697 results found.
... 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 Cichlids Punctuate Equilibrium In those pesky cichlid fish of African lakes we may be seeing punctuated evolution during an actual punctuation. Responding to the article in SF#108 on the Lake Victoria cichlids, A. Mebane called our attention to Lake Malawi. While the Lake Victoria cichlids seem to have evolved a profusion of species in a space of about 12,500 years, those cichlids in Lake Malawi may have done the same in only a century or two. T. Goldschmidt advances this evenmore-abbreviated time scale in his book Darwin's Dreampond . In it, he discusses how the water level of Lake Malawi fell more than 120 meters during the 1800s -- an exceptionally dry period in Africa. Today, the Lake is again high and once more host to isolated rocky islands, each with its own unique complement of cichlid fish; each island has species found nowhere else in the lake. Where did all these species come from, considering that their little islands were bone dry just a century ago? Goldschmidt writes: "Cichlids that inhabited these exposed rocks would have suffocated, unless they had already left for wetter climes. Yet today, species that do not exist anywhere else can be found near almost every rocky island. From an orthodox point of view, the most plausible explanation for this is quite surprising: many color forms as well as biological species developed over a period of less than two hundred years." This ...
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... Dec 1987 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Instances Of Observed Speciation Creationists have long maintained that no one has ever observed the creation of a new species in nature. C.A . Callag han has sought to counter this attack on evolution with a paper bearing the above title. Her concluding paragraph is: "I have cited several instances of ob served speciation that can be used as illustrative examples in the classroom. They should also silence at least one common creationist argument against evolution." The paper begins with the well-worn peppered-moth story; but Callaghan quickly dismisses this, as the creationists do, as merely an example of variation within a species. We now quote the lead sentences from her discussions of the next two candidates: "An incipient neospecies of Drosophila may have developed in Theodosius Dobzhansky's laboratory sometime between 1958 and 1963 in a strain of D. paulistorum...." "A probable instance of a naturally emerging plant species was discovered on both sides of Highway 205 at a single locality 25.5 miles south of Burns, Harney County, Oregon...." We have inserted underlining beneath the two words that greatly weaken the paper. In short, the biologists are not really sure that speciation occurred in these two cases. The reasons for doubt are also presented. The paper concludes with a discussion of allopolyploidy in plants, in which the chromosomes of a sterile hybrid are doubled, giving rise to a fertile variety. Allopolyploidy has been observed in primroses, tobacco ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 89: Sep-Oct 1993 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Solar activity, your mother's birth year, and your longevity "According to two scientists who stumbled on a startling statistical association -- though not necessarily a causeeffect relationship -- your life span may depend on the number of sunspots that appeared in the year your mother was born. "They found that if the sun was at a maximum in its 11-year cycle (during which the number of sunspots rises and falls), children of mothers born at that time would die an average of two to three years sooner than if their mothers had been born during the sunspot minimum." Before dismissing this fascinating correlation as "nut science," consider that the study was conducted by two established scientists at Michigan State University, B. Rosenberg and D.A . Juckett. Their report was published in the March 1993 issue of the mainstream journal Radiation Research . Furthermore, in two English studies of longevity. the same periodicity was remarked. Although the population sample in the Michigan State work was small (7552), the phenomenon appears sufficiently robust to admit to the columns of Science Frontiers! (In truth we covet bizarreness as much as robustness!) But what possible causal link might connect one's longevity with one's mother's date of birth? Rosenberg and Juckett point to the fact that when a woman is born all of her eggs are already formed. Later, they will mature and ...
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... 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, N. Guidon and A.-M . Pessis entitled their opening broadside: "Falsehood or Untruth"! They wrote: "The article by Meltzer et al (1994) is based on partial data and false information (highlighted below). Its battery of questions takes us by surprise; none of the three colleagues came up with these questions during the 1993 meeting -- mounted precisely to generate direct dialogue on the peopling of the America. We disagree with their statement, 'the comments on Pedra Furada are not offered lightly' (p . 696) ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 92: Mar-Apr 1994 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Target Earth Let Jupiter take care of itself! What about us -- Terra, the third planet? A February article in Sky and Telescope begins: "Military satellites have been watching huge meteoroids slam into the Earth's atmosphere for nearly two decades." Secret until recently, infrared scanner data from military satellites have detected 136 atmospheric explosions since 1975 with yields of 1 kiloton or more. There may actually have been as many as four times this number, because the satellites are programmed to look for unnatural events, such as nuclear detonations. They often ignore extraterrestrial projectiles. Why aren't earthbound observers aware of all these atmospheric explosions? Because most are infrared events; few emit enough visible light to attract the attention of ground-based observers. However, two of these "secret" meteoric events might explain some Fortean phenomena recorded over the last two centuries. April 15, 1978. Over Indonesia. A military satellite watched a colossal daylight fireball that, for one second only, would have rivaled the sun to anyone watching from the ground below and alert to such phenomena. The TNT yield was estimated at 5 kilotons. August 3, 1963. Between South Africa and Antarctica. A huge airburst equivalent to a 500 kilotons was picked up by a worldwide network of acoustic detectors. The cosmic interloper this time was believed to have been a small asteroid about 20 meters in diameter. (Beatty, J. Kelly ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 123: May-Jun 1999 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Puzzling Shadows August 3, 1997. Dooey, West Donegal, Ireland. The observer, A. Evans, was on a north-south beach. "It was a glorious day with some broken cloud over the land but none out to sea. Over the period between 3.00 and 6.00pm, a total of five jets passed overhead, all leaving vapour trails. Two showed a very interesting phenomenon, because while the vapour trails extended eastwards, the trails were continued westwards in front of the planes as dark lines which stretched all the way to the horizon. It was as if the plane was running on an aerial railway. I think it significant that only two of the planes showed this phenomenon as I suspect it was heightdependent. At this time the sun was high and shining from the south-southwest." J.O . Mattsson, Lund University, surmised that the black streaks in front of aircraft were shadows of the condensation trails behind the two planes. The shadows were cast forward ahead of the planes upon the hazy, though cloudless, atmosphere above the ocean. (Evans, Alun; "Condensation Trail Shadows," Weather, 53:371, 1998.) Comment. Since the sun was high in the sky, it is difficult to visualize how a the vapor-trail shadow could be cast directly ahead of the aircraft. Hummm! We suppose that the vapor trails acted like ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 44: Mar-Apr 1986 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Unidentified Flashing Object May 6, 1984. Equatorial Eastern Atlantic. "Whilst the vessel was approaching the equator, on a course of 023 and at a speed of 10.3 knots, flashing white lights were observed. The sea was rippled, with a low NW'ly swell and the wind light airs. The visibility was good, with the moon in its first quarter. At first it was thought that there were three lights, one being bright and the other two relatively dim, but as the vessel approached it it was decided that there were only two, one bright and one dim. "The radar, a 10-cm S-band Decca, was switched on and a single echo was detected initially at a range of 5 n. mile. By this time the lights had already been observed for halfan-hour, so it was estimated that they had first been observed when they were 10 n. mile distant. The time of the first sighting was 2220 GMT. The target, once detected, gave a very strong echo and gave the impression of being a large target. It was plotted and found to be stationary. The initial course of 023 was altered to 028 in order to enable the vessel to close the passing distance. "Throughout the observations neither light followed any set characteristic. Instead they just flashed at random, but never together. The intensity of the bright light would have ...
