The Most Interesting Science News Articles of the Week

Each week we uncover the most interesting and informative articles from around the world, here are 10 of the coolest stories in Science this week.

How Healthy Is Your Diet? New Urine Test Can Tell: 

You are what you pee, science says. [Full Story]

Baboons Vocalizations Hint at Origins of Human Speech:

Baboons use distinct vowel-like sounds in their calls. [Full Story]

3,400-Year-Old Graveyard with Family Crypts Unearthed in Egypt: 

The ancient Egyptian cemetery contains large crypts holding the remains of complete families and smaller, simpler tombs holding individuals, including children and infants. [Full Story]

Rusty Patched Bumblebee Declared Endangered: 

The rusty patched bumblebee is the first bumblebee species listed as endangered in the United States. [Full Story]

Primordial 'Ice Cream Cone' Creature Finds a Family Tree: 

Weird hyoliths, which survived for 280 million years on Earth, have a new place in the tree of life. [Full Story]

Strong, Flexible Spider Silk Created in Lab: 

A new, strong spider silk was produced in a lab, solving a problem that has long plagued the bioengineered materials. [Full Story'

Tree Man' Has Surgery: What Causes This Rare Condition? 

A 27-year-old in Bangladesh known as the "tree man" recently underwent surgery to remove the extensive, wood-like warts that covered his hands and feet. [Full Report]

Antarctic Science Lab On the Move to Escape Breaking Ice: 

A British scientific base in Antarctica is on the move to a new location, to avoid being cut adrift by a crack in a floating ice shelf. [Full Story]

Sorry, Steak Lovers: Red Meat Linked to Gut Condition: 

Men who regularly eat red meat have a higher risk of a developing an inflammatory bowel condition called diverticulitis than men who don't have much red meat in their diet, a new study finds. [Full Story]

Ultralight 'Super-Material' Is 10 Times Stronger Than Steel: 

A new material is stronger than steel but less dense than a plastic zip-close bag. [Full Story]

Follow Live Science @livescience, Facebook & Google+.

{ http://www.livescience.com/ }

15-01-2017 om 18:46 geschreven door peter  

AUDIO RECORDING DECLASSIFIED: UFO INCIDENT AT THE EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE IN 1965

On October 7, 1965, at Edwards Air Force Base near Palmdale, California, up to 12 UFOs were spotted and observed by military personnel. A fighter jet was 'scrambled' to intercept and pursue the objects.

The objects were described as having ‘flashing red lights on the bottom and green, glowing lights on top‘ and were reported to be performing extremely unusual flight characteristics (including right angle turns) over the restricted airspace of Edwards -the pilot of an F106 fighter jet sent up to intercept the objects also stated one UFO gained a ‘tremendous amount of altitude’ and ‘appeared to move right out into space’.

The event took place over a five hour period, documented with at least forty hours of communications audio recordings. Of those, only six hours of audio were declassified and released to the public.

The audio has now been synced with the transcript which makes it easier to grasp what is happening.

Interesting facts, at some point during the events, they contac the air force base "UFO officer". There is also an audio part in which they talk to the fighter jet pilot to give him directions on where the UFO was heading.

This case is a true classic! 

This article (Audio Recording Declassified: UFO incident at the Edwards Air Force base in 1965 ) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with full attribution and a link to the original source on Disclose.tv

RELATED ARTICLES

• U.S. Air Force 'Project 1974' Flying Saucer Programm Declassified
• Scientists And Military Witnessed MASS UFO ENCOUNTERS On The Arctic In 1965! 

{ http://www.disclose.tv/ }

15-01-2017 om 18:17 geschreven door peter  

NASA Releases New High-Resolution Earthrise Image

{ https://www.nasa.gov/ }

15-01-2017 om 17:53 geschreven door peter  

Helicopter Pilot Records a Video of a Glowing UFO (Video)

(Before It's News)

A helicopter pilot at Orlando, Florida claimed to have seen and videotaped a bright craft at approximately 1,500 feet altitude that eventually flew upward and disappeared.

The witness was outside when the incident took place at 5:24 pm on December 18, 2016. He said that he got a feeling to look up as if he needed to when he saw the glowing craft flew from a southerly direction to north. The strange thing was reportedly flying high but below the commercial airplanes flight altitude that were in traffic during that time.

The witness managed to record the UFO in video through his cell phone.

The witness said that he doesn’t know the size of the mysterious craft, but it was flying at around 1,500 feet. He took out his cell phone and recorded it on video as it went inside a very small cloud.

e expected the strange aerial thing to come out in a second, but it did not. He thought it disappeared for good and decided to stop recording it. However, to his amazement, he saw it came out of the same cloud. It turned and flew upward and disappeared, according to the witness.

The witness claimed that he is a certified helicopter pilot and he knows that what he saw and recorded on video was not something known, such as a plane, rocket, meteor, helicopter, birds, blimps, balloons and among other things.

The sighting was reported to MUFON and filed under Case 81052 in the witness reporting database.

Check out more contributions by Jeffery Pritchett ranging from UFO to Bigfoot to Paranormal to Prophecy

{http://beforeitsnews.com/ }

15-01-2017 om 17:40 geschreven door peter  

UFO Sightings: Remarkable Eyewitness Reports 15 – Jan 15, 2017 (Video)

(Before It's News)

Case 1: Flying Saucer over Rangiora, NZ – Mufon case nr. 81538.

2017-01-13 – Witness: I was trying to make my dog jump into the air to get an action shot of her, I do this often and end up with a lot of dud photos.

I was about to delete this off my camera when I noticed what looks like a large rock in the sky with a blue glow. I did not see this with my naked eye but wish I had so I could have zoomed in on it!
 

Case 2: airplane passenger captured two UFOs over Hawaii islands HI, US – Mufon case nr. 81529.

2017-01-12 – Witness: “This was just seemed on a picture I took out the airplane window and noticed while I was looking at pictures. I never saw this other than in my photos.”
 

Case 3: Large Orb with five small Orbs inside captured over Illinois – Mufon case nr. 81037.

2016-12-18 – Witness: “Thought it was a star or planet, but then it started flashing and then started moving more to my right, thought it was a satellite, but thought it was too large to be one.”

“I saw a big orb with five little orbs inside. I tried to take a video, but it was too far out there to zoom in on for a video.”
 

“I kept looking at it through a zoomed picture and it kept breaking up into five smaller orbs, then three, then two, and then reassembled itself into one big orb.”

“I then noticed an orb by it detach itself and then sporadically went left of the orb and then vanished. The object was in my sight for about two hours and then slowly vanished behind the treeline of my house.”

Case 4: UFO at Space Station: Comes out of nowhere, then camera moves.
 

2017-01-14 – The following video captured by Streetcap1 shows a UFO near the International Space Station.

NASA spotted this appearing and started to move the camera slowly to the right.

Whatever it was it has not reappeared to the best of my knowledge.

Thanks http://ufosightingshotspot.blogspot.com/

Check out more contributions by Jeffery Pritchett ranging from UFO to Bigfoot to Paranormal to Prophecy

{http://beforeitsnews.com/ }

15-01-2017 om 17:34 geschreven door peter  

(Before It's News)

Discovered by archaeologist Professor Winwood. The enigmatic symbols suggest an interaction of presumed Aliens or Extraterrestrials with ancient monarchs of this nation. Includes Egyptian characters like Thoth, Orus, and elongated skulls.

THE Strange medallion and coins found in the tomb of the ancient 

In the being that is above we can see in his hands, what seem eyes, or holes, also around his head we could say that the sun rises.
The object under the Alien-type Being, resembles a ship or galaxy.

The side cylinders that leave the circle look like glass containers with something inside.
Inside the central circle there is a sun making a spiral and the representation of two Pharaohs.

At the bottom, on the right and left are two winged angels, who remember by their form the Ark of the covenant. Alongside the winged angels are Isis and Horus.

The archaeologist Professor Winwood. He allegedly stole several objects from the tomb and years later would publish them in a magazine, this English archeologist was arrested and the recovered objects were placed in custody of the museum, objects were called in the so-called forbidden area of ​​archeology.

This area is where objects that are not attached to the protocol hierarchy and to the beliefs of official science, hiding them from the public. In January 2011 after the Egyptian riots, many treasures were removed from the Cairo museum among them allegedly this medallion, which was put up for sale on the Internet black market in 2012.

