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... at Shanidar, a Neanderthal grave site in Iraq, archeologists mellowed a bit in their assessments. Now, there is evidence that those supposed lowbrows were also musicians. In 1996, in a Slovenian cave, researchers discovered a flute crafted from the thigh bone of a cave bear. Stone tools of Neanderthal manufacture were found nearby. The flute is dated between 43,000 and 82,000 years old and is the oldest-known, deliberately manufactured musical instrument ever found. (Folger, Tim, and Menon, Shanti; "Strong Bones, and Thus Dim-Witted? Or Much Like Us?" Discover, 18:32, January 1997.) Really stale chewing gum! The journal Nature recently printed the photograph of a tooth-marked wad of chewing gum said to be ... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 111: May-Jun 1997 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Ancient Entertainments Neanderthal musicmakers, The Neanderthals have long been portrayed as insensitive and brutish. But when the remains of flowers were found at Shanidar, a Neanderthal grave site in Iraq, archeologists mellowed a bit in their assessments. Now, there is evidence that those supposed lowbrows were also musicians. In 1996, in a Slovenian cave, researchers discovered a flute crafted from the thigh bone of a cave bear. Stone tools of Neanderthal manufacture were found nearby. The flute is dated between 43,000 and 82,000 years old and is the oldest-known, deliberately manufactured musical instrument ever found. (Folger, Tim, and Menon ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 115: Jan-Feb 1998 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Woodhenges Before Pyramids The ancient inhabitants of Britain were constructing massive structures before Cheops, builder of the Great Pyramid, was even born! One of these structures is 5,000 years old. It is located at Stanton Drew, in southwestern England. But tourists at the site see only the Great Circle of standing stones, which is impressive enough but only the tip of the iceberg, so to speak. What is more spectacular is "seen" only by sensitive magnetometers. These instruments detect faint, ghostly remains of the magnetotactic bacteria that consumed the giant oak pillars that graced this site five millennia ago. The soil inside the Great Circle ... that there were once 400-500 oak pillars on the site. These massive cylinders were probably a meter in diameter, 8 meters (26 feet) high, and weighed 5 tons each. The rings of pillars occupied an area about the size of a football field (100 meters in diameter). The Stanton Drew woodhenge was probably too large to have been roofed, but the oak columns might have been carved or decorated. Why would anyone cut, haul, and array hundreds of massive oak pillars in nine concentric circles? Obviously, the ancient Britons used this oaken temple to seek help from supernatural powers! Well, that's what the archeologists say, but who really knows? (Hawkes, Nigel; "Woodhenge Find Rivals Stone Circles," London Times, November 11 ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 119: Sep-Oct 1998 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Really ancient oil -- and abundant life Geologists usually don't bother looking for oil in very ancient (Precambrian) rocks for two reasons: Conventional wisdom insists that oil is derived almost exclusively from organic matter, and additional conventional wisdom assures us that life was exceedingly scarce on earth billions of years ago. Any oil that was created billions of years ago would have surely been destroyed by intense pressures and high temperatures over the eons. Yet, Precambrian oil in commercial quantities has been found in formations up to 2 billion years old (in Siberia, Australia, Michigan, for example). While some of this oil might have migrated in-to the Precambrian rocks from younger source rocks, some of it does seem indigenous and, therefore, ancient. (SF#48) Now, three Australian scientists (R . Buick, B. Rasmussen, B. Krapez) have discovered tiny nodules of bitumen (lumps of hydrocarbons) in sedimentary rocks up to 3.5 billion years old in Africa and Australia. These bitumen nodules were formed when natural hydrocarbons were irradiated by radioactive isotopes that coexisted in the ancient rocks. Futhermore, these African and Australian rock formations were never severely deformed or subjected to high temperatures. The possibility exists, therefore, that some of the earth's oldest rocks may contain substantial oil reserves. So far, no one has seriously looked for oil in Precambrian rocks because of the two preconceptions ...
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... . Also: Gibbons, Ann; "Mother Tongues Trace Steps of Earliest Americans," Science, 279:1306, 1998.) Comment. The Bering Strait fetters have been struck. Above we even see hints that ancient seafaring will soon be allowed. Apparently epigraphic heresy, a la B. Fell, remains anathema. Also verboten: Pedra Furada, that 50,000-year-old site in Brazil. (SF#108, SF#105, SF#112) From Science Frontiers #119, SEP-OCT 1998 . 1998-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 107: Sep-Oct 1996 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Who Built The Kaimanawa Wall?Some 30 kilometers south of Lake Taupo, in New Zealand, stands an enigmatic array of stone blocks. It "looks" like a wall; a human-built wall. It also "looks" old; perhaps 2,000 years old according to some. Who built it? Passions are running high in New Zealand, where three hypotheses are being advanced: The wall was built some 2,000 years ago by the first settlers of New Zealand, the Waitahas, who were subsequently nearly exterminated by the Maoris, who arrived only 800 years ago. There are political problems with this theory, for the Maoris insist they are the original New Zealanders and therefore are due compensation for lands expropriated by later Europeans. The wall is merely what's left of a sawmill built only 50 or so years ago. The wall is simply a natural rock formation that has happened to split neatly into rectangular blocks -- like those slabs of beach rock that comprise the controversial Bimini "road" in the Bahamas. Future study of the "wall" will doubtless narrow the list to one. Meanwhile, let's take a look at the wall itself. B. Brailsford, of Christchurch, has been the chief investigator of the Kaimanawa wall, aided by American D.H . Childress, and others. The stones that make up the wall are 4-ton blocks of ignimbrite, ...
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... . Their large sizes imply that they are probably close to the missing crater mentioned above. Still unresolved is whether they were originally puddles of molten rock near the elusive crater or local ejecta analogous to volcanic bombs. (Ref. 1) Is the "age paradox" finally resolved? Some Australian geologists have stratigraphically dated the Australasian tektites as being just a few thousand rather than 770,000 years old. (SF#8 ) The 770,000-year figure is derived from the presence of Australasian microtekites at the Brunhes-Matuyama magnetic reversal and is, therefore, a "magnetostratigraphic" date. Recent excavations by now seem to confirm R. Fudali's assessment that all tektites and microtektites in the Australasian strewn field are definitely 770,000 years old. (Ref. 3 ... References Ref. 1. Taylor, S.R .; "Tektites: Some Unresvolved Problems," Meteoritics and Planetary Science , 32:4 , 1997. Ref. 2. Schnetzler, C.C . and McHone, J.F .; "Source of Australasian Tektites: Investigating Possible Impact Sites in Laos," Meteoritics and Plane tary Science , 31:73, 1996. Ref. 3. Fudali, R.; "The Stratigraphic Age of Australites Revisited," Meteoritics, 28:114, 1993. Comment. Still puzzling is why so many Australasian tektites show up in recent sediments. One theory is that humans valued these glassy objects and did some anthropomorphic strewing. Dumbbell- and tear-shaped tektites picked up in Indochina. From Science Frontiers #115, ...
