[necovek]

> ...and they aren't famous enough for you to trust them.

That's not how we gain extraordinary trust (remember, Kyrie Irving is pretty darn famous).

We expect all statements to be independently verified and attested by a bunch of experts, with eg. journalists verifying they are indeed experts (that's journalists' expertise). The more people who've you learned to trust in that chain of verifiers, the higher your trust.

When it comes to extraordinary claims like this, I usually go back to the "implementation": why and how did another civilization solve all of the physics problems of interstellar flight (if it did), how did they go undetected by other countries and amateurs, and why did they not simply reach out in an attempt to communicate?

At that point I can even buy that these "intelligence officers" believe what they are saying, but I still don't buy that their claims are true.

[Ireallyapart]

>That's not how we gain extraordinary trust (remember, Kyrie Irving is pretty darn famous).

Nope. It is how you gain extraordinary trust. It really depends on what they are famous for. There are many famous people or scholars who you respect and trust due to their fame. You trust them, because others trust them.

Fame can also cause distrust too. But it does cause trust as well.

>When it comes to extraordinary claims like this, I usually go back to the "implementation": why and how did another civilization solve all of the physics problems of interstellar flight (if it did), how did they go undetected by other countries and amateurs, and why did they not simply reach out in an attempt to communicate?

This is too much speculation. There are an infinite number of explanations here. Better to follow the the chain of events from the anomalous claim and start piecing together things forwards rather then just claim it's impossible because you can't think of any valid way for it to happen.

Additionally the claim itself is "extraordinary" so basically there is likely no mundane explanation for it if the claim is true.

>At that point I can even buy that these "intelligence officers" believe what they are saying, but I still don't buy that their claims are true.

So that's the first step right? They believe what they are saying. So from their perspective they witnessed extraordinary evidence. So what made them believe it? What did they actually see? Are they correct? Even if following this thread leads to something different then their claim, one can still learn something interesting.

Closed mindedness often involves logic that works backwards. You need to move forwards. If you see a path, moving forwards means following the path. Moving backwards means ignoring the path because you made a guess that there's nothing at the end of the path.

[necovek]

I am not sure why do you think there is only one way to increase trust in a claim made by unknown people?

I don't trust "famous" people. I trust that it's unlikely for a large group of "famous" (eg experts in relevant fields, which is a more specific interpretatiin of "famous"), unrelated people to not trust each other, and only once they reach a common ground, would my trust of their extraordinary claim rise.

Yes, I wouldn't trust Einstein proclaiming speed of light is finite, but when corroborated with independent claims of experiments from Michelson proving likewise, and others from 30 years ago, I would.

Basically, if it's too few people, I'd question how did others, unrelated people not see it: science mostly progresses these days when the body of knowledge is such that simply the next thing is in front of us, and multiple people simultaneously "discover" it. As it's many people making similar claims, I'd start considering it seriously.

This is how science works, and I am happy to follow that with media reports as well. It's not at all backwards IMO.

Sure, if I was working on a hypothesis, I would certainly venture into less trusty sources, but I would need to be ready to accept for my hypothesis to be disproven too.