The facts about the Majestic 12 and UFO evidence

In December 1984 a package with no return address and an Albuquerque post-mark arrived in Jaime Shandera’s mail in North Hollywood, California. Inside was a roll of 35mm film. When developed, it turned out to contain eight pages of an alleged briefing paper, dated November 18, 1952, in which Vice Adm. Roscoe Hillenkoetter told President-elect Dwight Eisenhower of the recovery of the remains of two crashed spaceships.

In the first of these crashes, in e­arly July 1947, authorities recovered the bodies of four humanoid beings. According to the document, which appended a copy of what was supposed to be the actual executive order, President Harry Truman authorized the creation of a supersecret group called “Majestic 12” (MJ-12 for short) to study the remains.

Acting on a tip from sources who claimed to represent Air Force intelligence, Shandera and his associate William Moore (coauthor of The Roswell Incident) flew to Washington, D.C. They searched the National Archives looking for references in official documents to MJ-12. They found a July 1954 memo from Gen. Robert Cutler, an Eisenhower assistant, referring to an “MJ-12 SSP [Special Studies Project]” to be held at the White House on the 16th of t­hat month.­

In the first of these crashes, in e­arly July 1947, authorities recovered the bodies of four humanoid beings. According to the document, which appended a copy of what was supposed to be the actual executive order, President Harry Truman authorized the creation of a supersecret group called “Majestic 12” (MJ-12 for short) to study the remains.

Acting on a tip from sources who claimed to represent Air Force intelligence, Shandera and his associate William Moore (coauthor of The Roswell Incident) flew to Washington, D.C. They searched the National Archives looking for references in official documents to MJ-12. They found a July 1954 memo from Gen. Robert Cutler, an Eisenhower assistant, referring to an “MJ-12 SSP [Special Studies Project]” to be held at the White House on the 16th of t­hat month.­

When this document was released in May 1987, it sparked massive controversy. The document is believed to be a hoax, but the identity and motive of the perpetrator remain unknown.

In the spring of 1987 an unknown individual, allegedly associated with an intelligence agency, gave British writer Timothy Good a copy of the MJ-12 document. Upon learning Good was going to disclose its existence to the press, Moore and Shandera released their copy, along with the Cutler memo. The result was a massive uproar, including coverage in The New York Times and Night line, an FBI investigation, and furious controversy that continues to this day.

For various technical reasons most investigators agree tha­t the MJ-12 document is a forgery, but the identity of the forger remains a deep mystery that even the FBI cannot crack. The forger apparently had access to obscure official information, much of it not even in the public record, leading to suspic­ions that an intelligence agency created the document for disinformation purposes. Whatever the answer, the MJ-12 document is surely the most puzzling hoax in UFO history.

TOP SECRET / MAJIC 002

EYES ONLY

***************
* TOP SECRET *
***************

_EYES ONLY_ COPY _ONE_ OF _ONE_.

SUBJECT: OPERATION MAJESTIC-12 PRELIMINARY BRIEFING FOR PRESIDENT-ELECT EISENHOWER

DOCUMENT PREPARED 18 NOVEMBER, 1952

BRIEFING OFFICER: ADM. ROSCOE H. HILLENKOETTER (MJ-1)

NOTE: This document has been prepared as a preliminary briefing only. It should be regarded as introductory to a full operations briefing intended to follow.

* * * * * *

OPERATION MAJESTIC-12 is a TOP SECRET Research and Development/Intelligence operation responsible directly and only to the President of the United States. Operations of the project are carried out under the control of the Majestic-12 (Majic-12) Group which was established by special classified executive order of President Truman on 24 September, 1947, upon recommendation by Dr. Vannevar Bush and Secretary James Forrestal. (See Attachment “A”.)

Members of the Majestic-12 Group were designated as follows:

Adm. Roscoe H. Hillenkoetter
Dr. Vannevar Bush
Secy. James V. Forrestal*
Gen. Nathan P. Twining
Gen Hoyt S. Vandenberg
Dr. Detlev Bronk
Dr. Jerome Hunsaker
Mr. Sidney W. Souers
Mr. Gordon Gray
Dr. Donald Menzel
Gen. Robert M. Montague
Dr. Lloyd V. Berkner

The death of Secretary Forrestal on 22 May, 1949, created a vacancy which remained unfilled until 01 August, 1950, upon which date Gen. Walter B. Smith was designated as permanent replacement.

* * * * * * * * * * * *
* TOP SECRET *
* * * * * * * * * * * *

TOP SECRET / MAJIC _EYES ONLY_
EYES ONLY T52-EXEMPT (E)
002

TOP SECRET / MAJIC 003
EYES ONLY
* * * * * * * * * * * *
* TOP SECRET *
* * * * * * * * * * * *
_EYES ONLY_ COPY _ONE_ OF _ONE_

On 24 June, 1947, a civilian pilot flying over the Cascade Mountains in the State of Washington observed nine flying disc-shaped aircraft traveling in formation at a high rate of speed. Although this was not the first known sighting of such objects, it was the first to gain widespread attention in the public media. Hundreds of reports of sightings of similar objects followed. Many of these came from highly credible military and civilian sources. These reports resulted in independent efforts by several different elements of the military to ascertain the nature and purpose of these objects in the interests of national defense. A number of witnesses were interviewed and there were several unsuccessful attempts to utilize aircraft in efforts to pursue reported discs in flight. Public reaction bordered on near hysteria at times.

In spite of these efforts, little of substance was learned about the objects until a local rancher reported that one had crashed in a remote region of New Mexico located approximately seventy-five miles northwest of Roswell Army Air Base (now Walker Field).

On 07 July, 1947, a secret operation was begun to assure recovery of the wreckage of this object for scientific study. During the course of this operation, aerial reconnaissance discovered that four small human-like beings had apparently ejected from the craft at some point before it exploded. These had fallen to earth about two miles east of the wreckage site. All four were dead and badly decomposed due to action by predators and exposure to the elements during the approximately one week time period which had elapsed before their discovery. A special scientific team took charge of removing these bodies for study. (See attachment “C”.) The wreckage of the craft was also removed to several different locations. (See Attachment “B”.) Civilian and military witnesses in the area were debriefed, and news reporters were given the effective cover story that the object had been a misguided weather research balloon.

* * * * * * * * * * * *
* TOP SECRET *
* * * * * * * * * * * *
TOP SECRET / [BLANKED]
_EYES ONLY_ T52-EXEMPT (E)
EYES ONLY 003

TOP SECRET / MAJIC 004

EYES ONLY
* * * * * * * * * * * *
* TOP SECRET *
* * * * * * * * * * * *
EYES ONLY COPY ONE OF ONE

A covert analytical effort organized by Gen. Twining and Dr. Bush acting on the direct orders of the President, resulted in a preliminary consensus (19 September, 1947) that the disc was most likely a short range reconnaissance craft. This conclusion was based for the most part on the craft’s size and the apparent lack of any identifiable provisioning. (See Attachment “D”.) A similar analysis of the four dead occupants was arranged by Dr. Bronk. It was the tentative conclusions of this group (30 November, 1947) that although these creatures are human-like in appearance, the biological and evolutionary processes responsible for their development has apparently been quite different from those observed or postulated in homo-sapiens. Dr. Bronk’s team has suggested the term “Extra-terrestrial Biological Entities”, or “EBE’s”, be adopted as the standard term of reference for these creatures until such time as a more definitive designation can be agreed upon.

Since it is virtually certain that these craft do not originate in any country on earth, considerable speculation has centered around what their point of origin might be and how they get here. Mars was and remains a possibility, although some scientists, most notably Dr. Menzel, consider it more likely that we are dealing with beings from another solar system entirely.

Numerous examples of what appear to be a form of writing were found in the wreckage. Efforts to decipher these have remained largely unsuccessful. (See Attachment “E”.) Equally unsuccessful have been efforts to determine the method of propulsion or the nature or method of transmission of the power source involved. Research along these lines has been complicated by the complete absence of identifiable wings, propellers, jets, or other conventional methods of propulsion and guidance, as well as a total lack of metallic wiring, vacuum tubes, or similar recognizable electronic components. (See Attachment “F”.) It is assumed that the propulsion unit was completely destroyed by the explosion which caused the crash.

