An interest in understanding the role that the Milky Way played in Egyptian culture and religion has led University of Portsmouth Associate Professor of Astrophysics Dr. Or Graur to uncover what he thinks may be the ancient Egyptian visual depiction of our galaxy.

Various Egyptian gods are either associated with, symbolize, or directly embody certain celestial objects. In his study, Dr. Graur reviewed 125 images of the sky-goddess Nut (pronounced "Noot"), found among 555 ancient Egyptian coffins dating back nearly 5,000 years.

Combining astronomy with Egyptology, he analyzed whether she could be linked to the Milky Way and his findings are now published in the  Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage.

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The Many and Myriad Portrayals of Nut

In scenes reflecting the day and night sky, Nut is shown as a naked, arched woman, sometimes covered with stars or with solar disks. Nut's arched posture is seen as evoking her identification with the sky and its protection of Earth below.

As the goddess of the sky, Nut is often depicted as a star-studded woman arched over her brother, the earth god Geb. She protects the earth from being flooded by the encroaching waters of the void and plays a key role in the solar cycle, swallowing the sun as it sets at dusk and giving birth to it once more as it rises at dawn.

However, on the outer coffin of Nesitaudjatakhet, a chantress of Amun-Re who lived some 3,000 years ago, Nut's appearance deviates from the norm. Here, a distinctive, undulating black curve crosses her body from the soles of her feet to the tips of her fingers, with stars painted in roughly equal numbers above and below the curve.

The Milky Way over the sand dunes of the Egyptian Western Desert near El-Fayoum. Note the similarity between the Great Rift and the undulating black curve that bisects Nut’s body. 

(Osama Faithi/Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage).

Dr. Graur said, "I think that the undulating curve represents the Milky Way and could be a representation of the Great Rift—the dark band of dust that cuts through the Milky Way's bright band of diffused light. Comparing this depiction with a photograph of the Milky Way shows the stark similarity."

He added, "Similar undulating curves appear in four tombs in the Valley of the Kings. In the tomb of Ramesses VI, for example, the ceiling of the burial chamber is split between the Book of the Day and the Book of the Night. Both include arched figures of Nut displayed back-to-back and separated by thick, golden undulating curves that issue from the base of Nut's head and travel above her back all the way to her rear."

"I did not see a similar undulating curve in any of the other cosmological representations of Nut and it is my view that the rarity of this curve reinforces the conclusion I reached in a study of ancient texts last year, which is that although there is a connection between Nut and the Milky Way, the two are not one and the same. Nut is not a representation of the Milky Way. Instead, the Milky Way, along with the sun and the stars, is one more celestial phenomenon that can decorate Nut's body in her role as the sky."

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The Milky Way in the Spotlight

In a study published last year (April 2024), Dr. Graur drew from a rich collection of ancient sources, including the Pyramid Texts, Coffin Texts, and the Book of Nut, to compare them alongside sophisticated simulations of the Egyptian night sky and argue that the Milky Way might have shone a spotlight on Nut's role as the sky in Egyptian mythology.

It proposed that in winter, the Milky Way highlighted Nut's outstretched arms, while in summer, it traced her backbone across the heavens. Dr. Graur's conclusions about Nut and the Milky Way have evolved since that initial paper. He said, "The texts, on their own, suggested one way to think about the link between Nut and the Milky Way. Analyzing her visual depictions on coffins and tomb murals added a new dimension that, quite literally, painted a different picture."

The astronomical ceiling from the tomb of Seti I (KV 17). Note the undulating black curves between rows of yellow half-circles that border the two halves of the ceiling. 

(Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage).

Both the current and previous studies are part of a larger project by Dr. Graur to catalog and study the multi-cultural mythology of the Milky Way. He said, "I chanced upon the sky-goddess Nut when I was writing a book on galaxies and looking into the mythology of the Milky Way. My interest was piqued after a visit to a museum with my daughters, where they were enchanted by the image of an arched woman and kept asking to hear stories about her."

There is no doubt that the relationship between ancient Egyptian mythology and the sky is deep and complex. Even now, thousands of years after that civilization was at the peak of its power and influence, there is still more to be discovered about the nature of that relationship, as Dr Graur’s work so clearly demonstrates.

• Top image: Nut’s cosmological vignette on the outer coffin of Nesitaudjatakhet. Nut’s body is covered in stars as well as a thick, undulating black curve that runs from the soles of her feet to the tips of her fingers. This curve, surrounded by stars on both sides, is reminiscent of the Milky Way’s Great Rift.
• Source: Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage.
• This is an edited version of a press release from the University of Portsmouth, entitled ‘Depictions of the Milky Way Found in Ancient Egyptian Imagery.

• https://youtu.be/wAF3-1fLn_0

{ https://www.ancient-origins.net/unexplained-phenomena }

03-05-2025 om 22:30 geschreven door peter  

A new study of ancient and modern societies shows that human populations need at least 2.7 children per woman – a much higher fertility rate than previously believed – to reliably avoid long-term extinction. While a fertility rate of 2.1 children per woman is often considered the replacement level needed to sustain a population, this figure doesn’t account for random differences in how many children people have – as well as mortality rates, sex ratios, and the probability that some adults never have children. In small populations, these chance variations can wipe out entire family lineages.

Why Declining Fertility Rates are a Ticking Time Bomb

In the new study, published April 30, 2025 in the open-access journal  PLOS One, Takuya Okabe of Shizuoka University, Japan, and his colleagues introduce the mathematical models they used to examine how demographic variability affects the survival of populations over many generations. Their study found that, due to random fluctuations in birth numbers, a fertility rate of at least 2.7 children per woman is needed to reliably avoid eventual extinction – especially in small populations.

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However, a female-biased birth ratio, with more females than males being born, can reduce the extinction risk, helping more lineages survive over time. This insight may help explain a long-observed evolutionary phenomenon: under severe conditions – such as war, famine, or environmental disruption – more females tend to be born than males. It also suggests that, while extinction isn’t imminent in large developed populations, most family lineages will eventually fade out, replaced by those that produce more females.

Chart showing how many generations can be expected to survive with fertility rates of 2.1 and 1.5 children per woman. (PLOS One).

The authors conclude that true population sustainability – as well as the sustainability of languages, cultural traditions, and diverse family lineages – requires rethinking conventional fertility targets. The findings also have implications for conservation efforts of endangered species in which target fertility rates are set, they point out.

"Considering stochasticity in fertility and mortality rates, and sex ratios, a fertility rate higher than the standard replacement level is necessary to ensure sustainability of our population," stated researcher Diane Carmeliza N. Cuaresma in a Public Library of Science (PLOS) press release.

 Has the Population Crash Already Begun? The Numbers Suggest It Has

In recent years much alarm has been raised about crashing birth rates in developed countries, which can lead to significant long-term population decline and possibly the complete depopulation of certain nations at some point in the future. Even in the short-term this development is problematic, as it causes an aging of the population that makes it more and more difficult for younger generations to provide the resources necessary to take proper care of the elderly.

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• Geneticists Show How Neanderthals Never Really Went Extinct

While immigration is a controversial subject in the modern age, there is little doubt that developed nations will have to be more welcoming to immigrants in the coming decades, if they want to prevent their population numbers from collapsing. But if the researchers responsible for this new study are correct, embracing immigration won’t solve the problem in the long run. The current fertility rate for the world as a whole is 2.3 children per woman, which is above the old 2.1 extinction level estimate but significantly below the new estimate. This implies a global population crash at some point, one that won’t be limited to developing countries alone (assuming the 2.7 estimate is correct).

One of China's deserted ghost cities, the Dayawan complex in Huizhou, Guangdong province. (Pekingi Kacsa).

Social, cultural and economic changes are all implicated in the drop in birth rates, and those factors can’t just be wished away. People’s needs, preferences, and expectations with respect to having children may change again, of course, and this combined with decisions by policymakers that might encourage higher birth rates could reverse the current trend. But this is far from guaranteed.

In the last 50 years the world’s population has doubled, rising from four billion to more than eight billion. Up to now, dealing with the consequences of this population explosion has been more urgent that worrying about future depopulation trends. But with fertility rates having now dropped below the 2.0 mark in 125 out of the 237 officially recognized nations, what was once a concern for the future may transform into a crisis in the present more swiftly than anyone could have imagined.

If the seriousness of the problem has actually been underestimated, as the new study published in PLOS One suggets, underpopulation may be shockingly close to replacing overpopulation as the world’s scariest demographic monster—in places like China, Japan, South Korea, Australia, western Europe and North America first, and almost everywhere else later on.