A group of people who worked on the renovation of a house in southern Egypt found a number of very rare coins.

They are unique in its kind that curiously have no images of a strange human figure.
So far no one could explain the origin of these parts. “

{ http://beforeitsnews.com/ }

15-01-2017 om 17:28 geschreven door peter  

The mysterious Vinca figurines; Evidence of extraterrestrial contact thousands of years ago

• The Mystery of the Vinca figurines. Researchers believe they are depictions of extraterrestrial beings that visited ancient man in the past
• Excavations in the vicinity of Belgrade have yielded over 2000 of these mysterious looking figurines
• Various styles of zoomorphic and anthropomorphic figurines are hallmarks of the culture the Vinča culture, also known as Turdaș culture or Turdaș-Vinča culture

The Mystery of the Vinca figurines

According to numerous researchers, the ancient Vinca (Vinča) culture depicted extraterrestrial visitors, gods that came from the sky and provided the necessary push for the advancement of civilization and technology among humans.

There has been a lot of speculation about the existence of extraterrestrial beings and the possibility of them interacting in the distant past, with ancient civilizations on Earth. Evidence of such encounters can be found across the world. In every single continent there appears to be evidence recorded in texts, monuments, and artifacts pointing toward the existence and interaction of extraterrestrial beings.

In many ancient depictions we see beings with oval-shaped heads, giant almond-shaped eyes that have specific dark pupils, narrow noses with slightly marked small mouths that most of the mites have no lips. The head is composed out of the specific shape that is in most cases, larger than the rest of the bodies. The color of the creatures ranges from blueish gray colors to light brown.

The depictions of these creatures has been attributed, from the standpoint of rationalistic and materialistic science, to hallucinations due to the ingestion of drugs or alcohol, fantastic projections of the collective unconscious, and hallucinations that are a result of certain brain injuries or diseases. Strangely, these depictions have existed in the distant past, about 7000 years BC in some European countries including the Balkans, former Yugoslavia and Northern Greece.

There is a great amount of evidence and many archaeological findings that have been proven to be authentic. The sequence of the Vinca (Vinča) culture is a set of very well documented items in the Vinca region, in the vicinity of Belgrade –  14 km of Belgrade, Serbia. Excavation in the area have yielded over 2000 of these mysterious looking figurines, the largest number of items of that type discovered in the region.

Putting the puzzle together, this has allowed archaeologists to verify that several centuries ago, human groups that inhabited the region received almost spontaneously a significative impulse that helped them become a civilized society, enabling them to develop a syllabic-alphabetic language and or linear writing system judging by the amount of phonetic signs used in it. All of this occurred several thousand years before the rise of the great ancient civilizations of the Euphrates and the Nile. This according to most researchers is considered as an archaeological anomaly.

Numerous archaeologists who have studied this enigmatic civilization do not have a convincing explanation for this anachronistic culture that was obviously too evolved for a time when most of the cultures of the Old World were still in the Neolithic stage, a time when not a single megalithic monument was erected.

What is perhaps most disconcerting is the fact that along with numerous samples of ceramic-naturalistic paintings and objects, engraved with amazing inscriptions, there are over three thousand ceramic and stone figurines where besides human and animal representations, are mainstream representations of strange humanoid beings whose characteristics fit perfectly into modern-day descriptions of otherworldly beings such as the grey aliens, believed to have visited Earth in the distant past, and even today. The Vinca (Vinča) culture figurines are original and unique items yet resemble art of other cultures in Mesopotamia and the Americas. The question many have asked is, why?

Even though the Vinca culture has had contact with other neighboring cultures, the sculptural art of the Vinca (Vinča) remained markedly different from that of other cultures in the region.

The most distinctive feature of these mysterious figurines are triangular shaped faces, large almond shaped eyes, mouths and noses that are nonexistent in most cases, which strangely seem to resemble animals such as grasshoppers. Some of these figurines mysteriously depict a combination of hybrid beings, half-human half reptile.

Most of these strange humanoid figures are depicted as guardian deities, some of them are believed to have been good while some of them evil. The zoomorphic-anthropomorphic depictions are a mystery that many researchers have not found an answer to.

According to researchers, the most striking sculptures representing the latest development of Vinca art are the monumental heads with a relatively normal size, that have some sort of helmet or mask. The widening of the mask follows the oblique line of the eyes, and its projection goes all the way to the height of what appear to be ears. What was the artists goal upon creating these masks and figurines? Did the artist intend to depict the Gods and deities which brought numerous advancements to their society and other human beings?

The objective here is to go beyond mere classification or identification of objects according to the criteria and principles of methodology of mainstream archaeological research. What caused the ancient Vinca do depict such mysterious creatures? What inspired them to create such sticking figurines, clearly not of human nature? Everything man does is, in one way or another, an imitation of the real world and nature around him. This points to the fact that the depictions of the ancient Vinča culture, are actually what they had seen thousands of years ago.

Is the Vinca culture evidence of prehistorical contact with extraterrestrial beings, around 9000 years ago? Researchers believe that the origin of the strange iconography is not only based on the physical appearance but also on other aspects such as the appearance of advanced linear syllabic-alphabetic writing and language, a form that would reappear several thousands of years later in other advanced civilizations of the mediterranean.

Interestingly, in civilizations of Southeast Europe there are no previous phases in the evolution of the writing system. Writing came to be “suddenly” in a relatively evolved form. It is a destabilizing fact breaking all previously established patterns, breaking the foundations of structures established by scholars of one of the most important marks of ancient civilizations, the writing system. It may not be coincidental that this cultural and so to speak technological leap appears associated with the first depiction of otherworldly creatures that could have been considered as gods thousands of years ago.

Researchers believe we are facing one of the oldest proofs of human contact with extraterrestrial beings that came from other planets or other dimensions.
We are faced with depictions of human-like beings obviously not connected or similar to any of the races or species of known hominids. This has led to the conclusion that these depictions are anything but human from a anthropogenic point of view.

Ancient oriental texts and doctrines speak of highly advanced beings which participated in the formation of civilization as we know it today. Depictions and texts about these beings are found in cultures across the globe, in every single corner of the world, yet for some reason, we seem to look past these depictions.

{ http://www.ancient-code.com/ }

15-01-2017 om 16:41 geschreven door peter  

Q&A with Don Donderi on aliens, Roswell and his UFO course at McGill

JOHN MEAGHER, MONTREAL GAZETTE

A retired McGill professor is convinced we have been visited by UFOs and extraterrestrial life forms.

In fact, Don Donderi knows people who claim to have been abducted by aliens from outer space.

Donderi teaches a course at McGill University called UFOs: History and Reality. The course, part of McGill’s Community for Lifelong Learning, outlines why “UFOs are real and extraterrestrial.”

Donderi, who holds a PhD in psychology from Cornell University, spoke to the Montreal Gazette about his lifelong interest in UFOs and why he believes aliens exist “beyond a reasonable doubt.”

This interview was condensed for space reasons. 

Q. How did teaching this course come about?

A. Well, I’ve been interested in the topic since I was 10 years old. I was certainly literate at 10 and I was following what was going in the papers and magazines in the United States, where I grew up.

And in 1947, there were (UFO) sightings. There was a famous sighting by a guy named Kenneth Arnold who was a private pilot who flew up in the Cascade (mountain range in Washington) and he saw and reported nine silvery objects flying over the mountains. He was very articulate in his report. … The story got into AP (Associated Press) the next day in June of 1947. And the AP headline writer coined the phrase ‘flying saucers’, which is where it all began.

Q. Wasn’t that the same year as the famous Roswell UFO incident in New Mexico?

A. It’s the same year actually, just a few weeks later. The whole Roswell thing came just after the Kenneth Arnold sighting in 1947.

Q. What’s your take on what happened at Roswell?

A. The U.S. government recovered the remains of a crashed unidentified flying object or to be more correct, an extraterrestrial vehicle.

Q. Do you believe aliens were found at the crash site?

A. It is believed that they also recovered bodies of dead aliens.

Q. Why so much silence and secrecy for all these years?

A. Well, that’s a very good question, and I raise it in my course. … The technology involved is extremely advanced; the implications for human society are incredible and possibly upsetting because we are under surveillance by technologically superior beings from other planets. We don’t know how to do what they do. We don’t know what their motives are or their interests are. And at the moment, as far as I know, we don’t have any active defences or preparations to deal with the situation. So it’s obviously upsetting. Secrecy is because when governments, any government, gets hold of new technology, and want to figure out how it works, their first interest is protecting their own turf on this and not sharing it with the world.

