this post was submitted on 21 Apr 2025
469 points (98.0% liked)

Showerthoughts

33862 readers
1228 users here now

A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.

Here are some examples to inspire your own showerthoughts:

Rules

  1. All posts must be showerthoughts
  2. The entire showerthought must be in the title
  3. No politics
    • If your topic is in a grey area, please phrase it to emphasize the fascinating aspects, not the dramatic aspects. You can do this by avoiding overly politicized terms such as "capitalism" and "communism". If you must make comparisons, you can say something is different without saying something is better/worse.
    • A good place for politics is c/politicaldiscussion
  4. Posts must be original/unique
  5. Adhere to Lemmy's Code of Conduct and the TOS

If you made it this far, showerthoughts is accepting new mods. This community is generally tame so its not a lot of work, but having a few more mods would help reports get addressed a little sooner.

Whats it like to be a mod? Reports just show up as messages in your Lemmy inbox, and if a different mod has already addressed the report, the message goes away and you never worry about it.

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 

If someone were to record a flawless, 4K video of an actual alien walking around or a spaceship flying overhead, people would just think it's a deep fake.

top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] Mbourgon@lemmy.world 78 points 4 days ago (1 children)
[–] xavier666@lemm.ee 20 points 4 days ago (1 children)

What's the XKCD code for this?

[–] Two9A@lemmy.world 29 points 4 days ago
[–] AbouBenAdhem@lemmy.world 145 points 5 days ago (3 children)

Plot twist: aliens introduced generative AI so people would dismiss evidence of their existence.

[–] Bytemeister@lemmy.world 3 points 3 days ago

Sam Altman is an alien in a human suit. Our AI sucks because aliens had to adapt their software to our crappy binary logic/architecture.

[–] LaLuzDelSol@lemmy.world 25 points 5 days ago
[–] Bytemeister@lemmy.world 6 points 3 days ago (2 children)

I always giggle at the idea that aliens would come here in some super advanced spaceship.

Look at the spacecraft we've managed to land on other celestial bodies. They're basically the lightest, sketchiest, life support boxes with a rocket motor that we can manage to get to the destination. It would be reasonable to assume that any alien out there reaching earth for the first time would either send a rover, or it would be the jankiest craft that could just barely get here.

[–] rumba@lemmy.zip 5 points 3 days ago (2 children)

That's assuming they came here first :)

Also, assuming one of the 60 horrible things happening right now doesn't prove the Fermi paradox.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] vithigar@lemmy.ca 1 points 3 days ago (1 children)

A persistent assumption about advanced interstellar travel is that engine efficiency is monumentally better to the point that the "tyrrany of the rocket equation" is no longer a factor, and extra mass can be carried without absolutely exploding your fuel requirements into absurdity.

If adding 10kg of payload didn't mean also potentially many times more mass of propellant we'd be sending up more robust spacecraft, no question.

[–] Bytemeister@lemmy.world 1 points 3 days ago

Rocket equation notwithstanding, there is the tyranny of development. Electric motors, rocket engines, ion thrusters... All of these locomotive technologies went through iterations. Even if alien scientist invented a warp drive capable of carrying an infinite amount of mass an infinite distance with no energy, there would still be a development process to implement and integrate that drive into a spaceship.

Technological progress, or the accumulation of knowledge does not happen overnight, it's built layer by layer.

[–] Ramblingman@lemmy.world 4 points 3 days ago

I followed disclosure for a while and it seemed to be mostly grifters. The big reveal never comes, meanwhile they are raking in the cash writing books and attending conferences. Some of them even have ridiculous shows on the "history" channel.

[–] latenightnoir@lemmy.blahaj.zone 45 points 5 days ago (19 children)

If I were The Aliens, I would've stopped coming here somewhere around 2013-2014. And I don't say this with any kind of undertone, I just feel we haven't developed in significant ways over the past decade. They most certainly haven't presented any social interest, so it's a study. They'd only need vertical slices every half century to a century or so.

load more comments (19 replies)
[–] andallthat@lemmy.world 11 points 4 days ago (2 children)

As an alien I would now spend all my time targeting wannabe influencers. Wait until they are alone, get naked and let them take high-quality pictures and videos of my green ass while I dance and play yankee doodle on my harmonica

[–] forrgott@lemm.ee 5 points 4 days ago

If Kirk were an alien...

[–] conditional_soup@lemm.ee 9 points 4 days ago (4 children)

Supposedly the DOD and alphabet boys have pretty good video, and have gone around confiscating good videos. That family in Vegas that claimed that they had aliens in their back yard a few years ago, the one where the cops said they didn't think it was a prank but wouldn't go into detail as to why, got a visit from the alphabet gang not long after, and they had surveillance cameras that pointed into that yard.