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... Lunar Landslide Lights Moonwatchers have reported light flashes, strange red glows, and mist-like patches emanating from certain lunar locales, particularly the huge craters Alphonso and Picard. Hundreds of such observations have accumulated since the Middle Ages. Modern more-systematic scrutiny indeed confirms that the moon is not such a dead place after all. (See ALF in The Moon and the Planets for much more on this fascinating subject.) Moonquakes, gaseous emissions, and even volcanic activity have been the favorite explanations of these TLPs (Transient Lunar Phenomena), but these are only surmises. The many close-up photos of the lunar surface taken in 1994 by the lunar satellite Clementine gave B. Buratti, K. Herkenhoff, and T. McConnochie the opportunity to search for geological common denominators connecting the sites where TLPs have been most frequent. The suspicious sites are characterized by bluish spectra that usually indicate unusually fresh deposits of lunar debris. Furthermore, these areas are usually found along the inside edges of large craters. Buratti et al opine that these are the sites of recent landslides that have cascaded off the crater edges. The dust and volatile gases released by these events might account for the observed luminous phenomena. (Cowen, Ron; "Explaining a Lunar Mystery," Science News, 150:314, 1996.) Reference. To order the book The Moon and the Planets (mentioned above), visit here . The lunar crater Gassendi on April 30 and May 1, 1966. The shaded areas mark the red glow observed on those dates by astronomers. From Science Frontiers # ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 108: Nov-Dec 1996 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Deflating a paradigm: brazil's pedra furada The paradigm. The New World was peopled from Asia by migration across the Bering Land Bridge about 12,000 years ago, or perhaps a wee earlier. The Pedra Furada site has been dated at 50,000 BP by N. Guidon and her team of archeologists. This challenge to the dominant paradigm is powerful and unambiguous. Picking up the gauntlet, several more-conservative archeologists visited the Brazilian site and penned a blistering critique in Antiquity. (Ref. 1) Their major contention was that the 500+ supposedly human-made stone "artifacts" collected by Guidon's team are actually "geofacts"; that is, they were chipped and flaked naturally as rocks fell one upon the other from nearby cliffs. We discussed this problem in some detail in SF#105. Several other reservations about the Pedra Furada work are also offered in Ref. 1. The reaction of Guidon et al to the Antiquity paper was thunderous to say the least. It revealed the depth of the chasm separating archeologists on the date of human occupation of the New World as well as internecine politics in archeology. (Ref. 2) Guidon et al flung two serious charges at the authors of the first Antiquity paper: (1 ) They had their facts all wrong; and (2 ) Their objectivity was distorted by their loyalty to the aforestated paradigm. Not withholding any punches, ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 109: Jan-Feb 1997 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Greenwich Late Time When J. Brink recently visited the Old Greenwich Observatory, in England, he saw a flag hanging on the building giving the longitude of the site, which by definition is 0 0' 0". The flag also announced that: "The Next Millennium Starts Here." Why is this in error? Answer below. (Brink, Johan; "Greenwich Late Time," New Scientist, p. 59, October 19, 1996) LONGITUDE FAUX PAS The next millennium (the year 2001 or 2000, depending upon your mind-set) really begins where all days begin: at the International Date Line, ... 180 . From Science Frontiers #109, JAN-FEB 1997 . 1997-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... ,000 and 176,000 years BP for artifacts found at the Jinmium site in Australia's Northern Territory are being subjected to extreme scrutiny. Thermoluminescence (TL) dating was used in estimating these dates, but TL-dating is in its infancy and full of pitfalls. Geochronologist R. Roberts has looked at the Jinmium data and ventures that the artifacts may be only 10,000 years old. However, he approves of TL dates of 50,000-60,000 years for two rock shelters elsewhere in the Northern Territory. (Gibbons, Ann; "Doubts over Spectacular Dates," Science, 278:219, 1997.) Triangular holes in boulders (SF#113). These puzzling holes may actually be left behind when tourmaline crystals are weathered out of the ... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 115: Jan-Feb 1998 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Addenda And Emenda Circles of contention (SF#110). As pre-dicted, the well-publicized dates of 116,000 and 176,000 years BP for artifacts found at the Jinmium site in Australia's Northern Territory are being subjected to extreme scrutiny. Thermoluminescence (TL) dating was used in estimating these dates, but TL-dating is in its infancy and full of pitfalls. Geochronologist R. Roberts has looked at the Jinmium data and ventures that the artifacts may be only 10,000 years old. However, he approves of TL dates of 50,000-60,000 years for two rock shelters ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 118: Jul-Aug 1998 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Astounding Undersea Structure Near Okinawa "A structure thought to be the world's oldest building, nearly twice the age of the great pyramids of Egypt, has been discovered. The rectangular stone ziggurat under the sea off the coast of Japan could be the first evidence of a previously unknown Stone Age civilization, say archeologists." Wow! Is this true? This so-called "structure" is 600 feet long and 90 feet high. Said to be about 10,000 years old, it obviously predates the edifices of the ancient Egyptians and Babylonians. The "structure" is now under about 75 feet of ocean near a small island named Yonaguni southwest of Okinawa. During the Ice Ages, it would have been exposed, just like the Bering Land Bridge to the north. Of course, the crucial question is: Is it really artificial? R. Schoch, the Boston University geologist who vouches that the Sphinx is also about 10,000 years old (SF#79), described the "structure" as a series of huge steps about 1 meter high. Schoch is impressed by the regularity of the steps, but does not discount a natural origin. A photo taken by divers does reveal a remarkably regular, stepped surface, but nature can be very methodical on occasion. Adding to the artificiality of the "structure" is the claim that a "road" encloses it. (Barot, Trushar; ...