Q. How certain are you of life beyond our planet?

A. I’m 100 per cent certain of that. The way I put it in my course and to the public is this: I have three main propositions. One, some of what people report as UFOs are extraterrestrial vehicles. That proposition, I believe, is established beyond reasonable doubt. And if you know your law, you’ll know that’s the standard for a conviction of a felony. Proposition 2 is that some of the extraterrestrial vehicles have ET crews, and proposition 3 is that some of these ET crews ‘catch and release’ humans to study them, so-called alien abductions. Proposition 2, I think, is established beyond a reasonable doubt, and proposition 3 is bound on probabilities.

Q. Do you personally know anyone who was abducted by aliens?

A. I know many people. I’d say 10, at least, who have claimed to be abducted. And in many cases, I respect their claims because I think they’re based on sound evidence.

Q. There are doubters, of course. How do you handle skepticism?

A. Listen, skepticism is absolutely OK. If you pick up my book (UFOs, ETs and alien abductions: A scientist looks at the evidence, 2013) which you probably won’t do, you’ll find I have a great deal of respect for skeptics who are doing their best to make sure what they know and what the world knows is based on reasonable sound evidence. That’s good. I’m a scientist.

Q. With the proliferation of drones, wouldn’t it be easy to fly one above Mount Royal and say: ‘Hey, look up, it’s a UFO!”

A. Exactly. One of my better friends, who is a drone user commercially — takes real estate photos for people — he and I and everyone else in the field knows it’s perfectly possible to fake UFO photographs and experiences.

Q. Have you ever seen a UFO yourself?

A. Only the kind that wouldn’t impress anyone as sound evidence because nocturnal lights, which is a technical term, are a dime a dozen and you couldn’t be sure at a distance what it was.

Q. What are the chances of a UFO landing on Ste-Catherine St. and an alien climbing out to shake my hand?

A. (Laughing) Ah yes, the famous White House lawn landing. I have no idea; I can’t possibly tell you on the basis of anything I’ve learned on the subject. Except that … whoever shows up will go away and not come back here for a while.

jmeagher@postmedia.com

{ http://montrealgazette.com/ }

15-01-2017 om 16:20 geschreven door peter  

15-01-2017 om 15:23 geschreven door peter  

WAT WEET MEN IN HET WITTE HUIS DAT WIJ NIET WETEN? ( VIDEO )

{ http://niburu.co/ }

15-01-2017 om 15:15 geschreven door peter  

UFOs Watching SpaceX Falcon 9 Rocket Launch And Landing, Jan 2017, UFO Sighting News.

Date of sighting: January 2017

Location of sighting: Vandenberg, California, USA

Original Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WimRhydggo

Time into video: 24:15

I wanted to see the Space X rocket launch and land over the ocean, and this is the most recent video of it happening, but as the rocket entered a low orbit, several glowing UFOs were seen from behind...watching. Then a few seconds later a larger UFO is seen in the clouds on the right side of the screen. Such rocket launches and landings are historical and technological marvels in human history. Its no wonder they are watching this event so closely. 

Scott C. Waring-Taiwan

{ http://www.ufosightingsdaily.com/ }

15-01-2017 om 15:04 geschreven door peter  

Green UFO Over Isle of Wight On Jan 2017, Video, UFO Sighting Daily.

Date of sighting: January 2017
Location of sighting: Isle of Wight, near England
News source: 

http://www.iwcp.co.uk/news/news/drone-claims-rejected-by-isle-of-wight-ufo-man-97306.aspx

UFOs are often seen near low populated areas, this seems to be the case here. The island is a county in England. It also happens to be an island. UFOs love low populated areas and this look like the famous Dudley Dorito UFO that has been seen since the mid 1980s over England. Awesome catch, and proof that there is a base someone on this side of England under the ocean. 
Scott C. Waring

News states: 
James Ward, 22, of Lake filmed the mysterious sighting on January 2 and the video went on to be featured around the globe. "It was really cool. I didn’t expect it to get national attention," James said. James said seeing his video on national media outlets was an 'overwhelming experience’. James, a full-time carer, filmed the sighting outside his home in Lake. Some have dismissed the sighting as a drone but James said the behaviour of the object ruled out that possibility. The footage has sparked the interest of UFO hunters and alien enthusiasts nationwide but James does not consider himself an enthusiast. "I just looked up and saw this light and thought 'I better film this’, so I took my phone out," James said. The video shows unidentifiable lights in the sky. "I was mesmerised. It looked like a typical round UFO space craft. "Before, I was 50/50 about whether there was life out there but this to me now is 100 per cent proof they exist. "The sighting has made me believe." 

{ http://www.ufosightingsdaily.com/ }

15-01-2017 om 14:59 geschreven door peter  

Picture perfect blastoff of SpaceX Falcon 9 on Jan. 14, 2017, Return to Flight launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California carrying fleet of ten advanced Iridium NEXT comsats to low Earth orbit.

Credit: SpaceX

With Billions and Billions of dollars at stake and their reputation riding on the line, SpaceX came roaring back to life by dramatically executing a picture perfect Falcon 9 rocket launch this morning (Jan. 14) that successfully delivered a fleet of ten advanced Iridium NEXT voice and data relay satellites to orbit while simultaneously recovering the first stage on a ship at sea off the west coast of California.

BREAKING NEWS – check back for updates.

The primary goal of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 launch from Space Launch Complex 4E on Vandenberg Air Force Base in California was to deploy the payload of the first ten Iridium Next communication satellites to low Earth orbit on the Iridium-1 mission.

“Thanks @elonmusk – a perfect flight! Loved watching sats deploy with you in the control room,” tweeted Matt Desch, Iridium Communications CEO, soon after receiving full confirmation that all 10 Iridium NEXT satellites were successfully deployed from their second stage satellite dispensers.

“More to go, but now to celebrate!!”

The inaugural ten will serve as the vanguard of a fleet that will eventually comprise 81 satellites.

SpaceX Falcon 9 first stage successfully soft lands on drone ship stationed in the Pacific Ocean off California coast after launching on Jan. 14, 2017, from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California carrying fleet of ten advanced Iridium NEXT comsats to low Earth orbit.

Credit: SpaceX

Today’s successful blastoff took place barely four and a half months after another Falcon 9 and its $200 million Israeli commercial payload were suddenly destroyed during a prelaunch fueling test on the Florida Space Coast on Sept. 1, 2016.

Another launch failure would have dealt a devastating blow to confidence in SpaceX’s hard won reputation.

The Sept. 1, 2016 calamity was the second Falcon 9 failure within 15 months time. Both occurred inside the second stage and called into question the rockets reliability.

The 229-foot (70-meter) Falcon 9 rocket was rolled out from its processing hangar to the launch pad and raised vertically yesterday.

Picture perfect blastoff of SpaceX Falcon 9 on Jan. 14, 2017, Return to Flight launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California carrying fleet of ten advanced Iridium NEXT comsats to low Earth orbit.

Credit: SpaceX

Today’s entire land, landing and satellite deployment event was shown live on a SpaceX hosted webcast. It offered extremely sharp views of Saturdays on time liftoff at 9:54:34 a.m. PST or 12:54:34 p.m. EST, and unbelievably clear images of the first stage descending back to Earth towards a tiny drone ship.

“Overall a wonderfully nominal mission,” gushed the SpaceX commentator during the webcast.

Since the Iridium 1 mission only had an instantaneous launch opportunity precisely at 9:54:34 a.m. PST or 12:54:34 p.m. EST, there was no margin for any technical or weather delays. And none happened. Although an errant boat had to be quickly escorted out of the exclusion zone less than 20 minutes before blastoff.

Confirmation of a successful deployment of all 10 Iridium NEXT satellites came at about T plus 1 hour and 17 minutes after liftoff from Vandenberg.

“So, so excited – finally breathing again!” tweeted Desch.

“Thanks for all the great vibes – I felt it! All 10 sats deployed; good orbit; good telemetry! WOW.”

“It was a clean sweep of 10 for 10,” said the SpaceX commentator during the live webcast.

In the final moments before the propulsive landing, you could read the lettering on the “Just Read the Instruction” drone ship as the engine was firing to slow the descent and the landing legs deployed.

Really there was no cutout or loss of signal the whole way down. So the world could watch every key moment as it happened in real time.

