Green Fog

The "Paranormal Pastor" Robin Swope tells a story here about a lady named Mary who saw a ghost-like figure in the form of a green mist.  Mary described the green mist as writhing and twisting around in the air as if it were trying to take on a more solid form.

The green mist in the story reminded me of green fogs I've heard about from other stories. Green fogs have allegedly appeared in the Bermuda Triangle before.  The green fogs may have something to do with some of the mysterious disappearances reported in the Bermuda Triangle.

The story of the Philadelphia Experiment also describes a green fog. The Philadelphia Experiment was an alleged military experiment that supposedly attempted to make a warship invisible.  Here is a description from Wikipedia:

In most accounts of the experiment, the destroyer escort USS Eldridge, was fitted with the required equipment at the Philadelphia Naval Yard. Testing began in the summer of 1943, and it was supposedly successful to a limited degree. One test, on July 22, 1943, resulted in the Eldridge being rendered almost completely invisible, with some witnesses reporting a "greenish fog" appearing in its place.

Some versions of the story also claim that the USS Eldridge teleported to Norfolk, Virginia or traveled back in time for about 10 seconds.

Wikipedia also points out in its article on the subject that the Philadephia Experiment is widely regarded as a hoax. Some parts of the story do sound a bit-far fetched, but it's possible that the story may at least be partially true.  The military probably did want to make an invisibility cloak of some sort and may have attempted to do so, but whether or not they were successful, I don't know. Attempting to make an invisibility cloak would not be the strangest experiment carried out by a government around that period of time (the Nazis and Soviets were known for strange experiments too). The more far-fetched parts of the story may have been exaggerations or disinformation.

But what of the green fog mentioned in the story? Oddly enough, the green fog may be what lends some degree of credibility to the story. Bruce Gernon described seeing an "electronic fog" during an experience he had in the Bermuda Triangle. He did not report the fog he saw as being green, but he has reported seeing "green flashes" around the Florida Keys (the fog and flashes may not be directly related though).

In an interview with Bruce Gernon and Rob MacGregor that I found here, MacGregor mentions a researcher named John Hutchinson who created the Hutchinson Effect, in which objects of various materials levitate under the influence of intense electromagnetic activity.  While Hutchinson was conducting experiments, a green fog appeared.  So electronic fog and green fog may be similar types of phenomena.  If so, could there be some kind of connection between the electronic fog Gernon described and the green fog that appeared during the Philadelphia Experiment?

So what are these green fogs?  In the Hutchinson Effect and the Philadelphia Experiment, the fog seems to have been the result of electromagnetic activity induced by man-made technologies.  But what about the reports of green fogs in the Bermuda Triangle or the green mist mentioned in Pastor Swope's article?  Green mists/fogs aren't really all that common in ghost stories, but Pastor Swope's story is certainly not the only one to mention a green mist/fog (see a couple more here and here).  So is green fog also a naturally (or supernaturally) occurring phenomena?

I'm not sure what these green fogs are.  I'm not sure what causes them to be green (or appear to be green) either.  Taking the man-made examples into consideration, the green fog seems to be more of an effect than a cause.  My guess is the phenomena can occur naturally (or supernaturally), but the phenomena can also be duplicated by man with the right electronic technologies.

But regardless of what causes it, if you ever see a green fog, don't be surprised if something weird happens.

--------------------------------
P.S.  I left a comment on a blog posting written by Rob MacGregor mentioning that I had cited something he said in this post.  In his response to my comment, he mentioned another story about green fog that he included  in the book he wrote with Bruce Gernon named The Fog.  According to that story, a fisherman and his partner were pursued by a bank of green fog while fishing off the coast of Florida at 2 AM. As the green fog neared them, they ran for it and called it a night.

So there is another example of green fog around the Bermuda Triangle.

---------------------------------
P.S.S.  I also want to clarify that the reason I think the green fog may lend some credibility to the story about the Philadelphia Experiment is because it happened before these other stories were written.  So these other examples of green fog/mist and the Hutchinson Effect that Rob mentioned may lend some credibility to the story about the Philadelphia Experiment because green fog was also said to have been witnessed during the experiment.  If the Philadelphia Experiment was completely fictional, what are the odds that the story tellers of the time would have mentioned green fog?  I can't dismiss the possibility that the Philadelphia Experiment is a hoax, but it seems unlikely (though not impossible) that the story tellers of the time would have been familiar with green fog in this context.

Visiting Pandora on Earth

You probably already know that the movie Avatar has been a major commercial success.  It has now passed Titanic as the highest grossing film worldwide.  You can read more about it here.

You may have also heard about the people who were depressed after watching the movie because it wasn't real.  Some people apparently wanted to be able to live like the N'avi.  Read more about that here.

Those depressed people may not be able to visit Pandora, but they might be able to go China, where a mountain has been renamed in honor of the movie.  The Southern Sky Column in Zhangjiajie, Hunan Province, has now been renamed Avatar Hallelujah Mountain and local officials even claimed that the mountain was the inspiration for Pandora.  Tourists are even being offered tours of locations that allegedly inspired the film.  Read more about it here.

Introverted Ghosts?

Electronic voice phenomena (EVP) is commonly used as evidence of ghosts trying to communicate audibly. You can find EVP clips on the internet or listen to them on TV shows like Ghost Hunters. I've listened to various clips of alleged EVPs, and some of them are rather intriguing. Sometimes they seem to say a person's name or respond to a question out loud.

But they aren't very clear. They usually just sound like blips of static to me. Once the ghost hunters suggest what they think the static says, I do think to myself, "Oh yeah, it does kind of sound like that I guess." But is it really saying that? Or is it just the power of suggestion? Are we just trying to hear what were told to hear? I don't know, maybe I'm just not good at interpreting EVPs.

But lets go ahead and assume for a moment that EVPs are communications from the spirit world. Why are they so brief? Why don't the ghosts ever seem to give many details? Why don't they say more? Is it difficult for them to communicate via sound waves? Do they have to muster up a lot of energy just to make a sound that an electronic device will pick up that will sound like a spoken language understandable to the listener?

Someone might argue that the ghost hunters can't hear the ghost say anything at the time, so they aren't able to carry on a conversation with them. But if that were the case, why not just explain to the ghost that they can't hear them now but that they are going to leave a recording device running and ask the ghost to give them a full dissertation on who they are, what the 'other side' is like, and what they do all day and that they will check back on the recording device later for any messages.

