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How Will We Make First Contact With Aliens: Doritos, Lights, or Music?

Reaching out to life beyond our planet is a lot messier than you might think.

JOHN WENZ

Recently, a group called METI International made waves by pointing a radio telescope based in Norway toward Luyten’s Star, a quiet, humdrum star 12.36 light years away with two Earth-mass-ish planets right in the “habitable zone” where water, under the right conditions, would stay liquid—and could potentially support life.

The man behind the message (for a planet that could possibly, maybe have life, transmitted as music along with a few math equations), was Douglas Vakoch, a psychologist and SETI researcher. Vakoch chose one of Luyten’s Star’s planets (called GJ 273b) chiefly based on its proximity. The message—which combines music and math—works like a clock, setting a rhythm for the music, then broadcasting it through two different tones to create a binary message, he told Wired.

“Sending intentional signals and waiting for a reply requires tremendous patience, and with Luyten’s Star we have the prospect of getting a response in just a quarter of a century—a blink of the eye on galactic timescales,” Vakoch said. At 12.36 light years, a civilization could receive the message in 2029-2030 and get one back to us by 2042—barely any time at all in cosmic terms.

The message wasn’t without controversy. There are plenty of critics of METI, or Active SETI as the practice is frequently also called, as opposed to the more “passive” listening of other SETI programs. But while sci-fi or any stray Stephen Hawking thought might provoke fears of an alien invasion, critics of METI fall more frequently into a different camp: Who should be making the call to our neighbors?

Shelley Wright, a physicist at the University of California-San Diego, began working on SETI initiatives in 1999. Despite their similar sounding names, METI and SETI are separate organizations. While the movie Contact made the popular image of a SETI researcher one hunting for radio signals, Wright has been looking for light beacons coming from other civilizations (a process known as optical SETI).

She also co-signed a 2015 statement urging researches to think long and hard about sending messages to other planets. The list includes a “who’s who” of SETI and exoplanet researchers alongside a few science writers and, of course, Elon Musk. The possibility of a millions-Earth-year-more-advanced civilization is raised in the letter, but the last point is perhaps the central thesis to the letter. “Intentionally signaling other civilizations in the Milky Way Galaxy raises concerns from all the people of Earth, about both the message and the consequences of contact,” the letter says. “A worldwide scientific, political and humanitarian discussion must occur before any message is sent.”

“My primary concern is that individual rogue voices are representing humanity without our collective consent and given an opportunity to join the discussion,” Wright said.

By “rogue voices,” she may very well mean Vakoch’s stream of thought. She wasn’t particularly impressed with Vakoch’s musical math message, telling The Daily Beast, “I enjoyed learning about their signal and it seemed like a fun activity for those involved, but the majority of these activities have to do with the thrill factor of sending a beacon, and for gaining exposure for that particular organization and/or facility.”

But Vakoch’s message isn’t the first—nor will it be the last.

The most famous signal is one drawn up by Carl Sagan and Frank Drake in 1974 and blasted out of the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico. It featured information on DNA, the numbers one through 10, a human figure, a crude guide to our solar system, and a pixelated radio dish, all encoded as a very simple bitmap that could be reconstructed in binary.

But not all messages are created equally, like attempts that amounted to sending a Dorito’s commercial to another planet or some plain-language text messages and a few theremin pieces beamed at six nearby targets—inelegant, indecipherable, and self-serving. (Also, one Active SETI message was just aBeatles song blasted into space.)

Vakoch staunchly believes his message is different from the rest.

“Past interstellar messages have tried to talk about everything, at the risk of communicating nothing,” Vakoch said. “Instead, we focus on communicating a few key mathematical and scientific principles needed to explain radio waves themselves.”

Wright pointed to the Pioneer Plaque, a simple plate aboard the Pioneer 10 and 11 craft, as an example of an Active SETI message that seemed right to her. The plates featured a map of radio-loud compact stars called “pulsars” that would help point back toward Earth. It also featured a neutral hydrogen atom diagram and a drawing of a nude man and woman, and a diagram of our solar system. The spiritual successors to the Pioneer missions, the Voyager 1 and 2 crafts, had a similar plate placed over a phonographic record made of gold. That record featured music, encoded images, dozens of languages, and more. (Drake and Sagan were instrumental in the creation of both the record and the plaque.)

Wright says the right way to go about it is to let a consortium of organizations examine what we should send, how the message should be encoded, and what kind of power is needed. She says the exploration of this idea is important to SETI research, in fact. But also, that just because we could send something out doesn’t mean that we should.

“Before sending a message I believe there needs to be extensive international based endeavor, potentially United Nations level,” she says. “The involvement should include scientists, politicians, and the general public that is 100% transparent.”

This surprisingly echoes Vakoch’s sentiments, even if in the views of some researchers he jumped the gun a little.

“My dream is that António Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations, would put this at the top of his agenda, so we could get the sort of broad based international discussion this topic deserves,” he says. But there’s a big point of difference between he and Wright. While Wright wants to wait for this conversation, Vakoch says that, “Until then, organizations with interests in interstellar communication have a special obligation to promote that discussion.”

Vakoch convened a group in May of this year to discuss what that message would take. Input from that meeting went into the Luyten’s Star message sent in October, which is music encoded with bits of science and physics knowledge. In April 2018, METI will send out some follow-up messages getting a little bit more in the weeds with a music lesson meant to teach melody, put together by 33 artists at the electronic 2018 Sónar Festival.

“That will allow us to introduce the fundamentals of musical melodies by turning the transmitter into a musical instrument itself, and demonstrating music through the structure of the radio signals and their relationship  to one another,” Vakoch said.

If other Active SETI groups want to join in similar efforts, he urges them to keep exact records to help out researchers receiving any reply decades later. Eventually, he hopes for an optical beam of METI’s own. But for right now, he’s just ready to get things underway.

“[We] may need to repeat these transmissions to hundreds, thousands, or even millions of stars before we get a response,” Vakoch said. “And that will require a fundamental shift of mindset that views science as a multigenerational project. So METI will continue to transmit to other stars in the coming months and years, starting with the stars closest to Earth and methodically moving outward.”

But to Wright and others, the impatience may have the peril of misrepresenting our species.

“The process of METI I believe is really important for the world to jointly think about what our message would be for first contact with another alien civilization,” she said.

{ https://www.thedailybeast.com/ }

10-12-2017 om 23:36 geschreven door peter  

How Area 51 became the center of alien conspiracy theories

Corey Protin and Matthew Stuart

Area 51 has been the focal point of alien conspiracy theories in America for decades. The remote military base in the Nevada desert has a lot of history, and has been associated with aliens almost since its inception. Here's why. Following is a transcript of the video:

In the early 1950s, US planes were conducting low-flying recon missions over the USSR. But there were constant worries of them being spotted and shot down.

So … in 1954, President Eisenhower authorized the development of a top secret, high-altitude recon aircraft Dubbed Project Aquatone. The program required a remote location that wasn't easily accessible to civilians or spies. Area 51 fit the bill perfectly.

It was in the Nevada desert near a salt flat called Groom Lake. No one knows exactly why it's called Area 51, but one theory suggests it came from its proximity to the Nevada Nuclear Test Sites. The Nevada Test Site was divided into number-designated areas by the Atomic Energy Commission. The location was already familiar territory for the military, as it had served as a World War II aerial gunnery range.

In the summer of 1955, sightings of "unidentified flying objects" were reported around Area 51. That's because the Air Force had begun its testing of the U-2 aircraft. The U-2 can fly higher than 60,000 feet. At the time, normal airliners were flying in the 10,000 to 20,000 feet range. While military aircraft topped out around 40,000 feet. So if a pilot spotted the tiny speck that was the U-2 high above it, they would have no idea what it was. And they would usually let air traffic control know someone was out there. Which is what led to the increase of UFO sightings in the area. While Air Force officials knew the UFO sightings were U-2 tests, they couldn’t really tell the public. So they explained the aircraft sightings by saying they were "natural phenomena" and "high-altitude weather research."

The testing of the U-2 ended in the late 1950s; but, Area 51 has continued to serve as the testing ground for many aircraft, including the F-117A, A-12, and TACIT BLUE.

No one knows for sure what Area 51 is up to these days. The government never even publicly acknowledged the existence of the base until 2013, with the release of declassified CIA reports. But if you’re ever at the Las Vegas airport, keep an eye out for some small, unmarked, passenger planes in a fenced-off area. They're how Area 51 employees get to work from their homes in Vegas.

This first video was first published on July 13, 2017.

{ http://uk.businessinsider.com/ }

10-12-2017 om 23:23 geschreven door peter  

Boeing Vs. Elon: How Dennis Muilenburg Could Actually Beat Musk to Mars

Boeing might have one huge advantage over SpaceX.

By Alasdair Wilkins

SpaceX founder Elon Musk threw down the gantlet Thursday on the race to Mars. He took to Twitter to issue a simple “Do it” in response to Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg’s assertion that the first person on Mars would get there on one of his company’s rockets.

While Musk’s much-publicized Mars dreams have dominated the conversation around human exploration of the red planet, could Muilenburg actually be right? Does Boeing have what it takes to pull ahead of SpaceX and take the first humans to Mars? To answer that, it’s useful to understand just where each company currently stands and where they are hoping to go.