• Top image: AI image of a future world city, abandoned and destitute and empty of people.
• Source: Freepik.
• This is an edited and expanded version of a press release from the Public Library of Science, entitled ‘2.1 Kids Per Woman Might Not Be Enough for Population Survival.’

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{ https://www.ancient-origins.net/evolution-human-origins }

03-05-2025 om 22:11 geschreven door peter  

16 Famous Historical Sites That Have Been Lost to Natural Disasters

Alvin Goodley 

Throughout history, natural disasters have wiped out cities, monuments, and entire civilizations. Some of the world’s most famous landmarks have been lost due to catastrophic events like earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and floods. These once-thriving places now exist only in ruins or stories. Here, we explore a collection of historical sites that nature took away, some well-known and others long forgotten.

1. Pompeii, Italy

Pompeii was a prosperous Roman city located near modern Naples. In 79 AD, Mount Vesuvius erupted, releasing clouds of ash, pumice, and toxic gases. The city was buried under meters of volcanic debris, instantly killing thousands of its residents. Remarkably, Pompeii remained frozen in time for centuries, preserving homes, streets, and even the positions of people caught in the disaster. Today, it provides one of the clearest insights into life in ancient Rome. The eruption also destroyed nearby Herculaneum, another significant Roman settlement.

2. Port Royal, Jamaica

Port Royal was a thriving Caribbean port and notorious pirate haven in the 17th century. On June 7, 1692, a massive earthquake struck, causing two-thirds of the city to sink into the sea. The earthquake was followed by a deadly tsunami, which drowned many survivors and left the port in ruins. Once one of the wealthiest cities in the New World, Port Royal’s destruction became a cautionary tale about decadence and immorality. Today, its submerged remains are a popular site for underwater archaeologists exploring its sunken treasures.

3. Alexandria Lighthouse, Egypt

The Lighthouse of Alexandria, also known as the Pharos of Alexandria, was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Built in the 3rd century BC, it stood over 100 meters tall and guided ships safely to the busy port of Alexandria. Several earthquakes between the 10th and 14th centuries weakened the structure until it eventually collapsed into the Mediterranean Sea. Though long gone, the lighthouse’s foundations were discovered underwater, and it continues to inspire modern designs of lighthouses around the world.

4. Helike, Greece

Helike was a wealthy Greek city located near the Corinthian Gulf. In 373 BC, a powerful earthquake struck, followed by a massive tsunami that submerged the entire city. Helike disappeared beneath the waters, and for centuries, its existence was thought to be a legend. In the 20th century, archaeologists discovered its ruins under layers of silt and water. The sudden destruction of Helike may have contributed to the stories of Atlantis, as the city’s fate seemed so sudden and mysterious.

5. Nan Madol, Micronesia

Nan Madol is an ancient city built on artificial islets off the coast of Pohnpei in Micronesia. Once a political and ceremonial hub for the Saudeleur Dynasty, it was constructed with massive stone walls and canals. Over time, the region was hit by severe tsunamis and typhoons that eroded parts of the city, leading to its abandonment. The remote location and challenging conditions have preserved much of the city, but it remains threatened by ongoing natural forces. Nan Madol’s ruins are an impressive testament to early island engineering.

6. Atlantis

The legend of Atlantis, first described by the philosopher Plato, tells of a mighty civilization that vanished beneath the sea in a single day and night. Many believe it was destroyed by an earthquake or tsunami, though its exact location remains a mystery. While no conclusive evidence has been found, some speculate that Atlantis may have been inspired by real ancient cities like Helike or Santorini. Whether real or myth, the story of Atlantis continues to captivate and inspire explorations for the lost civilization.

7. Old St. Augustine, Florida, USA

Founded by the Spanish in 1565, St. Augustine is the oldest continuously occupied European city in the United States. However, much of its early settlement was destroyed by hurricanes in the 17th and 18th centuries. These storms caused massive flooding, damaged buildings, and washed away parts of the original city. Old St. Augustine’s historic landmarks were repeatedly rebuilt after each storm, but the original structures were largely lost to time and nature’s wrath. Today, the city is a testament to resilience, though remnants of the old city still remain buried beneath layers of history.

8. Roman City of Baiae, Italy

Baiae was a lavish resort town for the Roman elite, famous for its thermal baths and opulent villas. Located on the Bay of Naples, the city was built on a geologically active area. Volcanic activity and a phenomenon called bradyseism, where land slowly rises and falls, caused Baiae to sink beneath the waters of the Mediterranean. By the 8th century, the city was completely submerged. Today, divers can explore the well-preserved ruins of villas, mosaics, and statues that once belonged to some of the most powerful Romans.

9. Akrotiri, Greece

Akrotiri was a bustling Minoan city on the island of Santorini, flourishing in the Bronze Age. Around 1600 BC, a massive volcanic eruption buried the entire settlement under ash, preserving it much like Pompeii. The eruption was one of the largest in human history and likely caused significant climatic and seismic changes in the region. Excavations of Akrotiri have revealed well-preserved frescoes, pottery, and buildings, offering a unique insight into Minoan life. Unlike Pompeii, no human remains have been found, suggesting that the residents evacuated before the disaster struck.

10. La Ciudad Perdida, Colombia

La Ciudad Perdida, or the “Lost City,” is an ancient Tairona settlement hidden deep in the Sierra Nevada mountains of Colombia. It was built around 800 AD and served as a major cultural and trade center. The city was abandoned after severe flooding, which contributed to its decline, along with disease and conflict. Thick jungle growth overtook the city, hiding it for centuries until its rediscovery in the 1970s. Today, its terraced platforms, stone paths, and plazas are some of the few remnants of this lost civilization.

11. Dwarka, Indi

Dwarka, mentioned in Hindu scriptures as the kingdom of Lord Krishna, is believed to have been a thriving port city. Archaeological evidence suggests that it existed around 3000 BC but was submerged due to rising sea levels. Underwater excavations near the modern city of Dwarka have revealed remnants of walls, structures, and stone anchors, indicating a once prosperous maritime center. While much of Dwarka remains a mystery, its legend continues to captivate both archaeologists and historians, who are still uncovering clues about its lost glory.

12. Yaxuná, Mexico

Yaxuná was a prominent Mayan city located in the Yucatán Peninsula, with its history dating back to 500 BC. The city thrived for centuries but was severely impacted by repeated hurricanes and flooding, leading to its eventual abandonment. These natural disasters caused widespread damage to its infrastructure and agricultural systems, weakening its economy and political power. Today, the ruins of Yaxuná, including pyramids and ceremonial structures, remain covered by jungle growth, though some areas have been excavated and preserved.

13. Sunken City of Pavlopetri, Greece

Pavlopetri, located off the coast of Laconia, Greece, is considered one of the oldest known submerged cities, dating back to around 3000 BC. It was a thriving coastal settlement, but repeated earthquakes and subsidence caused the land to sink, eventually submerging the city beneath the sea. Archaeologists have discovered well-preserved streets, buildings, and tombs underwater, offering a unique glimpse into the life of an ancient Greek city. Pavlopetri’s underwater ruins continue to fascinate both scholars and divers today.

14. Old Panama City, Panama

Founded in 1519, Old Panama City was a vital Spanish colonial outpost and the first European settlement on the Pacific coast of the Americas. In 1671, the city was attacked by pirates, leading to widespread fires that devastated much of its infrastructure. The final blow came in the form of an earthquake, which further destroyed what was left of the city. The Spanish authorities decided to relocate and rebuild Panama City at a new site, leaving the old ruins as a haunting reminder of its turbulent past.

15. Phanom Rung, Thailand

Phanom Rung is a Khmer temple complex in northeastern Thailand, built between the 10th and 13th centuries. The site was constructed on the rim of an extinct volcano, and over the years, it suffered from severe flooding and erosion. These natural forces damaged many of its structures, and the site was eventually abandoned. Though partially restored, the temple complex still bears the scars of centuries of neglect and exposure to the elements. Phanom Rung remains an important cultural and historical site, drawing visitors from around the world.

16. Villa Epecuén, Argentina

Villa Epecuén was a popular tourist resort town in Argentina, located along the shores of Lago Epecuén. In 1985, heavy rains caused the lake’s water levels to rise dramatically, flooding the town completely. For over 25 years, the city remained submerged under nearly 10 meters of water. Eventually, the waters receded, revealing the ghostly ruins of the once-thriving resort. Today, Villa Epecuén stands as a stark reminder of nature’s power, with its crumbling structures drawing curious visitors and photographers.

