NYTimes | Since
the pandemic began, Covid has often followed a regular — if mysterious —
cycle. In one country after another, the number of new cases has often
surged for roughly two months before starting to fall. The Delta
variant, despite its intense contagiousness, has followed this pattern.
After Delta took hold last winter in India, caseloads there rose sharply for slightly more than two months before plummeting at a nearly identical rate. In Britain,
caseloads rose for almost exactly two months before peaking in July. In
Indonesia, Thailand, France, Spain and several other countries, the
Delta surge also lasted somewhere between 1.5 and 2.5 months.
And in the U.S. states where Delta first caused caseloads to rise, the
cycle already appears to be on its downside. Case numbers in Arkansas,
Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi and Missouri peaked in early or mid-August and have since been falling
We have asked experts about these two-month cycles, and they acknowledged that they could not explain it.
“We still are really in the cave ages in terms of understanding how
viruses emerge, how they spread, how they start and stop, why they do
what they do,” Michael Osterholm, an epidemiologist at the University of
Minnesota, said.
But two broad categories of explanation seem plausible, the experts say.
One
involves the virus itself. Rather than spreading until it has reached
every last person, perhaps it spreads in waves that happen to follow a
similar timeline. How so? Some people may be especially susceptible to a
variant like Delta, and once many of them have been exposed to it, the
virus starts to recede — until a new variant causes the cycle to begin
again (or until a population approaches herd immunity).
The
second plausible explanation involves human behavior. People don’t
circulate randomly through the world. They live in social clusters,
Jennifer Nuzzo, a Johns Hopkins epidemiologist, points out. Perhaps the
virus needs about two months to circulate through a typically sized
cluster, infecting the most susceptible — and a new wave starts when
people break out of their clusters, such as during a holiday.
Alternately, people may follow cycles of taking more and then fewer
Covid precautions, depending on their level of concern.
Whatever
the reasons, the two-month cycle predated Delta. It has repeated itself
several times in the U.S., including both last year and early this
year, with the Alpha variant, which was centered in the upper Midwest
They call me the Back Door Santa
I make my runs about the break of day
They call me the Back Door Santa
I make my runs about the break of day
I make all the little girls happy
While the boys are out to play
I ain't like the old Saint Nick
He don't come but once a year
I ain't like the old Saint Nick
He don't come but once a year
I come runnin' with my presents
Every time they call me dear
I keep some change in my pocket, in case the children are
Home
I give 'em a few pennies so that we can be alone
I leave the back door open so if anybody smells a mouse
And wouldn't old Santa be in trouble if there ain't no
Chimney in the house
They call me the Back Door Santa
I make my runs about the break of day
I make all the little girls happy
While all the boys are out to play
They call me the Back Door Santa
Yeah, that's what they call me
They call me the Back Door Santa
Yeah, that's what they call me
sciencealert | A giant, sprawling structure almost a mile long has been discovered at
the southern tip of Mexico, with researchers saying it may represent the
oldest and largest monument of the ancient Maya civilisation ever
found.
The site, called Aguada Fénix, is located in the state of Tabasco, at
the base of the Gulf of Mexico. It's so vast for its age, the find is
making archaeologists recalibrate their timelines on the architectural
capabilities of the mysterious Maya.
Before now, the Maya site of Ceibal (aka Seibal) was thought to be the oldest ceremonial centre, dating back to around 950 BCE.
Aguada
Fénix, which measures over 1,400 metres (almost 4,600 ft) in length at
its greatest extent, dates to a similar timeframe, with researchers
estimating it was built between 1000 and 800 BCE – but its immense size
and scope make it unlike anything found before from the period.
"To our knowledge, this is the oldest monumental construction ever
found in the Maya area and the largest in the entire pre-Hispanic
history of the region," the researchers, led by archaeologist Takeshi
Inomata from the University of Arizona, explain in a new paper about the discovery.
What's
even more staggering is that this huge, unknown structure has actually
been hiding in plain sight for centuries, seemingly unrecognised by the
modern Mexicans living their lives on top of the vast complex.
ancient-origins | Arkaim is a mysterious site located in Russia.
Experts believe the citadel, not necessarily the oldest feature of the
site, was built between the 17th and 16th century BC. But there are
several reasons why Arkaim stands apart from other Bronze Age
settlements in the area, leading to the idea it was built by a separate
group. There is controversy on exactly who the builders were and what
they made the site for and that uncertainty has led to some fascinating,
if unorthodox, claims.
Although it is unknown who built Arkaim, archaeological evidence
found at the site suggests that it was inhabited by people of the Aryan
race. Specifically, it has been suggested that Arkaim’s residents once
consisted of members of the Sintashta culture, Indo-Iranian people of
the ancient Eurasian Steppe.
The principal evidence for Aryans having lived at Arkaim is the
discovery of horse burials following their style. This practice is
described in ancient Indian texts and says that horses were buried with
their masters. Being nomads, many Indo-European peoples had a strong
connection to their horses and it’s not surprising for them to think
that the deep connection would continue into the afterlife. Evidence of
ritual horse sacrifices has been found in stone necropolises unearthed
in the Arkaim Valley.