While there still remain plenty of unanswered questions about the specifics of the companies’ Mars plans, it does appear there’s a key difference in how SpaceX and Boeing view themselves in relation to NASA, and that distinction could shape their eventual paths to the red planet.

Musk’s Mars plans see SpaceX as the main driver. The work SpaceX does in low Earth orbit — both right now as a NASA contractor with its Falcon 9 rocket and in the future with its planned successor, the BFR — are about bringing in the funds and resources necessary so that SpaceX can pay for its own Mars plans. Plans can obviously change a lot between now and 2022, when Musk says the first uncrewed BFR will make the journey to Mars, but for now he has consistently described it as an entirely private venture.

Boeing, on the other hand, generally describes itself more as a collaborator with NASA. It is developing the Space Launch System in partnership with the space agency. The SLS is the equivalent of SpaceX’s BFR, in that its primary goal is to carry human beyond low Earth orbit for the first time since Apollo 17, with a trip to Mars very much parts of its long-term goal. But whereas SpaceX would presumably have sole discretion over how the BFR is used, Boeing is developing the SLS for NASA’s eventual use.

This is where it’s worth paying attention to Muilenburg’s specific phrasing in his comments to CNBC’s Jim Cramer: “Eventually we’re going to go to Mars and I firmly believe the first person that sets foot on Mars will get there on a Boeing rocket.”

A Boeing rocket, but not necessarily a Boeing mission — based on its current trajectory, it’s more plausible that a Boeing-built SLS rocket would be used on a NASA mission to Mars. And while NASA has experienced plenty of uncertainty and budgetary cutbacks over the past decade in its efforts to get humans back to the moon or go to Mars, it still remains the only organization, public or private, to ever take humans beyond low Earth orbit, and it has all the budgetary resources of the United States government.

Elon Musk and SpaceX might have the most single-minded commitment to getting humans to Mars, but Boeing’s closer partnership could — emphasis on could — end up giving them an advantage.

Right now, it’s safe to say that SpaceX is quite a ways ahead of Boeing in actually demonstrating what it can do as a commercial spaceflight company. While Musk’s Mars ambitions still have a ways to go before they are realized, SpaceX has established that it’s damn good at launching and recovering uncrewed rockets that can take satellites into orbit and deliver payloads to the International Space Station. Its Falcon 9 rocket has gone 16 for 16 in launches this year, with the long-awaited Falcon Heavy set for its maiden flight in January.

Boeing, on the other hand, has eschewed uncrewed rockets in favor of the development of the CST-100 Starliner, aa capsule designed to carry astronauts to the International Space Station. It’s working on that project as part of NASA’s Commercial Crew Development program, which is the space agency’s ongoing effort to support private companies as they develop spacecraft capable of carrying crewed missions to Earth’s orbit.

SpaceX is also involved in that program as it works to redevelop its Dragon capsule to carry people. Boeing and SpaceX are by far the biggest recipients of NASA funding for this project, with Boeing receiving $4.8 billion and SpaceX $3.1 billion of the total $8.3 billion the space agency has invested. And while both companies have pushed the initial deadlines for when their crewed capsules would make their first flights, 2018 is shaping up as a big year for both.

The current plan calls for SpaceX’s Dragon V2.0 to make an uncrewed test flight in February, with a first crewed flight to the ISS provisionally scheduled for June or later. The uncrewed Boeing test is set for June, with a crewed test flight in August and a maiden flight to the ISS in December.

Once one or both of these companies demonstrate they can actually take people into space, we can officially start talking a lot more seriously about who can make it to Mars first. For now, this is mostly speculative, and for all we know it’s entirely possible that it could be NASA and SpaceX, not Boeing, that end up working together to get the first humans to Mars. If nothing else, the next year at least gets us a step closer to taking the companies’ rivalries off of Twitter and onto the launchpad.

---

Hello! You've made it to the end of the article. Nice. Here's a related video you might like: "SpaceX Falcon 9 Blooper Landing"

{ https://www.inverse.com/ }

10-12-2017 om 23:09 geschreven door peter  

Humanity would welcome the discovery of ET despite fears of an alien invasion, predict psychologists

• Psychologists believe we would be positive about finding out aliens were real
• Scientists looked at responses to five 'alien' announcements in the last 50 years  
• Nasa believes there are dozens of worlds that could harbour alien life
• The space agency believes alien life will be found in the next few decades 

By Phoebe Weston For Mailonline

From ET to Spock, we've always toyed with the idea of extra-terrestrial life -  but how would humans react if it actually turned out to be true?

Psychologists believe we would be positive about finding out we were not alone, according to a study that looked at people's responses to five key 'alien' announcements since 1967 - and they appeared to be largely positive. 

This is despite warnings from scientists such as Stephen Hawking who say we should 'be wary' about answering alien signals.

Research released last week found there are dozens of likely worlds - including Pluto (pictured) and its moons - that could harbour alien life. Researchers at Arizona State University are trying to anticipate how humans would react if a discovery such as this came back positive

WILL WE FIND ALIEN LIFE?

Nasa scientists have claimed alien life could be found within the next few decades.

Experts say the search is heavily guided by characteristics of our own planet, helping scientists to weed out inhospitable worlds from those that may have promise for life, such as the icy moons Enceladus and Europa.

Nasa scientists are looking for environments that contain both oxygen and methane.

When these two gases are found in the same atmosphere, 'you've got something special,' the space agency says.

'There are ways to build up oxygen and methane in a planetary atmosphere, but the only way you could have both in the same atmosphere at the same time is if you produce them both super rapidly,' said Shawn Domagal-Goldman, of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center.

Michael Varnum, a psychologist at Arizona State University is trying to anticipate how humans would react if a discovery like this came back positive.

'One of the initial questions [of the initiative] that we're curious about is how might we respond if we discover evidence of extraterrestrial life', he told Washington Post.

Published online on a preprint server, the paper looks at the psychological reactions to extraterrestrial life in a 'systematic, careful way'.

In the first experiment Dr Varnum and his colleagues looked at five key events; the discovery of pulsars in 1967; the detection of the 'Wow!' radio signal in 1977; the announcement of fossilised microbes on a Martian meteorite in 1996; the behaviour of Tabby's Star in 2005 and the discovery of exoplanets within the Goldilocks zone in 2015.

In astronomy and astrobiology, the habitable zone is the range of orbits around a star in which a planet can support liquid water.

Since the concept was first presented in 1953, many stars have been shown to have a Goldilocks area, and some of them have one or several planets in this zone, like 'Kepler-186f', discovered in 2014.

Psychologists looked at fifteen articles using a program that scans for positive or negative words. 

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British astronomer Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell was the first person to discover a pulsar in 1967 when she spotted a radio pulsar (artist's impression) which was thought could be alien life

'The reaction seemed to be much more positive than negative,' found Dr Varnum.

Researchers also got 500 people to describe how they would feel if aliens were discovered and how they thought people more generally would react.

Participants said they themselves would feel positive but felt most people would not be so excited about the discovery.

SIGNS OF ALIEN LIFE? 

Discovery of pulsars

British astronomer Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell was the first person to discover a pulsar in 1967 when she spotted a radio pulsar.

Since then other types of pulsars that emit x-rays and gamma rays have also been spotted.

Pulsars are essentially rotating, highly magnatised neutron stars but when they were first discovered it was believed they could come from aliens.

'Wow!' radio signal

In 1977, an astronomer looking for alien life in the nigh sky above Ohio spotted a powerful radio signal so strong that he excitedly wrote 'Wow!' next to his data.

1. In 1977, an astronomer looking for alien life in the nigh sky above Ohio spotted a powerful radio signal so strong that he excitedly wrote 'Wow!' next to his data

The 72-second blast, spotted by Dr Jerry Ehman through a radio telescope, came from Sagittarius but matched no known celestial object.

Conspiracy theorists have since claimed that the 'Wow! signal', which was 30 times stronger than background radiation, was a message from intelligent extraterrestrials.

Fossilised martian microbes

In 1996 Nasa and the White House made the explosive announcement that the rock contained traces of Martian bugs.

The meteorite, catalogued as Allen Hills (ALH) 84001, crashed onto the frozen wastes of Antarctica 13,000 years ago and was recovered in 1984. 

Photographs were released showing elongated segmented objects that appeared strikingly lifelike.

Photographs were released showing elongated segmented objects that appeared strikingly lifelike (pictured)

However, the excitement did not last long. Other scientists questioned whether the meteorite samples were contaminated. 

They also argued that heat generated when the rock was blasted into space may have created mineral structures that could be mistaken for microfossils. 

Behaviour of Tabby's Star in 2005 

The star, otherwise known as KIC 8462852, is located 1,400 light years away and has baffled astonomers since being discovered in 2015.

It dims at a much faster rate than other stars, which some experts have suggested is a sign of aliens harnessing the energy of a star.

The star, otherwise known as KIC 8462852, is located 1,400 light years away and has baffled astonomers since being discovered in 2015 (artist's impression)

Recent studies have 'eliminated the possibility of an alien megastructure', and instead, suggests that a ring of dust could be causing the strange signals.

Exoplanets in the Goldilocks zone in 2015 

In February this year astronomers announced they had spotted a star system with planets that could support life just 39 light years away.