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... Project Sourcebook Subjects Do birds use genetic maps during migration?Routes taken by migrating German and Austrian blackcaps en route to Africa. Hybrids bisect these initial paths and would end up in the Alps. Many young birds migrate successfully without help from older birds who have made the trip before. The implication is that migration instructions, perhaps even some sort of map of astronomical or geo graphical references, are somehow written upon the genes inherited from their parents. Just how maps can be coded into gene structure is anyone's guess. (In fact, since the DNA in the genes seems to cody only for protein synthesis, the locations and characters of inheritable maps and other biological instructions are not immediately obvious.) The problem has been exacerbated by recent experiments with German and Austrian blackcaps. These two common European warbler species take different routes to Africa in the winter. The Ger-man blackcaps fly southwest and the Austrian southeast--routes 50 apart. A. Helbig has crossed the German and Austrian blackcaps to see what route(s ) their hybrid offspring would take. Curiously, they favored a route intermediate between those of their parents. The hybrids' route -- bisecting those of the parents' -- would take the hybrids right into the Alps, where survival would be unlikely. (Day, Stephen; "Migrating Birds Use Genetic Maps to Navigate," New Scientist, p. 21, April 21, 1991.) Comment. The puzzle at hand concerns those purported genetic maps. Presumably, the hybridization of the two blackcaps involves the melding to two different ...
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... Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Lightning "attacks" vehicles Sketch of the lightning ground tracks and craters in Shelhamer's parking area. "On Sunday, 17 July, 1988, the usual calm and quiet on the Shelhamer property in rural Hannacroix, New York, was suddenly disrupted by a bright flash and a powerful concussion. The house shook. A picture came off the wall and crashed onto the floor. A contact lens popped out of Mrs Shelhamer's eye. The electric power went out. The kitchen clock froze at 3.30 PM. Mr Shelhamer saw three wisps of smoke rise from his parking area. He noticed a strange smell in the air. A pickup truck, parked near the house, was covered with dirt. Two of its tyres were flat, and the hubcaps were lying on the ground. Strange trenches and tracks had appeared in the surface of the parking area. These trenches led Mr Shelhamer to a hickory tree, about 20m from the house. On it a 10cm scar had appeared, spiralling up the trunk toward the sky. A few minutes earlier it had begun to rain, and all this was the result of the lightning strike. "Perhaps the most extraordinary aspect of this lightning strike was the way the currents flowing from the hickory tree along the surface of the ground apparently leapt out of the ground in places to pass through the automobiles parked in the parking area. Two of the trenches that radiated from the tree ended at an automobile, but reappeared at the opposite side or end ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 52: Jul-Aug 1987 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Dowsing Skeptics Converted A while back, New Scientist ran an article on the "dowsing sense." Two letters prompted by the article were from scientifically trained people who originally were very skeptical about dowsing. The first letter from P.L . Younger, a university hydrogeologist, first mentioned that most dowsers are convinced that they are hunting underground streams of water. In actuality, he says, most underground water flow is intergranular and laminar. There are no underground streams to find! Then, he continued: "Having said all this, while conducting hydrogeological fieldwork in Colorado, I was involved in 'dowsing' the exact location of buried metal pipes using two L-shaped metal rods, which were balanced on the fingers (not clutched at all). Surface and subsurface pipes gave clear deflection of the rods. I was led to conclude that the rods operated as a crude magnetometer." B.W . Skelcher originally did not believe that any variation in the magnetic field or any other natural force would cause a hand-held stick to move. But: "One day, on the undeveloped plot of land adjacent to my abode, I spied a 'nutter' pacing to and fro with hazel in hand. When the fellow assured me that he was seriously checking the site for hidden water mains, power cables, and so on, I expressed my grave doubts. At this he handed me the twigs and ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 51: May-Jun 1987 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects When were the americas peopled?For more than 50 years, archeological dogma has had the first Americans trooping across the Bering Land Bridge about 12,000 years ago -- about 2,000 years before the termination of the Ice Ages. Despite tight discipline among most professional archeologists (jobs and grants go only to approved individuals), a few cracks are beginning to appear. As reported in SF#47, a Brazilian site has now been reliably dated at 32,000 years. If these early Brazilians came over the Bering Land Bridge, they must have left even earlier traces in North America. In fact, there are two hotly debated North American sites that seem to be very much older than the one in Brazil; namely, the Calico site in California; and a spot along the Old Crow River in the Yukon. Thousands of stone artifacts, apparently showing signs of being shaped by humans, have been recovered at Calico over the past two decades. The Calico artifacts are usually contemptuously dismissed as naturally fractured chert flakes. But at the other end of the belief spectrum (Don't laugh, much of science is just as much of a belief system as religion!) are those who see a long human history at Calico. B. Bower writes: "Two periods of human occupation have been dated at Calico. From about 15,000 to 20,000 years ago the area was inhabited by ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 97: Jan-Feb 1995 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Mentally Influencing The Structure Of Water If the presence of water can physiologically affect a human dowser, as claimed in the preceding item, perhaps the physiological state of a human can affect the properties of water. Well, it's worth a try! G. Rein and R. McCraty, of the Institute of HeartMath, first define two physiological states: "We have recently defined two new physiological states in terms of their unique electrophysiological characteristics. These states are generated using specially designed mental and self-management techniques which involve intentionally quieting the mind, shifting one's awareness to the heart area and focussing on positive emotions. Time-domain and frequency spectral analysis of heart rate variability, pulse transit time and respiration were used as electrophysiological measures of these states." Next, the two researchers brought together subjects immersed in one of these states and samples of water: "The present study reports on PK [psychokinetic] effects associated with these intentionality states. ECG monitoring was used to demonstrate when the individuals were in the entrained state. At this point a sample of distilled water in a sealed test tube was presented to the subjects. Five individuals were used in this study...While holding a beaker containing the samples, subjects were asked to focus on the samples and intentionally alter the molecular structure for five minutes. In an adjacent room, control samples were aliquoted from the original stock solution into test tubes. ...