• This article originally appeared on Rarest.org

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{ https://rarest.org/ }

03-05-2025 om 21:40 geschreven door peter  

Lost cities buried beneath volcanic rock. Hre we have the remnants of Akrotiri.

Akrotiri: The Bronze Age city hidden beneath Santorini’s ash

Before Athens left its mark on the ancient world, another city stood quietly on the island of Thera. Known today as Akrotiri, it was a Minoan settlement with well-planned streets, multi-story buildings, running water, and walls covered in vivid frescoes. The paintings showed ships at sea, blooming plants, and people at festivals — scenes that suggest a society with comfort, order, and culture.

Then the volcano erupted. Around 1600 BCE, Thera collapsed in on itself. Ash and debris buried the entire city.

When archaeologists began excavating Akrotiri in the 20th century, they found something rare. The streets were still intact. Pottery stood where it had been left. Color remained on the walls. It looked as if the people had only just stepped outside.

No human remains were found, which suggests that residents may have fled before the eruption. But the silence left behind feels complete. Over time, the site sparked speculation that it might have influenced the story of Atlantis, a powerful city lost to disaster and time.

Even without the myth, Akrotiri stands as one of the clearest windows into Bronze Age life in the Aegean. It isn’t just preserved. It’s alive with detail.

Pompeii: Where Roman life was frozen at the moment of death

It started with a column of smoke rising over Mount Vesuvius. People watched it from the streets, not knowing what was coming. By nightfall, ash covered everything. In Pompeii, life was still moving, meals being prepared, families resting, and children playing in courtyards.

Some were sitting down to eat. Others were lying down to sleep. A few tried to run. The ash came quickly. It buried the city exactly as it had been.

Seventeen centuries passed before Pompeii was seen again. When archaeologists began to dig, they didn’t just find ruins. They found a city that felt intact. Loaves of bread still sat in ovens. Graffiti still covered the walls. Shops, homes, and narrow alleys stood in place.

Even the people remained. You could see the folds in their clothing. In some cases, you could still see the looks on their faces.

Pompeii isn’t just a ruin. It’s a full snapshot of Roman life, caught in its final hours. This wasn’t the Rome of emperors or marble temples. It was a city of bakers, shopkeepers, children, workers. And every corner of it tells a story too ordinary — and too real — for a textbook to capture.

Ceren: A buried village that preserved the voices of everyday people

Most ancient sites focus on rulers, monuments, and warfare. Ceren tells a quieter story.

In what is now El Salvador, this small farming village was once part of a Maya-related culture. Around the year 600, a nearby volcano erupted without warning. Ash covered the village so quickly that it preserved almost everything exactly as it had been.

Archaeologists didn’t uncover palaces or royal tombs. They found homes, storage huts, planted fields, and tools left where they had last been used. Sleeping mats were still laid out. Food was still inside the cooking pots.

No human remains were found, which suggests the villagers had time to leave. What they left behind offers a rare and detailed view of everyday life.

Ceren was not a place of kings. It was a working community. The site shows how people cooked, stored food, built their homes, and farmed the land. It remains one of the few places in the Americas where the lives of ordinary people were preserved so completely.

Why volcanic eruptions can preserve what centuries usually destroy

Volcanic eruptions happen fast. Ash falls, roofs collapse, the sky turns dark, and towns disappear in a matter of hours. What starts as destruction can sometimes leave behind something else entirely.

When the ash settles quickly and thickly enough, it acts like a seal. It locks out air and moisture, which are the main forces behind decay. That’s why things like wood, food, fabric, plants, and even footprints can survive for thousands of years.

This is what makes cities buried by volcanic eruptions so different from most archaeological sites. In most places, time works slowly, wearing everything down. Walls collapse. Objects break apart or go missing. Organic materials rot away.

But in places like Pompeii or Akrotiri, everything stays where it was. Walls still stand. Food is still in the oven. Tools are still beside the people who used them. These are not just ruins. They are preserved spaces. Rooms, streets, and homes. They show us what life looked like on the day everything stopped.

They don’t just tell us what people built. They show us what people were doing.

What these buried cities still reveal about us

The lost cities buried beneath volcanic rock were not just preserved. They were paused.

The people who lived in them had no idea their final moments would be sealed in ash and rediscovered centuries later. But here they are, almost untouched, in ways that history rarely allows.

We don’t just find buildings or tools. We find meals left half-finished. Sleeping mats still in place. Homes arranged with care. We see what people took with them, and what they left behind. These are details we almost never get to see, and they make the past feel immediate.

But these discoveries also raise difficult questions. What does it mean to dig up the past when it includes real human lives? Should the remains of those who died be put on display? Who gets to decide how their stories are told?

Everything we build fades eventually. Cities fall. Habits change. Memory slips away. Unless something holds it in place. Civilizations come and go. History is clear about that.

These cities became more than anyone ever intended. They were sealed, protected, and passed on. Not through writing or monuments, but through layers of ash and centuries of silence. And in that silence, they still speak.

{ https://curiosmos.com/category/ancient-civilizations/ }

03-05-2025 om 20:54 geschreven door peter  

MARK GARLICK/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY//Getty Images

Gear-obsessed editors choose every product we review. We may earn commission if you buy from a link. Why Trust Us?

• Although Mars lost its surface oceans billions of years ago, a new study from UC Berkeley suggests that there’s lots of water deep within the planet’s crust.
• After analyzing data gathered from NASA’s InSight lander, the team’s mathematical models have suggested that water trapped with fractured igneous rock could cover the planet in a one-mile-thick ocean.
• Sadly, this water is located roughly 7 to 13 miles below the surface—a drilling depth that’d be incredibly difficult on Earth, let alone Mars.

It’s no secret that Mars contained—and currently contains—lots of water. Before the planet lost most of its atmosphere and its magnetic field, Mars likely contained flowing rivers and oceans much like its blue marble neighbor next door. The Red Planet eventually lost some H₂0 to evaporation, but a new study suggests that a lot of water is still locked away deep within the planet’s crust.

Analyzing seismic data gathered from NASA’s InSight lander, which arrived at Mars at the tail end of 2018, scientists from the University of California Berkeley concluded that it’s likely that Mars contains enough water deep within its crust to cover the entire planet with an ocean nearly one mile thick. The results of the study were published this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

Scripps Institution of Oceanography

A slice of the Martian crust, detailing the fractured igneous rock that contains water.

“Understanding the Martian water cycle is critical for understanding the evolution of the climate, surface, and interior,” study co-author Vashan Wright, previously a postdoctoral fellow at UC Berkeley and now an assistant professor at UC San Diego, said in a press statement. “A useful starting point is to identify where water is and how much is there.”

Finding water within Mars’ crust wasn’t exactly the primary mission of the Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport (InSight) lander, though it certainly falls within its purview. NASA describes InSight’s mission, which officially wrapped up in 2022, as measuring “the planet’s vital signs: its pulse, temperature, and reflexes.” While other missions explored canyons, volcanoes, and the geochemistry of Mars’ topsoil, InSight probed its geologic depths for evidence of tectonic activity and answers to lingering questions about how rocky planets formed around our Sun.

In this new study, scientists used seismic data collected by InSight and created mathematical models to explore the possible interior of Mars, employing the same methods that industries use to find underground aquifers and oil fields on Earth. According to these calculations, Mars contains a deep layer of fractured igneous rock with cracks that are saturated with liquid water. And where there’s water, there’s always a chance to find some form of (likely microbial) life lurking nearby.

“Establishing that there is a big reservoir of liquid water provides some window into what the climate was like or could be like,” UC Berkeley’s Michael Manga, a co-author of the study, said in a press statement. “And water is necessary for life as we know it. I don’t see why [the underground reservoir] is not a habitable environment. It’s certainly true on Earth—deep, deep mines host life, the bottom of the ocean hosts life. We haven’t found any evidence for life on Mars, but at least we have identified a place that should, in principle, be able to sustain life.”

And this water isn’t a mere trickle—in fact, if future astronauts could somehow pump out all of it, it’d likely fill entire oceans across Mars that are around one mile thick. However, the scientists behind this new study assert that such a feat is likely impossible.

While fresh groundwater on Earth can typically be found anywhere from 500 to 1,000 meters down, the researchers estimate that this water is likely located somewhere 11.5 and 20 kilometers, or around 7 to 13 miles, underground. That’s as deep (on the low end) as the deepest hole ever dug by humans on Earth—doing so on Mars is likely an engineering and logistical impossibility (at least, for now).