What if the ghosts have another reason for not saying that much though? What if they are intentionally vague because they don't think we can fully comprehend their answers? Sometimes ghost hunters sound like they are talking to a scared toddler when they talk to a ghost. Maybe they should consider the possibility that the ghosts know more about being ghosts than they do. Maybe they should consider that the ghosts are not confused and are fully aware of what is going on. Maybe the ghosts think we wouldn't be able to understand what its like on the 'other side' yet. Maybe it's like how a parent waits until a child reaches a certain age before they tell them about the birds and the bees. Maybe the ghosts think we're just to 'young' to understand.

But actually, I think it's probably more likely that the ghosts find it difficult to communicate via electronic recording devices. People have communicated (or at least appeared to communicate) with spirits via Ouija boards for years (Ouija boards are not recommended though!). Psychic mediums have claimed to communicate with spirits in another way. Ghost hunters have apparently carried on conversations with spirits via K2 meters (either that or they've gotten really really lucky with getting the device to light up right after asking questions out loud). So it's not necessarily that ghosts are always short on words, they just don't seem to be to fond of saying a lot on electronic recording devices.

 Of course, I can't dismiss the possibility that the static is just static from a random radio wave passing by. But there's still plenty of other types of evidence to suggest that ghosts do exist. I'd still believe in ghosts even if EVPs were just static.

Excusing 2012

My latest thoughts on 2012 were inspired by a post by Lon on  the blog Phantoms and Monsters.  Lon's post is about what appears to be planet sized spheres in the sun's corona that may be UFOs, expelled plasma, light distortion, or something else.  Lon's post isn't about 2012, but thinking about the anomalies around the sun's corona made me consider possible excuses people may use if the year 2012 comes and goes without the world ending or a great awakening.

Would anyone suggest that aliens came and numbed the effects of the sun during 2012?  Would they point to something like planet-sized UFOs around the sun claiming that the UFOs were there to prevent the earth's poles from shifting?  Would others accuse aliens of preventing a great awakening?  What other excuses might believers use?

Maybe instead of accepting that nothing significant happened, they would instead point to some event such as a major election or fancy new invention and herald it as the beginning of a new age.  The event itself might not be that significant in the grand scheme of things, but maybe they would consider it to be only the very beginning and that the world would change more over time because of it.  In other words, they may say an event occurring in 2012 is beginning of a new era in much the same way someone might use the phrase, "Today is the first day of the rest of my life."

As for me, I still just have a wait and see attitude.  I'm not really a believer or a non-believer.  But if 2012 comes and goes without anything significant happening in the world (or to the world), I'm curious to see how the believers will deal with it.  Even if nothing significant occurs, I doubt the hype will go away over night.

Sky Circles

Colin Andrews is famous as a crop circle researcher, but apparently he doesn't just limit himself to investigating crop circles.  He's also finding circles in the sky apparently.  He posted on his blog yesterday (January 16th, 2010) a link to pictures of a strange circle that appeared on weather satellite images over Australian.  As of today (January 17th, 2010), he is still investigating what caused the circle.  He's considered the possibility that it might be caused by HAARP, but he is still waiting (as of today) for a response from the Australian government's weather bureau to see if they have an explanation.  Of course, if it was HAARP, I doubt they would actually tell you that it was HAARP.

If you want to see if Andrews posts any updates on the circle, you can visit his blog here.  You can also see pictures of the circle in question on his website here.

2012: What about us?

In the latest episode of Jesse Ventura's Conspiracy Theory, Jesse and his team investigated claims that wealthy individuals and the government were building underground bunkers to prepare for a disaster that may occur in the year 2012.

It's no secret at all that there are people building underground bunkers in preparation for 2012.  However, the government isn't quite so forthcoming about what they are building their underground bunkers for.  It was reported that the government has been building an increasing number of underground bunkers over the last 10 years.

Hmm...the Cold War ended nearly 20 years ago.  So why would the government have embarked on a bunker building frenzy during the last 10 years?  What is it they are afraid of?

This episode wasn't your typical run-of-the-mill 2012 documentary though.  They didn't mention anything about the predictions of ancient oracles or the I Ching, and they barely even mentioned the Mayan calendar.  Jesse and his team focused on scientific data regarding expected solar storms in 2012.  It's alleged that the solar storms could be powerful enough to knock out the power grid, cutting off electricity throughout the nation.

So the conspiracy theory aspect of all this is that the government is allegedly building these bunkers in preparation for problems occurring as a result of solar storms in 2012.  I'm not surprised that politicians and elitists - the epitome of greed and selfishness - would only be concerned with saving themselves, but what about us?  What would the rest of us do if we woke up one morning and there was no electricity anywhere in the nation?

Here's some things to consider:

• Not only would your appliances not work, but you wouldn't be able to turn the TV on for news reports.  The TV station may have back up generators to power their equipment, but if you didn't have a generator of your own, that wouldn't do you any good.  Even if you did have a generator of your own, the solar storms may knock the television satellites offline too.  So even if you had a way to turn on your TV, there may be nothing transmitting.
• Landline telephones probably wouldn't be working.  Your cell phone may be battery operated, but the cell phone towers may be offline.  So you might not be able to call anyone.  
• Even if your laptop still had battery power, the internet may be offline, but even if the internet itself wasn't offline, if you didn't have electricity to power your modem, you still wouldn't be able to connect to the internet.  And even if you used an aircard sold by cell phone companies to connect to the internet, if the cell phone towers were offline, it wouldn't do you much good.  
• Radio stations may have backup generators, but it's possible the solar storms could interfere with radio transmissions too.  
• If you couldn't get your phone or the internet to work, the only people you would be able to contact immediately are your neighbors and anyone you know within driving distance.  Keep in mind that you would probably only be able to drive as far as the gas in your tank would get you because without electricity, gas pumps would be offline.  
• The nation would probably be in a state of martial law.

So what would happen after people started realizing that the power outage wasn't just limited to their street?  I imagine different people would react differently.  Many people probably wouldn't bother going to work.  For some people, there probably wouldn't be much point in going to work if they worked in a field where electricity was necessary to do their work.  Many people would probably be focused on contacting their family and friends.  A lot of people would probably sort to looting.  It would probably be a good idea to avoid looting though.  For one, looting a 65 inch TV and a $4000 computer isn't going to do you much good without electricity, and two, a looter that is bigger and faster than you might take offense if you took the 65 inch TV he was coming for.  

Of course, there is also the possibility that it wouldn't be safe to go outside at all.  The radiation from the storms may be unhealthy.  But you might not have any way of knowing that, and you might not have much of a choice either.  

