Avi Loeb's Galileo Project posts first results to near total silence

Avi Loeb was on the Event Horizon podcast 2 days ago as of this posting. The title of the podcast suggested a discussion of the first data set from their ongoing studies. Oddly, they barely discuss their data at all.

Starting around the 5:41 mark of the video below, Abinsays they released their first batch of data 2 days before this podcast was recorded. I have not been able to locate this data.

It's obvious their study did not uncover anything anamalous or presumably Loeb would have happily discussed these findings. Instead the interview is just standard "we need to look" interview he does all the time.

I find it a little strange that this new data announcement has had almost zero discussion.

Lastly, Loeb was vocal in complaining that he'd been invited to speak at the last House UAP hearing but his invitation retracted or he was asked not to attend in the end after sharing his data. See his statement here:


Source: https://avi-loeb.medium.com/avi-loebs-statement-on-uap-to-the-house-oversight-and-accountability-committee-3cc124e8cdd8


Here is a link to the Event Horizon interview:


Source: https://youtu.be/uJtER5ahdPY?si=FpLH8meIAd4bV1u2
 
The paper is here: it's about building an all-sky infrared camera array for the detection of UAPs and supporting data to illustrate effectiveness. It's still pending peer-review.

External Quote:
The Galileo Project is designing, building, and commissioning a passive, multi-modal, multi-spectral ground-based observatory to
continuously monitor the sky and conduct an exhaustive observational long-term survey in search of measurable anomalous phenomena[4–8]. This long-term field observation effort fits many recommendations from the NASA study and represents "a complex undertaking whose outcome could allow for substantial and systematic gathering of UAP data as well as a robust characterization of the background" [3].

We have designed and built the first observatory at our development site in Massachusetts [4], and we are now commissioning instruments for each of the sensor modalities separately (optical sensors in the infrared, visible, and ultraviolet; acoustic; radio spectrum; magnetic field strength; charged particle count; and weather), and in combination, to validate and benchmark their performance characteristics. Once commissioned, we will commence collecting scientific-grade data and begin to quantitatively identify classes of
objects and statistical outliers that are corroborated over time.
https://projects.iq.harvard.edu/sit...es/gp_2024_dalek_commissioning_paper_full.pdf

The NASA UAP Independent Study Team final report referenced is here: https://smd-cms.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/uap-independent-study-team-final-report.pdf

External Quote:
It is clear to the [NASA] panel that establishing a more robust and systematic framework and data repository for UAP reporting is essential. This particularly applies to civilian reporting of UAP: current FAA guidelines suggest that citizens wanting to report UAP contact their local law enforcement or one or more non-governmental organizations, which is inadequate for drawing scientific inferences. Although such eyewitness reports are often interesting and compelling, they are insufficient on their own for making definitive conclusions about UAP. Thus, their effective corroboration within a robust reporting and follow-up framework based on systematically gathered data (including the ATM system) can provide a useful tool for understanding UAP.
Unclear whether or not this Galileo (private) implementation of NASA's recommendations would make its raw data publicly available/searchable, as hopefully NASA's data would be.
 
The paper is here: it's about building an all-sky infrared camera array for the detection of UAPs and supporting data to illustrate effectiveness. It's still pending peer-review.

External Quote:
The Galileo Project is designing, building, and commissioning a passive, multi-modal, multi-spectral ground-based observatory to
continuously monitor the sky and conduct an exhaustive observational long-term survey in search of measurable anomalous phenomena[4–8]. This long-term field observation effort fits many recommendations from the NASA study and represents "a complex undertaking whose outcome could allow for substantial and systematic gathering of UAP data as well as a robust characterization of the background" [3].

We have designed and built the first observatory at our development site in Massachusetts [4], and we are now commissioning instruments for each of the sensor modalities separately (optical sensors in the infrared, visible, and ultraviolet; acoustic; radio spectrum; magnetic field strength; charged particle count; and weather), and in combination, to validate and benchmark their performance characteristics. Once commissioned, we will commence collecting scientific-grade data and begin to quantitatively identify classes of
objects and statistical outliers that are corroborated over time.
https://projects.iq.harvard.edu/sit...es/gp_2024_dalek_commissioning_paper_full.pdf

The NASA UAP Independent Study Team final report referenced is here: https://smd-cms.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/uap-independent-study-team-final-report.pdf

