Author: paranormalpeop

Well, capitalism has gone and done it again.  Construction companies in Peru have destroyed a 5000 year old pyramid.

One of the oldest structures ever erected in the America’s, El Paraiso, a component of the complex at Ancón-Chillón Valley of the late Preceramic era, is located several kilometres north of Lima Peru, in the district of San Martin de Porres.

Emily Culver of Peru This Week (an online Peruvian news outlet), reported on Monday that workers for two local construction companies used bulldozers and other equipment to destroy a large portion of the ancient pyramid.

The site is controlled by the Peruvian Ministry of Culture and is not protected under UNESCO.  Archaeologist Marco Guillén Hugo, who heads the excavation at the site, identified the construction companies Compañía y Promotora Provelanz E.I.R.L and Alisol S.A.C Ambas as the responsible parties, citing their longstanding but illegitimate claims of ownership of the land.[1]

El Paraiso stands amid 90 hectares of arable land, which makes its 53 hectares of protected space valuable to the area for crop development and other construction, but officials agree that El Paraiso’s historical and cultural importance far outweighs the agricultural value of the land.

Archaeologists believe that the site was occupied for a relatively short period, lasting 300-400 years between 3790 and 3065 cal BP, and that its builders used over 100,000 stone blocks in its construction.  It was likely used for ritual or religious purposes.

As with other examples of corporate greed motivating the desecration of cultural heritage sites, such as the partial destruction of the Nazca Lines in April of 2013 (also in Peru) and the complete destruction of the Noh Mul pyramid in Mexico in May, the damage to El Paraiso is irreparable.

Despite outrage by members of the Ministry of Culture, it seems unlikely that those responsible will suffer any repercussions and doubtless this will not be the last example of greed overshadowing historical relevance.

How would you react to seeing an exact duplicate of someone you love?  Would you be able to tell which was which?  Who is the real one and who is the…imposter?

What if you encountered that imposter independently?  What if they not only looked like, but behaved and sounded like the original?

This is, apparently, exactly what happened to reddit user zeejoo12, who describes a bizarre encounter with what some have called a real life Doppelgänger.  He posted his account of a strange mix up with his current girlfriend, wherein she appears at his apartment and confronts him for cheating on her, apparently.  She proceeds to slap him and break several personal items and then storms away in a taxi cab.  But to the man’s surprise, his real girlfriend appears out of nowhere, claiming to know nothing of the blow-up.

Confused and frightened, the man turned to the reddit community for help in understanding exactly what had happened.  His full story can be found here.

Despite the odd nature of that account, and the obvious opportunity for hoax, there are some elements of the story that intrigue.  There may be more questions than answers and many of them are explored in the epic trail of comments and speculation that follow the original post, but much of this tale conforms to the traditional notion of a Doppelgänger.

The word Doppelgänger is German for double-goer and was coined by 18^th century author Jean Paul (born Johann Paul Friedrich Richter) in his 1796 book Siebenkäs.  But the concept of the supernatural double dates back as far as Ancient Egyptian mythology (ka) and Norse mythology (vardøger), and possibly earlier.  Traditionally, a Doppelgänger is thought to be the paranormal double of a living person; an exact copy with memories and interpersonal connections intact.

The concept of the Doppelgänger is closely related to the metaphysical concept of bilocation, an idea with religious undertones and ties to many different philosophical systems; from shamanism and paganism, to Buddhism and Christian mysticism.  Bilocation, however, is actually the appearance of one individual in two (or more) different places at the same time, rather than two examples of a single person existing at the same time.

The famous story of the English metaphysical poet John Donne recounts his experience with his wife’s Doppelgänger on the night of his daughter’s birth (stillbirth).

“I have seen a dreadful Vision since I saw you: I have seen my dear wife pass twice by me through this room, with her hair hanging about her shoulders, and a dead child in her arms: this, I have seen since I saw you.”[1]

Minus the dead child, Donne’s account seems eerily similar to the story told by zeejoo12.