So what should we do if such an event were to occur?  It's difficult to plan ahead of time since you don't know what kind of situations you may be presented with.  Ideally, I'd hope that people would focus on meeting up with their friends and family and then deciding what to do from there.  There would probably be a lot of people looting, but let the looters fight amongst themselves.  It could take months or years for power to be restored.  You might have to adapt to living without electricity for a while.  

Hopefully people would see it as an opportunity to come together and get along with each other.  Looting might happen in the beginning, but hopefully people would eventually see it as an opportunity to share and help others in need.  If faced with such a situation (and assuming the radiation itself wasn't deadly), people would have the opportunity to turn what appeared to be a bad situation into something good by spreading good will.  

But it would it only be an opportunity.   People would have to decide for themselves if they wanted to take that opportunity.

Cryptid Misidentifications

As I was out walking earlier, I saw a crane (the bird species, not the machine of the same name) fly by near a pond.  It's not the first time I've seen a crane in this area, and it might be the same one I've seen before.

But, even though I've seen a crane around here before, I don't see one very often.  Today when I saw it, I considered that its body type resembles drawings I have seen of certain types of pterosaurs (except the crane had feathers, of course).  I wondered if maybe people who had claimed to see a pterosaur or something like a pterosaur could have misidentified a large crane.

But I didn't wonder about it for too long.  I can't dismiss the possibility that someone might have misidentified a crane as a pterosaur, but I think it's rather unlikely.  When I saw the crane today, it was instantly obvious to me that it was a crane.  Even if it had been twice or even three times the distance away from me that it was, I'm sure I would have still known it was a crane.  Even if it had been so far away that I had to squint to see it and still couldn't quite make it out, my first assumption would have still been a crane or some other type of large bird, not a pterosaur.

I googled 'pterodactyl misidentifications', and it seems that fruit bats are a common suggestion for what alleged pterosaur sightings might be.  One article I found said that large fruit bats can have a pterosaur-like profile when seen in silhouette, especially to 'nonscientific observers', as if to suggest that identifying a bat required at least a masters degree in zoology or something.  I mean, come on, most people know what a bat looks like.  A lot of the pterosaur and thunderbird sightings I have read about - credible or not - described something larger than a fruit bat.  And I think if I were to see a larged winged animal flying around at night, my first guess would be a bat or an owl of some sort - not a pterosaur.  It would have to be exceptionally large before I would even start considering the possibility that it was some sort of pterosaur or thunderbird.  But hey, that's just me.

And what about these skeptics who suggest that bigfoot sightings are bear misidentifications?  I guess I can see the possibility of some sightings being bear misidentifications - assuming that the bear was seen from the back and only at a distance and the witness got scared and ran away in the other direction without investigating any further.  But when people describe seeing humanlike faces, how can that be confused with a bear?  And what of the size and body type?  Skeptics like using bears as examples because bears can stand on their hind legs, but bears have long torsos and short legs - they still don't look humanlike even when standing on their hind legs.

And it's not like people don't know what bears look like.  Even someone who has lived in a city or the suburbs all their life with no interest in hunting or camping knows what bears look like.  Some of the people who have claimed to have seen a bigfoot are outdoorsmen who are familiar with the area they sighted it at and the wildlife that is normally seen in the area.  So what are the odds that they would misidentify a bear as a bigfoot?

I realize there are some people out there who may be overly-anxious to believe in bigfoot and let their imagination get the best of them, but is that really what most people would do?  Wouldn't most people be able to recognize a bear when they saw one - even at a far away distance?  And I could be wrong, but even if they saw a bear at a far away distance and couldn't tell for sure what it was, wouldn't most people be likely to assume it was bear anyways?  Wouldn't most people be more likely to assume what they are seeing is something normal and common?

But like I said, I could be wrong; maybe most people wouldn't assume it was a bear.  Maybe most people do have the vivid imaginations the skeptics accuse them of having.

And here's another thought - wouldn't it be ironic if someone misidentified a bigfoot as a bear?

J

Caprica

It's not to often that I get excited about a fictional television show, but I am excited about the premiere of the new series Caprica.

The series is a prequel spin-off to the reimagined Battlestar Galactica series, taking place decades before the events of Battlestar Galactica.

I didn't become interested in the Battlestar Galactica series until late in its run.  Once I saw the series finale, I was disappointed that I hadn't gotten interested in it earlier.  In contrast to a lot of other sci-fi programs that take place in space sometime in the future, Battlestar Galactica takes place in the distant past.  The people in the series are very similar to us.  Their technologies are only slightly beyond what we have today.  In many ways, those people are a reflection of society today.  They dress like us, they talk like us, and they act a lot like us.

The characters of Caprica will be a reflection of society today too.  But the premise of Caprica will be different than that of Battlestar Galactica.    Battlestar Galactica takes place during a post-apocalyptic era where the survivors are struggling to live and trying to find an opportunity to start over fresh.  Caprica takes place decades before the cylons attack the planet Caprica and the other colonized human planets.  According to Wikipedia:

Whereas the dark, post-apocalyptic reimagined series revolved around a final bid for survival, Caprica is preoccupied with a world intoxicated by success. "It's about a society that's running out of control with a wild-eyed glint in its eye," states Ronald D. Moore. The Twelve Colonies are at their peak, self-involved, oblivious and mesmerized by the seemingly unlimited promise of technology. Framed by the conflict between the Adamas and the Graystones over the resurrection of loved ones lost in an act of terror, the series will explore ethical implications of advances in artificial intelligence and robotics.

 The show will be a prime time drama that the producers are hoping will appeal to an ever wider audience than Battlestar Galactica did.  According to Wikipedia:

Though a critical success, Galactica had a predominantly male audience, and both Moore and the network felt the "war in space" backdrop was a major deterrent to female viewers. With these considerations and Caprica's storyline already focused on events taking place before the two Cylon Wars, the series has a different identity, with its own tone, content and style. While Caprica contains some Easter eggs for Battlestar fans, the series is intended to be accessible to new fans and as such, no prior knowledge is required.

The original pilot for the show was released as a direct to DVD release.  I think it has a lot of potential as a series.  Hopefully I won't be disappointed.