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... other star in the area was large enough to go supernova. But now it seems there was a mistake, and it was Sanduleak -69 202 all along that detonated. (Waldrop, M. Mitchell; "Supernova 1987A: Notes from All Over," Science, 236:522, 1987.) Comment. Naturally all of astronomy heaved a sigh of relief over this. Unfortunately, the relief was short-lived, and a second dose of antacid now seems required! Just a few days after the above, researchers reported in the New York Times some discomforting news: "According to Dr. Robert W. Noyes of Harvard-Smithsonian (Center for Astrophysics), the observations gathered by an extraordinarily sensitive camera show that the bright exploding star, or supernova, is actually two points of light, very close together, one about 10 times brighter than its companion. Since neither was present before the explosion, astronomers assume both arose from the same blast, but how this could happen is a mystery. .. .. . "The supernova and its apparent companion lie in the Greater Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of our Milky Way, at a distance of 150,000 light years from earth. The instrument used by the Harvard-Smithsonian group measured the distance between the two supernova elements as about one-twentieth of an arc second. This is about the separation a human eye would see between the headlights of a car some 6,000 miles away "Dr. Noyes said this distance was equivalent to an actual distance between the two bright objects ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 9: Winter 1979 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Have magnets, will travel Homing pigeons seem to possess at least two direction sensors. Years of experiments with released birds have proved that they use sun compasses on sunny days but have magnetic backups for cloudy days. But how do they sense the earth's magnetic field? Paired-coil tests suggested that the pigeon compass resided in the neck or back of the head. Narrowing the search with sensitive magnetometers and two dozen dissected pigeons, the authors discovered tiny bits of tissue containing magnetite crystals. The same tissues contained yellow crystals likely made by the iron-storage protein ferritin, which was probably used in the biological synthesis of the magnetite. (Walcott, Charles, et al; "Pigeons Have Magnets," Science, 205:1027, 1979) Comment. Many species of mud bacteria also synthesize magnetite for purposes of orientation, indicating that nature or some directive force used the same strategy in two widely separated species. From Science Frontiers #9 , Winter 1979 . 1979-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Is nothing certain anymore?It was discouraging enough to learn that many natural systems, from simple pendulums to our weather, are basically chaotic; that is, tiny changes in the initial conditions upon which predictions are based can lead to highly unpredictable outcomes. Chaotic systems are usually qualitatively predictable but not quantitatively predictable. We have no choice but to live with this chaos; it seems that that's the way the cosmos is constructed! However, it now seems that the situation is even worse than chaotic! Some systems, perhaps most systems, are also indeterminate, meaning that we cannot predict their qualitative behavior either. A simple example is the water swirling down the bathtub drain. This is not only chaotic but it has two qualitative final states: clockwise and counterclockwise. Regardless of which hemisphere you are in, you can change the direction of swirl with negligible effort. Each of the two final states of motion is still quanti tatively unpredictable. Systems that are more complex will possess many different final states, all chaotic. Can nature really be fundamentally chaotic as well as qualitatively uncertain? J.C . Sommerer and E. Ott have mathematically examined a relatively simple system consisting of a single particle moving in a force field, experiencing friction, and being periodically jolted. Besides settling into chaotic motion, this particle may also be forced away to infinity -- two radically different final states. The analysis revealed that for any set of initial conditions leading to the first type of behavior, there was an infinite number ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 46: Jul-Aug 1986 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Halley's comet infected by bacteria?" Halley's comet is coated with organic molecules. Two astronomers working with the Anglo-Australian Telescope, David Allen and Dayal Wickramasinghe, have found strong evidence in an infrared spectrum of the comet, taken two weeks ago. The spectrum, spanning the wavelengths 2-4 micrometres, shows a prominent feature centred at 3.4 micrometres which the two astronomers attribute to emission by carbon-hydrogen bonds in a solid." Chandra Wickramasinghe (Dayal's brother) states that the emissivity of Halley's comet matches exactly the emissivity of bacteria as observed in the laboratory. This observation supports the Hoyle-Wickramasinghe suggestion that comets transport life forms around the universe. Of course, more conservative scientists contend that rather complex organic molecules can be synthesized in space abiogenically. These molecules might account for the observations. (Chown, Marcus; "Organics or Organisms in Halley's Nucleus," New Scientist, p. 23, April 17, 1986.) Comment. This article seems to be accompanied by a bit of scientific revisionism. In response to this discovery, one English scientist remarked that these results, ". .. only confirm what everyone has always suspected." Now, it is true that comets have long been termed "dirty snowballs" but until very recently no one has maintained that comets are covered with dark, organic sludge. Reference. In category ...
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... . North Atlantic. Aboard the Queen Elizabeth II enroute from Cherbourg to New York. During this crossing of the Atlantic, the Queen Elizabeth II had to change course to avoid Hurricane Luis. Despite this precaution, the vessel encountered seas of 18 meters with occasional higher crests. At 0400 the Grand Lounge windows, 22 meters above the water, stove in. But this was only a precursor. "At 0410 the rogue wave was sighted right ahead, looming out of the darkness from 220 , it looked as though the ship was heading straight for the white cliffs of Dover. The wave seemed to take ages to arrive but it was probably less than a minute before it broke with tremendous force over the bow. An incredible shudder went through the ship, followed a few minutes later by two smaller shudders. There seemed to be two waves in succession as the ship fell into the 'hole' behind the first one. The second wave of 28-29 m (period 13 seconds), whilst breaking, crashed over the foredeck, carrying away the forward whistle mast. .. .. . "Captain Warwick admits that sometimes it can be difficult to gauge the height of a wave, but in this case the crest was more or less level with the line of sight for those on the bridge, about 29 m above the surface; additionally, the officers on the bridge confirmed that it was definitely not a swell wave. The presence of extreme waves was also recorded by Canadian weather buoys moored in the area, and the maximum measured height from buoy 44141 was ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 75: May-Jun 1991 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Of iron whiskers and particles that increase mass with age!Two pillars of the Big Bang hypothesis are: (1 ) Redshifts of galaxies support the notion of an expanding universe; and (2 ) The background microwave radiation can be interpreted as the dying embers of the Big Bang itself. Proponents of the Big Bang feel secure atop these pillars. But should they? A few Big-Bang skeptics, who have survived considerable establishment pressure, see growing cracks in those pillars. J. Narlikar identified two such cracks and, best of all, offered exciting remedies: (1 ) The redshift relationship, which works well with galaxies, falls apart when applied to quasars (see graphs); and (2 ) The background microwave radiation is much too smooth to come from the lumpy universe we observe. Narlikar opines as follows: Plot of red shift versus galaxy faintness supports the proposition that red shift is proportional to distance The same plot for quasars produces a scatter of points, suggesting that here red shifts have nothing to do with distance. "Given these problems, it is not a sound strategy to put all of our cosmic eggs in one big-bang basket. Rather, we should explore other possibilities. Thirty years ago, there was a more open debate on alternative theories, which made valuable contributions to our undersanding of cosmology. For a healthy growth of the subject, the big bang hypothesis needs competition from other ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 27: May-Jun 1983 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects An Earthen Stonehenge The six concentric octagonal (or circular) ridges at Poverty Point, Louisiana, are interupted by four avenues, as shown in the illustration. Other avenues may have existed to the east, assuming the ridges actually continued to complete the figure. K. Brecher and W.G . Haag have contended in earlier papers that two of the existing four avenues were solstice markers. R.D . Purrington, in the first of a pair of papers in American Antiquity, maintains that the Poverty Point ridges have been so badly eroded over the last 3,000 years that sight lines cannot be determined with any accuracy. In fact, the precise center of the octagonal figure is a matter of judgment. Purrington's reconstruction of sight lines along the avenues, using his assumed center, does not support the idea that the avenues were solstice markers. Brecher and Haag responded in the second paper that their viewing center is 100 meters from Purrington's . With this change. they claim good fits for two of the avenues as solstice markers. One of the two remaining avenues turn out to mark the setting of Canopus, the second brighest star in the sky. Even the unassigned last avenue has astronomical significance; it marks the setting of Gamma Draconis, a second-magnitude star, which the ancients employed as a nocturnal hour hand as it swung around the pole star. (Purrington, Robert D.; ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 92: Mar-Apr 1994 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Chilean Astronomer Reports Unidentified Atmospheric Phenomena F. Noel is an astronomer at the National Astronomical Observatory located on the outskirts of Santiago. He is a veteran of hundreds of nights worth of stellar observations over almost 30 years. In the latest number of the Journal of Sci entific Exploration, he reported some of his more perplexing sightings in the Chilean skies, two of which are related below: "At approximately 22:30 local time on January 17, 1980, I was in front of my home in the eastern suburbs of Santiago de Chile. The sky was cloudless, although there was some smog, especially in the west in the direction of downtown. Sunset had occurred at 20:55 local time. "At that time I observed a point-shaped luminous object at an elevation of about 20 degrees; it was moving at a rather slow angular velocity from southwest to west approximately. No noise was heard and it looked like an artificial satellite, except for the direction of its motion. Its brightness, color and angular velocity reminded me of the old Echo artificial satellite from the 1960s. The object disappeared from sight during the few seconds it took me to call two persons to participate in the observation. It was not apparent how the object had disappeared from view since there were no sources of obscuration evident. Having become puzzled by this observation I continued watching that same region of sky from time to time. "About ...