Apart from its creators, another mystery is why the site was suddenly
abandoned. There is some evidence of a fire, however that may not have
been the cause of desertion. Because the site was fortified, some people
believe it was abandoned when the inhabitants lost a war. Skeletons
have been found at Arkaim and in the expansive necropolises of the
valley, but the human remains do not generally suggest death in battle.
A particularly interesting find of human remains was made at Arkaim in
2013 - an individual with an elongated skull. The person may have
belonged to the Sarmati tribe. Researchers believe that the alteration
was intentional; it was, after all, a common practice amongst some
groups who lived in the South Ural (it is also found worldwide).
Nonetheless, the reasons behind this ritual deformation are unknown;
leading some to see stronger ties between the curious site of Arkaim and
extraterrestrials.
thescientist |Ralph Baric, an infectious-disease
researcher at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, last week
(November 9) published a study on his team’s efforts to engineer a
virus with the surface protein of the SHC014 coronavirus, found in
horseshoe bats in China, and the backbone of one that causes human-like
severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in mice. The hybrid virus could
infect human airway cells and caused disease in mice, according to the
team’s results, which were published in Nature Medicine.
The
results demonstrate the ability of the SHC014 surface protein to bind
and infect human cells, validating concerns that this virus—or other
coronaviruses found in bat species—may be capable of making the leap to
people without first evolving in an intermediate host, Nature reported. They also reignite a debate about whether that information justifies the risk of such work,
known as gain-of-function research. “If the [new] virus escaped, nobody
could predict the trajectory,” Simon Wain-Hobson, a virologist at the
Pasteur Institute in Paris, told Nature.
In October 2013, the US government put a stop to
all federal funding for gain-of-function studies, with particular
concern rising about influenza, SARS, and Middle East respiratory
syndrome (MERS). “NIH [National Institutes of Health] has funded such
studies because they help define the fundamental nature of
human-pathogen interactions, enable the assessment of the pandemic
potential of emerging infectious agents, and inform public health and
preparedness efforts,” NIH Director Francis Collins said in a statement at the time. “These studies, however, also entail biosafety and biosecurity risks, which need to be understood better.”
Baric’s
study on the SHC014-chimeric coronavirus began before the moratorium
was announced, and the NIH allowed it to proceed during a review
process, which eventually led to the conclusion that the work did not
fall under the new restrictions, Baric told Nature. But some researchers, like Wain-Hobson, disagree with that decision.
The
debate comes down to how informative the results are. “The only impact
of this work is the creation, in a lab, of a new, non-natural risk,”
Richard Ebright, a molecular biologist and biodefence expert at Rutgers
University, told Nature.
But Baric and others argued the
study’s importance. “[The results] move this virus from a candidate
emerging pathogen to a clear and present danger,” Peter Daszak,
president of the EcoHealth Alliance, which samples viruses from animals
and people in emerging-diseases hotspots across the globe, told Nature.
theconversation | Research we have just had published sheds new light on this Younger Dryas Impact Hypothesis. We focus on what platinum can tell us about it.
Platinum is known to be concentrated in meteorites, so when a lot of it
is found in one place at one time, it could be a sign of a cosmic
impact. Platinum spikes have been discovered in an ice core in Greenland as well as in areas as far apart as Europe, Western Asia, North America and even Patagonia in South America. These spikes all date to the same period of time.
Until now, there has been no such evidence from Africa. But working
with two colleagues, Professor Louis Scott (University of the Free
State) and Philip Pieterse (University of Johannesburg), I believe there is evidence from South Africa’s Limpopo province that partly supports the controversial Younger Dryas Impact Hypothesis.
The new information has been obtained from Wonderkrater,
an archaeological site with peat deposits at a spring situated outside a
small town to the north of Pretoria. In a sample of peat we have
identified a platinum spike that could at least potentially be related
to dust associated with a meteorite impact somewhere on earth 12,800
years ago.
The platinum spike at Wonderkrater is in marked contrast to almost
constantly low (near-zero) concentrations of this element in adjacent
levels. Subsequent to that platinum spike, pollen grains indicate a drop
in temperature. These discoveries are entirely consistent with the
Younger Dryas Impact Hypothesis.
Wonderkrater is the first site in Africa where a Younger Dryas
platinum spike has been detected, supplementing evidence from southern
Chile, in addition to platinum spikes at 28 sites in the northern
hemisphere.
We are now asking a question which needs to be taken seriously:
surely platinum-rich dust associated with the impact of a very large
meteorite may have contributed to some extent to major climatic change
and extinctions?
constitution | In the days following Trump’s earth-shattering election, I started
receiving calls from contacts in the Obama government. High-echelon
staffers at State, Justice, the FBI especially, as well as the DNC and
Obama White House were telling me of a “whitewash” in full swing. They
were sick and tired of carrying water for what they said was “a totally
corrupt president and Democratic Party.” The FBI sources I had were
particularly angry with James Comey and told me he “was in the DNC bag.”