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... Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects A Bright Flying Object And Another Enigmatic Crater The curious event described in the following abstract is eerily like the fireball and suspicious "crater" mentioned in SF#110. In that incident, which occurred November 22, 1996, near the HondurasGuatemala border, there was also a detonation. "On the early morning of 1994 January 18, a very bright luminous object crossed the sky of Santiago de Compostela, Spain. From visual sightings, it is concluded that the object wasn't a meteoric fireball (bolide). A surface "crater" in Cando (close to Santiago) with dimensions 29 x 13 m and 1.5 m deep was later discovered within 1 km of the projected "impact" point of the luminous object. At this site, in addition to the topsoil, full-grown pine trees greater than 20 m high were thrown downhill over a nearby road, leaving the downslope edge of the "crater" untouched and with a steep interior wall (this would not be the case if a regular landslide were responsible for the transport). Standing trees below the "crater" showed embedded soil and plant residues up to heights greater than 3 m. No strange materials (meteorites or artifacts) were recovered in or close to the "crater"; all materials belonged to the site and were not shocked; thus an impact is very improbable. "A possible explanation capable of reconciling all of the observations is presented. It hypothesizes an eruption of earth gases to create the crater, with the rising gas plume then ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 112: Jul-Aug 1997 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects We've Known It All Along!An archeologist really risks his or her reputation if he or she suggests that the Americas were peopled before 12,000 years ago. At least that's the way it was until early 1997, when a select "jury" of a dozen skeptical archeologists visited the Monte Verde site in southern Chile. There, T. Dillehay, made his case for a culture that preceded North America's Clovis culture by at least 1,000 years. Monte Verde artifacts go back at least to 12,500 years before the present. The Monte Verde tour, backed by two very detailed reports, convinced some of the most obstinate skeptics. The "jury" was "in," and the Clovis culture was "out," at least as being the first New World culture. Naturally, some still-skeptical archeologists bristled at the suggestion that a "jury" could decide for them. [But isn't that the way science always works?] Regardless, the once formidable 12,000year barrier now seems to have been officially breached. The Monte Verde dates imply either: The Bering land bridge, thousands of miles to the north, was crossed a few millennia before 12,500 BP, or The Monte Verde people arrived by some other route, perhaps by ship! (Wilford, John Noble; "Human Presence in Americas Is Pushed Back a Millennium, ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 118: Jul-Aug 1998 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects More Bones That Don't Belong More anomalous than Kennewick Man (that 9,300-year-old skeleton from Washington with Caucasian features (SF#109), is a skull from Brazil dubbed Luzia. Luzia was a female, aged 20-25, who lived near Belo Horizonte in southeastern Brazil. Luzia's skull and other artifacts came from a campsite carbon-dated by labs in Brazil and France as being about 11,500 years old. This makes Luzia the oldest skeleton ever found in the Americas -- assuming this whole story hangs together. The 11,500-year date is impressive enough, but anthropologist W. Neves, University of Sao Paulo, asserts that Luzia's skull and teeth are not Mongoloid but really characteristic of the South Sea islanders. Such observations agree with the studies of skeletal material by J. Powell, University of New Mexico. Powell has concluded that the oldest settlers of the New World probably did not trek across the Bering Land Bridge from Asia but came from elsewhere. (Borden, Keefe; "Skull Find Redefines American Ancestry," Austin American Statesman , May 24, 1998. (Cr. D. Phelps) From Science Frontiers #118, JUL-AUG 1998 . 1998-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... really comprised three disparate groups of people: (a ) the Moriori, who were of giant stature and superb gardeners; (b ) the Urukehu, a fair-skinned group known also as Starwalkers for their knowledge of the heavens; and (c ) the Kiritea or Stone People from Asia. Finally, stated sans reference, is the fact that in 1996 rock carvings 14,000 years old were found along a 49-kilometer stretch of the Amazon. (Paterson, Kimberly; "Pushing History Back beyond Our 'Real Time'," Auckland Sunday Star-Times , April 19, 1998. Cr. T. Brown) From Science Frontiers #118, JUL-AUG 1998 . 1998-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Vostok lies under some 4 kilometers of ice, it remains liquid as geothermal heat seeps up through its floor. Surprisingly, the thick ice cover does not preclude all contact with the surface above. The covering ice sheet moves slowly across the lake and, as it does so, its bottom melts a bit, releasing frozen-in oxygen as well as life forms -- still-living microorganisms and dead creatures that fell onto the Antarctic ice thousands of years ago. Thus, there is a perpetual source of food and new life. Cores drilled from the ice sheet capping Lake Vostok have brought up a great diversity of live microbes that have survived despite the low temperatures and passage of time. A living unicellular alga was found 2,375 meters down in ice about 110,000 years old. Spore-forming bacteria brought up from 2,395 meters are about 200,000 years old and still alive! Although science has proclaimed that Lake Vostok biology must consist entirely of microorganisms, no one really knows what is down there. Another fascinating fact is that some 70 other subglacial bodies of fresh water have been found under the central Antarctic ice sheet. Lake Vostok is only part of a "vast hydrological system." (Kapitsa, A.P .; "A Large Deep Freshwater Lake beneath the Ice of Central East Antarctica," Nature, 381:684, 1996. Monastersky, R.; "Giant Lake Hides beneath Antarctica's Ice," Science News, 149:407, 1996) Comment. Antarctica's "vast hydrological system" could ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 110: Mar-Apr 1997 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Sparrows At Play While looking through the ornithological literature for avian anomalies recently, we found an irresistible item that bears on that deeply profound bit on "Crow Woes" appearing in SF#109. Remember how the Yokohama crows placed stones on the train tracks and dropped others on houses? Well, this stone-dropping must have some adaptive value in the evolution of birds, because sparrows have also inherited the trait. E.C . Jaeger recounted this anecdote in a 1951 number of The Condor : "During my high school days at West Point, Nebraska, my father was a merchant occupying a building of two stories with a long pebble-covered, tarred roof sloping to the rear. Forming a short walkway behind the rear entrance were two sloping doors, which, when opened up, admitted entry to the basement stairway. Over a period of several days in mid-May of 1903, I noticed many small pebbles scattered about on these doors. I also heard from time to time the sound of small objects falling on the doors. Efforts to find the pebble-droppers were of no avail until one day when I happened to approach the rear of the building from the alley. My position some fifty feet from the building now permitted me to see several House Sparrows ( Passer domesticus ) bringing small stones to the edge of the roof and dropping them. As each pebble was dropped the bird involved turned its head ...