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... " to one another, and that other animals employ their sense of smell for relaying messages. But most of us do not realize that lowly fireflies congregate to communicate en masse, with untold thousands of individuals cooperating in huge synchronized light displays. In reading some of the descriptions of these great natural phenomena, one recalls the light displays used to communicate with the aliens in the movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind . J. Buck has been studying flashing fireflies for over half a century. In fact, his first review paper was published in 1938. Buck has now brought that paper up to date in the current Quarterly Review of Biology with a 24page contribution. It is difficult to do justice to this impressive work in a newsletter. Our readers will have to be satisfied with a mere two paragraphs, in which Buck summarizes some of the incredible synchronies. "More than three centuries later Porter observed a very different behavior in far southwestern Indiana in which, from the ends of a long row of tall riverbank trees, synchronized flashes '. .. began moving toward each other, met at the middle, crossed and traveled to the ends, as when two pebbles are dropped simultaneously into the ends of a long narrow tank of water...' "In 1961 Adamson described a still different type of display, the first from Africa: 'It is then too that one sees the great belt of light, some ten feet wide, formed by thousands upon thousands of fireflies whose green phosphorescence bridges the shoulder-high grass. The fluorescent band composed of these tiny organisms ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 65: Sep-Oct 1989 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Books About The Crop Circles You know a phenomenon has "made it" when a book is devoted to it. With the English crop circles, we now have two books (bibliographical information below.) We will try to stock at least one of these books, but it will be a few months before can can get them on this side of the Atlantic. Meanwhile, a review of the two books in New Scientist provides some information beyond that already presented in several past issues of SF. First, the crop circles, spanning 5 to 20 meters, are incredibly precise and sharp. Flattened stems on the periphery of a circle almost touch erect, undamaged stems. The so-called satellite circles that sometimes array themselves around the main circles may be connected by a narrow ring, thus: Even more curious, a short radial spur extends outward from some circles, so that from the air the circle resembles a fat tadpole. In his book, G.T . Meaden, the Editor of the Journal of Meteorology, U.K ., presents his theory of how the circles are incised in field crops: "He describes the clues that have enabled him to point to the circles being formed by the impact of a body of fast-spinning air that has been partially ionized. He explains how a columnar atmospheric vortex, with a vertical or inclined axis, provides the channel for the formation of a plasma ...
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... orchid cannot employ photosynthesis. Rather, it grows in conjunction with a fungus that obtains nutrients from surrounding roots. The fungal threads penetrate both roots and orchids. The orchids make ends meet by systematically killing and digesting the nutrient-laden fungal threads. When the orchid flowers, it pushes toward the surface just enough to open some tiny cracks in the earth. In these cracks, still below the surface, appear the tiny burgundy red flowers. These flowers are pollinated by minute flies, but just how the orchid's seeds are dispersed is still a mystery. (Cooke, John; "Hidden Assets," Natural History, 93:75, October 1984.) Bats navigate by somehow constructing an image of the external world from the echoes of their squeaks. Since bats have but two ears, one wonders how they can develop a three-dimensional image from a two-dimensional sensor; ie., two ears give right-and-left information only. The moustache bat makes up for this deficiency by generating echo-locating pulses at three distinct harmonics: 30, 60, and 90 kilohertz. Its external ears are so shaped that each of these three frequencies has a different acoustic axis, giving the bat in effect three separate sets of ears pointing in three different directions. Inside the bat's head, in the inferior colliculus of the brain, are three sepa rate sets of neurons sensitive to the three different frequencies. No one knows how the bat processes such information into a "display" it can use in swooping after insects at night. ( ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 48: Nov-Dec 1986 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Is there life on mars after all?G. Levin and P. Straat, who designed one of the three life-detection experiments on the Mars Viking landers, have always maintained that the positive results obtained with their experiment were unreasonably overruled by the negative data from the other two experiments. At a recent scientific meeting in Washington, they stated: "It is more likely than not that our experiment detected life on Mars." Their research in the decade following the Mars landings has only strengthened their belief. Further, they have demonstrated that one of the other life-detection experiments producing negative results was not sensitive enough to detect low population levels of microorganisms. Realizing that the no-life-on-Mars dogma is well-entrenched, they looked for other kinds of evidence for life. "In support of their claims, the two researchers presented two photographs of a Martian rock taken years apart by a camera on one of the landers. The photographs show greenish patches which had changed over time. Spectral analysis of the photographs compared favorably with the spectra given out by lichen-bearing rocks on Earth, as seen through a replica of the lander's camera." (Anonymous; "Is There Life on Mars After All?" New Scientist, p. 19, July 31, 1986.) From Science Frontiers #48, NOV-DEC 1986 . 1986-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 70: Jul-Aug 1990 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects A RELUCTANT, LONG-OVERDUE PARADIGM SHIFT How many times in SF have you read items about that 12,000-year barrier before which American archeologists would not permit serious consideration of human habitation in the Americas? Well, see SF#65, 59, and 57 for starters. In SF#55, written scarcely two years ago, establishment archeologist P.S . Martin wrote: "If humans lived in the New World more than 12,000 years ago, there'd be no secret about it." But, in late March, 1990, at a conference in Boulder, Colorado, D. Stanford lef off with: "It's time to acknowledge that we do have a pre-Clovis culture in the New World." (Pre-Clovis -before 12,000 years ago.) It's all true! A long-standing consensus has collapsed: the 12,000-year barrier, like the Berlin Wall, has disintegrated. The two most important demolition charges were the widely-accepted dates of 16,000 B.P . from the Meadowcroft Rockshelter, Pennsylvania, and 13,000 B.P . from the Monte Verde site in Chile. The Monte Verde date probably represents an American entry date of at least 20,000 years ago, if one accepts that the first Americans trekked all the way down from