External Quote:
It is clear to the [NASA] panel that establishing a more robust and systematic framework and data repository for UAP reporting is essential. This particularly applies to civilian reporting of UAP: current FAA guidelines suggest that citizens wanting to report UAP contact their local law enforcement or one or more non-governmental organizations, which is inadequate for drawing scientific inferences. Although such eyewitness reports are often interesting and compelling, they are insufficient on their own for making definitive conclusions about UAP. Thus, their effective corroboration within a robust reporting and follow-up framework based on systematically gathered data (including the ATM system) can provide a useful tool for understanding UAP.
Unclear whether or not this Galileo (private) implementation of NASA's recommendations would make its raw data publicly available/searchable, as hopefully NASA's data would be.
These documents are not the data from the study that Avi is saying he released 2 days before. I haven't been able to find any of this data or mention of a report on their website.
 
This is linked below the Event Horizon video:

Commissioning Data on Half a Million Objects in the Sky from the Galileo Project Observatory: Are Any of Them UAP?

External Quote:
After 3.5 years of planning, hardware assembly, data collection and analysis, the Galileo Project (GP) under my leadership released the commissioning data from its first Observatory at Harvard University in a new paper posted here (currently under peer review), with my GP postdoc Dr. Laura Domine as first author.

Source: https://avi-loeb.medium.com/commissioning-data-on-half-a-million-objects-in-the-sky-from-the-galileo-project-observatory-are-a23bd084233a
 
I am sorry, I wasn't following this.
Are they claiming they can monitor the entire sky around Earth?
I can think of a few military applications for this technology…
 
I am sorry, I wasn't following this.
Are they claiming they can monitor the entire sky around Earth?
I can think of a few military applications for this technology…
I don't think they say that.
But what they made is a multisensor system, going to be on a roof doing measurements.
I don't see how though how the Dalek IR camera array would make a difference in the uap search, but hey why not because technically it is a very interesting system (also software wise).
 
Well, from a quick look at their paper it looks well-written and not overhyped at all. Given they could secure the funds for it (...hopefully not public funds...), and they approached and reported the whole thing seriously and scientifically, I wholly approve of it and I do hope they'll find something interesting in the future (in which case it probably won't be UAP related, but oh well).

Just... did they really have to call it "Dalek"? :)
 
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Well, from a quick look at their paper it looks well-written and not overhyped at all. Given they could secure the funds for it (...hopefully not public funds...), and they approached and reported the whole thing seriously and scientifically, I wholly approve of it and I do hope they'll find something interesting in the future (in which case it probably won't be UAP related, but oh well).

Just... did they really have to call it "Dalek"? :)
Read through the paper and looked at two of the articles referenced in it. They are on the right track certainly.
They did manage to make more work for themselves by starting with the IR cameras first, but that forced them to develop the ADS-B based calibration system, which will probably benefit both them and others working on similar systems.
The various metrics they described are interesting, they do seem to be covered the bases. I especially like the focus on the sinuosity of the observed paths of the objects detected. Sinuosity makes an interesting filter to identify birds, beetles and falling leaves as opposed to airliners and satellites.
 
It's obvious their study did not uncover anything anamalous or presumably Loeb would have happily discussed these findings. Instead the interview is just standard "we need to look" interview he does all the time.
That's an interesting observation.
I'm wondering if Avi Loeb is gently trying to reduce his perceived enthusiasm for ETI hypotheses
(the following might belong in A Debunk of Avi Loeb's "Alien Spherules" claims, but I felt the above might make it relevant here):

Avi Loeb's most recent paper informed by his expedition to the waters off Papua New Guinea in order to retrieve spherules that might have come from the CNEOS 2014-01-08 bolide has just been published:

Chemical classification of spherules recovered from the Pacific Ocean site of the CNEOS 2014-01-08 (IM1) bolide,
Loeb, A., Jacobsen, S.B., Tagle, R. et al., Chemical Geology vol. 670, 20 December 2024-
-well; it's going to be published 20 December 2024, but the complete text appears to be on Elsevier (including appendices of data, which is commendable), https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0009254124004959

Interest in CNEOS 2014-01-08 (also called IM1, "Interstellar Meteorite 1" by some) is largely because its possible speed and trajectory might indicate origins outside of the Solar System, although this is still debated, see Wikipedia, "CNEOS 2014-01-08" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CNEOS_2014-01-08. Avi Loeb is confident that there was an extrasolar impactor.