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... ridiculed 50 years ago, it has been very successful in accounting for many geological phenomena. The theory is rarely challenged these days, but there are anomalies out there. "According to the simple plate-tectonic theory, the age of oceanic lithosphere is zero at a spreading oceanic ridge and increases with distance from the ridge. Thus the lithosphere of the central Atlantic, which current palaeogeographical reconstructions assure us began to open no earlier than 120 million years ago, has zero age at the Mid-Atlantic Ridge and, supposedly an age of about 120 million years close to the land masses of Africa and South America at the appropriate latitude. Yet, Bonatti and others (Nature, v. 380, p. 518, 1996) have now recovered samples of 140-million-year-old pelagic limestones not even from the edges of the Atlantic but right in the middle of the ocean, close to the ridge. How can this be possible?" The only explanation (? ) seems to be that this errant chunk of crust got "trapped" in the middle of the Atlantic -- like a misdirected suitcase on an airport conveyor belt. (Anonymous; "Old Rocks near the MidAtlantic Ridge," Geology Today , 13:17, 1997.) Background. Ocean crust is presently being formed by upwelling molten rock at the Mid-Atlantic Ridge and, consequently, has zero age. The oldest ocean crust is adjacent to the continents. From Science Frontiers #118, JUL-AUG 1998 . 1998-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Their extraordinary hairiness attracted much curiosity, and they were photographed several times. The hairy Burmese are the only example of a fourgeneration pedigree of congenital hypertrichosis lanuginosa, which is consistent with an autosomal dominant mode of inheritance. There is good evidence that, when members of this family were hairy, their dentition was also deficient." (Bondeson, J., and Miles, A.E .W .; "The Hairy Family of Burma: A Four Generation Pedigree of Congenital Hypertrichosis Lanuginosa," Royal Society of Medicine, Journal, 89:403, 1996. Cr. A.C .A . Silk) Reference. Excessively hairy people are cataloged at BHA26 in our Biological Anomalies: Humans I. For additional information on this book, visit here . Hairy 31-year-old Burmese woman with her 14-month-old son, who has long hair growing from his ear. From Science Frontiers #108, NOV-DEC 1996 . 1996-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... . Of the twenty-seven figures, ten are birds, three are whales, and two are seaweed plants. Theodolite measurements revealed a non-random distribution of the directions of lines attached to look-alike figures. The second test showed a physical relationship of present-day Andean plant and animal figures imagined as silhouettes in dark spots along the Milky Way to figure-lines pointing to the rising and/or setting of the same Andean figure 2000 years ago. In the third test, all other lines extending to the desert horizon from a figure center keyed into dark spots and bright stars along the Milky Way at the same Local Sidereal Time in the same year. Finally, the directions of the long axis of each quadrangle related to the same sky in the same year at each site. Linking these findings with what is known about the Nazca culture, an agricultural-ceremonial model is presented describing how this site may have been used." (Pitluga, Phyllis Burton; The Explorer, 12:1 , Summer 1996. The Explorer is a newsletter published by the Society for Scientific Exploration. Address: P.O . Box 5848, Stanford, CA 94309-5848.) Comment. Probably the best-known terrestrial Zodiac is that alleged to be composed of natural and artificial land forms in the vicinity of Glastonbury, England. See also SF#104 for the "Pit Zodiacs" said to be arrayed in the environs of Muggenberg, Netherlands. From Science Frontiers #110, MAR-APR 1997 . 1997-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 116: Mar-Apr 1998 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Target: Greenland Reports of recent large meteors and suspicious craters are plentiful in back issues of this newsletter. (SFs #93, #102, #103, #110, to name a few) Here is another. December 9, 1997, Greenland. At 5:11 A.M ., crews of three trawlers at widely separated sites off south Greenland reported "a blazing fireball that turned night into day." At a distance of 100 kilometers (62 miles), the flash was compared to that from an atmospheric nuclear explosion. Danish officials dismissed the possibility of a surreptitious nuclear test. The U.S . Air Force stated that the object was neither a reentering spacecraft nor artificial space debris. Some seismic tremors also emanated from Greenland, so the impact of a large meteorite is suspected. Based on the visual sightings and a moving object caught on a parkinglot surveillance camera in Nuuk, Greenland's capital, the probable impact point is at 61 25' N., 44 26' W. Efforts to locate the meteorite will have to wait for favorable weather. The supposed meteor was not a small object. The Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen compared it to the Kap York meteor that fell south of Thule, Greenland, in prehistoric times. Pieces of this iron meteorite aggregating 50 tons have been collected. (Sawyer, Kathy; "Fireball a Mystery till Thaw," Charlotte Observer, December ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 117: May-June 1998 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Hard Facts At Cahokia Monk's Mound, the largest mound at the Cahokia Mounds State Historical Site, in Illinois, is not what it seems. Superficially, it is a terraced earthen mound 100 feet high and more than three football fields long. What we now see of the mound was apparently constructed between 900 and 1200 AD. The prevailing dogma has long been that the Indians who built Cahokia worked only with earth, never with stone. Indeed, suitable stone is scarce in the area. On January 24, 1998, while drilling to construct a water drainage system at Monk's Mound, workers hit stone -- at least 32 feet of it -- perhaps a region of cobbles or slabs of rock. This region of stone, of undetermined geometry, is located 40 feet below one of the terrace surfaces, but still well above the base of the mound. The stones could well be an artificial structure of some sort. The discovery challenges the current thinking about the culture that built Cahokia. Only further research will reveal the extent and configuration of the stony region and where the stones may have come from. An editorial in the March 14, 1998, St. Louis Post-Dispatch put the Cahokia discovery in the larger context: New World archeology is in flux. Humans occupied the Americas long before 12,000 BP, and some of them may have been Caucasian (e .g ., ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 109: Jan-Feb 1997 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Too Much Order In The Early Cosmos Astronomers are becoming accustomed to the idea that many nearby galaxies are concentrated in spherical shells separated from one another by about 400 million light years. This onion-skin geometry is inferred from the fact that galactic red shifts cluster around specific values; that is, they are quantized. Since red shifts are held to be proportional to distance in the expanding universe paradigm: Voila! We have shells! This evidence of nearby cosmic order does not seriously disturb cosmologists, because in the nearby galaxies we are seeing that portion of the universe that is billions of years old. In other words, nearby there has been enough time for some degree of order to have evolved out of the primordial chaos of the Big Bang. Now though, "deep" surveys of galaxies, looking much farther back in time, still show clustered red shifts -- not the expected increasing chaos required by theory. Although the surveys are incomplete, astronomers are discomfited by this early lumpiness. Their theories say that there was not enough time for galaxies to organize themselves into sheets, shells, and skeins. If further "deep" probings of the cosmos confirm this redshift clustering, we may need a new evolutionary scenario. Good bye Big Bang and expanding universe! (Vogel, Gretchen; "Goodness, Gracious, Great Walls Afar," Science, 274:343, 1996. Vergano, D.; "New ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 107: Sep-Oct 1996 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Precocious Structure In The Cosmos Allied to the problem of old galaxies in young regions of the cosmos is the appearance of substantial amounts of structure early in the history of the universe. The new Keck 10-meter telescope in Hawaii has revealed giant "walls" of youthful galaxies rather than the more uniform distribution expected right after the Big Bang. There is just too much order much too early. (Glanz, James; "Precocious Structures Found," Science, 272:1590, 1996 From Science Frontiers #107, SEP-OCT 1996 . 