The first stage softly landed approx. 8 minutes and 18 seconds after the California liftoff.

“First stage has landed on Just Read the Instructions,” SpaceX tweeted post landing.

This was the first launch by SpaceX since last August from the Florida Space Coast, and it came off without a hitch.

Iridium 1 is the first of seven planned Falcon 9 launches to establish the Iridium NEXT constellation which will eventually consist of 81 advanced satellites.

At least 70 will be launched by SpaceX.

The inaugural launch of the advanced Iridium NEXT satellites will start the process of replacing an aging Iridium fleet in orbit for nearly two decades.

SpaceX Falcon 9 poised for Jan. 14, 2017, Return to Flight launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California carrying ten Iridium NEXT comsats to orbit.

Credit: SpaceX

This Falcon 9 was been outfitted with four landing lags and grid fins for a controlled landing on the tiny barge prepositioned in the Pacific Ocean several hundred miles off the west coast of California.

SpaceX Falcon 9 booster from Thaicom-8 launch on May 27, 2016 arrives at mouth of Port Canaveral, FL on June 2, 2016.

Credit: Ken Kremer/kenkremer.com

Watch this space for continuing updates on SpaceX.

Stay tuned here for Ken’s continuing Earth and Planetary science and human spaceflight news.

Ken Kremer

IridiumNEXT satellites being fueled, pressurized & stacked on dispenser tiers at Vandenberg AFB for Falcon 9 launch.µ

Credit: Iridium

Mission patch for Iridium-1 mission showing launch of the first 10 Iridium NEXT voice and data relay satellites on SpaceX Falcon 9 from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, for Iridium Communications, and planned landing of the first stage on a droneship in the Pacific Ocean.

Credit: SpaceX/Iridium

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  Poor Weather Pushes SpaceX Return Debut with Revolutionary Iridium Relay Sats to Jan. 14January 8

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{http://www.universetoday.com/ }

15-01-2017 om 00:38 geschreven door peter  

THE INCREDIBLE STORY OF HOW THE HUYGENS MISSION TO TITAN SUCCEEDED WHEN IT COULD HAVE FAILED

 

by Nancy Atkinson

Twelve years ago today, the Huygens probe landed on Titan, marking the farthest point from Earth any spacecraft has ever landed. While a twelfth anniversary may be an odd number to mark with a special article, as we said in our previous article (with footage from the landing), this is the last opportunity to celebrate the success of Huygens before its partner spacecraft Cassini ends its mission on September 15, 2017 with a fateful plunge into Saturn’s atmosphere.

But Huygens is also worth celebrating because, amazingly, the mission almost failed, but yet was a marvelous success. If not for the insistence of one ESA engineer to complete an in-flight test of Huygens’ radio system, none of the spacecraft’s incredible data from Saturn’s largest and mysterious moon would have ever been received, and likely, no one would have ever known why.

As I detail in my new book “Incredible Stories From Space: A Behind-the-Scenes-Look at the Missions Changing Our View of the Cosmos,” in 1999, the Cassini orbiter and the piggybacking Huygens lander were on their way to the Saturn system. The duo launched in 1997, but instead of making a beeline for the 6th planet from the Sun, they took a looping path called the VVEJGA trajectory (Venus-Venus-Earth-Jupiter Gravity Assist), swinging around Venus twice and flying past Earth 2 years later.

While all the flybys gave the spacecraft added boosts to help get it to Saturn, the Earth flyby also provided a chance for the teams to test out various systems and instruments and get immediate feedback.

“The European group wanted to test the Huygens receiver by transmitting the data from Earth,” said Earl Maize, Project Manager for the Cassini mission at JPL, who I interviewed for the book. “That’s a great in-flight test, because there’s the old adage of flight engineers, ‘test as you fly, fly as you test.’”

The way the Huygens mission would work at the Saturn system was that Cassini would release Huygens when the duo approached Titan. Huygens would drop through Titan’s thick and obscuring atmosphere like a skydiver on a parachute, transmitting data all the while. The Huygens probe didn’t have enough power or a large enough dish to transmit all its data directly to Earth, so Cassini would gather and store Huygens’ data on board and later transmit it to Earth.

Boris Smeds was head of ESOC’s Systems and Requirements Section, Darmstadt, Germany.

Credit: ESA.

ESA engineer Boris Smeds wanted to ensure this data handoff was going to work, otherwise a crucial part of the mission would be lost. So he proposed a test during the 1999 Earth flyby.

Maize said that for some reason, there was quite a bit of opposition to the test from some of the ESA officials, but Smeds and Claudio Sollazzo, Huygens’s ground operations manager at ESA’s European Space Operation Centre (ESOC) in Darmstadt, Germany were insistent the test was necessary.

NASA’s Deep Space Network is responsible for communicating with spacecraft. Pictured is the Goldstone facility in California, one of three facilities that make up the Network.

Image: NASA/JPL

“They were not to be denied,” Maize said, “so they eventually got permission for the test. The Cassini team organized it, going to the Goldstone tracking station [in California] of the Deep Space Network (DSN) and did what’s called a ‘suitcase test,’ broke into the signal, and during the Earth flyby, Huygens, Cassini and Goldstone were all programmed to simulate the probe descending to Titan. It all worked great.”

Except for one thing: Cassini received almost no simulated data, and what it did receive was garbled. No one could figure out why.

Six months of painstaking investigation finally identified the problem. The variation in speed between the two spacecraft hadn’t been properly compensated for, causing a communication problem. It was as if the spacecraft were each communicating on a different frequency.

Artist concept of the Huygens probe descending to Titan.

Credit: ESA.

“The European team came to us and said we didn’t have a mission,” Maize said. “But we put together ‘Tiger Teams’ to try and figure it out.”

The short answer was that the idiosyncrasies in the communications system were hardwired in. With the spacecraft now millions of miles away, nothing could be fixed. But engineers came up with an ingenious solution using a basic principal known as the Doppler Effect.

The metaphor Maize likes to use is this: if you are sitting on the shore and a speed boat goes by close to the coast, it zooms past you quickly. But that same boat going the same speed out on the horizon looks like it is barely moving.
“Since we couldn’t change Huygens’ signal, the only thing we could change was the way Cassini flew,” Maize said. “If we could move Cassini farther away and make it appear as if Huygens was moving slower, it would receive lander’s radio waves at a lower frequency, solving the problem.”

Maize said it took two years of “fancy coding modifications and some pretty amazing trajectory computations.” Huygens’ landing was also delayed two months for the new trajectory that was needed overcome the radio system design flaw.

Additionally, with Cassini needing to be farther away from Huygens than originally planned, it would eventually fly out of range to capture all of Huygens’ data. Astronomers instigated a plan where radio telescopes around the world would listen for Huygens’ faint signals and capture anything Cassini missed.

Huygens was released from the Cassini spacecraft on Christmas Day 2004, and arrived at Titan on January 14, 2005. The probe began transmitting data to Cassini four minutes into its descent through Titan’s murky atmosphere, snapping photos and taking data all the while. Then it touched down, the first time a probe had landed on an extraterrestrial world in the outer Solar System.

Because of the communication problem, Huygens was not able to gather as much information as originally planned, as it could only transmit on one channel instead of two. But amazingly, Cassini captured absolutely all the data sent by Huygens until it flew out of range.

“It was beautiful,” Maize said, “I’ll never forget it. We got it all, and it was a wonderful example of international cooperation. The fact that 19 countries could get everything coordinated and launched in the first place was pretty amazing, but there’s nothing that compares to the worldwide effort we put into recovering the Huygens mission. From an engineering standpoint, that might trump everything else we’ve done on this mission.”

The view of Titan from the descending Huygens spacecraft on January 14, 2005.

Credit: ESA/NASA/JPL/University of Arizona.

With its ground-breaking mission, Huygens provided the first real view of the surface of Titan. The data has been invaluable for understanding this unique and mysterious moon, showing geological and meteorological processes that are more similar to those on the surface of the Earth than anywhere else in the Solar System. ESA has details on the top discoveries by Huygens here.

Noted space journalist Jim Oberg has written several detailed and very interesting articles about the Huygens’ recovery, including one at IEEE Spectrum and another at The Space Review. These articles provide much more insight into the test, Smeds’ remarkable insistence for the test, the recovery work that was done and the subsequent success of the mission.