***************
*TOP SECRET *
***************
EYES ONLY
TOP SECRET / MAJIC T-52 EXEMPT (E)
EYES ONLY 004

TOP SECRET / MAJIC 005

EYES ONLY

***************
* TOP SECRET *
***************
EYES ONLY COPY ONE OF ONE

A need for as much additional information as possible about these craft, their performance characteristics and their purpose led to the undertaking known as U. S. Air Force Project SIGN in December, 1947. In order to preserve security, liaison between SIGN and Majestic-12 was limited to two individuals within the Intelligence Division of Air Material Command whose role was to pass along certain types of information through channels. SIGN evolved into Project GRUDGE in December, 1948. The operation is currently being conducted under the code name BLUE BOOK, with liaison maintained through the Air Force officer who is head of the project.

On 06 December, 1950, a second object, probably of similar origin, impacted the earth at high speed in the El Indio – Guerrero area of the Texas – Mexican border after following a long trajectory through the atmosphere. By the time a search team arrived, what remained of the object had been almost totally incinerated. Such material as could be recovered was transported to the A.E.C. facility at Sandia, New Mexico, for study.

Implications for the National Security are of continuing importance in that the motives and ultimate intentions of these visitors remain completely unknown. In addition, a significant upsurge in the surveillance activity of these craft beginning in May and continuing through the autumn of this year has caused considerable concern that new developments may be imminent. It is for these reasons, as well as the obvious international and technological considerations and the ultimate need to avoid a public panic at all costs, that the Majestic-12 Group remains of the unanimous opinion that imposition of the strictest security precautions should continue without interruption into the new administration. At the same time, contingency plan MJ-1949-04P/78 (Top Secret – Eyes Only) should be held in continued readiness should the need to make a public announcement present itself. (See Attachment “G”.)

Source coolinterestingstuff.com

{ http://www.alien-revelations.com/ }

12-04-2018 om 23:42 geschreven door peter  

What Are Good Reasons For The Government To Hide Proof Of Alien Contact?

I am going to try and deal with some potentially realistic scenarios. Keep in mind the government plans for the worst case scenario but hopes for the best. So these describe the worst case scenarios of the public finding out. Any worst-case scenario that is impossible to tame or deal with would indicate it might be best to keep the info hidden until they need to tell us.

Also, we should remember any species that is capable of surviving for the hundreds of years it would take to get here under less than light speed or any species capable of faster than light travel would also be hundreds and hundreds of years more advanced than us. Both long distance slow travel and faster than light travel are so incredibly difficult that it would far exceed our science. So much so that their technology would seem almost like magic to us. It would be like showing someone from the middle ages tv’s, jet planes and open heart surgery. They might have active nanotech, the ability to manipulate gravitons, antimatter, and magnetic monopoles or some other exotic technologies we haven’t even dreamed of yet.

To be very clear: These are hypothetical scenarios based on the question. Personally, I know of no evidence that leads any direct credence to any of these. While each might be possible there is no known evidence of any of these scenarios.

1. Aliens are suspected to have visited but only a very long time ago and there is no evidence of hostility. It would not make sense to get the public up in arms over something that happened hundreds or thousands of years ago. Such a revelation would create a host of issues from religious to political as well as boldening fringe groups, militants, and wackos. Why create an alarm if it was so long ago, there is no evidence they are harmful and we don’t even know if they would come back?
2. Aliens visited but only a few times and there is either no evidence of hostility or not enough to make a determination of if they are potentially friend or foe. In this scenario, the aliens might be peaceful or might not but if you get the whole world and the internet talking about it. You will eventually have high-profile and visible people making stupid or dangerous statements that could be misinterpreted by the aliens. Our movies are bad enough in how we depict aliens but if we have talking heads talking about how we need to put killer satellites in space to defend against what may, in fact, be peaceful aliens we risk creating a more tense situation than is necessary. When the aliens do return they will see us going crazy over aliens.That is probably not the way the government wants to make first contact.
3. Aliens have visited us could be hostile and they have technology that we cannot hope to compete with. This is the worst of all possible scenarios. They seem to be potentially hostile and they have weapons that would make it near impossible to beat them in a conflict. Widespread panic would engulf the world including doomsday cults and those that want to worship the aliens.Religious leaders would have to explain how aliens fit into systems that are inherently human biased.Speculation and talk of how to defend or fight such aliens in the media and public would make a potentially bad situation against a superior enemy worse. It might even move them to make a preemptive strike as opposed to accepting some kind of surrender or treaty.
4. The aliens are friendly, social and responsible. They are working with the government to quietly and slowly acclimate us to the idea of there being aliens without admitting it until we are ready to reduce panic and social unrest. Even if the aliens were good-natured they could easily see how exposing themselves to us could disrupt our societies. Thus they would tell the government to deny any existence but they would encourage us to explore the concepts in movies, TV and books and plays. Occasional leaks would happen because such a coverup cannot be perfect but those only help to seed the idea that aliens might exist.In this scenario, they are actually keeping it quiet so they can do a slow and phased exposure to this idea. First, they would show life on Mars and other planets in a simple and harmless form, and might even fake such results (if these planets are barren) just to get the dialogue going. Once we have accepted life can exist on other planets other revelations would come at a very slow pace maybe once every 5 or 10 years such as receiving a strange but brief broadcast signal. Eventually, these kinds of events and experiences would ramp up until we get to the point of actually trying to send messages to the aliens. The aliens which might very well already be here would pretend to be sending the messages from very far away and thus replies take 10 or more years. Eventually, they would plan for our first public first contact. Using a scenario like this most of the threats from the above scenarios could be avoided.
5. We know that they exist but we only know from receiving very distant and very faint communications. In this scenario, the government would want to tread very lightly and take it very slowly. They might not want to communicate back and confirm we are here until they know more about the aliens. There is no evidence the aliens have ever visited us and based on the source of the communications any trip or message would take a very long time to arrive. They would likely want to wait and learn more as well as ramp up our space spending so we can try to have sufficient technology to deal with any political or hostile situations that might arise.
6. There is evidence of aliens and it points to them either interfering directly with human development or the genetics of all life on our planet. The potential questions and issues surrounding alien-initiated Panspermia are too many to name.It would throw most religions into a tailspin because it would mean life was created by aliens and not by some deity. Many religions would fracture and either declare such evidence to be false and demonic or might even move to start embracing the aliens as gods and worshipping them. Others would leave the churches and yet others might join them seeking some kind of help as they fear the implications of such a revelation. Socially this would mean a great deal of upheaval given the numbers of religious people worldwide.Scientifically it would validate some science and throw others out the window. We would then have to begin looking at how this alien abiogenesis was accomplished and how much of the development of life was altered and how much was from natural evolution. All data on evolution would need to be carefully scrutinized.On top of all of that, the question would be if they are still here or not and how much they have continued to interfere with human development. Are we just a big experiment to them?

No matter how you look at it, although proof of extraterrestrial life in any form especially a sentient form would be both a big boon and a big strife to our society. It would likely be a transformative event on the scale of nuclear bombs. Using nuclear weapons as an example, governments were researching and developing the technology for them for decades and denied any knowledge of their existence until the USA actually dropped the first ones. Such things that shake up a society you do not take lightly. I trust the government would take finding aliens very carefully too.

Much thought has gone into what might be the Potential cultural impact of extraterrestrial contact. These include many additional scenarios to the ones above including loss of identity as a species, being forced to remove weapons of mass destruction, risks from technology we do not yet know how to use, legal issues over personhood and rights of aliens and so much more.

[/responsivevoice]

{ http://www.theangryufologist.us/ }

12-04-2018 om 23:07 geschreven door peter  

NASA TESS set to reveal thousands of alien worlds around us

Scott Sutherland
Meteorologist/Science Writer

Wednesday, April 11, 2018, 5:22 PM - NASA's newest exoplanet hunter is go for launch on Monday, and is set to draw back the veil on our universe, to reveal the multitude of alien planets that are no doubt surrounding us.