A 13 March 2024 article by Ethan Slegel on the Big Think website, "The humiliating truth behind Harvard astronomer's "alien" spherules", https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/truth-harvard-astronomer-alien-spherules/, is a summary of some of the criticism of Loeb's position. Loeb raised the possibility of any debris not only being extrasolar, but being of technological origin, and Slegel refers to this in increasingly acerbic terms:

External Quote:
Problem #3: Loeb's claim that the presence of elements rarely found in common meteorites, like Beryllium, Lanthanum, and Uranium, as well as other rare elements, indicate not only an origin beyond our own Solar System, but a technological origin for these samples... ...Loeb had previously claimed that the Beryllium, Lanthanum, and Uranium (BeLaU, for short) compositions of these objects, because those elements are not found in normal meteorites, are instead evidence that these spherules are not just from outside of our Solar System, but must be an indicator of alien technology. As is so often the case in crackpot circles, one extraordinary claim begets another...
Avi Loeb's speculations were greeted with enthusiasm by UFO enthusiasts. Slegel tells us that Patricio Gallardo had found that coal ash has a similar composition to Loeb's spherules, providing a link to Gallardo's paper
Anthropogenic Coal Ash as a Contaminant in a Micro-meteoritic Underwater Search, Gallardo, P. A., Research Notes of the American Astronomical Society 7 (10), 2023 https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2515-5172/ad03f9

Loeb et al.'s December 2024 paper presents evidence for isotopic composition of some spherules that he believes differ significantly from known solar system norms.
However, unlike some of his earlier speculation about intelligent ET origins for the spherules, Avi proposes a different mechanism for extrasolar origins of CNEOS 2014-01-08, citing a paper he co-authored,
Interstellar meteors from the tidal disruption of rocky planets on eccentric orbits around M dwarfs, Loeb, A., MacLeod, M., Astronomy & Astrophysics vol. 686, June 2024, abstract viewable at
https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/abs/2024/06/aa49250-24/aa49250-24.html

External Quote:

Results
We compare these properties [of M dwarf system ejecta of debris from tidally disrupted rocky planets, John J.] to those of the candidate interstellar meteoroid CNEOS-2014-01-08 (IM1). IM1's approximately 60 km s−1​ excess speed relative to the local standard of rest is naturally reproduced by the unbound debris of the disruption of an Earth-like planet around an M dwarf star. We suggest that such an encounter might explain the interstellar kinematics of IM1, and its unusual composition, especially if it originated in the fastest-expelled crust of a differentiated rocky planet.
Loeb's proposed explanation for the possible interstellar origins of CNEOS-2014-01-08, and the atypical isotopic composition of spherules he believes might have come from that object, are still speculative (and I'd guess controversial), but it might help us understand the possible origins of extrasolar materials on Earth if they are found, maybe including some of Avi's spherules.

But there appears to be little awareness from UFO groups/ enthusiasts that Avi Loeb seems to be de-emphasizing an ETI origin.
 
hopefully not public funds
They claim they have received only private donations so far, but it's possible AARO would be interested in the system, or the data:

External Quote:
Funding: This research was funded by private donations to the Galileo Project
source: https://projects.iq.harvard.edu/sites/projects.iq.harvard.edu/files/gp_2024_dalek_commissioning_paper_full.pdf, p.39

About the data, the paper mentions what was processed by the system and the results, which matches Loeb's apparent silence:

External Quote:
The ∼500,000 reconstructed aerial trajectories that we report from this commissioning period of five months give us insight into the volume of object parameter space that the Dalek is sensitive to. From the commissioning studies, we expect that the Dalek acceptance includes objects of apparent size larger than 3 pixels, which corresponds to a standard airliner of wingspan 50 m at a distance of 10 km or a bird of wingspan 1.5 m at a distance of 300 m. Kinematics-wise, objects with a speed larger than 200 m/s at a distance of 1 km or a speed larger than 2 km/s at a distance of 10 km are outside the Dalek's acceptance based on both the frame rate and our analysis requirement of at least four points in a trajectory. The reconstructed aerial trajectories are analyzed with a toy outlier selection based on high sinuosity. About 16% of trajectories are flagged as outliers and manually examined. 144 ambiguous objects remained, which are likely mundane objects but cannot be elucidated without distance estimation and multi-modality at this stage of development. We demonstrate the application of a likelihood-based statistical test to evaluate the significance of this toy outlier analysis. Our observed count of ambiguous outliers combined with systematic uncertainties yields an upper limit of 18,271 outliers (toy outliers flagged as unusual) having passed through the Dalek's detection volume and time window during the commissioning period at a 95% confidence level. This upper limit corresponds to ∼ 4% of the objects we reconstructed and ∼ 22% of the objects flagged as outliers based on their apparent trajectory sinuosity. For context, classified studies done by governmental agencies such as the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), which are often able to leverage distance estimations from radar data and data from multiple modalities, reported that ∼3% of the cases brought to their attention remained ambiguous. We expect that our upper limit will decrease in the future after we improve our detection pipelines, and include multiple instruments and range estimation in the survey. This paper also paves the way for conducting a similar commissioning process for each of our observatory's instruments before conducting a in-depth, multi-modal aerial survey. We plan to apply this likelihood-based method to all of our future outlier searches.