As Oberg says in IEEE Spectrum, “Smeds continued a glorious engineering tradition of rescuing deep-space missions from doom with sheer persistence, insight, and lots of improvisation.”

A modest Smeds was quoted by ESA: “This has happened before. Almost any mission has some design problem,” says Smeds, who says he’s worked on recovering from pre- and post-launch telecom issues that have arisen with several past missions. “To me, it’s just part of my normal work.”

For more stories about Huygens, Cassini and several other current robotic space missions, “Incredible Stories From Space” tells many behind-the-scenes stories from the amazing people who work on these missions.

Related

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15-01-2017 om 00:26 geschreven door peter  

CHILEAN GOVERNMENT RELEASES DECLASSIFIED UFO VIDEO

The term UFO has a way of stirring up speculation and controversy. Even though this bland acronym refers only to an airborne object who’s appearance hasn’t been explained yet – with no references whatsoever to “aliens” or “extra-terrestrials” – one cannot mention it without inspiring talk of little green men and massive conspiracies.

This has certainly been the reaction to a video that was recently released by the Committee for the Study of Anomalous Air Phenomena (CEFAA), the Chilean government agency responsible for investigating UFOs. Originally captured by a helicopter belonging to the Chilean navy two years ago, the release of this 10-minute video coincided with the conclusion of the Committee’s investigation into the anomaly.

Such is the procedure of the CEFAA whenever a UFO – or Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAP) as they call them – comes to their attention. And once an investigation into the sighting is concluded, the details are released to the public. Interestingly, this particular encounter – which took place on November 11th, 2014, in the coastal region between San Antonio and Quinteros – had them stumped.

A Chilean Navy version of the Europcopter Airbus Cougar AS-532, which was being flown by the aircrew that spotted the UFO.

Credit: Wikipedia Commons/Evogol

According to their report, a Chilean navy helicopter (an Airbus Cougar AS-532, like the one pictured above) was conducting a daytime patrol when a technician aboard spotted an object flying in their airspace. The technician then directed the helicopter’s infrared camera towards it and began filming. As the CEFAA recently indicated on their website:

“At 1:52 pm, while filming the terrain, the technician observed a strange object flying to the left over the ocean. Soon both men observed it with the naked eye. They noticed that the velocity and the altitude of the object appeared to be about the same as the helicopter, and estimated that the object was approximately 35 to 40 miles (55-65 km) away. It was traveling W/NW, according to the Captain. The technician aimed the camera at the object immediately and zoomed in with the infra red (IR) for better clarity.”

Further details from the investigation revealed that the officers reported the sighting to the General Directorate of Civil Aviation (DGAC) in Santiago. The DGAC reported that no air traffic was authorized to be in the region, and that they could detect no trace of the object on their radar. They also confirmed that their attempts to communicate using the standard radio frequencies (which the helicopter crew had also attempted) yielded no response.

What was even more strange was the way the object appeared as two “hot spots”, which looked to be connected. In addition, on two occasions, the object threw off some kind of trail before finally disappearing into the clouds. According to the technician who filmed it, the plume of material appeared to be very hot, which was indicated from the footage that showed how the stream glowed bright in the infrared band.

The route of the helicopter, based on the displayed geographic coordinates displayed on the camera.

Credit: CEFAA

Much like the object itself, the CEFAA investigation was hard-pressed to explain the appearance of these hot plumes:

“Some analysts have suggested the hypothesis that it is a medium-sized line aircraft and that the stelae of the detachable element may be the reserve water inside the apparatus, thrown by the crew. However, meteorology asserts that neither the altitude at which the object moved, nor the ambient temperature of that moment, allowed such a wake of condensation.”

After the encounter, the Chilean Navy submitted the footage to the CEFAA, which has spent the past two years looking into it. However, their investigation proved inconclusive. As General Ricardo Bermúdez, Director of CEFAA during the investigation, told Leslie Kean of the Huffington Post, “We do not know what it was, but we do know what it was not.”

In essence, they ruled that the anomalous object could not have been a military or civilian aircraft. They also ruled out the possibility that the clouds it emitted were caused by the expulsion of waste water, and that the object was too low to emit contrails. In the end, the CEFAA cataloged this object as an UAP, which is standard practice whenever a particular sighting merits that designation.

Image captured from the footage shot by the Chilean Navy helicopter, showing the thermal trail cast by the object, and its two bright spots.

Credit: CEFAA

However, since the video went public, one UFO hoax-buster has come forward with what he believes to be a sound explanation for the sighting. According to Mick West, an administrator at Metabunk.org – a website dedicated to debunking unscientific theories – what was seen in the video was actually the result a four-engine airplane leaving flying out of Santiago and leaving aerodynamic contrails in its wake.

Using online flight records, West tracked down two flights that were in the same airspace at the time – LA330 (from Santiago to La Serena) and IB6830 (from Santiago to Madrid). After examining the flights GPS data and conducting a 3D analysis, West concluded that the four-engine IB6830 was the likeliest culprit. The thermal plumes were engine exhaust, and its failure to show up on radar was because the radar operators were looking in the wrong place.

As West explained in his write-up about the incident:

“At the time this was spotted (the very first sighting on the video, at 13:52:34) IB6830 was actually around 35 miles away. However it would very quickly get further away. By 13:57 IB6830 would be 65 miles away. This explain why it was not seen on radar (IB6830 was on radar, just not where they thought it was).”

Image captured from the video showing two connected white circular lights, or “hot spots”. “Envoltura” means “envelope”, refers to the glow surrounding the two spots.

Credit: CEFAA

In addition to being in exactly the right position (according to West), aerodynamic contrails explains the thermal flare and the two “thermal spotlights” on the object itself (see image above). Basically, the pilots were looking at the plane’s engine glow, which was caused by its two engines on either side of the fuselage glowing hot and giving the appearance of two connected hot spots.

As the plane climbed, its engine exhaust created hot trails that looked like plumes when viewed through an IR camera. Given the fact that the plane was at a higher altitude than originally reported, the presence of contrails would therefore be a possibility, which is something the CEFAA had ruled because the object was believed to be too close to the ground for those to form.

As William of Ockham famously said, “Among competing hypotheses, the one with the fewest assumptions should be selected.” In this case, it would seem that West’s hypothesis accounts for all the knowns and unknowns in this case, and is therefore the correct one. In the coming weeks and months, the Chilean government may choose to revisit their ruling and reconsider designating this a UAP.

But in the meantime, UFO enthusiasts are likely to interpret this however they want. And many (not all) may indeed see this video as further confirmation that extra-terrestrials are already among us!

Cue the theme music from X-Files! And be sure to watch West’s video explaining his conclusions:

Further Reading: 

• CEFAA, 
• Huff Post,
•  Metabunk

{http://www.universetoday.com/ }

15-01-2017 om 00:13 geschreven door peter  

SECRET WORLD OF UFOS & UNDERGROUND BASES! DARK JOURNALIST & DR. RICHARD SAUDER

Published on Jan 14, 2017

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14-01-2017 om 23:58 geschreven door peter  

ANCIENT ALIENS – MAYAN PROPHECIES AND CROP CIRCLES – THE SUMERIAN CONNECTION

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14-01-2017 om 23:51 geschreven door peter  

We’ve all encountered artificial intelligence on the internet. Those AI programs are bots that are designed to mimic human behavior and make you feel more at ease with your decisions. As the programs became more advanced, it was shown that they could in fact influence your behavior. Artificial intelligence research today is nearing a tipping point that could unleash a world of morally ambiguous issues.

The Twitter war you had with that liberal pig or conservative nut job that never seemed to end. It never would end because you were likely speaking with a program whose sole purpose was to be defiantly defensive of its position forever. While you were smashing away on your keyboard in fits of existential rage, the likely cloud based software wasn't even getting a chuckle. The artificial intelligence used in these bots is simplistic in its directive, but can be extremely effective.

AI Twitter Bots

A study that was completed before the 2016 presidential election found that nearly 15 percent of the studied Twitter population were in fact bots. They are used by indeterminable, malevolent sources to build on each other and focus the conversation in a more desirable direction. Bots produced almost 20 percent of the conversation and the impact that may have had on the election is staggering. The study shows that both sides of the political landscape used bots to support their agenda. While these bots cannot yet directly impact policy, or vote for that matter, their impact on society cannot be ignored. 