the Bering Strait to Chile. Will ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 64: Jul-Aug 1989 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Cold Fusion Update We gingerly approached the topic of cold fusion in SF#63. Sure enough, a lot has happened in the past two months. For one thing, a panel of physicists got together and "voted" down cold fusion almost unanimously. This authoritative declaration seemed to be the beginning of the end for cold fusion - good riddance to those impertinent electrochemists! At the end of May, scientists assembled at Santa Fe for a Workshop on Cold Fusion Phenomena. Most thought this would be the coup de grace for cold fusion. Not so! More and more researchers reported either anomalous heat production or anomalous emission of neutrons from experiments based on the cold fusion results of Pons and Fleischmann at the University of Utah. Curiously, no one seemed able to get heat and neutrons at the same time and in the amounts Pons and Fleischmann had reported. We cannot go into all the experiments here. The upshot seems to be that cold fusion is not dead at all. In fact, a lot of people now believe that cold fusion actually does take place in palladium and titanium electrodes. Why, no one is sure. Nor is anyone able to explain the anomalous heat generation. Some think that two separate and distinct phenomena are being observed. One unbelievable anomaly has fissioned into two more-believable anomalies! Tune in next issue for the latest. Con't believe anything until things cool down a bit. ( ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 65: Sep-Oct 1989 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects How fares benveniste?J. Benveniste is in the news again! The July 20 issue of Nature has a news item entitled emphatically "INSERM Closes the File." (INSERM is the French institute of health and medical research.) Two INSERM committees recommended that Benveniste cease his work on high dilutions; work that seems to support the principles of homeopathy. The directory-general of INSERM, P. Lazar, however, did not endorse these recommendations. Benveniste was asked to look for errors in his experiments that might account for his "unusual results." Without question Benveniste is under the gun and future funding in jeopady. (Coles, Peter; "INSERM Closes the File," Nature, 340:178, 1989.) The headline in Science's news item was less emphatic: "Benveniste Criticism Is Diluted." Here, Lazar is reported as saying that he did not want to stifle research on new ideas and that Benveniste had been treated badly by Nature. Benveniste has not remained silent. In Le Monde , he stated that the results he had published in Nature have now been confirmed by two French teams, two American teams, and one in the USSR. (Dickson, David; "Benveniste Criticism Is Diluted," Science, 245:248, 1989.) From Science Frontiers #65, SEP-OCT 1989 . 1989-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... of an extraterrestrial impact -- meteorite or comet. The iridium leads to the heart of the LDG problem: Where did this immense amount of widely dispersed glass shards come from? Was it really created during the searing, sand-melting impact of a cosmic projectile? This is how today's catastrophists would have it? At least three "minor" problems bedevil the accepted impact theory. The surface of the Great Sand Sea shows no sign of a giant crater. Neither do microwave probes deep into the sand by satellite radar. LDG seems too pure to be derived from a messy cosmic collision. Known impact craters, such as that at Wabar in Saudi Arabia, are littered with bits of iron and other meteorite debris. Not so at the LDG sites. LDG is concentrated in two areas. One is oval-shaped; the other is a circular ring 6 kilometers wide and 21 kilometers in diameter. The ring's wide center is devoid of LDG. Could there have been a "soft" projectile impact; that is the detonation of a meteorite, perhaps 30 meters in diameter, 10 kilometers or so above the Great Sand Sea? The searing blast of hot air might have melted the sand beneath. Such a craterless impact is thought to have occurred in the 1908 Tunguska Event in Siberia. Another theory has a meteorite glancing off the desert surface leaving a glassy crust and a shallow crater that was soon filled in. But there are two known areas of LDG. Were there two cosmic projectiles in tandem? As of 1999, the origin of the beautiful ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 106: Jul-Aug 1996 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Does the human brain compute, or does it do more?Of course, the human brain can add and subtract, but does it perform all of its functions by manipulating 1s and 0s, as a PC does? The recent confrontation between G.K . Kasparov, boasting two hemispheres of gray matter, and IBM's Deep Blue chess-playing computer, with its boards of silicon chips, suggests that the human brain may do things somewhat differently. Consider that in the 3 minutes allotted for each move, Deep Blue could evaluate 20 billion moves. This means that it could examine every possible move and countermove for twelve sequences ahead and, in addition, selected lines of attack for 30 sequences. Kasparov was obviously doing no such computation. Yet, he won two, drew two, and lost only one game. IBM's A.J . Hoane, Jr., remarked that chess geniuses like Kasparov "are doing some mysterious computation we can't figure out." Hoane's use of the words "mysterious computation" tells us that he is a reductionist. The implication is that everything mental can be reduced to manipulating those 1s and 0s. In reality, Kasparov's brain may have been innovating, working out new strategies, discerning Big Blue's weaknesses. These "higherlevel" functions are needed when the problem (chess) is too complex for a computer to evaluate all ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 89: Sep-Oct 1993 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects In The Dark About Dark Matter During our last two-month collecting cycle, four "dark matter" items worth mentioning turned up. A wider search undoubtedly would have netted many more, because dark matter is worrying a lot of astronomers. Observations of visible matter, the only kind we can see directly, suggest that most of the universe is, in fact, composed of dark matter. This conclusion comes mainly from the belief that something unseen (dark matter) is tugging on visible matter, making it do things the laws of motion say it should not do. All visible bodies, therefore, seem to be careening about in a dense cloud of unseen, unknown masses. These might be dark, Jupiter-sized objects, black holes, and/or some exotic forms of matter. We must choose between the reality of dark matter or admit that something is awry with our laws of gravitation and motion when they are applied on a cosmological scale Now, let us examine those four darkmatter items from the recent literature: D. Lin, a University of California astronomer, has shown that the Large Magellanic Cloud that orbits around our own galaxy (the Milky Way) is being torn apart (" cannibalized") by the powerful gravitational pull of a dense cloud of dark matter surrounding the Milky Way. This dismemberment of the Large Magellanic Cloud cannot be explained by the gravitational forces exerted by the stars in our galaxy ...