But confirming and analyzing this vast reservoir of water deep within the Martian crust will be essential for understanding the planet’s overall composition, geologic history, and ancient climate. So, while this locked away water probably won’t sustain future Martian colonies, it’s certainly quenching our never-ending thirst for knowledge about our planetary neighbor.

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 { https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/ }

03-05-2025 om 18:40 geschreven door peter  

The Curiosity rover continues to capture fascinating anomalies on the Martian surface. In this instance, researcher Jean Ward has examined a particularly intriguing discovery: a disc-shaped object embedded in the side of a mound or hill. 

The images were taken by the Curiosity rover’s Mast Camera (Mastcam) on April 30, 2025 (Sol 4526). To improve clarity, Ward meticulously removed the grid overlay from the photographs, enhancing the visibility of the object. 

To provide better spatial context for the disc’s location, Ward assembled two of the images into a collage. In the composite, you can see the surrounding area including a ridge, and the small mound where the disc appears partially embedded, possibly near the entrance of an opening. 

The next image offers the clearest view of the anomaly. Ward again removed the grid overlay and subtly enhanced the contrast to bring out finer details, as the original image appeared overly bright and washed out. 

In the close-up, displayed at twice the original scale, the smooth arc of the disc is distinctly visible. Its texture seems unusual, resembling stone or a slab-like material, flat yet with a defined curvature. 

Might this disc-like structure have been engineered as a gateway, part of a hidden entrance leading to an architectural complex embedded within the hillside, hinting at a long-forgotten subterranean stronghold once inhabited by an extraterrestrial civilization? 

Links original NASA images: 

• https://mars.nasa.gov/raw_images/1461337/ 
• https://mars.nasa.gov/raw_images/1461336/
• https://mars.nasa.gov/raw_images/1461335/

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

03-05-2025 om 18:09 geschreven door peter  

El Cono: The mysterious sacred 'pyramid' hidden deep in the Amazon rainforest

{ https://www.livescience.com/archaeology }

03-05-2025 om 00:00 geschreven door peter  

An illustration of an ancient cataclysm.

These are not tales of heavy rain or local disasters. They describe oceans rising over mountains, entire lands disappearing, and only a handful of survivors rebuilding what was lost.

Many traditions also speak of fire from the sky. Norse mythology ends in flames. Zoroastrian teachings include a world-cleansing fire. The Aztecs believed one of their previous suns ended in flames. Some Aboriginal Australian stories describe stars falling and setting the land alight.

Darkness is another common thread. Egyptian texts mention days without sunlight. Hindu scriptures speak of an age of darkness, Kali Yuga. The Bible refers to the sun being darkened. In Mesoamerican myth, some world ages ended in a darkened sky and the absence of light.

These themes—water, fire, and darkness—are found across ancient myth, separated by geography and language. The repetition suggests more than coincidence. It hints at cultural memory of a forgotten cycle of global cataclysms.

Not linear, but cyclical time

Ancient civilizations did not always see time the way modern cultures do. Today we think in terms of progress and linear development. But in many ancient traditions, time moves in great cycles, each ending in destruction before renewal.

In Hindu cosmology, the Yuga cycle describes four ages. Each age sees a decline in morality and order, ending with devastation before the return of the golden age. According to some interpretations, we are nearing the end of Kali Yuga, the darkest phase.

The Aztecs described five previous suns, each representing a world age. Four have ended in catastrophe. The fifth, our current age, is believed to end with earthquakes.

Plato described a lost civilization—Atlantis—that fell in a single night of floods and earthquakes. He claimed this was not unique but part of recurring global resets known to Egyptian priests. He spoke of time as containing repeated “cataclysms” that wiped clean the memory of humanity.

These ideas all reflect an awareness of a forgotten cycle of global cataclysms. Civilizations were seen not as permanent, but as vulnerable to periodic collapse.

Earth’s long rhythms and forgotten science

Some researchers believe these myths preserve real events—possibly triggered by natural cycles we’ve only recently begun to understand.

One of these is Earth’s axial precession, a 26,000-year wobble that shifts the position of stars in the sky over time. Some ancient sites, like the Sphinx and Stonehenge, appear to align with stars in ways that match not the present sky, but the sky of ancient epochs. This has led to speculation that ancient cultures were tracking time on cosmic scales.

Another candidate is cosmic impact. The Younger Dryas Impact Hypothesis suggests that around 12,800 years ago, a fragmented comet struck Earth, causing sudden cooling, mass extinctions, and enormous fires across North America. This timing aligns closely with many flood myths and with the end of advanced prehistoric cultures like the Clovis.

Even solar activity might play a role. Some traditions describe the sun behaving strangely—growing dark, changing color, or acting violently. These could be ancient observations of solar flares, magnetic disruptions, or atmospheric changes following comet impacts.

While mainstream science debates these theories, the ancient stories do not shy away from describing worldwide destruction. The key question is whether they are describing fiction—or a pattern we have forgotten.

Myth as encoded memory

Writers like Graham Hancock, Randall Carlson, and others have popularized the idea that myths are not superstition, but information preserved through symbolism and story. They argue that ancient structures, oral traditions, and ritual  calendars were part of a global system meant to remember past cataclysms. One example according to some authors is Göbekli Tepe.

Many ancient monuments are aligned with stars, solstices, or equinoxes. Some appear to be maps of the sky or calendars tracking long cycles. Petroglyphs and sacred texts often describe disasters in symbolic terms—dragons, floods, heavenly fire—that may represent real events experienced by ancient people.

While these theories are controversial, they force us to ask difficult questions. Why do myths around the world describe similar events? Why do so many refer to a world before the current one? And why were ancient people so focused on preserving this knowledge?

Perhaps they were trying to pass on more than culture. Perhaps they were trying to warn us.

A message for the present age

Modern life feels stable—until it doesn’t. Earthquakes, volcanoes, solar flares, asteroid near-misses, and rapid climate shifts all remind us how fragile civilization really is.

The ancient world may have known this better than we do. Their stories speak not only of disaster but of recovery. The survivors of the last cycle built again. They told their children. They carved the warnings into stone.

Maybe myths are more than imagination. Maybe they are fragments of a survival manual.

The forgotten cycle of global cataclysms might not be a relic of the past. It might be a reality we are part of, one we no longer see because we stopped looking. The ancient world remembered. The question is whether we are still capable of doing the same.

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{ https://curiosmos.com/category/ancient-civilizations/ }

02-05-2025 om 23:38 geschreven door peter  

Derinkuyu Underground City in Cappadocia, Nevsehir, Turkey

Derinkuyu: A vast city buried beneath Cappadocia

In central Turkey’s Cappadocia region, the ancient city of Derinkuyu plunges 18 stories below ground. Discovered by accident in 1963 when a homeowner knocked down a wall and found a hidden room behind it, Derinkuyu revealed an enormous underground complex — complete with kitchens, wine presses, churches, ventilation shafts, and even livestock pens.

At its peak, Derinkuyu could accommodate more than 20,000 people. Stone doors could seal off sections of the city in case of invasion, and long vertical shafts provided fresh air to the deepest levels. The earliest sections may date back to around 800 BCE, with possible Hittite origins, though some scholars argue it could be even older. It was later expanded and used by early Christians fleeing persecution.

Kaymakli: A connected city beneath the stone

Not far from Derinkuyu lies Kaymakli, another underground settlement likely connected by tunnels to its larger neighbor. Unlike the vertical structure of Derinkuyu, Kaymakli spreads out horizontally, with a maze of rooms across at least five known levels — though many believe there are more yet to be discovered.

Kaymakli was designed for community living, with homes, kitchens, storage areas, and stables all organized into clusters. Its structure suggests it was built not just for hiding, but for long-term habitation. Most experts date its active use to the Byzantine era, especially during times of regional conflict, but some of the rock-cut foundations could be much older.

Mazı: A hidden vertical city carved into the rock

Mazı is a lesser-known but equally fascinating example of ancient underground cities in the Cappadocia region. Unlike the more spacious layouts of Derinkuyu or Kaymakli, Mazı is a vertical settlement, built deep into the volcanic stone with narrow passageways, hidden doors, and steep staircases.

Its design suggests a focus on defense. Invaders could be slowed or trapped in tight corridors, while residents could escape or defend themselves using hidden exits and small observation holes. Archaeological evidence links Mazı to the Roman or early Christian period, but the full timeline of its use is still uncertain.

Özkonak: Engineered for siege survival

Located in northern Cappadocia, Özkonak may be smaller than Derinkuyu, but it features some of the most sophisticated defense features ever found in ancient cities. Built with narrow shafts that allowed residents to pour boiling oil or water on attackers, it also had communication pipes that ran between levels — a rare feature not seen in other sites.