Here's a trailer:

Sometimes the only proof is belief

I was thinking about an article I read I while back, and I don't remember who wrote it or where I read it, but the point the writer wanted to get across was that he thought UFOlogists should stop putting so much emphasis on the Roswell incident. He thought that by putting so much emphasis on the Roswell incident - by way of books, lectures, and the internet - UFOlogists were running the risk of losing any credibility they may have if the Roswell incident was ever proven to not have been an ET UFO crash. But after I thought about it, the question that came to my mind is how would anyone ever prove that the Roswell incident wasn't an ET UFO crash? The official story says that it wasn't a crash, but many people believe the official story is a lie, therefore, it doesn't constitute proof that an ET UFO didn't crash in Roswell, New Mexico back in 1947. Back in the 1990's, the government declassified documents relating to Project Mogul, a top secret project that existed from 1947-1949 that was tasked with operating high altitude spy balloons to spy on Soviet atomic bomb tests. With the declassifying of Project Mogul documents, the government essentially issued a new official story about Roswell, saying the original official story wasn't quite the whole truth. It was a balloon that crashed, according to official sources, but it wasn't a weather balloon - it was a spy balloon that they were testing. They claimed they had to keep the 'truth' about the spy balloon a secret because they didn't want the Soviets to know they were using balloons to spy on them. The Project Mogul story sounds plausible considering the Cold War between the United States and Soviet Union was going on. But a lot of people still don't believe that story. Some people think that story is still just a cover up. So if some people are not going to believe whatever the official story is, how is it ever going to be proven to not be true? What could they ever do or say that would convince everyone that it wasn't an ET UFO that crashed in Roswell? Personally, I'm not convinced that the Roswell incident was an ET UFO crash, but I'm not conviced the official story is true either. But I really don't know how anyone is going to prove that it wasn't an ET UFO that crashed in Roswell as long as people still believe they are hiding the truth.

So what about the flipside of this, what if the government admitted that it was an ET UFO that crashed in Roswell and that they retrieved the wreckage and bodies and reverse engineered the technology? If that were to occur, I imagine there would be many UFOlogists that would laud that disclosure as proof the Roswell incident was an ET UFO crash and proof of ET life. But would it be proof? If the current official story doesn't constitute proof now, why should it constitute proof then? It seems to me the proof is in the belief. Currently, many UFOlogists believe the official story is bogus. If the government were to tell them something that sounds more like what they already believe to be true, then I think they would most likely accept that official story as proof.

But would it be enough proof? If an official story only constitutes proof sometimes, can it ever be considered solid proof by itself?

So now we've come to a new question. How could they prove that it actually was an ET spaceship that crashed in Roswell? If the official story doesn't count as proof that it wasn't an ET UFO now, why should the official story suddenly count as proof that it was an ET UFO if the story was changed to admitting it was an ET UFO?

At this point, someone might say something like, "Well, hopefully they'd have pictures of the wreckage being recovered, or better yet, video footage."

That's the famous picture of Jesse Marcel holding what is allegedly the 'balloon' that crashed at Roswell. Many people think the picture was staged though. But if that picture isn't proof that it was a balloon, why would a picture (or video) of a spaceship being recovered be considered proof? Who's to say that a picture of a spaceship wasn't staged (or photoshopped)?

Now, at this point, someone might say something like, "Well, hopefully they could put some of the wreckage or one of the bodies on display."

But what if the wreckage was faked? What if the body was created in some geneticists lab to look like an alien? How would you really know for sure that it was real?

Now, at this point, someone might ask something like, "Well, why would they go to all that trouble to fake that?"

Well, what if they admitted to finding a crashed spaceship, but they didn't tell the whole story. What if the official story stated that a spaceship crashed, they recovered the wreckage, reversed engineered what they found, claimed they used that technology to build the SR-71, and they are not sure why the spaceship crashed and had no further contact with the aliens. Some people might accept that. Maybe it sounds like what they already thought might have happened. But what if that isn't exactly how it went down. What if what really happened was that they shot down the spacehship, arrested the aliens, brutally tortured them for information, and succeeded in pissing off the rest of the alien species who then proceeded to start abducting people for DNA samples to conduct experiments on creating human-alien hybrid super soldiers with appetites as big as a cow's for a future invasion of the planet earth (and this is just a 'what if' scenario, I'm not actually throwing that out there as a legitimate suggestion of what might have happened). What if the aliens succeeded in invading earth because no one was prepared for the invasion because no one bothered to keep pressuring the government for a full disclosure because they already believed they had been given a full disclosure? So that might be a reason they would fake having an alien spaceship - telling people something they will believe so they will shut up and quit asking about it. I mean, if they lied about it for decades, how would you ever really know for sure when they were telling the truth?

But I'm only using the Roswell incident as an example. This post isn't about whether or not the Roswell incident was a balloon, a spacehship, or something else. The point of this post is that proof oftentimes consists of something that confirms what someone already believes to be true. Have you ever dismissed something you heard simply because it contradicted something you already believed to be true? Have you ever known or known of someone who dismissed something they were told because it didn't fit with what they already believed to be true?

And if you have never actually experienced something or investigated it for yourself, then how can you personally say that you know for sure it is true? Is it because 'most' people think its true? Is it because someone with a PhD said so? Is it because CNN or FOX reported it?

As Marcus Aurelius said, "The opinion of 10,000 men is of no value if they know nothing about the subject." We should be careful to assume that something is true because 'most' people think it is true. We also shouldn't forget that someone who is well educated and has credentials can still be wrong about something. What if they are merely repeating something their college professor taught them? What if their professor was merely repeating something that they were taught? What if what they were taught was never true in the first place? What if it was just assumed to be true because it had been 'known for a long time'? And what if the news reports were reporting information that was inaccurate? What if the were just reporting something outlandish in attempt to boost ratings so they could charge more money for ads?

Not all proof is necessarily based on belief though. If you went to a pool and someone told you the water was cold, if you didn't believe them, you could just get in and see for yourself if it's cold. Once you've stepped in, you have solid proof as to whether or not the water is cold because you've experienced it. Prior to that, all you had was word of mouth. You could have just chosen to believe what you were told and not bothered to get in the water at all.

Maybe this is why parents sometimes get frustrated when their children get in trouble because they did something they were told not to do. Perhaps the children didn't believe their parents when they were told that they could get in trouble. Sometimes children may just have to experience something for themselves to get the proof they need to avoid getting into the same kind of trouble again.

But proof doesn't always come from your own personal experiences (and sometimes even certain experiences can be misleading). Sometimes the only proof available to you is something that confirms (or fits with) what you already believe to be true.

I guess 'proof' can be a personal preference.