Other famous accounts of Doppelgänger encounters, like that of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and even Abraham Lincoln – who saw himself in a mirror sporting two faces[2] – serve to solidify the paranormal nature of the phenomenon, and since then countless fictional works have been dedicated to the notion of a dark double.

Today the term doppelganger (as opposed to the traditional Doppelgänger) is commonly used to describe people who simply look alike, and with the prospect of human cloning looming in the not so distant future, it’s likely that it will see greater use in contemporary culture.

Depending on which definition you choose, there are varying explanations for the Doppelgänger phenomenon.  With our global population approaching more than 7 billion, the notion of more than one person looking eerily similar to another becomes a matter of statistics, rather than supernatural influence.  But in those cases, like that above, where the experiencer(s) encountered the same person in two distinctly different locations or situations simultaneously, the prospect of explaining things gets a bit muddied.

Some have proffered ideas about mirror worlds or alternate dimensions briefly converging, creating unique circumstances that culminate in alternate realities clashing and interacting with each other.  And without delving into yet another tangent explaining that dimensions are simply directions of travel and not places, suffice it to say, the semantics of the argument are less important than the foundation.

Interestingly, the many-worlds theory of quantum physics, or the many-worlds interpretation may actually support this idea.  The many-worlds theory says that through universal wavefunction, all possible histories and futures exist simultaneously. This is different from the multiverse theory, as the latter is the assertion that outside of our physical universe exist many other universes, possibly with differing laws of physics.

Though the many-worlds theory doesn’t say much about where those alternate histories and futures may be, physically.   They could be overlaid on top of our reality or they could be separated by the infinite recesses of whatever exists beyond existence.  In the case of the former, there do seem to be opportunities for such overlap to result in occasional temporary convergence, but any suggestion in that regard is pure speculation.

Other theories connect the Doppelgänger phenomenon with spirits and demons, claiming that the double is an evil incarnation of the original person, an evil twin if you will.  The ancient mythological creatures incubus and succubus are sometimes connected to the Doppelgänger phenomenon, suggesting that they might take the form of their victim, or people close to them in their seductive efforts.

Somewhat lesser known are hypotheses involving time-slips, wherein the experiencer is thought to be viewing events that occurred in the past or will occur in the future.  Which, surprisingly enough, is something Einstein showed is possible, if not technologically challenging.

You might think that the long and illustrious history of the Doppelgänger should be better understood than it actually is, but in truth, the phenomenon’s transient nature coupled with its unpredictability have severely limited opportunities for investigation.  All that is available to researchers are after-the-fact accounts, often decades or even centuries old.  Nonetheless, it can hardly be said that all the accounts are hoaxes or misidentifications, leaving the field wide open for further inquiry.

In the world of weird there are many places that elicit wonder and trepidation.  Aside from the usual haunted locals that many think of, there are many geographical locations that embody mystery, the Bermuda Triangle for one.  Though if there were an election for the capitol of weird, one location would be at the top of the list of consideration: The Ural Mountains.

The Urals, as they are commonly known, are a mountain range stretching north and south through western Russia.  The iconic region ranges from the coast of the Arctic Ocean in northern Russia to the borders of Kasakhstan in the south.  It marks the northern border between the continents of Europe and Asia and is a treasure trove of geological bounty and historical significance.  Its highest peak, Mount Narodnaya, sits at 6,217 feet.

Like many mountainous regions, the Ural Mountains have their share of strange stories and mysteries, but perhaps the strangest story to come out of the area is that of the Dyatlov Pass Incident.

