THE X CHRONICLES NEWSPAPER

Planet Earths ONLY Paranormal / Parapsychology Newspaper

Vol. 18, No 7 ISSN-1499-8599 / ISSN-1499-8602 July / August 2011

ROSWELL CRASH OF 1947: RUSSIAN SPACECRAFT NOT UFO & ALIENS

by Rob McConnell
In her new book Area 51: An Uncensored History of Americas Top Secret Military Base, Annie Jacobsens book about Americas most mysterious military installation, she offers a glimpse of a large-headed little gray space alien being interrogated by scientists in white coats. This is both a tease and a distraction. Yes, Annie Jacobsen eventually addresses the U.F.O. issue with which conspiracy theorists eagerly associate Area 51, but her book, Area 51: An Uncensored History of Americas Top Secret Military Base is not

science fiction. It is an assertive account, revelatory, of the long-hidden United States weaponry and espionage programs to which she says Area 51 is home. There are those who say Area 51 is home to nothing, because it does not officially exist. Annie Jacobsen, a national security reporter and contributing editor to The Los Angeles Times Magazine, happened to be at a 2007 family dinner with her husbands uncles wifes sisters 88-year-old husband, the physicist Edward Lovick, when Mr. Lovick leaned over and said, Have I got a good story for you. That happened to be the year when formerly top secret records about the development of certain stealth technology, most notably the C.I.A.s A-12 aircraft, code-named Oxcart, were made public, even though the creation of the A-12 had occurred nearly 50 years before. In any case, Mr. Lovick had been instrumental in A-12 research, and he did much more than relate his story. He plugged Annie Jacobsen into a network of elderly scientists, pilots, engineers and other witnesses who had firsthand accounts of Area 51 and its surroundings, a test range located in southern Nevada. I tell you all this, Annie, because you give a damn, one of them told her. This testimony pointed her in the direction of extremely arcane documentation, material of needle-in-a-haystack obscurity. Armed with numbingly intensive

documentation, Annie Jacobsen has put together a set of strong allegations about Area 51s covert history. Part of Area 51 is devoted to the nuclear weapons testing that began with the Manhattan Project, continued under the aegis of the Atomic Energy Commission and prompted The New York Times to tell tourists, in 1957, about a project called Operation Plumbbob: This is the best time in history for the nonancient but nonetheless honourable pastime of atom-bomb watching. Annie Jacobsen recoils at the weaponry that was being developed and the ghastly results of atomic testing. But she acknowledges ways in which it wound up keeping Americans safe. Her book then moves on to the surveillance technology that was meant to override the need for nuclear arsenals. Her research into the world of overhead, the aerial espionage that needed to be developed in extreme secrecy, is compellingly hard-hitting. One of her sources is Col. Richard S. Leghorn, whom she calls the father of peacetime overhead espionage. Continued on Page 2 THE PARANORMAL BROADCAST NETWORK IS NOW LIVE www. paranormalbroadcastnetwork.com

In This Edition of The X Chronicles Newspaper

(Print/Online/CD ROM/e-Book Version) July / August 2011 - 44 Pages
01 - Roswell Crash of 1947: Russian Spacecraft 02 - Balloon Boy Flying Saucer Returns to Colorado 04 - The Future of UFOs 06 - Will Aliens Ever Land on Earth? 07 - Denver Alien Concert for End of the World 08 - People Who Dont Believe, Anything 09 - Astronaut: Aliens Havent Been Here 10 - Dead Alien Found in Siberian Snow? 11 - Russian Ufologist Visits Gaddafi 12 - Top 10 Alien Encounters Debunked 13 - More UFOs and Aliens 15 - Where Has The Paranormal Gone? 16 - Residents Hurt By Avro Arrow Demise 17 - Goodall Tells the Rich to Save Earth 18 - Ghosts of the C.N.E. 19 - Paul the Psychic Octopus 20 - Carl Jung - Taking Inner Life Seriously 21 - Carl Jung - Freud and the Nazis 22 - The X Zone Store 23 - The X Zone Store 24 - Nazis Taught Dogs to Read and Speak 25 - Experiment in Telepathy from Space 26 - Journal Rejects Precognition Studies 27 - Ghost Gambler Caught 29 - John Edwards: Psychic or Fraud 30 - Psychic Nurse Unfairly Treated? 32 - Chupacabra Shot Dead, Or Is It? 33 - Alaskas Loch Ness Monster 34 - Finding Bigfoot Hoaxed Cast Says 35 - The Dire Saga 36 - Psychic Ellen Hartwell 37 - Upside Down World 38 - Weirdest Mystery Animals In The World 39 - Alien Beings Will Return to Exeter 41 - The Age of Credulity 42 - Do Sea Monsters Really Exist? 43 - End of World Prophecies Cause Real Harm

ROSWELL CRASH OF 1947: RUSSIAN SPACECRAFT NOT UFO & ALIENS

Continued from Page 1
Annie Jacobsen has also spoken to Col. Hervey S. Stockman, the first man to fly over the Soviet Union in a U-2; Col. Hugh Slater, an Area 51 base commander; and Jim Freedman, an Area 51 procurement manager who was one of the few people privy to a wide range of the bases activities. Ms. Jacobsen writes that not even President Clinton was able to gain full knowledge of what the military contractors at Area 51 were up to. Area 51: An Uncensored History of Americas Top Secret Military Base is guided by its authors political assessment of changing American military strategy, particularly during the cold war. It describes Area 51s strategic importance during the eras of Sputnik, the Bay of Pigs, the lunar landing and the Vietnam War, with a strong narrative account of C.I.A.-Air Force territorial fights about whose aircraft were better suited to combat situations. She also writes about the reverse engineering the analysis of equipment by taking it apart and reassembling it at which Area 51 scientists are thought to excel. She acknowledges their work on a Soviet MiG aircraft that was hidden inside a cargo plane for its trip to Nevada. But she does not take seriously what some readers will find most urgent about an Area 51 study: rumours that alien spacecraft are reverse-engineered there, too. Back to that little gray alien allegedly seen at Area 51: Annie Jacobsen has a theory about the bases alleged U.F.O. connections. It goes back to the radio broadcast of The War of the Worlds in 1938 and the panic it engendered. Making a series of implications that are her books most controversial aspect, she connects this hysteria to the 1947 alleged flying saucer crash in Roswell, N.M., a story cherished by conspiracy theorists and not easily refuted. Annie Jacobsen connects the appearance of a real, disc-shaped, hovering object with Stalin-era Soviet intrigue. She hypothesizes that the relic found in Roswell was the opening shot in the cold war. She suggests that the supposed space creatures were human guinea pigs, the results of American experiments as monstrous as the Nazi ones conducted by Josef Mengele. And she thinks that once the rumours of a Roswell landing and cover-up began, American intelligence sources might have found U.F.O. rumours to be excellent cover for their activities, no matter how surprised they were by the need to encourage such thinking. Two Air Force officials once found themselves on a panel with members of the Civilian Saucer Investigations Organization of Los Angeles. (Continued on Page 3)

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ROSWELL CRASH OF 1947: RUSSIAN SPACECRAFT NOT UFO & ALIENS

Continued from Page 2
Although this connect-the-dots U.F.O. thesis is only a hasty-sounding addendum to an otherwise straightforward investigative book about aviation and military history, it makes an indelible impression. Area 51: An Uncensored History of Americas Top Secret Military Base is liable to become best known for sci-fi provocation. Area 51: An Uncensored History of Americas Top Secret Military Base is noteworthy for its Annie Jacobsens dogged devotion to her research. Angry over being denied access to a research facility, she began talking to a security guard who, it turned out, had worked at Area 51 and became one of her most valuable sources. When it comes to EG&G, the secretive engineering company that plays a major role in the Area 51 story, she describes pressuring one unnamed EG&G employee persistently, no matter how hard he resisted. You dont want to know, said this anonymous source, when grilled about the most nefarious part of Annie Jacobsens U.F.O. theory. She asked again. You dont know the half of it, he replied, still stonewalling. And then, over lunch, she put a crouton on a plate and asked how the extent of her knowledge about the whole Area 51 story compared with the crouton-plate ratio. Great news for ufologists: the stilluntold truth, this man finally admitted, is bigger than the crouton. Bigger than the plate. To the delight of conspiracy fans everywhere, it remains bigger than the whole table. A great book by a great author who has the UFO community in a total buzz and shaking in their boots. Their fear is simple: If Annie Jacobsen is right, that what they want so desperately to believe are UFOs from other planets manned by space aliens are really terrestrial crafts from this planet that are manned by earthlings who are the result of human experimentation or not, ufology will cease to exist. What will the ufologists investigate? Research? Speak about? Write about? Blog about? What will happen to all those cheesy UFO and alien websites? I guess they will find themselves spots in other arenas of the paranormal like ghost hunters, sasquatch hunters, monster hunters, crop circle researchers and the other many areas of the paranormal where the mysteries are so far, still alive, for now anyway. I am certain that the eventual fall of ufology will the start the domino effect that will lead to the demise of the woo woo factor found all too often with those paranormal / parapsychology hobbyists who remind me of the CB Radio enthusiasts of the 70s who also had way too much time on their hands. When the dust settles around the controversy of Ms. Jacobsens book, Area 51: An Uncensored History of Americas Top

Secret Military Base, and the smear campaign against Annie Jacobsen by the UFO community comes to an end, although I am not a psychic, I predict that those who read Area 51: An Uncensored History of Americas Top Secret Military Base will look at the UFO phenomena in a totally different light. Take off the rose-coloured glasses world and prepare for reality. Area 51: An Uncensored History of Americas Top Secret Military Base by Annie Jacobsen is a hardcover edition and is available online and can be found in book stores everywhere and with a suggested retail price of $29.99 in Canada. For The X Zone Radio & TV Show and The X Chronicles Newspaper, I am Rob McConnell.

Balloon Boys Flying Saucer Returns to Colorado for Public Display

Countdown Begins for Thursday Unlaunching Event in Aurora
SunHerald.com
AURORA, Colo. -- Flimflam One has landed. The runaway flying saucer-like balloon, which circumnavigated the global mediasphere during a 60-mile rescue chase across the skies of Colorado in 2009, has returned to the state of the drama. This time, from Florida, by UPS ground. Beginning Thursday, July 21, the 20foot wide object d'fraud will be hovering from the ceiling of Mike's Stadium Sportscards in Aurora, Colorado, for the bemusement of customers and curiosity seekers. Next week, a live webcam will enable chronic balloon voyeurs worldwide to view Colorado history deflated at http://www.mikesss.com. On October 15, 2011, the second anniversary of the balloon's infamous flight, Flimflam One will descend for the last time and be retired into authenticated slices of collectible

Americana, with all sale proceeds benefitting the Smoky Hill High Thanksgiving SHARE Basket Project. The homemade "experimental flying saucer," set adrift by former Fort Collins, Colorado reality TV aspirant Richard Heene on October 15, 2009, was reported to have been carrying Heene's 5 year old son, Falcon, an alleged stowaway. The resulting made-for-TV news hoax set off an international media storm, as spellbound onlookers riveted themselves to live TV and real-time social media coverage. When the free-flying balloon descended, then deflated, so did Heene's ill-conceived hoax. Heene and his wife, Mayumi, were subsequently convicted in Colorado state court on related charges, then sentenced to brief jail terms and eight years probation. The Heenes have since relocated to Florida. Renamed Flimflam One by its new owner, Michael Fruitman, 41, the UFO-like balloon was purchased at auction from a California attorney representing the Heenes. The auction sale fell only $997,498 short of Heene's published $1 million expectation. "I thought, let's have some fun with this," said Fruitman. "So, I bought Flimflam One for our customers to enjoy. Then, well slice into authenticated chunks of collectible Americana to raise money for the Thanksgiving food project. It's a win-win, no matter what, providing my 3 and 8 year olds don't get any clever ideas." Flimflam One will be ceremonially unlaunched at noon on Thursday, July 21, 2011 at Mike's Stadium Sportscards, 4022 South Parker Road, Aurora. It will remain on display for free public viewing and photographs through mid-October, during regular store hours (Monday-Saturday 10am-8pm; Sunday Noon5pm). On October 15, 2011, the second anniversary of the balloon's infamous flight, Flimflam One will descend for the final time and be retired into slices of collectible American memorabilia. Balloon Boy devotees, curiosity collectors and former NASA astronauts may reserve their authenticated piece of history at http://www.mikesss.com.

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The Future of UFOs

The Future Of UFOs
What will our grandchildren tell us they saw in the skies?
By James Clark,
I saw a flying saucer the other day. Id popped into the British Library in London to visit their current science fiction exhibition, and at the entrance was a model of a crashed saucer. It got me thinking about the changing mythology of UFOs. To say that Unidentified Flying Objects are the subject of mythology is not the same as saying UFOs are imaginary. Throughout history people have noticed strange things in the skies, and at any one time there are competing attempts to explain what was seen. However, there appear to be fashions that affect which stories permeate the public consciousness most deeply at a particular time and in a particular place. Sightings of fiery shapes in the air probably did much to influence ancient tales of dragons, for instance, as well as stories about the loogaroo of West Indian folklore (a vampiric witch who lives as an old woman by day but strips off its skin at night to fly around as a fireball). Around the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, reports from the USA, Europe, and New Zealand interpreted lights in the sky as mysterious airships. These airships were often thought of as scientific wonders piloted by genius inventors, evoking the contemporary fiction of Jules Verne and similar authors. Other writers were simultaneously drawing on the idea that the planet Mars might be inhabited, enthused by the then-popular belief that apparently straight lines on the Red Planets surface were artificial canals. Those stories fuelled a sense that the airships might actually be Martian vehicles. The idea of UFOs as spaceships really took off in 1947, following a US sighting by pilot Kenneth Arnold, and its fascinating to note that Arnold reported the objects he saw as crescent-shaped. It was their motion in flight that he described as like a saucer skipping across water, but widespread misunderstanding of a reporters subsequent phrase -- flying saucers -- struck a chord with the public. That happened at the dawn of the Space Age, as World War II rocket technology blasted first machines, then animals and eventually humans into a new frontier. It was incredibly fertile imaginative ground for the concept of UFOs as spaceships, and, although the flying saucer itself gradually fell from favour, UFO and alien spacecraft remained largely synonymous. I know Im using pretty broad strokes here, but as I looked back at that crashed flying saucer I couldnt help but wonder whether this familiar Space Age-influenced mythology will continue to evolve. Interest in space exploration is waning, with the most visible indication being the end of the Space Shuttle programme. There are concerns about how much space exploration costs, and a growing feeling we should concentrate on matters closer to home.

With rising concern over the environment, might we soon be drawn more towards framing strange aerial phenomena as unusual weather effects? Perhaps heightened tensions among and between various religious groups will coincide with a shift towards interpreting heavenly sightings as visionary events. Might increasing paranoia over security manifest in reports of hi-tech surveillance craft? The possibilities are numerous. Most interestingly, will a shift in popular mythology - if and when it emerges - move us closer to or further from the truth of what might be above our heads? []

Niagara's UFO mystery is solved...

By Allan Benner
PORT COLBORNE Was it a UFO or a hot air balloon? Actually, it was just a stray balloon from a Saturday night wedding reception. A representative from Sherkston Shores said a couple was celebrating their wedding at the beach that evening. "The whole theme was around the Make a Wish Foundation," said the Sherkston employee, who declined to be identified. During that celebration, the revelers released lighted helium balloons into the air above the popular resort. "That was part of the whole wish. They lit them and they went up," the woman said. But when campers at the park saw the spectacle that evening, someone called 9-1-1 to report a UFO, she added. "They just assumed I don't know what they assumed," she said. Port Colborne Fire Prevention Officer Mike Bendia said there were several calls to 91-1 that night, reporting something unusual over Lake Erie. While some callers might have reported seeing UFOs, he said the call firefighters responded to was a little more realistic. "We got it (the call) as a hot air balloon down," Bendia told The Tribune Sunday. He said the call came in at 10:34 p.m.,

initially as a call to assist Niagara Regional Police in an investigation. After firefighters called dispatchers on their way to the resort, they were told a camper thought he witnessed a balloon crashing into the lake. He said firefighters were on scene for about 40 minutes. While there, they spoke to the man who reported the hot air balloon crash. Bendia said the balloons were about three feet tall and illuminated. "It went out over the lake and the guy sitting at his trailer saw this thing and thought it was a hot air balloon from quite a distance away. It was a legitimate call," he said. "But they did get a whack of other calls on it." "The balloon turned out to be wedding balloons that were set off from the quarry," Bendia said. Bendia said firefighters needed to respond just in case. "If it turned out to be a hot air balloon that was down, there could have been people in it. We do rescue," he said. "That alien stuff, I don't know where that come from. It may have came from the park." The Sherkston Shores representative did not release the identify of the newlyweds.[]

UFO Disclosure Day

UFO Disclosure Day: Is the Conspiracy Out There?
by Benjamin Radford
For those who missed it, Friday, July 8 2011 was World Disclosure Day, when, presumably, the public will get new information about the ongoing UFO cover-up by governments around the world. According to a piece on AOL News: "Pro-disclosure advocates like Stephen Bassett hope people will focus attention on an alleged truth embargo that he says has resulted in the withholding of knowledge by all major world governments about a supposed extraterrestrial presence here on Earth. In addition, supporters are encouraged to discuss how things might change once an official announcement has been made and what policies shouldor have beenenacted by world leaders post-disclosure. Bassett is a registered lobbyist who runs the Extraterrestrial Phenomena Political Action Committee, an organization that since the late 1990s has been demanding Congress release information about the presence of aliens as soon as possible. "The purpose of World Disclosure Day is to provide a focal point for people and organizations to come together to assert their right to know extraordinary information being withheld from them by their governments -- the truth embargo," he said. "World Disclosure Day will also help broaden public awareness of the disclosure process and those organizations involved in this advocacy work." Yet World Disclosure Day is based on what seems to be a false premise: That there exists a very successful global conspiracy that has spanned at least six decades and been agreed to by all countries around the world, throughout different administrations and regime changes, to cover up hard evidence of extraterrestrial contact. UFO conspiracy theorists such as Bassett have a difficult time explaining why, exactly, all the governments of the world are so concerned about the public being aware of aliens. Often the claim is that the public "isn't ready to know," that it would send the public into an alarmed panic. This is easily refuted when you note that many people are already convinced that aliens not only visit Earth on a regular basis, but may even be secretly living among us. According to a CNN poll,"80 percent of Americans think the government is hiding knowledge of the existence of extraterrestrial life forms. Sixtyfour percent of the respondents said that aliens have contacted humans, half said they've abducted humans, and 37 percent said they have contacted the U.S. government." ANALYSIS: UFOs Filmed Over London -Or Not So whether or not aliens really exist and are visiting us, many people already believe they do, and thus the idea that such knowledge is too world-changing to accept is nonsense. No one is screaming or panicking. Why would the world's governments go to such lengths to avoid

people having final proof of something most of them already believe? It just doesnt make sense. Either governments have no credible evidence of UFOs to disclose, or they are spending an incredible amount of time and effort keeping what they do know secret for no apparent reason. Robert Sheaffer, a longtime UFO researcher, noted on his Bad UFOs blog that people have always believed that the truth about UFOs would be revealed any day now. He quoted about a half-dozen predictions from writers and UFO researchersmany written in the 1970sthat the truth about UFOs would be revealed soon. Alas, this World Disclosure Day, like all the others, came and went without any new information about extraterrestrials being released. Maybe next year.[]

Keith Taylor, former president of San Diego Association of Rational Inquiry, said there is a simple explanation for the prevalent belief in UFOs. "It's the manifestation of deliberate ignorance," he said. "Our culture has developed to the point where we choose to believe what we want to believe."

London UFO video, not of actual UFOs

The web is still crazily talking about the London UFO video clips. Several astronomers and analysts have emerged out with the claim that those video clips were just hoax and cooked up by some professional video editors. The viral debate over UFO kicked off with a couple of video clips were posted on YouTube, which revealed a mothership and a number of individual tiny alien white dots moving along the sky in London. The clips were taken anonymously and posted on YouTube several days after the alleged appearance of UFOs in the sky over a BBC Radio building in the city. According to experts, the clips might have been forged by some video editors either for the promotion of any upcoming sci-fi film like Iron Sky or just to cause some hot discussions on the Web. But the Iron Sky is to come only in 2012. Watching the clips in detail, one expert said opined that there were no reasons to think that those clips were original. The mothership and its UFO siblings videotaped over London are among the absolute easiest images to fake: glowing ovals and dots. London mothership and fleet looked exactly like the white oval and white dots spotted over the Jerusalem sky early this year. Another hoax and another dose of reality for those who have nothing better to do with their time than dream up aliens and UFOs. []

Man preaches 'UFO gospel'

UPI
SAN DIEGO, July 6 (UPI) -- A San Diego man who snapped a picture he believes depicts alien spacecraft 21 years ago says he believes UFOs will visit Earth next year to rescue humans. Mike Orrell, 54, said he snapped a photo of the sky off Highway 78 at the Inaja memorial park in California 21 years ago and later noticed three red dots in the corner of the picture, The San Diego Union-Tribune reported Tuesday. Orrell, whose picture was recently featured as part of the "Science of Aliens" exhibit at the Air & Space Museum in San Diego, said his research since taking the photo has led him to believe the dots were extraterrestrial spacecraft. He said he believes the aliens will return to Earth next year to rescue humans from a cataclysmic event. "I've been given a great gift that I have been trying to share," he said. "I believe I was chosen to spread the UFO gospel and to my dying day that's what I'm going to do."

Will Aliens Ever Land on Earth?

London UFO videos hoax, French village bemused by will aliens ever land on Apocalyptic strangers earth?
TWS
Do you think whether aliens will ever land on the earth raising threats to human hood? Most people may not at all even be certain about the existence of some extraterrestrial creatures and their possible landing on our planet earth. But there are some astronomers who believe that some aliens will once hit the land, and may even annihilate humans and other earthy creatures. According to Andrei Finkelstein, a leading Russian astronomer, we can meet aliens within 20 years. Finkelstein, director of the Russian Academy of Sciences' Applied Astronomy Institute stated that by 2031, we can meet space creatures on earth. They may have different color skin, but even we have that, the eccentric astronomer went on to describe about the aliens. The discussion over the aliens boosted up with the recent video clips on YouTube on some UFOs over the London sky. A couple of clips show a mothership and its fleet of two or three zipping around in the sky. The cameraman clearly shot the dancing of UFOs in the sky, reportedly over the BBC Radio building in the city. However, several astronomers went on to call the video clips as fake and forged by some video editing experts.[] Alerted by the phenomenon, France's sect watchdog, the Miviludes, said it was placing the village under scrutiny, fearing it could become the site of mass suicides such as those in France, Switzerland and Canada in 1994 and 1997. In those cases, 74 members of the Order of the Solar Temple, including 11 children, died in a series of apparent collective suicide pacts and murders. Bugarach's mayor Delord said there are already some grounds for alarm. Last year one devotee attempted to perform harakiri, the ritual Japanese suicide, with a Samourai sword. Meanwhile, the head of Miviludes, Georges Fenech says he flew over the area in a helicopter recently and saw six settlements of the U.S.-based Ramtha movement, founded by J.Z. Knight in 1998. "We don't want to be paranoid, but we are taking this seriously," Fenech told Reuters. At the start of the year, French couple Philippe Meniere and Agnes Jardel, reportedly members of the group, went on the run in South Africa after shooting a policeman, and eventually died themselves in a shootout. Media reports said they had believed for years the world was about to end. In sleepy Bugarach, 86-year-old MarieSimone -- whose job it is to decorate the small village church with flowers -- just sighs and shrugs when she hears of the esoteric goings on. "Apparently it all comes from the Internet. But they should just clear off, they'll never find any UFOs," she said, adding that neither she nor the village priest believe a word of it. Mayor Delord, however, says the influx has brought some benefits to the sleepy community, with hotel bookings on the rise, bringing in extra money for the village. He remains circumspect about the trend, however. "Of course, after the end of the world, that source (of funds) may dry up. We'll have to find something else," he said.[]

(Reuters Life!) - Residents of the tiny southern French hamlet of Bugarach, population 194, are up in arms at a rising influx of Doomsday believers convinced it is the only place that will survive judgment day in 2012.
Apocalypse devotees dressed in white are now a familiar sight in this picturesque village, drawn here by various New Age theories including claims that a nearby rocky outcrop, the Pic de Bugarach, harbors an alien technical base. "These blasted prophets from all over the world have turned our mountain into some sort of UFO garage," Jean-Pierre Delord, mayor of Bugarach, told Reuters. "You may think it's funny, but they're deadly serious... The end result is that all these fanatics are coming here to hide out," he said. The Internet is awash with predictions that the world will come to an end next year, based in part on an interpretation of the ancient Mayan calendar which claims December 21, 2012, marks the end of the current era. Surrounded in legend for centuries, Bugarach has become a focal point for many Apocalypse believers as rumors have circulated that its mountain contains doors into other worlds, or that extraterrestrials will return here on Judgment day to take refuge at their base. "The aliens will get here soon, we need to prepare for their arrival," said 42-year-old Kean, who travelled here from the Netherlands to witness the return of the otherworldly beings. Dressed in a white tunic symbolizing the purity of his quest, he had just finished telling three new arrivals they would be building a bread oven at the settlement, and that those participating would get a 50 percent discount on their stay. MOUNTAIN OF MYSTERY Nestled in the foothills of the Pyrenees, in a region once home to the mysterious heretic sect the Cathars before they were driven underground in the 13th century, Bugarach has inspired countless myths, supported by the particular nature of the site. Locals have dubbed the famous Pic, rising 1,230 meters (4,035 feet) above sea level, an "upside-down mountain" as the top layers of rock are said to be older than the lower layers. And the abundance of limestone rock and caves in the area has inspired stories of underground caverns and networks of tunnels, perhaps built during the war or even by the Cathars. From there, it is a small step to the idea that the place could contain a magical underground hiding place or escape route from Armageddon. Now, with natural disasters such as the earthquake in Japan and hurricanes in the United States adding to a sense of imminent doom, the number of people flocking to Bugarach has risen sharply -- 20,000 visitors since the start of the year, more than double last year's figures, according to the mayor.