Seven Earth-like planets were discovered orbiting nearby dwarf star 'Trappist-1', and all of them could have water at their surface, one of the key components of life.

Three of the planets have such good conditions, that scientists say life may have already evolved on them. 

Researchers claim that they will know whether or not there is life on any of the planets within a decade, and said 'this is just the beginning.' 

This could be because 'most Americans tend to think, on any desirable trait or ability, that they're better than the average person,' Dr Varnum said.

In the third part of the experiment researchers presented a 1996 article reporting bacteria on a Martian meteorite.

The consensus is now that they were just mineral deposits but those participating in the experiment were left to believe they were forms of life.

They still described their reactions positively, leading Gordon Pennycook, a Yale University psychologist who was not involved in the experiment to say he was 'pretty confident' humans would be pleased if aliens were discovered.

Dr Varnum warned these results were based on American publications and it is possible the rest of the world would respond differently.

Physicist Stephen Hawking has previously warned we we should 'be wary' about answering alien signals, and suggests an advanced civilization could attempt to colonise Earth.

Hawking said if we were to really meet an advanced civilisation, it could be similar to when the Native Americans first encountered Christopher Columbus – and ‘that didn't turn out so well’.

SHOULD WE BE WARY? 

If there are any intelligent alien life forms out there, Stephen Hawking thinks we're playing a dangerous game by trying to contact them.

The physicist believes if aliens discovered Earth, they are likely to want to conquer and colonise our planet.

'If aliens visit us, the outcome could be much like when Columbus landed in America, which didn't turn out well for the Native Americans,' he said in an interview.

But co-founder and former director of the Seti Institute, Jill Tarter, doesn't think this will be the case.

She argues any aliens who have managed to travel across the universe will be sophisticated enough to be friendly and peaceful.

'The idea of a civilisation which has managed to survive far longer than we have...and the fact that that technology remains an aggressive one, to me, doesn't make sense,' she said.

Seven Earth-like planets were discovered orbiting nearby dwarf star 'Trappist-1', and all of them could have water at their surface, one of the key components of life (artist's impression)

Last month Nasa scientists claimed alien life could be found within the next few decades.

Experts say the search is heavily guided by characteristics of our own planet, helping scientists to weed out inhospitable worlds from those that may have promise for life, such as the icy moons Enceladus and Europa.

Nasa scientists are looking for environments that contain both oxygen and methane.

When these two gases are found in the same atmosphere, 'you've got something special,' the space agency says.

'There are ways to build up oxygen and methane in a planetary atmosphere, but the only way you could have both in the same atmosphere at the same time is if you produce them both super rapidly,' said Shawn Domagal-Goldman, of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center.

Video playing bottom right...

 

 

 { http://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

10-12-2017 om 22:56 geschreven door peter  

Why we haven't encountered extraterrestrial life? Blame it on false communication, say experts

By Poulami Nag

YouTube

Although we haven't found aliens yet, we have established the fact that communicating successfully with extraterrestrial beings is a difficult job. The number of solar systems present in the universe and the vast distance between them makes it extremely tricky to comprehend where to start and how. However, the most important question is what if the methods we are employing are not even comprehensible to them?

If intelligent extraterrestrial civilizations exist out there in the universe and if they are trying to reach out to us, there are multiple ways of communication that they might be using. For example, it can be visible lights; if they are technologically more advanced they could use the ultraviolet light and X-rays or it is also possible for them to make use of a completely different wavelength along the electromagnetic spectrum.

Recently, a Breakthrough Listen project surveyed around 700 stars in the universe and found out only 11 signals, which could be alien. However, finally, all of them were revealed to be false positives.

"In order for us to discover a distant transmitter, they'd have to ping us in just the right time window," said an astrophysicist at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, Rene Heller. Add to that they would also have to make use of the same frequency of the radio signal that we are listening in, Heller said, reported Wired.

An independent astronomy researcher Michael Hippke believes that "radio is an immature and inefficient way to communicate over interstellar distance. He conducted a comparison among all the potential ways of communication between the solar systems. "If we'd have an outpost at the nearest star next year, we'd certainly not use radio signals to communicate. Instead, current technology would favour optical or UV lasers. Better technology would use even higher frequency communication, like X-rays," said Hippke.

In his new paper, which was published on the arXiv server, Michael Hippke discovered that if we use the photons while trying to establish communicating across solar systems, we need to send them at wavelengths of about one nanometer, whereas, the wavelengths of the radio waves that we are sending currently range from 1mm to 10 km. It would then place those waves in the X-ray part of the electromagnetic spectrum. Photons are the primary particles, which create visible light. "Radio might be used by some civilizations over a short period of time before they abandon this wasteful childish technology," Hippke said.

Other than photons and lights, there are other means of communication as well. For example, there is neutrino and also the very ambitious megastructure method.

Also Read: Two super-Earths found orbiting a dwarf star, one could harbor alien life

While on Earth we have already achieved communication with neutrinos, it is going to be really difficult to send them off to the galaxies further than Earth and Pluto's distance, according to Hippke. Among all the possible methods, the most preferred route would be to send a probe inscribed with something, he said. We had tried this one earlier with the Golden Record vinyl aboard NASA's Voyager 2 spacecraft. It was launched in 1977 and a copy of it is now available for people to purchase.

{ http://www.ibtimes.sg/ }

10-12-2017 om 22:16 geschreven door peter  

Half of humans believe in extraterrestrial life, says new research

By DailyNews

 

Nearly half of Earthlings believe that we aren’t alone in the universe — and want to make contact with alien life, according to a new study.

Researchers say the results help to explain the lasting popularity of the ‘Star Wars’ franchise 40 years after the first movie was screened.

But making contact could be dangerous for humanity. Physicist Professor Stephen Hawking has previously warned if aliens discovered us, it could ‘end life on Earth’.

Researchers published findings that 47 percent of more than 26,000 respondents believe ‘in the existence of intelligent alien civilizations in the universe’.

An even greater 61 per cent said ‘yes’ when asked if they believe in ‘some form of life on other planets’, researchers at Amsterdam-based research program Glocalities found.

Roughly a quarter said they do not believe intelligent life exists beyond Earth, they found.

This is not the first survey to collect views on extraterrestrial beings – questionnaires in Germany, Britain and the United States have found similar rates – but researchers said this was the largest poll of its kind with such global reach.

‘The high score on the belief in the existence of intelligent alien civilisations and the distinct profile of these people partly explains the immense popularity of space movies such as Star Wars,’ said research director Martijn Lampert.

‘People who believe in the existence of intelligent alien civilisations are not a marginal minority,’ he said.

The most believers in intelligent alien life were in Russia, at 68 per cent, trailed closely by Mexico and China, with the down-to-earth Dutch bottoming out the list at 28 per cent, the poll found.

The interviews were conducted in 15 languages between December 2015 and February 2016 in countries representing 62 per cent of the world’s population and 80 per cent of the global economy.

However, some experts believe we should be extremely wary about answering alien signals.

If there are any intelligent alien life forms out there Professor Hawking thinks we’re playing a dangerous game by trying to contact them.

The physicist believes if aliens discovered Earth, they are likely to want to conquer and colonise our planet.

‘If aliens visit us, the outcome could be much like when Columbus landed in America, which didn’t turn out well for the Native Americans,’ he said in an interview.

Last week psychologists also revealed that if we did discover alien life most people would still be happy about it.

Michael Varnum, a psychologist at Arizona State University was trying to anticipate how humans would react if a discovery like this came back positive.
The paper looked at the psychological reactions to extraterrestrial life in a ‘systematic, careful way’.

In the first experiment Dr Varnum and his colleagues looked at five key events; the discovery of pulsars in 1967; the detection of the ‘Wow!’ radio signal in 1977; the announcement of fossilised microbes on a Martian meteorite in 1996; the behaviour of Tabby’s Star in 2005 and the discovery of exoplanets within the Goldilocks zone in 2017.

‘The reaction seemed to be much more positive than negative,’ found Dr Varnum.
Researchers also got 500 people to describe how they would feel if aliens were discovered and how they thought people more generally would react.

Participants said they themselves would feel positive but felt most people would not be so excited about the discovery.

{ http://www.tunisiesoir.com/ }

10-12-2017 om 22:06 geschreven door peter  

UNIVERSITY IMPLEMENTS COURSE ABOUT ALIENS TO PREPARE PEOPLE FOR EXTRATERRESTRIAL CONTACT

10-12-2017 om 21:57 geschreven door peter  

V404 CYGNI: UNEXPECTED MAGNETIC FIELD CHALLENGES EVERYTHING WE KNOW ABOUT BLACK HOLES

10-12-2017 om 18:27 geschreven door peter  

10-12-2017 om 18:03 geschreven door peter  

Existence and working of Alien life can be explained by microorganisms in Antarctica

A glacier is seen from NASA's Operation IceBridge research aircraft on Oct. 31, 2017.

Mario Tama / Getty Images file

The team obtained soil samples from two “pristine polar deserts” along the coast of East Antarctica and analyzed the DNA of the bacteria in the dirt. According to NASA, celestial bodies with liquid water oceans underneath their surface ice are ripe for microbial life.