Hopefully I've proven my point here. I'd like to believe that I have. J

Staging Evidence for Ratings

I used to enjoy the show Mysteryquest, but I won't be watching anymore.  I found out yesterday that a MUFON State Director named Mark Easter admitted to "misleading the public" in an episode of Mysteryquest.  Apparently, in an effort to boost ratings, the producer of the Mysteryquest episode obtained some debris from an old test rocket and had it planted in the desert.  Easter was aware of this and knew what the debris was but proceeded to comply with the producer's request to pretend to discover it.  Here is an excerpt from an article on the subject:

The producer, the crew, area 51 advisors and Mark all met at the Rachael, Nevada Little Alien Inn. As they were talking about the day's shoot. up pulls a man named Peter Marlin with a jeep full of wreckage. "It's the remains of a nose cone to a test rocket from Area 51 launched in 1967". Not only did Peter have the debris but he also had"1000 pages of tech information on the rocket". This debris was not mysterious at all. They all knew what it was, when it was launch and by whom. The producer had hired Peter as part of the show. But, here is where it got really tricky. They all go out to the crash site where the wreckage was found and:.....

"When we arrived at the destination the producer proceeded to explain how the sequence would be shot. We had to pull the huge pile of debris out of Peter's Jeep…and plant it in the desert so on camera we could drive up and discover it. In the shot Peter and Mark are kneeling next to the debris and pulling pieces out talking about them as they pretend they are looking at it for the first time."

The producer instructed Mark to interject certain words about the debris into the dialogue like "alien", "extraterrestrial" and the word "UFO". They all then proceeded to go searching the site for other debris. When they didn't find any, the producer again came up with a brilliant, if less than ethical, solution. They would plant a piece of the debris and act as if they just found it. This farce even went to the extent where the show sent the material out to a Rutgers' scientist for analysis.

Read the rest here.  The subject has also been written about on UFO Media Matters and Phantoms and Monsters.

To say that staging the evidence is "misleading the public" is putting it mildly.  That not only looks bad for MUFON but for Mysteryquest too.  I'm not surprised though.  I don't condone it and I'm nonetheless disappointed by it, but I'm not surprised.  TV shows are about ratings, because ratings sell ads.  But when a show portrays itself as a documentary series performing real investigations, then staging the evidence tarnishes its credibility.

This revelation has left me wondering if other shows similar to Mysteryquest have also staged evidence just to make an episode more interesting.  I guess part of the problem with having a whole series that focuses on any sort of mystery or paranormal topic is that the producers run the risk of spending a lot of money investigating something only to find nothing of interest.  In the Mysteryquest episode, if they had gone out into the desert and didn't find anything, they would have wasted time and money in doing so and still had a deadline to meet to get the show ready to be aired.  A couple of guys wandering around in the desert not finding anything wouldn't be that interesting, and it wouldn't fill up much of the time slot.

So if Mysteryquest has staged evidence, how many other shows may have done the same thing at some point?  As much as I enjoy watching paranormal themed documentary style shows, I'm beginning to wonder which ones (if any) are really worth watching.  Probably the best one out there now in my opinion is SyFy's Destination Truth.  I think some of the other networks may do well to try and adopt Destination Truth's lighthearted format for their documentary series'.  Josh Gate's keeps Destination Truth entertaining by narrating the team's journey to the various locales they visit and making it funny.  The Destination Truth team could probably go on an investigation and find nothing and still make finding nothing entertaining.  The team always seems to have a good time wherever they go.

I don't think the problem is just an effort to get better ratings though.  There are so many documentary style series' now, I think some of the producers may be finding it difficult to efficiently produce a whole season of episodes and make them all interesting and entertaining.  We'd probably get better documentaries if the networks focused more on individual documentaries or mini-series.  But maybe that wouldn't fill up enough time slots - I don't know.

I know this revelation was only about a single episode of Mysteryquest, but it's caused me to lose interest in watching the show or similar shows again because it's left me wondering how often these shows may have staged evidence just to make an episode more entertaining.  When I watch a documentary series that portrays its episodes as serious investigations, then I want to see a serious investigation - not just be 'entertained'.  If I want to be entertained, then I will watch a fictional program or Destination Truth.

Dragons and Dinosaurs

Dragons are a creature that feature in the stories and mythologies of various cultures around the world.  They're mentioned in the Bible and ancient middle eastern stories, they feature prominently in east Asian traditions, and have also featured in ancient and medieval European folk tales.  The east Asians typically depict dragons as large snake-like creatures, while the Europeans typically depict them as sauropod-like creatures, oftentimes with wings.  While dragons may be depicted somewhat differently in different cultures, it seems that giant reptilian creatures of some sort feature in stories from all around the world.

So where did all these people get these ideas about giant reptiles?  The study of Paleontology has only been around since the 19th century, but people have been finding dinosaur fossils for hundreds, maybe thousands of years.  Could the stories of dragons have been developed by people who found dinosaur fossils?  If so, the next question in my mind would be how did they know the fossils were reptilian?  If they had never seen large reptiles before, what would make them think the fossils belonged to reptiles?  Even if someone in ancient times had found an intact skeleton of a sauropod, what about it would indicate to them it was a reptile instead of some bizarre cross between a giraffe and an elephant?

Some people point to the Ica stones as evidence that some dinosaurs roamed the earth at the same time as humans.  The Ica stones also depict scenes that appear to show men looking through telescopes, performing open heart surgery, and performing cesarean section births.  These stones are generally believed to be a hoax not only because of what they depict, but because one man who sold the stones claimed he had been carving them himself (Although it's been claimed that he confessed to carving them to avoid jail time, because if they were legitimate artifacts, they would be the property of the government, and therefore, illegal to sell.).

But the Ica stones are not the only depictions of dinosaur-like creatures from the past.

An ancient Greek mosaic known as the Nile mosaic of Palestrina depicts what looks like some sort of dinosaur like creature.

The temple of Ankor Wat in Cambodia has a depiction of what has been alleged to be a hippo with a lotus flower behind it.

It also looks a little bit like a stegosaurus.  I don't know if it is a stegosaurus, but I don't think it looks like a lotus flower and hippo either (tail looks to long to be a hippo to me).

A figurine found in Anatolia also bears a modest resemblance to a stegosaurus:

It might not be a stegosaurus, but it's hard to tell exactly what it is supposed to be after a few thousand years of weathering.

People argue over what these ancient artworks depict, but what about the depictions of dragons themselves?  Regardless of how you spin it, dragons resemble dinosaurs.  Any single depiction of a dragon might not match up exactly with any single known type of dinosaur, but there is no denying the obvious similarities.  I think it's also important to note that dinosaur skeletons are rarely ever found completely intact.  Modern depictions of dinosaurs are artists interpretations based partially on fossil evidence, and partially on guesswork.  With that in mind, there may be even more similarities than previously thought.

