What Next - Congress Wants to Know: Do Aliens Exist? | 2023 In Review
Slate News
Slate Podcasts
4.5 • 6K Ratings
🗓️ 27 December 2023
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
While the What Next team spends some time with their families this week, we revisit some of 2023’s biggest, strangest, and best stories. Regularly scheduled programming resumes Jan. 2.
In a recent public hearing, three government officials told Congress that not only are “unidentified anomalous phenomena” real, they’re a major national security concern. But one witness took his testimony even further, claiming the government possesses materials of “non-human origin.” How much do we really know about UAPs – or, as they’re more commonly known, UFOs? And now that Congress is involved, are we about to learn a whole lot more?
Guest: Garrett Graff, contributor at WIRED magazine; author of the forthcoming book, “UFO: The Inside Story of the US Government's Search for Alien Life Here—and Out There”
Originally aired July 7.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | At Barclays, we're here for the land of football. |
| 0:06.4 | We're here for the Premier League. |
| 0:09.0 | And the Barclays Women's Super League. |
| 0:12.1 | We're here for the football chance for giving more girls a chance. |
| 0:18.0 | We're here for the grassroots and all the muddy booths. From schools to stadiums, we're here for it all. |
| 0:27.6 | Barclays, here for the land of football. |
| 0:32.2 | Hey everyone, here at what next our job is to ask questions. And this year we asked a lot of serious ones about war, politics, fascism, health care. |
| 0:44.0 | But some of our questions, we're a little less orthodox. |
| 0:47.4 | Questions like, has Pickleball invaded our towns? |
| 0:51.2 | Do aliens exist? And is Stephen Spielberg actually cursed? |
| 0:57.0 | Since it's the holidays, we wanted to take a break from the headlines and listen back to some |
| 1:01.4 | of our wackier questions. |
| 1:03.8 | So if you're on a little vacation from the news right now, first of all, we forgive |
| 1:07.4 | you. |
| 1:08.4 | And second of all, we promise these shows are going to be like unwrapping a present, the kind you actually |
| 1:12.3 | want to get. |
| 1:15.0 | Today, we are asking a timeless question, is the truth out there? |
| 1:22.0 | Because it turns out, this was a big year for unidentified flying objects. |
| 1:27.0 | Even Congress got involved. |
| 1:29.0 | This conversation aired back in July. |
| 1:31.0 | It's still one of our favorites. Last week things got a little weird in Washington. |
| 1:47.0 | The subcommittee hearing on unidentified anomalous |
... |
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