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10-12-2017 om 17:34 geschreven door peter  

It’s Official – We Now Know That “UFOs” or “UAP” Are Real – So Are They Extraterrestrial or Not?

http://www.collective-evolution.com

It’s almost 2018, and the subject of Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs) or Unidentified Ariel Phenomenon (UAP, a term that seems to be the new “official wording” from government personnel) is now a verified fact within the mainstream. Just as certain as we are of  several different concepts that come from repeatable hard science, or information about other phenomena in other subject areas dealing with observation, we (humanity) are just as certain about UFOs.

When Ex Canadian Defence minister Paul Hellyer said that “UFOs are as real as the airplanes flying overhead,” he wasn’t joking. Documents, along with live testimony from dozens, if not hundreds of people from within “high level” government and intelligence groups have also been speaking about the topic quite publicly.

There are literally too many examples to name, from four star generals, to directors of military contractors like Lockheed Martin, directors of intelligence agencies, heads of major military committee’s, like NATO, and much more.

The latest examples would be Steve Justice, a recently retired 30 year director of Lockheed Skunkworks (aerospace), and now on as a director at To The Stars, who recently stated:

“This is a concept for an international point-to-point transportation craft that will erase the current travel limits of distance and time.  It mimics the capabilities observed in unidentified aerial phenomenon by employing a drive system that alters space-time metric.  We have glimpses of how the physics of this works, but we need to harvest technologies from the Science Division to “realize” the capability.” 

– Steve Justice, Aerospace Division Director

By making this statement, he is relaying that there are unidentified craft that are using these capabilities to travel what we would consider to be vast distances.

One of his predecessors, Ben Rich (2nd director of Lockheed Shunkworks) also made some very interesting comments. You can read more about that,  and access those comments here.

Robert Bigelow, the Founder of Bigelow aerospace recently went public stating that he knows for a fact that “ET” is here. You can see that interview and read more about it here.

Sure, witness testimony is not enough to draw a conclusion, but given their positions and long records of “credibility,” it’s almost ridiculous to ignore. If it were one or two people there would be reasons to doubt, but when there are multiple hundreds, we know something is up, especially when their encounters with “UFOs” has already been verified by their employer, the government, and by official previously classified documents.

Since many do not consider witness testimony credible, no matter who it comes from, it’s always important to mention the documents, the evidence of radar trackings and more.

Obviously, this is a topic that still challenges many people, rubs them the wrong way and conflicts with long held belief systems. This has been a pattern with many subjects and new discoveries throughout human history, things change slowly over time, but with our rapid technological development,  which is still increasing at an exponential rate (don’t forget the black budget world), we don’t seem to be that far off. In fact, we already seem to be there.

“We already have the means to travel among the stars, but these technologies are locked up in black projects, and it would take an act of God to ever get them out to benefit humanity. Anything you can imagine, we already know how to do it.” 

– Ben Rich (source)

Remember, UFO doesn’t exactly 100 percent equate to extraterrestrial, however, it’s one of many possibilities and probabilities that has its own evidence to make that assertion.

The documents that have been released by several governments, intelligence agencies and cases via The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) indicate objects and encounters (mostly military encounters) with objects travelling at unattainable speeds, and performing maneuvers that no known aircraft of ours can, in some cases defying our own understanding of physics.

“As the F-4 approached a range of 25 nautical miles it lost all instrumentation and communications. When the F-4 turned away from the object and apparently was no longer a threat to it, the aircraft regained all instrumentation and communications. Another brightly lighted object came out of the original object. The second object headed straight toward the F4. ”  (source)

We even have publications in peer-reviewed journals being put out about extraterrestrial hypothesis exists. Here is one example, here is another.  Here’s another interesting one from 1994 talking about physical evidence related to the phenomenon, which we now have more of today.

Below is a great little talk from Jacques Vallee talking about how can start learning from all of these encounters. He’s a computer scientist and astronomer who has done work for NASA, and more. He’s most table for co-developing the first computerized mapping of Mars and for his work at SRI International on the network information centre for ARPANET.

Are there really legitimate reasons for the cover-up after so many years? Was it justified? I believe humanity is meant to live in transparency, and we and can handle this type of information, and we were meant to receive it. Acknowledging certain truths about the nature of reality is an important step in our human evolution, as it provides opportunities for us to move beyond paradigms of the past, and move forward to where we are supposed to go, and perhaps that is to the stars.

Government Deception

This would be an appropriate time to state that, obviously, our governments have deceived us on so many levels, it’s more than likely that as more information continues to make its way into the public domain, there will be good reasons to have a heightened sense scepticism when they speak about UFOs and/or extraterrestrials, as with anything else.

The mainstream world is full of twisted agendas and attempts to alter our perception for truth and profit, or other agenda’s that are not really in the people’s best interest, but rather the ‘1 percent’s’ best interest. The global war against drugs, or terrorism are perfect examples. Especially with the fact that ‘false flag’ terrorism has become more transparent.

To get a clear picture of this topic, which is almost impossible to do the deeper you get into it, one must do independent research rather than rely on the same media which has tight ties to corporate and government interests, under the guise of “national security.”

This is not to say that there are not good people, with pure intentions, just doing their job within these arenas. It’s a complicated topic, but when discussing it one must always keep the Deep State in the back of their mind, as it controls the entire geo-political perceptive, in most cases.

There are efforts being made to alert the public, Tom Delonge’s To The Stars effort is one of them, but this is a very compartmentalized topic. He is getting information from those from within the intelligence world, but who are they getting their information from and is it correct? Is it truthful? Or is there some sort of spin on it, for whatever reason? And do those who are relaying this information even realize that there could be as spin?

Who knows what’s really going on.

The corporate and financial take-over of our democratic system has contributed to the secrecy, no doubt. This topic has huge technological and intellectual implications that could completely transform our planet and help create new ways of doing things here. And, as with everything else, those who are making billions and trillions off of the old way of doing things might also have a say.

What type of propulsion systems are these craft using?

Sure, we know UFOs are real, but mainstream media (as well as government) have a long history of taking real events and using them for their advantage, and usually do so by twisting our perception what’s really going on.

With this topic, as with every other, we simply can’t rely on government and official intelligence people all the time, with complete credibility. It’s important to remember that there is a lot of disinformation that has infiltrated this field, and one must always use their discernment.

Are They Extraterrestrial? 

The existence of UFOs is verified, in several different ways, but extraterrestrial intelligence is still a different story. There are multiple factors that lead to the extraterrestrial hypothesis. As mentioned above, before UFOs were officially “verified,” there was good reason to believe in their existence, and now it’s official. In the same way, there is now evidence to believe that some of these sophisticated craft are in fact extraterrestrial.

“There is a serious possibility that we are being visited and have been visited for many years by people from outer space, by other civilizations. Who they are, where they are from, and what they want should be the subject of rigorous scientific investigation and not be the subject of ‘rubishing’ by tabloid newspapers.” (source)

– Lord Admiral Hill-Norton, Former Chief of Defence Staff, 5 Star Admiral of the Royal Navy, Chairman of the NATO Military Committee

Many people, like Lord Admiral Hill-Norton, have come forth expressing the same thing, and have flat out said that they have knowledge of extraterrestrial intelligence as it related to the UFO phenomenon.

Here’s an FBI document  discussing extraterrestrial bodies and craft (page 21 & 22) , here’s an article with an interesting CIA document linked in it referring to extraterrestrial bodies and a military encounter.  There are several examples one can locate within the literature, which are  both benevolent and malevolent in nature.

Below is an interesting discussion featuring Richard Dolan, one of the worlds foremost authorities on the topic. He goes in a little deeper about the extraterrestrial hypothesis. If you want to learn more about the topic, he’s a great place to start.

“It is my thesis that flying saucers are real and that they are space ships from another solar system. I think that they possibly are manned by intelligent observers who are members of a race that may have been investigating our Earth for centuries.”

– Herman Oberth, founding father of modern rocketry (source)

http://www.collective-evolution.com/2017/12/08/

10-12-2017 om 17:17 geschreven door peter  

UN ASTRONAUTE DE LA MISSION STS 115 DE 2006 COMMENTE UN OVNI : « L’OBJET EN QUESTION VIENT JUSTE, EUH, DE PASSER DEVANT NOUS À NOUVEAU » (VIDEO)

Le 9 septembre 2006, la navette spatiale Atlantis a décollé pour la station spatiale internationale dans le cadre de la mission STS 115. Pendant cette mission de 13 jours, il y a eu beaucoup d’activité d’ovnis.

Et nous ne parlons pas de rumeurs ou de rapports du type « je l’ai entendu d’un ami d’un ami ». Au cours de la mission, la NASA a diffusé plusieurs heures de données en direct sur la liaison descendante en provenance de la navette spatiale Atlantis.

2 incidents d’OVNI sortent du lot, parce que vous pouvez entendre l’équipage de la navette spatiale et Mission Control au sol communiquer sur ces objets mystérieux.

Le premier incident s’est produit le 19 septembre 2006, lorsque l’équipage a filmé un objet volant entre la navette spatiale et la terre. Vous pouvez entendre quelqu’un de Mission Control à Houston parler de l’objet et dire aux astronautes qu’ils vont le surveiller de près. L’objet lui-même est filmé et on dirait qu’il suit l’équipage dans l’espace.