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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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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 88: Jul-Aug 1993 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Bruised Apples A serious problem has cropped up in supermarkets, where fresh, ripe apples are piled up high in beckoning pyramids. Surely, as the heights of the pyramids increase, the bottom-most apples will be crushed, particularly those in the center under the apexes. Common sense tells us that crushing forces will be greatest at Position #4 in the illustration. But grocers need not be concerned about Apple #4 . Two Czech researchers, J. Schmid and J. Novosad, using pressure sensors, found that in a horizontal plane through a stacked pyramid the maximum pressure actually occurs in a ring of objects (apples) some distance from the pyramid's vertical axis. How come? (Watson, A.; "The Perplexing Puzzle Posed by a Pile of Apples," New Scientist, p. 19, December 14, 1991.) A theoretical analysis of the problem by J. Grindlay doesn't help much. He analyzed a two-dimensional pile of disks, as shown, and calculated that maximum bruising forces should occur at the outermost disks instead of at the center, (Grindlay, J.; "Bruised Apples," American Journal of Physics, 61:469, 1993.) Comment. Thus, common-sense expectations, experimental measurements, and theoretical calculations lead to three different results. Much more work needs to be done here. From Science Frontiers #88, JUL ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 98: Mar-Apr 1995 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Emf fertilizer?In 1986, the U.S . Navy began operating a 90-kilometer-long radio antenna stretching pole-to-pole through a Michigan forest. Broadcasting at only 76 hertz, this long antenna can communicate effectively with submerged submarines. Although the antenna produces electromagnetic fields about the same as those from a large household appliance, some of the trees adjacent to the antenna have enjoyed an unexpected spurt in growth, according to D. Reed and G. Mroz of the Michigan Technological University. "The researchers have been gathering data on the growth of trees since 1985, making measurements at two sites, one near the antenna and the other 50 kilometers away. The results seem to suggest that the electromagnetic field has a subtle influence on the forest. They found that two species of trees, northern red oak and paper birch, do not seem to be influenced by the antenna at all. But red pines near the antenna grew taller than red pines at the distant site, while aspen and red maple grew thicker than their counterparts further off." (Kiernan, Vincent; "Forest Grows Tall on Radio Waves," New Scientist, p. 5, January 14, 1995) Trees are not the only plants affected. Algae in the upper Ford River, where the field is only 10% as strong as that near the antenna, increased chlorophyll production sharply after the antenna started operation. The cause ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 71: Sep-Oct 1990 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects The bombardier beetle pulse-jet Creationists have long pointed to the bombardier beetle's jet-like defensive spray mechanism as a device that could not have evolved in many small steps. It must be complete and perfect to work at all. New high-speed photos and related research demonstrate that: "The ejection system of the beetle shows basic similarity to the pulse jet propulsion mechanism of the German V-1 'buzz' bomb of World War II." What the beetle has "evolved" is an intermittent explosive process that fires about 500 pulses per second. The explosive energy comes from the mixing of two separate fluids (hydroquinones and hydrogen peroxide with oxidative enzymes). (Dean, Jeffrey, et al; "Defensive Spray of the Bombardier Beetle: A Biological Pulse Jet," Science, 248:1219, 1990.) Comment. The fundamental question is, of course, how can many, small, random mutations contribute to the development of the mechanisms of the pulse jet, its two fuels, the pumps, the fuel reservoirs, the control system, etc., when only the complete, perfected system has survival value. Although creationists argue that the theories of evolution and natural section are unconvincing here; it is still possible that atheistic factors still beyond our ken are operating, and that what we really need is a better theory of evolution. From Science Frontiers #71, SEP-OCT ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 89: Sep-Oct 1993 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Homo erectus never existed!( Left) Homo erectus skull. (Right) Homo sapiens skull. Are these markedly different skulls representative of two different species or merely variants of the same species? The record of human evolution is littered with skeletons -- not only the legitimate bones of early hominids but also with discarded evolutionary charts and discredited taxons. A taxon is a welldefined biological classification, such as a phylum or species. We modern humans are given the label Homo sapiens. We are told with great assurance that we evolved from earlier hominids, such as Homo erectus and, perhaps, Homo nean derthalis. Homo erectus has long been a key feature of all those charts of human evolution decorating our textbooks. But this venerable taxon is getting fuzzier and fuzzier. "Reappraisal by Cornell University paleontologists of a 200,000-year-old skull from India's Narmada River suggests that the fossil was probably a Home sapiens -- not a Homo erectus -- and marks another spot of the globe where humans may have evolved. .. .. . "The reappraisal of Narmada Man preceded the recently announced discovery of two Middle Pleistocene fossils from Yunxian, China, that seem to share the traits of Homo erectus and Homo sapiens. Kennedy would like to bury the taxon Homo erectus altogether, "Those who would like to keep the taxon see a 200,000year-old Narmada Man as a last gasp for Homo ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 35: Sep-Oct 1984 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Mind Before Life For some years S.W . Fox, at the Institute for Molecular and Cellular Evolution, University of Miami, has been experimenting with possible precursors of life. So-called "microspheres" are hot items in Coral Gables these days. Fox and his colleagues make microspheres by preparing a heated stew of various amino acids. These amino acids form long polymer chains spontaneously. Then, when water is added and the mixture reheated (or processed in some other way), the polymers organize themselves, again spontaneously, into spheres a few microns in diameter. Each sphere consists of a two-layer membrane with residual material trapped inside. Although thicker, the microsphere membrane is very similar to the lipid bi-layer enclosing normal living cells. The relatively stable microspheres could, in theory, have formed sheltered environments for the evolution of the more complicated parts of living cells. The microspheres absorb sunlight and, with the addition of this energy, display some of the electrical characteristics of biological neurons, like those in the brain. The implication is that some components of "mind" may have existed in the very earliest life forms. (Peterson, Ivars; "Microsphere Excitement," Science News, 125:408, 1984.) Comment. Two comments here: First, the word "spontaneous" is customarily employed when describing how atoms unite to form molecules and molecules combine into polymers, which then gather ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 88: Jul-Aug 1993 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Seashore Seiches At many spots around the world, sealevel rises and falls with periods of only a few minutes -- much shorter than the common semidiurnal tides and much longer than wind-generated waves. These oscillations of the water surface are termed "seiches." Two fundamentally different kinds of seiches have been noted in the recent literature. The first variety is transitory and can be set into motion by weather disturbances and earthquakes. The second is permanent and a bit more mysterious. Let's take transitory seiches first September 17, 1992. Anglesey, England. At about 0700 in the morning: "I was on the beach at Trearddur on western Anglesey, when an acquaintance drove down the beach towing a fishing boat. He launched the boat in about six inches of water and we then engaged in conversation for a couple of minutes. Turning to the boat, we were amazed to find that it was high and dry about 20 metres from the water's edge. Small flatfish, mainly immature brill, could be seen stranded and flapping in the wet sand. About a minute later, the sea started to return and quickly rose up the beach beyond where the boat had originally been launched. An hour later, the oscillation in sea level was still taking place. I determined that the period was just over three minutes and the amplitude just under one metre, the latter measured with reference to a half-submerged ...