It seemed the whistleblowers had had enough.
They told me it was demanded by the head of their departments, Kerry
at State, Lynch at Justice, Clapper the DNI, Brazile at the DNC, Comey
at the FBI and the president (Jarrett was the point person) that all
documents “unflattering” to the Obama administration or Hillary Clinton
State Department and campaign be destroyed. Unflattering was
“Obama-speak” for incriminating. There is a law specifically against the
destruction of government documents because the taxpayer owns them.
This was a government-wide expansion of the destruction of Hillary
campaign and Hillary State Department emails and evidence that had
started years prior, of course, in a conspiracy to obfuscate the illegal
activities of her continuing criminal enterprises.
These are the specifics my sources confirm:
**The data collection was NOT LIMITED to Trump servers or the
nonsensical “Russia Investigation,” but rather included data collection
from all servers and internal/external email accounts; cell phone and
landline conversations in their entirety; all text messages; as well as
“hum int,” following Trump campaign team members around as they
conducted their duties or personal chores. KGB-like surveillance. A
source told me, “We were conducting so much human and “sig-int”
surveillance on Trump and associates, al-Qaeda and ISIS were receiving
less attention from our operatives and agents than the man running for
president.”
**The data collection on Trump, his family, Bannon, Conway, Manafort,
Lewandowski, their families and everyone else associated with the Trump
campaign WAS NOT INCIDENTAL. It was purposeful and targeted. It was not
reverse-targeted and it was not investigating Trump activities with
Russians. “During the late days of the campaign, we knew Ms. Conway’s
life better than her husband did,” one source opined.
**The data collection and human intelligence (following Trump family
and associates around) was not initially collected as part of a
domestic-to-foreign warrant looking into the supposed collusion of Trump
with the Russians. The surveillance of the entire Trump staff was a
domestic, criminal plot to ensure Trump never became president. Source:
“Everybody in U.S. Intelligence knew that this was highly illegal. It
was framed to us that Trump was trying to hurt America; that he was
treasonous. We all innately knew who was being treasonous. And there was
never a foreign component to this. It was always domestic.”
**The widespread, illegal surveillance and wiretapping of Trump and
his campaign didn’t begin in October, 2016. Nor did it begin in early
2016. IT BEGAN ALMOST IMMEDIATELY when Trump announced in the summer of
2015. This wasn’t just “oppo research.” This was Bill & Hillary
going to Obama as the head of the DNC and entering into a conspiracy
with Obama, Jarrett, Rice, Rhodes and even Kerry to DESTROY TRUMP. They
then involved Brennan, Clapper and lastly Comey, the first two being all
too happy to do whatever was necessary to destroy Trump. Source:
“Remember, all these activities started before Trump was nominated;
right after he declared. So the “Russia” issue hadn’t even been dreamed
up by the Democrats yet. In terms of roles played, Clapper and Brennan
were the” wet men.”
**There were no warrants obtained for any of this outside of the
Russian FISA warrant, after-the-fact and these surveillance activities
were designed not to look into any relationship between Trump campaign
officials with Russia but to eliminate Trump as an opponent so Hillary
could skate to the presidency. This, of course, is highly illegal. I
consider it treason. Source: “Jarrett and the administration tried to
get warrants after the fact. After the surveillance program had already
started many months prior. They were backdating it to protect Obama and
his staff of radical operatives.”
**The nefarious ongoing activities also involved the mass, agency and
government-wide destruction of computers, laptops, cellphones,
documents, emails, files, texts and the shredding and/or “Bleachbiting”
of anything that could incriminate the Obama cell. As Dr. Evelyn Farkas
so breathlessly warned, it was crucial to get the info out before the
incoming Trump staff could save the new president from this
felony-ridden invasion of privacy.
**By placing Obama/Clinton loyalists, willing to break any law in
order to destroy or delegitimize Trump, in positions just under the
directorships of the FBI, NSA, CIA, DIA and other IC agencies, Obama
thought, after he left office, he’d be able to manipulate them to hurt
the incoming Trump staff, undermining everything he did. This is why
Trump had such a hard time initially and there were all these anti-Trump
leaks. Source: “Even once Lynch, Clapper and Brennan were gone from our
government, Obama and Jarrett had so sneakily placed their people,
people who were real Marxist radicals, real Trump-haters, so deep into
the underlying Directorships at the CIA, DNI and FBI, that the
undermining could continue after Obama left the White House. It was like
a ticking time bomb lying in wait for President Trump.”
**The Obama crew coordinated the entire conspiracy from beginning to
end. It was only in October last year that they saw the diabolical
opportunity to turn their wiretapping and surveillance crimes into a
“Russian investigation” of Trump. “Obama saw the opportunity to switch
the blame onto a fabricated fantasy of Trump collusion with Russia. It
was classic disinformation,” my source told me.
bibliotecapleyades |As mentioned in the beginning of this book, I have been for
many years interested in the work of George Gurdjieff. A series of
articles written by William Patrick Patterson for Telos Magazine
entitled “Gurdjieff in Egypt” and a subsequent video released by
Patterson with the same title rekindled my interest in Gurdjieff’s
work. In his second book, Meetings With Remarkable Men, Gurdjieff
had stated that he once had seen a map of “pre-sand Egypt” in the
possession of an Armenian monk. This map had stimulated Gurdjieff to
go to Egypt and search for teachings about human origins in ancient
wisdom schools.