La deuxième observation a eu lieu le lendemain. L’incident a été filmé avec 2 caméras différentes. Vous pouvez entendre l’un des astronautes dire que « l’objet en question est de nouveau passer devant leur nez ». Pourquoi ont-ils dit que l’objet est « de nouveau » passé ? Peut-être que ce n’était pas la première fois qu’ils rencontraient cet étrange objet extraterrestre ? Lors de la deuxième observation, 4 ovnis apparaissent juste devant la navette spatiale Atlantis.

Ce billet n'affirme que des faits qui ont été notoirement diffusés sur des médias alternatif, et divers medias mainstream. Il cite les sources: articles de presse/vidéos.

    Conformément au sens de l'art du code pénal , il ne peut être considéré comme diffamatoire (art. 34 de la loi du 29 juillet 1881).

    En conséquence, sa censure serait assimilable à entrave à la liberté d'expression (L431-1 du code pénal)

10-12-2017 om 16:58 geschreven door peter  

If Alien beings are Living on Earth, Why Haven’t They Announced Their Presence?

Many people in UFOlogy believes that aliens live amongst us.  They could be your neighbour, spouse, paper boy, or coworker. You just know that your boss and sixth-grade teacher must have been an alien. No human could ever have that bad of breath.  If they can pass for human are they humans? Are they hybrids an exotic mixture of off-world DNA and ours? Are they wearing holo-suits or some such advanced mirage designed to look like us? Or are they us? Are they home grown humans just tweaked a bit. All good questions.

If they are here why are they here? Is there an agenda that we do not know? Are they refugees from a planet even worse than our own? Is there many planet Earth’s that has been seeded from ours. If one of those other world humans comes home are they an alien, or a repatriated Earthican? Has disaster recovery plans were put in place to preserve the treasure trove of life on this pale blue dot.

There are many possibilities that could be entertained, which most people don’t seem to think about:

1) Aliens may not want to impinge upon the will, rights, or direction of this particular planet.

2) They could just be observing from a distance.

3) They might not want to alter Earth’s timeline (past, present or future).

4) They might be waiting for the “right” time they feel we are ready to be engaged.

5) They could be here to do experiments or to control the direction of our timeline (discreetly).

6) They are only here to watch over and/or to protect us.

7) They may not be able to survive for extended periods on the surface of this planet, and further, they may feel vulnerable in that regard.

8) They may not want to introduce new diseases to our immune systems, or vice versa to theirs.

9) There could be multiple races of aliens competing against each other for different reasons.

10) They may have tried in the past with but unintended or undesired results.

When conducting observational studies on less advanced life forms, it is of the utmost importance to not interfere and leave no trace in order to collect the most accurate data on specimens. For the visiting researcher to announce themselves would be to alter the behaviour of the studied subject, thus rendering any collected data to be corrupted, would it not? That pesky observer effect.

Consider Ms Dian Fossey’s groundbreaking investigations of primates. Dian Fossey was an American zoologist, primatologist, an anthropologist who undertook an extensive study of mountain gorilla groups over a period of 18 years. Her careful embedment after intense ‘stay away’ alarms and aggressive actions from the primitive gorillas is relative here. Note that ‘aggressiveness’ to strangers is a major trait of most apes, and is especially a factor to be kept in mind about humans by visiting extraterrestrials because we are weaponized beyond stones and sticks. But once embedded, Ms Fossey was able to even sit down in their midst and take notes, etc.

We use animal camouflage that to us appear silly and blatantly crude but many animals are OK with it and we are able to study them up close.  I expect the same would happen from any extraterrestrials studying us.  One might expect the camouflage issue to be a simple challenge as we as a species have lost so many of our ‘survival instincts and senses’.

What we humans have retained is an ability to selectively profile – so an ET with human exterior and basic movements would not be easily noticed.

I think it’s possible that aliens are among us because a number of alleged “abductees” have reported perceiving aliens who look like us. The most credible abductee, in my opinion, is Travis Walton, who was abducted on November 5, 1975. What makes Walton’s abduction different from others is the number of witnesses who saw the UFO that took Walton. Namely, six co-workers (loggers), who saw a UFO emit a beam of light that knocked Walton unconscious. His six co-workers fled the scene, returned 15 minutes later, and Walton and the UFO were gone. Walton was returned five days later, naked on a highway in Arizona. While this may sound absurd or humorous, there are no reasons that six working-class guys with no interest in UFOs would invent such a story. The men received no financial remuneration for their story, and if fact, the experience caused them huge trouble. They were ridiculed for their claim, and some of them left their hometown to seek anonymity following the events in 1975. It is notable that all six guys, aside from Walton, have not changed their story since 1975. One of them claims that infamous UFO sceptic and debunker Philip J. Klass offered him 10,000 dollars to change his story and claim the whole thing was a gag. He refused to do so.

Unlike many other individuals who claim to have been abducted, Walton has witnesses who last see him lying unconscious on the ground below a UFO. Although Walton was missing for five days, he can only remember a relatively short time frame of his experience – just a few hours, and really, only one hour of full and complete mental clarity. While he saw three aliens that looked like the so-called “greys” people talk about, he saw two individuals, a man and a woman, who looked totally human, and he thought they were human. He does not believe they were human, however, because they never spoke to him. Walton’s memories are “conscious” memories – he never underwent hypnosis to recall the events.

So, either some aliens look human, or we are the same species as aliens and were put here at some point, or aliens have the ability to appear human. We should not discount that possibility because many abductees have claimed that entities appear to them in forms that would not frighten them; people have claimed that entities appeared to them who look like Jesus, deceased relatives, fairies and in other forms.

I believe it is very much possible that aliens are among us. Temple University professor David Jacobs (I believe he is a historian) has done a lot of work with alleged abductees and has written a number of books on the subject. He learned how to do hypnosis and has “regressed” alleged abductees. He concludes, on the basis of hypnotic regressions with hundreds of alleged abductees, that aliens are living among us. Given that Professor Jacobs is a ration person, a professor with a PhD who applies a rigorous methodology to his work, I believe we need to seriously consider these claims, as fantastic as they sound. Professor Jacobs openly states that witness testimony given under hypnosis is not a particularly strong form of evidence, but in his words, “We have a lot of it (evidence)”. Jacobs also notes that many alleged abductees claim to have seen human-looking entities.

Let’s assume for a moment that aliens are among us, why would they not reveal themselves? We can only speculate. First, there is the question of method. How should they reveal themselves and to whom? They may be observing us and based on their observation, they may have concluded that civilizations divided into units called nation-states, each of which has its own leaders. If they are observing us, then they understand that our leaders are motivated not by wisdom – they do not have humanity’s best interest in mind, but serve the interests of economic elites. That is how our political system functions, in general. And I mean all countries on Earth.

They may understand that revealing themselves to us would constitute a profound shock. Our civilization is at an extremely early point of development. We have discovered more advanced technology only in the last 150 years or so – electricity etc.. and our technology is certainly very primitive. They may understand that for a civilization that is not aware of any other civilization, becoming aware of other intelligent life in the universe would come as a cultural paradigm shift. Nothing would ever be the same. That kind of revelation can be profoundly disruptive. They may, in fact, be revealing themselves slowly, to lessen the shock.

There is a third possibility, which is less pleasant and which is actually advocated by Professor David Jacobs – that aliens have a secret agenda, and that agenda may not be to our benefit. That is a scary thought. One might ask, would that agenda possibly be? This possibility might also explain why the US government is so adamant about keeping a lid on the subject – authorities may know something that we don’t, and when I saw “authorities” – I don’t mean the president of the United States, but some small group of people deep within the intelligence apparatus.

It is interesting to note that despite the large number of credible witnesses who have seen UFOs, or actually interacted with alien entities – despite the fact that some of those events have been witnessed by dozens of people, sometimes by several, or sometimes a few – and despite the fact that some of those witnesses are extremely credible (military officials, pilots, and otherwise sane people) the official opinion of authorities who define our worldview (government, academia, and media) is that no evidence of alien life exists. We are, according to the “official” view, still looking for evidence of alien life. At the same time, we have been inundated with countless reports of extraterrestrial sightings. Clearly, there is a huge gap between evidence and the claims of authorities.

I find it depressing that the vast majority of humanity forms its opinions based on nothing more than the opinions of “authority figures”. People believe whatever a man in a suit and tie on television tells them to believe. No matter how much evidence exists to support the view that “we are not alone”, people will not believe in the existence of extraterrestrial intelligence until someone announces it on television.

We must realize it is our differences which make us amazing, that each one of us has the right to all that should be available to every one of us, that we need to start educating everyone with facts and not our moronic superstitions, that we need to share our resources and help heal our planet, that we have to change our path from the ruinous and self-absorbed direction we are taking, that none of us is born with prejudice but each of us is born with a gift to help improve our planet’s well being, That we see each other as our best friends, that our little blue planet is a gift to cherish and enjoy its amazing beauty. When we have matured as the planets human population and can value ourselves as helpers rather than takers, then we might be ready for us to introduce ourselves, and share with you undreamt of technologies and approaches to life and living that would further advance our civilization to the point where we might be acceptable to the other populations in the area of space closest to us.

We are nowhere near that lofty high water mark yet. There is a good chance that we will never attain it and that is why we have not received an official invitation to all life on Earth to join the galactic pantheon of intelligences.