The Aliens are Coming, The Aliens are Coming

ALMEDIANY
To mark the 15th anniversary of the hit film starring Will Smith and Jeff Goldblum, "Independence Day," and because a Russian scientist recently made the claim that Earth will come into contact with humanoid aliens by the year 2031, along with recent UFO sightings over the skies of merry, old London, AllMediaNY will be providing you with some pretty exciting (and usually amusing) content regarding UFOs, aliens. Without releasing further details on the forthcoming articles, we can safely say that they'll mostly cater to human beings - although we will have some coverage for any possible E.T. types who happen to stumble upon our page. Rest assured, of course, that all of our usual content will remain, so we'll continue bringing you coverage of the 2011 Copa America and the political scene in Washington, along with local news and, of course, all the latest in entertainment news. Should the unlikely event of an alien invasion take place during the upcoming week, we promise to immediately switch into more serious alien invasion news coverage. No matter what, we'll have you covered.[] Watch The All New Paranormal Broadcast Network ParanormalBroadcastNetwork.com

Denver Alien Concert for End of World

ALIEN CONCERT FOR END OF WORLD DENVER
A all-star concert for extraterrestrials is being planned for 2012 the apocalypse. UFO Phil, a songwriter and filmmaker from Colorado Springs, Colo., who earned fame appearing with comedian Tom Green and on radio shows like Coast to Coast AM, is organizing a live concert for extraterrestrials. The stellar show is scheduled for June 10, 2012 to correspond with the arrival of aliens on Earth, an event foretold centuries ago by the Mayans, according to UFO Phil. The show will take place in Monterrey, Calif., at the site of the legendary 1967 Pop Festival. A lot of people think the world ends in 2012 because the Mayan calendar runs out, said UFO Phil, whose real name is Phil Hill. But actually, thats when the Blue Ones get here. The Blue Ones, according to Hill, are good aliens. Bad aliens, he says, are red. Hill, 39, promises that the intergalactic travelers will bring new technology to share with Earth. They will also come bearing advanced medicine, exotic foods and a brand new calendar. For the proposed concert, Hill is composing an original work called Symphony for the Aliens. The symphony will incorporate special proprietary musical instruments never used on Earth, Hill said. Humans wont be able to hear the music, since the instruments create ultrasonic tones audible only to aliens. It wont be an entirely silent show, though, because Hill is shooting for the stars with the rest of lineup. Hes trying to book earthlings Kanye West, Katy Perry and Lady Gaga. Mystic Uri Gellar is also supposedly slated as the opening act.[] secret military planes? The Air Force dismissed Arnold's sighting, saying it was simply a mirage. Regardless of whether you're a believer, the story of Kenneth Arnold is an amazing piece of Northwest folklore. You can find plenty of details at HistoryLink and Wikipedia. Oh, and the infamous Men in Black were first encountered that summer in Tacoma following the Maury Island UFO incident. The truth is out there!

U.S. Air Force releases the Roswell UFO report on Jubne 24 in 1997
NashuaTelegraph.com On June 24th 1997, the U.S Air Force released a 231-page report titled The Roswell Report, Case Closed, intending to prove once and for all that there had been no UFO crash in Roswell, New Mexico, back in 1947. The military was therefore not in possession of any alien bodies from the UFO wreckage and there was no massive government cover-up regarding extraterrestrial life. How could that be the case, they reasoned, when there had been no crash? Unfortunately for the military, this had the opposite effect. Angry ufologists took the report to pieces, pointing out inconsistencies and continuing to cry cover-up. We will attempt to pare down the rather convoluted tale of the Roswell UFO incident to its very basics. In June of 1947, William Mac Brazel discovered some unusual materials spread across the fields of the Foster homestead, where he worked as foreman. According to Brazel, the material consisted of rubber strips, tinfoil, and some kind of tough paper and sticks. He reported his find to the local sheriff, who in turn reported it to the Roswell Army Air Field. The Air Force declared it to be the remnants of a flying disc. The remnants were shipped to the Fort Worth Army Air Field in Texas for examination. The Air Force then retracted their statement, saying what they had thought was a flying disc turned out to be nothing more than an errant weather balloon. The Roswell incident faded into obscurity until the 1970s, when Major Jesse Marcel (who had accompanied the remnants from Roswell to Fort Worth) gave his account of what had transpired to author Stanton T. Friedman. Since then, suspicions that the government covered up what really happened have been alive and well. Whether or not the cover-up claims are true, the possibility of extraterrestrial life is a fascinating one. Check out the SETI Institute at www.seti.org to see what astronomers are discovering about life on our own planet and the chances of finding intelligent life elsewhere in our great big universe.[]

scientific reason for them. Then, on a weekend where those who speculate and dream about extraterrestrial life largely wound up being ridiculed, Dawkins used Darwinistic assumptions to imagine what the alien life forms will look like. Perhaps were not totally in the dark on what life might be like on other planets, Dawkins said before guiding a long and fascinating tour through evolutionary anomalies. They will have evolved through some gradual process. You cant suddenly manifest organisms of complexity out of nothing that carry the illusion of design. []

Grossman's favorite Erie ghost stories Erie Times-News

1 Herman Lund still watches over his Lund Boat Works. Though the longtime Erie shipbuilder died decades ago, Gossman claims to have carried on a conversation with Lund during a paranormal investigation of the boat works on East Dobbins Landing. 2 UFO spotted at Presque Isle State Park, July 1966. Gossman, who was a high school student living in Lake City at the time, says he feels a special affinity for this tale of a strange flying object spotted at Beach 6. After all, he says, his hometown is the site of one of the first and only UFO landing ports. The Erie Morning News featured a story on in its Aug. 1, 1966, edition. 3 Graveyard Pond at Presque Isle, final resting place of 180 sailors who died of smallpox. Gossman contends the site of the winter of 1813-1814 catastrophe, left, ought to be declared a national military cemetery.4 The Storm Hag, controller of weather in Lake Erie. Need proof of her dastardly work? How about the more than 400 documented shipwrecks in this part of the lake, which is noted for its wicked storms, Gossman offers. 5 Marquette & Bessemer No. 2, shipwrecked in December 1909. The cargo ship, below, with Capt. Robert R. McLeod, left, disappeared mysteriously in the midst of a storm and was never found, though some of the 59 lost souls aboard turned up -- including a lifeboat with nine frozen bodies spotted off Presque Isle days later. []

64th anniversary of flying saucers at Mt. Rainier

By Dave Meyer America's fascination with flying saucers began in Washington state on June 24, 1947. Businessman and pilot Kenneth Arnold was flying his small plane from Chehalis to Yakima when he spotted what appeared to be a formation of nine strange aircraft traveling near Mt. Rainier. Arnold calculated they were flying at supersonic speeds of at least 1,200 miles an hour, something military aircraft of the day were incapable of doing. Arnold described the shiny objects as "something like a pie plate that was cut in half with a sort of a convex triangle in the rear" and that they flew "like a saucer if you skipped it across the water." The term "flying saucer" made it into a newspaper headline and the rest, as they say, is history. Hundreds of flying disc sightings were reported around the world after Arnold's story hit the newspapers. The most famous event was the alleged UFO crash near Roswell, New Mexico that July. Were they alien spacecraft or super-

Hawke's Bay UFO mystery solved

Dawkins gave a preview of his soon-to-be published childrens book designed to address tales and fables told to children about why things are the way they are and then gives the

People Who Dont Believe, Anything

A weekend spent with people who dont believe, anything
by Matt Hickman Sierra Vista THE HERALD So I went to the international skeptics convention in Las Vegas last weekend looking for freedom from existential oppression and enlightenment divorced from superstition. Mostly what I found instead was a UFO convention where no one believed Earth has ever been visited, an alternative medicine convention where everyone thinks homeopathy is a scam, and a religious conference where no one believes in anything supernatural. Saddest of all, I found a movement that refuses to move because its so busy standing up against everything, it cant stand for anything. The Amazing Meeting 9, gets its name from James The Amazing Randi, the famous debunker of tricks masquerading as magic and all things paranormal, who, now at a whitebearded 82, is a Moses figure of sorts to the more than 1,600 attendees. More than half of them were first-timers and most of those were under 30. All were extremely intelligent, though not as many as youd think were stereotypical nerds. The conference draws big television celebrities including Bill Nye the Science Guy and astrophysicist Neil de Grasse Tyson, who, speaking in a giant conference room at the South Point Hotel and Casino, decried scientific illiteracy in the U.S. in funny, yet ominous ways. Two-thirds through his speech, the host of PBS Nova gave the audience the red meat it craved. I try to stay out of the religion thing, he said. But I know its what you want to hear. Tyson brought up a news item from a couple years back when a New Jersey high school student recorded his science teacher telling the class that dinosaurs were aboard Noahs Ark and that each of them needed to give their lives to Jesus. This re-ignited the science vs. religion in the classroom debate and Tyson powerpointed a four paragraph letter to the editor he wrote for the New York Times. You could feel the inertia of a thousand salivary glands churning into motion as Tysons letter argued that the science vs. religion debate was beside the point. The bigger issue being ignored was that it was factually impossible for dinosaurs and humans to have co-existed. This drew gushing applause, but all I could think was, no, that, too is beside the point. The shocking story is that Im watching 1,600 people with IQs over 130, including Tyson, who has the mass media appeal to do whatever he wants, let themselves be hijacked and consumed by some knuckle-dragging schoolteacher in New Jersey. Why give the opposition so much power? Why imagine theyre more indomitable than they are when the scientific analysis tells you their trend is sloping downward while yours is rising? Why so willfully let them keep you down? The consensus of TAMsters I talked to guffawed at the possibility of becoming a powerful cultural and political movement. Many cited an increase in fundamentalism among American Christians as a sign that the deck is still stacked against them immutably. To which I counter: That means youre winning! Your science is tearing down thousands of years of the very thing they raised their children by and entrusted their eternal souls to and you expect them to be cool and rational about your attack? You should be disappointed if they did go down without a fight. What I realized is that most at the conference really dont want power and really dont want to lead. They would rather sit in their treehouse of ironic superiority and laugh at the ridiculous things the mortals do and then explain them away scientifically. Hemant Mehta, who authored the book I sold my soul on eBay, got where I was coming from. He pointed to a poll taken during the 2008 election that showed 25 percent of 18 to 29 year-olds ascribe to no religious affiliation, a generation that for the first time includes a high number of second generation atheists. Mehta, whose soul was finally purchased for $504 by a Seattle-area pastor who assigned his subject to visit and observe churches in his hometown of Chicago, likened the subconscious fear atheists may have of becoming mainstream to another social trend thats taken an ostracized group and made it common. Its going to be like being gay. It just kind of happened that it wasnt a big deal to be gay anymore, Mehta said. What happens when you say, Im an atheist, and they say, oh, me too. Oh my God, what do you do when you say youre an atheist and no one cares anymore? Mehta, now a math teacher in the Chicago area who authors the blog The Friendly Atheist has more affection for churchgoers than most of his fellow conventioneers. He believes there are things the skeptic community can learn from churches to grow and be more marketable, something he discovered first-hand when in college he formed the campus network SWORD (Students Without Religious Dogma). We dont have hope to sell, Mehta said. We cant give them that, but we can give them the biggest thing the blunt truth. If they want false hope, theyre not going to get that from us. One such convert is Fergus Mason, a Glasgow native whose first time at TAM was the highlight of his first trip to America. He discovered the skeptic movement while working as an intelligence gathering contractor in Afghanistan, killing the long and lonely hours of downtime listening to skeptic podcasts. I was a conventional Christian in the Church of Scotland, Mason said. But I dont think belief is a good thing anymore. Id rather know than believe. If you fear the unknown, learn. Dont trust, dont believe, learn. To replace the hope and empowering sense of magic religion has given adherents through the years, most forward-thinking atheists point to the small feeling one gets when looking at the endless expanse of a night sky and the even greater humility one encounters when studying the infinitesimal place human life holds in the known universe. I was dead for 13.7 billion years and then I was born. I have one moment of sun on the Earth it gives you a sense of urgency, Mason said. Were a part of something so awesome, I cant describe it. Mason rejected my contention that skeptics stand against plenty but stand for nothing proactive. We are for thinking, for questioning, he said. Very often were seen as a negative movement, a reaction to something, but its not. Were evolved to think. Put us up against a chimp and we lose in every department except the ability to think. What makes us more adaptable is we can think, and too many people dont think. Perhaps the youngest attendee at the conference was 13-year-old Connor Drescher from Woodland Hills, Calif. He did his first TAM two years ago when brought by his mother, a mathematics professor at Cal-State Northridge, who was among the presenters last weekend. A bright-eyed and precocious youngster, Connor is not optimistic about seeing a mainstream skeptical movement in his lifetime. It really depends on whether we keep going in the direction and whether the skeptical movement is big enough in a few years. Today, people are extremely naive and anti-science, he said. At school, the kids are all jerks. The smart people wind up secluding themselves even more. But hopefully we can make ourselves known. If James Randi is the Moses of the skeptic movement, and Bill Nye, Neil de Grasse Tyson and Penn and Teller are its celebrity prophets, then Richard Dawkins is its messiah. You ignoramouses in TV land may know Dawkins from the spoof of him in the two-part South Park episode Go God Go where Cartman is transported into the future to discover a world where Dawkins-worshipping otters rule the world and fight pointless wars over which group of otter atheists bear the proper nomenclature. The Oxford-based evolutionary biologist gave the most highly anticipated speech at TAM 9, and surprisingly, and perhaps to the dismay of some who wanted him to spend the hour throwing snowballs at creationism, his message was profoundly proactive and forwardthinking. Dawkins gave a preview of his soon-tobe published childrens book designed to address tales and fables told to children about why things are the way they are and then gives the scientific reason for them. Then, on a weekend where those who speculate and dream about extraterrestrial life largely wound up being ridiculed, Dawkins used Darwinistic assumptions to imagine what the alien life forms will look like. Perhaps were not totally in the dark on what life might be like on other planets, Dawkins said before guiding a long and fascinating tour through evolutionary anomalies. They will have evolved through some gradual process. You cant suddenly manifest organisms of complexity out of nothing that carry the illusion of design. []

Astronaut: Aliens Havent Been Here

Former Astronaut Musgrave: Aliens Exist, But Haven't Visited Earth
International Business Times
Former NASA astronaut Story Musgrave has been to space six times, so he has as good of a claim as anyone to being an expert on extraterrestrial matters. A large UFO gathering he is planning to address is eagerly awaiting his input, but they may be disappointed: while Musgrave believes firmly that aliens exist, he said that he has yet to encounter evidence they have ever visited Earth. "I'm going to tell them that, for me, and my interpretation of everything that's come my way, I cannot arrive at the idea that we have been visited -- either in the past or now," Musgrave told The Huffington Post as he outlined his plans for the 42nd annual Mutual UFO Network Symposium in Irvine, California. Musgrave said that he has pored over the evidence, using his access to get "as deep in the bowels of the military and the intelligence community as you can go," but found no evidence supporting contentions that aliens have been documented or that the government has covered up an encounter. "Some astronauts have been quoted as saying they think they're [aliens] out there -- I have seen their evidence, and for me, it's not evidence," Musgrave said. "Other astronauts were not able to provide me with any empirical evidence, either." The government has certainly looked into the possibility. The Federal Bureau of Investigation recently released a huge cache of documents detailing their dogged pursuit of purported UFO sightings, but what appeared to be flying saucers ended up being trash can lids. []

Cylon Raider or algae? Swedish booze hunters may have made the UFO find of the century
A SWEDISH team searching for booze on the bottom of the ocean may have found a UFO instead. The Ocean Explorer team made several million dollars back in 1997 when it located the wreck of the trade ship Jonkoping. On board was a consignment of 1907 Heidsick Monopole Gout Americain, the corks of which were popped late last year after wine buffs snapped up the bottles for around $13,000 apiece. That's kept Ocean Explorer team leader Peter Lindberg in the deep-sea suds search business ever since, but nothing he's found has caused as much controversy as a circle that turned up on a sonar survey on June 19. Mr Lindberg didn't say much about it at the time apart from releasing the image and ruling out theories that it may be a land mine or algae bloom. Obviously, that didn't generate enough

attention, so now, after further examination, Mr Lindberg has gone public with some more details about the dimensions of the disc. "At 87m down, between Sweden and Finland, they saw a large circle, about 60 feet in diameter," he told local media last week. "You see a lot of weird stuff in this job but during my 18 years as a professional I have never seen anything like this. "The shape is completely round a circle." Mr Lindberg said the team has also noted what they say could possibly be tracks running some 300m up to where the disc lies. The team claims the tracks show the object has moved, either on or since settling to the ocean floor. Six of the nine-member team were asleep in their bunks on-board the Ocean Explorer's ship at the time of the discovery, but the three watching the sonar "couldn't believe" what they were seeing. Despite the promise of alien riches, Mr Lindberg said his team would not attempt to investigate the disc. "It is not in our sphere of interest to go for this object, since it might be nothing," he said. "We cannot afford spending funds just to have a look at it, even if it might be a new Stonehenge." "It is up to the rest of the world to decide what it is." []

Just back from Florida where he witnessed NASAs final Atlantis mission, Matthews used this Sunday as an educational opportunity and quizzed customers about the end of the space shuttle era. Those who correctly answered the name of the first woman in space (Valentina Tereshkova) and what cosmonauts eat instead of bread in space (tortillas), won a bottle of Sophies homemade hot sauce. Science is my passion, said Matthews, who, unsurprisingly is popular among students at UBC. I love to educate and communicate. I put a little bit of the cosmic into Cosmic Cafe. A consultant to the once-popular science fiction TV series X-Files, Matthews is a principal investigator with Canadas space agency and travels the world working with other experts in the field of astronomy. Hes off soon to Vienna and Spain for his work but always comes home to Sophies. Trivia is important. []

NEWS OF THE WEIRD

Criminals With Chutzpah It was a 2004 gang-related murder that had frustrated Los Angeles police for four years until a homicide investigator, paging through gangbangers' photographs for another case, spotted an elaborate tattoo on the chest of Anthony Garcia. Evidently, that 2004 killing was such a milestone in Garcia's life that he had commemorated the liquor store crime scene on his chest. The investigation was reopened, eventually leading to a surreptitious confession by Garcia and, in April 2011, to his conviction for first-degree murder. (Photos from Garcia's several bookings between 2004 and 2008 show his mural actually evolving as he added details - until the crime scene was complete enough that the investigator recognized it.) [Los Angeles Times, 4-22-2011]

Cosmic approach to astrophysics

By SUZANNE WILTON, 24 HOURS
Hes walked the red carpet with Isabella Rossellini - wearing an alien penis hat - and conferred with the worlds leading space scientists on missions to outer space. And when hes not jet setting around the globe, UBC astrophysicist Jaymie Matthews is bringing star science to the brunch masses. For more than a decade, Matthews has brought another dimension to Sophies Cosmic Cafe, an iconic eatery with walls adorned with kitschy memorabilia from the 1960s and 70s. His Sunday trivia sessions at the Kitsilano caf have become almost as famous as the diners mile-high apple pie.

THE X ZONE RADIO SHOW ARCHIVES ARE AVAILABLE 24/7/365 AT www.xzonepodcast.com

Dead Alien Found in Siberian Snow

'Dead alien' found in Siberian snow after 'glowing pink and blue lights' crash from sky
Incredible footage has emerged of what a group of Russians claim is the remains of a mangled alien. The Sun reports the lifeless "body" was found in snow in the Irkutsk region of southern Siberia following reports of a "pink and blue glowing object" which crashed from the sky. The "extra-terrestrial" appears to have lost a limb. Even the country's Emergencies Ministry staff have investigated the incident after investigators said no aircraft were reported in the area. Search and rescue teams found no evidence of an aircraft crash. The strange clip of the discovery has now been seen by nearly 1.5 million people in the two days since it was uploaded on April 17. So is it a fake? "Why do all aliens have to be naked?" one commentator pointedly asked. "FAIL. Sorry...so fake," another wrote. But the same writer was quick to qualify her comments. "Do aliens exist? Certainly ... I believe they do. But not in this video."
View the video at The X Zone YouTube Channel at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBKbqHjKZQs

the ones he's made, with that Mylar," Wethli said. "That's why they're shiny up there." Apparently the model Sams flew above Three Rivers Stadium more than 30 years ago wasn't the only one that caused a stir. "He did it in England and he caused some kind of traffic wreck in front of [Buckingham] Palace," Wethli said. "And he got in all kinds of trouble about it." []

Space Oddity: Russian Chess Chief (and Ufologist) Visits Gaddafi

By Simon Shuster / Moscow
Tuesday, June 14 2011 - When the U.S. and France asked Russia last month to help mediate the war in Libya, they were probably not expecting a self-proclaimed emissary of alien life to show up in Tripoli for a meeting with Muammar Gaddafi. But on Sunday evening, as NATO air strikes continued on the Libyan capital, the besieged Colonel took the time to entertain a Russian politician named Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, best known for his claims that extraterrestrials took him on a mystical tour of the galaxy in their spaceship in 1997. Far from convincing Gaddafi to step down, the visit seemed geared toward giving him a confidence boost and an unlikely lesson in the game of kings. For the past 15 years, Ilyumzhinov has also presided over the world chess federation, known as FIDE, which makes him the first head of an international body to meet with Gaddafi since the U.N.-backed bombing campaign against him began in March. In a video shown on Libyan television on Sunday night, Ilyumzhinov praises Gaddafi's resilience. "It's a great honor for me to be here to see that you are very well, healthy, because many people... gave wrong information," he said in stilted English. The two men then played a rather awkward game of chess. Allowed the first move, Gaddafi made a clumsy opening, nervously moving his pawn from F3 to F4, and Ilyumzhinov took the piece and moved it back for him. The game ended in a draw and a handshake for the cameras, after which Ilyumzhinov told reporters that Gaddafi had promised never to leave Libya, regardless of the West's support for the rebels battling to overthrow him. The two-hour chat,

Steelers UFO Mystery Uncovered

Bridgeville Resident Says Uncle Created Kite To Look Like UFO WTAE.com
PITTSBURGH -- On an October afternoon at Three Rivers Stadium in 1979, the Steelers and the Dallas Cowboys were lining up on the field for a play when something in the sky caught the attention of the players, the fans and the people in the broadcast booth. "There it is," one of the announcers said. "What is that?" Some at the game speculated the object was a UFO, but two local men say otherwise. One of them is Duquesne University archivist Thomas White, who looked at the 32-year-old television footage to offer his opinion. "Something like two kites that might have been connected together, moving in the wind," White told Channel 4 Action News reporter Sheldon Ingram. "I've seen footage of these kites before and they move very similar in a similar fashion." So is it a UFO or a kite? Bridgeville resident Scott Wethli said it's both. "This is a UFO kite," Wethli said. "It's intended to look like a UFO, exactly." Wethli said the UFO-looking kites were designed by his uncle, Kenneth Sams, who lived in England and died in 2003. "The ones he flew over the stadium are

Ilyumzhinov said, was held not in an underground bunker, where many western experts had presumed Gaddafi to be hiding, but in "one of the administrative buildings in the Libyan capital." The two-day visit, billed as an attempt to promote chess in Libya, had a clear diplomatic tint that seemed at cross-purposes with Russia's much-touted drive to mediate an end to Libyan conflict. On May 27, U.S. President Barack Obama asked his Russian counterpart Dmitri Medvedev to help convince Gaddafi to cede power. The next week, Medvedev dispatched his Africa envoy, Mikhail Margelov, who told a news conference in the rebel stronghold of Benghazi on June 7 that Gaddafi must step down, as he "has lost his legitimacy after the first bullet shot against the Libyan people." But last week, Margelov returned to Moscow without ever meeting with Gaddafi. Ilyumzhinov has now beaten him to it, a move that would have been unlikely, given its geopolitical significance, without at least tacit approval from the Kremlin. On Monday, Margelov, the Africa envoy, said he had discussed Ilyumzhinov's trip to Libya with him beforehand. "I advised him to play white, start with E2 to E4, and let Gaddafi know that his match is approaching the endgame," Margelov said on Monday. But if anything, Ilyumzhinov gave Gaddafi some badly needed encouragement, much as he had done by praising Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein during the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003. In an October interview with TIME, Ilyumzhinov said Hussein had been "a dear friend" whom he sorely missed, and he went on to denounce the West for pushing its values onto other countries a very popular view among the Russian public and much of Moscow's political elite. "The western man is primitive in his thinking," Ilyumzhinov said. "If something doesn't fit into his scheme, even if it is an idea that is new and useful, it is easier to write it off as corrupt or insane." Continued on Page 11

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Russian Ufologists Visits Gaddafi

Space Oddity: Russian Chess Chief (and Ufologist) Visits Gaddafi
Continued from Page 10
Ilyumzhinov served as the head of the Russian republic of Kalmykia between 1993 and 2010. Four years into his tenure, which was stained by frequent allegations of corruption and mismanagement, he began to claim that he had been kidnapped by aliens who taught him how to save mankind from certain destruction. The planet Earth, he told TIME in October, was set to collide with the planet Nebiru, killing everyone on the planet, unless people cleansed their "aura" by playing more chess. The game would also allow humans to regain the powers of teleportation and telekinesis, which ancient civilizations possessed, Ilyumzhinov says. None of his eccentricities, however, ever seemed to hurt his standing with the Kremlin. In 2005, then-President Vladimir Putin appointed Ilyumzhinov to another five-year term as the leader of Kalmykia, a poor and mostly Buddhist region in southern Russia, and Ilyumzhinov has been a dogged Putin ally ever since. In 2010, Ilyumzhinov struck a deal with the Kremlin to leave office, and was rewarded with Russia's support for his bid to get re-elected as the head of FIDE last year. In his interview with TIME, he said he preferred the FIDE presidency to his governor's seat, because it was a global platform that allowed him to travel the world and meet with world leaders. "FIDE is very helpful in getting my messages across," he said. At the time, Ilyumzhinov was referring to the messages he says he learned from extraterrestrials. But on Sunday, his role as FIDE president allowed him to send the world another message: Gaddafi still has a few friends left on this planet and the Libyan strongman had no intention of giving up power. For the western powers eager to see Gaddafi deposed, it may have been better if Ilyumzhinov had stuck to his work on intergalactic conflicts and stayed clear of the earthly ones now unfolding in North Africa. [] Australia (Chester Hill), Defense Archives Queanbeyan and Headquarters Air Command, RAAF Base Glenbrook," Carpenter said. "Despite searching these locations, the files could not be located and Headquarters Air Command formally advised that this file is deemed lost." Bill Chalker, a UFO researcher previously given access to the files, told the Sydney Morning Herald he last viewed the files at the National Archives only a few months ago. [] Alien visitations Grudgingly, Shostak and other scientists interviewed for this article allowed that the 1977 film "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" is not as bad as most other alien flicks in the credibility department (though perhaps only by a sliver). The aliens in "Close Encounters" ultimately benevolent, as reinforced by the fact that many of them look like hairless children do not win believability points for their appearance. Rather, it is historical context that makes them feel more "real." In crafting the film, director and writer Steven Spielberg tipped his hat to many iconic cases in "ufology," the study of unidentified flying objects (UFOs) and their alleged extraterrestrial occupants' meddling on Earth. Claimed abductions are one well-known example. So are "lights in the sky" at night on rural roads. Fittingly, in "Close Encounters," a Midwestern everyman's pickup truck is spotlit from above by a hovering alien ship. All sorts of electromagnetic oddities ensue: a flashlight goes dark, a metal railroad sign shakes as if buffeted by shifting magnetic fields and the truck driver gets sunburned on his face. These phenomena jibe with accounts from UFO witnesses, said Bruce Maccabee, a well-known ufologist, retired optical physicist and author of the "UFO/FBI Connection: The Secret History of the Government's Cover-Up" (Llewellyn Publications, 2000), among other books. "Spielberg knew his ufology," said Maccabee. (Indeed, the title of "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" comes from a ufological classification system.) Not motiveless enemies Although their overall intent is never explained, at least the aliens in "Close Encounters" were not illogically hell-bent on crossing vast cosmic distances only to wipe out humanity or invade our bodies, scientists noted. Along these lines, another movie drawing mild plaudits for believability is 2009's "District 9." The shrimplike, bipedal aliens known derogatorily as "prawns" have families and experience emotional states like our own. That intellectual congruity allows the aliens to be used symbolically as stand-ins for minorities, offering a new window on how societies mistreat them, said Sidney Perkowitz, a physicist at Emory University in Atlanta, and author of "Hollywood Science: Movies, Science, and the End of the World" (Columbia University Press, 2007). "['District 9'] brings in a different aspect of aliens [to film]," Perkowitz said. Continued on Page 13

What Makes an Alien Encounter Movie Believable?