Just over nine years ago, NASA launched the Kepler Space Telescope, which has found over 2,600 confirmed alien worlds, and an even greater number of candidate worlds awaiting confirmation from other sources. Kepler accomplished this by initially fixing its gaze down the local branch of our galactic spiral arm, at one specific batch of around 100,000 stars, and then later, under its K2 mission, by adjusting its field of view to a different patch of space every three months.

On Monday, April 16, NASA is scheduled to launch their new Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite, aka TESS. 

This new satellite will take up the search from Kepler, but rather than looking at only one patch of the sky, TESS will scan nearly the entire sky around us, during its first two years in space.

Watch below to see the field of view of TESS, and how it plans to scan space around us.

NASA will be hosting three different events on Sunday, April 15 - a NASA Social Mission Overview at 11 a.m. EDT, a prelaunch news conference at 1 p.m. EDT, and a science news conference at 3 p.m. EDT. Tune in below to watch (and enjoy the NASA TV stream until then).

Then, return on Monday, April 16, first at 10 a.m. EDT for a live 30 minute show NASA EDGE: TESS, which will discuss how the spacecraft will search for alien worlds, and then at 6 p.m. EDT for coverage of the 6:32 p.m. EDT launch.

How do you find exoplanets?

There are a few ways to tell if there are planets orbiting around a distant star.

You can directly image them, but this is very difficult, and only captures the largest planets, and those in the most distant orbits around their stars. You can watch for a wobble in the star's light, caused as a planet drags the star around in a bit of a stellar dance. Again, this tends to only find the largest planets. You can even use spacetime itself, as a planet's gravity forms a gravitational lens, warping the light from stars directly beyond your star of interest. This, too, only tends to find the largest planets, since they create the largest gravitational lens.

The most successful method at finding planets, and the best at finding smaller, rocky worlds, is the 'transit method'.

Here, you aim a very sensitive, very steady telescope at a distant star, and watch that star, constantly, for as long as possible. If the star's light dims briefly, and does so regularly, by the same amount, it is very likely that you're seeing a planet pass between your telescope and that star. 

This animation demonstrates how a 'transiting' exoplanet shows up to a telescope like Kepler or TESS. Credit: NASA/Scott Sutherland

TESS will use this method as it concentrates on over 200,000 of the closest stars around us, out to about 300 light years, which will be far brighter than most of the stars studied so far by Kepler. This will provide much more information on these targets, as the spacecraft's cameras spend a total of 27 days on each sector of space.

The combined field of view of the four TESS cameras (left), how each of the 26 observation sectors (13 per hemisphere) fit together during the first two years (centre), and the duration of observations for different regions of the celestial sphere, taking into account overlap of TESS's field of view. The dashed black circle around the ecliptic pole is where the James Webb Space Telescope will be able to observe at any time.

Credit: NASA GSFC

That schedule will limit TESS's ability to spot repeat transits, except for those planets orbiting closely around red dwarf stars, however by scanning nearly all of the space around us, it still has a chance to pick up thousands, to tens of thousands of transiting planets during its initial 2-year scan, and possibly things that we can not even anticipate at this time.

"I don’t think we know everything TESS is going to accomplish," Stephen Rinehart, TESS project scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, said in a NASA statement. "To me, the most exciting part of any mission is the unexpected result, the one that nobody saw coming."

Sources: NASA | NASA | NASA

Watch Below: New exoplanet-hunting satellite will scan nearly the entire sky for alien worlds

{ https://www.theweathernetwork.com/ }

12-04-2018 om 22:58 geschreven door peter  

12-04-2018 om 22:35 geschreven door peter  

Scientists find salty, Europa-like subglacial lakes

BY MIHAI ANDREI 

A sealed lake is an ideal place to look for clues about extraterrestrial life — and researchers have just identified a few more.

Small valley glacier exiting the Devon Island Ice Cap in Canada. The Devon Ice Cap appears to be the only holder of salty subglacial lakes (as far as we know).

Image credits: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center.

Life on other planets might not be located the most obvious of places. While researchers used to think that Earth-like planets such as Mars or Venus were capable of holding life, modern research has shown that places like Europa or Enceladus are much more likely to be hospitable (Europa and Enceladus are two frozen moons of Jupiter and Saturn respectively). However, astronomers have evidence that beneath the frozen surface lies a vast ocean of liquid where life may very well thrive. Researchers want to explore this avenue before actually landing a shuttle on the surface of these moons (which may take a very long time) and the best way to do that is by studying subglacial lakes.

Subglacial lakes are bodies of water perfectly sealed under a glacier — typically an ice cap or ice sheet. There are 400 known subglacial lakes in the world, most of which can be found in Antarctica, with Lake Vostok being probably the most well known. Since they’re sealed off from the rest of the world, life can develop and adapt independently — this essentially means that subglacial lakes are potentially unique microbial habitats which can provide information about how life might have developed on places like Europa. Now, lead author Anja Rutishauser, a Ph.D. student at the University of Alberta, has found the first subglacial lakes in the Canadian High Arctic.

“If there is microbial life in these lakes, it has likely been under the ice for at least 120,000 years, so it likely evolved in isolation,” Rutishauser said. “If we can collect a sample of the water, we may determine whether microbial life exists, how it evolved, and how it continues to live in this cold environment with no connection to the atmosphere.”

An artist’s cross-section of Lake Vostok, the largest known subglacial lake in Antarctica. Importantly, the lake is sealed by kilometers of ice.

Image credits: Nicolle Rager-Fuller / NSF.

What makes these newly discovered lakes extra special is that they seem to contain very salty water — all other subglacial lakes we know of are thought to contain freshwater, or only mildly saline water. All subglacial lakes are good analogs for life beyond Earth, but the hypersaline nature of these newly discovered lakes makes them particularly tantalizing analogs for ice-covered moons in our solar system, according to the researchers. There is strong evidence that Jupiter’s icy moon Europa contains hypersaline water.

The lake was discovered using remote sensing, which is promising, especially considering that NASA’s Europa Clipper mission, which is set to launch sometime in the 2020s and take samples from Europa, will use similar remote sensing techniques. An analysis of the radar data shows that the lakes are located 550 to 750 meters beneath the Devon Ice Cap, one of the largest ice caps in the Canadian Arctic. They’ve not had contact with the outside world for tens of thousands of years.

“If there is microbial life in these lakes, it has likely been under the ice for at least 120,000 years, so it likely evolved in isolation,” Rutishauser said. “If we can collect a sample of the water, we may determine whether microbial life exists, how it evolved, and how it continues to live in this cold environment with no connection to the atmosphere.”

Now, researchers would like to sample this environment, which is probably more complicated than you’d expect. It’s not just drilling through hundreds of meters (or perhaps even kilometers) of ice that’s problematic: there’s also the matter of contamination — if a unique microbial environment does exist, the last thing you’d want to do is contaminate it.

• Journal Reference: Anja Rutishause et al. Discovery of a hypersaline subglacial lake complex beneath Devon Ice Cap, Canadian Arctic. DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aar4353

{ https://www.zmescience.com/ }

12-04-2018 om 22:24 geschreven door peter  

On This Day In Space! April 12, 1961: Yuri Gagarin Becomes 1st Human in Space

• Email Hanneke Weitering at hweitering@space.com or follow her @hannekescience.
• Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+. 

12-04-2018 om 22:12 geschreven door peter  

Nieuwe NASA-telescoop vanaf volgende week op zoek naar buitenaards leven - HLN.be 

Bron: NASA, Business Insider

De TESS is NASA’s krachtigste telescoop totnogtoe die zal worden ingeschakeld voor de zoektocht naar leefbare planeten buiten ons zonnestelsel. Maandag omstreeks 16.32 uur lokale tijd zal een Falcon 9-raket de satelliet in een baan om de aarde brengen.

Lees ook

NASA wil Mars verkennen met “robotbijen”

Groter gebied

NASA ontdekte al duizenden exoplaneten met de Kepler-telescoop, maar die onderzocht slecht een smalle, diepe regio. TESS zal een gebied afspeuren dat honderden keren groter is, en veel dichter bij de Aarde, op zoek naar mogelijk leefbare planeten.

“We leerden van Kepler dat er aan de hemel meer planeten dan sterren zijn en nu zal TESS ons de ogen openen voor een brede waaier aan planeten rondom de meest nabijgelegen sterren”, zegt Paul Hertz, directeur van de afdeling astrofysica bij NASA in een persbericht.

