or that he was watching Fox News and they beamed him up and took him to the mothership would be nowhere near enough proof.
I'm going to bid on some more NO.
I think that this next week or two is going to be critical for this topic, beginning with this Saturday. All of the major figures have been consistent since November, and doubling down this week, that whistleblowers are coming forward this month.
They've basically put the entire topic on the line with their statements. Even if they are all lying, that is a good thing; proving something false moves science forward too. If there is no progress forward into finding out what's going on within these two weeks, then I will be much less likely to buy more NO - if at all - in the future, because everyone in the entire topic will have discredited themselves with their claims that this coming week is it.
Sora came along about a week before all this stuff with the drones started to happen, so it's basically now impossible to trust anything coming out of anywhere except the Federal government and local authorities. Social media is flooded with images of unknown provenance, the Federal government is clearly lying, and local authorities are consistent that something is up.
Ironically, I can't be as confident betting in this market anymore not because I think it's NO, but there's no way to figure out what's actually going on anymore. Every site is flooded with videos of such poor quality that it's conceivable that Sora could have generated them.
Therefore, I am betting in this market now, which is the direct cause of the problem: /SteveSokolowski/will-a-majority-of-manifold-respond I think that it's going to resolve to YES.
@SteveSokolowski in classic fashion none of this makes sense as video editing software capable of making similar low quality videos has been available for decades and the videos are also easily made by just taking shots of consumer drones in low light conditions. You can buy a drone and test this yourself with a cell phone camera. Sora is irrelevant.
The market was also always about it being "revealed to be world shattering" so even if you think it is world shattering, if this can be obfuscated it's still NO on being revealed and you think it's a YES for this market.
@SteveSokolowski I haven't seen a single Sora video that is indiscernible from real, even poor quality video. Not yet.
Maybe relevant. I'm pretty curious about this one (POLL):
https://manifold.markets/DanHomerick/is-believing-in-conspiracy-theories
My theory about what's happening is starting to coalesce.
The drones in New Jersey are some operation started by the government, or a rogue defense contractor, with some sort of new advanced power source. Biden ordered this to start, or the defense contractor ordered it to start, on a Monday during a lame duck period after Harris lost, taking off on Thanksgiving, and working during evening hours so as not to pay overtime during the late night. Whatever the purpose of these drones is is irrelevant. They're telling the truth they pose no threat. However, the timing suggests that Biden wanted to do this and punt the consequences to Trump.
There probably has not been an actual increase in non-human activity (the orbs and actual unidentified craft.) They have always interfered with military installations and shut down nuclear weapons. What's occurred is that the vitriol directed at people who report what they see with their own eyes has completely evaporated.
That shameful attitude society directed towards such people was so strong that it's led to a 100x increase in reporting of true UFOs, because 99% of citizens had been conditioned to believe they were insane.
The White House caused this to occur with their obvious lies, destroying the aura of ridicule that they were able to hide under for decades. So, now everyone who sees this stuff records it, shares it, and more people look up. They do see a lot of planes, but they also see things that are inexplicable and which have always been there. And all of a sudden, legitimate journalists are beginning to notice that there are strange orbs doing weird things, that this is a real story, and that we should get answers.
@SteveSokolowski this right here is why no one takes UFOs seriously. It's conspiracy theorism all the way down.
@SteveSokolowski One scintilla of evidence would be helpful with this analysis. You wouldn't want to come off "half-cocked".
@KevinBlaw How do you have enough time in your day to visit every market I participate in and demean me? I thought you just stuck with pretending to be a lawyer.
@SteveSokolowski Evidence, please. You should know what that word means if you are going to be a litigator.
@SteveSokolowski do you consider the government or rogue defense contractor a worldview-shattering origin?
@KevinBlaw speaking of lawyering, can you @ mods in the Wells Fargo shit show market since he’s not resolving it despite the deadline passing?
I would but he blocked me for calling him a troll (and is also trolling others by not counting it for his “will I block users who call me a troll” market). As such, I can’t comment on the market page directly.