In the News

Mesolithic Wall in North Sea

15 February 2024 Archaeology
At https://www.livescience.com/archaeology/11000-year-old-submerged-stone-wall-discovered-off-germany-was-once-used-to-trap-reindeer ... It is probably guesswork that it was used to trap reindeer but what other animal  could it have been - red deer

Flipping the Poles

13 February 2024 Astronomy, Electromagnetism
Sent in by William - a link to an MSN story on the Sun's magnetic flip halfway through our current solar cycle. The last one

Volcanoes

11 February 2024 Catastrophism, Geology, Plate Tectonics
The Iceland volcano has sparked back into life for the third time since roughly December of last year - see https://livescience.com/planet-earth/volcanos/iceland-volcano-erupts-for-3rd-time-triggering-lava-fountains-over-200-feet-tall ... the Icelandic volcano,

The Geminids and Worlds in Collision

11 February 2024 Astronomy, Catastrophism, Geology
I couldn't resist the title. Not planets but comets and asteroids breaking up or smashing each other about. Let's begin at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/32---phaethon ... which is

Shark Graveyard

10 February 2024 Biology, Catastrophism, Evolution, Geology
At https://www.livescience.com/animals/sharks/325-million-year-old-shark-graveyard-discovered-deep-within-mammoth-cave-harbors-new-fossilized-species ... at Mammoth Cave National Park in Kentucky two new shark species that lived 325 million years ago on the geological column have

Galactic Centre Ejections

10 February 2024 Astronomy, Electromagnetism
At https://www.livescience.com/space/black-holes/event-horizon-telescope-spies-gargantuan-energy-jets-erupting-from-nearby-supermassive-black-hole ... The Event Horizon Telescope has witnessed a 'gargantuan' burst of energy erupting from a supermassive black hole. What is really meant is

Pre Clovis Settlement

9 February 2024 Ancient history, Anthropology, Dating
This is now a perennial update since the Clovis dam was breached not so long ago. Fourteen projectile points from Coopers Ferry in Idaho have

Special Relativity and the Lorentz Equations: errors in Einstein's 1905 paper

31 January 2024 Physics
The paper in the title has just been published in Physics Essays 37, January 2024, Alasdair Beal .. ISSN 0836-1398 [print] and 2371-2236 [online]. Special

Sink Holes

20 January 2024 Geology
Sink Holes as big as a skyscraper and as wide as a city street open up on the Arctic sea floor.  See https://www.livescience.com/sinkholes-opening-arctic-seafloor ... there

Siberia's Exploding Craters

20 January 2024 Catastrophism, Geology
At https://www.livescience.com/planet-earth/geology/mystery-of-siberias-giant-exploding-craters-may-finally-be-solved ... this is a subject that has fascinated many people, from geologists to global warmers, and from the guy in the pub to

Electromagnetic dating of the Ishtar Gate

20 January 2024 Archaeology, Dating, Electromagnetism
At https://www.livescience.com/archaeology/babylons-ishtar-gate-may-have-a-totally-different-purpose-than-we-thought-magnetic-field-measurements-suggest ... archaeologists made use of the clay bricks at Babylon's Ishtar Gatte to measure the magnetic field to determine the construction date. This

Fountains of Diamonds

18 January 2024 Catastrophism, Geology, Physics, Plate Tectonics
At https://www.livescience.com/planet-earth/geology/fountains-of-diamonds-that-erupt-from-earths-center-are-revealing-the-lost-history-of-supercontinents ... diamonds, it is thought, reach the surface of the earth during massive volcanic eruptions - as supercontinents break up. In Late Cretaceous,

Melanesian Border Plateau

18 January 2024 Catastrophism, Geology, Plate Tectonics
At https://www.livescience.com/planet-earth/superstructure-bigger-than-idaho-has-been-growing-on-the-seafloor-by-fiji-since-the-dinosaur-age ... a hguge plateau, or superstructure as it is called at the link, has been growing near Fiji since the Cretaeous period. It

Fossilised Eyes and Brains

18 January 2024 Biology, Catastrophism, Geology
This one will surprise a few. At https://www.livescience.com/planet-earth/fossils/462-million-year-old-fossilized-eyes-and-brains-uncovered-in-secret-welsh-fossil-site ... in what must have been instantaneous burial and preservation we have a fossil deposit at a

Iceland Volcano Update

17 January 2024 Catastrophism, Geology
At https://www.livescience.com/planet-earth/volcanos/iceland-volcano-situation-in-grindavik-has-become-very-bleak-following-new-eruption ... the Iceland volcano has sparked back into life, once again. Lots of pictures at this link - and many other links on

Oasis Wall

17 January 2024 Archaeology
At https://www.livescience.com/archaeology/4000-year-old-wall-found-around-oasis-in-saudi-arabia-likely-defended-against-raids-from-nomads ... a nine mile long wall has been found at the Khaybar Oasis - dating back to around 4000 years ago. It was

The Big Ring and the Nube

17 January 2024 Astronomy
At https://www.livescience.com/space/a-big-cosmological-mystery-newfound-cosmic-corkscrew-defies-our-understanding-of-the-universe  ...  astronomers have discovered a cosmic ring - a gigantic  spiral of galaxies and galaxy clusters. It is 1.3 billion light years wide

Scary Temperatures

16 January 2024 Climate change
Putting the 'hottest year evah' into perspective - go to https://climatedebate.co.uk/global-temperature/ ... where we are told about different ways of measuring global temperatures produce small

Ecuador lost civilisation

15 January 2024 Anthropology, Archaeology
Sent in by Gary ... https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-67940671.amp ... a lost Amazon valley full of settlements, in numbers comparable to the Maya. These lost settlements are in

J0613+52

15 January 2024 Astronomy
William sent in the link https://www.yahoo.com/news/astronomers-accidentally-discover-dark-primordial-130045610.html ... but you can read the same story at https://www.sciencealert.com/bizarre-galaxy-discovered-with-seemingly-no-stars-whatsoever ... The galaxy appears to have no stars to