Someday the sheep will be separated from the wolves, and then you will know their name and see their many faces.

{ http://www.theangryufologist.us/ }

10-12-2017 om 16:33 geschreven door peter  

This mysterious rock-comet is the parent body of this week’s Geminid meteor shower. It’ll brush closely past Earth on December 16, just a few nights after the Geminids’ peak. Will 2017 be a fantastic year for the Geminids?

3200 Phaethon will sweep close to Earth – just 0.069 astronomical units (6.4 million miles, 10.3 million km, 26 lunar-distances) on December 16, 2017 at 23 UTC; translate to your time zone.

Image via Osamu Ajiki (AstroArts)/ Ron Baalke (JPL) / Ade Ashford (AN)/ AstronomyNow. It will not be visible to the eye.

On the peak mornings of the 2017 Geminid meteor shower – December 13 and 14 – the moon will be in a waning crescent phase, visible only shortly before dawn, and near two planets before dawn. Even more importantly, a curious body known as 3200 Phaethon – sometimes called a rock-comet, thought to be the source of the Geminid meteor shower – will be gliding through space relatively near to Earth. It’ll come closest to Earth in its 523.5-day orbit only a few days after the Geminids’ peak, on December 16.

What will happen? No one knows for sure how many meteors you might see, or if 2017’s shower will be extra special because 3200 Phaethon is nearby. But it’s a fact that, when a parent comet is nearby, a meteor shower can be spectacular.

So plan to watch this shower in 2017!

Here’s everything you need to know about the 2017 Geminid meteor shower

Click for 10 tips on how to watch the 2017 Geminids.

Click here to see the Geminids online, via Virtual Telescope Project

The object 3200 Phaethon is located between the red tick marks at the center of this photo. Image acquired November 20, 2017 by Gianluca Masi of the Virtual Telescope Project. Gian will be hosting an online view of 3200 Phaethon. 

Click here for more details.

3200 Phaethon is a very interesting and mysterious object. It was one of the first known bodies in space that blurred the distinction between asteroids and comets. All the other meteors in annual showers are known to be icy debris left behind by comets, after all, but the Geminids are known to come from this strange asteroid-comet hybrid, which some call a rock-comet.

Asteroids are rockier, or more metallic, than comets. Their orbits tend to be more circular, while comets tend to have more elongated orbits. 3200 Phaethon, with its asteroid name, has an orbit that more closely resembles that of a comet than an asteroid. It also has mysterious ejections of dust, and dust tails, and astronomers have said it’s possible that the sun’s heat causes fractures on the surface of 3200 Phaethon, similar to mudcracks in a dry lake bed.

This closeup of an image of 3200 Phaethon by NASA’s STEREO A spacecraft shows a tail extending faintly toward lower left.

Image via NASA/ SkyandTelescope.com.

3200 Phaethon was the first asteroid to be discovered via spacecraft on October 11, 1983. Astronomers Simon F. Green and John K. Davies noticed it while searching Infrared Astronomical Satellite (IRAS) data for moving objects. Charles T. Kowal confirmed it optically and said it was asteroid-like in appearance. The object received the provisional designation 1983 TB. Two years later, in 1985, using the convention for naming asteroids, astronomers assigned it its number and name: 3200 Phaethon.

An interesting feature of the orbit of 3200 Phaethon is that it comes very close to the sun, closer than any other named asteroid (though there are numerous unnamed asteroids that do sweep closer to the sun). That’s why it was given the name Phaethon, for the mythological son of the Greek sun god Helios.

Today, it’s classified as a potentially hazardous asteroid, which doesn’t mean it’s a threat to Earth. It just means two things. First, 3200 Phaethon is big – about 3 miles (5 km) wide – big enough to cause significant regional damage if it were to strike Earth. Second, it’s known to make periodic close approaches to Earth. A “close approach” in 2017 means 26 times farther than the moon. And, by the way, the orbit of 3200 Phaethon is exceedingly well studied, and astronomers know of no upcoming strike by this object in this foreseeable future.

In fact, in December 2017 – according to NASA NEO Earth Close Approaches – there are no fewer than 30 objects that’ll come closer than 3200 Phaethon. The closest of these will be 2017 WV12, a 20- to 40-meter-wide object that’s miss us by about a million miles (1.6 million km) on December 9.

The composition of 3200 Phaethon resembles that of asteroid 2 Pallas. Both are dark, B-type asteroids comprised of materials that have been modified by water. The first in this series of Hubble images is marked with the asteroid’s spin axis (top) and south pole.

Image via B. E. Schmidt et. all / NASA / ESA/ SkyandTelescope.com.

On the peak nights of the 2017 Geminid meteor shower – nights of December 12 and 13, mornings of December 13 and 14 – the meteors will be radiating from near the star Castor in Gemini. On those nights, 3200 Phaethon won’t be far from Gemini on the sky’s dome. It’ll sweeping across a neighboring constellation, Perseus the Hero. Will you be able to see it with the eye? Not even kinda. Its magnitude is predicted to be around +10.7, making it far too faint to see with the eye alone.

Telescope users will be following 3200 Phaethon, however.

AstronomyNow has charts for telescope users, to help you track 3200 Phaethon

SkyandTelescope.com offers this chart of 3200 Phaethon’s track

And don’t forget to watch for 3200 Phaethon online, via Virtual Telescope Project

The Virtual Telescope Project will be offering online viewing this year of both the Geminids and 3200 Phaethon. Check out the times listed in the poster above. 

Click here to translate to your time zone. 

Click here to go to Virtual Telescope Project’s site.

Bottom line: 3200 Phaethon will brush relatively close to Earth on December 16, just a few nights after the peak of the 2017 Geminid meteor shower. Will 2017 be a fantastic year for the Geminids?

Sharing is caring!

{ http://earthsky.org/ }

10-12-2017 om 16:22 geschreven door peter  

It was on Thursday, November 20, 1952 that the controversial and infamous UFO Contactee, George Adamski, claimed a face to face encounter with an alleged extraterrestrial named Orthon. The location was near to Parker, Arizona. Also along for the ride were George Hunt Williamson (who was even more controversial than Adamski, and for a variety of highly dubious reasons, including smuggling), Adamski’s secretary Lucy McGinnis and Alice Wells. The latter was the “…owner of the property where Adamski gave lectures on Universal Law and the café where he flipped burgers to pay the rent,” as good mate Greg Bishop describes it in his article “Tracks in the Desert.” You can find the article in Greg’s book, Wake Up Down There! Around 8:00 a.m., the group rendezvoused with Al and Betty Bailey. So the story went, it was very much on a hunch that the group headed out to Parker.

Everyone was hungry, so breakfast was the first order of the day. It was followed by a scan of the skies for UFOs. How incredibly convenient that one such craft – of a “cigar”-like shape – allegedly turned up, and which Betty raced to film. She failed to do so, however, because she was too excited – or so we’re told. Adamski informed the group – his ego overflowing – that the aliens had come to see him. The result? McGinnis and Al Bailey drove Adamski down a small road, in the direction of the craft. Adamski soon got out of the car, ordering the pair to return to the rest “as quickly as possible…and watch for anything that might take place.”

Well, what supposedly happened next is that a number of military jets quickly appeared on the scene, something which allegedly caused the crew of the UFO to hit the gas and get the hell out of Parker. Not to worry, though: another UFO – a “beautiful small craft” – soon took its place. Not only that, it landed. Out of the craft walked a very human-like ET who waved genially in Adamski’s direction. Adamski later stated: “I fully realized I was in the presence of a man from space – a human being from another world!” His name, Adamski said, was Orthon. And he came from Venus. Yes, really. Venus. Whatever. There was the usual Contactee-driven discussion about the perils of atomic weapons and Armageddon, after which Orthon walked back to his craft and get on the road, so to speak.

Even more, ahem, “convenient,” Williamson had brought with him some Plaster-of-Paris (as we all do when we got for a drive in the desert, right?) and was able to make casts of Orthon’s footprints. Williamson would say (in his 1954 book, Other tongues, Other Flesh): “I could see where the space being had scraped away the topsoil in order to get more moist sand that would take the impressions from the carvings on the bottom of his shoes. The carvings on the shoes must have been finely done for the impressions in the sand were clear cut.”

The saga of Orthon became one of the central points in Adamski’s tales, books, lectures, and conferences. Far less well known, however, is the fact that Adamski also shared his thoughts and revelations concerning Orthon with none other than the FBI and the Air Force’s Office of Special Investigations.

On January 12, 1953, an agent of the FBI and one of the AFOSI turned up at Adamski’s California home. They were actually there to chase down a rumor suggesting that Adamski had in his possession a strange contraption which could destroy aircraft. Our aircraft. It turns out that wires had gotten crossed somewhere. The man who was making claims of possessing this aircraft-destroying technology was actually not Adamski at all. It was one Karl Hunrath, a UFO investigator who – along with friend and fellow-saucer-seeker, Wilbur Wilkinson – vanished under mysterious circumstances in November 1953. And never to be seen again.