Now, as to whether those videos really do exist or if it's a bunch of hokum, well, it's going to have to be a case of maybe believe it when we see it. I've been following the UAP disclosure efforts with great interest, regardless of where they lead. I've always been a UFO/ET enthusiast, but I'm the type that wants to see proof, not "trust me bro, just look at these three pixels, my cousin said he fucked an ET in the army". If we're going to get proof, though, at this point we're going to need more than video. That window's been shut for a while, thanks to CGI, Photoshop, etc.

[–] Auli@lemmy.ca 5 points 3 days ago (7 children)

It's all B's you couldn't keep it secret with that many people knowing about it.

load more comments (7 replies)
load more comments (3 replies)
[–] makyo@lemmy.world 31 points 5 days ago (3 children)

I'm not sure there was ever the possibility of a really convincing UFO video. I'd be skeptical of something extremely realistic even if we were still in the days before convincing traditional effects. It's just too high a bar - it's much easier to believe that a video was staged, even to an unbelievable level, than it is to believe that it depicts actual beings from another planet. I think that's why the UFO community hangs their hat so much on Disclosure these days. They must realize that only confirmation from a trusted authority could be real confirmation.

[–] yesman@lemmy.world 23 points 5 days ago

They must realize that only confirmation from a trusted authority could be real confirmation.

This is a neat observation because it's ironic on it's face. UFO people actively work to discredit institutions and authority. But you're right, they are desperate for confirmation from the Pentagon, the Vatican, even something on official DMV letterhead would be a blockbuster event in UFO/conspiracy spaces.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] OmegaLemmy@discuss.online 13 points 4 days ago (2 children)

Wow. An actual shower thought.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] Treczoks@lemmy.world 22 points 4 days ago (7 children)

Lets put it this way: in the 60s, a photo was not a simple or common thing. Only a few people had a camera at hand, and films could only take 20 to 30 pictures, so they were used sparingly. Still, many UFO pictures date from back then.

Nowadays, everyone has a camera on person, and you can do thousands of pictures in a row. There are millions of recording video surveillance cameras everywhere. So if UFOs exist, there should be myriads of pictures and recordings, many of which in top notch quality, where you could read the labels on the little green mens console buttons.

So far, they remain to be seen.

[–] monkeyslikebananas2@lemmy.world 16 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (1 children)

Take a picture of a plane with your cellphone. Not to say that there are aliens in any way, but the devices we have can barely capture a decent picture in a grocery store security system. After 20/30 meters pretty much nothing is clear without specialized equipment.

[–] nBodyProblem@lemmy.world 12 points 4 days ago

Yeah there is a reason why plane spotters use 400+mm lenses

[–] nBodyProblem@lemmy.world 10 points 4 days ago (1 children)

There is a very reasonable explanation for this: If we are a topic of research for them, they could have simply stopped studying us in the same way

Take our own science for example. We pull out of studies when the funding dries up. Maybe the aliens’ government grant ran out. Or, perhaps they have a policy of avoiding interference with the subjects. They could have changed methodology in response to the threat of high resolution recording equipment

[–] MotoAsh@lemmy.world 4 points 4 days ago (3 children)

Nahh, any species able to come close to interstellar travel would be able to observe us from afar. We can already take good data on other planets' atmospheres. It's not going to be too much longer (probably still past our lifetimes, but) before we can take spy satellite quality photos of the surface.

Sure, some alien species might prefer to be more hands-on, but I'd hope they'd also recognize the destructive power humans have and stay away; It's a lot easier to break something than to invent it, and few things remain even recognizable after being hit by bigger military weapons. A lot of older movies/media relied on that fact to make the other thing seem so fantastically strong. Like the alien ship shrugging off a nuke in Independence Day.

load more comments (3 replies)
load more comments (5 replies)
[–] demizerone@lemmy.world 8 points 4 days ago (2 children)

I've seen one myself, back in 2015. Flew right over me without a sound. Someone else on the ground saw it too and flashed an extremely bright beam at it and it responded back by flashing multi colored lights back. I took a picture of it and the only thing that showed up is a small blurry dot. But it was at night.

[–] nandeEbisu@lemmy.world 15 points 4 days ago

Yep that sounds like a flying object that no one identified.

[–] null_dot@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Amazing. Pack it up everyone. Looks like the old "are we alone" question has been settled once and for all.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] Agent641@lemmy.world 8 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (3 children)

Actual, legit Fortean lore regarding this is that the phenomena knows when it's being observed and photographed, and can manipulate time and space such that it doesn't show up on digital photos.

[–] null_dot@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 3 days ago

That's so pathetic.

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 10 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

How convenient. Reminds me of Carl Sagan's "The Dragon in my Garage" essay.

For anyone who hasn't read it (I highly recommend reading the entire book that it's from: "The Demon-Haunted World") here's a link (it's only two pages): http://people.whitman.edu/~herbrawt/classes/110/Sagan.pdf

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] BradleyUffner@lemmy.world 13 points 5 days ago (1 children)

You clearly underestimate the stupidity and lack of logic employed by conspiracy theorists.

load more comments (1 replies)
load more comments
view more: next ›