Only four levels of Özkonak have been excavated so far, but archaeologists believe there are deeper chambers waiting to be uncovered. Like many of Cappadocia’s subterranean settlements, the exact age of Özkonak is still debated, though its structure suggests it was built with long-term survival in mind.

Tatlarin: A mysterious city still under excavation

Tatlarin is one of the lesser-explored ancient cities in the region. Located near Nevşehir, it features a chapel, storage rooms, and stables — all carved into the rock. Unlike the larger underground complexes, Tatlarin remains only partially excavated, and much of it is still hidden beneath the surface.

Its layout and architecture suggest it may have served both residential and religious purposes. The lack of large-scale tourism or full excavation gives Tatlarin a unique role in understanding the broader underground building tradition in ancient Anatolia.

Why were entire cities built underground?

I believe that the real mystery behind these ancient cities isn’t just their size, but the decision to build them underground at all. Excavating stone, carving tunnels, and creating entire living systems beneath the surface was no small task. It required time, planning, and purpose.

Some historians believe the cities were designed as defensive strongholds, built to protect people from invasions during unstable periods. With hidden entrances, stone doors, and narrow corridors that could be easily defended, the idea holds weight. Others argue that the underground environment offered relief from extreme weather or natural disasters, allowing communities to survive in harsh conditions.

There is also evidence of religious use. In many of these cities, archaeologists have found chapels, altars, and Christian symbols carved into the rock. This suggests they may have served as places of refuge during times of persecution, particularly in the early centuries of Christianity.

Still, these explanations only go so far. The scale of some cities, with facilities for wine production, animal shelters, and food storage, points to long-term habitation. They were not simple hideouts. They were meant to sustain life.

Perhaps the true answer is a combination of factors, or perhaps we are still missing the bigger picture. Until more evidence comes to light, the reasons why these ancient cities were built underground will remain one of the most compelling questions in archaeology.

{ https://curiosmos.com/category/ancient-civilizations/

02-05-2025 om 23:32 geschreven door peter  

An illustration of an ancient cataclysm.

These are not tales of heavy rain or local disasters. They describe oceans rising over mountains, entire lands disappearing, and only a handful of survivors rebuilding what was lost.

Many traditions also speak of fire from the sky. Norse mythology ends in flames. Zoroastrian teachings include a world-cleansing fire. The Aztecs believed one of their previous suns ended in flames. Some Aboriginal Australian stories describe stars falling and setting the land alight.

Darkness is another common thread. Egyptian texts mention days without sunlight. Hindu scriptures speak of an age of darkness, Kali Yuga. The Bible refers to the sun being darkened. In Mesoamerican myth, some world ages ended in a darkened sky and the absence of light.

These themes—water, fire, and darkness—are found across ancient myth, separated by geography and language. The repetition suggests more than coincidence. It hints at cultural memory of a forgotten cycle of global cataclysms.

Not linear, but cyclical time

Ancient civilizations did not always see time the way modern cultures do. Today we think in terms of progress and linear development. But in many ancient traditions, time moves in great cycles, each ending in destruction before renewal.

In Hindu cosmology, the Yuga cycle describes four ages. Each age sees a decline in morality and order, ending with devastation before the return of the golden age. According to some interpretations, we are nearing the end of Kali Yuga, the darkest phase.

The Aztecs described five previous suns, each representing a world age. Four have ended in catastrophe. The fifth, our current age, is believed to end with earthquakes.

Plato described a lost civilization—Atlantis—that fell in a single night of floods and earthquakes. He claimed this was not unique but part of recurring global resets known to Egyptian priests. He spoke of time as containing repeated “cataclysms” that wiped clean the memory of humanity.

These ideas all reflect an awareness of a forgotten cycle of global cataclysms. Civilizations were seen not as permanent, but as vulnerable to periodic collapse.

Earth’s long rhythms and forgotten science

Some researchers believe these myths preserve real events—possibly triggered by natural cycles we’ve only recently begun to understand.

One of these is Earth’s axial precession, a 26,000-year wobble that shifts the position of stars in the sky over time. Some ancient sites, like the Sphinx and Stonehenge, appear to align with stars in ways that match not the present sky, but the sky of ancient epochs. This has led to speculation that ancient cultures were tracking time on cosmic scales.

Another candidate is cosmic impact. The Younger Dryas Impact Hypothesis suggests that around 12,800 years ago, a fragmented comet struck Earth, causing sudden cooling, mass extinctions, and enormous fires across North America. This timing aligns closely with many flood myths and with the end of advanced prehistoric cultures like the Clovis.

Even solar activity might play a role. Some traditions describe the sun behaving strangely—growing dark, changing color, or acting violently. These could be ancient observations of solar flares, magnetic disruptions, or atmospheric changes following comet impacts.

While mainstream science debates these theories, the ancient stories do not shy away from describing worldwide destruction. The key question is whether they are describing fiction—or a pattern we have forgotten.

Myth as encoded memory

Writers like Graham Hancock, Randall Carlson, and others have popularized the idea that myths are not superstition, but information preserved through symbolism and story. They argue that ancient structures, oral traditions, and ritual  calendars were part of a global system meant to remember past cataclysms. One example according to some authors is Göbekli Tepe.

Many ancient monuments are aligned with stars, solstices, or equinoxes. Some appear to be maps of the sky or calendars tracking long cycles. Petroglyphs and sacred texts often describe disasters in symbolic terms—dragons, floods, heavenly fire—that may represent real events experienced by ancient people.

While these theories are controversial, they force us to ask difficult questions. Why do myths around the world describe similar events? Why do so many refer to a world before the current one? And why were ancient people so focused on preserving this knowledge?

Perhaps they were trying to pass on more than culture. Perhaps they were trying to warn us.

A message for the present age

Modern life feels stable—until it doesn’t. Earthquakes, volcanoes, solar flares, asteroid near-misses, and rapid climate shifts all remind us how fragile civilization really is.

The ancient world may have known this better than we do. Their stories speak not only of disaster but of recovery. The survivors of the last cycle built again. They told their children. They carved the warnings into stone.

Maybe myths are more than imagination. Maybe they are fragments of a survival manual.

The forgotten cycle of global cataclysms might not be a relic of the past. It might be a reality we are part of, one we no longer see because we stopped looking. The ancient world remembered. The question is whether we are still capable of doing the same.

{ https://curiosmos.com/category/ancient-civilizations/ }

02-05-2025 om 22:34 geschreven door peter  

{ https://www.universetoday.com/ }

02-05-2025 om 21:32 geschreven door peter  

An image of the ancient Citadel of Aleppo.

Beneath the streets of Aleppo, under the hills of Turkey, and across the plains of Mesopotamia lie the bones of cities long gone. Not buried by nature always, sometimes by choice. Sometimes layered on purpose. These are places where people didn’t just return to rebuild after collapse — they stayed put and built again, directly on top of the past.

The phenomenon of ancient cities built on top of each other is not a quirk of history. It is one of the most consistent and revealing patterns in the archaeology of early civilization. At sites like Çatalhöyük, Tell Brak, and Jericho, we find stacked layers of mudbrick, ash, and stone that represent thousands of years of unbroken occupation. When I look back at these, I kind of feel that every layer tells a story. And it is not just one of progress, but one of survival, one of adaptation, and the human instinct to stay grounded in place.

But before I go any further, I would like to take a moment to explain the words “tell,” “tepe,” and “tappeh”.

What do “tell,” “tepe,” and “tappeh” mean?

If you’ve ever come across names like Tell Brak, Göbekli Tepe, or Tappeh Sialk, you might have wondered what those words mean. So, they’re not just names. They’re clues about the history hidden beneath the surface.

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In archaeology, a “tell” is an artificial mound formed by layers of human settlement built up over time. The word tell comes from Arabic and means “hill.” These mounds form when people live in the same place for hundreds or even thousands of years. Each time a building collapses or burns down, the debris stays behind. New buildings go up right on top. Over time, the site rises higher and higher, creating a mound filled with history.

In Turkish, the same kind of mound is called a “tepe,” which also means “hill.” That’s why we see names like Göbekli Tepe in modern-day Turkey. The name literally translates to “Potbelly Hill.”

In Persian (Farsi), the word is “tappeh.” In Iran, many ancient sites use this term, like Tappeh Sialk or Tappeh Hesar. Just like tells and tepes, these are mounds formed from ancient cities that were built, destroyed, and rebuilt over and over again.