Patterson had also been fascinated with Gurdjieff’s travels to Egypt
and had done extensive investigations of his work. Patterson is
convinced that Gurdjieff had seen an image of the Sphinx on the map
of “pre-sand Egypt” and went to Egypt to investigate for himself. Of
course, I contend that if the map was indeed of a “pre-sand Egypt”,
it would have contained the pyramids as well as the Sphinx at
ancient Giza before the current desert conditions. According to
Patterson, Gurdjieff had stated that his teachings had come from a
complete system of “Esoteric Christianity” that originated in
ancient Egypt many thousands of years before the time of Jesus. I
met Patterson at a talk he gave in Denver, Colorado in July of 1999.
Both Patterson and I agreed that Gurdjieff might have come in
contact with the indigenous tradition over 100 years ago, especially
in his extended stay in Ethiopia. Gurdjieff adamantly maintained
that the source of all modern esoteric systems had their origins in
predynastic Egypt, essentially supporting our paradigms of ancient Khemit.
However, Patterson also mentioned other statements of Gurdjieff that
stimulated further investigations on my part. Gurdjieff had stated
in his writings and discussions that he had found inscriptions on
the walls of the Temple of Horus in Edfu, which is in the south of
Egypt, that mentioned the myth of Atlantis. In his articles
Patterson mentioned a book by British Egyptologist E. A. Reymond,
The Origins of the Egyptian Temple, in which translations of the
texts of Edfu were given. Reymond called these inscriptions “The
Building Texts” and claimed they were the myths of the origins of
ancient temple buildings.
I found Reymond’s translations of the Edfu texts to be incoherent
and poorly done and decided to discuss these texts with Abd’El Hakim
in Egypt. On our tour in October of 1999, we went to the Temple of Horus at Edfu and found the inscriptions on the walls ourselves. It
became apparent to us that the texts at Edfu were copies of much
older texts, the temple having been built in the Ptolemaic period
ca. 200 BC, and were discussing events that had taken place in
ancient Khemit many thousands of years before the temple was built.
Gurdjieff had stated that the texts spoke of an advanced people,
whom Reymond referred to by the standard Orthodox translation of the
term Neter, as “Gods” who had come from an island that
had been
destroyed by a flood and had brought their wisdom to the ancient
Khemitians. However, Hakim’s interpretation was vastly different. I
believe the texts are referring to the time of the ancient Ur Nil
over 30,000 years ago when the vastness of the river had turned all
of Northern Africa into a series of large islands.
As the Khemitians
became united, they moved from island to island, erecting temples
and pyramids and creating the ancient Khemitian civilization. Once
again, this became a basis for the future myth of Atlantis. Hakim
was definite that the texts were not referring to a more advanced
non-Khemitian people coming from outside Africa, and teaching the
Khemitians how to build in stone. I propose that the ancient people
followed the river from the south and the west and formed the union
of the 42 tribes in the Land of Osiris, Bu Wizzer, and other ancient
sites in the south, such as Edfu and Abydos.
The texts are therefore
describing the Khemitian’s ascension into higher consciousness,
becoming “one” with the Neters, opening their senses and creating
high civilization. The texts discuss how the “Neters arrived” from
different islands, and began the process of erecting large--scale
edifices in stone. We did not find any references to cataclysms, but
even so, the ancient Khemitians may have “island hopped” until the
42 tribes united and coalesced into a coherent civilization.
There may have been an advanced island civilization in the Atlantic
(or Antarctica, as has been claimed) that perished as a result of
the great cataclysm proposed around 11,500 years ago. But it may
also be that there were large islands in Northern Africa as a result
of the ancient Ur Nil around this same time that were populated by
an advanced civilization of ancient Khemitians. The Myth of Atlantis
may have referred to the entire Global Maritime Culture that existed
in many parts of the world prior to 10,000 years ago, much of which
was almost completely destroyed by cataclysmic events. I believe
ancient Khemit should be included in that mythology.
Ancient Khemitian priests may have entertained Greek travelers with
stories of cataclysms destroying island civilization as an oral
history of the Global Maritime Culture that once existed, knowing
full well that ancient Khemit was part of that past glory, but not
revealing the complete story to the “barbarian” Greeks.
bibliotecapleyades |To comprehend fully the secret information in the Bible, it is
important to understand the extent of the subterranean tunnel system
and associated chamber facilities existing below the surface of the
Pyramid Plateau, for it was there that
major elements of Mystery School teachings developed.
What happened
under the sands thousands of years ago is not reflected in today's
history books, and discoveries made in the last eight decades or so
verify that point.