Space.com
Aliens are all the rage at the box office this year, appearing in sci-fi thrillers such as "Super 8," the comedy "Paul" and action movies including "Cowboys and Aliens," just to name a few. For movie studios, extraterrestrials are a good bet: Ever since the advent of the motion picture, filmgoers have reliably forked over dollars to see them. Yet for escapist entertainment's sake, these on-screen aliens tend to be grotesque, mucosal monsters or kidfriendly, big-eyed charmers rather than beings plausibly from another planet. Some movies, however, have at least nodded in science and history's direction, and in so doing have presented slightly more believable versions of E.T. Arms and legs, or tentacles? In an awful lot of movies, aliens look remarkably like us. This arrangement is convenient for narrative purposes, such as audience sympathy, and not to mention budgetary concerns (2009's "Avatar" for the former, and 1951's "The Day the Earth Stood Still" for the latter). [Television's Best Science Fiction Shows Ever] To a certain extent, it's anyone's guess as to what an alien might look like, because after all, we have yet to find anything living outside of our planet's biosphere. So it's certainly possible that intelligent, spacefaring aliens could stand erect on two legs, wave two arms and look upon us with two forward-facing eyes. "You can't argue that something that looks like us is an implausible design for an intelligent species because obviously it works," said Seth Shostak, senior astronomer at the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) Institute in Mountain View, Calif. Accordingly, movies featuring humanoid aliens should not be deemed unbelievable offhand. But the anthropomorphic bias that directors sometimes have for their aliens' physical form is less a matter of scientific uncertainty than an unsubtle manipulation of audience expectations. "Friendly [aliens] always look like children, while unfriendly ones look like arthropods or something you would order at a seafood restaurant," Shostak said.

Australia loses UFO documents

CANBERRA, Australia, June 9 (UPI) -- The Australian Department of Defense said most of its files related to unidentified flying objects appear to have been destroyed or lost. Natalie Carpenter, assistant director of the department's freedom of information office, said in response to a freedom of information request from Fairfax media that officials were only able to locate one UFO file, "Report on UFOs/Strange Occurrences and Phenomena in Woomera," the Canberra Times reported Thursday. Carpenter said it appears all of the other files have been destroyed, except for one that officials have been unable to find. "In an effort to retrieve this file, our office conducted searches of the Defense Record Management System, National Archives Australia (Canberra), National Archives

Top 10 Alien Encounters Debunked

Top 10 Alien Encounters Debunked
Benjamin Radford #1 CATTLE MUTILATIONS: The story: When alien visitors are not abducting people (see number 2) or implanting things in them (number 3), or making circles in crops (number 7), they butcher cattle, either for research purposes or perhaps sadistic amusement. Since the 1970s, hundreds of animal corpses have been found with unusual or inexplicable features, including being drained of blood and having their organs removed with "surgical precision." The real story: Livestock predation has plagued ranchers and farmers for millennia, but it wasnt until the last few decades (during the publics peaking interest in UFOs) that anyone thought to attribute the deaths to aliens. Research has shown that the "mysterious" features are in fact quite ordinary and are caused by natural decay processes and scavenger attacks. Curiously, exactly the same phenomena has been attributed to not only aliens but also to Satanic cults and the dreaded chupacabra creature of Hispanic folklore. #2 ALIEN ENGINEERS The story: Science cant explain how the Great Pyramids of Egypt were constructed; because they are so precisely aligned and designed, aliens must have had a role in creating them thousands of years ago. The real story: While many people assume that those living in earlier times (such as the ancient Egyptians) were not resourceful enough to possibly have created impressive engineering feats without extraterrestial aid, this is not true. Actually, the methods by which the pyramids could have been constructed are well documented, and have appeared in many places including National Geographic magazine and Mark Lehners book The Complete Pyramids. The only real mystery surrounding the pyramids is why anyone would still think aliens were involved. #3 AREA 51 The story: Area 51 is where the U.S. government stores and studies extraterrestrial bodies and aircraft, including the unfortunate (and apparently poorly-trained) alien pilots that crashed in Roswell. Some even say that it is an officially-sanctioned landing base for spaceships. The real story: The simple fact of the matter is that the public doesnt really know much about what goes on at the military base near Groom Dry Lake, Nevada (popularly but not officially called Area 51). It is a top secret military base, and there are of course perfectly legitimate government and military reasons for keeping the bases purposes secret that have nothing to do with aliens or UFOs; 60 Minutes correspondent Leslie Stahl suggested that the area may be a dumping ground for toxic waste. Theres no reason to think that anything alien is going on there, but where there is secrecy, there will be conspiracy. #4 THE FACE ON MARS The story: Proof that intelligent alien life exists in the universe can be found on Marsor so claims Richard Hoagland, author of the book The Monuments of Mars: A City on the Edge of Forever. According to Hoagland, NASA photographs of the Cydonia region of Mars show a human-like face. According to Hoagland, this must have been constructed by intelligent beings and indicates that there are (or were) alien cities on Mars. The real story: The "Face on Mars" is an example of imagination and wishful thinking. The photographs that show an area vaguely resembling a face on Mars were taken by the Viking 1 Orbiter in 1976. Since then, far better photographs have been taken of Mars (for example, by the Mars Global Surveyor in 1998). They show that the area is heavily eroded, and the "face" was simply a combination of low image resolution and tricks of light and shadow. #5 CROP CIRCLES The story: Aliens are the most likely explanation for the mysterious circles and other designs that occasionally appear in farmers fields. They are some sort of sign or message that humans have not yet deciphered. The real story: Despite films like Signs, there is no evidence that crop circles are made by alien intelligences. Hoaxing is by far the best explanation for crop circlesfar more so than aliens who supposedly travel across the vast universe to reach Earth, only to flatten wheat in rural English and American farms as some sort of information. (Youd think that aliens with superior intelligence would realize their messages arent getting through, and be a little more direct.) #6 THE ALIEN AUTOPSY FILM The story: The 1947 "Roswell Incident" (see number 1) got a boost of credibility in 1995 when a grainy, black-and-white film surfaced. The top-secret film (shot by the military and showing a post-mortem dissection of an alien body) was touted as evidence of what some UFO buffs had claimed all along: that alien bodies had been recovered by the U.S. government. The real story: Soon after the alien autopsy footage was broadcast on Fox television, serious doubts were raised about the authenticity of the film. Skeptics (and even many UFO researchers) branded the film a hoax, pointing out anachronisms and inconsistencies in the film. Yet because the Roswell story is so short on evidence, others clung to the autopsy footage as real. Earlier this year, the special effects artist who created the alien confessed that it was in fact a hoax. #7 FLYING SAUCERS The story: On June 24, 1947, the modern UFO era began when a man named Kenneth Arnold saw nine flying saucers moving at high speed near Mount Rainer, Washington. Soon others began reporting seeing similar UFOs, spawning a flap. The real story: The phrase "flying saucer," so familiar to Americans and UFO buffs, is the result of a reporters error. After interviewing Arnold about his sighting, a reporter from the Eastern Oregonian newspaper reported that Arnold saw round, aerial objects (in fact he said they were "crescent shaped"). Arnold stated that the objects "flew erratic, like a saucer if you skip it across the water"not that what he saw resembled an actual saucer. Yet that "saucer" interpretation stuck, prompting many eyewitnesses to repeat (and hoaxers to duplicate) Arnolds nonexistent description. This strongly shows the role of suggestion in UFO sightings; as skeptic Marty Kottmeyer asks, "Why would extraterrestrials redesign their craft to conform to [the reporters] mistake?" #8 ALIEN IMPLANTS The story: As part of nefarious experiments, aliens have implanted various objects in human abductees. Victims have found small foreign objects in their bodies and come to realize they had been abducted. Several alien implants have been recovered, and when they are scientifically tested, they are found to be indestructible or of materials not found on Earth. The real story: Joe Nickell, a columnist for Skeptical Inquirer magazine, noted that Since 1994 alleged implants have been surgically recovered but theyve become remarkably diverse: one looks like a shard of glass, another a triangular piece of metal, still another a carbon fiber, and so on. None was located in the brain or nasal cavity, instead being recovered from such extremities as toe, hand, shin, external ear, etc.; some were accompanied by scars while others were not. As physicians know, a foreign object can enter the body unnoticed, as during a fall, or while running barefoot in sand or grasseven as a splinter from a larger impacting object. People find all sorts of weird things in their bodies, but so far none are of alien origin. #9 ALIEN ABDUCTIONS The story: Hundreds of people claim to have been abducted by aliens, especially during in the 1980s. They were subjected to rape, experiments and implantations (see number 3), and other bodily intrusions. Several prominent researchers, including Harvards John Mack, supported the claims and wrote books about these victims. The real story: There may be several causes of the alien abduction experience. Many of these experiences are only recovered years later, during psychological treatment for other issues. Research has proven that false memories can be created in the course of therapy by careless psychologists. People can actually come to believe they were abducted or abused when they were not. Other researchers have shown that a common psychological process called sleep paralysis may be misinterpreted as an alien abduction Continued on Page 13

What Makes an Alien Encounter Movie Believable?

Continued from Page 11
Far beyond us Another oft-pointed-to movie that does better by aliens than most is 1997's "Contact," which starred Jodie Foster as Ellie Arroway, a SETI scientist. [Top 10 Messages We've Sent to Space] "'Contact' was wild, but not out of-thequestion wild," said Carolyn Porco, the imaging team leader for NASA's Cassini mission, who helped advise on the movie as well as the 2009 remake of "Star Trek." In the film, a decoded signal from space contains blueprints for a fantastic machine with three spinning rings; a capsule containing Arroway drops into the machine, hurling her through multiple wormholes; she eventually arrives at a metaphysical representation of a Florida beach, where of all entities her deceased father materializes. The aliens behind this illusion, Arroway guesses correctly, have "downloaded" her memories and constructed a simulation in order to more easily communicate with her. "'Contact' really handles things smartly by not showing the aliens, just showing us how advanced their technology is," Perkowitz said. SETI's Shostak also liked that the aliens in "Contact" are immeasurably beyond us technologically. Our civilization is a mere ten thousand years old; extraterrestrial civilizations that emerged earlier in the universe could have had billions of years to develop incredible capabilities. In movies, aliens are "usually just at the right level for us to take them on," Shostak said. "If you think of the timescales of things happening in the cosmos, that's completely bonkers." Waiting to believe At any rate, filmmakers of alien movies do not list "fidelity to science" as a chief aim of their productions that are meant to entertain well before they educate. "Hollywood people don't see it as their duty to respect science it takes a backseat," said Porco. "To think [Hollywood is] informing you about the likelihood of what E.T. might be like is like thinking that John Wayne movies are good cultural insights into the American Indian," joked Shostak. Of course, aliens were not considered a topic worthy of study in the scientific community until relatively recently, so a dearth of "realism" in the multiplex seems to be a foregone conclusion. But the surge of exoplanet discoveries since the mid-1990s, along with the expected confirmation of a habitable, Earthlike planet almost any day now, is changing attitudes. Aliens gaining traction in academia could pave the way for somewhat believable versions of them to grace the silver screen someday. "Not too long ago, if scientists [at a

conference] had had a session on alien life, they would have been laughed off stage now it's taken pretty seriously," said Perkowitz. "In the next few years, maybe we'll see some scientists worry about this [cinematic credibility gap]," Perkowitz added, "and those scientists will be consultants on movies." []

Top 10 Alien Encounters Debunked

Continued from Page 12
#10 THE ROSWELL INCIDENT The Story: The most famous UFO crash in history occurred in 1947, on a ranch just outside of Roswell, a dusty New Mexican town. Mysterious debris and alien bodies (see number 5) were recovered, spirited away in a government cover-up. The real story: There was indeed a cover-up of what crashed outside Roswell, but authorities were hiding not a crashed alien saucer but a weather balloon from a secret spy program called Project Mogul. The debris described by the original eyewitnesses exactly matches the balloons used in the program; the fanciful stories of alien bodies did not appear until much later. The Roswell Incident was in fact only one of many similar (and clearly folkloric) stories of crashed vessels containing alien bodies and debrissome dating back nearly 100 years earlier.

against a common enemy. Though the aliens themselves weren't terribly different from a lot of other creatures we've seen zooming down from space in other movies, their mission on Earth was wholly original and offered a clever twist on Western themes. The spaceships looked great, right down to their lasso-like alien tech; and the alien ship was gorgeously designed to look look like something right out of the craggy landscape of the American west. Truly, this was the Weird Western done right. Favreau and his team blended their alien invasion and Western imagery seamlessly, in a way that you may have imagined but probably haven't seen done well before. The plot was, as producer Roberto Orci told us last year at Comic-Con, a play on classic John Ford Western The Searchers except this time, the aliens have abducted the people our heroes love, and the Indians are allies. The ensemble cast worked terrifically well, with Adam Beach stealing the show as Ford's surrogate son who has always been more likely to follow in the old man's footsteps than his loutish blood kin. Sam Rockwell and Daniel Craig are also fantastic, and there's a slightly cheesy but nevertheless cool twist with one character that really put the flick into X-Files-y goodness territory. I'm not going to tell you any more than that. Just see it, fer crissake. And if you're the kind of person who cries in movies, like me, bring a hankie too.[]

Cowboys and Aliens will blow you away and make you cry
i09 - Annalee Newitz
Jon Favreau introduced the Cowboys and Aliens premiere at Comic-Con last night by telling us that it would be like the surprise Christmas present under the tree that you kept shaking, trying to figure out what was inside. And then it turned out to be unexpectedly awesome. He was right his new flick really was like a nice present after a summer film season of sequels and adaptations that didn't give us anything we didn't already expect. Spoiler-free first impressions ahead! In case you were holding your breath and crossing your fingers for an eye-peeling, heart-pounding flick to make the summer end in a bang - yes, this movie is definitely awesome. It's packed with gorgeous imagery, down-anddirty action, and an amazing, nuanced performance from Harrison Ford. Though the whole cast was terrific, I really felt like this was Ford's film. As a grizzled old war vet whose toughness has alienated his only son, Ford managed to strike the perfect chord of badassery mixed with kindhearted regret. Who thought that a movie about cowboys, Indians, and villains fighting creepy-ass aliens would also pack an emotional punch? I didn't. And so when the tearful moments came right in the middle of battle it was a pleasure to feel more than just bloodlust. Not that there wasn't plenty of bloodlust, and cheering for the good guys to band together

NEWS OF THE WEIRD

Bright Ideas New York scent artist Christopher Brosius had made his name with fragrances recalling childhood (such as Clean Baby Butt, Green Bean and Baseball Glove), but felt it was time, according to an April report in New York magazine, to approach the next frontier -- to make a perfume so exclusive that no one could smell it. By Brosius' reasoning, the scent's chemicals would provoke whatever reactions scents provoke in those exposed to it, but the actual scent would be undetectable to the nose; hence, no one would know why they were reacting as they were. By trial and error, he combined jasmine, sandalwood and natural amber, and scaled them down in power, yielding what he calls Where We Are There Is No Here. Said Brosius, "The question, 'What perfume are you wearing?' should never arise." [New York, 4-24-2011] ADVERTISE IN THE SEPTEMBER 2011 EDITION OF THE X CHRONICLES NEWSPAPER! FULL PAGE 1/2 PAGE 1/4 PAGE ADS ARE AVAILABLE! TO RESERVE YOUR AD TODAY EMAIL publisher@ xchronicles-newspaper.com

10 Best SCI-FI TV Shows of All Time

News-a-Rama.com
Now this is a numbing prospect. Take all of the science-fiction shows ever, and determine a top ten? Who wants that kind of fan umbrage on their head? We do! Granted, we'll miss some favorites of some devoted fans (you, in the back, with the "Misfits of Science" shirt on, we're talking to you!). But, as it is, we're going to make an honest effort to determine what's the best. Know this: this list leans in the direction of science fiction rather than fantasy, and we're confining it to live-action. #10 Quantum Leap: 1989-1993, 5 Seasons, NBC Edging out "Adventures of Superman" (our mental list is miles deep), "Quantum Leap" operated on a great premise. You had one scientist "leaping" into body after body across time, and his only companion was the holographic representation of a computer back home that only he could see. That's pretty high-concept sci-fi for TV, but it worked. Beautifully. Much of the credit goes to series leads Scott Bakula and Dean Stockwell, both of whom played drama and comedy in perfect pitch the whole time. #9 Firefly: 2002, 1 Season, Fox Joss Whedon had already thrown down the gauntlet on genre programming with "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and "Angel." Fox gave him a chance to do a new vision of science fiction, and Whedon ran with it. Unfortunately, Fox ran in the opposite direction, abandoning the show as it hit its stride. "Firefly" posited a future universe that echoed today's political landscape but felt like a classic western. From the spare theme song to the presence of neither aliens nor sound in space, "Firefly" was about the details. #8 Farscape: 1999-2003, 4 Seasons, Syfy Probably the item on this list to invite the most debate, but that's too bad. "Farscape" crammed more into an episode than some shows do in an entire season. Yes, there were puppets. But there were also wiseass heroes, operatic villains, many discussions about physics, loves among tragedy, deaths, and, well, a whole lot of fun. Ben Browder's next-gen Buck Rogers was the glue, and the rest was gravy #7 The X-Files: 1993-2002, 9 Seasons, Fox One of the longest-running shows of its kind (certainly on American network television), "The X-Files" was groundbreaking because it married the familiar TV formula of the police procedural (our heroes are FBI!) with the fantastic (and they chase aliens!). Built solidly on the chemistry of leads David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson, the show featured many great done-in-ones parked against a heady backdrop of conspiracy and alien abduction.

Yes, it went on too long. That's probably because no one wanted it to leave. #6 The Prisoner: 1967-1968, 1 Season, ITV The spiritual follow up to Patrick McGoohan's "Danger Man" ("Secret Agent" in the States), "The Prisoner" went way beyond the concept of "former spy washes up on mysterious island". George Markstein and McGoohan put together a number of ideas that resulted in the highly allegorical tale of the former agent trapped in a mysterious village. While many of the trappings were obviously sci-fi, much of the density of the show came from its thought provoking ruminations on social constructs and the will of the individual. And of course, it's got maybe the best ending ever. #5 Lost: 2004-2010, 6 Seasons, ABC Complain all you want about the finale, we're here to tell you something: not all questions ever need to be answered and no one owes you anything. Part of the majesty of "Lost" was that it did dare to raise questions and challenge assumptions in an age where TV is seemingly ruled by a vast armada of reality TV. "Lost" was unreality TV, charging headlong into time travel, alternate realities, smoke monsters and more with abandon. Not every viewer may have been totally satisfied, but one can hardly dispute the totality of vision and the flair with which the creators, cast, and crew pulled it off. Plus, polar bears. #4 The Outer Limits/The Twilight Zone (tie!): Limits: 1963-1965, 2 Seasons, ABC; Zone: 1959-1964, 5 Seasons, CBS This slot has to be a tie. "Zone" came first and ran longer, but had a lot more emphasis on fantasy in its run. "Limits" included a lot more science fiction in its short life, but didn't have the staying power of "Zone." Nevertheless, they're both testaments to the possible excellence of anthology programming. "Limits" ended up providing us with the seed for "Terminator" in Harlan Ellison's "Soldier." And we love "Zone" for nothing so much as "To Serve Man," adapted by Rod Serling from Damon Knight's story. That's what classic means, folks. #3 Battlestar Galactica: 2003 intro miniseries, 2004-2009 series, 4 Seasons, SyFy Updating the lovable 1978 cheeseball in a ferocious manner, BSG defied expectations with a remake light-years beyond the ambition of the original. It was a series bold enough to ask you to sympathize with identity-stealing villains, then ballsy enough to ask you to identify with terrorists and religious fanatics during a time of real-life war. There was grousing about the last few minutes of the series finale, but let's consider the 110 minutes or so that came before that: some of the most intelligent and breathless action you'll ever see on TV. BSG goes down a classic, period. #2 Star Trek Original Series: 1966-1969, 3 Seasons, NBC

What can you really say here? "Star Trek" is "Star Trek," a cultural phenomenon that bridges generations, survives and thrives in reinterpretation, and invites reinvention. Yeah, so, the science isn't perfect. But what is? How about Leonard Nimoy's Spock? How about the energy and bluster of a preeverything-I-do-is-intentionally-hammy William Shatner? How about every fit of pique thrown by DeForest Kelley? "Star Trek" is a cultural giant. We're still lining up to see "Star Trek" movies. Exploration plus the human spirit divided by dilemma and action. It's an equation that still works, 44 years later and counting. #1 Doctor Who 1963-1989/2005-Present, 32 Seasons, BBC One/BBC HD Fiendishly clever by incorporating the means to recast the lead into the very premise of the show, "Doctor Who" remains the longestrunning science fiction program in, well, any kind of history. Eleven actors have played The Doctor, all different incarnations of the same man thanks to the Time Lord's ability to regenerate. The shows over time have spanned virtually any kind of tale that can be told within sciencefiction -- and beyond. There's action, humor and a fair amount of wrenching drama (don't believe me? Witness the end of David Tennant's remarkable run). Granted, the good Doctor left the air for a time in the '90s, but it's safe to say that he's made more than a firm comeback. At 32 seasons and counting, "Doctor Who" must be the top sci-fi show ever.

Paranormal Activity scares up a prequel

Paranormal Activity is back for a third installment and this time, were in for some retro camcorder scares. The people behind the extremely successful horror franchise (the first movie raked in $107 million on a $15,000 production budget) just unveiled a trailer for the prequel, starring sisters Katie and Kristi as young girls in the late 1980s. The demonic sightings that were captured on digital and security cameras in the first two Paranormal flicks seem to have been replaced by the good ol camcorder and tripod. Paranormal Activity 3 will be released in theatres October 2011.

PSYCHIC READINGS BY ELLEN HARTWELL ellenhartwell.com Know the future today!

Where Has The Paranormal Gone?