So where did the ancients come up with their ideas of dragons?  Are they the result of some ancient psychic having visions of the earth's distant past?  Or could people have seen 'ghosts' of dinosaurs, like a type of residual haunting?  Or could it be that ancient people found dinosaur skeletons and tried to visualize what they may have looked like (much like how modern artists try to visualize what they looked like based on scientific descriptions)?  Or is it just a mere coincidence that depictions of dragons just so happen to resemble depictions of dinosaurs?  Or could it be that humans and some dinosaurs did coexist at the same time?

Some people think that dinosaurs and humans not only coexisted at the same time, but that certain types of dinosaurs still exist today.  Some people have speculated that the Loch Ness monster and Champ may be plesiosaurs.  Chessie of the Chesapeake Bay is said to be a long serpent like creature, which some some have speculated might be a zeuglodon.

Of course, it's not known whether those sea serpents actually exist, much less if they are dinosaurs that survived extinction.  However, stories of dinosaurs surviving extinction are not limited to aquatic dinosaurs.  The Mokele-mbembe is allegedly a type of sauropod that lives in remote areas of the Congo today.  The term Mokele-mbembe translates to "one who stops the flow of water," because apparently the Mokele-mbembe is so large it can get into a river and stop the flow of water.   A handful of westerners have claimed to see the animal, and when locals of the region are shown pictures of animals known to exist in the region, they are able to identify them; when they are shown animals not native to the region, they draw a blank; when shown pictures of sauropods, they identify them as Mokele-mbembe (Although, according to the Wikipedia entry on the subject, a BBC documentary interviewed some tribe members who identified the Mokele-mbembe as a rhinoceros.  So I guess it may depend on which local you ask).  And it is not a situation where they are confusing the picture of a sauropod with a smaller sized reptile, because they are clear that the Mokele-mbembe is very large, and the name itself suggests that it is very large.

So what are the odds that some large sauropods could have survived extinction and still roam the earth in remote areas?  I don't know what the odds are, but it may be important to emphasize that the regions these animals supposedly inhabit are very remote.  We may have satellites and have charted the whole planet, but there are still plenty of places in the world that are rarely visited by people.  There are monuments in the Amazon that modern archaeologists have not excavated (not yet, anyway).  It's known that these monuments are there because they can be seen from an airplane.  But those monuments stay still.  They don't go anywhere.  A 'Mokele-mbembe' - whatever it is - can move around. So while there may be satellite images of the Congo and western investigators may have traipsed through the jungles at various times, the entire Congo is not under constant surveillance.  

Some people have also claimed to see pterosaurs flying through the sky.  There are also stories of flying serpents, which may or may not fit the description of what a dragon is.  A sighting of a flying serpent isn't necessarily paranormal though, as is it known that some snakes have the ability to glide through the air.  However, I doubt a small snake gliding through the air would be mistaken for a large dragon.

So is it possible that some dinosaurs survived extinction and still exist today?  Well, it's not only possible, it's true.  For anyone who doesn't believe that, I would recommend you go to the local zoo and look for an animal known as the 'crocodile'.  Crocodiles walked the earth with the Tyranosaurus Rex, and they still walk the earth today.  The Tuatara lizard also walked with dinosaurs.  Turtles lived with dinosaurs.  The coelacanth was once thought to be a prehistoric fish that had gone extinct, that is, until they found some living ones.  Certain types of insects, such as a grasshoppers and cockroaches, walked with dinosaurs too.  All of these animals look the same now as they did in the past.  All of these animals survived the dinosaur extinction.  Bugs, turtles, fish, and small lizards might not be dinosaurs, but crocodiles are.  Crocodiles are not the largest type of dinosaur, nor are they the smallest.  They are dinosaurs in every sense of the word.  They not only lived at the same time T-Rex's lived, but they are clearly large reptiles.  If you factor in their aggressive nature, the term 'terrible lizard' (which, of course, is what the word 'dinosaur' means) could be a fitting description.

So if crocodiles still exist, why not another type of dinosaur?  Could dinosaurs be the inspiration for dragons?  Could the dragons that the Chinese people revere have been some type of dinosaur that their ancestors had seen?  Could a dinosaur sighting have turned into a local tradition, which in turn spread to other communities, which eventually lead to a widespread tradition? Could a similar sighting somewhere else have produced similar results in other cultures around the world?

Something to ponder, I suppose.

UFO Misidentifications

The other evening I was out driving and I glanced up and saw an airplane flying by.  This is not unusual.  People see airplanes fly by all the time.  And aircraft is very common in the skies around here, considering there is a regional airport and two military bases here.

But for some reason, I glanced up at that airplane again, and it occurred to me that all I could really see was two white lights next to each other moving slowly across the sky.  I couldn't actually make out a fuselage, wings, or a tail.

Most serious UFOlogists will tell you that the majority of UFO sightings are misidentifications of conventional aircraft, the International Space Station, bizarre weather phenomena, or Venus.  You may hear someone suggest misidentifications account for anywhere from 80% to 99% of UFO sightings, and I'm inclined to agree that the majority are misidentifications.

However, as I was looking at the two white lights the second time, I also thought about how ironic it would be if those two white lights were a real UFO and I had just assumed it was an airplane and looked away.  I'm sure what I saw was an airplane, but if some odd reason someone was skeptical that there was airplane flying through the sky that night and questioned me as to whether or not I could clearly see the fuselage, wings, or tail of the airplane, I would have to answer that I could not.

So, in spite of the fact that most UFO reports are probably misidentifications of something conventional, I wondered if there had ever been any instances where a legitimate UFO sighting was not reported because the observer just assumed they were looking at an airplane or helicopter and looked away from it without giving it a second thought.  How ironic would it be if a UFO was misidentified as an airplane?

I don't know if there has ever been any instances where someone saw a UFO and misidentified it as something conventional.  I don't suppose you can really get any good statistics on how many UFO sightings go unreported, since, you know, they're unreported.  You can come up with statistics on reports you do have, but you can't really come up with statistics on reports you don't have.  Any statistical percentage you come up with on reports you don't have would just be a guess.

Nevertheless, I'm still pretty sure those two white lights I saw the other evening were lights from an airplane.  J

An Interview with Dr. Charles Tart

I found an interview with Dr. Charles Tart, a Psychology Professor with an impressive academic resume, where he answers questions regarding his views on science and spirituality.  I was very impressed by the interview, so I'm posting a link to it for anyone interested in reading it.