1996-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... -- no twin phenomena here. Odds against this synchrony were said to be 50 million to 1. (Anonymous; "3 Sisters Deliver 3 Babies -- All on Same Day," San Francisco Chronicle, March 14, 1998. Cr.J . Covey.) Oliver is all chimp. That aberrant chimp, Oliver, thought by some to be a humanchimpanzee hybrid (SF#110), is 100% chimpanzee say geneticists at the University of Texas. Even so, Oliver always walks erect and can mix drinks! (Holden, Constance; "Oliver no 'Humanzee'," Science, 280:207, 1998.) Phase changes. He was not frightened by a ghost or abducted by aliens, but the hair of a healthy, 45-year-old French farmer turned from black to pure white in less that 14 days. For six months the embarrassed man endured, but then over a period of four months, his hair grew back to full black. (Nelson, Douglas; "Aaaaaargh," New Scientist, p. 93, April 11, 1998.) Mummified llamas yield superior wool. The wool found on a group of mummified llamas that had been sacrificed and buried some 1,000 years ago in Peru had hair far finer than cashmere and far superior to that of modern llamas. The ancient Peruvians apparently knew how to breed their animals to accentuate certain features. Their secret was lost during the Spanish conquest. (Anonymous; "Mummified Llamas Yield Superior Wool," NEARA Transit, 10:6 , Spring 1998 ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 109: Jan-Feb 1997 Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues Last Issue Next Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Contents Archaeology Riddles of the sphinx And they went forth and multiplied Kennewick man: a 9300-ear-old caucasian skeleton in north america? Astronomy Lunar landslide lights Greenwich late time Too much order in the early cosmos Biology Biology lite Biology heavy Geology Wind-driven ice sheets in death valley The nodoroc Geophysics Rogue wave smashes the queen elizabeth ii Unclassified The return of the monolith Indeterminacy in computers ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 119: Sep-Oct 1998 Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues Last Issue Next Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Contents Archaeology Anthropology unbound Basalt synthesis invented over 3,000 years ago! Astronomy The end of the old-model universe Einstein in free fall Biology Murder in the nest The black death and ccr5-delta 32 Mapping with a song Cassowary, 1; automobile, 0 Geology Really ancient oil -- and abundant life Mounds of mystery Geophysics Some green flashes are yellow Auroral maps! Waterfall phenomena Physics Curious effects department ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 120: Nov-Dec 1998 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Pyramid stones not "cementitious"In SF#119, we followed the item on artificial basalt with a comment about J. Davidovits' claim that the stone blocks of the Giza pyramids are actually made from a limey cement and poured on-site. No long-distance hauling and lifting into place required! We have since found (serendipitously) an authoritative refutation of Davidovits' claim. K.D . Ingram et al analyzed stone samples from the Giza pyramids using scanning electron microscopy, electron diffraction by X-rays, powder X-ray diffraction, inductive coupled plasmography, Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy, and other techniques. Their conclusion: ". .. the pyramids are made of limestone and are not cementitious in nature." (Ingram, Kevin D., et al; "The Pyramids -- Cement or Stone?" Journal of Archaeo logical Science, 20:681, 1993.) From Science Frontiers #120, NOV-DEC 1998 . 1998-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 121: Jan-Feb 1999 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects A Continent Lost In The Pacific Ocean Our title is also the English title of a book published recently in Japan. The subtitle quoted below implies that we are not discussing the supposed lost continent of Mu. "Riddle of the Submarine Ruins in the Ryukyu Islands" Rather, the underwater site is that introduced in SF#118 and located southwest of Okinawa. It is hardly the size of a continent. The book's author is Masaaki Kimura, and he has filled his book with stunning underwater photographs and diagrams of this "lost continent." Unfortunately, except for a Contents page, which is in English, the rest of the book is in Japanese. We'll have to settle for the Contents page, which is rather revealing. Human Beings under the Sea The Submarine Ruins Discovered Were the Ryukyu Islands a Continent? Discovery of a Civilization Lost in the Sea An Ancient Civilization in Southernmost Japan A Continent Lost in the Pacific Ocean Submersion of the Land and Tectonics of the Earth Hypotheses for the Land Lost in the Pacific Ocean A Utopia Sunk in the Pacific Ocean Pretty inflammatory stuff, so much so that we must be wary indeed! One of the drawings in our photocopy is good enough to reproduce here. The immediate impression, as with many of the underwater photographs, is that surely this structure is artificial. But we must remember that Nature has her playful moods and has deposited simulacra everywhere, perhaps even ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 121: Jan-Feb 1999 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Problems Of Aboriginal Art In Australia In SF#117, we reproduced some Australian rock art featuring sylph-like, flowing human figures quite unlike today's aborigines. In our more recent library searches, we have come across an old article that provides additional examples of the socalled Bradshaw paintings -- more of those graceful human forms with long, billowing tresses. Very out-ofplace in today's Outback. The same article adds an even more puzzling human representation to the burgeoning file of mysterious Australian art. It is a carving found in a cave of northwestern Australia. Here is the text accompanying the sketch. "Another cave introduced a fresh problem. Fronting it, high up on the vertical face of a cliff, and unreachable without mechanical aid, had been carved out of the solid stone a human head in profile, which I show. It was 2 feet long and 16 inches across, and 1 -inch thick; and I leave my hearers to say whether it is not a striking and distinguished face. It is absolutely different from the heads of modern Aborigines. The worn edges of the cameo, where it joined the rock-surface, seemed to mark a long interval since it was carved; the difficulty of carving it where it stood must have been immense -- unless, indeed, the rock face had been near the ground at the time, and the ground had worn away since - ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 110: Mar-Apr 1997 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects http://www.aros.net/angio/pistuff/piquery At this Web site you can enter your Social Security Number (or telephone number, etc.) and discover if it appears among the first 1.25 million digits of pi. Perhaps when God was designing the Universe and was contemplating what the value of pi should be, he put your number somewhere in this transcendental number! (Anonymous; New Scientist, p. 64, January 4, 1997.) Comment. Of course, pi has as many digits as you care to compute (at least we think it does!) If your number is not among the first 1.25 million digits, it will certainly appear somewhere later. It's just that you are not first in line! From Science Frontiers #110, MAR-APR 1997 . 1997-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 107: Sep-Oct 1996 Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues Last Issue Next Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Contents Archaeology Who built the kaimanawa wall? The irish in iceland Astronomy An old galaxy in a young part of the universe Precocious structure in the cosmos "NOT WITH A BANG BUT A WHIMPER" Biology Organ music High social order in a new order Subversive cancer cells Rock-based life Geology Antarctica's lake vostok revisited Geophysics More sparks on the beach Horizon-to-horizon bioluminescent bubbling band Tear of the gods? Psychology Did mozart use the golden section? The perils of dhmo Ten myths of science ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 111: May-Jun 1997 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Tobacco And Cocaine In Ancient Egypt The current newsletter of the New England Antiquities Research Association has flagged an important anomaly that appeared on a 1997 TV program. "In January [1997] the Discovery Channel broadcast a program stating that cocaine and tobacco had been found in Egyptian mummies known to be at least 3,000 years old. Tests used modern forensic methods and were repeated many times under carefully controlled conditions. Since coca and tobacco are not known to have grown anywhere other than the Americas, the evidence points to trade routes across the Pacific or Atlantic in those remote times. The program seemed to favor a Pacific crossing and then delivery via the Silk Route. Watch for a rebroadcast." This news item continued with a reference to Dr. Balabanov's supporting tests on bodies from China, Germany and Austria, spanning the years 3,700 BC to 1100 AD. These bodies contained incredibly high percentages of nicotine. (Ross, Priscilla; NEARA Transit, 9:5 , Spring 1997.) Comment. In SF#7 /48, back in 1978, we reported that the mummy of Rameses II contained anomalous traces of nicotine. From Science Frontiers #111, MAY-JUN 1997 . 