Where Have All the Ghosts, Bigfoot, Faeries, Gnomes, UFOs and Aliens Gone?
appeared to disappear, within minutes, the UFO was identified as a plane landing at the Toronto Island Airport. A quick call to a contact at Pearson Internationals Air Traffic Control confirmed fact that what UFO enthusiasts believed was a flying saucer from another planet was indeed a small commercial plane on final approach and subsequent landing at Toronto Island Airport. With all the evidence that Marty and I were able to present to the UFO Groupies, they were still insistent that what they had seen was a UFO enter Lake Ontario, to an underwater UFO base that was off the shores of Hamilton. All the reports of the paranormal have been made by people who do believe or are sitting on the fence between Believer and Skeptic, just waiting for the excuse to become full blown believers. In the dozens of haunted locations that I have been in, I have never seen a ghost, apparition, or witnessed anything that could not be explained by a rational mind. On the other hand, while at those same locations at the very same time, other people swore that they had witnessed ghostly apparitions, doors open and close by invisible forces and even articles levitating without any visible means of support. The difference - they saw, what they wanted to see through the manifestation of subconscious imagery, which, could be in fact transmitted telepathically to others who wanted to believe and were open to participating in a paranormal experience. I often relate the following demonstration of this to people at lectures and seminars that I have given over the years. At the invitation of a popular Toronto talk show host, I performed the following at the corner of Bloor and Yonge Street. It was noon, and people from all the office buildings in the area were leaving for their lunches. I stood on the SW corner of the intersection and looked straight up, my hands by my side, not saying a word. Within minutes, I had amassed a crowd of inquisitive Torontonians who were also looking up, and now pointing to what they believed, or perceived that I was looking at. What this very simple experiment proved is that the crowd around me believed that I was looking at something in the sky, and based on their belief and my action of looking into the sky, they created, in their subconscious, an object that they were convinced was real. Taking this simple experiment and applying it to paranormal activity, we can easily see how the perception effect of the paranormal works. This also explains why there has not been any physical or scientific evidence to support many of the claims of the paranormal that can be found on the internet. Simply put, you cannot capture a mental mirage in a digital photo. If you are reading this column and you have proof, I mean real proof that ghosts, bigfoot, faeries, gnomes, UFOs or aliens do exist, I would like to hear from by sending me your story and your proof to itisfact@xzoneradiotv.com. Consequently, if you have proof that claims of the paranormal are fake, please send your stories to itisfiction@xzoneradiotv.com. Now for some exciting news! REL-MAR McConnell Media Company, the parent company of The X Zone Radio & TV Show is now proud to announce the launch of our 24/7/365 new TV channel on the net - The Paranormal Broadcast Network www.paranormalbroadcastnetwork.com where you can watch Astronauts Gone Wild, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to The Moon, Creepy Canada and The X Zone Radio & TV Show, just to name a few. Thats The Paranormal Broadcast Network www.paranormalbroadcastnetwork.com. For The X Zone Radio & TV Show, The X Chronicles Newspaper and The Paranormal Broadcast Network, I am, Rob McConnell (xzone@xzoneradiotv.com). []

By Rob McConnell Last evening, my wife Laura called me upstairs to bring to my attention that there was an episode of Gene Simmons Family Jewels, in which Gene and his wife Shannon are brought aboard the Queen Elizabeth II, which is reportedly haunted. Being led through the supposed haunted areas of the ship, now turned hotel / tourist attraction now moored in Long Beach, California by a supposed psychic/medium, Gene and Shannon, did not experience, and understandably, experience any paranormal activity whatsoever. Chuckling, under the scorning eyes of my wife, I returned to my home office which is located in the lower level of our Hamilton home and contemplated the past 20 years of doing The X Zone Radio & TV Show, working on various TV productions in Canada and abroad, publishing The X Chronicles Newspaper and going on so-called paranormal investigations asking myself, why is there only a very small percentage of the human race on this planet at this very time who believe that they have in fact witnessed a paranormal event? I decided to have an overdue heart-toheart with myself and while sitting at my desk, wrote on the pad in front of me, Are you a Skeptic or a Believer? Well, after a few minutes of pondering this self-inflicted quandary, I realized that I am both. I am a realist! I started going through the investigation files that I had worked on with the Canadian Registry of Paranormal Activity with my good friend Martin Mclean when The X Chronicles Newspaper was started in St. Catharines, Ontario some 20 years ago. The first file that I went through was the reports of UFO flying into Lake Ontario off the shores of Hamilton, as observed by a local coffee guzzling, donut munching group of selfproclaimed Niagara UFO Researchers. As Marty and watched the clear skies over Lake Ontario, the group pointed out with excitement a shiny object in the sky that was descending from the heavens and appeared to disappear into the waters off the shores of Hamilton The key word here is appeared. Checking a map that we had brought with us, finding our exact location on the map and then using a compass heading that we had taken as the UFO descended and vanished into Lake Ontario and drawing a straight line from our location to the point where the UFO

MORE WEIRD NEWS!

Government in Action! "Common sense lost its voice on this one," concluded a Wethersfield, Conn., city councilman, lamenting the local school board's having spent at least $630,000 to "resolve" an ethics complaint against the board's chairwoman -- all because her son had improperly taken a $400 high school course for free. The town's ethics board conducted more than 60 hours of hearings over 11 months, incurring $407,000 in legal expenses, and finally voted, 3-2, to uphold the complaint. (However, the ethics board ordered only that the chairwoman reimburse the $400; the school board then voted to pay all her legal expenses.) [Hartford Courant, 6-10-2011] "Science does not trump the testimony of individuals," said Detroit prosecutor Marilyn Eisenbraun, explaining her office's decision in April to disregard DNA evidence that the University of Michigan's Innocence Clinic said exonerates Karl Vinson, 56, who has spent 25 years in prison for rape. Despite the science, Eisenbraun said she had to stick with eyewitness identification by the victim. Although Vinson has been eligible for release for 15 years, the Parole Board keeps turning him down -- because he refuses to acknowledge guilt. (Update: In July, the Michigan Court of Appeals declined to order either Vinson's release or a new trial, but did grant him an extraordinary right to appeal, based on the new evidence.) [Detroit Free Press, 4-18-2011, 7-22011] In June, as five young men gathered around the Mount Tabor Reservoir near Portland, Ore., one urinated in it, thus "contaminating" the 7.2 million gallons that serve the city, and, said Water Bureau administrator David Shaff, necessitating that the entire supply be dumped. Under questioning by the weekly Portland Mercury whether the water is also dumped when an animal urinates in it (or worse, dies in it), Shaff replied, certainly not. "If we did that, we'd be (dumping the water) all the time." Well, asked the reporter, what's the difference? Because, said Shaff (sounding confident of his logic), "Do you want to be drinking someone's pee?" [Portland Mercury, 615-2011] []

Residents Hurt By Avro Arrow Demise

Many local residents hurt by Avro Arrow demise
Orangeville Banner
With blue sky and ideal atmospheric conditions, chief test pilot Jan Zurakowski taxied the experimental CF-105 onto the runway. Crowds of Avro employees lined the tarmac and rooftops that day to watch their creation in action. What began as a speck in the distance, within seconds reached a crescendo of thundering power as, with the grace of a dream the Arrow shot past the admirers. Jan Zurakowski directed the 105s nose towards the heavens, kicked in the afterburners, and left the CF-100 and Sabre chase planes hopelessly behind. Zurakowskis dream machine climbed to its cruising altitude of 53,000 feet, then reached a speed of mach 1.98 or 1307 mph (2,104 km/h). When Jan landed after being slowed down by the drag chute, the noses scorched paint was a testament to the speed he had reached. This flight should have signalled a day when the Canadian aeronautical industry reached its zenith, as Maltons Avro Canada plant in 1953 had begun the development of the CF-105 Arrow, destined to become the deltawinged supersonic aircraft which was to be the primary interceptor for the RCAF from 1960 and beyond. The Arrows titanium skin was unique, and its twin Pratt & Whitney J-75 jet engines propelled the craft to a speed almost twice the speed of sound, the 105 heralding an advanced design that was well ahead of any such aircraft that existed in its day. In 1957, the governing Liberal Party lost power to John Diefenbakers Conservatives. To overcome what it referred to as reckless Liberal spending, the Conservatives were determined to demonstrate their fiscal responsibility to the Canadian electorate. From the day Diefenbaker gained power, the fate of the Arrow was in jeopardy. The CF-105 was to be armed with the Canadair Velvet Glove missiles and prospects for the Arrow looked promising, even though further development was still necessary. The launch of the Soviet Sputnic, however, altered the perspective of air defence in the world. In place of manned fighter aircraft, the United States government pressured the Canadian Department of National Defence to consider its American BOMARC missile system as the frontline means of Canadas defence. Following studies by Canadian officials, on Feb. 20, 1959, by cancelling the Arrow contract, Diefenbakers government put 14,528 employees out of work. Several hundred, of those who lost their jobs with Avro Canada were residents of Orangeville. They then had to scramble for any job they could obtain, whether they were qualified or not. Dismissed Avro employees thereafter referred to that date as Black Friday. Suddenly six experimental versions of the CF-105 that were built were destined for the

scrap heap. The BOMARC missile system adopted by the Canadian government never did prove to be effective. When John Diefenbakers party lost power in 1963, in all probability it was due in large part to its mishandling of the Avro Arrow program. Engineers with aeronautical expertise drained away to NASA in the US, where they fuelled the American space program. The death of the Arrow was not the only fatality of the Diefenbaker guillotine, Avro Canada had also been developing the YZ-9 Avrocar, a vertical takeoff and landing aircraft which in the air resembled a flying saucer. Two prototypes were built, as proof-ofconcept test vehicles. Tethered to the ground, one of the experimental models sounding like the drone of a million angry wasps, climbed to treetop heights. The YZ-9 Avrocar did have some unresolved thrust and stability problems, but proved its ability to achieve vertical flight. In addition to the promising Avrocar and Arrow, Avro Canada had under development the Iroquois engine, which was reputed to exceed the power of the Pratt & Whitneys by 25 percent, with a corresponding increase in speed for the Arrow. The Iroquois engine, was once referred to as the jewel in the Arrow program. Avro Canada was also developing the C102 Jetliner, an advanced version of a commercial airliner with handling qualities and performance superior to any other airliner in existence. In 1950, the Jetliner carried the first jet airmail from Toronto to New York City in a record time of 58 minutes. Built by Avro Canada in 1949, the Jetliner was beaten into the air, by only 13 days by the De Havilland Comet, the Avro creation thus becoming the second jet airliner in the world. During its brief career the Avro Jetliner, for its exceptional handling, garnered interest from American entrepreneur Howard Hughes who considered its production under licence,

and ordered 11 for his personal use. Considering this trio of amazing craft, it was truly a sad day when Canadas aeronautical supremacy was allowed to slip down the drain.

Malvern East researcher revealing mind power

A MALVERN East researcher is interested in altered states of consciousness. Kylie Harris is working on a Phoenix Institute project measuring extra sensory perception. The institute offers counselling and therapy using visual art, music, movement, and transpersonal techniques. In para-psychology literature, theres an established protocol to facilitate altered states of consciousness, Ms Harris said. The project seeks an alternative active protocol in a shamanic-like journeying technique. Rather than creating an environment that quiets the mind, the project looks at whether a more active, guided imagery would also lead to altered states, she said. It involves listening to a recording that contains shamanic drumming music and verbal instructions. One of four picture is selected by the researcher, but not revealed to the participant, who is able to hold the covered picture and asked to record any thoughts or visions while listening to the recording; then the four pictures are revealed and the participant tries to determine which of the four pictures they had held, she said. The new protocol which could be used in a therapeutic context, she said.[] WE ARE ALWAYS INTERESTED IN WHAT YOU, THE MEMBERS OF THE X ZONE NATION HAVE TO SAY! SEND US AN EMAIL TO

xzone@xzoneradiotv.com

Goodall Tells the Rich to Save Earth

Goodall tells the rich to save endangered Planet Earth
By Lusekelo Philemon
Arenowned conservationist Dr Jane Goodall has asked developed nations to assist developing countries in addressing ravaging poverty, saying that the poverty was derailing global effort to address environmental challenges facing the endangered planet earth. She explained that millions of people in developing nations had been stuck in the jungle of poverty; as a result most of them relied on forests and surrounding bushes to obtain firewood, charcoal and timber, among other products, for their livelihood. The global environmental conservation efforts should go hand in hand with addressing poverty amongst people in the developing world, Dr Goodall told a gathering turned up at a tourist hotel here to watch a documentary film titled, Janes Journey in Celebrating 50 years of Environmental and Humanitarian Achievements. The film show was organised by the Jane Goodall Foundation and Tanzania Natural Resources Forum (TNRF). A 75-year-old conservationist, who began her groundbreaking research nearly half a century ago, said that poverty was very rampant in rural areas in most developing countries. The UN messenger of peace noted that people in the developing world need to be assisted with small-scale projects, which would enable them generate income and in turn, assist them to reduce pressure they exert on forests and the environment, in general. Dr Goodall called upon people to play their role within their localities and beyond in protecting the planet earth, which she said was overwhelmed with a number of challenges, including global warming. She also asked people to learn how they could live in peace and harmony with the natural world for the good of the present and future generations. Dr Goodal, who is a champion of the worldwide Roots and Shoots programme, called for more environmental education to school-going children, saying the move would make them become aware of critical environmental knowledge and issues. She informed that the Roots & Shoots programme, which aims to inspire children and youths to make positive changes happen for people, animals and the environment, was operational in more than 120 countries worldwide. On July 14, 1960, Jane first set foot on the shores of Lake Tanganyika, in what is now Tanzanias Gombe National Park. The chimpanzee behavioral research, she pioneered there, continues to produce a wealth of scientific discovery, and her vision has expanded into a global mission to empower people to make a difference for all living things. The launched documentary offers an intimate portrait of the private person behind the world-famous icon, possibly the most fascinating woman of the life time, whose

scientific breakthroughs are considered to be among the most important of the past 100 years.

Berkhamstead Psychic Didn't See Arrest Coming

Psychic George Lavery, who was sentenced in his absence for fraud in June 2009, has been arrested in Spain and is now behind bars for his crime. Lavery appeared before the Inner London Crown Court in Southwark. He was originally sentenced to three years in prison and ordered to pay 5,500 in compensation, but last week he received a further 6 months behind bars for absconding. Lavery, aged 44 and formerly of High Street in Berkhamsted at the time of the offence, worked as a psychic medium and had been contacted by the victim, who wanted to contact a girlfriend after their relationship had broken down. Lavery, also known as Simon Lavery, told the victim that he could help him rebuild the relationship. Lavery and Hamilton then contacted the victim pretending to be the ex girlfriend via a mobile phone the victim had bought for them. They persuaded him to part with thousands of pounds of money under the pretext of a wedding between the man and his ex girlfriend. This included an engagement ring. The victim, a man from Watford, eventually realised that he had been defrauded when he saw the mobile phone he had bought at Lavery's house. He then contacted the ex girlfriend on her usual mobile number, but she knew nothing of the wedding. The offence took place between October 1 2007 and 2 June 2008. Lavery and Hamilton pleaded not guilty in September 2008, but were found guilty of fraud by false representation in June 2009. They were sentenced the same day. Detective Constable Phil Freebrey, the officer in the case, said: "This is excellent news that we have now arrested Lavery and he is finally doing time for his callous, greedy crime. It sends a strong message to criminals that they can run and try to evade justice, but we will

eventually catch up with them. DC Freebrey added: "Lvery was eventually traced to Benidorm in the Costa Blanca, after some helpful information from members of the public following our media appeals at the time." However, his accomplice John Hamilton, aged 54 from St Leonards in Sussex, is still wanted on warrant and thought to be in Spain also. Anyone with information should call investigating officer DC Freebrey via the nonemergency number 101. Alternatively, call Crimestoppers (an independent charity) anonymously on 0800 555111

Can't Possibly Be True

It was not difficult to find critics when the Orlando-area government job-service engine Workforce Central Florida said it was spending more than $70,000 of federal stimulus money to help the laid-off by handing out 6,000 satiny capes for jobless "superheroes" to "fight" "Dr. Evil Unemployment." ("Absolutely absurd" was the reaction of a laid-off customerservice representative.) Several critics interviewed by the Orlando Sentinel noted that such an awkward program further erodes the unemployed's fragile self-respect. WCF, though, remained convinced. In the words of a spokeswoman, "Everyone is a superhero in the fight against unemployment." [Orlando Sentinel, 4-15-2011] Oops! Oswind David was convicted of "first-degree assault" in a 2006 trial in New York City, but unknown to him, his lawyer, and the judge, the charge had already been dismissed by another judge due to prosecutorial error. Nonetheless, David has been in prison since his conviction, serving a 23-year term, and was freed only in May when the error came to light. (However, the New York City district attorney still resisted releasing David, arguing that only the "first-degree" part had been dismissed. A judge finally freed David on bail while prosecutors ponder reopening the case.) [WABC-TV, 5-26-2011] []

Ghosts of the CNE

Ghosts of the CNE
Paranormal investigator tells haunted tales of Exhibition Place
InSideToronto.com
There have long been stories of ghosts lurking on the grounds of Exhibition Place - accounts by staff of books falling off shelves, seeing apparitions out of the corners of their eyes and feelings they weren't alone. And according to Richard Palmisano, a paranormal activity investigator, these aren't just tall tales. After a 13-month investigation of the Exhibition grounds, Palmisano said he has confirmed the presence of many ghosts there. Roaming the buildings is a ghost who communicates using bells and maracas. Palmisano said he believes the ghost was a show clown when he was alive. Then there is Michael, an electrician who worked in the general services building when it was a hydro facility and was electrocuted when he knelt on a live line. "He is looking after people. Subconsciously he gets people to do things like post warning signs or put a gate up," Palmisano said. Palmisano's favourite spirit, he said, has to be Jenny, a young girl who lives on the first floor in Stanley Barracks. "Jenny is looking for her cat," he said. "She died in an accident, her scarf got tangled and she was strangled. But she is there and her father is there looking after her." In his latest book, Ghosts of the Canadian National Exhibition, Palmisano chronicles his team's 13-month investigation of the grounds and buildings of Exhibition Place. The research for this book began during the Canadian National Exhibition (CNE) in 2009. "They were doing these ghost walks and I heard about it and went down because I grew up around the CNE and loved going down there every year," he said. "So I went down and looked at their ghost walks and then I wrote them a letter requesting to do a full investigation." Palmisano said the archivists at the CNE came on board and they started a full investigation in October 2009. Each chapter of the book details investigations into buildings like the Stanley Barracks, the Horse Palace, the Press Building and Scadding Cabin. "There were some buildings that had less activity, for example the Press Building," Palmisano said. "But there is not one building that didn't have (ghosts)." Although Palmisano said the activities of ghosts don't often frighten him, Stanley Barracks was probably the scariest of the investigations his team conducted. "There are two individuals that gravitate to the basement (at Stanley Barracks). Nasty people," Palmisano said. "One is named Bob and his buddy Dave or David and they terrorize the other spirits actually." Palmisano has been investigating the paranormal for 32 years. His interest in the

subject began when he was a child living in the area of Dufferin and Bloor streets. "It was a very haunted house," Palmisano said. "I used to hear people walking and talking down the hallways when there was no one there and I used to get coat hangers scraping on the back of the closet door in the middle of the night and stuff like that." As scary as that was for him, Palmisano said it piqued an interest and a curiosity about ghosts that has never quite been satisfied. Palmisano, who lives in South Etobicoke, now owns and operates two companies dedicated to the study and advancement of paranormal research: The Searcher Group, which currently has 21 members from investigators and researchers to technicians, mediums and scientists; and The Canadian Institute of Parapsychology, which provides education and public assistance. He has also developed what he calls the Memory Matrix theory, which looks at why ghosts are here. "When I formed the Searcher Group, we started looking at old theories and developing new theories that actually make sense," Palmisano said, "because there really hasn't been a lot of advancement in what we do over the last 150 years." During their investigations, Palmisano and his team use electronic voice phenomena (EVP), mediums and an array of devices that test electromagnetic and static fields. Spirits, Palmisano said, are social and often talk to each other. Sometimes through this communication they use each other's names, which can be helpful in his investigations. "The backbone of our investigative work is surveillance. We use audio video surveillance," he said. "If we think there is activity in a particular hallway or a room we drop a unit in the room and then block it off so people can't get in there." Those audio and video recordings are where Palmisano said the team gets most of its information.

During the 2011 CNE, Palmisano will conduct some lectures, do book signings and lead a virtual tour based on the book. For more information on events planned with Palmisano during the CNE, visit www.cnearchives.com Beginning this fall, Palmisano and The Canadian Institute of Parapsychology will offer courses in paranormal investigation. Ghosts of the Canadian National Exhibition, published by Dundurn Press, was released July 18. This is the fourth book that Palmisano has written and he is working on a fifth book about an old investigation, which he said was the scariest experience he has had in his career. "There are things out there that people shouldn't deal with," Palmisano said. "They aren't ghosts. They are beyond ghosts; some people would call them demonic. []

Paul the Psychic Octopus

The Search for Paul the Psychic Octopus' Successor
In 2010, Paul the Psychic Octopus correctly predicted the outcome of all of Germany's World Cup matches. Can a cephalopod have extrasensory abilities? News item June 21, 2011: The Women's Soccer World Cup matches begin on June 26, 2011, and will be held in Sinsheim, Germany. Meanwhile, the Sea Life aquarium chain is searching for the successor for Paul the Psychic Octopus, a cephalopod mollusk. Paul the Psychic Octopus made news last summer when he correctly predicted the results of all of Germanys matches in the 2010 World Cup and the loss to Spain in the semifinals. Can animals have psychic talents? Parapsychologists call animal psychic ability anpsi. There has been a lot of research and documentation in this speculative science. The evidence points to some animals do have psychic abilities. The octopus is considered the most intelligent of all invertebrates. Paul the Psychic Octopus: Predictions The talentled animal who resided in Sea Life Aquarium, Oberhausen, Germany, correctly predicted all six of Germany's World Cup games, including its loss to Spain in the semi-finals. Paul doesnt have a Ouija Board, pendulum, Tarot cards or a crystal ball or any of the traditional tools of divination, which are commonly used to aid individuals who predict the future. His keepers put two clear boxes into his aquarium. One has Germanys flag on it; the other, the opposing countrys flag. Both of the boxes had mussels in them. The winner was determined by which box Paul opened. Paul the Psychic Octopus: Fame In July 2010, Katie Nelson, New York Daily News staff writer, wrote, in Octopus German Flag Spain, that when Paul predicted Germany would lose to Spain in the semi-finals, the Germans were angry with him. Throngs of people insulted Paul and his mother who was in another aquarium. Some soccer fans posted octopus recipes on the Internet, with threats to Paul. The Spanish government defended him. Spain's Prime Minister Jose Luiz Rodriguez Zapatero facetiously said that he was concerned for Paul and was thinking about sending him a team to protect himself during a radio broadcast. Environment and Fisheries Minister Elena Espinosa said that she would ask for a ban to go fishing for Paul so the Germans couldnt feast on him. He also made an enemy Iran's President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The talented cephalopod attracted thousands of people to his aquarium. Paul was the inspiration for songs and a documentary film: The Life And Times Of Paul The Octopus. Filmmaker Alexandre Philippe Paul said he was a friendly octopus. Bob Burhans, curator at SeaLife Carlsbad Aquarium, in the same aquarium chain as the one where Paul lived, said he doesn't know if octopi are psychic, but he's impressed with the aquatic animals intelligence. He said the creatures are about as bright as dogs. Employees put food in a bottle to see how long the cephalopods would take to open it. The first day, it was fifteen minutes; the second day, five. The octopi, then, learned to open the bottles more quickly. Paul the Psychic Octopus: Epitaph Tara Kelly, of NewsFeed, wrote RIP Paul the World Cup Psychic Octopus about Pauls death. He was two and a half years old when he peacefully died of natural causes, while sleeping, on October 26, 2010, aged two years, eight months. The aquarium staff said his death was not unexpected because octopi usually live for a few years. Paul is remembered for his World Cup predictions. He will have a successor who will be named Paul, in his honor. Paul the Psychic Octopus: Choosing a Successor David Moye, in the Search is on for New Psychic Octopus, wrote that the cephalopods heir will be selected when the Women's World Cup starts on June 26, 2011 in Sinsheim, Germany. Each of the countrys eight Sea Life aquariums will have one octopus predict the results by picking mussels to eat from one of two bottles with the competing countries flags, as Paul did. Predictions will be released on each match day at 11 AM. The animal with the most correct predictions will be Pauls official successor. Crystal Kranz, who works at an aquarium, won't speculate about who the winner will be. She said that Paul raised awareness about octopi and attracted many people to aquariums where people can learn about them. Philippe is skeptical that the other octopi can duplicate Pauls record. Crystal Kranz, who works at an aquarium, won't speculate about who the winner will be. She said that Paul raised awareness about octopi and attracted many people to aquariums where people can learn about them. Philippe is skeptical that the other octopi can duplicate Pauls record. Could Paul have been Psychic? Parapsychologists and witnesses believe that animals have psychic ability. One of them is to predict the future, including death. In 2007, Oscar, a Nursing Home Cat Successfully Predicted Residents Deaths made international headlines. When he went lay on patients beds, the staff called families because death was imminent. He was 100 % accurate. Octopi are considered as intelligent as dogs. Dogs' Have Death Premonitions and Grief: They Know When Loved Ones are Dying and Grieve Afterwards. This suggests that Paul had the psychic ability to predict the future, although the prophecies involved sports, not death. Drs. J. B. Rhine, who coined the term, anpsi, and William McDougall, the founders of modern parapsychology, studied Lady Wonder, a horse who demonstrated psychic abilities, for more than a month, according to Connie Hill, ed., Psychic Pets & Spirit Animals, Llewellyn Publications, 1997. Lady Wonder answered math and conversational questions, found missing children, had telepathic ability and predicted events. She presaged the involvement of the USA and Russia in World War II, Franklin D. Roosevelt winning his third election and the names of the champions in heavyweight boxing matches. This research evidences that Paul, most likely, was able to foretell the future. Hopefully, one or more successors will be found. More research is needed about Anpsi, the Psychic Abilities of Animals who Exhibit Extra Sensory Perception. For now, Paul is remembered for his 100% correct predictions and people anticipate who his successor or successors will be. []