Read the interview here: An Interview with Dr. Charles Tart (original link is no longer available, see this link instead)

H/T

Posted using ShareThis

Bill Clinton discusses the Roswell Incident

Here is an interesting video clip with former President Bill Clinton discussing the Roswell UFO incident.



Early in the questioning, Clinton mentions that there were people in his administration that thought there was a UFO and an alien buried in Nevada by the government (the location was off-limits to the public).  Clinton said he sent someone there to "figure it out."  According to him, there was just a secret defense installation there with people doing "boring" work that they didn't want anyone else to see.  Maybe that's true, but what I found to be interesting about it was that Clinton had to send someone to figure it out.  Not only were there people in his administration that thought there was a UFO there, but apparently this installation was so secret that he didn't even know what it was and couldn't just ask one of his generals what it was or pull it up in some sort of encrypted database of secret installations on his computer.

As far as Roswell goes, Clinton said he did attempt to find out if there were any secret documents about the UFO incident, but said that if there were any secret documents about it, they were concealed from him too.  He also said, "I wouldn't be the first President that underlings have lied to or that career bureaucrats have waited out.  But there may be some career person sitting around somewhere hiding these dark secrets even from elected presidents.  But if so, they successfully eluded me, and I'm almost embarrased to tell you I did try to find out."

So apparently, like a lot of us, even Clinton wanted to find out if something other than the official story happened at Roswell.  Many people suspect the government of lying and covering up Roswell and many other incidents and programs.  According to Clinton, underlings (i.e. government officials) have lied to Presidents before.  So if they'll lie to the President, who's to say they won't lie to us too?

I think we can also glean from Clinton's statement just what a tangled web the government is.  Not only did he not know about everything that was going on in the government, he also alludes to not being able to just pick up the phone and find out anything he wants to know about particular government operations - he had to send someone to find out about the secret operation in Nevada.   He said that operation was in the public domain now, but you have to wonder how many other operations there are that are going on now that aren't in the public domain.  You also have to wonder, considering that he admitted that 'underlings' have lied to Presidents, how many times a President sought information about secret information and was lied to about what was really going on.  You also have to wonder why the 'underlings' would lie about it to the President in the first place.  You also have to wonder why an 'underling' would be privy to something the President wasn't.  Makes you wonder who the 'underling' really is.

And I couldn't tell for sure, but I thought Clinton seemed slightly fidgety in the video and had a tendency to look down a lot (but, granted, it was hard to tell if he was looking down and I'm not sure where the audience was sitting either).  If my observation is accurate, I can't help but wonder if he wasn't hiding something himself.

Sometimes I think the President has become to much of a figurehead to the people.  People often applaud the President when things are going good, and blame the President when things are going bad.  But I don't think we should lump to much of the praise or blame on the Presidents.  I think that video clip really shows that a President does not rule alone - there is a lot more going on in the government than just what the President does.  I think the 'career bureaucrats' that Clinton mentions wield a lot more power in Washington than the Presidents do, but the career bureaucrats seem to remain mostly behind the scenes.


H/T for the video.

A Quick Synchronicity

Earlier this evening I was at a friend's (who's also a co-worker) house, and I mentioned that I saw the receptionist where we work earlier in the day.  Right after I said that, he asked, "At Wal-Mart?"  And I said yes, and asked him how he knew I saw him (the receptionist) at Wal-Mart (and this isn't a small town, there's plenty of other places I might have seen him).  He answered by just saying that he had seen him at Wal-Mart before,  which really doesn't make much sense, considering that just because he had seen him at Wal-Mart before doesn't mean that Wal-Mart is where I saw him, but I guess it was just the first thing that came to his mind.

But get this...while we were having this conversation, a Wal-Mart commercial came on TV.  I don't really see any significant meaning to it, but what are the odds of that occurring?

Separating Scientists: The Toolmakers and The History Rewriters

To anyone who has read this blog for a while, it's probably apparent that I have a tendency to be critical of the scientific establishment.  And I'd like to emphasize that my criticisms of the scientific establishment are just that, criticisms of the scientific establishment.  They are not criticisms of the scientific method, the philosophy of science, scientific investigation, or learning in general.

One reason that I am so critical of the scientific establishment is because I don't see science as an establishment. I also don't lump everyone wearing the scientist label into one crowd.  You could get a Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, and Kabbalist together and label them as "religious" people.  While that might be a true statement, that broad label overlooks the key differences between the religions the people represent.

On the same note, if you take an Archaeologist, Paleontologist, Medical Doctor, a Rocket Engineer, and a Computer Engineer, you could label them all as "scientists," but the label doesn't clarify the differences between the types of science.

However, people don't readily point out the differences between the scientists and the types of science they research.  I think this is kind of tragic, because it allows some scientists to ride on the accomplishments of other scientists.

The point I want to get across here is that we don't have computers, airplanes, and GPS systems because of Charles Darwin or a Big Bang Theory.  We have computers, airplanes, and GPS systems because someone took the time to conceptualize them and then figure out how to build their concept.

On the other hand, we have a group of people trying to rewrite history that they didn't live through or experience.  Their version of history is based on a materialistic viewpoint, and they model their concept of history through that viewpoint.

However, these two groups of people label themselves as scientists.  One group seeks to design new tools, the other seeks to rewrite history from their perspective.  Throughout the 20th and 21st centuries, the tool making scientists have made many notable accomplishments, allowing the history rewriters to ride along with that success and teach their materialism.

I'd like to point out that tool makers have been around since the earliest records of men (and presumably before that too).  Regardless of whether you think we were created here, planted here by aliens, or 'evolved', its apparent that men have been making tools for a long time.  One generation develops a tool, and another generation builds upon the original design.  The wheel becomes a cart, the cart becomes a carriage, the carriage becomes a car.  These toolmakers have been making tools since before the word "science" was invented.  If our modern engineers want to call themselves scientists that is fine, but what they are doing is something people did before "science" was defined.

The medical doctors of today take what is called the Hippocratic Oath (or rather, a modernized version of it).  The Hippocratic Oath is basically an oath a doctor makes to practice medicine ethically.  Hippocrates is widely considered to be the father of Western medicine, yet he lived circa 460 BC - 370 BC - long before science was defined.  So the study and practice of medicine has been around for a long time.  Over the years, knowledge of medicine has increased tremendously.  We might call it "Medical science" today, but the study of medicine existed before modern term was defined.