Kepler vs. TESS

De Kepler-telescoop onderzocht 150.000 sterren op zoek naar exoplaneten die eromheen cirkelen. De telescoop speurde daarbij een gebied ter grootte van 0,25 procent van de nachtelijke hemel af dat 3000 lichtjaren diep is. Daarbij ontdekte hij een vijftigtal rotsachtige, aardeachtige planeten, waarvan er tien mogelijk bewoonbaar zijn, en 4000 mogelijke andere planeten sinds de lancering in 2009. Met een artificiële intelligentie-algoritme van Google werden in die data nog meer kandidaat-planeten aangetroffen.

TESS zal gedurende twee jaar 200.000 sterren aan ongeveer 85 procent van de nachtelijke hemel onderzoeken die allemaal amper minder dan 300 lichtjaren van ons verwijderd zijn en zo’n 30 tot 100 keer krachtiger de sterren die Kepler bestudeerde. 

Transitiemethode

De telescoop hanteert de transitiemethode en detecteert exoplaneten door op zoek te gaan naar dipjes in het zichtbare licht van de sterren. Als die dipjes repetitief zijn en een vast tijdsinterval hebben, kan dat wijzen op een planeet of planeten die rond een ster cirkelen.

“TESS zal duizenden planeten ontdekken en is bovendien specifiek ontworpen om een groep kleine planeten te vinden die rond kleine sterren draaien”, zo valt te lezen op een website van het project. Onderzoekers verwachten een 300-tal planeten te vinden die zo groot zijn als de Aarde of als een superaarde: maximaal twee keer zo groot als de Aarde.

Opvolging

De James Webb-ruimtetelescoop die vanaf 2020 de Hubble-ruimtetelescoop moet vervangen en het grootste ruimteobservatorium zal zijn dat ooit gelanceerd werd, zal de data van TESS vervolgens verder onderzoeken en de meest interessante nabijgelegen rotsachtige planeten bestuderen.

Met wat geluk zal de James Webb-telescoop zelfs licht opvangen van de atmosfeer van een exoplaneet en zo indirect bewijs vinden voor buitenaards leven.

{ https://www.hln.be/ }

12-04-2018 om 21:42 geschreven door peter  

Where are the aliens? Enrico Fermi called the fact that there are so many stars and yet no aliens visiting us a paradox. Perhaps the second half of the paradox is wrong … aliens exist and are living amongst us but we’re so distracted by watching what we know that we complete ignore them. That’s the premise behind the Cosmic Gorilla Effect, and a new study suggests that a simple video experiment with athletes and an ape may prove that we’re not alone … just oblivious.

“The cosmic gorilla effect or the problem of undetected non terrestrial intelligent signals” is the title of a new studypublished in the journal Acta Astronautica. The “gorilla effect” refers to a famous experiment conducted by Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons – cognitive psychologists and authors of The Invisible Gorilla: How Our Intuitions Deceive Us. A video (seen here) shows six people – three in black shirts and three in white – passing basketballs to only those wearing the same colored shirts. The participant is instructed to count how many times the people in white shirts pass the ball. At the end, they’re asked for their total, given the correct answer, and then asked another very embarrassing question:

“But did you see the gorilla?”

Yes, a gorilla walked between the players and most people are so focused on counting that they miss it completely. The experiment is often used to describe situations like the unreliability of witnesses at crime scenes who are often focused on something else. In their new study, neuropsychologists Gabriel de la Torre and Manuel García from the University of Cádiz in Spain use a “cosmic” version of the gorilla effect to explain why we may not see the extraterrestrials walking through the scenery of our lives.

“If we transfer this to the problem of searching for other non-terrestrial intelligences, the question arises about whether our current strategy may result in us not perceiving the gorilla. Our traditional conception of space is limited by our brain, and we may have the signs above and be unable to see them. Maybe we’re not looking in the right direction.”

Garcia and de la Torre conducted their own experiment – asking volunteers to differentiate between aerial views of buildings and nature scenes while hiding a tiny gorilla in one of them. Intuitive people noticed the gorilla more often than those who saw themselves as logical or methodical. One way they explained this is by the concept of ‘reverse pareidolia. Pareidolia is the tendency to see something real or significant in a random array of shapes – the ‘face of Jesus on a tortilla’ or pyramids, buildings or animals in blurry photographs from the surface of Mars. In reverse pareidolia, we’re looking so hard for extraterrestrial beings we’re familiar with (greys, reptilians, robots, etc.) that we completely miss things that resemble nothing we’ve ever encountered. Instead of seeing things where there are none, we’re not seeing things where there are some.

The “cosmic gorilla effect” is entirely plausible, especially when you throw in the ideas of multiple dimensions and the existence of dark matter. However, is it true? Or are we in the “zoo hypothesis” with ETs who would be visible to us but intentionally hide themselves while they observe us?

Here’s another experiment for you. Somewhere hidden in this article is a great name for band. Did you see it?

{ http://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

12-04-2018 om 21:20 geschreven door peter  

As with all things that require vast amounts of manpower and capital, the Chinese are making swift advances in their space program. Despite threatening nearly the entire planet with a falling space station and dropping mysterious surveillance devices onto villages, the Chinese are on their way to becoming global leaders in space exploration. Chinese scientists recently developed plans to ‘colonize’ the moon with silkworms and launch a giant space laser into orbit – you know, for “peaceful” stuff. With all of this growth in their space program, it’s natural that the Chinese might be up to some more shadowy operations behind the scenes. Aren’t we all?

Whatever the Chinese are doing in Vanuatu, it’s got its neighbors spooked. Diplomats from Australia and New Zealand have expressed concern over a growing Chinese military presence on the small island nation. The Sydney Morning Herald notes that “access to open ocean can be useful for testing missile and space capabilities” and that “a future naval or air base in Vanuatu would give China a foothold to coerce Australia, outflank the US and its base on US territory at Guam, and collect intelligence in a regional security crisis.”

Vanuatu has strategic value in the South Pacific.

However, while many outlets are focusing on the militaristic advantages offered by a South Pacific base, the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post recently ran an opinion piece pointing out that the rumored Chinese military installation on the island nation of Vanuatu might actually be some sort of mysterious space monitoring station. Just what are the Chinese up to in Oceania?

According to Beijing-based military expert Zhou Chenming, the base will likely be for used for rocket test flights and other aerospace experiments:

China needs a space control station in the South Pacific because it is going to launch more heavy rockets. The speculation is understandable because whatever projects China sets up overseas now, people will imagine it is going to be a military base, especially since space projects are carried out by the Chinese military.

Zhou points out that given China’s ambition to launch a manned lunar mission in the 2030s, it makes sense for them to establish a space base over open ocean where they won’t have to drop their rocket boosters onto unfortunate villages. What might this base foreshadow about the looming war in space?

{ http://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

12-04-2018 om 21:07 geschreven door peter  

How well do you know your U.S. UFO lore? The incident referred to as the “only historically documented UFO sighting in the United States” occurred in what state? If you said “New Mexico,” you’re close … but only because the International UFO Museum Research Center in Roswell, New Mexico, donated funds to pay for a memorial to the incident which occurred on September 1st, 1969, in Sheffield, Massachusetts. There’s a UFO memorial in Sheffield, Massachusetts? Yes, but you’d better get there in a hurry because the local government wants it moved. Again. What do the aliens have to say about this?

“This Governor’s Citation [is] in recognition of the off-world incident on Sept. 1st, 1969, which engaged the Reed Family, which has been established.”

That’s part of the inscription on a 6-foot tall, 5,000-pound concrete memorial located at the end of the Old Covered Bridge, a replica (the original burned down in 1994) of the one Thom Reed, his mother, grandmother and brother crossed over on that hot night and into … something. Reed was 9 at the time and has become the official re-teller of the tale. He told it once again recently on the website All of New England.

“We then continued toward the Sheffield Covered Bridge. It was dark and there was a glow emitting up through the planks as we entered the bridge. As we exited the bridge my grandmother turned and talked to me as I had given my brother candy and she thought he might choke on it. She remarked on the luminescence that still remained behind us. At that point the craft was still beneath the riverbank.”