Carl Jung - Taking Inner Life Seriously

Carl Jung, Part 1: Taking inner life seriously
Achieving the right balance between what Jung called the ego and self is central to his theory of personality development
Mark Vernon - The Guardian
If you have ever thought of yourself as an introvert or extrovert; if you've ever deployed the notions of the archetypal or collective unconscious; if you've ever loved or loathed the new age; if you have ever done a Myers-Briggs personality or spirituality test; if you've ever been in counselling and sat opposite your therapist rather than lain on the couch in all these cases, there's one man you can thank: Carl Gustav Jung. The Swiss psychologist was born in 1875 and died on 6 June 1961, 50 years ago next week. His father was a village pastor. His grandfather also Carl Gustav was a physician and rector of Basel University. He was also rumoured to be an illegitimate son of Goethe, a myth Carl Gustav junior enjoyed, not least when he grew disappointed with his father's doubt-ridden Protestantism. Jung felt "a most vehement pity" for his father, and "saw how hopelessly he was entrapped by the church and its theological teaching", as he wrote in his autobiographical book, Memories, Dreams, Reflections. Jung's mother was a more powerful figure, though she seems to have had a split personality. On the surface she came across as a conventional pastor's wife, but she was "unreliable", as Jung put it. She suffered from breakdowns. And, differently again, she would occasionally speak with a voice of authority that seemed not to be her own. When Jung's father died, she spoke to her son like an oracle, declaring: "He died in time for you." In short, his childhood was disturbed, and he developed a schizoid personality, becoming withdrawn and aloof. In fact, he came to think that he had two personalities, which he named No 1 and No 2. No 1 was the child of his parents and times. No 2, though, was a timeless individual, "having no definable character at all born, living, dead, everything in one, a total vision of life". (At school, his peers seem to have picked this up, as his nickname was "Father Abraham".) Jung was perhaps not so unusual, as many children indulge similar internal fantasies. Where Jung differed was in taking his inner life seriously. "I have always tried to make room for anything that wanted to come from within," he noted. Later he renamed and generalised No 1 and No 2, calling them the ego and the self. Achieving the right balance between the two aspects of the psyche is central to his theory of personality development, called individuation. Jung finally came into his own at university. He proved himself a brilliant student, developing "a tremendous appetite on all

fronts", graduating in medicine and natural science in double-quick time. His first public paper was entitled On the Limits of the Exact Sciences, in which he questioned an inflexible philosophy of materialism. His doctorate was On the Psychology and Pathology of So-Called Occult Phenomena, and laid the foundations for two key ideas in his thought. First, that the unconscious contains part-personalities, called complexes. One way in which they can reveal themselves is in occult phenomena. Second, most of the work of personality development is done at the unconscious level. He first made a name for himself in the Burghlzli psychiatric hospital in Zrich, working with Eugen Bleuler, the doctor who coined the word "schizophrenia". Jung developed the word association test of Francis Galton, the cousin of Charles Darwin. A patient was read a list of words and asked to respond to each one with the first word that comes into their mind. The response, and the time taken to produce it, is recorded. Previous research had already demonstrated that prolonged response times indicate that the stimulus word unconsciously troubles the patient. Sometimes, it is possible to identify a group of such words. Jung's contribution was to link these groups with the unconscious part-personalities and show how the test provides a window into the distressed world of the mentally ill. People are not simply mad, he concluded. Rather, there is a method in their madness. In one case, Jung showed that a patient who for 50 years had been fixated on the apparently meaningless task of making illusory shoes, had been abandoned by a lover who was a cobbler. Jung was becoming quite well known, with his fame in Zrich prompting the first of several questions that subsequently came to dog his reputation. It concerns his alleged womanising. At university, he discovered that he could sway an audience with the force of his character and ingenuity of his ideas. In Zrich, he gave public talks. "Clusters of women formed a phalanx around him before and after each of his lectures," writes Deidre Bair in her seminal biography. Then, a woman called Sabina Spielrein became his patient and, it was

rumoured, his lover perhaps just one of many. Later, he certainly formed a mnage trois with Toni Wolff, to which his wife Emma only slowly became reconciled. Sleeping with patients is now the unforgivable sin among psychotherapists. Had Jung committed it? After examining the evidence over several chapters, Bair concludes that it is impossible to discover the truth of what happened, though the rumours and speculation appear wildly exaggerated. After all, this was an age in which husbands and wives would greet each other with a chaste shake of the hand, even in private. Jung had an electric personality. It is hardly surprising that such charisma was interpreted as erotically unsettlingly. Further, the phenomenon of patients developing powerful feelings for their therapists part of what is called transference was then new. Freud's earliest collaborator, Josef Breuer, dropped the "talking cure" when one of his patients didn't just fall in love with him but developed a phantom pregnancy, naming him as the father. Freud first thought that transference was unhelpful and should be circumvented. Then, he came to believe that it was the cornerstone of psychodynamic therapy because it brings back to life otherwise buried feelings and affections. Continued on Page 21

News That Sounds Like a Joke

Night club singer Simon Ledger was arrested following a performance at the Driftwood Beach Bar on Britain's Isle of Wight in April after a patron complained to police. Ledger was covering the 1974 hit "Kung Fu Fighting," and two customers of Chinese descent reported that they felt victims of illegal "racially aggravated harassment." [Daily Telegraph, 4-27-2011]

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Carl Jung - Freud and the Nazis

Carl Jung, Part 2: A troubled relationship with Freud and the Nazis
Continued from Page 20

On the 50th anniversary of Jung's death it is time to put accusations of him collaborating with the Nazis to rest
Jung's relationship with Freud was ambivalent from the start. First contact was made in 1906, when Jung wrote about his word association tests, realising that they provided evidence for Freud's theory of repression. Freud immediately and enthusiastically wrote back. But Jung hesitated. It took him several months to write again. They met a year later and then it was friendship at first sight. The two talked non-stop for 13 hours. Freud called Jung "the ablest helper to have joined me thus far", and spoke of how Jung would be good for psychoanalysis as he was a respected scientist and a protestant a dark observation that was to haunt Jung three decades later when the Nazis came to power. For now, different tensions persisted. A request Jung made highlights one axis of difficulty: "Let me enjoy your friendship not as one between equals but as that of father and son," he wrote. The originator of the Oedipus situation, in which murderous undertones supposedly exist between a father and a son, was alarmed. Freud did anoint Jung his "son and heir", but he also experienced a series of neurotic episodes revealing the fear that Jung was a threat too. One such incident occurred when they travelled together to America in 1909. Conversation turned to the subject of the mummified corpses found in peat bogs, which prompted Freud to accuse Jung of wanting him dead. He then fainted. A similar thing happened again a while later. A different sign of conflict came when Jung asked Freud what he made of parapsychology. Sigmund was a complete sceptic: occult phenomena were to him a "black tide of mud". But as they were sitting talking, Jung's diaphragm began to feel hot. Suddenly, a bookcase in the room cracked loudly and they both jumped up. "There, that is an example of a so-called catalytic exteriorisation phenomenon," Jung retorted referring to his theory that the uncanny could be projections of internal strife. "Bosh!" Freud retorted, before Jung predicted that there would be another crack, which there was. All in all, from early on, Jung was nagged by the thought that Freud placed his personal authority above the quest for truth. And behind that lay deep theoretical differences between the two. Jung considered Freud too reductionist. He could not accept that the main drive in human life is sexual. Instead, he defined libido more broadly as psychic energy or life force, of

which sexuality is just one manifestation. As to the Oedipus complex, Jung came to believe that the tie between a child and its mother was not based upon latent incestuous passion, but stemmed from the fact that the mother was the primary provider of love and care. Jung had anticipated the attachment theory of John Bowlby, which has subsequently been widely confirmed. Jung also believed that the contents of the unconscious are not restricted to repressed material. Rather, the unconscious resources an individual's life. A human person is built up of layers. The conscious aspect is the psychosomatic whole that comprises the body and cognisant mental life. Beneath that lies a personal unconscious, a supply of material from the life of the individual. And beneath that lies a collective unconscious that is inherited. Jung believed he had objective evidence for this common heritage from his studies of schizophrenics, who apparently spoke of images and symbols they could not have discovered in their reading, say, or culturally. It is a contentious proposition to which we will return. For now, it's worth noting that again Jung anticipates post-Freudian theories, this time about the nature of the unconscious. In his recent book, The Social Animal, David Brooks observes that 21st century sciences are showing how the unconscious parts of the mind "are not dark caverns of repressed sexual urges." Jung wrote precisely that 100 years ago, and neuroscientists, psychologists and economists of today might find parts of Jung a highly suggestive read. For Freud, Jung was becoming a highly uncomfortable read, and by 1913 their friendship was at an end. Jung maintained his respect for Freud though: when he wrote Freud's obituary in 1939, he observed that Freud's work had "touched nearly every sphere of contemporary intellectual life". However, the betrayal that Freud felt has arguably spoiled relationships between the two schools of psychodynamic thought to this day. I was recently speaking with a Freudian analyst who quite casually referred to Jung as a womaniser and Nazi. We considered the first accusation last week. Now, we should consider the anti-Semitic charge. The evidence is carefully weighed in Deirdre Bair's biography and, in retrospect,

Jung could be accused of making mistakes during the 1930s. However, other actions he took clearly rescue his reputation. The accusation that he was a Nazi fellow traveller stem from evidence such as a magazine article he had written 1918. Jung drew distinctions between Jewish and German psyches to illustrate the variety of heritable elements of the collective unconscious. When Aryans reread the article in the 1930s, they distorted it out of all proportion. Further, they glossed over another observation, that the German psyche had "barbarian" tendencies, Jung's reflection on the 1914-18 war. They also missed his main point that the unconscious should be taken very seriously. It can drive the death of millions. Jung is also accused of complying with the Nazi authorities, in particular with Matthias Gring, the man who became the leader of organised psychotherapy in Germany, not least because he was the cousin of Hermann Gring. In fact, Matthias put Jung's name to pro-Nazi statements without Jung's knowledge. Jung was furious, not least because he was actually fighting to keep German psychotherapy open to Jewish individuals. And that was not all. Bair reveals that Jung was involved in two plots to oust Hitler, essentially by having a leading physician declare the Fhrer mad. Both came to nothing. It has also come to light that Jung operated as a spy for the OSS (the predecessor to the CIA). He was called "Agent 488" and his handler, Allen W. Dulles, later remarked: "Nobody will probably ever know how much Prof Jung contributed to the allied cause during the war." After the war, Rabbi Leo Baeck, a survivor of the Theresienstadt concentration camp, confronted his friend about his involvement with the Nazis. Jung admitted failings, though perhaps also had the chance to tell a fuller story. Baeck and he were fully reconciled. Fifty years after Jung's death, the anniversary that falls today, it is time that casual Nazi accusations ceased too.[]

KNOW YOUR FUTURE TODAY! PSYCHIC ELLEN HARTWELL www.ellenhartwell.com

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Nazis Taught Dogs to Read and Speak

Wooffan SS Experiment: WWII Nazis Taught Dogs to Read and Speak
Suite101.com
Nazis tried to train dogs to learn communication skills in the Tier-Sprechschule ASRA School. Dr Jan Bondeson researched and wrote about the experiment. The Wooffan SS experiment was researched by Dr. Jan Bondeson, a senior lecturer at Cardiff University, who wrote about his findings in his book, Amazing Dogs: A Cabinet of Canine Curiosities. The Nazis established the dog school, Tier-Sprechschule ASRA in the 1930s, based in Leutenburg and directed by headmistress Margarethe Schmitt. They hoped the canines would learn to communicate with their SS masters. Nazi officials recruited dogs from all over Germany and trained them to speak, read and tap out words using their paws. Wooffan SS Experiment: The Nazi Dog School In the 1920s, Germany had many animal psychologists who believed dogs were able to communicate and think abstractedly. Nazis were very interested in their ideas. Hitler was commended for his attitude towards animals; Goering, a proponent of animal protection. Hitler was interested in the prospect of using trained dogs in the Nazi war effort, so he advised members of the German army to study the canines usefulness. Theres no evidence that the SS used talking dogs during WW II. Nazi Trained Accomplishments Dogs: Amazing

People who have canine families have taught dogs commands, such as Sit, and tricks like Roll over. Horses are taught to change gaits and rear up on command. Ive trained both animals and actually trained one of my cats. Minx can be a pest. One day, I told her to go to bed. She did! From that day on, every time I told her to go to bed, she has obeyed. Cats can be toilet trained. These animals also communicate with humans by their vocalizations and body language. When Draco, wants a treat, he taps on my arm. Minx learned how to do this by watching him. Animal Psychic Phenomena and the Nazi Trained Dogs Anpsi is the scientific study of animals psychic abilities. Joseph Banks, "J.B." Rhine PhD, one of the Fathers of Modern Parapsychology coined the term. In 1952, the US Army asked Rhine if he could train dogs to locate underground mines by dowsing, the psychic ability to detect underground objects. The dogs were trained to sit when they detected a box. The handlers werent told where Rhines colleagues buried the boxes to eliminate the possibility of telepathy. Two hundred and three tests were run. The dogs were successful over fifty percent of the time, above the odds of chance. Telepathy is one of the Psychic Abilities of Animals who Exhibit Extra Sensory Perception. This is the ability to communicate without using the traditional five senses. British parapsychologists tried to control animals' movements by using thoughts. The animals responded at a level greater than chance. A Russian neurophysiologist discovered that dogs responded to his unspoken commands. Eminent parapsychologist Dr. Karlis Osis evidenced cats were influence by thoughts when placed in a tmaze. One of my cats, Smoky Topaz, only went into the kitchen when I was thinking about making tuna for dinner. Its not out of the realm of reality that telepathy played a part in the Nazi trained dogs; however this ability wasnt a part of the experiment. Nazi Dogs: Canine Language

A daily reporter from Mail Online wrote Howl Hitler: Nazis Tried to Teach Dogs to Talk and Read And Claimed One Could Even Discuss Religion, Incredible New Book Claims. According to a reporter from The Telegraph, Bonderson traveled to Berlin to research literature about the Nazi trained dogs and the Wooffan SS experiment. Hitler was a dog lover and had two German Shepherds, Blondi and Bella. The tyrant was interested in using dogs to help the Nazis win WW II. Some of the dogs tapped out words with their paws. Rolf, an Airedale terrier, was exceptional. He was said to have replied, Mein Fuhrer, when asked who Adolf Hitler was. It was claimed that he contemplated religion, learned foreign languages, wrote poetry, wanted to join the army and asked a noblewoman if she could wag her tail. A dachshund, Kurwenal, spoke by using a different number of barks for each letter and said he would vote for Hindenburg. A German pointer, Don, imitated a human voice to signify he was hungry and wanted cakes. Mail Online has pictures of these wondrous canines. Can Animals Communicate with Humans? The answer is yes, as evidenced by many animal actors and performers who obey commands.

RaisingSpot.com has excellent information about dog language. Whimperings or whinings are signs of greeting, desire or submission. Growls are a warning or a threat. A growl may be accompanied by a snarl for added emphasis. The tones of barking signify different emotions. High pitched barks are greetings and may be accompanied by whimperings to convey enthusiasm or excitement. Prolonged or anxious barking, yelping, indicates stress or pain. Low and short or deep barks are warnings when dogs sense danger. An exceptionally low, short bark is a sign of aggression or hostility, to which growls might be added. Howling has different meanings. It might mean boredom, loneliness, a celebration when neighborhood dogs howl together, as wolves do, or that a sound hurts the dogs ears. Howling can also be a sign of Dogs' Death Premonitions and Grief. When Lord Carnarvon - known for excavating King Tuts tomb -- died in Egypt, his dog, in London, howled at the precise hour of his death. Before a close friends death, one of the neighbors dogs who loved the man howled all night. The man died the next day. Were the Nazi Trained Dogs Able to Speak? Its apparent that we must conduct further research into dogs who are trained to communicate with humans by speech and tapping out words. Was the information in the documents that Bondeson found about the Wooffan SS Experiment accurate? The only way to prove or disprove the validity of the data is to perform further experiments, as was done with animal-human telepathy. []

Experiments in Telepathy from Space

Experiments in telepathy from outer space
Philippine Daily Inquirer
ONE OF the most common and most easily demonstrated psychic abilities of man is telepathy, which can be defined as the mental process of transmitting or receiving thoughts without the use of ones physical senses. The existence of mans telepathic powers has been scientifically demonstrated beyond doubt by Dr. JB Rhine of Duke University in North Carolina after more than 25 years of controlled laboratory experiments involving hundreds of subjects. In Dr. JB Rhines experiments, both the transmitter and receiver were facing each other without seeing what the other was transmitting. They were separated only by a wooden wall. So the question that has often been raised is whether telepathic signals can be transmitted over long distances. Or is there a limit to how far telepathy can go? This question was answered by astronaut Edgar Mitchell, who conducted an unauthorized experiment in telepathy while in outer space. Sealed envelope According to the story I read about this secret experiment, before Edgar Mitchell left for the moon in the Apollo 14 spaceship in 1971, he gave a sealed envelope to a trusted friend with the instruction not to open it until he returned to earth. While in outer space, Mitchell, who holds a doctorate degree in science, transmitted a telepathic message to four individuals on earth. Three of them received the message correctly. According to the story, one of those to whom the message was transmitted was the well-known Swedish psychic Olof Jonsson, who was then living in Chicago. This was the same psychic whom dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr. hired to help him find the fabled Yamashita treasure. I had the privilege of meeting Jonsson personally in 1978 or 1979. I asked Olof if it was true he was one of the recipients of the telepathic message that astronaut Mitchell transmitted while he was in outer space. And he confirmed to me the story was true. I asked him what the message Mitchell transmitted to him was. He replied that it was the symbols on the Zener cards, which Dr. JB Rhine used in his ESP experiments at Duke University. The Zener card symbols consisted of a cross, star, wave, circle and square. Jonsson told me he got all the symbols correctly, and in the exact sequence Edgar Mitchell had sent them. That was not exactly the way Mitchell recalled it in his book Psychic Exploration, A Challenge to Science. According to Mitchell, the results were statistically significant, not because any of the receivers got a large number of direct hits, but because the number of hits was amazingly low. The statistical probability of scoring so few hits was about 3000: 1. This negative ESP effect, called PSI-

missing, is something that has frequently arisen in other psychic research-work, and theorists are attempting to explain its significance. In any case, it offers good evidence for PSI, because the laws of chance are bypassed to a significant degree. Later experiments by other researchers, notably those conducted by American author Harold Sherman with his British friend Sir Hubert Wilkins in the Arctic, proved telepathic communication can be carried on over very long distances. (See Shermans book Thoughts Through Space, published by Fawcett Books, New York, 1973). For the pragmatic, scientific-minded and rational astronaut like Mitchell, seeing planet Earth from outer space created in him a profound shift in consciousness. The rational man in me, said Mitchell, had to recognize the validity of the nonrational cognitive process. Ignored by mainstream science After he left Nasa, Edgar Mitchell founded a scientific research organization he called The Institute of Noetic Sciences, which systematically and rationally explores those areas of knowledge and phenomena traditionally ignored by mainstream science. In the early 90s I had the rare privilege of being invited to address the scientists of the Institute, then based in Sausalito, California, about my research on faith healing and psychic surgery in the Philippines. Edgar Mitchell admitted that as he delved deeper into psychic research and parapsychology, his initial skepticism began to fade. As a student of science, he said, I believe there is nothing in the universe that is unworthy of investigation. []

DID YOU KNOW...

The typical American child watches 1,680 minutes of television per week (about two months a year). The same youth spends 38 minutes a week in meaningful conversation with his or her parents. Treatment-resistant tuberculosis has been reported in 42 states and Washington, D.C., up from 13 states during the tuberculosis epidemic of the late 1980s and early 1990s. The aqualung, a device for breathing under water was invented by Jacques Cousteau and Emile Gagnan of the French Navy in 1943 so that "frogmen" could put mines under enemy ships. In 1994, scientists in Australia invented a way of removing fleece from sheep without shearing. They injected the sheep with a special hormone, then wrapped them in lightweight hairnets. Three weeks later, the fleece could be peeled off the sheep by hand. If all major forms of cardiovascular disease were eliminated, human life expectance would increase by 9.78 years. A new survey of pillow primping practices indicates that 23% of people consider themselves stackers; 20% plumpers; 16% are rollers; 16% cuddlers; while the reminder are smashers and crunchers. The world record for passing gas was set on Japanese television, 3,000 times in a row ! Did you know that a cricket's ears are on its knees? That a fly has tastebuds on its feet. All the moons of the Solar System are named after Greek and Roman mythology, except the moons of Uranus, which are named after Shakespearean characters.

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Journal Rejects Precognition Studies

Journal rejects studies contradicting precognition
Peter Aldhous - New Scientist
It was one of last year's most astonishing scientific stories: a leading psychology journal accepted a paper presenting evidence for precognition an ability to perceive future events. What's more, mainstream psychologists had pored over a preprint of the paper and found no fatal flaw. Bold scientific claims need to be replicated before gaining widespread acceptance, however, and now the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, which published the paper in its March 2011 issue, has touched off controversy by rejecting the first attempts to repeat the work without sending them out for peer review. The incident exposes a problem that may be biasing the entire body of psychological literature, argues Richard Wiseman of the University of Hertfordshire, UK, one of the authors of a manuscript that describes three failed attempts to repeat an experiment in the original paper. If failed replications languish unpublished, he says, "you don't know whether the effects that are published are genuine. It's a problem in psychology, and it's a particular problem in parapsychology." The original paper described nine experiments conducted over eight years by Daryl Bem, a social psychologist at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, with a longstanding interest in parapsychology. Bem's strategy was to take well-established psychological phenomena and reverse the sequence of events, so that the "cause" happened after the "effect", rather than before. Delighted and perplexed When news emerged that the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology had vetted the work and decided to publish it, believers in the paranormal were delighted, sceptics perplexed, and bystanders fascinated. New Scientist's initial story about the paper was among the most widely read articles we published online last year. Bem ended up a minor celebrity, being interviewed on Comedy Central TV's The Colbert Report where host Stephen Colbert homed in on experiments into "time-travelling porn", in which volunteers seemed to anticipate the position where erotic images would appear on a computer screen. Frivolity aside, confirmation of Bem's findings would turn established ideas about time, cause and effect on their head. "We openly admit that the reported findings conflict with our own beliefs about causality and that we find them extremely puzzling," the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology's editors said in an accompanying comment. Other researchers began to try to repeat the results as soon as news of Bem's findings began to spread. Wiseman set up a registry of such attempts, which has so far documented five. Primed for random choices

Three of these were described in a paper from Wiseman, Christopher French of Goldsmiths, University of London, and Stuart Ritchie of the University of Edinburgh, UK, which was sent to the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Each tried to repeat an experiment of Bem's which was based on a well-tested experiment for memory priming. In Bem's back-to-front version, participants were shown a list of words and then asked to recall words from it. Later Bem showed them words randomly selected from the same list, and it turned out that they had been better at recalling these words in the prior test. The subsequent display seemed to have influenced their earlier memory. In the conventional psychological experiment on which Bem's experiment was based, people are shown particular words, and then are given a list of words that include the ones they have previously experienced. The participants are next asked to recall as many words as possible from the list, allowing the experimenters to quantify the effect of the prior priming on the recall of those words. In contrast to Bem's results, Wiseman, French and Ritchie failed to find that the subsequent typing facilitated the volunteers' earlier recall. But Eliot Smith of Indiana University in Bloomington, the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology editor who handled the submitted paper, declined to send it out to review. "This journal does not publish replication studies, whether successful or unsuccessful," he wrote. Journal of Bem Replication Smith defends the decision, noting that he made the same ruling on another paper that, by contrast, supported Bem's findings. "We don't want to be the Journal of Bem Replication," he says, pointing out that other high-profile journals have similar policies of publishing only the best original research. "I certainly agree that it's desirable that replications are published," Smith told New Scientist. "The question is where. There are hundreds of journals in psychology."

Bem stressed the importance of replication in his original paper. However, he argues that firm answers will come only when it is possible to conduct a meta-analysis of multiple attempts at replication. "I understand the journal's position," he says. "It almost never publishes a single study." Wiseman is unconvinced, however, arguing that a meta-analysis may miss the whole picture if journals are reluctant to publish replication studies: "My feeling is that the whole system is out of date and comes from a time when journal space was limited." He argues that journals could publish only abstracts of replication studies in print, and provide the full manuscript online. []

MORE OF DID YOU KNOW ...

Astronauts brought back about 800 pounds of lunar rock to Earth. Most of it has not been analyzed. In 1959, the Soviet space probe "Luna Two" became the first manmade object to reach the moon as it crashed onto the lunar surface. In 1968, "Apollo Seven," the first manned Apollo mission, was launched with astronauts Wally Schirra, Donn Fulton Eisele and R. Walter Cunningham aboard. Jupiter's moon Ganymede is the largest moon in the Solar System, and is larger than the planets Mercury and Pluto. Olympus Mons on Mars is the largest volcano in our solar system. On a clear night in the Northern Hemisphere the naked eye can discern some 5000 stars. On February 7, 1969 a meteorite weighing over 1 ton fell in Chihuahua, Mexico. Only 55% of all Americans know that the sun is a star. Uranus is the only planet that rotates on its side.

