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775/6 again

25 January 2013
Catastrophism

The AD775/6 event was a Thunderbolts feature a week or so ago – go to www.thunderbolts.info/wp/2013.01/16/caught-in-the-crossfire/ … and Rens Van Der Sluijs mentions both the entries of 776 (A/Sax Chron) and 793 (Roger of Wendover). Rens is however critical of the mainstream handling of the issue as they studiously ignored the work of a number of scientists he lists, including Paul LaViolette (2011). The latter has produced a wealth of geophysical and archaeological evidence in support of big solar flares (or stellar flares) and the next step will be to get hold of his paper.

In the mean time it is worth while to restate what started all this off. A Japanese cedar tree showed a rapid increase in the concentration of C14 in the year AD775 and this was matched by a peak in Beryllium 10 in polar ice cores dated to the same year. Firstly, the tree ring date is undoubtedly correct as Japanese cedars live a long time – but it is not altogether certain the ice core date is completely reliable. For example, we have witnessed a bit of a spat  recently over ice core dating of Vesuvius, in AD79 according to accepted historical dating methodology – but even this is by no means entirely certain as Steve Mitchell has suggested there is perhaps an inbuilt error of 15 years in Bede's chronology (and may be a little more). The ice cores are anchored to known volcanic eruptions – but there is no proof that a volcano blowing in the Mediterranean would have much of an effect in Greenland. Therefore, it is feasible the Vesuvius analogy is misplaced. In that case it may be that 776 can be applied to the tree rings but the beryllium 10 may belong to 793 (although there is indication that Roger's dates are not entirely reliable in any case). Obviously, mainstream are likely to disagree – the match is more than coincidental. Perhaps. What is galling is that a solar flare has been discounted for no apparent reason – apart from being an undesirable option as far as uniformitarianism is concerned, potentially creating all kinds of problems no one really wants to think about. Apart for the loonies.

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