During the Renaissance, the Catholic establishment began to lose its hold on Europe once the Protestant reformers began questioning their authority.  It wasn't long after that though that the so-called 'age of enlightenment' began, which led to some people considering non-traditional outlooks on life and history, which led to materialism, which led to the modern scientific establishment.  Essentially we've traded one establishment for another.  Woopty-doo.

So really my criticisms here are against the history rewriters.  Sure, they may abide by the philosophy of science and use the scientific method as tool for investigations and research, but ultimately, their brand of science is highly interpretative.  Their brand of science isn't like the science of an aerospace engineer.  The aerospace engineer designs airplanes.  The history rewriters just intepret data they find from a certain point of view.

Which brings me to another point.  Scientists are always about the data.  They want to see the data.  Data, data, data.  They want to know what the data says.

But the data doesn't "say" anything.  Data is interpreted.  And not everyone may interpret the data the same way.

I have a book called Thousands...Not Billions, which makes a case for the earth being much younger than 4.5 billion years old.  The book is written by a group of scientists called Radioisotopes and the Age of Earth (RATE), and they used the same data and radiometric dating techniques that the mainstream scientific establisment uses.  The establishment says the earth is 4.5 billion years old because the data 'says' so.  But as I pointed out, data doesn't say anything.  The establishment has interpreted the data to mean that earth is 4.5 billion years old.

So how did the RATE scientists, who, by the way, are credentialed scientists, determine that the earth is so much younger?  The Great Flood.  What the establishment views as age, the RATE scientists view as flood deposited rock.  RATE lumped what the mainstream scientists refer to as Cenozoic, Mesozoic, and Paleozoic eras together as a single layer of flood deposits.

So what we really have here is a debate between Catastrophism and Uniformitarianism.  Catastrophism suggests that the earth has been affected by sudden, catastrophic events (such as the Great Flood).  Uniformitarianism, on the other hand, suggests the opposite, that natural laws and processes that operate in the universe now have always operated that way without interruption.  Uniformitarianism is the lens the scientific establishment views history through.  It's actually pretty clear that the Uniformitarianism theory in its original form (which was developed by James Hutton and Charles Lyell) is not accurate, so during the 20th century the scientific establishment created a set of "correction tables" (or "calibration tables").  When asked how they 'know' the earth is 4.5 billion years old, the scientific establishment will say because the radiometric data 'says' so.  Wrong.  The data hasn't 'said' anything.  They intepreted the data to mean that by examining it with a certain pre-conceived notion.

There are those out there that would suggest trying to dispute what the scientific establishment says about pre-history is just an attempt to cling to old religious beliefs.  Well, I could say the same thing about those people. They are clinging to 19th century materialism and its interpretation of history and reality.  How convenient that the Darwinist crowd created a new theory (Uniformitarianism) to support their theory of evolution.  It was necessary to do so, otherwise the theory of evolution would have fallen apart long ago.  The Darwinists needed a way to claim the earth was millions and billions of years old in order to make their theory of evolution plausible (by dismissing the hundreds of ancient stories of a catastrophic flood, the Darwinists can interpret radiometric data to suggest that the earth is billions of years old).  Creating a theory about history to support another theory about history isn't the same as building airplanes.

I also criticize the scientific establishment because they often have a tendency to 'speak with authority'.  They speak about theoretical concepts as though they were already known to be true.  A recent example of what I mean can be seen in an article about dark matter.  I think the main body of the article presents an authoritative tone regarding the existence of dark matter, yet if you go to the bottom, there's a little snippet that points out that not all scientists believe in dark matter.  Well, if that's the case, I think the mainstream scientists need to make it a little more clear that dark matter itself is just a theoretical concept, instead of 'speaking with authority' about something that is not yet known to be true.  Their concept of dark matter may very well be accurate, but until they actually find something and can clearly define it, they need to drop the authoritative tone.

This also goes for the so-called Higgs-Boson particle.  Few scientists are interested in studying ghosts or psychic phenomenon, yet they'll spend billions of dollars and devote years of time to trying to find some unknown particle that no one has ever seen and may not even exist.  Go figure.

And what of these 'peer-reviewed' journals?  Are we to assume that because a bunch of people who already think alike agree with what an article says, that the article must be true?  Frankly, when it comes to interpreting scientific data, I'm not interested in a 'peer' review.  I would rather have an analysis by people with different viewpoints.  Preferably, the data collection would be done by people with different viewpoints too.  I think by doing so, we could get a more thorough examination of the data, instead of just looking at it through a single lens.  As a result, people could review the different intepretations of the data, and draw their own conclusions from those intepretations, instead of just being told what the data supposedly means.  When doing research, it's good to investigate a subject or the data thoroughly.  If you're only looking to find specific answer, there's a good chance you'll find it.  You can probably find someone out there to tell you what you want to hear.  But it's not always good to stop researching something because you found someone who will tell you what think (or hope) is true.  Maybe it is true, but, you know, maybe it isn't.  Get some different perspectives, and draw your own conclusions.  Ultimately, you can still choose your own perspective, but at least you can say you listened to other perspective and tried to understand where those perspectives were formed.

So when it comes to science, I try to have an open mind.  I don't lump all scientists together.  When reading about science, I try to determine what lens the writer is looking through.  The tool making scientists look through a lens toward the future.  The history rewriting scientists look through a lens to the past.  History is one of my favorite subjects, yet the lens of 19th century materialism is of little interest to me.  But hey, I'll still consider their viewpoint...but I'd want to consider other viewpoints too.

I criticize the establishment because they have a tendency to speak with authority and try to tell people what to believe.  Some may argue that religious leaders from the past and present do the same thing, but there are already plenty of criticisms of religious establishments out there.  I don't think there is enough criticism of the scientific establishment, which is one reason why I have chosen to take a critical position regarding the scientific establishment.  Another reason I criticize them instead of religious establishments is that devout religious people admit their beliefs are based in faith, but scientists claim to base their beliefs on rationalism and data.  So when they start talking about evolution, big bangs, dark matter, and Higgs-Bosons, they darn well better have some clear evidence that it's true first.  And the evidence better be as clear as the sky is blue before they start 'speaking with authority'.  Claiming the evidence is clear doesn't mean it's clear.  It's obvious that the sky is blue.  It isn't obvious that the universe exploded itself into existence.

Our tool makers, as they have throughout history, continue to make great accomplishments. Our history rewriters on the other hand, eh, not so much.  I think lumping our history rewriters into the same bunch as our tool makers is an insult to the tool makers...but that is just my opinion.