Data Availability Statement: The raw data supporting the conclusions of this article will be made available by the authors on request.
source: https://projects.iq.harvard.edu/sites/projects.iq.harvard.edu/files/gp_2024_dalek_commissioning_paper_full.pdf, p.38 and 39

In summary, from the ~500,000 events registered, 80,000 were flagged, from which only 144 remained unexplained but are all expected to be mundane. With ranging data and more sensors, they expect to meet AARO's 3% performance, which would reduce the ambiguous to less than 24 per month on average. Their current rejection rate is ~99.97%, and projected to increase to over 99.98% with software and hardware upgrades.
 
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Just... did they really have to call it "Dalek"?
I've met with people from the USAF Kessel Run and Section 31 teams, so I think there's a general compunction to use whatever scifi term you like any time there's a critical nerd mass.

Plus I always raise my Spock eyebrow when I see the Panavia Tornado's MFD is called TARDIS.
 
From the paper
" 16% of trajectories are flagged as outliers and manually examined in the IR images. From these ∼80,000 outliers, 144 trajectories remain ambiguous, which are likely mundane objects but cannot be further elucidated at this stage of development without information about distance and kinematics or other sensor modalities"

This tells me their tool is useless. They generated 144 UAP observations in 5 months but admit they have know way of following up on what they are. So all this is good for is generating more bullshit.
 
This tells me their tool is useless. They generated 144 UAP observations in 5 months but admit they have know way of following up on what they are. So all this is good for is generating more bullshit.
Perhaps they hoped some aliens did some sort of trick, to show themselves. "Hello, look over here"
 
This tells me their tool is useless. They generated 144 UAP observations in 5 months but admit they have know way of following up on what they are. So all this is good for is generating more bullshit.

Maybe not completely useless. If one wants to study UAPs, the first thing is to identify them, that is filter out everything that is an Identified Aireal Object (IAO). Much of UFOlogy is simply recording or reporting what turn out to be known things in the sky and claiming they're unknown, either mistakenly or deliberately.

If out of 500,00 observations over 5 months there was only 144 UAPs that couldn't be directly identified, that's only .028% of all observations. At the very least this counters the UFOlogical claim that UAPs are ubiquitous. When Loeb's people actually tried to catalog a sizable data base of things observed in the sky, only .028% fell into an unknown category. Even then, they suggested that these unknown ones could probably be identified given more information. So not a lot of aliens out there.

As @Mendel mentioned above, for every sensor system, from our eyes to whatever the most sophisticated contraptions the military has access too, there becomes a point where the LIZ exists for each system.

I don't see any aliens coming out of this study, but it is good to see a weeding process taking place with something that shows the vast, vast number of things in the sky are NOT UAP. They are known and identifiable. The hard core will likely argue that the .028% is where the aliens are. But if so, it counters their own aliens are everywhere argument. One can always argue "There's a needle in this haystack; we just need resources and serious people to find it." Finding a needle in a few pieces of straw though, should be much easier.

If nothing else, this system severely narrows down the field of UAPs, which I would argue, puts a bigger burden on the UFOlgists to produce something truly anomalous or alien. I would think if the project produced more results like this, effectively only finding a very small number of unidentifiable observations in a large data set and stating that these few UAP could probably be identified giving more information, the UFOlogical community will move on from it as it doesn't produce the results they want.
 
It's a counter to those who say, "if only someone would look". If all identifiable "trajectories" are mundane and only the LIZ remains, then that's a negative result. It's a well known source of science bias that these are harder to publish, but they're valuable nonetheless.
 
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