The Fayum Oasis district, just a few kilometers outside the boundary
of the Memphis Nome, presents a site of unusual interest. It was in
that lush, fertile valley that Pharaohs calling themselves the
"masters of the royal hunts" fished and hunted with the boomerang
(1), Lake Moeris once bordered the Fayum Oasis and on its shores was
the famous Labyrinth, described by Herodotus as "an endless wonder
to me".
The Labyrinth contained 1500 rooms and
an equal number of underground chambers that the Greek historian was
not permitted to inspect, according to Labyrinth priests, "the
passages were baffling and intricate", designed to provide safety
for the numerous scrolls they said were hidden in subterranean
apartments.
That massive complex particularly impressed
Herodotus
and he spoke in awe of the structure:
There I saw twelve palaces regularly disposed, which had
communication with each other, interspersed with terraces and
arranged around twelve halls. It is hard to believe they are the
work of man, The walls are covered with carved figures, and each
court is exquisitely built of white marble and surrounded by a
colonnade. Near the corner where the labyrinth ends, there is a
pyramid, two hundred and forty feet in height, with great carved
figures of animals on it and an underground passage by which it can
be entered. I was told very credibly that underground chambers and
passages connected this pyramid with the pyramids at Memphis.
The pyramids at Memphiswere the pyramids at Giza, for
Giza was
originally called Memphis (see reference, "Giza formerly Memphis" on
Nordan's map from Travels in Egypt and Nubia, 1757, on page 152 of
previous chapter).
Many ancient writers supported Herodotus' record of underground
passages connecting major pyramids, and their evidence casts doubt
on the reliability of traditionally presented Egyptian history. Crantor
(300 BC) stated that there were certain underground pillars
in Egypt that contained a written stone record of pre-history , and
they lined access ways connecting the pyramids.
In his celebrated
study, On the Mysteries, particularly those of the Egyptians, Chaldeans and the Assyrians,
Iamblichus, a fourth-century Syrian
representative of the Alexandrian School of mystical and
philosophical studies, recorded this information about an
entranceway through the body of the Sphinx into the Great Pyramid(2):
This entrance, obstructed in our day by sands and rubbish, may still
be traced between the forelegs of the crouched colossus. It was
formerly closed by a bronze gate whose secret spring could be
operated only by the Magi. It was guarded by public respect, and a
sort of religious fear maintained its inviolability better than
armed protection would have done. In the belly of the Sphinx were
cut out galleries leading to the subterranean part of the Great
Pyramid.
These galleries were so art-fully
crisscrossed along their course to the Pyramid that, in setting
forth into the passage without a guide throughout this network, one
ceasingly and inevitably returned to the starting point.
It was recorded in ancient Sumerian cylinder seals that the secret
abode of
the Anunnaki was,
"an underground place... entered
through a tunnel, its entrance hidden by sand and by what they
call Huwana... his teeth as the teeth of a dragon, his face the
face of a lion".
That remarkable old text, unfortunately
fragmented, added that "He [Huwana] is unable to move forward, nor
is he able to move back", but they crept up on him from behind and
the way to "the secret abode of the Anunnaki" was no longer blocked.
The Sumerian record provided a probable
description of the lion-headed Sphinx at Giza, and if that great
creature was built to guard or obliterate ancient stairways and
lower passages leading to subterranean areas below and around it,
then its symbolism was most appropriate.
Local 19th-century Arab lore maintained that existing under the
Sphinx are secret chambers holding treasures or magical objects.
That belief was bolstered by the writings of the first-century Roman
historian Pliny, who wrote that deep below the Sphinx is concealed
the "tomb of a ruler named Harmakhis that contains great treasure",
and, strangely enough, the Sphinx itself was once called "The Great
Sphinx Harmakhis who mounted guard since the time of the Followers
of Horus".
NYTimes | Imagine receiving a phone call from your aging mother seeking your help because she has forgotten her banking password.
Except it’s not your mother. The voice on the other end of the phone call just sounds deceptively like her.
It
is actually a computer-synthesized voice, a tour-de-force of artificial
intelligence technology that has been crafted to make it possible for
someone to masquerade via the telephone.
Such a situation is still science fiction — but just barely. It is also the future of crime.
The
software components necessary to make such masking technology widely
accessible are advancing rapidly. Recently, for example, DeepMind, the
Alphabet subsidiary known for a program that has bested some of the top
human players in the board game Go, announced
that it had designed a program that “mimics any human voice and which
sounds more natural than the best existing text-to-speech systems,
reducing the gap with human performance by over 50 percent.”
The
irony, of course, is that this year the computer security industry,
with $75 billion in annual revenue, has started to talk about how
machine learning and pattern recognition techniques will improve the
woeful state of computer security.
But there is a downside.
“The
thing people don’t get is that cybercrime is becoming automated and it
is scaling exponentially,” said Marc Goodman, a law enforcement agency
adviser and the author of “Future Crimes.” He added, “This is not about
Matthew Broderick hacking from his basement,” a reference to the 1983
movie “War Games.”