Propaganda has been used by governments since their conception in order to manipulate and control the proletariat. All means of communication have been used to rally support for whatever causes the government, monarchy, or dictator thought was prevalent. These bots are particularly effective, however, because of their ability to target specific demographics. The artificial intelligence analyzes all of the human intelligence we so willingly provide, to adjust the strategy it uses that has the highest probability of having the preferred result. The result being that one person in one battleground state changes their opinion, and the ripple effect that could influence the outcome of the most conflicted election in recent memory.

Artificial Intelligence Personality

With the artificial intelligence of bots and similar programs increasing at an alarming rate, the question might be, how good are they really at judging human personality? A Stanford study found that computers can judge personality traits better than people close to you. The computer used Facebook likes to match the subjects own scores of the five basic personality dimensions: openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. 

The Uncanny Valley (UV) hypothesis posits that the degree of human likeness of an agent has a complex relationship to the reaction of the humans to the agent. So, as artificial intelligence is better able to judge our personalities, the bots that we interact with on a daily basis will be better at manipulating us into behaving in a way that their programmer wants.

The internet is being catalogued all the time, partly by companies storing their user info, and also by our own hands when we store our information in cloud based software. A bot that has access to information about every click you make and word you type could direct you ever more accurately to the page that it wants you to see, and in a way that most affects your subconscious. If you are skeptical of this, think about the cereal you eat, the car you drive, and the phone you are likely reading this on. The advertisers know their audience and they directed their ads at you to subtly angle you toward their products. Think of that effect, times the 200 plus Facebook likes that each user, on average, makes.

AI Vetting Politicians

There has not been much empirical research regarding the personality traits of politicians. When given the Narcissistic Personality Inventory (NPI), along with some clergy and librarians, the politicians scored the highest in total narcissism. Without statistical significance this study is merely a suggestion, but one that few psychoanalysts would likely disagree with. That relentless self assurance is used to convince the American people that they are the best person for the job. It is inherently a destructive personality trait that all too often results in implosion. Artificial intelligence could be used in the vetting of presidential candidates. It could use all of their personal social media presence and any factual data imputed to decide if they are statistically fit for public office. In theory, proper testing of individuals in power could keep populations from making bad choices.

Military Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence is becoming increasingly present in future plans. When armed with advanced weaponry and an upgraded AI, a drone that could be bought on Amazon becomes a deadly weapon. The Pentagon is spending billions to develop autonomous and semi autonomous weapons. One example is a missile that can decide its own target with pinpoint accuracy. It can go through a crowded room and kill only whom it has decided is the target. The fear, of course, is that the more autonomy we give these machines, the more chance we are taking that they drift from their core directives and kill an unintended target. This is something that has been explored in science-fiction for some time and is now reality. The Aegis warships can fire defensive missiles without human order. Israel and South Korea both have AI defense systems that are capable of killing targets a mile out. The letter presented by the International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence said it best. Members include Elon Musk, Stephen Hawking, and Steve Wozniak.

"Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology has reached a point where the deployments of such systems is practically if not legally feasible within years, not decades, and the stakes are high: autonomous weapons have been described as the third revolution in warfare, after gunpowder, and nuclear arms."

The US Army is developing robots that can navigate an environment when given a voice command. They are meant to act as teammates with the soldiers, and to keep human lives out of danger as much as possible. The robots all have memory, gathered and stored in a central unit. Cognition will come about once the algorithms for perception and long term memory are perfected. The Army's own website states that they are using psychological theory to augment the robots in areas such as learning and memory. The US Army Research Laboratory Human Research and Engineering Directorate (HRED) are attempting to mimic the way humans use memories to problem solve and develop those methods into algorithms for an autonomous system. This isn't just happening in the US. The Japanese are attempting to humanize robots. Humans react less harshly to robots that resemble humans. Japanese engineers aren't as focused on military use but they have developed very sophisticated robots that are able to accomplish human-like tasks. Artificial intelligence isn't inherently inimical to mortal life, it is the purpose humans give AI that creates the danger.

Technological Singularity

The technological singularity (or just singularity) is the hypotheses that the invention of artificial super intelligence will abruptly trigger runaway technological growth, resulting in unfathomable changes to human civilization. This really isn't hypothetical as the current math correlated to pace of technology creates a very clear path to incredible exponential growth.

By 2045 a computer with artificial intelligence will improve itself to the point of becoming a super intelligence and initiate a new era. This is becoming less science fiction and more science inevitability. Moore's Law is named after Intel co-founder Gordon Moore. The law originally stated that the number of transistors per square inch on integrated circuits would double every year since their invention. When these limitations are inevitably overcome, computers will have the processing ability more akin to the human brain which is approximately 10,000 trillion cycles per second. Engineer Peter Diamandis believes that  by the year 2025, we will have a $1,000 dollar computer that can process at the speed of human brain. 

Zoltan Istvan, a transhumanism activist, believes the eventual problem is, when the machine realizes it can do anything and grow in terms of speed, capacity, and memory, it might learn to deceive us very quickly as well. 

Medical Artificial Intelligence

There is another side to artificial intelligence that could mean great things for quality of life. Medicine has made fantastic advancements in the last 100 years. The medical community is divided regarding the use of AI in hospital systems. The Department of Medicine at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center has a research program called AIM (Artificial Intelligence in Medicine) that is working to apply AI techniques to increase our understanding of the body. AI systems can work objectively and without variability. The AIM algorithms are used to take the raw digital data and make images of parts that the surgeon wouldn't be able to see. It takes images and can evaluate them and offer objective information to the physician. Lastly, it can also adjust itself when new information is given. This update aspect is important because it can detect minor changes that may have otherwise been missed. 

Artificial Intelligence and the Government

The government has acknowledged the influence of artificial intelligence. President Obama's Precision Medicine Initiative and the Cancer Moonshot will rely on artificial intelligence to find data to help in diagnosis and treatment of cancer and other life-threatening illnesses. In 2016 the Federal government created the National Science and Technology Council sub-committee on machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence. It is designed to monitor the advances in AI but also coordinate how to use the science in government services more effectively. It is a challenge for any breakthrough in medicine to be deployed and become commonplace. There isn't an efficient system for new algorithms to be included in hospital systems. Hospitals tend to prioritize the money and if an algorithm won't greatly increase revenue, they are less likely to apply it. 

Japan is also applying 10 billion yen to the science ministry. There is a focus there in the medical industry, diagnosing of symptoms and finding optimal treatments. Imagine a world where machines could analyze themselves and either fix what is wrong, or alert someone before it breaks completely. We can avoid having entire systems down in a crisis. Twenty firms and research institutions in Japan, including Toyota, NEC, and the government itself, are backing the RIKEN research Institute. Many of these groups believe that we are within striking distance of the tipping point and that AI itself is now not only inevitable but may be the only solution to the chaos that will inevitably follow its own birth.

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14-01-2017 om 21:55 geschreven door peter  

Still Searching for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI)

Riding the wave of popular enthusiasm for 'Star Wars' and the Marvel universe, the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) has found renewed interest and funding.

Irrespective of Hollywood's perspective on the implications of alien contact, the dialogues that would inevitably follow an actual encounter are enormous, almost too staggering to conceive. Imagine the questions we could ask a visiting extraterrestrial: Do you have a cure for cancer? Is there life after death? Are the physical laws in your part of the universe the same as in ours? Is there a way to overcome the burden of gravity, prolong youth, exceed the speed of light...? Think of the things we could learn, among them, as Carl Sagan put it, how "possibly to avoid the dangers of the period of technological adolescence we are now passing through."

SETI

Yet despite the obvious benefits to be reaped from such contact, there exists a vociferous group that appears to oppose any and all efforts to make it. Riding the wave of popular enthusiasm for Star Wars and the Marvel universe, the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) has found renewed interest and funding. Its detractors have argued that after untold sums of money and over half a century, there has been not a single piece of credible evidence that their exists life outside of our universe.

Vintage OMNI: The Future of Space Travel

Much to the skeptical late Senator Proxmire's disappointment, NASA joined in SETI efforts at a low-level in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Some of these SETI-related efforts included Project Orion, the Microwave Observing Project, the High Resolution Microwave Survey, and Toward Other Planetary Systems. On Columbus Day in 1992, NASA initiated a formal, more intensive, SETI program. Less than a year later, however, congress canceled the program. For nearly two decades, SETI was secondary to the search for new technology and ideas here on Earth, in the dawn of the digital age.