1997-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 113: Sep-Oct 1997 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Can computers have ndes?When HAL, the treacherous computer in the film 2001: A Space Odyssey, was being slowly throttled by the one surviving astronaut, it tried first to negotiate. Then, as board after board of electronic components were disconnected, it burst into the old song A Bicycle Built for Two . It had learned this tune early in its silicon-based life. Surprisingly, real computers can experience similar Near-Death Experiences (NDEs). S.L . Thaler, a physicist at McDonnell Douglas, was studying neural networks designed to mimic the structure and functions of the human brain. Such neural nets can actually learn as programmers train them. As a evening avocation, Thaler devised a program that randomly severed connections in the neural net, in effect destroying the artificial brain bit by bit. When between 10 and 60% of the connections were destroyed, the net spat out only gibberish. Near 90% destruction, though, strange "whimsical" information was produced that was definitely not gibberish. In contrast, untrained neural networks generated only random numbers as they were "put down"! Evidently, HAL's tuneful demise was not so fanciful after all. (Yam, Philip; "Daisy, Daisy," Scientific American, 268:32, May 1993.) Comment. A.C . Clarke, author of 2001, has stated firmly that HAL's name was not chosen ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 113: Sep-Oct 1997 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Earth's Shifting Crust Our title is identical to that of a book published by C.P . Hapgood in 1958. He also wrote The Path of the Pole (1970). Several other authors have also proposed that sudden slippages of the earth's crust caused wild climate fluctuations in the past with devastating biological consequences -- in particular, all those quickfrozen mammoths in Siberia. These poleshift scenarios coming from thinkers swimming far out of the scientific mainstream have been studiously ignored in a "new" and well-publicized pole-shift theory recently appearing in Science. The "new" theory relates to an old (534-millionyears-ago) crustal slippage, whereas Hapgood was talking about a cataclysm within the last 10,000 years or so. Nevertheless, it would have been nice to see Hapgood's earlier work acknowledged. Four features of this "new" proposal make it more palatable than Hapgood's to today's geologists and geophysicists: Two of the "new" authors, J. Kirschvink and D.A . Evans, are at the prestigious California Institute of Technology, while Hapgood was a PhD-less history professor at Keene State College. Status is important when theorizing. Kirschvink et al propose a scientifically acceptable mechanism for the onset of rapid crustal slippage. They visualize a huge chunk of the seafloor suddenly foundering and thereby changing the planet's mass distribution. This imbalance caused ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 115: Jan-Feb 1998 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects The Berkeley Walls Extended For almost two decades, R. Swanson has been searching out the enigmatic stone walls that festoon the Berkeley Hills and beyond, far, it now seems. We first mentioned these walls and provided a photograph back in 1985. (SF#39) Since then, Swanson's labors have received a modicum of public notoriety but hardly a flicker of academic interest. One reason for professional disinterest seems to be that grant money for exploring old walls is nonexistent! To bring new readers of SF up to speed on these perplexing California walls, we quote two paragraphs from a recent article by Swanson. "On the crest of the Berkeley hills there is a long line of large rocks, some are three feet in length, they may weigh a half ton. A century ago they ran for miles on these dry, wind-swept crests then down in a line to what is now the botanical gardens." .. .. . "In the past twelve years, I have visited over forty miles of these stone structures. To call them walls is something of a misnomer. Some do go in a straight line, others twist like a demented snake up a steep hillside, others come in a spiral two hundred feet wide and circle into a boulder with a six-inch knob carved on the top of it. Some are massive, over six feet tall and run for miles." ...
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... of In Situ Methane Quantities in a Large Gas-Hydrate Reservoir," Nature, 385:426, 1997. Also: MacDonald, Ian R.; "Bottom Line for Hydrocarbons," Nature, 385:389, 1997.) Comment. Methane is well-known as a "greenhouse gas." If really large "burps" were released, climatic changes would probably ensue. Unfortunately, gashydrates are rather unstable. What would happen if a large asteroid slammed into the Blake Ridge? Huge quantities of methane would disgorge into the earth's atmosphere. The climate changes might be disastrous for fauna (like the dinosaurs!) and flora. The heavily shaded area of the Blake Ridge (area = 26,000 km2) contains gas-hydrates and free gas. Drill sites 995 and 997 are also indicated. From Science Frontiers #111, MAY-JUN 1997 . 1997-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... , like those on a sailor's biceps, nor are they on parts of the body usually displayed. What is most interesting are their locations; some groups are placed at traditional Chinese acupuncture points. Bolstering this suspicion is the determination from computer tomography (noninvasive imaging) that the Iceman suffered from arthrosis of the lumbar spine. The Iceman's body is punctured at the points usually used by acupuncturists to treat this condition! "These findings raise the possibility that the practice of therapeutically intended acupuncture originated long before the medical tradition of ancient China (approximately 1000 B.C .) and that its geographical origins were Eurasian rather than East-Asian, consistent with far-reaching intercultural contacts of prehistoric mankind." (Dorfer, Leopold, et al; "5200-Year-Old Acupuncture in Central Europe?" Science, 282:242, 1998.) From Science Frontiers #121, JAN-FEB 1999 . 1999-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... .c . and then some!B. Fell and some other epigraphers have claimed that a large corpus of inscriptions found on rock walls and tablets all across North America proves that Europeans frequented this continent long before Columbus, perhaps 1,000 or more years before. Mainstream archeologists and anthropologists vigorously reject such claims. The scratches are merely plowmarks and the tablets are frauds. As customary in these newsletters, there is a "however"! Some even more ancient North American bones are telling an even older tale. Besides Kennewick Man (SF#109), that well-preserved Caucasoid skeleton found recently in Washington state, there are a half dozen or so other well-dated North American skeletons that do not appear to be Asiatic. These skeletons are 8,000 or more years old and resemble those recently discovered in Asia. Collectively, they indicate that early Caucasians were farranging indeed. (Also, the Ainus now living in Japan have some Caucasian features.) It is possible that Caucasians preceded or accompanied Asian peoples across that famous Bering Land Bridge. They may even have helped found some of the Native American populations. (Recall the blue-eyed Mandans?) Despite the political incorrectness of Caucasians in "America B.C ." some scientists seem ready to accept the testimony of the bones, even while rejecting later epigraphic evidence. D. Stanford, at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, muses: "I think we're going to see the whole complexion of North American prehistory change real fast." (Rensberger, Boyce; ...