The
alarm about malevolent use of advanced artificial intelligence
technologies was sounded earlier this year by James R. Clapper, the
director of National Intelligence. In his annual review of security, Mr.
Clapper underscored the point that while A.I. systems would make some
things easier, they would also expand the vulnerabilities of the online
world.
A prominent industrialist,
McCone also served for more than twenty years as a governmental advisor
and official, including head positions at the Atomic Energy Commission
and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). He also worked for the ITT corporation. In 1946, Ralph Casey of the General Accounting Office
implied that McCone was a war profiteer, testifying that McCone and his
associates of the California Shipbuilding Corporation had made
$44,000,000 on an investment of $100,000."[3] McCone's political affiliation was with the Republican Party.[2]
informationphilosopher | The laws of nature, except the second law of thermodynamics, are
symmetric in time. Reversing the time in the dynamical equations of
motion simply describes everything going backwards. The second law is
different. Entropy must never decrease in time.
Many natural processes are apparently irreversible. Irreversibility
is intimately connected to the direction of time. Identifying the
physical reasons for the observed irreversibility, the origin of
irreversibility, would contribute greatly to understanding the apparent
asymmetry of nature in time, despite nature's perfect symmetry in space.
In 1927, Arthur Stanley Eddington coined the term "Arrow of Time" in his book The Nature of the Physical World.
He connected "Time's Arrow" to the one-way direction of increasing
entropy required by the second law of thermodynamics. This is now known
as the "thermodynamic arrow."
(Nature of the Physical World, 1927, p.328-9)
In his later work, Eddington identified a "cosmological arrow,"
the direction in which the universe is expanding, as shown by Edwin
Hubble about the time Eddington first defined the thermodynamic arrow.
New Pathways in Science, 1937, p.328-9)
There are now at least five other proposed arrows of time (discussed
below). We can ask whether one arrow is a "master arrow" that all the
others are following, or perhaps time itself is just a given property of
nature that is otherwise irreducible to something more basic, as is
space.
Given the four-dimensional space-time picture of special relativity, and
given that the laws of nature are symmetric in space, we may expect the
laws to be invariant under a change in time direction. The laws do not depend on position in space or direction, they are invariant
under translations and rotations, space is assumed uniform and
isotropic. But time is not just another spatial dimension. It enters
into calculations of event separations as an imaginary term (multiplied
by the square root of minus 1). Nevertheless, all the dynamical laws of
motion are symmetric under time reversal.
So the basic problem is - how can macroscopic irreversibility result from microscopic processes that are fundamentally reversible?
ibtimes | If
latest reports are to be believed, the Islamic State militants might be
conspiring to deliberately infect jihadists with the deadly Ebola virus
and send them to America in order to spread the disease in the US – an
event that could see America being attacked in a new pseudo-war.
The Israeli News Agency,
a site which claims to be Israel's first online news organisation has
confirmed the authenticity of the report saying it "clears all news
items relating to Israeli security with the Israel government press
office."
The agency said, citing "Israeli security sources", that dozens of
ISIS fighters in Syria have fallen ill and had symptoms of Ebola. This
news quickly ignited a new conspiracy theory claiming that ISIS is
planning to send Ebola-infected militants into the US to spread the
disease.
"While Western nations fighting the Islamic State might consider this
reported Ebola outbreak among radical jihadists to be welcome news,
there is a very big, very dangerous downside to Islamic terrorists being
carriers of the virus," Norvell Rose, the winner of numerous journalism
honours, writes for WesternJournalism.com.
The article also cites the Israeli News Agency (INA) for inference
into why the news could prove dangerous for the Americans. The INA in
its report quoted a source it identified only as "AVi", who is "a global
anti-terrorism consultant" as saying: "We know that ISIS has training
camps in Africa and it is highly possible that this is where contact
with the virus was made.
"This would add new meaning to the US stating that no boots would be
on the ground as both missiles and Ebola penetrates one of the worst
evils that the world has ever known."
The theory was further bolstered by reports of a direct threat
from the ISIS militants who said they would spread the Ebola virus to
the United States and its allies if they continue to wage war on the
organisation inside Syria and Iraq as reported by Shoebat.com, a website created by Walid Shoebat who was a radicalised Muslim until 1994 when he converted to Christianity.
Shoebat quoted a statement from ISIS published in another website called Vetogate.com.
The statement reportedly said: "Followers and soldiers of the Islamic
State are mostly suicide bombers and all of them are ready not only to
carry Ebola, but to drink Ebola if they were asked to carry and spread
it in the United States. This is not difficult but we need a decision
from the leaders jihadist (sic)."