Ghost Gambler Caught

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Ghost Gambler Caught In Vegas After 32 Year Dead

OnlinePoker.net
A gambler who went missing in 1979 and declared legally dead in 1986, has now been arrested while working at a casino sports book in Las Vegas. At the time of his disappearance Arthur Gerald Jones was a commodities broker in Chicago and had a wife and three kids. However, the trader apparently had an ongoing gambling problem which once saw him lose $30,000 on a single basketball game. Not surprisingly, Arthur Jones soon found himself facing financial ruin and even had to sell his seat on the Chicago Board of Trade to help pay off $210,000 worth of gambling debt. However, his troubles didnt stop there and according to his wife at the time, Joanne Esplin, Arthur Jones may have ended up in the pockets of the Chicago mob running errands for the criminal organisation. One day in 1979, the then 40 year old told his wife he was on his way to a business meeting, but Joanne Esplin then contacted the police the following day when her husband failed to return home. Soon after, Arthur Jones silver Buick was found at OHare International Airport, and considering his jaded background foul play was suspected and he was declared legally dead. Unbeknownst to his wife, who subsequently received $47,000 in survivor

Alien abduction: Police plead for ET's safe return

Midland-Kalamunda Reporter
POLICE are searching for a giant green alien which was stolen from a Bellevue caravan business last week. The two-metre statue, known as ET, had called Traveller RV on Great Eastern Highway home until last Thursday. The statue, worth about $4000, was sitting on top of a pyramid of trailers when taken. Sergeant Garry Tuffin, of the East Metropolitan Crime Prevention Unit, said officers were now calling on the public to help ET come home. The offenders have gained access into the sale yard by cutting a hole in the fence, then climbed onto the roof of the property and stolen the statue, he said. They have also gone into seven caravans in the sale yard and stolen televisions from each of them. Sgt Tuffin said the business was well lit and witnesses would have likely seen anyone taking the statue. Anyone with information should contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000. DID YOU KNOW... What we call the sky is merely the limit of our vision into the atmosphere. The sky, like the horizon, is always as far away as one can see.

benefits from the Social Security, Arthur Jones had procured a fake ID proclaiming himself to be Joseph Richard Sandelli incorporating the Social Security number of a Mr Clifton Goodenough .He then headed off to Las Vegas, a place famed in the 1980s for allowing certain elements a fresh start. Now aged 72, Jones past has finally caught up with him after investigators eventually started heeding the words of Mr Goodenough, who since 1995 had been facing problems with the Social Security Administration over requests to pay taxes on money he hadnt earned. Eventually, Jones was arrested when he tried to renew his drivers license at the Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles, with crosschecking measures between the two departments then identifying him as the culprit. After 32 years living out a new life in Las Vegas, Arthur Gerald Jones is currently facing a whole array of charges which include identity theft and fraud.[]

Sixth Sense: The ESP Debate

Sixth Sense: The ESP Debate
Seyoun Kim - The Cornell Daily Sun
Despite critics, Prof. Emeritus Daryl Bem, psychology, believes in extrasensory perception in the form of premonition.ESP is made of four different phenomena: telepathy, the ability to communicate without using normal communication methods; remote viewing, the ability to gain information from an object far away; precognition or premonition, the ability to knowledgeably or emotionally predict the future; and psychokinesis, the ability for the mind to influence matter. Bems research, published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, attracted much attention in the psychology community mainly because the journal typically does not publish research on parapsychology, the subfield of psychology containing ESP. In anticipation of the response from the community, an editorial comment was published with Bems article defending their decision to publish the research despite their own reservations about Bems claims. Bem conducted nine different experiments to prove the existence of premonition. As summarized by Prof. Thomas Gilovich, psychology, and chairperson of the department, Bem was able to use a number of paradigms in the field of psychology and tweak them to test for precognition. A series of nine experiments specifically designed for publication in JPSP included over 1000 participants. Bem collected data that showed that participants displayed more predictive ability than could be explained by chance. This suggests that mechanisms, which Bem believevs to be precognition and premonition, allow participants to know beforehand which side to choose. In one experiment, Bem asked students to pick one of two curtains as the one they thought contained a picture behind it. Although the students correctly chose the correct curtain 53.1 percent of the time, which appears to not be too different from the expected 50 percent, Bem believes this value is, in fact, statistically significant and unlikely to appear by chance. A paper published by researchers at the University of Amsterdam suggests that Bem uses incorrect statistical methodology by using one-tailed tests instead of two-tailed tests, which would be more difficult to prove significance for. By re-analyzing Bems data using a different set of statistical analysis tools, however, the researchs show that Bems data is not statistically significant. Bem believes this claim is an absolutely ridiculous argument to be making and that the assumptions used by the University of Amsterdam researchers are unrealistic. Gilovich explained another point of concern about Bems findings. He states that ESP is inconsistent with everything that we know about the way the physical universe works and that there is no plausible mechanism that we understand at all that would explain how ESP works.

Still, Gilovich complimented Bem, saying the experiments were a very nice adaptation of the standard paradigms, cleverly modified to test for the existence of precognition. It is Bems belief that there is nothing in physics that is contradicted because although ESP might not be in line with Newtonian physics, it is in line with quantum physics. He added, The fact that we do not have a mechanism to explain it is a major deterrent. But almost every theory first started out as an unexplainable phenomenon. Bem understands the opposition to his research. I do not think that people are irrational to want stronger evidence for this sort of thing, Bem said. He hopes that his belief in ESP will eventually explained by a concept called quantum entanglement which suggests that two parts of matter or energy that were once together are connected even after they are separated. With all of the reaction from the psychology community about his paper, Bem is surprised by the degree of what strikes me as fear that [ESP] might be true and the willingness to disregard an entire set of phenomena. []

Psychics scam residents

mississauga.com
Two men calling themselves psychics and claiming to be able to banish evil spirits and pick winning lottery numbers have bilked their victims out of more than $200,000, according to Peel Regional Police. Police are hunting for the pair, who have been setting up shop in various locations around Mississauga for the past five to six months. Some local victims have been identified in what investigators have dubbed the Evil Spirits Scam, but police say there may be others. Its unknown exactly how many victims may be involved and we would encourage anyone who thinks they may have

been deceived by the suspects to contact our Fraud Bureau, said Peel spokesperson, Const. Adam Minnion. The victims walked into the suspects various places of business and were told that, for a fee, the medium/psychic would help them pick winning lottery numbers for upcoming draws. A few simple tricks are performed, according to police, to convince the victims of their psychic abilities, and the suspects then ask for a fee, which has ranged anywhere from hundreds to thousands of dollars. Some victims have also been told they have evil spirits in them, and, again for a fee, the suspects have offered to get rid of them, according to police. Not all psychics are purported to be fraudulent, however the public should be very suspicious when asked for further fees to determine lottery winning numbers, Minnion said. Conjuring cheap magic tricks should not be considered evidence that a psychic or medium has some influential or divine insight. Peels Fraud Bureau is investigating. There are two male suspects. One uses the alias Pandit Kasithas Guruji. He is described as South Asian, 55 to 65 years, 5-foot-4 130 pounds, with a full beard. He wears traditional East Indian attire, according to investigators. The second suspect uses the alias Ashok Kumar and is described as South Asian, 35 to 40 years, 5-foot-6 to 5-foot-8, with dark skin, a round face and a moustache. Anyone with information is urged to call the Peel Fraud Bureau at 905-453-2121, ext. 3335.

John Edward: Psychic Medium or Cold Reading Fraud?

By Becauseilive - The Hub Pages
The title of this hub suggests that I am calling the validity of John Edward's mediumship into question. From a journalistic standpoint, indeed I am. I want to examine all available evidence and present an argument both for and against his psychic abilities, particularly his assertion that he communicates with the dead and has been doing so since a young age. From a personal perspective, however, I will say that I do believe in him. I don't know whether or not he gives cold readings or has accomplices sitting in the audience or microphones hidden in the eaves outside where guests of the show wait on line. But I do know that he provides closure, that the people who have sat down with John Edward for a reading have come away feeling as though they connected with someone they had lost. His universal message is that another realm does exist, that although we cannot see those who have past we must never forget that they are still there, alive and well on the other side, and that they continue to watch over us. He reinforces this fact over and over again, and despite it's legitimacy it provides comfort if nothing else. After giving private readings at home and at psychic fairs for a number of years, John Edward was eventually given his own show "Crossing Over" on the SciFi channel in July 2000. A hundred or so audience members gather in a studio with John Edward and wait as he receives images from the otherside. The audience is instructed NOT to give him any information or further details, just to either validate or invalidate the messages he is delivering to them. He emerges from backstage, gives a brief intro, then begins talking quickly and "feeling pulled" to a particular section of the audience, saying something like, "I'm getting an M name, like M, like Mary, Marie, Maria...?" Skeptics unanimously agree that Edward uses a method called "cold reading" during his performances. Cold reading is a mentalist technique that dates back to the Spiritualist movement of the late-1800's. According to Wikipedia.org, cold reading is "a technique used to convince another person that the reader knows much more about a subject than he actually does. Even without prior knowledge of a person, a practiced cold reader can still quickly obtain a great deal of information about the subject by carefully analyzing the person's body language, clothing or fashion, hairstyle, gender, sexual orientation, religion, race or ethnicity, level of education, manner of speech, place of origin, etc." The definition goes on to say that cold readers use high probability guesses, picking up on clues from their subjects to see if their guess is going in the right direction. If it is, the medium will quickly reinforce this information. If it's a miss, the medium will quickly move on. Mediums who allegedly use the cold reading technique usually assure compliance

from their subjects ahead of time by saying something like, "Often the messages I receive will be unclear and fuzzy; I'll need you to help me decipher what it is they're really trying to say." The medium will begin by making a series of probing questions, the subject will reveal further information with his or her verbal or non-verbal replies, and the pattern repeats from there. One cold reading technique supposedly employed by John Edward is called "shotgunning". Basically, the medium quickly offers a huge amount of very general information all in one sentence to a large group of people (the audience), watches for reactions, then narrows the scope down to a smaller section until someone connects with the information. A shotgun opening could sound something like, "I'm getting an M name from a mother-figure, someone above you, this could be mother, aunt, grandmother, older cousin, step-mother even someone who raised you who acted as a mother-figure." Critics point out that due to the show being edited for television, Edward appears to be more accurate than he actually is. Those who have attended a live taping estimate that he is only correct 10-20% of the time. While this may be true, and certainly John Edward seems to employ these methods of cold reading, some amazing "hits" have been documented. On the website Greatest Hits and Misses of Psychic John Edward, one example of a great hit involves a Disney ring. John Edward: One last validation. She says to go into the bathroom, Okay and in the bathroom there is something in an unusual spot, forward left. So when you walk into the bathroom, right to the left there, there's something right there she wants me to acknowledge. It's like Mickey Mouse related. It's like Disney related. Sitter (Mother's older Daughter): - Oh My God! John Edward: What is this? Sitter (Mother's sister): That's where my ring is that she got me when she was in Disney World.

Skeptics also latch onto the idea that Edward never says anything negative. The messages from the deceased are always pleasant, letting their loved ones know that they're fine, that they're doing okay. And yet I can remember one instance where he connected with a woman's mother and reported that she was very cold, very negative, with a biting tongue and a nasty attitude. Skeptics are hard pressed to believe that everyone is happy and loving on the other side, but isn't that what Heaven is for? Critics also believe that Edward is immoral for targeting people when they are at their most vulnerable, mourning over the loss of a loved one. Bottom line, whether his methods of communicating with the dead are valid or not, John Edward is friendlier, and more astute than his crude, harsh counterparts James Van Praagh and Sylvia Browne. The messages he delivers are positive and reassuring, providing comfort and solace in a time of extreme grief. His readings have helped thousands of people find peace in the midst of a tragedy, thereby enabling them to move on and live fuller, happier lives, secure with the knowledge that their loved ones are safe and sound in a place we cannot see, waiting to reconnect with us when the time is right. []

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Psychic Nurse Unfairly Targeted

'Psychic' nurse says she is unfairly targeted in hospital records case
MARIA ST. LOUIS-SANCHEZ AND BARBARA COTTER The Gazette
A city nurse who lost her job after accessing a Memorial Hospital patient database said she was unfairly targeted because of her psychic abilities. Lori Niell, who was an occupational health nurse for the city for eight years, said she made her supervisors uncomfortable so they accused her of accessing the encrypted and password-protected Physician Link patient database to find the medical history of patients and use that information to pretend to be a psychic. I certainly did not misuse anyones medical information because I have integrity, Niell said. I remain uncharged and unarrested and I expect to remain that way. Hospital and city officials contend that Niell accessed the records of 2,500 Memorial Hospital patients without cause. A police investigation is under way. She had access to the database but she was not a Memorial employee, and had no medical or other work-related reason for accessing the hospitals records, said hospital spokesman Brian Newsome. From my understanding, she was accessing the records when she wasnt at work, Newsome said. She wasnt doing it as part of her job. The hospital is contacting the patients by mail, and is working with the U.S. Office of Civil Rights, which is responsible for investigating patient privacy complaints. Officials allege that Niell accessed the records for personal reasons, but did not elaborate. However, Newsome said it did not appear the records were being accessed to commit identify fraud. Niell denied that she had accessed anywhere close to 2,500 records but admitted to the Gazette Monday night that she did use the database for personal reasons, such as to look up the phone number of a friend that she had lost. However, she said that using the database that way is common practice for many in the medical community. Thats my crime, but as far as this other allegation, absolutely ridiculous. I wouldnt dream of doing what theyre accusing me of, she said. I guarantee that accessing the database for stuff like that is rampant in the medical community. If you talked to other medical people, youd find out that its pretty damn common. If they are going to get me for that, they would have to get a tremendous number of people for that. She said she is being investigated because her supervisors were uncomfortable with her psychic ability. Niell, who said she has had three near-death experiences, said she was often able to get a psychic reading from people she was around. Once, she said, she was recognized by the city after correctly warning a patient he was close to a heart attack and advised him to seek immediate treatment. The city gave me a plaque for lifesaving intervention, she said. They liked it when it worked for them but didnt like it when I made them uncomfortable. Niell said her supervisor was looking for a way to fire her after Niell told her about a possible life-threatening condition and the supervisor became angry. Niell admitted she later accessed the database to see if the supervisor heeded her advice and sought treatment. City spokesman John Leavitt said Niell became a target of an investigation after her supervisor noticed unusual activity on the system, including how many times it was being accessed and from where it was being accessed. Memorial was notified on May 20. What I was told is that the patterns were unusual enough to cause some concern, so it seemed prudent to bring it to the attention of Memorial Hospital and ask them to investigate, Leavitt said. Colorado Springs Police Department Sgt. Steve Noblitt said police have uncovered a motive but would not divulge it. No arrests have been made. Niell said her house was surrounded by police officers with guns drawn on June 22. With a search warrant, they seized two computers, personal papers and more than 20 years of journals she had kept. I was using those journals to work on a book, and now they say they can hold onto them for up to two years, she said. Niell said that tensions between her and her supervisor became so tense that she resigned on May 20, but city officials told her they would have fired her had she not resigned. She suspects the city made her case public because officials are worried about information she has from a deceased city employee who has been speaking to her from beyond the grave. Its a power play, she said. They are showing me how strong they are. I know for a fact that they are pushing me because there is a dead city employee with important information who I have access to. She would not elaborate on the name of the dead employee or the type of information she had. Newsome said Memorial has created a task force to look into beefing up security, and its looking into software systems to more quickly alert hospital officials to unusual activity surrounding medical records. Patients who are concerned about their records or want more information can call 1866-283-9930 []

'Dead' Man Found Alive, Wakes in Morgue

Christian Post
A 50-year-old man who was presumed dead has woken up in a rural village mortuary over the weekend, screaming to be let out. After spending 21 hours inside the morgue, the Eastern Cape residents screams were heard, however, terrified attendants believed the screams to be a ghost and fled from the mortuary. The regions health department spokesperson told the Sapa news agency that the attendants later returned and called an ambulance, and that the man was treated for dehydration. Doctors put him under observation and concluded that he was stable, said Eastern Cape health spokesperson Sizwe Kupelo. He did not need further treatment. The man, whose name has been withheld, could not be woken by his family. After numerous efforts at waking him the family, believing he was dead, called the local undertakers. He later woke from his deep sleep in the cold morgue at 5.00 p.m. local time (11.00 a.m. EST) and demanded to be let out, according to the BBC. At first the men ran for their lives, Kupelo reported of the attendants working at the morgue during the incident. The morgue owner, Ayanda Maqolo, said that the driver who picked the man up, checked his pulse, looked for a heartbeat, but there was nothing, according to the Associated Press. Maqolo said he and his staff were terrified, I was glad they (police) had their firearms, in case something wanted to fight with us. Maqolo is still trying to recover from the ordeal. He said according to AP, I couldnt sleep last night, I had nightmares. Area officials have stressed to the public the importance of calling doctors or other emergency services before pronouncing someone to be dead. Undertakers should not be called unless these measures have been taken, urges Kupelo. He said, You begin to ask yourself how many other people have died like that in the morgue. []

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The Lies I Told As A Psychic

The lies I told as a psychic
I thought it would be an easy part-time gig. But faking out strangers was much trickier than I ever predicted
By Erin Auerbach
It was 2 a.m., and by the time I got off the phone with Judy, I knew all about her dead husband, ungrateful children and the grandkids she didn't get to see enough. I predicted that she would travel and meet a new soul mate. Judy laughed a lot, cried a little and paid $300 for the privilege of speaking to me. Too bad I wasn't a real psychic. Actually, I was a failed actor. Long before "Glee" made choir dorks seem cool (or at least profitable), I sang show tunes and mugged my way through high school in unflattering dresses and character shoes. In college, I was cut from my musical theater program, and though I graduated with a bachelor of fine arts, I couldn't be satisfied without a theater degree. My ego needed it. I also feared that a real job with a desk, entry-level salary and 401(k) would become my permanent station in life -- as if working at an insurance company or bank right out of college would handcuff me to that industry for the next 50 years. So I moved to Las Vegas, which seemed like the perfect place to hide from the grown-up world. Knowing my parents would only support such nonsense if I stayed in school, I enrolled at UNLV -- also known locally as the University of Never Leaving Vegas -- to pursue a master's degree in theater. Lacking the abs of steel required to pull off the tight, shiny getups of the Vegas showgirl, I took a variety of odd part-time jobs. I made $6 per hour job coercing vacationers to sit in an auditorium, watch screenings of crappy sitcoms and fill out opinion surveys. Then I played the role of a soda jerk at the World of Coca-Cola museum, where angry tourists heckled me once they learned that I wasn't actually allowed to serve them anything to drink. Dejected, I scoured the classifieds. Then I saw it: "Phone actors wanted. Work from home. Make your own hours." Could it be true? Or was this some sort of telemarketing scheme? I called the number. A friendly man assured me that this was completely legit. "You've heard of the Psychic Friends Network, haven't you?" he asked. "This is just like that." Yes, I had seen the commercials. My brothers and I mocked the company's spokeswoman Dionne Warwick. When we were little kids, our parents took us to one of her performances at a Lake Tahoe hotel. She sang a few songs, coughed and asked for water. It was a short show, and my parents were disappointed they had wasted money on it. "The thing is, I'm not sure that I'm psychic," I confessed. There were times I suspected things were going to happen before they did. But did knowing my family was going to throw me a surprise party for my 15th birthday count as mystic instinct? "That's OK," he said. "We'll give you everything you need for the job." I called my mom for advice. She wouldn't hesitate to tell me if she thought this was a bad idea. We both believed in psychics. In fact, one of my mother's closest friends had this power. Although Grace was elderly and forgetful, she was truly clairvoyant. She even adopted a rottweiler for protection because of a premonition she had about being robbed. One day she left the dog at home, and she was held up. "As long as you can work from home, I think it's fine," Mom said. "You're insightful, and you can probably be very helpful to people." I attended one short training session, where I filled out a 1099 form so I could become an independent contractor. (That sounded so glamorous, until I learned that this meant I would get reamed when it came time to file my taxes.) The trainer said that some of their contractors made thousands of dollars and worked constantly. He stressed that we didn't necessarily have to be psychic to do the job; we could learn how to perform a tarot card reading to achieve the same effect. I bought a deck along with an instruction booklet at one of those psychic specialty bookstores that sells more crystals than books. I also had to get rid of call waiting. Aside from the obvious distraction, it posed too big a risk of disconnecting conversations. Callers got my undivided attention. Considering I couldn't tell the future, it was the least I could offer. The main thrust of the job entailed keeping clients on the phone for as long as possible. At $5 per minute, some lonely, needy or desperate person could pay hundreds of dollars for a chat. (By the time I joined the 1900-number business in 1998, laws had been passed to automatically end the calls after an hour. Too many sad sacks had racked up thousands of dollars in phone bills they would never be able to pay. After lots of complaints, the government intervened.) The company lured callers with the promise of three free minutes, but as soon as they heard the beep, the meter started. As a professional phone psychic, I would earn $7/hour until I logged in 20 hours of calls. Then I would get a bump to $8/hour. The ultimate goal was to work my way up to $15/hour while the company pocketed the rest. I never made it that far. The trainer had also suggested that I create a nom de phone. So clients knew me as Anita, the name of one of the nurses at UCLA Medical Center who cared for my father in the first days after his liver transplant. I associated her with kindness, healing and nurturing, a good omen. At the beginning of each conversation, I told callers to ask me a question, shuffled tarot cards and tried to interpret what they meant. Anita had only positive things to say about everyone's future. Trust me, no one wanted to hear otherwise. I had never called a psychic hotline, but Mom's friend Grace had read for me in person. (She didn't use cards.) Positive or not, I didn't always agree with what she said. Naturally, I liked the occasional bits of conversation when she told me the things I most wanted to hear, like that I was going to (eventually) find lasting love. So I gave every card a positive spin. "Oh, I see we've pulled that Death Card. How exciting! You've overcome a lot. This means good things are going to happen for you." In response to what most women wanted to hear, I said: "Well, of course you'll find love. And soon." And for men: "A new career opportunity will give you lots of options and more money." About half of the callers were onto me immediately. They would tell me that they thought this was nonsense and that I was a fraud. The first surly customer I encountered pummeled me. "Thank you for calling. This is Anita. Is this your first reading?" "I don't believe in this garbage," Angry Man said. "I'm so sorry you feel that way," I said in the most chipper tone I could muster. "Have you had a reading before?" "No." "I'm shuffling my tarot cards." My voice got higher. "Now ask me a question, and we'll see if they can give you some of the answers you're looking for?" "OK, genius. What's my wife's name?" "Oh," I stammered, "It doesn't really work that way. That's not really what I do. I " Click. I panicked. The trainer said that if too many calls ended before the three-minute grace period, and monthly calls didn't average a minimum of 10 minutes, the company would dump me. So I tried a different tactic, agreeing with people's concerns about psychics and 900 numbers and convincing them that I only spoke about what the cards revealed (as if I actually understood how to read them properly). People liked the idea of the cards having power instead of me. Some customers still screamed and quickly hung up. But a surprising amount of skeptics enjoyed telling me off for several minutes to vent their disgust while intermittently asking about their futures. But I began to realize why I got rejected from the theater program in college. My roleplaying skills sucked. This job came more easily to others. My friend Russ, a talented actor, worked for another psychic hotline. He thoroughly enjoyed perpetrating a fraud. He told me that he started each call by saying that he just drank a vial of lamb's blood to give him fortune-telling superpowers. "You can't be serious. Does that really work?" "Some idiots believe me," he said. "But most people just think I'm funny, and we wind up having a nice talk." Continued on Page 32

Chupacabra Shot Dead, Or Is It?

The lies I told as a psychic
Continued from Page 31
A few of my calls lasted an entire hour and consisted of me reassuring the person on the other end of the line that everything would be OK. Those folks really didn't give a damn about psychics or readings. They just wanted to talk to a friendly voice. Some people had terrible problems and cried a lot. I had a list of crisis hotline numbers to give to those who confessed to thoughts of suicide and other equally alarming problems. I kept these calls short, told the troubled souls on the other end of the connection to save their money and gave them toll-free numbers for help. An 18-year-old caller from Alaska helped me more than I helped him. He wanted to know if he should enlist in the military so he could pay for college. He talked about the long, dark days of Alaskan winters and the exciting prospect of being stationed in a warmer climate. He spoke longingly about the way this choice would take him to places he had never seen. He didn't have any money, and his parents were gone. I cringed. How was this poor guy ever going to pay for this call? My stomach hurt. I identified with his uncertainty, his searching for a place to fit in, and his desire to escape, but I had a safety net. He didn't. That's when it occurred to me that I had no business trying to guide anybody's major life decisions. I had enough trouble with my own. "So what do the cards say, Anita?" He sounded so hopeful. I stared at the untouched deck in front of me. "Honestly, I don't know. I think you should talk to your friends and relatives. Or maybe ask your pastor for advice." We had only been on the phone for eight minutes, but I told him I had to go. He didn't get mad, which actually made me feel worse. That's when it dawned on me that burger flippers, toilet scrubbers and those who facilitate elephant mating had cleaner jobs (and probably took more pride in their work) than I did. My psychic days ended with that call. In retrospect, the only satisfying tte-ttes during my stint as a telephone psychic came from errant horn dogs who thought all 900 numbers were created equal. "Hi!" I began. "What is your question for me today? What would you like to know about your future?" "You sound hot." "Well, aren't you nice! What would you like to find out about today?" "You know what I'm doing?" he said, panting. Once I met my 10-minute minimum, I gave up trying to steer the conversation toward my fake tarot reading. "Oh yeah, I know." "Well, what do you think about that? Do you like it, baby?" "Fine by me," I replied. "You're the one who's getting screwed." [] PSYCHIC ELLEN HARTWELL www.ellenhartwell.com

Chupacabra Shot Dead, Or Is It? Twitter Has Gone Berserk

The Internet is a wonderful thing and sometimes can leave you with a question mark over your own mind when you read about something. One of those things is about the mythical legends that we are always hearing sightings of, now we have heard something pretty outrageous, apparently the Chupacabra has been shot dead or has it? Whatever the creature is Twitter has gone berserk for it! Quite often when you hear about different sightings such as the Loch Ness Monster, BigFoot or alien sightings you have to take them with a pinch of salt. There are a lot of people with some big imaginations out there which is one of the reasons that some of the films that feature these creatures are pretty well done. The latest rumor of the Chupacabra being shot dead is a strange one and its certainly one thats not beyond belief. For those of you who are unaware of what this thing is supposed to be or what the name means we will just let you know now. The literal Spanish translation is Goat Sucker with Chupar meaning to suck and Cabra being a goat. The creature got the name because it apparently sucks the blood of goats and other livestock. Over the years there have been several apparent sightings and a few killings of creatures which have been proven to be creatures we know about such as coyotes but with severe problems such as parasites throughout their bodies. The creature is believed to be dog like in appearance but with little or no fur, elongated rear legs and shorter front ones. There have been a number of sightings over the years where scientists have apparently identified the dead animals that they have received as coyotes or coyote hybrids with different types of dog or wolf. Its all very strange and its also very possible that these are weakened creatures attacking livestock because of their ill health and the livestock not being able to get too far away. We have also read through an article with a poll over on the Huffington Post where 13-year-old Carter Pope spotted a strange animal walking across a field, he got his dad and then the creature was shot dead. Hair and skin

samples were collected from the carcass and passed on to be tested to see if this is another coyote or if its the Bigfoot of Latin culture the Chupacabra! []