In mid January 1959, a group of young skiers embarked on a trip into the frozen wilds of Kholat Syakhl, a mountain in the northern Ural range, commonly known as The Dead Mountain (the name Kholat Syakhl means dead mountain in Mansi, the dialect of the local Mansi people, and refers to the lack of wildlife on the mountain).  Nine of the ten members of the group hiked into the mountains headed for the slopes of Otorten (one member, Yuri Yudin, fell Ill early on and was forced to turn back).  On February 1^st, the experienced group, led by Igor Dyatlov (after whom the mountain pass was eventually named) strayed from their planned route, probably because of poor weather conditions, and found themselves on a high slope of Kholat Syakhl, where they decided to camp overnight.

The events of that night are not well understood, but judging by the aftermath, whatever happened, it was one hell of a night.

Deduced from intensive search and rescue effort and subsequent investigation, the early morning hours of February 2^nd 1959 were tragic and eventful.  Search efforts, which were initiated on February 20^th found an eerie scene. The camp was found on February 26^th and it was quickly determined that something bad had happened.  A tent was found and it appeared that whomever had been inside had torn their way out of it…from the inside.

Footprints were found leaving the camp, unfortunately, these footprints showed that the hikers were either barefoot, wearing socks or only one shoe.  Fearing the worst, search teams upped the intensity of their search and eventually found the first of the group, Yuri Krivonischenko and Yuri Doroshenko, huddled around the base of a large cedar tree just more than a kilometer from the campsite; frozen, shoeless and dressed only in their underwear.  The remains of a fire were found nearby, but the -30 degree climate and high winds would not have been staved off by a fire alone.

Next to be found were Dyatlov, Zina Kolmogorova and Rustem Slobodin.  All three were found part way between the camp and the cedar tree, in poses that suggested that they were attempting to return to the tent when the elements overtook them.

The other four members, Semyon Zolotariov, Nicolai Thibeaux-Brignolles, Ludmila Dubinina and Alexander Kolevatov, weren’t found for another two months. They were eventually found under four meters of snow in a ravine 75 meters beyond the cedar tree.  It appeared that these four had survived longer than the previous five, as it seemed that they had taken clothing from their fallen comrades in an effort to survive.

All in all, it seemed apparent that the group had succumbed to the elements, but further investigation generated a host of questions.  Why had they left the warmth and safety of their tents?  Why had they ventured out without their clothing or shoes?  And why did they not attempt to recover their belongings after leaving the camp?

These compelling questions further drove the investigation and very few answers seemed to emerge.

Early on, the official cause of death for the entire group was listed a hypothermia, but following a more thorough assessment of their injuries, investigators found that two of the group members had fractured skulls and two had severe chest trauma resulting in several broken ribs.  One of the women, Ludmila Dubinina, was missing her entire tongue.  One Dr. Boris Vozrozhdenny estimated that the force required to inflict the chest wounds would have been similar to a severe car accident, but what baffled investigators was the fact that there were no external wounds.  No cuts, scrapes, bruises or other visible trauma.

Theories and speculation began to circulate; some people thought that perhaps an avalanche had struck the camp after lights out, though there was no sign of avalanche damage anywhere near the camp.  Others thought that the local Mansi people had happened upon the group and took exception to them trespassing on their land, and had slaughtered them in the night.  This of course, makes little sense, as the Mansi are not territorial in this manner and have no history of such behaviour, nor could such an attack have accounted for the type of injuries found…no superficial or external wounds.

What is perhaps the most baffling part of the story is the fact that the clothing of some of the deceased showed radioactive contamination at higher levels than would be found naturally.  Though skeptics have correctly pointed out that some camping lanterns use Thorium gas mantles, which can leave radioactive residue on clothing and other items in their general proximity, but who knows if the levels found were consistent with that of Thorium mantles.

Many theories, some more credible than others, have surfaced over the years, but the fact that there were no survivors or eyewitnesses drastically impeded the investigation, which was officially closed in May of 1959.  Investigators cited the “absence of a guilty party” for their laughable conclusion that the group members had died due to a “compelling natural force”.  The local government also imposed a ban on anyone seeking to camp or even travel through the area, which lasted for more than three years.