Reed says the craft rose up and suddenly engulfed the car in a reddish amber light.

“The next thing I remember is being in a building or a large area that resembled an airplane hangar with long fluorescent tubes, providing very low lights, equally spaced out on the top corner walls. My left arm was grabbed by a small bald hairless person. He pushed me out of the room and down a hallway. At that point I remember seeing two large ant-like insects there. They were four and a half feet tall with stick bamboo like legs. Their heads were orangey gold and shaped like a football. “

What’s a football?

The next thing Reed says he remembers is being back in the car. Only his grandmother was conscious and she drove the car back. What they thought was 15 minutes had actually been a couple of hours. They reported the incident to the police the next day and found that at least 20 others had also reported seeing a UFO. A local radio station said they received 40 calls from witnesses. At some point, Reed was said to have taken a lie detector test and got a 99.1 truth rating.

Based on that, the Great Barrington Historical Society declared the UFO sighting “historically significant and true” and money was raised, including a donation from the International UFO Museum Research Center in Roswell which has a wall dedicated to the incident, to create and install the monument at one end of the replica of the bridge.  After a graffiti incident, the stone was moved a few weeks later when officials discovered it was on town property. The new location, 30 feet away on the Pine Island Farm, was eventually updated with two benches and lights and it became the Thom Reed UFO Monument Park. (Numerous photos of the monument and Thom Reed can be seen at the park website.)

“It’s kind of on town property and no one decided it could go there. The town has bylaws and if we let one place put something up then why can’t someone else? I don’t want that to happen.”

Town Administrator Rhonda LaBombard told the Berkshire Eagle that a recent land survey found that the little park with the big monument is still on a town right-of-way easement and must be moved again or the town will remove it in May. Reed himself is puzzled because LaBombard chose the site herself and farmer Louis Aragi thought it was on his private land.

What’s the problem? Despite the fact that it’s the “only historically documented UFO sighting in the United States” and the subject of six documentaries and numerous TV UFO investigation shows, the little park is probably not the tourist draw Sheffield had hoped it would be, and city officials may be concerned about future vandalism or other problems they don’t want responsibility for.

This couldn’t come at a worse time for Thom Reed. He’s currently working on three novellas based on the sighting, a possible six segment mini-series, and will be speaking at the International UFO Museum’s UFO Festival July 6- 8, 2018, where he’ll discuss the incident and probably his two other UFO encounters.

Maybe while he’s there he should pass the hat for the memorial.

{ http://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

12-04-2018 om 21:00 geschreven door peter  

Legendary Astronaut Apparently Spotted A UFO On Way To The Moon

Online UFO enthusiasts are debating whether the legendary astronaut Buzz Aldrin ever spotted or sighted an alien spacecraft.

This report goes viral when Aldrin, the second man on the moon, and three others had reportedly passed lie detector tests under strict lab conditions.

The Institute of BioAcoustic Biology in Albany, Ohio reportedly conducted a study which Aldrin, Al Worden, Edgar Mitchell and Gordon Cooper took part. But it had been said that there must be more to this story or less.

Aldrin allegedly said that he spotted an unknown spaceship that had a shape of a letter L on his way to the moon. It was reportedly verified in subsequent lie detector tests that Aldrin was telling the truth.

However, it is impossible to know the integrity of the company that allegedly conducted the tests as no information on their website that could support the claims about Aldrin taking part of the tests.

Also based on the reports of Reddit Q&A, Aldrin also answered questions about the event where he spotted a UFO on his way to the moon was revealed to be in fact three years ago.

In this report of Reddit, they questioned Aldrin whether he believed in aliens and also about the sightings on his way to the moon on Apollo 11.

Aldrin then replied that he sighted a light moving with them on Apollo 11 towards the Moon. He noted that the light could be explained in a lot of ways like it could be a spacecraft of another country or world. He further explained that it could also be the rocket they had separated from, or possibly the 4 panels that moved away when they extracted the lander from the rocket, and they were facing with the two spacecraft. Aldrin did not discount the possibility that the sun reflected at one of those 4 panels. However, in technical terms, the light can be defined as unidentified, according to Aldrin.

According to Aldrin, they studied what they observed, and he wanted to share what happened to the world, but it did not apparently materialize. Many years later, he had a chance to disclose their observations on a television network in another country. However, UFO enthusiasts in the U.S. apparently got angry with him for not giving them the information. Aldrin explained that it was not an alien as he borrowed what Carl Sagan had said; extraordinary observations require extraordinary evidence.

He also stated that there must be life somewhere in billions of other galaxies that are not yet explored.

Aldrin was on the same mission of Neil Armstrong, who was the first man on the moon and known for his quote “That one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.” Aldrin soon followed Neil’s footsteps, making him the second man on the moon. Armstrong and Aldrin were on the lunar surface for a total of only 21 hours, 36 minutes and 21 seconds.

Buzz Aldrin Saw a UFO During 1969 Apollo 11 Moon Landing Mission: "There Was Something Out There"

Buzz Aldrin explains Apollo 11 UFO sighting - not an alien ship

{ http://www.latest-ufo-sightings.net/ }

12-04-2018 om 20:41 geschreven door peter  

Amazing footage recorded over Las Vegas! 9-Apr-2018

This strange unidentified flying object was recorded over MacDonald Ranch area of Henderson in Nevada on 9th April 2018.

What do you think this craft is?

{ http://www.latest-ufo-sightings.net/ }

12-04-2018 om 20:34 geschreven door peter  

5 Underwater Discoveries That Cannot Be Explained!

Underwater mysteries like that object found at the bottom of the Baltic Sea, underwater pyramids and more.

{ http://www.latest-ufo-sightings.net/ }

12-04-2018 om 20:29 geschreven door peter  

ARJUN WALIA

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.

Related CE Article : US Government Set To Release Official Video Footage, Pictures & Documented Evidence of UFOs

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.

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.

Related CE Article:

• Is A False Flag Alien Invasion In The Works? Wernher Von-Brauns Colleague Seems To Think So

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.

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)

{ titbitssite­.wordpress­.com }

12-04-2018 om 00:59 geschreven door peter  

Are Indonesia’s Massive Megalithic Statues Depictions Of Ancient Astronauts?

The Lore Lindu National Park contains more than  400 megalithic sculptures some of which have anthropomorphic representations, which some compare with the moai of Easter Island, but even to otherworldly visitors.

The Bada Valley is located on the island of Sulawesi, Indonesia, within the Lore Lindu National Park.

Its main attraction is more than 400 megalithic sculptures scattered all over the place, 30 of which have anthropomorphic representations, which some compare with the moai of Easter Island, but even to otherworldly visitors.

Hundreds of these statues are believed to date back to the 14th century and are called watu (“stone”) in the local Badaic language and arca (“statue”) in Indonesian.

The purpose of the megaliths and their builders are unknown.

Are Indonesia's Massive Megalithic Statues Depictions Of Ancient Astronauts?The Mystery Vault | The Mystery

They were discovered by western archeologists in 1908, although they are locally documented at least since the 14th century.

There are dozens of sculptures whose purpose unknown, and whose dating ranges from 1,000 to 5,000 years old, which means that they could be at least 500 years older than the first moai statues of Easter Island.

Some researchers believe that they are related to the megalithic culture of Laos, Cambodia, and parts of Indonesia, where different examples of megaliths have appeared.

However, the Bada Valley statues are unique in all of Southeast Asia due to their morphology.

Two Dutch ladies standing by a statue in Bada Valley in the 1930s.

Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

Local legends associate them with the cult of the ancestors, but also with sacrificial rites and even petrification myths of delinquents and looters in very ancient times:

“One named Tokala’ea, for instance, is said to be a rapist turned to stone; deep cuts in the rock represent scars from knives. Another statue named Tadulako—once a trusted village protector who turned to granite after stealing rice—was left to gaze across the valley at the villagers he betrayed.”

Still today some locals believe that stones have supernatural powers and are able to move by themselves, and many attribute them to our ancient ancestors and to beings that came from the heavens, thousands of years ago.

Archeologists have so far identified both male and female sculptures, differentiated by the representation of the genitals and facial features, such as long hair in women.