Bigfoot Tracks Spotted in Lincoln's Old Stomping Grounds

"Honest Abe" loved tall tales, but there's no record he ever saw a Bigfoot. Still, the same area where Abraham Lincoln came to fame (Chatham, IL, a suburb of Springfield) has experienced a rash of unexplained howls at night and some giant footprints investigated by police. The foot track pictured here looks like a bear print. A huge bear print. And they're not known to inhabit the area, so if it isn't a Sasquatch (which are supposed to be somewhat friendly), then taking out the trash just got a lot more dangerous. Bigfoot tracks are usually distinguished by their similarity to human feet, rather than a bear's. The telltale sign is toes instead of claws. This gigantic 18-inch track means the beast, whatever it is, must be over 10 feet tall. But footprints in wet ground are funny things. They can grow exponentially over time to make it seem a much larger animal is behind the markings. But that didn't stop a local Sasquatch expert to claim confidently this might be a "Squatch" print, since it's not the first one reported. What is with these guys? Do they think by repeating over and over "they DO exist, they DO exist" that it makes the story true? Sheesh... Until some bones are discovered, these sightings have to be taken with a grain of salt. But it would have made a great tall tale for "old Abe" to spin for his enthralled followers. "That reminds me of a story... Have you heard the one about the man in a bear suit?" []

Alaskas Loch Ness Monster

Discovery joins a long list of Lake Iliamna Loch Ness watchers
Craig Medred - Alaska Dispatch
The Iliamna Lake monster -- Alaska's own Loch Ness, "Nessy" of the North -- has escaped to the sea! Or maybe it has spawned other monsters that have escaped to the sea. There is no other logical conclusion to be drawn from the reports by Discovery Channel that it has video of the creature, or video of something like the creature, and the always reliable reports of Alaska fishermen. Reality TV star Andy "Hillstrand believes the many fishermen who have reported seeing the animal 'are not a bunch of fruitcakes. These are people who are familiar with the local marine life,'" reports Discovery News. Amazingly, too -- again according to Discovery News -- Hillstrand saw the creature himself. Here is the Discovery News account: A possible new believer in "Cadborosaurus" is Andy Hillstrand of "Deadliest Catch" television show fame. He told Discovery News that he might have seen another one of the enigmatic animals while filming "Hillstranded," a new Discovery Channel special debuting that features the 2009 footage. Hillstrand and his brother Johnathan traveled to sites in Alaska where Cadborosaurus has been spotted. Referring to one location, he said, "We saw a big, long white thing moving in the water. We chased it for about 20 minutes." What luck? P.T. Barnum call home. This monster story is as old as the Alaska hills. The Anchorage Daily News once sent a reporter to Lake Iliamna, the reported home of Nessy of the North, the creature now being boldly classified as a Cadborosaurus (Suckerus, for short) to look for the creature. He didn't find anything. So the newspaper in 1979 offered $100,000 for solid evidence of any such creature. Needless to say, the reward was never paid. Way back in 2004, when the Internet was still in its infancy, writer Matt Bille tracked the Nessy of the North legend for a website called Alaska Science Outreach. Here's what he wrote: Reports of something odd in Iliamna go back to the Aleut and other indigenous tribes, although no one knows how far back in time these stories began. The Aleuts did not hunt the lake's creatures, and believed them to be dangerous to men fishing in small boats. Some early white settlers and visitors reportedly saw the things, too, but the stories about Iliamna did not gain wide circulation until the 1940s, when pilots began spotting monsters from the air. The flyers' descriptions generally matched the native tales. The lake's mystery inhabitants were most often described as long, relatively slender animals, like fish or whales, up to 30 feet in length. Iliamna Lake, where this creature has long been reported, drains to Bristol Bay via the

Kvichak River. Bristol Bay is in the Pacific Ocean north of the Aleutian Islands. Once Alaska's Nessy got there, he-she-it could go anywhere. The 60-mile Kvichak River is undammed. Boats go up and down it all the time. So do sockeye salmon -- by the millions. A hungry monster swimming against the tide of fish bound for the spawning grounds could literally eat its way to sea every summer. What a life. Given this sort of abundance of food and the longevity of this story, there surely must be whole families of Cadborosaurus out there. This writer must confess he once even lassoed a Cadborosaurus, or some such thing, on an excursion to Iliamna Lake. He was forced to let it go only when his kayak reached speeds surely in excess of 30 mph. Thus another escape for the wily monster. Discovery News, are you listening? There's another opportunity here for one of those whacked out Alaska shows.[]

from the sea creature. Jobes tells the DailyMail that he was walking the Abbey footpath in Fort Augustus in May with his wife when he saw what appeared to be a sea creature bobbing in the water about 200 to 300 yards off shore. I had a wonderful shock, Mr Jobes said.I have actually been coming up to Inverness for the past 45 years and I have never seen anything like this before. As is the case with most sightings, other Nessie spotters are skeptical, including Veteran Loch Ness hunter Steve Feltham who believes a large stick or another object may have made its way into the waters, although he does admit that the hump on the photograph can not be immediately explained away at this time. In the meantime, heres a video that claims to have caught the sea creature on tape in 2007.

Loch Ness Monster Spotted? Or It Could Just Be A Stick. Let The Debate Begin
The Inquisitir
This week we have a new sighting of the elusive Loch Ness Monster of Scotland and theres photographic evidence to go along with the find. Loch Ness hunter William Jobes, 62, took the photo shown above and he says it wasnt by mistake, hes been hunting Nessie for 45 years. The photograph was taken hear Fort Augustus, Scotland and appears to show a spiny back and perhaps even a tail or spike protruding

DEATH TRIVIA
Most-visited presidential grave: John F. Kennedy's in Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Va. 2. The only other president buried in Arlington: William Howard Taft. 3. The only president buried in Washington, D.C. proper: Woodrow Wilson, who was laid to rest in the National Cathedral. 4. The only president buried on the grounds of a state capitol: James Polk in Nashville, Tenn. 5. The only presidents buried together: John Adams and his son John Quincy Adams are in a basement crypt in Quincy, Mass.

Finding Bigfoot Hoaxed Says Cast

Finding Bigfoot Hoaxed! Says Cast
Gather.com
The TV show Finding Bigfoot has a lot of critics debunking the evidence that the legendary cryptid really exists. That now includes the people who appear on the show itself. Cast members from the TV show have commented in various online forums that they are bugged by the heavy-handed editing done by producers of the series, and are not happy that they seem to be putting false words in their mouths. To say nothing of using tricks to make their actual findings more seemingly groundbreaking. Critics of this kind of documentary-style Reality TV shows have pointed to programs about the Paranormal which seem to build on the gullibility and limited experience of viewers. The phrase what the hell was that? is becoming a catch-phrase for the practice. It derives from the many characters in these shows who utter the phrase as they respond to perfectly normal, and easily explained, phenomenon caught on camera. Usually through night-vision FLIR lenses and filming ghosts or the famed Sasquatch itself. This seems to be the case in the latest example of rigged Reality TV. Cast member and BFRO leader Matt Moneymaker says, in response to a question about one particular scene with typically grainy footage, the thing I ran after up the hill was a human someone who was sneaking around us in the woods trying to watch the production in progress. I said so repeatedly and vehemently at the time, for the cameras, but they edited out all of that in order to make it seem unclear what I was chasing after. That seems to be all the proof needed. Looks like Reality TV itself is the next Sasquatch. Someday everybody will try to prove it really does exist..[]

I want to believe
Dan Carlsen
Years ago, The X Files was my favorite TV show, and I remember a UFO poster on Special Agent Fox Mulder's office wall with the caption, I want to believe. From time to time over the years, I've mentioned that cryptozoology is a hobby of mine. For those unfamiliar with the term, cryptozoology is the search for and study of as yet unknown animal species. Yes, I am talking about bigfoot, the Loch Ness monster, ultragiant squid and sharks, black panthers in Maine, giant wolves in Wisconsin and other such creatures of myths and legends. And like Fox Mulder, I want to believe. And I am not a nutcase. Recent years have seen an increase in the number of television shows dealing with cryptozoology such as Monsterquest, Finding Bigfoot, Animal X, Destination Truth and more. Several such shows are enjoying ratings success that would indicate there's an audience

for such programs and interest in the subject matter. And not everyone who takes the subject of unknown creatures seriously wears a tinfoil hat and lives in his parents' basement surfing the Internet in his underwear all day. Serious scientists such as the famous primate expert Jane Goodall, Jeff Meldrum of Idaho State University, Daris Swindler, George Schaller and Russell Mittermeier have all encouraged that the subject of bigfoot be approached with an open mind. Likewise, most marine biologists agree there may be hundreds, if not thousands, of new species yet to be discovered in the world's oceans. I read an article just last week that stated nearly 1,000 new animal species have been discovered in Southeast Asia in recent years and more discoveries are likely in that region. Skeptics point to a number of reasons to doubt the existence of large legendary beasts. They rightly note that the majority of new species discoveries are of small animals such as rodents, reptiles, amphibians and insects. The notion that 8-ft. tall uprightwalking apes are wandering through the world's remote regions or 30-foot long sea serpents are swimming through large deep-water lakes is lacking in evidence. Photographs alone are no longer definitive given the ease with which they can be fabricated. Also the vast majority of photos are so blurry and videos so short and shaky that the term blobsquatch has come to describe such pictures and videos. Skeptics also point to a lack of physical evidence. Support of a breeding bigfoot population in North America, for example, would require the existence of several hundred creatures. Why has no body been found?

Why have fecal and hair samples been so hard to come by? There are plenty of plaster casts of footprints, some of which show hard-to-fake dermal ridges that are neither human nor ape, but ultimately it will take a carcass to prove bigfoot's existence beyond all doubt. Before we accept the absence of a body as proof something doesn't exist, consider this. I have spent countless hours hiking and hunting in the most remote areas of the Black Hills. I know that cougars and even black bears live in the Hills. I've seen cougar tracks, heard their vocalizations and know many have seen me, even when I didn't see them. I've never encountered a cougar carcass lying on the Black Hills forest floor. Nor have I ever seen a dead elk not harvested by a hunter. I've never seen a bear carcass in the Hills or areas of Colorado and Wyoming where I know they exist. If a reasonably intelligent animal relies on avoiding humans for survival, humans can be avoided. And forests and seas do a very good job of carcass disposal by natural means. On the record, game management officials from a number of states have told me the standard remotely possible but highly unlikely line. Off the record, I've been told things that would make your hair stand on end. I do dismiss cryptozoology fans who insist such creatures are from another planet or dimension, tied to UFOs or have paranormal powers. But when it comes to serious scientists who seek evidence to support or dismiss the existence of creatures that were once thought to be only myths, put me in the I want to believe but need to be convinced category.

The Dire Saga

The Dire Saga is a finely crafted book of action, adventure, sorcery, love found and love lost. Betrayal and loyalty are woven into these exciting pages which focus on Magnus, the hero, who lost himself and rediscovered himself as he engages with the forces of good and evil. Love and compassion touch Magnus cold, warrior heart and he finds himself thrown into a maze of incredible experiences! He battles evil beings, uses sorcery and fights against it. Magnus shows us his world and we can only be moved by the humanity in this noble man from realms seen only by the author of this book now generously shared with us mere mortals!Can Magnus world and love be saved or is his valiant quest for naught? Questions such as, What is evil? What is good? are asked and answered within this compelling saga.

Psychic Ellen Hartwell

A LETTER TO YOU FROM ELLEN HARTWELL: Dear Seeker: I've been a professional clairvoyant for over fifteen years. Giving readings is "the call" on my life and I believe that it is a sacred privilege to witness your journey. As an empath, I connect with your emotions and the feelings of those you may ask about. As a clairaudient, I hear words and phrases that are pertinent to whatever situation you may wish to discuss. As a trans-channel, I can sense what the person you are most interested in knowing about is likely to say and/or do in a particular circumstance. As a woman who has raised a special needs child, who is a lover of animals and who is very proud to be owned by an American Bull Dog. I have compassion and a reverence for all living things (except wasps). I hope that my warmth, humor and fluid ability to connect with what is known will quickly make me one of your favorite readers. Do not believe that you are separate from the Divine, diligent Seeker. It simply is not so. Yours, Ellen Hartwell

Upside Down World

Upside Down World: The Loss of the Sacred Cosmos
considering morality and wisdom as significant parts of the story - not just the great conquistadors, pioneers, homesteaders, opportunists, and freedom seekers from Europe battling the savage, pagan, Warring Indigenous Nations from the Americas. Similarly, Crowleys challenges mainstream views of American history and culture with an eloquent explanation and analysis of why America has not lived up to the ideals on which it was founded. Despite the profound insights, the text is never aggressive or judgemental. What you find is a passionate Crowley advocating a pure heart, clean hands approach to life for all members of a society. Denise Martin, PhD Assistant Professor Pan African Studies and Humanities. Upside Down World: The Loss of the Sacred Cosmos. I include myths from ancient Egypt, Babylon, India, Scandinavia, and Ireland along with Buddhist philosophy and American Indian wisdom. Crowley finds that mythological themes from these traditions often overlap with themes in the Semitic myths, where the king took special care of widows, orphans, and the disadvantaged. Another theme that centers on Semitic literature is the attempted seduction of the hero by a goddess or femme fatale. When the hero refuses the invitation, the female destroys the hero or someone close to him. Interestingly, this happened to most of the heroes from Babylonia, Scandinavia, Celtic, and Egyptian mythologies. Christina Hamlett, Childrens Writer, April 2011, www.ChildrensWriter.com

REVIEWS
Like the quest for a unified theory in physics, Eugene Crowley Jr., seeks to integrate the historical, political, social, mythical, spiritual, scientific, religious, and intellectual realities of the western world into a coherent paradigm. But unlike the physicists who believe they are mapping new territory, Crowley maintains that Golden age civilizations of the past left us with a wealth of information via, myths, art, architecture, music, etc that can help us unify our fragmented world. The unifying principle is simply to reintroduce or in some cases, reconcile the sacred with all of our endeavours which in turn will actualize the ultimate purpose and meaning to the life experiences of both individuals and society. Crowleys premise holds that the sacred dimension to all of the above realities has been neglected in western culture, resulting in the unbalanced civilization that exists today. This unbalance celebrates patriarchy over matriarchy, individuality over the good of society, man made over divine laws, the physical body over moral character, materialism over moderation and surface over depth. Crowley supports his premise by relying heavily on mythological archetypes found in Kemetan / Egyptian, Greek, and Germanic / Nordic cultures and then applying them to the context of historical events. In one intriguing example, American patriarchs are cast as Set, the ancient Kemetan (Egyptian) neter of disorder and prototype of the Judeo- Christian Satan: The American fraternal saw the idea of a brother one belonging exclusively to a family of European ancestry. The concept of brother was not welcomed to those of a different racial origin. The organizers of the EuropeanAmerican societies identified the concept of brother parochially, and they were unable to attain a spiritual or cosmic relation in the idea of brother. The Americans thus separated the bond of brotherhood with humanity. In fleeing the tyranny of their former European kings by seeking a land of freedom, the new Americans became like their former despotic kings by limiting the liberties and freedoms of humans in their new nation. The American country would later alter the major systems of the culture and dilute the original concepts of education, religion, politics, economics, and entertainment to artificial forms with restricted participation by non European-Americans. In the alteration of the secret fraternities, the early Americans lost the meaning of life according to the wisdom that had spread throughout the ancient world. Instead of acting like Osirus by living the truth, the early patriarchs acted like Set, the assassin of Osirus and destroyer or truth. His chapters on Turning the Americas Upside Down, Let Wisdom Rein, Sins of the Founding Fathers together are worth the price of the book. Rarely has the encounter between Indigenous people of the Americas and Europeans been described from a vantage point

Upside Down World by Gene Crowley is an exciting and thought provoking book. In an age of confusion, Mr. Crowley does a thoughtful and well documented look at history, myths, and lasting spiritual truths that are forgotten or frequently overlooked in our age of technology and our seemingly never ending pursuit of new and improved. Although controversial at times, Mr. Crowley puts forth some highly persuasive arguments regarding truths contained in myths which have held over the millennia and how returning to these basic truths can restore sanity to an insane world. Paul Linden, Psy.D Professor of Psychology Roosevelt University

About The Author -

Eugene Crowley, Jr
Eugene Crowley Jr., was born in St. Joseph, Missouri, in 1944. He spent thirty- two years teaching high school English Grammar, World Literature, and Mythology in Chicago. He earned a Masters degree in General Psychology from Roosevelt University in Chicago. He is a former member of the Jungian Institute in Evanston, Illinois. He has traveled throughout the United States, Europe and South America. In his first professional attempt in writing, he extends the focus of his Masters thesis, Meaning in Life for Urban Adolescents, to adults by encouraging them to reach a level of maturity by living more harmoniously with themselves, their fellow man, and the universe. The author sees a need for an overhauling or a reinventing of Western culture with the application of the moral and wise traditions that had given the Native American Indians and ancient civilizations wholeness, order, and harmony. These cultures maintained a balance with themselves and nature. While many universities are eliminating their Classical Studies, the author sees a need in understanding the past civilizations spiritual, psychological, and holistic approach to life. These approaches gave them serenity and security in their connection with the universe. They knew their place in the Big Picture. Mr. Crowley wants to share his compassion and enthusiasm in predicting what other writers are forecasting, the dawning of a new Age of Wisdom, a Renaissance, or Enlightenment where Western man will discover his true inner nature and put it to use to serve humanity. In his compassion to help humanity by informing them of the meaning of life, Crowley encourages everyone to discover the sacredness of the Self, nature, and the universe. With these tasks completed diligently, there should be optimism for a New Enlightenment and the restoration of the sacred cosmos. www.eugenecrowley.com

This book, superbly woven from an extremely broad range of historic and philosophic sources by Mr. Crowley, has made me realize just how extensively Western societies have suppressed the spirituality, mythology, self-awareness, unity with nature, and internal wisdom that flourished in ancient peoples and cultures. Our mechanized societies claim superiority over the past, but this book demonstrates how we should reconsider, reexamine, and assimilate guidance from the past that is currently downplayed, if not totally ignored by todays world. By doing so, we can become happier, calmer, and more self-aware individuals, capable of living our lives to the fullest. This could lead to a new golden age in the modern world. I strongly recommend this book to all people, especially those who are not satisfied with their lives! John Edward Hart Author of Op Amps Made Easy Professor emeritus, DeVry University

Author Eugene Crowley Jr. (www.eugenecrowley.com) seeks to reconcile Western secular thought with Eastern and American Indian philosophies in his book,

Weirdest Mystery Animals in the World

The Weirdest Mystery Animals in the World
Ed Grabianowski
There are hundreds of mysterious cryptids in the world, a mythical menagerie of barely-glimpsed monsters, lost species, and terrifying legends. But let's face it: most of them are pretty pedestrian lake monsters and Sasquatch variants. There are a few, however, that are so bizarre you kind of hope they're real. Here are our favorites. Dingonek In the late 19th and early 20th century, European explorers ventured into the jungles of West Africa and found dozens of undiscovered species like the bongo and the okapi. Along with confirmed species, they also brought back tales of bizarre beasts that they learned of only through African legends or brief glimpses along the shores of steamy jungle rivers. There are dozens such creatures, but the dingonek takes the prize as the weirdest. Called the "jungle walrus," big game hunter Edgar Beecher Bronson described it as, "fourteen or fifteen feet long, head big as that of a lioness but shaped and marked like a leopard, two long white fangs sticking down straight out of his upper jaw, back broad as a hippo, scaled like an armadillo, but colored and marked like a leopard, and a broad fin tailGad! but he was a hideous old haunter of a nightmare, was that beast-fishBlast that blighter's fangs, but they looked long enough to go clean through a man." The Flatwoods Monster In 1952, witnesses in West Virginia headed into the woods to investigate an object in the sky, possibly a meteor. There they came upon a creature that stepped straight out of a nightmare: 10 feet tall, with a glowing red face in the shape of an ace of spades, wearing a cowl. Its body was covered in a pleated, dark green skirt, and it held out short, clawed arms. It hissed at them , causing the group to flee. They also reported an acrid smell, and witnesses later had convulsions with throat and nose irritation. This was likely a case of excited witnesses getting scared by a barn owl in a tree (the ace of spades face and clawed "arms" are a dead giveaway), then later getting so worked up about the monster that they developed the basic symptoms of hysteria. Still, it makes you wonder how you'd react if you ran into something like that at night in the woods. Ningen One sure way to make a cryptid seem 100 times creepier is to give it human features, especially if it's on a body that really really should not have human features. Now it's not just a weird unknown animal, it's some kind of alien intelligence watching us andwaiting? Shivers. Japan's Ningen is one of the best examples of this: picture a strange species of whale with pale white skin, humanoid arms and human-like eyes and mouth. Most of the photos of it are pretty unconvincing frankly, they all look like Photoshops, flat out CGI fakes or just icebergs with somewhat humanoid shapes.

Minhoco This South American beast is said to look like a giant black earthworm with two horns or tentacles on its head. And I mean giant: witnesses in the 1800s said it left massive trenches that diverted rivers and uprooted trees as it passed. A popular theory suggests the sightings represent a giant species of caecilian, amphibians with no legs and a segmented appearance that burrow underground and are native to South America. Seems somewhat plausible, since scientists are still discovering new caecilian species. This creature is so famous that a highway in So Paulo, the Via Elevada Presidente Artur da Costa E Silva, is nicknamed the Minhoco. "I vote for outer space. No way these are local, boys. The Beast of Bray Road This cryptid gets a spot on the list for a few reasons: 1). It's from Wisconsin, which just seems weird. Nothing about Wisconsin strikes terror into my heart, but apparently they have a beast. 2). It's got an awesome alliterative name. The Beast of Bray Road sounds very badass. 3). It's basically a straight-up werewolf. That seems unoriginal at first, but how many cryptid stories have the guts to just go right to "werewolf"? In truth, some of the reports from the 1980s suggest more of a Bigfoot type creature, or even just a crazed bear, but some describe a giant, upright, seemingly intelligent wolf creature. One witness saw a wolf creature with muscular arms, "jointed like a man's," holding food with its palms turned upward. The Wisconsin Werewolf! Incidentally, the name "Beast of Bray Road" makes me think, for some reason, of the Bay City Rollers, which brings to mind an image of rollerskate wearing disco werewolves. This is turn brings me to the realization that somewhere there is a Hollywood producer utterly bereft of ideas (more than one, probably), sitting there working on 300 Part 2: 600!, or a gritty, angsty remake of My Mother the Car, when instead she could be pushing a rollerskate wearing disco werewolf project. This is why I don't believe in god. The Lake Worth Monster First sighted in 1969, Texas' Lake Worth Monster shares a heritage with other crazed goatmen (Maryland has a notable one). It

attacked cars among other urban legend worthy behavior. If you're ever out parked in your car with your sweetie near Lake Worth, Texas, you should pretty much expect to be assaulted by a half-man, half-goat with scales and ragged clothing who may or may not hurl large objects like tires at you. There's one photo of the monster, but I don't really know what to make of it. This monster is extra awesome because of this piece aired by a local TV station that has that certain, "intern with too much time on his or her hands in the editing suite" flavor to it. Did we really need the intro explaining the other important non-goatman things that happened in 1969? Could there be a less smooth segue than Hendrix into the X-Files theme? Scape Ore Swamp Lizard Man Descriptions of attacks by this creature, first spotted in the late 1980s near Bishopville, South Carolina, sound like tales right out of a pulp comic book. It's a seven-foot tall reptilian humanoid that runs with alarming speed and is strong enough to seriously damage cars with its clawed hands. By some accounts, it can climb any surface with the gecko-like pads on its fingers. Reports are a bit shaky for this cryptid, mainly because a few of the sightings and pieces of evidence have been proven to be hoaxes. Is there a whole race of angry lizard men? Is it some kind of mutant? Owlman We couldn't put Mothman on this list because we talked him recently and at great length (though he surely would have made the top 5). Instead, we'll go with the UK's Mothman analogue, Owlman. A strange, large flying creature has been sighted around Cornwall dating back to the 1970s. Two witness accounts give a clue as to the true nature of Owlman: "It was like a big owl with pointed ears, as big as a man. The eyes were red and glowing. Its feet were like pincers." "It was horrible, a nasty owlface with big ears and big red eyes. It was covered with grey feathers. The claws in its feet were black. It flew straight up." Perhaps if it was like an owl, and had an owl face, it was an owl. It might seem odd how often Occam's Razor comes along and slices up weird paranormal entities into little owl-shaped paper dolls, but that's how science works.[]