Since then, others have come forward with further information, such as another group of hikers who camped approximately 50 kilometers south of the Dyatlov group, claimed to have seen several large orange glowing orbs in the general direction of Kholat Syakhl on that evening.  It was also found that the area of the Dyatlov camp was directly in the flight path of intercontinental R-7 missile test launches from the Baikonur Cosmodrome (though it’s not clear if there had been any test launches on that night).  Some have claimed that there had been an inordinate amount of scrap metal of unknown origin in the vicinity of Kholat Syakhl, and that the Russian government was/is complicit in a cover-up of illegal military dumping.

Few have come right out and said it, but there is the obvious possibility of UFO or alien influence in this case, and though that may seem far-fetched, it remains clear that the members of the Dyatlov group were subjected to a terror that caused them to act in a most irrational and ultimately fatal manner.  These experienced hikers put aside common sense and fled the safety of their camp, knowing that the elements were likely to kill them.  Why would someone do that, unless the prospect of staying (or returning) was more frightening and dangerous than braving the frigid night?

This book is a collection of 50 short essays attempting to explain various mysterious happenings throughout recorded history, from the Arc of the Covenant and The Holy Grail to the JFK assassination and even the true author of the works of Shakespeare.  Take from that what you will.

By short, I mean each chapter – or “entry” as the author calls them – is no longer than three or four pages, and this is by no means enough space to handle the complexities of the subjects covered.  The author, Bill Price, clearly has a passion for history, especially medieval and Victorian history, but he is less than charitable with more contemporary topics.

He is disdainful in his treatment of anything that resembles a conspiracy theory, often dismissing out of hand any theory that doesn’t match up with his orthodox world view.  Take Roswell for instance; a highly complex and well-studied mystery among the Fortean community.  Price dismisses all possibility of alternate explanations and swallows the government story, hook, line and sinker.  What’s worse is, he suggests that the reader should too.  The Roswell situation is by no means resolved, in anyone’s eyes, and for an author purporting to explain and celebrate the mysteries of the world, his methods leave something to be desired.

One wonders why he would have included such topics as the Bermuda Triangle or the Yeti if he had little regard for the many theories offered by learned men and women the world over.  But, it is conceivable that editors and literary agents might have pressured him to include topics that would generate interest from a younger, more internet savvy demographic.

Given his treatment of these more esoteric subjects, one might hesitate to accept his conclusions regarding other, more traditional mysteries (if there is such a thing).  To quote the book, I suspect that many of his conclusions are nothing more than a “load of nonsense.”  He offers no new information, and gives no sources to inspect for any of his “facts”.  Though the book does offer a “further reading” list, which is also quite short, but still appreciated.

To point out the silver lining in this storm cloud, I will say that his literary style is charming and witty, and that I would consider reading any of his other books on European history and other subjects for which he has an obvious passion.

In the end, I recommend that you pick up this book from your local library, if you can find it, rather than wasting money and being disappointed.

“If you can’t explain it to a six-year-old, you don’t understand it yourself.”  Whether it was Feynman, Einstein or Vonnegut who actually said it (if any of them), Dawkins has certainly taken it to heart.

His knowledge of the subject matter is unmistakable, with certain marked exceptions, and while one would do well not to forget what this book was intended to be, it’s difficult to ignore the distinct air of condescension wafting up from nearly every page.

The Magic of Reality is not Richard Dawkins’ best work, by far.  Although that opinion may be coloured by my pre-existing familiarity with basic natural science.  His treatment of topics, such as plate tectonics and cosmology are, shall we say, rudimentary.  But that may be by design.  Where he discusses biology and evolution his expertise is easily identified, but his earlier works, such as The Greatest Show on Earth for example, are much more comprehensive and informative than this book.