Other sculptures are minimalist, with faces indicated by a simple line for eyebrows, cheeks, and chin. Most of the megalithic figures are alone, with a small number of statues distributed forming groups. Curiously, some of the statues are up to 4 and a half meters tall.

Some statues have been found to represent animals as well.

Those that represent humans have huge heads with massive eyes and tall, straight bodies. Most of the statues have fallen and remain half-buried on the banks of rivers or in the middle of the field.

Megalithic Baula statue in the Bada Valley.

Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

The Bada Valley is also well-known for the Kalambas, circular pots carved out of a single block of stone.

The so-called Kalambas can be found all across the valley and were crafted in various shapes and sizes.

Archeologists have found that some of Kalambas have a circular hole in the center, while others have been found to contain two, having a partition in the middle.

Despite the fact that the real use of the Kalambas remains a mystery, some say that these massive pots were used as bathtubs for nobles or kings.

Some authors indicate that these massive circular pots were once used as coffins, or even as cisterns for the storage of water.

Archeologists believe the Kalambas were once covered as they have found massive stone lids in their vicinity, which means that they were not used as bathtubs.

However, just as with the massive megalithic statues, the true purpose and origin of the Kalambas remain a profound mystery that archaeologists have not been able to solve.

Both the statues sand the Kalambas have been abandoned a long time ago, and researchers have not found any tools or other pieces of evidence of the ancient cultures that built them.

{ https://www.ancient-code.com/ }

12-04-2018 om 00:37 geschreven door peter  

Egypt’s Stonehenge: Nabta Playa Predates Stonehenge By At Least A 1,000 Years

Studies and measurements made by satellite and GPS seem to confirm Nabta Playa’s alignment with Sirius, Alpha Centauri, and Orion’s Belt.

Thanks to recent studies we’ve been able to understand how in the distant past, Africa and much of Arabia was much different than it is today. We know that between 130,000-70,000 years ago the Egyptian region known as Nabta Playa, now an arid desert, was a savannah with abundant vegetation and wildlife.

Nabta Playa "ritual" area, Saharan Neolithic

Buffalos, giraffes, antelopes, and gazelles populated this endorheic basin that came to have a large lake.

The archaeological discoveries indicate that the human presence goes back at least to the tenth millennium BC.

There, among the numerous sites scattered around the area, we find a small cromlech, raised about a thousand years before Stonehenge, whose purpose remains a profound mystery.

Located deep within the Nubian Desert, about 800 kilometers south of Cairo and 100 kilometers west of Abu Simbel lie the ruins of the Stonehenge of the desert.

The first groups of people must have been attracted to the region because of their sources of water and pasture for the cattle. The archaeological findings indicate the existence of settlements in this region in dates between the tenth and the eighth millennium BC.

The Nabta Playa cromlech is oval in shape, its largest diameter being about five meters. Seen here is a reproduction of the cromlech in the Museum of Aswan.

Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

These people had a culture of domesticating cattle (perhaps the first in all of Africa to practice cattle grazing), and they used ceramic utensils adorned with elaborate inscriptions.

Around the VII century BC, archaeologists say there must have been an extensive and organized settlement in the region, with a deep well of water as a source of resources.

Cabins built with poles have been found.

The people who lived in the region had a rich diet which included fruits, vegetables, millet, sorghum, and tubercles.

Also, in the seventh millennium, but somewhat later, goats and sheep were brought to the region, apparently from the northwest.

38 “Sun calendar” in Nabta Playa

(courtesy L. Suková)

The people who inhabited the region developed quickly and upgraded their settlements.

Archeological excavations have revealed that these prehistoric people secured their survival, apparently, with a greater level of organization than their contemporaries of the Nile Valley: they erected stone structures above and below the ground, elaborately designed villages were erected, and the inhabitants of the region built deep wells that maintained water all year.

Sometimes during the VI millennium BC, evidence of a religion or prehistoric cult appeared; archaeologists discovered cattle buried in stone chambers with roofs covered with clay. Cattle were normally only killed on important occasions.

It has been suggested that the cult associated with sacrificing cattle shown in Nabta Playa marks an early evolution of the Hathor cult of Ancient Egypt.

Hathor was worshiped as a protector of the desert regions of Serabit el-Khadim.

Eventually, as this ancient people developed, sometimes between 6100 and 5800 BC one of the oldest known lithic constructions on Earth, the small “cromlech” of Nabta Playa, which is believed to have been erected a thousand years before Stonehenge.

As noted by Fred Wendorf and Romuald Schild: “The construction of the megaliths and the large complex structures at Nabta required significant effort, indicating the presence of a religious or political authority with control over human resources for an extended period of time. They, together with the calendar circle and cattle burials, represent an elaborate and previously unsuspected ceremonialism in the Neolithic of the Eastern Sahara. Although the evidence remains insecure and thus it cannot be demonstrated that these Saharan cattle pastoralists had a ranked society, this is, nevertheless, a strong possibility.”

Approximate location of Nabta Playa.

Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

It consists of thirty stones arranged in a circle, inside which there are six other stones.

The site also has five lithic alignments that extend from a set of central stones.

Astrophysicist Thoms G. Brophy suggested that the “megaliths” of Nabta Playa could have constituted a kind of astronomical observatory.

The circle of stones would be a calendar with four pairs of stones as doors, facing two to two: a pair oriented in a north-south direction and the second in a northeast-southwest direction, indicating the solstice.

Also, according to Brophy, the six central stones, and their different inclinations would also be part of the observatory.

He proposed that three of those stones are related to the Orion belt and the other three with the shoulder and the main star of Orion, with greater inclination than the three previous stones.

Its cycle is repeated approximately every 25,000 years, following the precession of the equinoxes.

The last minimum of the Orion belt occurred between 6400 and 4900 BC., according to radiocarbon dating of the remains of bonfires made in the circle.

In regards to the five radial alignments, Brophy’s interpretation suggested that the lines drawn from these stones to the radial stone were associated with the celestial places where several stars are represented by the central stones in the “circle-calendar” at the time of the ortho heliacal vernal equinox.

He theorized that the different distances represented the brightness of the stars, and deduced that the builders of the astronomical calendar associated the distance of the Earth to the stars with a scale of one meter = 0.799 light years, within the margin of error for astronomical distances calculated today.

Nabta Playa, one of the oldest astronomical observatories on Earth?

A study conducted by the University of Colorado in 2007 concluded that the dates of the alignments proposed by Brophy were deviating for at least 1,500 years.

The archaeologists of the University of Colorado proposed that the area would have been a ceremonial center around 6100-5600 BC, where people from different places congregated to perform animal sacrifices, evidenced by a large number of remains found on the old beach of the lake.

Around 5500 BC, more organized groups began visiting the region and built burial chambers and other burial mounds. Sometimes around 4800 BC the cromlech would have been raised, aligned approximately with the summer solstice.

More complex structures would follow him during a period that would go from 4500 to 3600 BC.

Measurements were also made by satellite and GPS, which confirmed a possible alignment with Sirius, Alpha Centauri, and Orion’s Belt.

In their study, researchers suggest that the repetitive orientation of the megaliths, stelae, human tombs and animals found reveal a very early symbolic connection with the North.

The conclusions made by experts is that the symbolism derived from the archaeological records of Nabta Playa in the 5th millennium BC is very basic, and focused on issues of practical importance for a nomadic people: cattle, water, death, land, sun, and the stars.

{ https://www.ancient-code.com/ }

12-04-2018 om 00:21 geschreven door peter  

The Enigmatic Gotland Grooves, Ancient Cosmic Calendars?

While many of us are fascinated with Pyramids scattered across the globe and massive stones such as those found at Puma Punku or Baalbek, the truth is that there are many other ancient wonders around the globe worth knowing about.

If we travel to the Swedish Island of Gotland, we will come across a fascinating ancient historical treasure.

The island of Gotland is home to the largest concentration of grooved stones in all of Europe, artifacts that are more interesting than they seem. The island of Gotland is the largest island of the Baltic Sea and is located off the east coast of Sweden and the north coast of Poland.

Grooves from Ronehamn, Gotland, Sweden.

Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

The island is a limestone plateau, without mountains, inhabited since ancient times and famous for its abundance of sheep.