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... formed. Although the Clovis Police do not carry guns, they will make sure that all who stray from the archeological mainstream will be held up for censure. (Does this mean denial of funds and access to some journals?) The "law" that the Clovis Police will enforce says that humans did not enter the New World before 12,000 BP -- the oldest date of the artifacts attributed to the Clovis people. Perhaps we have dwelt on this subject too long, but the whole idea of the Clovis Police is counter to the spirit of science. The members of the Clovis squad and their objectives can be found in a recent issue of Science. (Marshall, Eliot; "Clovis Counterrevolution," Science, 249:738, 1990.) Somehow, the following two important articles escaped the Clovis Police. Meadowcroft Rockshelter, Pennsylvania. Responding to mainstream criticism of Meadowcroft radiocarbon dates (Some people just refuse to believe them!), J.M . Adovasio et al report that they now have 50 internally consistent dates, some made using accelerator mass spectrometry, that place humans at Meadowcroft at least 14,000-14,500 years ago. (Adovasio, J.M ., et al; "The Meadowcroft Rockshelter Radiocarbon Chronology 1975-1990," American Antiquity, 55:348, 1990.) Monte Verde, Chile. Another recent issue of Science reviews the first of two volumes on the Monte Verde site. This volume deals with the site itself. The artifacts themselves are reserved for Vol. 2. The reviewer states: " ...
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... CAROLINAS?The Carolina Bays get scant notice in the literature these days, but E.R . Randall has rescued them this undeserved obscurity. "For years, people living along the Carolina coast have marveled at a series of strange, oval-shaped depressions in the ground called 'Carolina Bays.' "From the air these shallow, marshy bogs created a landscape that resembles the pockmarked surface of the moon. They crisscross each other in a chaotic tapestry, but at ground level are hardly noticeable because of thick forests and semitropical swamplands. "Highways and modern housing developments have all but obliterated thousands of the bays, leaving them visible only to trained eyes. "Still, it is estimated that no fewer than 300,000 such bays, ranging from a few feet across to almost two miles in diameter, dot the East Coast landscape from southern New Jersey to northeastern Florida. One source places the number at more than half a million." Map showing areas of abundant Carolina Bays and frequent meterorite finds. However, meteorites are rare in the areas of the bays. Floyd continues with a brief history of the Carolina Bay region and then reviews some of the theories of origin that have been proposed. Two now-discarded mechanisms of formation invoked: (1 ) immense schools of spawning fish; and (2 ) icebergs stranded as the Ice Ages waned. In presenting today's favorite theory, Floyd quotes from H. Savage's book The Mysterious Carolina Bays : "' These half-million shallow craters represent the visible scars of but a small fraction of ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 89: Sep-Oct 1993 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Electric Fish Not Backward In Data Processing The incredible sophistication of the brain and nervous system of fish using active electric sensing is evident in the South American fish Eigenmannia . This fish (different from the knife fish above) emits electric pulses at frequencies betwen 250 and 600 per second for electrolocation and communication. M. Kawasaki, at the University of Virginia, has investigated what happens when two of these fish operating on similar frequencies meet. Ordinarily, the fish would jam each other's sensory apparatus and "blind" each other. To circumvent this Eigenmannia has evolved a "jamming avoidance response," in which they both shift their pulse frequencies away from each other. To accomplish this, the fish must be able to detect time disparities between the two sets of signals less than 1 microsecond long. Their individual electroreceptors are not capable of handling such small time differences. Kawasaki has concluded that the jamming avoidance response can come only from highly sophisticated signal processing in the fish's central nervous system. (Kawasaki, Masashi; "Temporal Hyperacuity in the Gymnotiform Electric Fish Eigenmannia ," American Zoologist , 33:86, 1993.) Comment. Echo-locating bats and dolphins also possess sophisticated data processing apparatus for analyzing the echos they receive back from their prey and surroundings. It will be interesting to discover if evolution has come up with similar organic "components" for handling acoustic and electric signals. Further, we know ...
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... attention in SF. We now address these complaints with a case of adequate strangeness. T.M . Olsen has investigated a bizarre observation from Kentucky. The date was September 28, 1996. "Vance C. Johns, a secondary-school horticulturist, lives a rural area east of Louisville. Sometime between midnight and 1:30 AM, he got up to use the bathroom and saw a strange object outside his bedroom window. His wife, Florence, keeps the drapes open on the center of three picture windows, and he immediately opened the other drapes for a better look. The open view through the windows, which face south, is of a grass lawn sloping to a curved driveway. This 0.8 -hectare cleared area is devoid of trees and other objects. Two large, automatic floodlights illuminate the ground around the entire house, and under a full moon, it was bright enough to read a book. The night was clear and about 10 C with no noticeable wind. No aircraft were in the area. "At a distance of 14 m (measured after the incident) from his vantage at the bedroom window, there appeared on the lawn an object resembling a common railroad cross tie but oriented in a vertical position, with one end on the ground. It was matte black, 2 1/2 - 2 3/4 m high and 30 - 35 cm wide. The sides were smooth with a well-defined corner joining the west and north sides. The view of the top showed the west and north top edges were also ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 9: Winter 1979 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Venus and earth: engaged or divorced?Proponents of astronomical catastrophism have made much of the supposed resonance between the earth and Venus, in which Venus rotates exactly four times between the times of its closest approach to earth (inferior conjunction). Astronomers have maintained that the gravitational forces are too slight to force a resonance lock. This has led to speculation that the two planets were once much closer. The most recent measurements of the rotational period of Venus show it to be 243.01 days rather than the 243.16 days for exact resonance. I.I . Shapiro (of MIT) and his colleagues, who made the measurements, wonder whether Venus may be just approaching or just escaping a resonance lock. Whichever the case, the near-resonance is not likely to be a coincidence. (Anonymous; "Venus and Earth: Engaged or Divorced?" Astronomy, 7:58, October 1979.) Comment. If Venus is just escaping resonance lock, how long ago was the lock exact? A few thousand years? And how close were the two planets? Reference. The solar system is full of curious resonances. See ABB4 in our Catalog: The Sun and Solar System Debris. This book is described here . From Science Frontiers #9 , Winter 1979 . 1979-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 9: Winter 1979 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Bermuda Triangle In Orbit Every time the British research satellite Ariel 6 passes over British Columbia and the Caspian Sea, something turns off the high voltage power to two of its experiments, leaving a third power supply unaffected. Even more eerie is the discovery that the sun must be shining on the ground for the phenomenon to occur. The radio commands controlling the switching are coded on a 5 kHz subcarrier superimposed on a l48.25 MHz carrier. The frequencies and coding are so highly specific that it is hard to imagine how the spurious commands arise. Also peculiar is the finding that the undesired switching can be prevented by simply beaming the pure carrier at the satellite just before it enters the two mystery zones. (Schwartz, Joe; "Mystery Beams Affect UK Satellite," Nature, 280:25, 1979.) Comment. This is only the latest in a long series of mysterious spacecraft electronic problems. From Science Frontiers #9 , Winter 1979 . 