So while the words are different, they all point to the same idea. Whether it’s a tell, tepe, or tappeh, it means you’re looking at a place where people stayed for a long time, rebuilding their homes on the same ground again and again. And underneath each one lies layer after layer of forgotten history.

Why did people rebuild in the same place?

I will try and explain this the best way I can so it makese sense.

But before we start I would like to clear somehing: rebuilding on top of older ruins wasn’t just about tradition. It made practical sense for a lot of reasons, and those reasons were often tied to survival.

First, there was the need for water. Fresh sources like rivers, springs, and wells didn’t move. If a site had good access to water, people would come back to it again and again. In dry regions, staying close to reliable water could mean the difference between life and death.

Then there was the value of fertile land. Soil that could support crops wasn’t available everywhere. Once people learned how to work the land in a specific place, it made sense to stay there. Moving away could mean losing hard-earned knowledge about how to survive in that environment.

• Geography also played a role. Many early cities were built on hills or near mountain passes, where they had a better view of the surrounding area and could defend themselves more easily. Others were near trade routes, allowing them to control movement and commerce. Giving up those positions would have been a big loss.
• Materials mattered too. Building supplies like stone, timber, and mudbrick were valuable and not always easy to find. After a disaster — whether from war, fire, or time — people often reused whatever they could. Rebuilding on the same ground saved effort and made use of what was already there.

Finally, there was a deep sense of connection to place. People returned to where they had grown up, where their ancestors were buried, where stories had been passed down. These locations held emotional weight. Staying put wasn’t just practical. It helped people hold on to who they were.

Çatalhöyük: Where life and memory were stacked in mudbrick

Without a doubt, one of my favorites.

In the heart of what is now central Turkey lies one of the earliest known cities in human history — Çatalhöyük. First settled around 7500 BCE, this Neolithic site grew into a dense community of thousands. What makes it so fascinating isn’t just its age, but how it was built and rebuilt over time.

People at Çatalhöyük lived in tightly packed mudbrick houses. Instead of streets, they walked along rooftops, entering their homes through holes in the ceiling using ladders. When a house was abandoned or collapsed, a new one was constructed directly on top of the old foundation. Over the span of about 1,200 years, this cycle created 18 layers of construction, stacked one above the other.

The layers weren’t just architectural. They were deeply personal. Families buried their dead beneath the floors of their homes. That meant every new house was also resting on the memory of those who had lived there before. Çatalhöyük was more than a city. I feel it was a place where memory, ancestry, and everyday life were physically tied together. Layer across layer.

Tell Brak: A city that grew from a sacred center

Over in northeastern Syria stands Tell Brak, another key to understanding the layered nature of ancient cities. It began as a small settlement around 6000 BCE, but over time, it developed into one of the first large urban centers in the world.

Its early structures were likely ceremonial — shrines and sacred enclosures that marked the site as spiritually important. As the population grew, homes, administrative buildings, and roads began to form around these sacred spaces. And like at Çatalhöyük, the site was rebuilt again and again as each generation adapted to new conditions.

Some of Tell Brak’s layers are thin, representing short-term activity. Others are deeper, the result of longer, more stable phases of occupation. What holds it all together is continuity. Despite changes in leadership, culture, and environment, people kept coming back. They didn’t abandon the place when things got hard. They built over it and moved forward.

Tepe Gawra: Sacred patterns that never faded

North of Mosul in modern-day Iraq lies Tepe Gawra, a site known not just for its long history, but for how that history was shaped by religious life.

Tepe Gawra was occupied from about 5000 BCE and contains 16 layers of construction. As temples fell out of use, new ones were often built on top of them. In some cases, the exact layout was preserved, even as decorative elements or materials changed. This suggests more than just practicality. It points to a deep respect for sacred space.

Generations of people reused the same ground to worship, plan, and gather. The buildings changed, but the meaning behind them did not. Tepe Gawra shows how spiritual identity was literally rooted in place.

Jericho: A city layered with 11,000 years of survival

Few places on Earth have been occupied as long as Jericho. Located near the Jordan River, it is one of the oldest continually inhabited cities in the world. Excavations at Tell es-Sultan, the ancient core of Jericho, reveal more than 20 layers of human settlement dating back to around 9000 BCE.

One of the most striking finds is a massive stone tower and wall system that dates to the Neolithic era, long before similar structures appeared elsewhere. As each civilization passed through, it built on top of what came before. Homes, fortifications, and tools from different ages now lie stacked in the soil, preserved in a vertical record of resilience.

Jericho isn’t just a story about one people or one culture. It’s a case study in continuity. Despite conquest, natural disaster, and political change, the city remained. The location mattered more than the name or ruler of the day.

Aleppo and Damascus: Where history still breathes beneath the surface

Some ancient cities are still very much alive. Aleppo and Damascus, both located in Syria, are among the world’s oldest continuously inhabited cities. Unlike Çatalhöyük or Tell Brak, these are not archaeological sites frozen in time. They are living, breathing places where people still go to work, shop in markets, and pray in centuries-old mosques.

But beneath those streets lie the buried remains of Bronze Age buildings, Roman roads, and medieval fortifications. Excavations are difficult because life continues above them. Still, what’s already been uncovered tells a clear story: layer after layer, civilization after civilization, all built in the same place.

In cities like Aleppo and Damascus, I dont see the past as being buried and forgotten. I see it built into the streets and buildings people still use today. The layering never really stopped.

Staying in place wasn’t always a choice. Sometimes, it was the only option.

So what do we learn from the amazing examples above? Not every ancient city was rebuilt because people wanted to keep a tradition alive. Sometimes they stayed because the ground still gave them what they needed. There was a spring nearby. Or the fields still produced grain. Or the road still led to trade.

But other times, they stayed because the land had become part of who they were. The memory of ancestors, rituals, and buried homes gave the place weight. Walking away would have meant walking away from everything that gave their lives shape.

That’s why we find temples built over older temples. Streets rebuilt along the same lines. City walls rising again where they once fell. In other words, this wasn’t nostalgia. It was actually a way to keep going while staying grounded in what came before.

Technology is now catching up to what was always there

We’ve known for centuries that cities were built on older cities. But only recently have we started to understand just how many layers are hidden beneath the surface, and how much we’ve missed by only looking at what we can see.

With ground-penetrating radar, LIDAR, and other tools, archaeologists are finding older foundations below familiar sites. What we thought was the beginning turns out to be the middle. Cities like Troy and Uruk have become deeper, both in time and meaning, thanks to what these tools reveal. But LiDAR has made some amazing discoveries in the Amazn rainforest as well, where it practically discovered traces of a long-lost civilization whose traces were buried beneath dense layers of vegetation.

What I also find extremly intersting and peculiar is that in places like Jericho or Damascus, the remains of dozens of earlier settlements lie just below modern streets. They’re not ruins in a museum. They’re still part of the living city, buried but not gone.

Every time a shovel hits stone in these places, it brings up more than debris. It brings up decisions of the ancestors. To rebuild. To stay. To remember. And thats kind of what Zahi Hawass told me during one of my podcasts when I asked him about Giza, and how much “stuff” was still buried beneath the surface there. He replied saying that if you were to excavate in present-day Giza, youd likley come up with an item of two of the ancient Egyptian civilization. And I guess this applies to other sites across the world.

{ https://curiosmos.com/category/curious-lists/ }

02-05-2025 om 00:00 geschreven door peter  

This Woman Found Alien Creatures Show Very Disturbing Interest Human Soul

This woman researched alien abductions and found that aliens manipulate perception, control consciousness, cause unexplained illnesses and mental decline, and engage in gruesome activities in underground facilities. Her work showed that alien encounters could cause serious physical, emotional, and spiritual harm, making people question what aliens really want.

Dr. Turner was a brave activist for human rights and an investigator of alien abductions. She had a background in Old English studies and used to teach at a college. She wrote three books about alien abductions: Into the Fringe (1992), Taken (1994), and Masquerade of Angels (1994), which she co-wrote with a psychic named Ted Rice. Through her work, she asked important questions about whether aliens were truly friendly.

She started studying alien abductions in 1988. In her books Into the Fringe and Taken, she shared her own experiences and those of others who had been abducted, showing how frightening these events were.

In Masquerade of Angels, she wrote about Ted Rice’s experiences. At first, Rice thought the aliens were good, but he later realized they were dangerous. One disturbing story he told was about seeing his dead grandfather turn into a reptile-like creature who behaved in a threatening way. This event was followed by the sudden death of Rice’s grandmother.