The statement further said: "The process of spreading disease is not
difficult. It can easily be transported in a bottle in your bag from
Africa to America. The contents of the bottle can then be released in an
air-conditioning duct or put it in the public drinking water."
solami | §1 In
1961, the Egyptologist Sir Alan Gardiner
set the stage for a more enlightening reading of humanity's record - in
as much as it relied on Egypt's history and its King List
as relayed to us notably by the historian Manetho. In his book "Egypt
of the Pharaohs" (p.170), he declared: "Manetho's narrative represents
the last stage of a process of falsifications which started within a generation
after the triumph of Amosis" over the vilified Hyksos
(1575-1550 Old Chronology, henceforth OC). In this
critical analysis, Gardiner has been supported by a growing number
of scholars, some thus coming up with remarkable - even if occasionally
conflicting - new ideas, theories and insights
(1).
One of them, the Islamic scholar and Egyptologist Ahmed Osman,
in one of his latest books "Moses Pharaoh of Egypt - the Mystery of Akhenaten
Resolved", thus commented our tampered records:
"Like the
accounts of the historian Manetho, the Talmudic stories contain many distortions
and accretions arising from the fact that they were transmitted orally
for a long time before finally being set down in writing. Yet one can sense
that behind the myths there must have lain genuine historical events that
had been suppressed from the official accounts of both Egypt and Israel,
but had survived in the memories of the generations" (p.24). "The Alexandrian
Jews were naturally interested in Manetho's account of their historic links
with Egypt, although they found some aspects of it objectionable. His original
work therefore did not survive for long before being tampered with [2/3
of Zarathushtra's Avesta reportedly was even
deliberately destroyed]" (p.27). And: "Yoyotte ... became one of the few
to see through the 'embellishments' of the biblical account and identify
the historical core of the story ..." (p.48).
§2 Thus,
it was time someone went beyond mere bickering over the confusing King
Lists. With his book "A Test of Time", the Assyrologist and Egyptologist
David Rohl
has presented an archeologically and astronomically supported NewChronology
(henceforth NC, with the reign of Ramses II thus placed in
the 10th century BC, i.e. dated some 350 years later than traditionally
recorded, and the reign of Akhenaton beginning some 3025 years ago
and overlapping the ascendancy of David as the successor to King
Saul). If independently confirmed in its key elements by further
research, we would find ourselves at the threshold of a new era, providing
startling
synchronologies of the past to which we were blinded through our own
shortcomings and not necessarily by design. Recognizing this could
have vast implications for the future far beyond the bedeviled Middle
Eastern craddle where our monotheistic beliefs appear to have their common
roots. Osman's comments on the above-quoted koranic and biblical
texts may help us to get there:
"... the Koran presents
the confrontation in such a precise way that one wonders if some of the
details were left out of the biblical account deliberately. Here Moses
sounds less like a magician, more like someone who presents evidence of
his authority that convinces the wise men of Egypt, who throw themselves
at his feet and thus earn the punishment of [an imposter] Pharaoh. One
can only suspect that the biblical editor exercised care to avoid any Egyptian
involvement with the Israelite Exodus, even to the extent of replacing
Moses by Aaron in the performance of the rituals. ... [During] their sed
festival
celebrations, Egyptian kings performed rituals that correspond to the 'serpent
rod' and 'hand' rituals performed by Moses - and, in performing them, Moses
was not using magic but seeking to establish his royal authority. I think the correct
interpretation of these accounts [of the Bible and the Koran] is that,
when Akhenaten was forced to abdicate, he must have taken his royal sceptre
to Sinai with him. On the death of Horemheb, the last king of the Eighteenth
Dynasty, about a quarter of a century later, he must have seen an opportunity
to restore himself to the throne. No heir to the Tuthmosside kings existed
and it was Pa-Ramses, commander of Horemheb's army and governor of Zarw,
who had claim to the throne. Akhenaten returned to Egypt and the wise men
were gathered in order to decide between him and Pa-Ramses. Once they saw
the sceptre of royal authority and Akhenaten had performed the sed
festival rituals - secret from ordinary citizens - the wise men bowed the
knee in front of him, confirming that his was the superior right to the
throne, but Pa-Ramses used his army to crush the rebels. Moses was allowed
to leave again for Sinai, however, accompanied by the Israelites, his mother's
relatives, and the few Egyptians who had been converted to the new [monotheistic]
religion that he had attempted to force upon Egypt a quarter of a century
earlier. In Sinai the followers of Akhenaten were joined subsequently by
some bedouin tribes (the Shasu), who are to be identified as the Midianites
of the Bible. No magic was performed, or intended, by Moses. The true explanation
of the biblical story could only be that it was relating the polical challenge
for power in a mythological way - and all the plagues of which we read
were natural, seasonal events in Egypt in the course of every year. ..."