Alien Beings Will Return To Exeter

Alien beings will return to Exeter
Seacoastonline.com
EXETER The Exeter UFO Festival will mark its third anniversary Labor Day weekend with a new sponsor, new and returning speakers, and a celebration of New Hampshire's most famous alien sighting. Dean Merchant, the festival's organizer, said businesses and nonprofits will combine their talents for a day of out-of-this-world fun Saturday, Sept. 3, in downtown Exeter. September 2011 is the 50th anniversary of the alleged abduction by aliens of the late Betty and Barney Hill of Portsmouth. The Hills were returning from a Canadian vacation and were driving through the White Mountains when they reportedly saw an alien craft and were taken on board. The experience gained them national fame, and they were the subjects of books and at least one movie. To her dying day Betty Hill continued to report UFO sightings, some of them in Exeter. This year, Merchant said, the Hills will be inducted posthumously into the Exeter UFO Festival Hall of Fame. The event has a three-fold purpose, according to Merchant. It gets people into downtown Exeter, benefiting the local businesses, and helps them find something to do on Labor Day weekend. The Exeter Kiwanis Club will sponsor this year's festival. Pamela Gjettum, Kiwanis past president and current secretary, is a longtime Exeter booster. "We like the fact," she said, "that the festival brings loads of people to downtown Exeter." The Kiwanis were involved from the start, setting up their food stand and making money for local charities, she said, and the festival gives them a good platform. "We needed a big downtown festival," Gjettum said, and the UFO event fills the need. The events have drawn 1,000 people to downtown Exeter, she said. And it's fun, Gjettum said. The event serves two groups: the "true believers," who cluster around the Town Hall and the nationally known speakers, and the second group, people who come to Exeter to "have a good time and spend their money." Merchant has stayed on as UFO festival organizer, and reported that several popular events will be back. The Children's Festival at Founders Park, next to the library, will feature a "story circle," crafts and its signature event, building a spacecraft out of recyclable items in the "debris field." Pamela Merchant, Dean's wife, is heading up the children's activities. Neil and Elaina Santerre of Santerre's Stones and Stuff will provide a central hub for downtown activities and redemption of prizes. "It's 'Starship Command,'" Merchant said. He expects other downtown merchants to get into the spirit with sales and special promotions such as the Loaf & Ladle's "UFO Whoopie Pie." The Loaf & Ladle will also be the site of an "Alien Cafe" with local acoustic musicians. And the Kiwanis Club will set up a grill for quick snacks across from Town Hall. The Alien Pet Costume Contest returns, to be judged by Seacoast Media Group columnist Gina Carbone, he said. While the festival offers something for everyone, the serious UFO buff will find everything they need in Town Hall, the site of the annual lecture series. The speaker series begins Saturday at 8:30 a.m. with Kathleen Marden, Betty Hill's niece and author of several books on the phenomena; filmmakers Jeff and Jessie Finn, who are making a documentary on the Hills' experiences; and Steve Furmani of the New England Mutual UFO Network. Speakers also include renowned UFO researchers and writers Stanton Freedman and Richard Dolan. Authors and speakers will sign books and go one-on-one with believers in a "Meet and Greet" room. In the evening, Merchant said he hopes to show the film "Strange September," about the Hills and their experience. All events are free, with the festival funded by donations and sale of souvenir Tshirts. Proceeds from the T-shirt sales go to local children's charities, after taking out "seed money" for the following year's event. Merchant said last year's proceeds went to Big Brothers/Big Sisters, New Outlook Teen Center, and to local families in need through the owner of a children's clothing store. And, he said, the event raises understanding of unexplained phenomena. Exeter was also the site of the "Incident At Exeter," a sighting documented in another book by Fuller, and there have been less-publicized events in the town.[] Dr. Alice Chase, who wrote 'Nutrition for Health', died of malnutrition. (not verified) Each year in America there are about 300,000 deaths that can be attributed to obesity. Followers of the Zoroastrian religion leave their dead atop a local tower, where vultures handle the nasty business of disposing the spiritually impure flesh. In 1845, President Andrew Jackson's pet parrot was removed from his funeral for swearing. In 1992, approximately 750 deaths occurred in the United States due to workplace violence. In 19th-century Europe there was so much anecdotal evidence that living people were mistakenly declared dead that cadavers were laid out in "hospitals for the dead" while attendants awaited signs of putrefaction. In Erwin, Tennessee an elephant was once hanged for murder. In the Spanish Pyrenees, when a beekeeper dies, each of his bees is splashed with a drop of Black Ink. In the United States, poisoning is the fourth leading cause of death among children. Influenza caused over twenty-one million deaths in 1918. Nutmeg is extremely poisonous if injected intravenously - it can kill you. On average, people fear spiders more than they do dying. However, statistically you are more likely to be killed by a champagne cork than by the bite of a poisonous spider. On average, right-handed people live 9 years longer than their left-handed counterparts. Only one in two billion people will live to be 116 or older. Over 2500 left handed people are killed each year from using products made for right handed people. The Buddhist priest and mystic, Kukai, who died on 23 April 835, is believed by his followers to have become a 'Buddha in his own body' by mummifying himself while still alive. The most extraordinary thing about the Tarim mummies of Xinjiang province in China is that these naturally-preserved bodies are not Chinese but Caucasian. Discovered in the Takla Makan desert, the mummies are dressed in what has been described as a 'Celtic tartan' style of clothing. When a person dies, hearing is generally the last sense to go. The first sense lost is usually sight. Then follows taste, smell, and touch. When Thomas Edison died in 1941; Henry Ford captured his last dying breath in a bottle. (Continued on Page 40)

FROM THE WORLD OF X ZONE TRIVIA

A body decomposes four times as fast in water than on land. A dentist invented the Electric Chair. A human head remains conscious for about 15 to 20 seconds after it is decapitated. A murder is committed in the US every 23 minutes, which makes about 22852 murders each year. About 100 people choke to death on ballpoint pens each year. Ancient Egyptians shaved off their eyebrows to mourn the death of their cats. Burials in America deposit 827,060 gallons of embalming fluidformaldehyde, methanol, and ethanolinto the soil each year. Cremation pumps dioxins, hydrochloric acid, sulfur dioxide, and carbon dioxide into the air. Cancer is the second leading cause of death in Orange County, California. Number one is heart disease. Cockroaches can live for nine days without their heads, at which point they die of starvation. Diabetes is the fourth leading cause of death in the U.S., accounting for about 180,000 deaths per year.

Alien Killed With A Coal Shovel

The alien killed with a coal shovel
By Gavin Havery - The Northern Echo
Stories of alien abductions peaked in the Sixties and Seventies, but one case that predates them is said to have taken place in the North-East. Gavin Havery reports. IT is a sunny spring day in 1940. Soldiers are marching south along Saltwell Road, in Gateshead, towards Low Fell. Nearby, five-year-old Robert Hall is playing with his friends in the maze of red brick Tyneside terraces, not far from the train tracks. Earlier in the day, he had seen something whizzing about in the sky and, after he tired of playing with his friends, he decided to go to his Hedley Street home around the corner. Robert, a retired window cleaner, says he was confronted by an aircraft the like of which he had never seen before. He described it as a big egg-shaped thing surround by bright light. Robert says it was then that he spotted strange-looking creatures standing in the back lane. He says three of them were built like men, but ranged from 2ft to 4ft in height, one looked like Big Foot while another had long flowing hair and a coat that partially covered a skeletal body and bat wings. Other children were petrified and in shock. They were trying to get over the railway, but there was barbed wire and they were getting cut and were screaming, he says. The story sounds like something from a low budget sci-fi film but the man telling it is no attention-seeking youngster. Robert Hall is 76 and he has been telling the same story all his life. And now he is telling it in a television programme that has brought his story to a worldwide audience. Recalling what happened, Robert says the creatures spoke to him in perfect English, with no accent, and asked if they could examine him. I told them it was 1940 and we were at war with Germany, he says. They took blood out of the back of my neck and put some jelly on. I kept my eyes shut. I was so frightened I was shaking. After 20 terrifying minutes, he was allowed to go. I was up that street like a shot, he says. My parents thought I was kidding and so did the soldiers. The next day, Robert says, two men with black suits came to the house and warned him that if he said anything, he would disappear. One close encounter would be fascinating enough, but the pensioner says things took an even more sinister turn a few days later when an alien tried to snatch him off the street. He says a grey alien, fitting the common description of an extra terrestrial with big eyes and a large head, grabbed him. He was on me in a couple of seconds, he says. I fell over the kerb and bashed my toe. My Uncle Ernie saw what was happening and bashed its head in with a coal shovel. The aliens body was allegedly put in a coal sack and Robert was sent to find a local policeman, Sergeant Brookes. He says the Army was called and took the body to a church. Robert says strange small triangular marks appeared on his left cheek, which remained until he was about 12 or 13, before disappearing, leaving no trace. Seventy years after his alleged close encounter, Roberts story has become the subject of a television documentary. Researcher and broadcaster Richard Hall, who is not related to Robert, studies all things out of the ordinary for his digital television programme, The Rich Planet Starship, and richplanet.net In 2008, he was giving a lecture on UFOs at the Caedmon Hall, in Gateshead, when he was contacted by Robert, who lives nearby. Richard, who is 43 and lives in Sunniside, but is based in Consett, says: It is a fascinating story and it is a very, very early case in terms of modern day grey alien abductions. Richard says other abduction cases were reported in Brazil in 1957, and in the US in 1961, increasing throughout the Sixties and Seventies. There is a case of a recovered UFO in Missouri where small alien creatures were allegedly recovered and, obviously, we have got Roswell in 1947 (an alien spacecraft allegedly crashed at Roswell, in New Mexico). But this predates all of that, which makes it a very interesting case. Richard carried out a three-month investigation into Roberts claims. He verified that street and shop names checked out. He also managed to confirm there was a Sgt Brookes working the area at the time. Richard says Roberts description of the creatures the small stature, the grey skin, the large eyes, the craft itself, elliptical shape and the metallic surface with the bright light are common features of alien abduction stories Theres also the fact that they tried to interfere with Roberts neck. I dont believe that they took blood, as Robert claims, he says. They were possibly trying to put something in. Interestingly, Robert says the creatures had a short, white hand-held device which could subdue or immobilise somebody and theres the triangular marks that were left on his face. These are all things that we find in abductee cases, again and again. Richards investigations are ongoing and he is keen for anyone who can back up Roberts claims to get in touch with him. Robert, who has four children and three grandchildren, is sincere and earnest about his alien encounter all those years ago. Richard, who has met Roberts sister, says it is a story he has stuck to since he was a little lad. Robert says: I got the p**s taken out of me for years, and at school the teacher would say theres the boy who believes in little green men. They werent bloody green, they were grey. I will take it to my grave. []

SCIENCE FACTS
A diamond will not dissolve in acid. The only thing that can destroy it is intense heat. A lump of pure gold the size of a matchbox can be flattened into a sheet the size of a tennis court. Absolutely pure gold is so soft that it can be molded with the hands. An ounce of gold can be stretched into a wire 50 miles long. Colored diamonds are caused by impurities such as nitrogen (yellow), boron (blue). With red diamonds being due to deformities in the structure of the stone, and green ones being the result of irradiation. Diamond is the hardest naturally occurring substance, and is also one of the most valuable natural substances. Diamonds are crystals formed almost entirely of carbon. Because of its hardness, the diamond is the most enduring of all gemstones. They are among the most costly jewels in the world, partly because they are rare, Only four important diamond fields have been found - in Africa, South America, India, and the Soviet Union. In 1957, the Shipping port Atomic Power Station in Pennsylvania, the first nuclear facility to generate electricity in the United States, went on line. (It was taken out of service in 1982.) In 1982, in the first operation of its kind, doctors at the University of Utah Medical Center implanted a permanent artificial heart in the chest of retired dentist Dr. Barney Clark, who lived 112 days with the device. Mercury is the only metal that is liquid at room temperature. Mineral deposits in caves: The ones growing upward are stalagmites, the ones growing downward are stalactites. Natural gas has no odor. The smell is added artificially so that leaks can be detected. Prussic acid, in a crystalline powder called Zyklon B, was used to kill in Germany's gas chambers. The gas would paralyze the victim's lungs, causing them to suffocate. Sea water, loaded with mineral salts, weighs about a pound and a half more per cubit foot than fresh water at the same temperature. Ten per cent of the salt mined in the world each year is used to de-ice the roads in America. The air we breathe is 78% nitrogen, 21.5% oxygen, .5% argon and other gases. The Chinese were using aluminum to make things as early as 300 AD Western civilization didn't rediscover aluminum until 1827. The most abundant metal in the Earth's crust is aluminum. []

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The Age of Credulity

The age of credulity
Tom Spears - The Ottawa Citizen
In the difficult and dangerous attack on the hideout of Osama bin Laden, U.S. special forces had an odd task. They had to take a photograph of bin Laden. And they had to bring home some of his DNA. These were not idle souvenirs. They were evidence to prove bin Laden was dead, just in case someone suggested the whole story was a hoax or a conspiracy. And of course many said just that, starting the very day when the news broke. We live in a constant state of disbelief, where, despite having more education than any society in human history, people would rather take the word of an anonymous Internet post over that of a recognized authority, especially where there's a conspiracy theory. This strange credulity is growing. Many reporters remember when there were a few guys with fax machines who sent us badly typed letters analysing why the Kennedy assassination was a hoax. Now it has spread to everything. We are besieged with claims that H1N1 vaccine will kill you, that Obama was born in Kenya and is secretly a Muslim (to the point where he actually had to produce his birth certificate, for heaven's sake), and that aircraft contrails are actually "chemtrails" - mind control drugs sprayed on us by the government. An especially insidious one was the fake study that alleged measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine caused autism. You can't have a more thoroughly discredited piece of work, yet parents still cling to it. The result: We've just had a measles outbreak in Quebec. Measles is sometimes fatal to young children, and children did die during measles outbreaks in recent years in England, where many more parents avoided measles shots. I used to think that people only pretended to believe silly theories for the fun of it. This may explain Elvis sightings, but it doesn't explain the widespread resistance to medical research. So why should people distrust their doctors and at the same time embrace detox, aai berries, and longevity secrets from remote tribes with lifespans a lot shorter than our own? Perhaps the mad cow experience is responsible for a lot of this tendency. For years, the British government kept assuring people that the disease was under control. By 2009, it had killed 165 people in Britain, and infected more than 170,000 cattle. An official inquiry found Whitehall hadn't lied, but had attempted a policy of public "sedation." Certainly the public's trust was shattered. As well, many studies have found an odd human tendency. The public believes scientists if, and only if, their studies support the opinions the public already holds. Studies that conflict with one's own prejudices quickly become "junk science." I travelled to England in 2000 for research on genetically modified foods. At that point the British Medical Association opposed them. The group's spokeswoman, a senior medical professor from Scotland, told me she felt they were probably not harmful, but there was nothing to justify even a small risk. Since then the BMA has concluded the safety of GM foods has been proven. But public opinion remains opposed. Michael Oppenheimer, a prominent geoscientist from Princeton University, gave a speech this spring outlining how difficult it has become for scientists to speak on areas in which they are experts. He cites NASA climate specialist Jim Hansen, who "has asserted that by and large, members of our community (i.e. scientists) are reticent, hesitant to speak out about the implications of their research, and when they do, they take a cautious approach. By and large, he's probably right, and I too would like to see my colleagues have more to say because I think they . have a lot to offer. But it's not easy to do so in a satisfying way; the messages are easily misunderstood; our interventions are sometimes unhinged from our expertise in a way that is not helpful to the listener (after all, reticence is sometimes the right choice). Also, it's not clear when, who or if, anyone is listening." We are a society of generalists, Oppenheimer notes. Yet the questions facing us in medicine, climate and other fields increasingly demand high levels of specialized education. The point made by novelist and physicist C.P. Snow in the 1950s remains valid. He cautioned that western societies could not afford to ignore scientific training, that learning about laws of nature is as central as learning about literature. We don't all need PhDs, but we need to learn to look carefully at evidence, to consider that a drug with years of clinical testing isn't on the same level as a "wellness product" with none. In the 1700s, the mentality that we now call the Age of Reason enabled exploration, industry, better health, economic growth. It would be tragic to throw that away today.[] the Air Force released a paper, unclassified, that examined weather modification as one method of remaining a world Superpower in the year 2025. I've read the paper, and read it again, and again. The paper clearly states "This report contains fictional representations of future situations/scenarios." The goal was to, if you will, think outside the box, to imagine a world in 2025 in a way that takes into account the unimaginable changes that have happened in the recent past. Think microwave oven, computers, cell phones. Those are relatively recent developments that at one time seemed mythical. So was the goal of this 1996 paper: to "imagine" the world in 2025. That imagined world included weather modification. So, was that 1996 paper telling? Did it give away secret plots to spray the atmosphere and us? Here's how a contrail, the scientific name for these things, forms: Jet exhaust has water vapor in it. Planes fly way high, where the air is very cold. Cold air forces the moisture in the exhaust to condense, forming man-made trails of cloud particles. Why are they there some days and not others? Why do they sometimes look like planned patterns? The upper atmosphere has to be just moist enough that the contrail doesn't evaporate as soon as it forms. That happens sometimes, but not always. The patterns that chemtrail proponents say look planned are simply the paths that American airspace follows. Airspace is generally gridded into north-south paths. "Anybody can take a look at the skies for themselves and tell the difference between what is a contrail and what is a 50 mile path of ... spray that ... turns into a cloud." Need more opinions? They are all over the net. But, here's the opinion of the leader of the Ua's Atmospheric Science program: "They are formed out of water vapor from the jet exhaust," says Dr. Betterton, from the UA Atmospheric Science Department. The paper released by the Air Force in 1996 was mysterious sounding. Perhaps it's only natural that if a military organization releases a fantastical paper wherein the contributors were asked to fantasize about such things as weather modification that some members of the public wig out about it. "There is no conspiracy," assures Dr. Betterton. Call them crazy or buy into their theories. They are there, and they likely aren't hushing up any too quickly.[]

Contrail Controversy
By Chuck George
We've seen the roadside signs...We've gotten the emails... Some people are worried, and are on a mission to tell everyone. The theories about these so-called "chemtrails" are vast: solar radiation management, population control, weather control, or biological and chemical warfare. Chris Haskill.. is a Tucson Resident heading the movement here on chemtrails. "They are spraying barium aluminum powder and they are doing this to control the weather." Does the government have a clandestine plan to control the weather? It is fact that the government has thought about and experimented with weather modification. However, it is also fact that the air force has stated on more than one occasion that they are "not conducting any weather modification experiments or programs and (have) no plans to do so in the future." This whole thing started in 1996 when

Do Sea Monsters Really Exist

As a mysterious skeleton is washed up on a British beach... Do sea monsters REALLY exist?
By Dr Darren Naish - MailOnline
For centuries theyve been a part of maritime legend, inspiring curiosity and terror in equal measure. Lurking in the depths of the oceans, shocking in size and appearance, gigantic serpents and prehistoric monsters are as much a source of fascination as ever, especially in Hollywood. In the past two or three years alone, attacks by huge undersea beasts have provided the centrepiece battles at the ends of blockbusters such as Pirates Of The Caribbean, Clash Of The Titans and The Voyage Of The Dawn Treader. But are such tales of strange sea beasts more than mythology? Is there any evidence to suggest that some of these monsters of the watery deep - from Jules Vernes giant squid in Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea to the legendary Kraken, a leviathan sending sailors to their doom - might actually exist? Certainly, the study of the possible existence of sea monsters and other creatures of legend - known as cryptozoology - remains an area that captures the imagination of scientists and laymen alike. Last week I took part in a major debate at the Zoological Society in London at which I and my colleagues wondered whether there might be more to these stories than mere myth. Only this week, photographs emerged of the large carcass of an unidentified sea creature washed up on the beach near Aberdeen. It is the subject of fevered speculation, with some claiming it is a sea monster and others (more sensibly) saying its a plain old pilot whale. Further fuelling the popular enthusiasm for sea monster lore, on Tuesday night the Discovery Channel screened footage, filmed by Alaskan fishermen, of what appeared to be an immense sea creature at least 30ft long with humps on its back, breaking the surface of the ocean. What may simply be an example of a whale and its wake has been imaginatively recast by viewers as the Alaskan Nessie. Given that previously unknown large marine animals continue to be discovered, the idea is far from outlandish. Its perfectly plausible that species of shark, rays and whale still wait to be identified. Indeed, according to some estimates, there could be as many as 50 species of large sea going animals awaiting discovery. Despite advances in sonar equipment, remotely operated cameras and deep-sea submersibles, only a fraction of the vast oceans that cover so much of the Earth have been examined. It was only in 1976, for instance, that the incredible Megamouth shark was discovered. And it was found entirely by chance when one became entangled with the anchor of a U.S. navy ship off the coast of Hawaii. An unusual-looking, deep-water

creature with a large, rubbery head and enormous mouth that can open 4ft wide, the Megamouth is unlike any other shark previously seen. To this day, sightings remain extremely rare. Equally rare is Omuras whale, named after a biologist from Tokyo. This creature, around 33ft in length, was first caught by a Japanese research vessel in the Pacific in the late Seventies yet hardly any specimens have been caught or filmed since. So we can be extremely confident new species will keep on being found as we continue to explore our planet. What we dont know is whether any of these species might match those creatures mentioned in the fantastical tales passed down to us through history or in more recent eyewitness accounts of sea monsters. The Roman writer Pliny gives an account of a giant octopus in his natural history books, while sea dragons began to feature on the edges of medieval maps in the 13th century to demarcate the edge of charted waters. By the time of the Renaissance, tales of strange creatures sighted on the horizon or washed up on shore were increasingly common. On his return journey from Newfoundland in 1583, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, an adventurer and half-brother of Sir Walter Raleigh, claimed to have encountered a strange, lion-like sea monster with glaring eyes. By the 18th century, the reports had become more elaborate. Equally rare is Omuras whale, named after a biologist from Tokyo. This creature, around 33ft in length, was first caught by a Japanese research vessel in the Pacific in the late Seventies yet hardly any specimens have been caught or filmed since. So we can be extremely confident new species will keep on being found as we continue to explore our planet. What we dont know is whether any of these species might match those creatures mentioned in the fantastical tales passed down

to us through history or in more recent eyewitness accounts of sea monsters. The Roman writer Pliny gives an account of a giant octopus in his natural history books, while sea dragons began to feature on the edges of medieval maps in the 13th century to demarcate the edge of charted waters. By the time of the Renaissance, tales of strange creatures sighted on the horizon or washed up on shore were increasingly common. On his return journey from Newfoundland in 1583, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, an adventurer and half-brother of Sir Walter Raleigh, claimed to have encountered a strange, lion-like sea monster with glaring eyes. By the 18th century, the reports had become more elaborate. One common notion about sea monsters is that, if they exist, then perhaps they could be modern-day descendents of plesiosaurs, the marine reptiles that ruled the seas during the age of the dinosaurs. After all, the sightings often superficially seem to match some of the characteristics such as a long neck or giant flippers of these long extinct creatures of the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods. The belief that the oceans might contain descendants from the dinosaur age is known as the prehistoric survivor paradigm. But there are two central problems with this idea. First of all, what we know of plesiosaur fossils shows that the living animals did not really match the modern sea monsters described by eyewitnesses. While the modern-day sea monsters are described as raising their necks high out of the water and even waving them around, plesiosaur necks were far less flexible. In fact, it seems plesiosaurs were simply unable to raise their massively long necks above the waters surface. If you have ever tried to lift a heavy pole out of the water from one end, you will know how gravity makes such a task impossible. Continued on Page 43

End of World Prophecies Cause Real Harm

As a mysterious skeleton is washed up on a British beach... Do sea monsters REALLY exist?
Continued from Page 43
The second main problem with the prehistoric survivor idea is that there are absolutely no fossilised plesiosaurs from rock younger than 65 million years old. If some plesiosaurs had survived into our present age, we would expect a continuous fossil record. Ah, say those who want to believe these marine giants are still with us, what about the coelacanth the 5ft fish that was thought to have become extinct at the same time as the plesiosaurs, but in the Thirties was discovered to be living in the seas off southern Africa? There were, it is said, no coelacanth fossils younger than 65 million years old, yet it obviously survived down the millennia. However, the bones of plesiosaurs are extremely large and tough, which means not only that they remain intact but they are also easy to recognise and classify. It is a completely different story with the coelacanths, whose bones are much more fragile, small and vulnerable, so traces are far harder to find. Whatever your view and experts remain divided it seems that the best biological evidence suggests we are unlikely to discover a terrifying new monster lurking in the depths. But thats not to say it wont happen. []

Do End of the World Prophecies Cause Real Harm?

2012 Expert Reveals How Myths Can Cause Bankruptcies And Death
By Dr. Christopher Keating (HealthNewsDigest.com) - As a physics professor, Dr. Christopher Keating knows the world is not going to end any time soon. But that doesnt mean the myth of the apocalypse cant cause harm. I hear the argument that predictions made by doomsday prophets like Harold Camping are harmless because the majority of people will ignore them. But, many people ruined themselves financially because of Campings prediction that the rapture would occur on May 21. In the past, predictions like this have even led people to commit suicide. Its difficult to stand by and watch while people are harmed because of someone like Camping. said Keating, author of Dialogues on 2012: Why the World Will Not End (www.Dialogueson2012.com). Science and religion have both been misused by fearmongers to promote the idea that the world will come to an end in October, in 2012 or what ever comes next. There is always the next

crackpot who thinks he has all of the great answers. I wish there was a way to convince the public that these people are merely putting forth these ideas for their own self-promotion and profit. Just look at Camping. He originally predicted the rapture would occur in 1994 and people believed him. Now, even though he was wrong last time, people mindlessly followed him again! The next big prophecy revolves around the ancient Mayan prediction that December 21, 2012 will be the day the world ends. Keating said that date is as erroneous as Campings flexible timetable. Claims about December 21, 2012 are fiction with no scientific evidence or validity, Keating said. The world will still be here on December 22, 2012. The basis of the 2012 prediction comes from the Mayan calendar, but that calendar is not even Mayan. It was developed more than a thousand years before the rise of the Mayan civilization and was already well-established before the Maya ever appeared on the scene. Moreover, Keating pointed out that the Mayans werent necessarily the most qualified people to make any kind of enlightened predictions. While the mystery of the Maya civilizations demise is intriguing, the Maya were not the advanced civilization that some are claiming. The Maya did not have any special powers or knowledge that would allow them to make any such prediction, Keating said. They were not an enlightened civilization. They engaged in terrible violence, including horrific animal and human sacrifices, frequently preceded by torture. The bodies of the victims were thrown into the source of their drinking water. The common people would bury their dead under the floors of their homes. They didnt even have the wheel. How is it that this culture is supposed to have been so intelligent they were able to predict the end of the world? The difference between the latest Camping debacle and the 2012 predictions is that Keating believes the 2012 doomsayers are twisting science to support their wild claims. Camping used these bizarre numerology arguments to get his end date. 2012 people are using false arguments and bad science. As an example, recent news coverage concerning Comet Elenin has all the 2012

theorists in a tizzy, he added. Comet Elenin is a small comet that is currently over twice as far from Earth as the Sun, but some believers in the prophecy are claiming it will be responsible for earthquakes and a shift of the Earths axis. Basically, people just need to use a little common sense when they hear these stories about the end of the world. If people would do just a little research on their own we could quickly put the fearmongers out of business and prevent a lot of harm. It would be great if science received as much attention from the public as these false predictions. About Dr. Christopher Keating Dr. Christopher Keating is a professor of physics with 20 years experience conducting research in space physics with several published scientific papers. His experience as a teacher includes nearly all topics in undergraduate physics, space science and astronomy. He has also served for over 30 years in the United States Navy and Navy Reserve working principally as an analyst in naval intelligence.

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