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... This is not a hoax! Melanoma sniffing. In 1989, the Lancet , a respected British medical journal, published an article relating how a female dog, half border collie, half doberman, sniffed out a spot of melanoma on a woman. In fact, the dog ignored all of the other moles on the woman and even tried to bite off the melanoma. Melanoma is the most dreaded form of skin cancer, so this bizarre report stimulated A. Cognetta, an American dermotologist, to try an experiment. First, another dog, named George, was trained to find tubes containing melanoma samples, which he did correctly 99% of the time. Next, a human with active melanoma was enlisted. Several bandages were placed on the subject's body including one over the melanoma site. Once again, George was almost 100% accurate in his diagnosis. Subsequently, George successfully identified malignancies on other patients. (Walker, Kenneth; "George the Dog Helps Take a Bite out of Skin Cancer," Chicago Sun-Times , September 6, 1998. Cr. J. Cieciel.) Seizure sniffing. An English woman subject to epileptic seizures never goes anywhere without her dog Rupert. Rupert has a nose for the odor that precedes epileptic seizures in humans. He barks about 40 minutes before the actual seizure, giving the woman a chance to get to a safe place. Of course, Rupert barks at other things, too, but his seizure bark is noticeably different. (Walker, Kenneth; "Mutt Gives Epileptic Advance Warning on Seizures," Chicago ...
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... Slabs of this artificial rock -- flat and smooth on one side from the molds -- are abundant. In fact, some 100 cubic meters of the material have been found. (Stone, E.C ., et al; "From Shifting Silt to Solid Stone: The Manufacture of Synthetic Basalt in Ancient Mesopotamia," Science, 280:2091, 1998. Also: Bower, B.; "Ancient Mesopotamians Made Rock from Silt," Science News, 153:407, 1998.) Comments. In the light of the Mesopotamian's success in making artificial stone, perhaps we should reconsider Davidovits' claim that the ancient Egyptians cast some of the blocks they used to build the pyramids. In other words, they, too, made artificial stone at the sites of the pyramids. (SF#34 and SF#54) We can't resist remarking that the first-author's name jibes with the subject at hand. A variety of "nominative determinism"? From Science Frontiers #119, SEP-OCT 1998 . 1998-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Archea collected from a hot vent 3 kilometers deep in the Pacific has been sequenced. Biologists were taken aback. Methanococcus jannaschii , as it has been dubbed, possesses 1738 genes, of which 56% are entirely new to science. Many of these genes do not look anything like those found in the prokaryotes and eukaryotes. In a word, they seem "alien." (Morell, Virginia; "Life's Last Domain," Science, 273:1043, 1996.) How alien? Well, they are so tough that they could have arrived from Mars on a meteorite. Millions of years of residence in a meteorite edging its way toward a rendezvous with earth mean nothing to the Archea. They have even been cultured from the interior of a salt crystal 200 million years old. (Fanale, Fraser; "Martian Substances," Science, 275:321, 1997.) From Science Frontiers #112, JUL-AUG 1997 . 1997-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... water vapor at an altitude of 75 kilometers than well-established theory predicted. That was back in 1991. Now, a second satellite experiment of different design has confirmed the existence of this "excess" water vapor. Most geophysicists are perplexed, to say the least. Not L. Frank, though, because these experiments are in line with his theory that the upper atmosphere is continuously pelted by house-size, fluffy, icy comets -- some 20 each minute. (SF#112) Frank asserts: "When you get that excess of water vapor up there, it just can't come from the Earth. It must come from space." Even so, other geophysicists are reluctant to accept Frank's icy comets -- that would be too much "crow" to eat! One point levied against Frank's icy comets is that they would introduce more than three times the amount of water vapor actually measured. M. Summers, a theoretician at the Naval Research Laboratory, summed up mainstream opinion: "There's definitely something very unusual going on in the mesosphere that we don't understand at all, but I'm not even close to saying this supports the small-comet hypothesis." (Kerr, Richard A.; "Rising Damp from Small Comets?" Science, 277:1033, 1997. Also: Monastersky, R.; "Reservoir of Water Hides High above Earth," Science News, 152:117, 1997.) From Science Frontiers #114, NOV-DEC 1997 . 1997 ...
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... , objective world from a spiritual one. If their intuition is correct, there is the thought that, by breaching this barrier during NDEs, the percipients might transcend our usual confines of time and space. At these moments, "planetary visions" beyond the moment might occur; that is, prophecy! Before chucking this issue of SF, "hard" scientists should recognize that the foregoing surmise can be tested, not as rigorously as measuring the electron's charge, but still a test of sorts. K. Ring has collected testimonies of these so-called "planetary visions" from individuals who had been clinically dead for more than 10 minutes, but who were subsequently revived (obviously!). Typical of Ring's collected testimonies was this from a 17-year-old NDE percipient: "I was informed that mankind was breaking the laws of the universe and as a result of this would suffer. This suffering was not due to the vengeance of an indignant God but rather like the pain one might suffer as a result of...defying the law of gravity. It was to be an inevitable educational cleansing of the earth... "At the end of this general period of transition, mankind was to be "born anew" with a new sense of his [or her] place in the universe." Surveying his collection of like testimony, Ring generalized: "Surprising commonalities in these visions predicted a rising tide of natural, economic, and political crises culminating around 1988. Unless human beings turned toward God, took better care ...