In those outcrops of limestone, and in the rocks and stones scattered throughout the island, there are some grooves (which in Swedish are called sliprännor) made thousands of years ago by ancient mankind.

So far, experts hav documented more than 3,600 grooved stones, of which about 700 are scored directly into the limestone bedrock, the rest are found on about 800 stones.

As noted by Space Math / NASA, the length of the grooves varies from about 0.5 up to one meter.

They are between 5 cm to 10 cm wide and 1 cm to 10 cm in depth. The grooves on a stone are not parallel. Instead, they are oriented in several directions, some grooves crossing other grooves. Yet on any particular stone, the grooves are not randomly oriented but seem to follow a prescribed orientation, although that orientation may change slightly from grove to grove.

Grooves from Hörsne, Gotland, Sweden.

Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

The grooves on the stones became a topic of interested for experts in the 1850s when researchers started comparing them with similar ones existing in France, where they are called polissoirs and date from the Neolithic era, created by the same culture that erected the menhirs and dolmens.

The difference is that in Gotland we find the highest concentration of grooved stones in the world, with the whole island practically covered with them.

The most important question: why?

By 1933, more than 500 sites had been documented with these grooved stones on the island.

At first, it was thought that they could have been made to sharpen Neolithic axes or swords during the Middle Ages.

However, it was soon evident that the width of the medieval or Viking swords was greater than the grooves themselves to fit into them.

And as for the Neolithic weapons, none could be found in the excavations made so far.

So, what were they? And why did the ancients create them?

Grooves on stone as part of a prehistoric grave. Bursgvik, Gotland, Sweden.

Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

As mentioned in the above article by NASA Space Math, the stretch marks or grooves are between 50 centimeters and 1 meter long, depending on the location, about 10 centimeters deep and another 10 centimeters wide.

From the curvature of the grooves it seems that they had to be made with some abrasive object, according to some a pendulum, using quartz sand and water.

So, if they were not made by sharpening tools or weapons, what was their purpose?

As explained by NASA, is that the mysterious stones are in fact astronomical calendars.

This is the longest known series of grooves on Gotland (Sweden). It is situated on the farm Hugreifs, about 600 m south-east of the church at Gammelgarn. The 32 grooves mark the direction to the rising or setting full moon on the date of its passage of the bright star Antares in Scorpio. The dates are in the Gregorian calendar. (Measurements by S. Gannholm.)

 Image Credit.

This is based on the curious alignment of the grooves, which always appear in groups and point in different directions, even overlapping at times.

Sören Gannholm, who studied the enigmatic stones in the early 1980s, found that many of the grooves point in the direction of the start or end of the full moon on different dates with an interval of 19 years.

A computer simulation taking into account the azimuth found a correspondence of the orientations for the period 3300-2000 BC, which may confirm their Neolithic origin.

Recent research of 1256 grooves revealed that they are arranged with certain positions of the celestial bodies, possibly the sun or the moon. Most of them are oriented east to west, although the island is itself oriented north-south.

Certain late 1st-millennium picture stones on Gotland display grooves that have been produced after the relief of the stones was formed, which show the grooves to be late. Furthermore, with the level above current sea surface of the lowest grooved outcrops on the island, that shows them to be no older than AD 1000 judging from post-glacial shoreline displacement.

It has been suggested that on one picture stone, part of the Late Iron Age decoration is carved into the bottom of a groove, suggesting that this groove must be older than the picture.

Source: NASA / Space Math

Featured image credit: Wikimedia Commons.

{ https://www.ancient-code.com/ }

11-04-2018 om 23:57 geschreven door peter  

What On Earth Is That? Have UFO Hunters Found A Massive Antenna on Antarctica?

Apparently, Antarctica has all the perfect ingredients for being called a Conspiracy haven.

Now, A UFO Hunter and Youtuber from Arizona (USA) claims to have discovered a giant object using satellite images from Google Earth on the Frozen Continent.

According to his claims, there’s a massive Antenna covered by thick layers of snow on Antarctica, and it wasn’t placed there by penguins, was it?

Antarctica, a continent shrouded in mystery

For years has Antarctica been mentioned in the same sentence as UFO, Conspiracy, Aliens, Secret Bases, and Pyramids.

But what makes Antarctica so mysterious, and is there anything anomalous on the frozen continent at all, other than secret penguin societies?

This is the result of wind currents, right?

Image Credit: YouTube

Mostly because of its isolated geographical position, Antarctica is being bombarded by stories of secret bases, aliens, and pyramids.

Its far away from society, its mostly uninhabited, its covered in snow, and it was once a continent teeming with life.

But because of the fact that it’s mostly uninhabited, visited mostly only by scientific expeditions, and located far away from society, the continent of Antarctica offers all necessary ingredients for a great conspiracy theory.

The above facts have made Antarctica appear every once in a while, in news as one of the most mysterious places on Earth.

Therefore, it is not strange that numerous ‘conspiracy theories, claims, and accounts’ have been proposed throughout the years, trying to explain some of the many enigmatic occurrences on Earth’s most isolated continent.

Many authors have proposed that there are many interesting things hidden beneath Antarctica that are kept away from society.

And even though we know about Antarctica only for a little over 100 years, there are numerous ancient maps that depict parts of Antarctica free of ice.

Anyway, despite the fact that many details about Antarctica are exaggerated, every once in a while, something new is found on the icy continent.

Now, a man who goes by the nickname MrMBB333, believes that satellite images from Antarctica supposedly show a structure with straight lines which he reckons, is not the product of nature, nor wind currents, for that matter.

Oh, here’s the video:

Skeptics argue that it’s just snowdrifts, but Michael insists it’s a giant antenna.

The question that arises now is who could have built such a structure in a place like that if of course, it is a massive manmade structure.

So, what do you think?

Could this be some sort of massive underground facility on Antarctica? Or is this discovery, as skeptics suggest, just the result of mother nature and wind currents?

{ https://www.ancient-code.com/ }

11-04-2018 om 23:47 geschreven door peter  

Once Upon a Time in a Thunderstorm

Thunderstorms in Earth’s upper atmosphere remain something of a mystery. Scientists cannot reach them directly with instruments; they are too high for balloons and too low for weather satellites. Flying through thunderstorms or camping out on mountaintops waiting for one typically ranks low even on an adventurers' bucket list.

An investigation aboard the International Space Station has come to the rescue. The European Space Agency (ESA) Atmosphere-Space Interactions Monitor (ASIM) is a collection of optical cameras, photometers and a large X- and gamma-ray detector mounted on the outside of ESA’s Columbus Module on the station. For at least two years, it will observe thunderstorm-generated electrical discharges in the upper atmosphere – the stratosphere and mesosphere – up to the ionosphere, the edge of space. This Earth observation facility enables study of severe thunderstorms and their role in the Earth’s atmosphere and climate.

Upper-atmospheric lightning, known as transient luminous events, includes colorful phenomena with names straight out of a fairy tale: sprites, elves, and giants.

The space station offers this investigation an ideal observing platform for several reasons. Its low-Earth orbit brings the observations as close as possible to these upper-atmosphere phenomena. The station’s orbit also offers almost complete coverage of tropical and subtropical regions, much of which are difficult to access but are where some of the most intense thunderstorms form. Finally, observations are made in optical bands that are subject to absorption in the atmosphere and so cannot be used for ground observations.

Sprites are flashes caused by electrical breakdown in the mesosphere. Blue jets are lightning discharges reaching upwards through the stratosphere, and elves are concentric rings of emissions caused by an electromagnetic pulse at the ionosphere’s bottom edge. Giants are large discharges that create an electrical breakdown of the atmosphere from the top of thunderstorms to the bottom ionosphere. Terrestrial gamma-ray flashes are a flash phenomenon generated at the top of thunderstorms. Evidence suggests that run-away electron discharge causes some of these phenomena.

In the 1920s, English scientist C.T.R. Wilson received a Nobel Prize for work with a cloud chamber that made visible the ionizing radiation from cosmic rays and X-rays. He predicted that electrical discharges can occur above thunderstorms in the mesosphere, and that thunderstorm electrical fields can accelerate electrons to relativistic energies. Instruments were not sensitive enough to provide a definitive answer until 1993, however, when flashes of X-rays over thunderstorms were observed from NASA’s Compton Gamma Ray Observatory.