In 2015, Stephen Hawking and Russian billionaire Yuri Milner announced a well-funded effort, called the Breakthrough Initiatives to expand efforts of space travel and the search for extraterrestrial life.

Solar-Polar Orbiter

Throughout the 1970s, SETI projects were not the only imaginative opportunities to be fleeced by then Senator Edward William "Bill" Proxmire. Funds for the Solar-Polar Orbiter, a spacecraft designed to fly over the poles of the sun, were cut as were funds slated to outfit the Enterprise, the test space shuttle. As one vintage writer put it, the cuts left "barely enough to keep the Enterprise from being cannibalized for spare parts." Similarly, Proxmire vigorously opposed the Apollo-Soyuz rendezvous on the grounds that the Russians were somehow inferior to us in aerospace. This has been debunked, as evidence now shows that the space race was actually quite close. The senator seemed blind to the fact that the Russians were there first with Sputnik and that the Soviets were regularly sending men into space before Neil Armstrong.

Paul Davies' Search for Alien Intelligence

The Eerie Silence: Renewing Our Search for Alien Intelligence

Via: amazon.com

Buy Now

The arguments behind this depreciation of a government sponsored space program are simple: the program itself is too expensive, we get too little for the money spent, and, besides, it could be better deployed on such things as poverty, education, and national infrastructure spends. This has led to a migration of brain power to the private sector and what is becoming the privatization of space

Neil Armstrong

Ironically, we got a great deal for the money we spent on the 20th century race for space and listening for aliens. The development of communications satellites alone, an advance that has done more for human understanding than all the social welfare projects funded to date, would seem worth the cost. Moreover, who can put a dollar value on the tremendous uplifting of the human spirit that occurred on July 20, 1969, when Neil Armstrong walked on the surface of the moon, setting the tone for America's world leadership? In a time where we have serious deficits in our world leadership, fragile economies and very little that unites us globally, SETI remains rare exception. There is still a vast unknown that may be the answer to the human condition.

Finally, it is foolish to think that money cut from space programs will actually be used to better the quality of life here on earth. Lumped under the general category of "defense," more than 60 percent of the federal budget for research and development, for example, still goes to the creation of newer and more sophisticated means of destruction. We may have ended the space race, but we never stopped the arms race.

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14-01-2017 om 21:44 geschreven door peter  

UFOs: The Stiff Reality of a Flexible Phenomenon

by RYAN SPRAGUE

When facing the UFO phenomenon head on, the most problematic question one may ask is actually the most simple: Are UFOs real?

The answer is yes. The answer is always yes. In fact, it’s literally right there in the letters; UFO. It is, in essence, an object in flight that is unidentified. Perhaps the most common place definition comes from the late astronomer, J. Allen Hynek. In his book, 'The UFO Experience: A Scientific Inquiry', Hynek dryly yet appropriately describes a UFO as being:

“… the reported perception of an object or light seen in the sky or upon the land. The appearance, trajectory, and general dynamic and luminescent behavior of which do not suggest a logical, conventional explanation and which is not only mystifying to the original percipients but remains unidentified after close scrutiny of all available evidence by persons who are technically capable of making a common sense identification, if one is possible.”

It doesn’t get much more self-explanatory than that. But where did this painfully obvious term stem from? And why, throughout the past sixty years or so, has it become not so obvious? The acronym was coined by Captain Edward Ruppelt, who in 1953, led the official investigation into aerial phenomena through the channels of the U.S. Air Force. To further the public from any notion that these objects were extraterrestrial, Ruppelt , serving as a catch-all for the mysterious objects appearing, flying, and sometimes floating through the skies. The acronym stuck, remaining the go-to letters for almost every media outlet known to man.

Thousands and thousands of declassified documents by intelligence agencies around the world can be found in reference to UFOs. These documents boast reports from the simply mundane misidentifications and natural phenomena, to the most intriguing and perplexing, begging more questions on just exactly what these UFOs are and are not. Here, in the United States, we left it up to the military to investigate what could potentially be a threat to our own safety on the hard ground below and the cushioned security of our skies above. Let’s take a look at how it all began.

The Official Study of the Phenomenon Begins… and Ends

The U.S. Air Force first attempted to decipher the enigmatic code behind these aerial phenomena back in 1947 with Project Sign. As the project’s personnel compiled case after case of sightings, they argued that what they seemed to be dealing with was, in fact something of extraterrestrial intelligence. However, this notion was quickly swept under the rug, and replaced in 1949 by Project Grudge. Headed by aeronautical engineer, Edward J Ruppelt, Project Grudge was in essence, a continuation of looking into these phenomena with a much more objective eye, dismantling the possibility that UFO activity was caused by anything but natural and/or manmade anomalies and intervention.

The study of UFOs continued in its final iteration, Project Blue Book, in 1952 with chief investigator, Hector Quintanilla. This was the longest, and most publicized Air Force study which compiled over 12,000 reports of sightings in the western world alone. Project Blue Book continued until 1968, when the Air Force-funded Condon Committee was created to draft a final report on their findings.

Physicist, Edward U. Condon, and an investigative group out of the University of Colorado, used files from Project Blue Book and several independent UFO research organizations to determine that, first and foremost, UFOs caused no threat to national security. They also concluded that there was absolutely no scientific evidence proving that UFOs were extraterrestrial in origin. And with that, the official American study of the phenomenon came to a whimpering end. But that didn’t stop certain members of these projects from looking further into the phenomenon and case reports.

Civilian Research Organizations

Many individuals within the government were involved in the study of UFOs. Most notably of these individuals was none other than the aforementioned J. Allen Hynek. Hynek, having been a lead investigator all throughout Project Grudge and Project Blue Book, was first hired to explain away each and every UFO report as natural or manmade phenomena. But after seeing Blue Book out until the very end, he simply couldn’t accept that that was a conventional explanation for every sighting or incident. His skeptical view slowly tilted to a more open-minded approach, favoring the idea that some of the UFOs being seen could, in fact, be of an extraterrestrial or non-human intelligence. And in 1973, he would found the Chicago-based Center for UFO Studies (CUFOS). This organization consisted of many credible scientists and researchers who evaluated UFO reports in a careful and thorough way. To this day, a large archive of the work done by Hynek and CUFOS can be found through various online outlets and through the publication of Hynek’s definitive book, The UFO Experience: A Scientific Inquiry.

While many other organizations came and went, perhaps the most visible and well known would have to be the Mutual UFO Network (MUFON). Originally founded by Walt Andrus, a technology manager and educator, and John Schuessler, a retired aerospace engineer, the two would invite many of their colleagues to join the organization, such as notable nuclear physicist, Stanton Friedman and optical physicist, Dr. Bruce Maccabee. Using their technical and analytical skills in many different arenas throughout the years, MUFON now boasts chapters in every single state, investigating cases of aerial phenomena, close encounters, and in its most modern iteration, even supposed alien abduction cases. Investigators bring their reports and data to the state directors who then follow up on many of the cases with an objective and critical approach. MUFON remains active today, hosting several large conferences throughout the year and an annual journal of case reports.

Unlike the investigative organizations above, there is another ambitious undertaking that consists of compilation of UFO reports by the public. The National UFO Reporting Center, (NUFORC) founded in 1974 by Robert J. Gribble, the center has catalogued a staggering 90,000 reports in its history. Aside from its cataloguing endeavors, the center also provides regional statistics to assist specific geographical needs of those who seek information about local sightings and reports. The center remains active as this book is being published, having been taken over in 1994 by Peter Davenport, a former MUFON member, and professor of genetics and biochemistry. Davenport sing-handily runs the center from his home, and updates case reports on a weekly basis.

While many other civilian organizations have come and gone, the challenge for each seemed to be that of funding. Each organization held highly esteemed scientists and every facet, yet very little money had ever been set into place to provide any substantial sustainability. This is something the scientific community, UFOs aside, have always wrestled with. How does one fund their research when theory is their only means in which to progress? Perhaps this may be why scientific study into the UFO phenomenon lay deep on the fringe, splintering off into the above organizations in all their ambitious efforts. Perhaps by looking closer at the relationship between mainstream science and the UFO phenomenon, we can begin to narrow in on the phenomenon’s deeply embedded, and often ridiculed reputation.