If we accept that his intention was to publish a primer on the natural sciences or even on the value of a scientific world view, then I suppose this book was a success.  Though by virtue of who Dawkins is, I doubt that many of his readers have the dismal level of scientific literacy one would need to see this book as valuable.  Perhaps, if it finds its way into the hands of a few less informed people, teenagers maybe, it would be a worthwhile effort, but there are far better and less biased books available on the subject.

Dawkins has, in this book, tackled subjects that are outside of his professional purview.  This isn’t to say that his opinions and insights are unwelcome (in most cases), but why take on the burden of elucidating on subjects for which your own knowledge is limited (or non-existent).  Oddly, he takes on the UFO Abduction phenomenon, dismissing outright any claim that something unexplained is happening to however few sincere people in the community.  Dawkins is, however, entitled to his opinion, predictable as it might be, but the reader would do well to understand that it is just that, an opinion, and not a scientific fact (in the case of UFO Abduction at least).

Reading The Magic Of Reality isn’t a wasted effort, but I would suggest that there are better books on which to focus your attention.

This book made me a Happy Atheist.  Not that I wasn’t before I read it, but in some small way PZ Myers has made me that much happier.  I have already recommended this book to a number of friends and will continue to do so.  Unlike many of Myers’ critics, who predictably complain that he broke no new ground here, and that his approach was unrefined and lacked direction, I enjoyed the pace and meandering path the book led me along.  In fact, I dare say, this is precisely the point of any book, to allow the author to guide you along the path that they intend, not the one you think should be.

The Happy Atheist is a heartfelt and unpretentious look at the folly of religion.  It is blissfully free of condescension and elitism, which many of its contemporary works cannot claim.  And it is smart and witty and impassioned.  Myers set out to write a book on atheism, using humour as a weapon against superstitious wish-thinking, and he succeeded, at least in my mind.

I was immensely impressed with Myers lament for the lost history of generations past.  Lost because their lives, their struggles and their triumphs were not recorded and handed down in the form of a sacred book.  He deftly illustrates the historic and poetic value of the Bible, emphasising its importance as a tool for recognising that our ancestors were people, with lives and dramas and loss.

Though if you take only one thing away from this book, let it be this:  every person has the right to designate any silly thing as sacred to them, but they do not have the right to dictate what is sacred to you and me.  This is the most succinct and intelligent argument that I have ever read against the fallacy that religious beliefs somehow deserve the reverence that the devout so often demand.

Whatever your personal opinion of PZ Myers and his secular antics, or his scathing and often misunderstood wit, you would do well to add this book to your shelf, along-side The God Delusion and God Is Not Great, and if you’re truly enlightened, perhaps even a copy of the Koran and the Bible.

Everything you experience is in the past.  In fact, the nature of reality dictates that everything you will ever experience, everything you can experience will have already happened by the time you experience it.

Confused?  Allow me to explain.

Light travels fast, as you may already know.  Really fast.  Mind bogglingly fast.  299,792,458 metres per second to be precise.  Or in more relative terms, roughly 300,000 kilometers per second.  That’s pretty much the ultimate speed limit of the universe.  According to Albert Einstein’s Theory of Special Relativity, nothing can travel faster than light, but if you could, which you can’t, but if you could, you’d be able to plant yourself at any point along the space-time continuum.  That is to say that you could travel to any place or time that you choose, with certain caveats, the most relevant being that you can’t.

Still confused?  I’ll continue then.

When you look to the stars at night, those twinkling little dots of light in the sky, what you are seeing is the light emanated by distant suns.  Some with planets around them, others without.  That light that you see is confined by the same speed limit as the light our own sun emits.  That means that a distant star, one perhaps several thousand light-years away, isn’t exactly as it appears in the sky.

When the light leaves its parent star, it’s travelling at 300,000 kilometers per second, but there are many millions, or even billions of miles between stars. For example, the nearest star to our solar system (besides our sun) is called Proxima Centauri and it is approximately 4.24 light-years from Earth.  That means that it takes light, the light emitted from the star, approximately 4.2 years to reach Earth, and subsequently…your eye.  That is precisely where the term light-year comes from, it is the standard by which galactic distance is measured, and all because light travels at a constant speed.