But, such was Adamski’s still-ever-present ego, after putting the two agents right on the Hunrath affair he launched into his experiences with Orthon. The FBI files on Adamski and Orthon are in the public domain (thanks to the Freedom of Information Act) and state the following: “At a point ten and two-tenths miles from Desert Center on the road to Parker and Needles, Arizona, [Adamski] made contact with a space craft and had talked to a space man. Adamski stated that he, [deleted] and his wife Mary had been out in the desert and that he and the persons with him had seen the craft come down to the earth. Adamski stated that a small stairway in the bottom of the craft, which appeared to be a round disc, opened and a space man came down the steps. Adamski stated he believed there were other space men in the ship because the ship appeared translucent and [he] could see the shadows of the space men.”

Adamski also revealed that the alien was “over five feet in height, having long hair like a woman’s and garbed in a suit similar to the space suits or web suits worn by the US Air Force men.” Adamski also informed the FBI and AFOSI agents that he conversed with Orthon by means of sign language, but felt that his mind was being “read.” As evidence of this, Adamski said that as he was about to take a photograph of the aliens’ craft, the humanoid “motioned” him to stop. Adamski told the agents that he took his photograph regardless, but that this was not to the liking of Orthon, who grabbed the material evidence out of Adamski’s hands and soared off into the sky.

Adamski’s adventures with the aliens were not over, however. Once again, according to the FBI: “Adamski further advised that he had obtained plaster casts of the footprints of the space man and stated that the casts indicated the footprints had designs on them similar to the signs of the Zodiac. On January 12, 1953, Adamski advised that on December 13, 1952, the space ship returned to the Palomar Gardens and came low enough to drop the [film negative] which the space man had taken from him, Adamski, and had then gone off over the hill. Adamski stated that when he had the negatives developed at a photo shop in Escondido, California, that the negative that the space man had taken from him contained writing which he believed to be the writing of the space men. Adamski furnished the writer with copies of the space writing and photographs of the space ship.”

From another source, however, the FBI was told that: “The photographs were taken by setting the camera lens at infinity, which would sharpen the background of mountains and trees and blurs the saucer, which was probably strung on a thin wire. [Source] advised that if the camera were set at infinity the wire would not show.”

And, that seems like a very good place to stop – and to move on from George and his photos. None of which impressed the FBI or the Air Force, at all.

{ http://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

10-12-2017 om 15:42 geschreven door peter  

Aarde produceert mysterieus gebrom en niemand weet waar het vandaan komt - HLN.be

erben van 't Hof

Bron: AD.nl

De wetenschappers probeerden het eerder op land, maar zelfs na honderden pogingen leverde dat weinig op. Op de oceaanbodem was er wel succes. De gegevens zijn al in 2013 verzameld maar het wegfilteren van allerlei ruis nam een tijd in beslag. Nu is de studie gepubliceerd in het wetenschappelijke tijdschrift Geophysical Research Letters.

Lees ook

Nu moeten ook grote ventilatoren Great Barrier Reef redden

Mysterieus

Voor het menselijk oor is het mysterieuze geluid uit de aarde niet te horen. Het betreft maximaal 4,5 millihertz, 10.000 keer lager dan wat mensen kunnen oppikken.

De onderzoekers uit verschillende Europese landen gebruikten voor hun studie elf maanden lang tientallen seismometers. Daarmee gingen ze duizenden kilometers van de Indische Oceaan af. Omdat het gebrom overal in het onderzochte gebied aanwezig is, bestaat het vermoeden dat het over de hele wereld op de zeebodem is waar te nemen.

Hoewel de wetenschappers dolblij zijn dat het is gelukt om het geluid op te nemen, weet nog niemand waar het precies vandaan komt. Een theorie is dat de golven in de oceaan trillingen veroorzaken maar anderen vermoeden juist dat het gebrom het resultaat is van stormen en turbulentie in de atmosfeer. 

Bekijk deze video's ( = bijgevoegd door Peter2011 )

{ https://www.hln.be/ }

10-12-2017 om 15:32 geschreven door peter  

Archeologen ontdekken spectaculaire nieuwe grafkamers met mummies in Egypte - HLN.be

Bron: Belga, ANP

De tombes stammen waarschijnlijk uit de achttiende dynastie van het oude Egypte, meldden de Egyptische autoriteiten volgens de BBC. De tombes werden zo’n twintig jaar geleden al gevonden, maar nu voor het eerst uitgegraven. “Het is echt een uitzonderlijke dag”, zei minister van Oudheden, Khaled al-Anani.

Lees ook

Hoe kon piramide van Cheops gebouwd worden? Archeologen lossen groot deel van mysterie op

De tombes bevinden zich in de buurt van Luxor, vlakbij de tempel van Hatsjepsoet en de Vallei der Koningen. Van wie ze zijn is niet bekend. Mogelijk gaat het om hooggeplaatste ambtenaren.

Het graf is het laatste van verschillende archeologische vondsten in Egypte dit jaar. In april vonden archeologen acht mummies in een andere grafkamer, eveneens in Luxor. In maart ontdekten ze een bijzonder groot beeld in een achterbuurt in Caïro, dat waarschijnlijk koning Psammetichus voorstelt. 

 AFP

 AFP

 EPA

 EPA

 AFP

 EPA

 EPA

{ https://www.hln.be/ }

10-12-2017 om 15:06 geschreven door peter  

The world of sleep and dreams has long fascinated mankind, and has held a prominent place in folklore, legends, and myths around the world for as long as we have been able to ponder such things. It is interesting that even now in the modern age sleep and dreams remain virtually as mysterious as they always have been, with no real concrete, agreed upon reasons for why we do either one of them. When we dream we might as well be venturing out to the boundaries of the known universe for all we know about them. One curious and recurring facet of this landscape of mystery and lore is the consistently reported presence of entities or demons, usually hostile, which appear to us in our dreams or upon awakening to watch, frighten, and torment us. Do such creatures exist, invading our subconscious as we sleep and lurking on the fringes of this shadow world? Or is there some other more rational explanation to all of this? Here is a peek into the strange world of dream demons.

Tales and myths of dream-dwelling entities and apparitions can be found in all cultures from every corner of the world, with the descriptions of such mysterious entities varying as much as the people who dream them. Japan has its Baku, also known as “eaters of dreams.” China has its dream-walking fox spirits. St. Lucia has its creepy dream spirits called the kokoma, which come in the form of babies that beat their victims with furious little fists. In Germany these entities were called the trud or alp, and they were said to come to people or even animals in their dreams to press down on them and in some cases even crush the victims to death, with the German word for “nightmare,” alpdrücke, coming from their name.  Medieval Europe had its “old hags,” which were spooky apparitions that similarly invaded dreams to immobilize or hold their prey down, and there were also the incubi and succubi, which were dream demons that sexually assaulted their victims and fed off of sexual energy. In Anglo-Saxon and Old Norse lore these dream demons were called the mårt, or also the mara, mahr, or mare, which is indeed the origin of the English word “nightmare,” which comes from the word nightmårt.

Although such dream entities can be found in many different physical forms in far-flung countries across the world, the basic experience of encountering them is remarkably similar between cultures. The victim typically will awaken or partially awaken unable to move, as if being held down by some unseen force, and there is often a sense of something pressing down on the chest, a sense of breathlessness, or the terrifying experience of being actively attacked or strangled, and in some cases there is even sexual molestation or assault involved. In almost every case there is described as being some entity or presence in the room that exudes a nearly incapacitating aura of malevolence and dread, sometimes more than one, either peering from the shadows or the very thing sitting atop the victim or attacking. These entities are often accompanied by strange sounds or smells that the victim cannot explain and which feel incredibly real, often more potent than anything in the waking world. Professor Chris French, psychologist at Goldsmiths, University of London, says of the phenomenon:

It is a very common experience but typically people haven’t heard of it. I have people calling me about it and often they have the same story; they’ve been suffering and never told anyone because others would think they were crazy. In the whistles and bells version, people get a strong sense of a presence and they may also get hallucinations. They may see dark shadows and lights and monstrous figures, or footsteps and mechanical sounds or voices. They may feel as if they are being dragged out of bed. It is absolutely terrifying. There is also intense fear. It doesn’t have a dream-like quality; it feels incredibly real.

These are classic hallmarks of such attacks, and are present and incredibly consistent throughout cultures around the world. Indeed, many of you reading this likely have experienced such inexplicable, scary incidents yourselves, no matter where you are from, and many accounts of encountering such alleged dream creatures are harrowing. One report reads:

I couldn’t move a muscle. Something was in the room and walked across the bed. I tried to scream but only a slight noise came from my throat. Whoever or whatever was in my room then disappeared. Unfortunately, I have been getting this horrible paralysis for about two months now. The last time it happened I managed to open my eyes but still could not move my body.

Another was given by a young woman named Helena Adelina, 24, who reported a menacing, very vivid and real figure that would stalk her in her sleep and immobilize her nearly every night, and she became convinced that this was not just any ordinary nightmare. She would report:

He was a slim, tall figure but with no features, like a silhouette. My sense was that he was terrifying, an ancient being, very dark and pure evil. Sometimes I would wake and not see him but hear his voice in my ear talking about destruction, war and death. Sometimes he would grab me around the ankles and drag me under the covers. I would be fighting it and be struggling to breathe. Sometimes a woman would enter the scene, laughing and cackling. She would keep slapping me around the face and laughing and finding it very amusing. And there would be a serious ringing in my ears. When I came out of it my ears would be ringing very badly. At the time it was happening it felt like it was going on forever; how long it went on for I don’t know.