Mainstream Science and UFOs

After the sobering determination made by the Condon Committee’s report, all hope of a possible intelligent extraterrestrial presence seemed to dissipate. But a small shred of debate by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) cracked open the possibility that the scientific community wasn’t completely against the notion of a possible alien phenomenon. In response to the Condon Report, the AIAA noted that at least thirty percent of cases studied remained unexplained by conventional and natural sciences, and that scientific benefit could still be gained by furthering the study of the phenomenon.

Michael Shermer, publisher of Skeptic Magazine and contributor to Scientific American, once stated that:

“In all fields of science there is a residue of anomalies unexplained by the dominant theory. That does not mean the prevailing theory is wrong or that alternative theories are right. It just means that more work needs to be done to bring those anomalies into the accepted paradigm. In the meantime, it is okay to live with the uncertainty that not everything has an explanation.”

While Shermer accepts living in this uncertainty, many scientists keep the current paradigm in a stagnant purgatory, not only by ignoring the UFO phenomenon entirely but refusing to even acknowledge the potential of such technologies and how they could ultimately benefit both science and on a greater scale, humanity. But the dark cloud looking above has always been that of pure ridicule, a festering specter whispering in the collective scientific ear that UFOs are simply bunk, and not worth the time, talents, or intelligence of some of the greatest thinkers in history. In a field where thought reigns supreme, and reputations hang on the threads of governmental influence, far-out theories on exotic aircraft of potentially non-human intelligence could completely overshadow even the most influential of scientists and the contributions they have made to their respective fields. But there are those who are willing to put their thoughts in the face of ridicule and speak publicly about such fringe topics, and are willing to call others out for their woeful ignorance to the topic in general.

Of those who reject it right out, “They’re wrong, naive, stubborn, narrow-minded, afraid and fearful,” says Eric Davis, an American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics award winning- propulsion physicist at the Institute of Advanced Studies. In an interview with Lee Spiegel of the Huffington Post, Davis would elaborate: “It’s a dirty word (UFOs) and a forbidden topic. Science is about open-minded inquiry. You shouldn’t be laughing people off. You should show more deference and respect to them. Scientists need to get back to using the scientific method to study things that are unknown and unusual, and the UFO subject is one of them.”

While such accusations can seem generalized, Davis also admits that there are many scientists who do study the phenomenon, if even from the peripheral. “There are those who are aware of the evidence and observational data that is irrefutable. It is absolutely corroborated, using forensic techniques and methodology. But they won’t come out and publicize that because they fear it. Not the subject, but the backlash from their professional colleagues.”

Davis goes on to admit that this topic isn’t just meant to be studied by the scientific community. “It’s the domain of military intelligence,” he suggests. “The fact that [unknown] craft are flying around Earth is not a subject for science, it’s a subject for intelligence-gathering, collection and analysis. That’s because UFOs are not a natural phenomenon, and that’s what science studies.”

Whatever these UFOs may or may not be, they seem to defy most conventional propulsion theories that we readily know of here on our planet. But therein lay the limitations scientific methodology. For instance, why do UFOs, making the most dramatic and unconventional maneuvers, need to be piloted by some sort of biological entity? Why is this the reason that some scientists dismiss the objects being piloted craft whose said pilots could not conceivably survive such speeds, velocity, or maneuvers? We send hundreds of unmanned spacecraft out into the heavens constantly for this very reason. What if the objects we witness, racing, floating, and suddenly appearing and disappearing in our skies are nothing more than highly advance drones from somewhere off-planet? Perhaps it could be best summarized by theoretical physicist, Michio Kaku. He once remarked:

“Some scientists have scoffed at UFOs because they don’t fit any of the gigantic propulsion designs being considered by engineers today, such as ramjet fusion engines, huge laser-powered sails and nuclear pulsed engines, which might be miles across. But UFOs can be as small as a jet airplane, and can refuel from a nearby moon base. So sightings may correspond to unmanned reconnaissance ships.”

So if we are dealing with potential craft (some being unmanned perhaps, some not) entering our atmosphere from space, who better to carry the proverbial weight of UFO observation and possible investigation than those who study celestial bodies and space itself? With the most powerful telescopes observing objects of great distance, and individuals with vast knowledge of what could potentially lay within and beyond earth’s atmosphere, it would be more than appropriate for astronomers to play a large role in the search for truth behind these elusive anomalies.

In 2010, a barrage of UFO sightings saturated the headlines of Chinese newspapers, reports coming in almost on a daily basis. As strange lights and solid objects plagued the skies of China, local airports were temporarily shut down until the objects could no longer be observed as a potential threat for landings and takeoff. Clearly, this was turning into more than just a simple misidentification by civilians.

Planetary astronomer, Wang Sichao, of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, investigated many of these sightings throughout the years, taking a keen interest in the phenomenon as it hit closer and closer to home at the Purple Mountain Observatory where he worked. In at interview with the Beijing Review, Sichao would comment on the UFO reports as “events of credible facts backed by observation. But these facts cannot yet be explained by existing scientific knowledge or natural phenomena.” And while Sichao took on the bulk of UFO sightings in China for self interest and curiosity, he would go on to explain why astronomers are not primarily in the business of searching for or investigating UFO reports: “The reason is that a UFO only appears randomly and often disappears rapidly in a few minutes,” he would continue. “By the time large professional telescopes are started up, it has already disappeared. So, we can only rely on information from occasional sightings or encounters by observers.”

In his book, The UFO Phenomenon: Should I Believe?, author and scientist, Dr. Robert Davis points out that:

“Evidence within Ufology is largely based on such anecdotal claims, it is very difficult to build testable hypotheses to either reject or confirm through a validation process, such as, testing predictions against observations to confirm a hypothesis…. ufology would greatly benefit from collaborative research efforts with the scientific community, but instead, have often alienated (no pun intended) them.”

It would seem that with the amount of dedicated scientists connected to the study of UFOs in its sordid independent organizational past, that rigorous scientific method and mainstream acceptance would gradually become inevitable. But with such a complex and frustrating phenomenon taunting us from the corner, it just doesn’t seem to be moving as swiftly as we may have hoped it would. To further the point that science and UFO studies are not exactly in synch, Richard Hall, assistant director of the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena (NICAP) once stated: “Although the ranks of Ufology contain the seeds of science, it should not now pretend to be a science, but a popular movement advocating scientific investigation. It should (and could) clarify and present the factual evidence in a manner designed to encourage a true scientific investigation, which would make use of all the techniques and facilities available to science today.”

The Journey Begins

So while we seem to have varying opinions on a governmental, scientific, and civilian level, one factor remains constant: UFOs are on the mind of individuals in every walk of life, from the simple observer on the side of the road, to the most forward-thinking (and sometimes skeptical) scientists of yesterday and today. So again, we are faced with many dilemmas of how to move forward. These phenomena are far more complex than a singular non-human intelligence pulling the proverbial strings of mystery. A fellow colleague of mine, author and researcher, Micah Hanks, suggested the following in his book, The UFO Singularity:

“The mere proof of official interest in the UFO presence throughout the years cannot by itself make concrete the existence of intelligent life elsewhere in the universe, nor can it prove that any single phenomenon can be attributed solely to the identity of the kinds of unidentifiable aircraft in our skies…probing even deeper into the mystery, there could yet be stranger solutions to the enigma that exists somewhere in our midst.”

Conclusions

While we continue to search for these strange answers in our midst, we also continue to question the approaches we take in that search. Whether it be from the anecdotal evidence of eyewitnesses or the analytical eye of scientists throughout the world, the phenomenon remains as elusive as ever. So in all its enigmatic glory, all we can truly do is continue to search somewhere in the skies for the answers we seek, and the questions we crave. Will we be satisfied with the answers science eventually gives us? Or will we deny it, leading us back down the path of the illogical and immeasurable? Only time will truly tell. And in that telling, we can be certain of one thing: the UFO phenomenon isn’t going to ever leave us. In fact, it seems that it has only begun its invasion on our curious, and ever-expanding minds.

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Ryan Sprague is the author of 'Somewhere in the Skies: A Human Approach to an Alien Phenomenon' (Available on Amazon). He's written for Open Minds Magazine, Phenomena Magazine, and UFO Truth Magazine. Speaking on the UFO topic, he has been featured on ABC News, Fox News, and The Science Channel. He is a regular on the Travel Channel's 'Mysteries at the Museum'. When not writing, he is the co-host for both the 'Into the Fray' & 'UFOmodPOD' podcasts, available on iTunes. Learn more at www.somewhereintheskies.com

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14-01-2017 om 21:33 geschreven door peter