(p.178f) "This would explain
how a new version of the Osiris-Horus myth came into existence from the
time of the Nineteenth Dynasty. Osiris, the King of Egypt, was said to
have had to leave the country for a long time. On his eventual return he
was assassinated by Set, who had usurped the throne, but Horus, the son
of Osiris, confronted Set at Zarw and slew him. According to my interpretation
of events, it was in fact 'Set' who slew 'Horus'; but their roles were
later reversed by those who wished to believe in an eternal life for Horus
[alternatively, if their roles were not reversed, that might support the
idea that Moses/Akhenaton had a role to play in Canaan/Palestine in the
post-exodus period]. This new myth developed to the point where Osiris/Horus
became the principal god worshipped in Egypt in later times while Set was
looked upon as the evil one. This myth could have been a popular reflection
of a real historical event - a confrontation between Moses and Seti
I on top of the mountain in Moab." (p.187f)
§3 These
conclusions could go a long way to explain not only the developments
which took place following the 18thDynasty
but many of the undercurrents still gripping the Middle East. Particularly
the relations between the descendents of the competitors to the Throne
of Pharaoh,Ramses I and Akhenaton (Moses if, for
this study, we were to follow Osman'sanalysis:
2);
i.e. the Egyptians on the one side and the
"Children
of Israel" on the other who, both, would appear to be victims of imaginative falsifiers
of history. And they would clear up many mysteries, if it were not
for the uncertainties which persist on what happened at the end and after
Akhenaton's 17 year reign, particularly whether, how and where Akhenaton
lived on. So far, no archeological or historical evidence has become
known which would undisputably attest to Akhenaton's death at a certain
time and place.
§4 Until
recently, most scholars tended to interprete the fragmentary archeological
data as pointing to a violent death of what many describe as the
"heretic
Pharaoh" at his regnal year 17. And they mostly associated that end
of the first monotheistic reign
with the subsequent resurgence of the Amon cult all over Egypt. Initially,
this seemed to be supported by esoteric
sources, i.e. by currently living persons who, on the basis of personal reincarnation
experiences, are said to have been contemporaries
of Akhenaton (3).
By their very nature, these subjective accounts are just that. They
cannot be relied upon without corroberating data. Nevertheless, in the
absence of more conclusive information - like contributions from other
disciplines - they may constitute imaginative and sometimes helpful
hints and pointers for further research and more enlightened analysis.
§5 Pointing
notably to the striking parallels between Akhenaton's Great
Hymn to Aton(Gardiner, p.225f) and Psalm
104, scholars suspect the authors of these texts to be identical. Moreover,
the Encyclopaedia Judaica (vol.12, pp. 378, 388, 389, 390, 400)
recorded :
"No primary
source of information on Moses exists outside the Bible. ... [In] the Haggadah's
hymnic confession Dayyeinu, ... Israel's career from Egypt to the settlement
is rehearsed in 13 stages without a reference to Moses. ... According to
Artapanos, Moses ... was the first pilosopher, and invented a variety of
machines for peace and war. He was also responsible for the political organization
of Egypt (having divided the land into 36 nomes) ... According to Josephus,
Moses was the most ancient of all legislators in the records of the world.
Indeed, he maintains that the very word 'law' was unknown in ancient Greece
(Jos., Apion 2:154). ... Hecataeus
of Abdera presented Moses as the founder of the Jewish state, ascribing
to him the conquest of Palestine and the building of Jerusalem and the
Temple. He explained, in the Platonic manner, that Moses divided his people
into 12 tribes, because 12 is a perfect number, corresponding to the number
of months in the year (cf. Plato, Laws, 745b-d; Republic, 546b). ... Very
curious is the legend recorded by Israel Lipschuetz b. Gedaliah (Tiferet
Yisrael to Kid. end, n.77). A certain King, having heard of Moses'
fame, sent a renowned painter to portray Moses' features. On the painter's return with the portrait
the king showed it to his sages, who unanimously proclaimed that the features
portrayed were those of a degenerate
[4].
The astonished king journeyed to the camp of Moses and observed for himself
that the portrait did not lie. Moses admitted that the sages were right
and that he had been given from birth many evil traits of character but
that he had held them under control and succeeded in conquering them. This,
the narrative concludes, was Moses' greatness, that, in spite of his tremendous handicaps,
he managed to become the man of God. Various attempts have, in fact, been
made by some rabbis to ban the further publication of this legend as a
denigration of Moses' character."
§6 Together,
these and other ancient voices are seen to support the view that the name Moses
- incidently like that of Salomon - may be less
the real name and more one which was adopted post-festum for the
biblical editors' or their taskmasters' purposes. Could it be then that
the person hidden behind the name-of-convenience of Moses is in fact Akhenaton?
In that event, he would have lived beyond his reign in Egypt (similarities
come to mind with Jesus’
alleged post-crucification life in Kashmir (India) and elswhere
and how that persistently recurring story has been treated by the powers
that be, i.e. by those who consider themselves as the gardiens of the
Holy Grail).
§7 Sigmund Freud
concluded in his 1939 book "Moses and Monotheism"
that Moses was not an Israelite but an Egyptian whose teachings
derived
from Akhenaton's pure monotheism (which he had imposed for apparently
imperative economic reasons). That, of course, would require rewriting
those stories which ante-date the "exodus of the Israelites" - if
that ever happened as such and was not in fact an exodus of monotheistic
Egyptians - rather than one of slaves - to what may have been their
Palestinian exile
(essentially brought about by deseases and power struggles
between factions associated with the legitimate, and on the other
side with the illegitimate contender to the Throne of Pharaoh?).
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