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... area observed a red-andyellow fireball moving east-to-west. The bolide's passing was marked by a loud detonation. From this information, one would bet heavily that this was simply a routine meteor detonation caused by the heat generated during entry into the atmosphere. The next morning, however, people discovered a landslide covering several acres on the slopes of Cerro Negro, a mountain 14 kilometers from San Luis. Did the meteor slam into the mountain overnight? So far, investigators have not been able to decide whether the landslide is just gravity-slumping on the slope or a disturbance created by the night's meteor. One observer believes he can see traces of a crater some 50 meters wide. Experts from the U.S . and Canada plan to examine the site in detail. (Anonymous; "A Hit in Honduras?" Sky and Telescope, 93:12, March 1997.) From Science Frontiers #110, MAR-APR 1997 . 1997-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 111: May-Jun 1997 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Exotic Seismic Signals Not all terrestrial tremors emanate from buckling crust and slipping tectonic plates. The crashing of large waves on a seashore sends "microseisms" to sensitive instruments hundreds of kilometers away. The bubblings of Old Faithful geyser give rise to an enduring and engaging "harmonic tremor." As for the more "exotic" sources of seismic signals, they had an entire session devoted to them at the Fall 1996 meeting of the American Geophysical Union. Here are two of the unusual seismic events presented there. July 10, 1996. Yosemite National Park. "At 6:52 pm PDT Wednesday, July 10, 1996, a large block of granite, with an estimated mass of 80,000 to 184,000 tons, detached from the cliff between Washburn Point and Glacier Point, in Yosemite Valley. The rock mass subsequently launched from the cliff and free-fell ballistically an estimated 550 m before impacting approximately 30 meters from the base of the cliff in the Happy Isles area of the valley floor in Yosemite National Park...This rock fall was well recorded by 3 UC Berkeley (BDSN) and Caltech (TERRAscope) broadband seismographic stations and 15 shortperiod seismographic stations (operated by the USGS in Menlo Park and the University of Nevada, Reno). In fact, it is the largest vertical rock free-fall ever recorded seismically and it registered on seismographs up to 200 km distant." (Uhrhammer, ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 116: Mar-Apr 1998 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Eco-Darwinism: Diffuse Individuals Epigenetic phenomena -- those phenomena beyond the pale of DNA -- are seen in "diffuse individuals" such as fungi, where it is difficult to separate individual units of life. To illustrate, some fungi may be 1,000 years old and extend for 35 acres (15 hectares) and yet possess a single, still unmodified genome. In his review of A. Rayner's new book Degrees of Freedom: Living in Dynamic Boundaries , T. Wakeford writes: "So, like the World Wide Web, a fungal network is decentralized. There is no central region capable of exerting control over the rest of the network. Rayner's own work suggests that the growth patterns of fungal filaments are forged as much by the environment that they encounter as by their genes. He believes that epigenetics, the process whereby opportunities in an organism's surroundings dictate which genes are expressed, is the norm in microorganisms. Genetic determinism is thus turned on its head." (Wakeford, Tom; "We Are the Fungus," New Scientist, p. 49, May 10, 1997.) Comment. Looking at the above situation from an information viewpoint, as one must these days, it seems that the environment can somehow "interpret" genes as the situation demands. In other words, genes are not "single-message" information carriers, but can be " ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 116: Mar-Apr 1998 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Mystery Of The Stoned Pharaoh So reads the caption under the photo of an Egyptian sarcophagus in the French magazine Telerama . The short article accompanying the photograph relates how a respected toxicologist, a Dr. Balanova, has presented "irrefutable" proof that the mummy of the pharaoh Henut Taui contains traces of both cocaine and tobacco. This pronouncement elicited the comment: "Madame Balanova hallucinates!" The reason for such a reaction is not hard to find. The mainstream position has been that cocaine and tobacco are New World substances that were unknown in the Old World until after 1492. A stoned pharaoh implies trans-Atlantic commerce 2,000 years before Columbus. (Merigaud, Bernard; "La Cocaine des Pharaons," Telerama , p. 122, September 3, 1997. Cr. C. Mauge.) Comment. Fragments of tobacco leaves have been discovered in the stomach of the pharaoh Ramses II. (SF#7 ) From Science Frontiers #116, MAR-APR 1998 . 1998-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 117: May-June 1998 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Foo Fighters Recalled U.S . airmen called them "foo fighters." These still-unexplained luminous phenomena seem to have been filed away and forgotten by science. It is not that good evidence is lacking. Perhaps the foo fighters cannot be encompassed by recognized laws of physics! We last reported on them in 1992 (SF#83), when some old Air Force records turned up. We now re-resurrect the foo fighters with an Associated Press Bulletin from 1945. "AMERICAN NIGHT FIGHTER BASE. France, Jan. 1. -- The Germans have thrown something new into the night skies over Germany -- the weird, mysterious "foo-fighter," balls of fire that race alongside the wings of American Beaufighters flying intruder missions over the Reich. "American pilots have been encountering the eerie "foo-fighter" for more than a month in their night flights. No one apparently knows what this sky weapon is. "The balls of fire appear suddenly and accompany the planes for miles. They appear to be radio-controlled from the ground and keep up with planes flying 300 miles an hour, official intelligence reports reveal. "There are three kinds of these lights we call 'foo-fighters,'" Lieut. Donald Meiers of Chicago said. "One is red balls of fire which appear off our wing tips and fly along with us; the second is a vertical row ...
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... So, B. Nodland and J.P . Ralston stirred up a hornets' nest this past spring when they published a paper that began with this paragraph: "Polarized electromagnetic radiation propagating across the Universe has its plane of polarization rotated by the Faraday effect. We report findings of an additional rotation, remaining after Faraday rotation is extracted, which may represent evidence for cosmological anisotropy on a vast scale." (Ref. 1) Most inflammatory was their claim that the plane of polarization of the radio waves rotated more along a particular direction [axis?]; specifically, along a line connecting the constellations Aquila and Sextans. (Ref. 2) Only a few days after the NodlandRalston paper was published, it was blasted in Science. The major complaint was that their data were old and incomplete, since they derived mainly from observations made prior to 1980. (Ref. 3) Indeed, a similar study using more recent measurements but fewer radiation sources seems to refute the NodlandRalston claim of a preferred direction in the cosmos. (Ref. 4) Nodland and Ralston disagree with the charges and the implications of the other study. It will be a while before this is all sorted out. The paradigm that Nodland and Ralston are challenging is deeply entrenched and of great philosophical import. (There's nothing "special" in the cosmos, especially humans!) References Ref. 1. Nodland, Borge, and Ralston, John P.; "Indication of Anisotropy in Electromagnetic Propagation over Cosmological Distances," Physical Review Letters, 78:3043, 1997. ...
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