So, in case you slept through high school science class, that means that all you can ever see of the stars in the night sky, is their past.  Their distant past in most cases.  In some cases we’re talking about billions of years distant.

You may be thinking that this is all well and good for stars that are thousands, millions or even billions of light-years away, but how does this mean that everything I experience is in the past?

Aha!  This is where it gets interesting.

Like I said above, light speed is constant.  It’s dependable, like a trusted neighbour, or your mom.  It will always travel at 300,000 kilometers per second.  Well, that’s not exactly accurate, but outside of some very specific circumstances it is constant.  That means that the light emitted from the light bulb in your bedroom also travels at that speed.  Now, unless you’re mega-rich and have a mansion the size of a galaxy, that light probably only has a few feet to travel, so in any perceptible way it happens instantaneously.  But our perceptions aren’t really trustworthy.

Even over a distance of a few feet it still takes time for the light to travel from the bulb to the wall, where the wall’s surface, depending on its colour, absorbs all but a very narrow band of the spectrum, and the light is then reflected away from the wall and into your eye.  This is where it impacts the special cone shaped cells that line your retina, and you see it.  This all happens in a very short fraction of a second, depending on the size of the room, but rest assured, it happens constantly, everywhere…in every room with a light bulb that is turned on.

So you see, that elapsed time between the light streaming out of the light bulb, hitting the wall and being reflected into your eye takes time.  It means that the state of the wall, or whatever object you’re looking at, could conceivably be different than it was when the light hit it, than it appeared when that light hit your retina.

Not convinced?  OK, well, there’s more.

The speed limit of light is not the only factor that contributes to the fact that everything you experience is in the past.  After all, that’s only one of our five senses (as though we have only five).  In fact, it’s our senses that really prove this concept to be true.

Let’s stick with light for the time being.  After that light jumps through all the hoops I laid out above, it does indeed strike the back of your eye.  It’s collected by those little cone shaped cells on your retina (there are also rod shaped cells, which do the same thing, in a slightly different way, but this isn’t important to this discussion).  Those little cones do a little magic (not really) as they convert the different wavelengths of light and the varying brightness of that light into a complex series of electrical impulses that travel up the optic nerve, through the back of the eye and into the visual cortex of the brain.  There, those electrical impulses are sorted and correlated with a whole library of memories and the entire jumbled mess is converted into an image.  Not like a jpeg or something.  Well, actually, it’s a little like a digital image, but that’s another story.

Next, your visual cortex serves up a conceptual model of that image to your conscious mind, which you experience as visual information that has been encoded with spatial information and made relevant to your world view through a comparison to memories, dreams and previously learned information.  It’s a complicated process, though somewhat elegant if you think about it, and it happens constantly.  Even when your eyes are closed and you’re asleep.

I know, I know…I still haven’t explained how this means everything you experience is in the past.

OK, here it is.  That process, like the speed of light itself, happens almost instantly…almost.  It does take a certain amount of time for those little electrical impulses to travel up the optic nerve, or the auditory nerve, or the olfactory nerve, or…well you get my point.  It also takes a small amount of time for the synapses in your visual cortex, or your olfactory bulb, to collate and cross reference the information against your previous experience, and then finally it takes a further fraction of a second for that information to be served up to your consciousness as a perceptual sense.  The point is…it all takes time.  Not much time, but as with the consequence of the speed of light, the information being received by your eye is technically out-of-date by the time it reaches your consciousness.

The world at large is constantly changing, from nano-second to nano-second and our perception of this world is, in fact, nothing more than a conceptual model served up to our consciousness by the hardware of our nervous system.  Just as you can never technically consider yourself truly in the moment, this fact also proves that your senses are really only giving you a general approximation of your external reality.  You aren’t ever actually experiencing the real thing…and what you experience is always filtered and coloured by your previous experience and knowledge.