Sadly, Dr. Turner died from breast cancer in 1996. After her death, more of her work was published, including stories about her own family’s encounters with aliens. She also believed that people who were abducted were targeted on purpose, not randomly chosen. Dr. Turner thought the military was secretly involved, targeting people who reported alien experiences.

In her 1995 lecture at the MUFON Convention, Dr. Karla Turner introduced herself as an abductee, using that term because she had been taken and controlled by non-human entities.

She explained that this was a form of alien abduction, something that she and her family had experienced, and she had documented these events in her book Into the Fringe, published in 1992.

Her book focuses on the period between 1987 and 1990, when she and her family became consciously aware of their alien encounters, which had been happening since childhood.

In her view, the nature of alien activity is deliberately designed to prevent humans from collecting solid proof.

According to Dr. Turner, this makes it difficult to feel confident about many of the “facts” in the field. She explained that, based on everything she had learned, there were very few things she felt comfortable calling facts, and that list was very short. Instead of presenting case reports, photos, body markings, or drawings of aliens and spacecraft, as she had done in the past, she chose to take a different approach in this lecture.

Before her death, Dr. Karla frequently spoke at UFO conferences in the United States and other countries, urging people to take action. She claimed that aliens were manipulating our perceptions and spreading disinformation to weaken us and deceive us into thinking they cared about us, when in reality, their intentions were self-serving and disregarded our well-being. Turner emphasized the need to regain control over the situation and confront these aliens.

Dr. Karla Turner listed the fact: We do not know for certain what these entities are. They could be extraterrestrial, interdimensional, or even from Earth, or they might be something we haven’t imagined yet.

She explained that while some abductees have reported the aliens describing themselves as coming from various origins, we cannot verify these statements, so we can only speculate. For convenience, she used the term “alien,” but she didn’t necessarily believe they were from another planet.

The second fact she shared was more critical: she believed that some of the aliens were liars. Over the decades, aliens had made predictions and promises that did not come true.

Dr. Karla emphasized that, based on the historical record of these encounters, very few of these predictions had come true, and none of great significance. She illustrated this with a personal st

She recounted the experience of a young man named James, whom she had known since he was 11 years old. James had been through a series of intense encounters and abductions, particularly in 1987 and 1988.

One of the entities he frequently encountered described itself as an interdimensional being, claiming to be from the 10th dimension and aware of the 11th. This entity would appear in different forms—sometimes a nebulous shape, sometimes a human woman, or even just parts of her, like her head or hands.

Dr. Karla shared a story about a young man named James. James had met a woman who gave him detailed information about events happening several states away, which he was able to check and found out were completely true. This made him a believer in what the woman told him.

He was an outstanding student, a valedictorian at a prestigious private school, with a bright future ahead. However, the woman warned him that in five years, he would be “turned on” to do a specific job, no matter where he was or what he was doing, and he would know it when it happened.

This warning had a powerful effect on James. Instead of continuing his promising life, he dropped out of college, abandoned his career plans, and stopped caring about personal relationships.

He decided he only had five years left before losing control of his life, so he spent his time partying and making just enough money delivering pizzas to enjoy himself before “they” took him over. In reality, none of the predicted events happened.

Five years later, in August 1993, he and others were still living their normal lives. James’s life, however, had been badly damaged by believing these lies.

Dr. Karla pointed out that the best way to make someone believe a lie is to sandwich it between two truths, which is what the woman did.

She explained that during alien encounters, not only are human perceptions controlled, but so are memories and emotions. Researchers like Budd Hopkins and David Jacobs have talked about “screen memories,” where abductees remember seeing something ordinary—like a deer or a rabbit—when in fact something alien had happened. But Karla said the manipulation went much deeper than just those quick screen images.

She said that during encounters, aliens could control pain, pleasure (including sexual pleasure), and emotions. In every encounter, the abductee is under some level of control, often much more than they realize.

Another important point she made was that false memories could be implanted over real events, making abductees remember things that never actually happened. Even under hypnosis, these implanted memories could sometimes stay in place unless special techniques were used to break through them.

Dr. Karla Turner shared a story about a woman named Joy who had an unusual experience. Joy found herself in a room, much like the lecture hall they were sitting in, standing at a podium.

Joy believed she had a beautiful spiritual experience where she read messages from a strange book to a group of smiling grey aliens, feeling deep love and acceptance.

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But under hypnosis, it was revealed that this memory was a false illusion. In reality, she was naked, suspended in a beam of light, and used by aliens for medical examinations and sexual abuse. She cried out to God for help, but none came.

The trauma from this real event deeply changed her life, affecting her faith, her sexuality, and her emotional well-being for the next 20 years, even though she didn’t consciously remember the true event until much later.

Dr. Karla then explained an important point: abductees, even though they report their experiences honestly and sincerely, are actually reporting what the aliens want them to perceive.

What abductees see, feel, and remember is heavily manipulated. She emphasized that while abductees are truthful in their reports, their memories are often filled with illusions, false emotions, and distorted perceptions created by the aliens.

She highlighted that human involvement is also a real part of the abduction phenomenon. Besides alien interactions, many abductees report being monitored and harassed by human agents, such as through helicopter surveillance or military interventions.

Dr. Karla shared that her husband had been abducted and interrogated by a military group in 1988, an event she hadn’t even heard of happening to others at the time and which disturbed her even more than the alien encounters.

Dr. Karla Turner explained that in her book Taken, she included four more accounts of women whose lives had been interfered with by what appeared to be military or human forces, not just aliens.

Although she couldn’t publicly share all the hard evidence because of confidentiality, she was convinced by the information they had — names, dates, places, and military bases were all documented. She emphasized that it was not just an alien trick; it was very real.

She went on to say that whatever the alien abduction agenda really is, it clearly involves very physical actions and procedures. These actions suggest the aliens’ goals are not purely spiritual. Much of what happens during abductions seems to go far beyond just creating hybrid babies.

She pointed out that if aliens were only interested in breeding hybrids, then people would have to explain why there are so many other strange procedures being done.

For example, implants are inserted into many parts of the body — the brain, ears, neck, spine, legs, hips, and even, in one notable case, into a man’s penis. Some implants have been seen on x-rays, CAT scans, and MRIs, while others do not show up at all. A few implants have been physically removed, but according to Karla, no tests have yet revealed what they really are or what they do inside the human body.

She also described other disturbing procedures like the insertion of wires and tubes into people’s chests, kidneys, ovaries, knees, and feet. Aliens have been reported taking bodily fluids and injecting unknown substances into different parts of the body. Brain surgeries were also frequently reported by abductees, with many saying it felt like their heads were opened and their brains removed.

Dr. Karla talked about deliberate pain experiments where abductees were tortured to study their reactions, and possibly even for the aliens’ amusement.

She mentioned bizarre procedures, such as abductees being immersed in liquid and forced to breathe it, a method now often mentioned by other researchers like Budd Hopkins and David Jacobs.

Dr. Karla questioned what breathing liquid had to do with crossbreeding. She also described cases where abductees were forced to drink or eat unknown substances that had strange effects, like making them passive or hypnotized. One woman, Angie, was given a bitter red liquid that made her pass out, after which she was interrogated by several beings.

Dr. Karla also talked about the topic of cloning. She said she wasn’t just referring to the idea that the small gray alien workers were mass-produced like cars in a factory. She was also talking about the cloning of human bodies.

Sometimes abductees are shown bodies that are exact copies of themselves. Other times, they see many identical human bodies that are just lying there, lifeless.

In one case, a man was taken to a place where he saw about 40 human bodies—20 males and 20 females. All the males looked exactly alike, and all the females looked exactly alike. They were all young, blonde, and very healthy-looking.

Karla questioned what all of this cloning and body production had to do with the alien agenda, especially the crossbreeding program. She pointed out that the aliens’ goals weren’t only physical. They also focused on long-term psychological programming of abductees. The aliens seemed to target people’s personal relationships, their views on sex, their political beliefs, and their religious ideas.

For example, many abductees reported becoming highly suspicious of their government after their experiences. Some even felt paranoid around others, both inside and outside of the UFO community.

Dr. Karla shared that one woman named Jane, who was featured in her book Taken, said that the aliens made her distrust the government. Similarly, abductees often found their spiritual beliefs changed.

Dr. Karla said aliens can create virtual reality experiences that seem completely real to abductees. She shared a case of Ted Rice.

In the early 1990s, Ted was visiting friends in Florida when something strange happened. One night, he heard his hostess, Marie, screaming for help. When Ted ran to her room, he saw a blue glowing sphere around the bed where another guest, Frances, was lying. Frances was frozen, unable to move, and seemed to be having a conversation with things that no one else could see.

