 I'm Darren Marlar and this is a Weird Darkness Bonus Bite. From Newsweek.com, renowned physicist's response to UFO hearing goes viral by Jess Thompson. After Congress's hearing on UFOs and whistleblower David Grouch's claims that the U.S. government has covered up the existence of aliens on Earth, a popular physics professor and science communicator weighed in on Twitter. Brian Cox, a TV presenter and professor of particle physics at the University of Manchester in the U.K., tweeted on Wednesday, �I keep being asked what I make of the UFO thing in Congress yesterday, so here it is. I watched a few clips and saw some people who seemed to believe stuff, saying extraordinary things without presenting extraordinary evidence,� he said. �Therefore I have nothing more to say other than it would be great if true. It would take a bit of pressure off our civilization if we weren't the only means within the Milky Way by which the universe understands itself. Sadly, as of today, I still feel that pressure, so can we perhaps focus on not messing our world up rather than hoping that, to paraphrase Sagan, someone will float down to save us from ourselves.� His tweet was liked more than 57,000 times as of this recording. During Wednesday's hearing, titled Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena � Implications on National Security, and Government Transparency, conducted by the House Oversight Subcommittee, former U.S. Intelligence Officer David Groesch, who is an Air Force veteran and member of a Pentagon Task Force that investigated UFOs, told the panel that he was absolutely certain that the federal government is in possession of UFOs. UFOs are now also known as Unidentified Aerial Phenomena, UAPs. He also said that non-human biologics had been found at crash sites and that the presence of these findings had been covered up by the government for decades. Groesch said the same thing to News Nation in June. �These are retrieving non-human origin technical vehicles. Call it spacecraft, if you will, non-human exotic origin vehicles that have either landed or crashed. Well, naturally, when you recover something that's either landed or crashed, sometimes you encounter dead pilots, and believe it or not, as fantastical as that sounds, it's true.� At the hearing, Groesch also said that alien technology reverse engineering programs could serve as a catalyst for a global reassessment of our priorities and that covering up these off-world craft was bankrolled by misappropriation of funds. These whistleblowers have dealt directly with UAPs, both man-made and of extraterrestrial origin, Stephen Greer, an American ufologist and founder of the Disclosure Project, which aims to get alleged classified UFO information disclosed, previously told Newsweek. We're also requesting an amnesty period for very high-value people involved in illegal operations related to UAPs and federal witness protection, as well as explicit protections against retaliations in relation to pensions and personal assets. UAPs are often cited by members of the public. In 2022, there were 510 UAP sightings, 171 of which, quote, appear to have demonstrated unusual flight characteristics or performance capabilities and require further analysis, unquote. While the remainder were balloon-like entities, according to a January report from the Office for the Director of National Intelligence. The majority of UAPs can be accounted for as balloons, drones, or drifting aerial junk. Joshua Semeter, a professor of electrical and computer engineering and director of the Center for Space Physics at Boston University and member of NASA's Independent Panel to Study UAPs, previously told Newsweek. In some cases, the visual impression is impacted by perspective bias, where a slow, nearby object looks like a large, rapid, distant object. That said, there is a small percentage of observations that remain unexplained, he continued. These cases generally involve an object that exhibits unusual flight characteristics, for instance, rapid acceleration, rapid velocity or extreme maneuverability, characteristics that cannot readily be accounted for through known technologies. Find the link to the original story in the show notes and find more news on the Weird News and Blog at WeirdDarkness.com