In 1990, the first observation of a sprite was documented, and since then ground and aircraft observations discovered a multitude of discharges above thunderstorms, and spacecraft in low orbit observed X- and gamma-ray radiation.

ASIM represents a comprehensive global survey of these super-high altitude, difficult-to-observe-from-the-ground events to help determine their physics and how they relate to lightning. The investigation also studies high-altitude cloud formation and determines what characteristics make thunderstorms effective in disturbing the high-altitude atmosphere. The research improves understanding of the effect of thunderstorms on Earth’s atmosphere and contributes to better atmospheric models and meteorological and climatological predictions.

“High-altitude observation allows us to study these events without the obscuring clouds,” said principal investigator Torsten Neubert of the National Space institute of the Technical University of Denmark. “With ASIM we will better understand the complex processes of upper-atmospheric lightning, which are also elements of ordinary lightning, although they take on different forms. This understanding can improve technology for detecting ordinary lightning.”

The investigation also helps clarify the effect of thunderstorms on the atmosphere, ionosphere and radiation belts, and will monitor the influx of meteors in Earth's environment and their effect on its atmosphere. Blue jets at the top of thunderstorm clouds, for example, change the concentration of greenhouse gases, another way thunderstorms can affect the stratosphere.

The types of discharges and their structure help scientists better understand the structure of the atmosphere where they occur and of the thunderstorm battery that powers them.

“We will learn more about thunderstorm clouds and more of the fine-structure of the stratosphere and mesosphere, of which little is known,” Neubert said. Based on video taken by ESA astronaut Andreas Mogensen from the space station in 2015, scientists already learned more about what types of cloud create such activity, and that lightning comes from clouds at an altitude of about 10.5 miles (17 km). “These are solid scientific results documenting for the first time how active the tops of thunderclouds can be,” he added.

ASIM observations also improve understanding of the effect of dust storms, urban pollutants, forest fires, and volcanoes on cloud formation and electrification, and the relation of eye-wall lightning activity to intensification of thunderstorms. That could help us all live more happily ever after.

For more information about current investigations happening aboard the space station, follow @ISS_Research. For opportunities to see the space station pass over your town, check out Spot the Station.

{ https://www.nasa.gov/ }

11-04-2018 om 23:18 geschreven door peter  

THE TRUTH ABOUT THOSE “ALIEN ALLOYS” IN THE NEW YORK TIMES UFO STORY

Is the government really stockpiling materials in a Nevada building that scientists cannot identify?

What to make of a Las Vegas building full of unidentified alloys?

The New York Times published a stunning story (Dec. 16) revealing that the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) had, between 2007 and 2012, funded a $22 million program for investigating UFOs. The story included three revelations that were tailored to blow readers’ minds:

1. Many high-ranking people in the federal government believe aliens have visited planet Earth.

2. Military pilots have recorded videos of UFOs with capabilities that seem to outstrip all known human aircraft, changing direction and accelerating in ways no fighter jet or helicopter could ever accomplish.

3. In a group of buildings in Las Vegas, the government stockpiles alloys and other materials believed to be associated with UFOs.

Points one and two are weird, but not all that compelling on their own: The world already knew that plenty of smart folks believe in alien visitors, and that pilots sometimes encounter strange phenomena in the upper atmosphere – phenomena explained by entities other than space aliens, such as a weather balloon, a rocket launch or even a solar eruption.

Point No. 3, though – those buildings full of alloys and other materials – that’s a little harder to hand wave away. Is there really a DOD cache full of materials from out of this world?

One of the authors of the Times report, Ralph Blumenthal, had this to say on MSNBC about the alloys: “They have, as we reported in the paper, some material from these objects that is being studied so that scientists can find what accounts for their amazing properties, this technology of these objects, whatever they are.” When asked what the materials were, Blumenthal responded, “They don’t know. They’re studying it, but it’s some kind of compound that they don’t recognize.”

Here’s the thing, though: The chemists and metallurgists Live Science spoke to – experts in identifying unusual alloys – don’t buy it.

“I don’t think it’s plausible that there’s any alloys that we can’t identify,” Richard Sachleben, a retired chemist and member of the American Chemical Society’s panel of experts, told Live Science. “My opinion? That’s quite impossible.”

Alloys are mixtures of different kinds of elemental metals. They’re very common – in fact, Sachleben said, they’re more common on Earth than pure elemental metals are – and very well understood. Brass is an alloy. So is steel. Even most naturally occurring gold on Earth is an alloy made up of elemental gold mixed with other metals, like silver or copper. [8 Important Elements You’ve Never Heard Of]

“There are databases of all known phases [of metal], including alloys,” May Nyman, a professor in the Oregon State University Department of Chemistry, told Live Science. Those databases include straightforward techniques for identifying metal alloys.

If an unknown alloy appeared, Nyman said it would be relatively simple to figure out what it was made of.

For crystalline alloys – those in which the mixture of atoms forms an ordered structure – researchers use a technique called X-ray diffraction, Nyman said.

“The X-ray’s wavelength is about the same size as the distance between the atoms [of crystalline alloys],” Nyman said, “so that means when the X-rays go into a well-ordered material, they diffract [change shape and intensity] – and from that diffraction [pattern] you can get information that tells you the distance between the atoms, what the atoms are, and how well-ordered the atoms are. It tells you all about the arrangement of your atoms.”

With noncrystalline, amorphous alloys, the process is a bit different, but not by much.

“These are all very standard techniques in research labs, so if we had such mysterious metals, you could take it to any university where research is done, and they could tell you what are the elements and something about the crystalline phase within a few hours,” Nyman said.

Sachleben agreed.

“There are no alloys that are sitting in some warehouse that we cannot figure out what they are. In fact, it’s pretty simple, and any reasonably good metallurgical grad student can do it for you,” he said.

Nyman said that if metals did fall from some mysterious aircraft, some forensics experiments would quickly answer a lot of questions about that aircraft. [UFO Mysteries: These Sightings Have Never Been Solved]

“How has the hunk of metal changed?” Nyman said. “From my scientist’s perspective, that’s the kind of question I’d be asking. Maybe, if it has to do with world politics, and we want to know where the metal comes from, maybe there’s some analysis that can lead you to where it was mined, or what country uses that particular alloy, that kind of thing.”

If the aircraft had come from space, Nyman said, that travel would leave telltale signs in the metal as well, in the form of spacefaring debris and ionization (changes to the electrical charges of the substance’s atoms).

Even if a chunk of alloy that hadn’t been seen before did fall to Earth from outer space, both Nyman and Sachleben agreed that it wouldn’t necessarily have come from an alien craft. In fact, Sachleben said, alloys strike the planet regularly – space-traversing alloys like those found in fairly common nickel-iron meteorites – leaving behind telltale signs. The meteor that wiped out the dinosaurs was even identified by the rare-Earth metals it left behind in certain geological formations in Earth’s crust.

It’s important to point out that while Blumenthal did go on cable news and say the alloys were unidentifiable mysteries, helping to spur speculation, that’s not what his article actually stated. Here’s the full quote from Saturday’s piece:

“The company [involved in the DOD research] modified buildings in Las Vegas for the storage of metal alloys and other materials that … program contractors said had been recovered from unidentified aerial phenomena. Researchers also studied people who said they had experienced physical effects from encounters with the objects and examined them for any physiological changes. In addition, researchers spoke to military service members who had reported sightings of strange aircraft.”

From this statement, there’s no actual sign that there’s anything unusual about the alloys themselves. All the Times wrote was that the DOD researchers tasked with finding weird UFO stuff collected some metal, interviewed some people who had claimed startling experiences with it, and decided that it was UFO-related.

In an email to Live Science regarding these metal alloys, Blumenthal said, “We printed as much as we were able to verify. Can’t go beyond that.”

As for whether there’s an explanation at least for the metals themselves, Sachleben said: “There’s not as many mysteries in science as people like to think. It’s not like we know everything – we don’t know everything. But most things we know enough about to know what we don’t know.”

Source www.scientificamerican.com

{ http://alien-ufo-sightings.com/ }

11-04-2018 om 23:04 geschreven door peter