Frances later described how she heard what sounded like a helicopter overhead. She looked up and saw the ceiling dissolve, revealing a strange craft above the house. Two alien beings came from the craft and communicated with her. Ted and Marie, outside the blue energy sphere, only saw the light and could not hear what Frances was experiencing. If they hadn’t been there to witness it, Frances would have believed she had a completely real encounter. This case, Karla said, proved that aliens can create incredibly convincing illusions.

Karla also brought up a troubling fact: aliens seem to have a mysterious interest in the human soul. Even though this isn’t talked about much publicly, she emphasized that many abductees report experiences related to souls.

For example, a young girl was asked by aliens if they could “borrow her soul.” Two different abductees from St. Louis both described being shown a huge metallic sphere in space, which they were told was a “soul recycling center.” Others have memories of living past lives in alien bodies. One man even recalled seeing his young human body die, his soul being captured, and then inserted into a new body with the help of alien technology.

Dr. Karla defined propaganda as any organized effort to spread a specific belief or idea. In her view, aliens are using propaganda on abductees. They shape what people believe about them by using their ability to create illusions and virtual realities. Sometimes they appear as familiar faces, like dead relatives or even celebrities, to make abductees more compliant during encounters. In many cases, they even appear as religious figures like Jesus, always with specific features, such as blue eyes and blonde hair.

Dr. Karla explains that aliens seem to encourage humans to believe they are beautiful and compassionate. They do this by showing themselves as attractive beings, knowing that humans often wrongly associate beauty with goodness. She warns that this manipulation plays on our emotions rather than on any real proof of their true nature.

{ https://howandwhys.com/ }

01-05-2025 om 23:29 geschreven door peter  

{ https://www.universetoday.com/ }

01-05-2025 om 23:04 geschreven door peter  

Pearlescent orb seen over Hamburg, Germany on April 30, 2025, UFO Sighting News.

Date of sighting: April 30, 2025

Location of sighting: Hamburg, Germany

Source: Reported to me on X

 

This is a cloud orb, it was reported to me on X formerly Twitter today. The cloud orb was seen in Germany crossing the sky, it's rare to see them in the daytime and even more rare to see one this big, so something special and technologically important is happening over there. The object appears to be silvery-white with a pearlescent or metallic shine. It's reflecting sunlight, suggesting it's either metallic or highly reflective, possibly spherical or slightly domed in structure. The glow around the edges may be from light diffraction or motion blur, but a slight possibility of it being due to propulsion. From the second photo showing trees for reference, the object appears quite small in the sky, possibly 1–3 meters in diameter if it's at drone or low-altitude aircraft height. But if it's at a higher altitude, it could be 5–10 meters wide or more. No contrail, no wings, and no visible structure for propulsion are seen. This looks like alien tech to me. 

Scott C. Waring - UFO Sightings Daily

 

Eyewitness states: 

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

01-05-2025 om 22:32 geschreven door peter  

Alien Buildings On Planet Mercury, NASA Doesn't Want You To See! UFO Sighting News. VIDEO.

• https://ser.im-ldi.com/M10/IMAGE_ARCHIVE/CLEAN/0528915.png

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

01-05-2025 om 22:19 geschreven door peter  

Hexagon UFO Over 29 Palms, California April 27, 2025, UAP Sighting News. Video!

Credit: NUFORC at https://nuforc.org 

Date of sighting: April 27, 2025

Location of sighting: 29 Palms, California, USA

 

This is a unique UFO. The object is a six sided hexagon and it has a black disk within its center. The black area of the disk is likely to be the dome of the disk and would be transparent to the pilots within. Amazing colors and yes, UFOs do have lights! So many people say UFOs don't have lights...so lets think about that...intelligent beings from across the universe who are probably from a planet that's anywhere from 1-10 billion years older than our own...of course they discovered lights somewhere in their culture. If they came from across the universe they also have light speed, which also means the ability to time travel. Funny how some people think. 

Scott C. Waring - UFO Sightings Daily

 

Eyewitness states: 

The object was rough around the edges, huge moving in a jerky fashion with no clear trajectory all over the sky The object (there was only one) appeared suddenly. Tonight is the new moon - so it was definitely not the moon, and in any case was much brighter than even a full moon. It was much larger in appearance than the stars. The striking thing was its great brightness and irregular shape and path. It seemed to move arbitrarily with no clear path. The movents were jerky and at varying speeds. It covered the breadth of the sky in its path during the time it was visible. I have clear vision and had not used any mind altering substances. During the time I watched it, it began to take on a more circular shape, with an empty space in the middle.

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01-05-2025 om 22:09 geschreven door peter  

Glowing Orbs Over Moscow, Missouri April 27, 2025, UFO UAP Sighting News.

• https://nuforc.org 

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01-05-2025 om 21:58 geschreven door peter  

Energy Entity, California parking lot, April 24, 2025, UFO UAP Sighting News.

Date of sighting: April 24, 2025

Location of sighting: California, USA

Source: Unknown

 

A friend sent this to me but it wasn't his, instead it was shared with him. A glowing ball of light suddenly appears out of nowhere in a parking lot and moves back and forth, before it enters the back of car. Now I know this is an energy entity because it's able to control itself...meaning if it was lighting then these cars would be exploding in the parking lot. There does seem to be a great deal of smoke in the back area at the end of the video...as if an electric car battery may have exploded, but unsure. I'm unable to contact the original source so I cannot confirm it's real and not ai, however if its ai, its very advanced...with a quality I have not seen before. 

Scott C. Waring - Utah, USA

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01-05-2025 om 21:43 geschreven door peter  

Several days ago, a massive blackout swept across large parts of Spain, Portugal, and parts of southern France. Millions were left without power as the interconnected European energy grid experienced a rare and abrupt failure. While authorities quickly pointed to a "rare atmospheric phenomenon" as the cause, not everyone is convinced. 

Here are some explanations of authorities as well as controversial theories: 

According to REN, Portugal’s national electricity grid operator, the blackout was triggered by a fault originating in Spain’s power infrastructure. The disruption, they claim, was linked to "induced atmospheric variation", a term referring to extreme temperature differences that led to anomalous oscillations in high-voltage transmission lines. These oscillations reportedly caused synchronization failures between regional grid systems, ultimately sparking a chain reaction of failures across the European network. 

What makes the situation even more intriguing is that just days before the blackout, Spain hit a historic energy milestone. On April 16, for the first time, the country’s electricity demand was met entirely by renewable energy sources - solar, wind, and hydro, during a weekday. It raises questions whether the outage was caused by a technical failure of this new renewable energy system. 

While this achievement is noteworthy, it also exposes the fragility of a grid increasingly reliant on variable energy sources, especially solar, which can fluctuate dramatically with weather and atmospheric conditions. 

Despite official explanations, some experts and observers remain skeptical. There were no solar flares or geomagnetic storms in the days leading up to the blackout, and solar activity had been relatively calm. Critics argue that while atmospheric disturbances may have played a role, they are not sufficient to explain such a widespread, synchronized failure.

Despite the fact that the blackout this time was probably not caused by solar flares or geomagnetic storms it has been proven that Earth’s magnetic shield is rapidly weakening, leaving us increasingly vulnerable to powerful solar storms. The magnetic north pole is accelerating toward Siberia, and the South Atlantic Anomaly continues to expand, ominous signs that a looming plasma event could bring consequences far beyond just technological disruption.

This has led to speculation that the blackout could have been intentional, possibly even a test run for handling future crises or threats to infrastructure. 

Among the more controversial theories is the suggestion that this event might have involved the use of a graphite bomb, a non-lethal weapon designed to disable power grids. These devices disperse ultra-fine carbon filaments into high-voltage power lines, causing short circuits by creating conductive paths between lines. Such an attack would appear as a grid malfunction but could be devastating in scale. 

Another controversial theory is that the outage has been caused by weather manipulation systems such as HAARP or the Ice Cube Neutrino observatory, constructed at the Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station in Antarctica. 

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Could this have been a covert drill or a demonstration of vulnerability? Some point to global forums, such as the World Government Summit, where figures like Klaus Schwab have warned about Black Swan: An unpredictable event that is beyond what is normally expected of a situation and has potentially severe consequences. 

Whether the blackout was triggered by a rare natural event, a technical failure, or something more deliberate, it seems only a matter of time before we face a true Black Swan event.

 

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01-05-2025 om 21:32 geschreven door peter