1979-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 76: Jul-Aug 1991 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects New Insights As To The Structure Of Matter Possible "nuclear-molecular" forms of magnesium-24 and carbon-12. Inside the atom. Physicists have long visualized the atomic nucleus as being a shell-like arrangement of its constituent protons and neutrons. Tantalizing experiments suggest other wise. Magnes ium-24, for example, may under some circumstances exist as two carbon-12 nuclei in tight orbit, as in the illustra tion. Even more startling is the "sausage" form of magnesium-24, in which six helium-4 nuclei (alpha particles) are lined up in a row. This "hyperdeformed" state has not yet been detected in the lab, but it demonstrates new thinking among the physicists. (Kenward, Michael; "Are Atoms Composed of Molecules?" New Scientist, p. 21, April 6, 1991.) Comment. Evidently we do not know everything about nuclear physics. Beyond the molecule. We are used to seeing atoms and molecules arranging themselves into mathematically regular crystals. Now it appears that particles consisting of thousands of atoms also spontaneously organize themselves. A.S . Edelstein et al find that molybdenum particles assemble themselves in cubes with two prominent edge lengths: 4.8 and 17.5 nanometers. The larger cubes show up in micrographs as 3x3x3 groupings of the smaller cubes. The smaller cubes each contain about 7000 atoms. (Edelstein, A.S ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 42: Nov-Dec 1985 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects The Night Of The Polar Dinosaur Somewhere west of Deadhorse, a small town on Prudhoe Bay in northern Alaska, paleontologists have found the bones of at least three species of dinosaurs. But wait, the latitude there is 70 north today and according to magnetic measurements of the rocks, it was about the same when the dinosaurs met their demise. At these high latitudes the dinosaurs either had to contend with two months of darkness each year or they had to migrate many hundreds of miles over the rough Alaskan landscape. The visions of dinosaurs groping for tons of vegetable food in the polar night is about as incongruous as imagining them trekking down to the Lower 481 Scientists are now maintaining that these dinosaurs did prosper on the shore of the Arctic Ocean, even in the dark, because the climate then was semitropical or temperate. This was because the earth's climate was more equable or uniform. They are, however, surprised by the lack of mineral deposition in the dinosaur bones, which look rather "mode m". (Anderson, Ian; "Alaskan Dinosaurs Confound Catastrophe Theorists, " New Scientist, p. 18, August 22, 1985. ) (The apparent survival of dinosaurs during two months of darkness is being used as an argument against asteroidal catastrophism, which it is claimed wiped out the dinosaurs with a long-lived dust cloud that blocked the sun. WRC) From Science Frontiers #42, NOV- ...
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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. 122: Mar-Apr 1999 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects A Genetic Disconnect Bandings on chromosome 9 from humans (H ), chimpanzees (C ), gorillas (G ), orang-utans (O ) If human and chimpanzee nuclear DNAs differ by only 1.5 %, why are the two species so profoundly different in anatomy and behavior? The obvious external differences are body hair, the use of language, the method of locomotion, and of course culture. Less well known is the fact that humans are more susceptible to diseases like as cancer and AIDS. Apparently, superficial comparisons of DNAs slough over genetic details that result in major differences in the living animals. Some of the genetic differences between humans and chimps seem to belie that miniscule 1.5 % difference everyone bandies about. To illustrate, humans have only 46 chromosomes, while the great apes all have 48. The 1.5 % figure doesn't hint at this significant difference. Next, take a look at chromosome #9 in humans and the great apes. Chromosome bandings are different enough to raise further suspicions about the 1.5 % figure. (Gibbons, Ann; "Which of Our Genes Make Us Human?" Science, 281:1432, 1998.) Comments. It is easy to see how gross comparisons of DNA might miss important details. The popular "DNA-hybridization" method simply mixes together strands of DNA from the two species being compared. These are allowed ...
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... Victorian house with high ceilings, attics and cellars. Our kitchen and living room face roughly S.S .W . In the late afternoon, a very heavy thunderstorm erupted with torrential rain, and thunderclaps and forked lightning occurring not quite, but almost, simultaneously. Towards the end of the storm, about 5.30 P.M ., I was in the kitchen and my mother in the living room, both facing the windows. There was a very loud peal of thunder and a loud crack, rather like the little explosion of a Christmas cracker greatly magnified. I was at the sink, close to the window, on the ledge of which stands an electric Corvette water heater, plugged in but not switched on. Beside me, about four feet from the ground and two feet to the left of me, at the moment of the crack, there appeared for a second or so, electric blue flashes, six to eighteen inches in length coming from a white centre. I felt nothing, but was startled. There was no damage to the water heater or anything else. Just as I exclaimed at the blue flashes, I heard my mother cry out and ran to her in the living room. She was sitting in a chair about ten feet from the window, under which stands the television set, plugged in but not switched on. About eight feet from the floor and four feet in front of the double-glazed window (i .e . between the television and the fireplace, but not quite over or opposite either), appeared an ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 50: Mar-Apr 1987 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Mind-bending the velocity vectors of marine algae From the referenced paper's abstract: "A consciousness experiment in which the Doppler shift of He/Ne laser light was used to describe changes in the velocity and vector of a marine alga, Dunaliella, was reported by Pleass and Dey in 1985. Because the subject of the consciousness experiment is living, we expect strings of baseline velocity and vector data which are, at some level, inextricably time-variant. This complicates the statistical procedures which must be used to analyze the data. "This paper examines the variation in baseline data strings, and describes two alternative statistical procedures which have been used to determine the probability of consciousness effects. Two levels of control are applied, allowing global comparison of frequency distributions of experimental scores with similar distributions derived artificially from baseline data. In both cases the null hypothesis is that there is no psi effect. The data quite strongly suggest the rejection of the null hypothesis, although the distributions of run scores contain several values beyond 3 sigma and are nonnormal. This limits the definition of probabilities." (Pleass, C.M ., and Dey, N. Dean; "Finding the Rabbit in the Bush: Statistical Analysis of Consciousness Research Data from the Motile Alga Dunaliella," The Explorer, 3:6 , no. 2, 1986. The Explorer is a publication of the Society for Scientific Exploration.) Comment. ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 78: Nov-Dec 1991 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Fossil Identity Still Up In The Air In 1986, we reported the discovery of bird-like fossils in Texas by S. Chatterjee, a paleontologist at Texas Technical University. Chatterjee was so certain that the fossils (two specimens exist) were primitive birds that he named the species Protoavis texensis (first bird from Texas). During the past five years, the scientific community has chafed while Chatterjee studied his finds and wrote them up. It seems that many paleontologists do not think that Proto-avis is really a bird at all, and Chatter jee has been slow in releasing details. But now his first paper has appeared in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society . Result: Many doubts still remain about the status of Protoavis. A. Feduccia: "Calling this the original bird is irresponsible." (1 ) J.H . Ostrom: "Sad to say, for all its length, little support for the claim is to be found in this paper." (2 ) J. Gauthier: While some of the bones appear bird-like, they also look dinosaurian and could represent a new type of theropod dinosaur. (3 ) For his part, Chjatterjee asserts that Protoavis' skull has 23 features that are fundamentally bird-like, as are the forelimbs, the shoulders, and the hip girdle. "His reconstruction also shows a flexible neck, large brain, binocular vision, and, ...
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