These are pretty typical examples of these sorts of reports, and while it may seem that this is all in the witnesses’ heads, there are amazingly reports of these supposed entities having an actual physical effect on or presence in the real world around the dreamer. In these terrifying cases objects can move, the sleeper can be witnessed by others to be thrown about or struck, and those who have had these horrific dreams sometimes report having bruises, scratches, or bite marks on their bodies upon waking that could not have possibly been self-inflicted, and in the case of Incubus attacks exhibiting vaginal tears that cannot be explained. One prisoner gave a report of being attacked by a dream demon, which was actually seen by his cell mate, saying:

The last time it happened, I was tossing and turning and trying to get to sleep when a strange dark power pulled me off the bed and pushed me against the wall. My cellmate screamed when he saw what was happening.

The cellmate would report that before his eyes the victim had been physically lifted off of the bed and thrown against the wall in such a way that it could not have possibly been done by himself. In other cases, the visual hallucinations that victims report are seen by others around them, making them perhaps something more, and objects can be seen to move on their own. One elderly witness said of such an encounter in an article on the topic by Craig Hamilton-Parker called Demonic Possession, Attacks and Sleep Paralysis thus:

I am terrified at night as I believe that I am being menaced by a ghost or spirit. If I awake during the night, I see what I would call “smoke” in my room. One night my husband and I saw the harrowing sight of my bedclothes being slowly pulled off the bed. But the last straw was when I felt “it” move to the side of the bed and poke me hard in the arm. I prayed out loud but it wouldn’t go away.

In yet another report from the website Psychic Experiences the witness describes an evil being in his dreams that also left behind physical changes in the real world and holds hints of having some connection to the supernatural. The dream reportedly featured a shapeshifting entity calling itself the two names “Gamigin” and “Lillin.” In this intense dream this apparition brings the witness to a house full of strangers, and the victim would say of what happened next thus:

Its an apartment filled with strangers who were waiting on me but would not tell mw why. Then fear strikes when it occurs to me this guy who brought me here is a demon, he then tells me the women in the room want my soul and hes brought me to them, that it was his job to give me to them and that by doing so he would be allowed back into hell. In my dream I began to pray which made the demon and the people in this place angry. The women came out from the room where they had been waiting on me and they were witches. I showed them the grey streak in the front of my hair, which I have in real life, and told them I was a witch too so while they were confused I tried to escape. At this point I was finally able to wake myself up. I ended up falling back asleep and right back into the dream, this time the demon came to me different but the same goal of getting my soul so he could return to hell. I finally woke and would not let myself go back to sleep. I looked up the names of the demon he gave which were actually real names to real Christian based demons. I have previously never looked into. Any type of demonology nor did I watch anything about it before I went to sleep in fact I have never heard any of the names before, which scared me a little more. I have always been sensitive to spirits and energy but never anything like this nor anything that ever scared me this much. I will also add that about 2 years ago my younger sister started dabbling in witchcraft and brought in a Ouija board and messed with it as well. I was not home during this time and she has since moved out but I fear she may have opened something she had no business to. Side note, the past few weeks I have had experiences with something cold on the back of my neck, the house being incredibly colder inside than the temps outside, lights turning off and on for no reason and weird unexplained noises.

One particularly odd report of such an apparition affecting the physical world around the sufferer can be seen in an account by a woman who seems to have been visited repeatedly by a classic Incubus. One report written of in an article on ThoughtCo., called Spirit Lovers: Incubus and Succubus Attacks, relates the tale of a frightened woman who was visited and tormented on a regular basis by a sex-crazed dream demon that also stalked her daughter and was able to cause objects to move and could be seen by other people. The witness explains:

My age is 47 and I am female. For about six years, my daughter and I felt walking on the bed and other surfaces that we sleep on. My husband and son thought we were nuts. It would happen while we were completely awake or even just getting into bed. The walking would be light and sometimes the bed would wave.
A couple of times, during that approximate six years, I would wake up to find something sexual happening. At that time I would shake it away. My husband had been sick for the last five years (stroke and other complications), and this past December passed away. A few months before he died, I found him sitting on the side of his bed looking ashen. He had told me that something jumped on his bed. It had happened before and he always blamed it on the cat, even though the cat was not in his room. This time he believed and was shaken.
On August 1, the entities were back in my bed, and this time I relented at a weak moment. I can’t understand how I could have because the thought of it frightens me. The first few times, my heart was beating like a drum. Once it started, it never ended. I developed an insatiable appetite for sex and didn’t stop thinking about it 24 hours in the day. Neither did “they.” I rationalized that it was friendly spirits of the universe, but I knew in the back of my mind differently.
For three days, going on four, I had constant sex. They did not enter for long and then the next one would come. I could not get enough. Literally, I could not function normally.
The turning point came today. I was at work and something that was cold enveloped me starting at my feet and ending behind me. My hands, which were trying to type at the time, were frozen in place, not paralyzed. The thing seemed to scare the others away like it had some power beyond theirs. It had sex with me while I was sitting in the chair, but it was different. More mellow and soft. It scared me tremendously because it was outward and not inward, like the others. This is all going to wear me down if I don’t find some serious help. This is all true.

Such reports go on and on, always very potent and vivid, mostly while the victim is partially or even fully awake and aware of what is going on. What are we to make of such amazingly strange experiences? Well, the official scientific explanation is that this is all due to a natural phenomenon known as “sleep paralysis,” a sleep disorder which various studies have estimated around 20% to 40 % of the population, possibly more, will experience at some point in their lives. The whole thing works like this. When we sleep, we enter a phase of sleep called the REM stage, or the “Rapid Eye Movement” stage, which is accompanied by the eyes moving very quickly back and forth under the eyelids. It is this stage in which dreams come to us, and to keep our bodies from acting out on what we are seeing or doing in this dream world they release a neurotransmitter called glycine and a nerve receptor in the voluntary muscles called GABA, which effectively paralyze us.

In most cases, these chemicals will have dissipated by the time we wake up, but in some instances they can still be active even when the brain wakes up either fully or partially during REM sleep, keeping your motor functions inhibited even as you are awake. In essence, when this happens you become fully aware of your surroundings, yet you are still partially immobilized by your own body. According to this theory, the sense of a malign presence or spiritual attacker or apparition is the brain’s desperate attempt to explain to itself what is going on, eventually conjuring up these subliminal images of evil entities, demons, and ghosts. The disorder has been used to explain everything from dream demons, to poltergeists, to alien abduction and even demon possession, and supernatural explanations of this supposed phenomenon go back centuries.

While this is the scientific rational explanation, there is little knowledge of how this actually works or what it entails, and it remains poorly understood. Of course, despite this attempt to write this all off as misfiring brain chemistry and derailed sleep cycles, it is hard to reconcile this with some of the reports that describe actual physical symptoms of attack, effects on the real world, or episodes witnessed by other people, complete with inexplicable physical phenomena such as moving objects. There are also those who insist that what they have encountered is not the result of mere hallucinations or fierce nightmares, but rather something more, something with a malignant will, intent, and intelligence of its own. An article called The Dark Side of Lucid Dreams, by a Ryan Hurd, explains that there could be more to such entities than just hallucinations, saying thus:

This class of nightmares seems not to be merely reflections of fear, but to have an autonomous energy all its own. There is intelligence in the eyes of the dream figures, and they don’t like to be told that they are a symbol of some waking-life fear, or that they are not “real.” They have their own story to tell, but we often don’t know how to listen….yet.

Throughout history people have been haunted by such nocturnal, dream invading specters. Is this all the result of tricks of the human brain during sleep or could there be something more to some of these accounts? If so, what is going on here? If there are indeed at least some cases that go beyond the sleep paralysis explanation, then why could these entities be and what do they want? Whatever the answers may be, this is a universal phenomenon that has gone on since time unremembered, virtually unchanged across cultures and geographic boundaries, and only reasserts that there is much about sleep and dreams that we have yet to fully understand.

{ http://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

10-12-2017 om 12:02 geschreven door peter  

Ancient Egyptians tell us they superseded an Earlier Kingdom

How over the ages have we managed to class History as Mythology you have to wonder, is it simply because the Powers that were at Play on this Earth thousands of years ago did not fit our understanding in relatively modern times?

By calculating the decrypted information obtained from the Papyrus of Turin, we obtain the initial period, referred to as the kingdom of Ptah, creator and first ruler of ancient Egypt, dating back 39,000 years!

The Egyptian historical texts are not the only one to record extremely long life and kingdom reigns and just as the Sumerians state that they did not develop their knowledge, but that it was given to them.

Just as the Incans told the Conquistadors "We did not build this. It was here long before us."

Why is it that humans don’t know their true origins and why all the things they have discovered in Egypt and everywhere else have been kept away from us?

Because it would change every aspect of life here!

  

{ http://ufosightingshotspot.blogspot.com/ }

10-12-2017 om 11:44 geschreven door peter  

Has NASA found ALIENS? Shock space reveal NEXT WEEK in hunt for life

NASA could be on the verge of an alien breakthrough and will reveal a new discovery next week.

By Charlotte Ikonen 

{ https://www.dailystar.co.uk/ }

10-12-2017 om 00:00 geschreven door peter