When you consider the elegant but convoluted means by which your optic system feeds you information, consider also the many ways that this system can break down.  Most of those ways will result in blindness, or partial blindness, but some will just skew the information your brain is being fed.  Which will in turn skew your perception of reality.

All in all, this has been a somewhat wordy way to illustrate that your senses can’t be trusted.  This applies to the paranormal world in a very specific way, and I know you got the point.  Try to remember it.

In this book Christopher Hitchens presents a portrait of the beatified and saintly character known as Mother Teresa.  Then he uses his keen intellect, his wit and his powerful insight as a brush to strip away decades of misrepresentation, misunderstanding and a general inability to see the Virgin of Calcutta in the light of truth.  The image that remains is, in a word, appalling.

To be clear, Hitchens isn’t suggesting that Mother Teresa had endeavoured to deceive anyone.  No, in fact he very carefully and clearly points out that she has never asserted anything but the truth about her motives and methods. Except possibly in failing to admit the nature of some of her associations over the years.  With this caveat included, I think the New York Press’ indictment on the back cover more than a little uncalled for: “If there is a Hell, Hitchens is going there for this book.”  Not that such a threat would have in any way affected the secular giant that was Christopher Hitchens.

Though I do have a complaint to level about this book.  As with several other titles by Hitchens, this book is a prime example of the intellectual snobbery for which Hitchens was so famous.  He refused to dumb-down the language or to dilute the metaphors in order to make his work more appealing to the masses.  This has endeared him to the New Atheist movement, which as a rule, venerates such elitism.  It’s unfortunate though, that the great power of Hitchens’ insight into the failings of religion, especially that of the Catholic Church, remains inaccessible to a large section of society.  A section that would benefit from a clear and concise valuation theism.  This isn’t to say that his work is unreadable, no, not at all.  With a little effort and a vigilant eye, his ideas are well understood, but this effort isn’t likely to be undertaken by those without a vested interest in the subject matter.

The Missionary Position is an important book, if diminutive.  To my knowledge, it is the only unbiased study available on the actions and words of a woman who was canonised by her congregates long before her death in 1997.  You may claim that Hitchens was anything but unbiased, and there might be some truth to that, but despite his personal feelings about the fraudulent reputation of Albanian born Anjezë Bojaxhiu, turned Catholic sister, turned religious visionary and champion of “the poorest of the poor, the lowest of the low”, his treatment of the subject remained even-handed throughout.

In the wake of the release of his latest book, there has been a bit of Dan Brown-itus floating about the bookish community.  Both from fans and critics.  Dan Brown has a singular ability to both inspire and to spark distain.  While he has a huge following of fans, myself included, he has also generated a rather large, almost cult-like anti-fan base; people who would rather see his career take a dive than to enjoy the fictional mysteries he writes.

His latest book, Inferno, if you haven’t read it yet (spoiler alert by the way), is an homage to the Divine Comedy, or more specifically, the first part in the comedy, Inferno, commonly known as Dante’s Inferno.

Written by renowned Italian poet Dante Alighieri between 1308 and 1321, this epic poem is widely considered to be, not only the preeminent work of Italian literature, but one of the greatest works of literature in the history of mankind.  It is a truly beautiful and inspiring piece of writing, as are the final two parts, Purgatorio and Paradiso.

For those unfamiliar, the Comedy tells the tale of Dante as he embarks on a journey through hell and purgatory in pursuit of his love, Beatrice, who resides in heaven (paradise).  Dante is guided through hell (and purgatory) by the ancient poet known as Virgil, and the two of them make their way through the ten circles of hell, observing and discussing the various horrors they witness along the way.

Though he has said that his motive for writing Inferno was to inspire a greater love and awareness for the Divine Comedy, Brown’s story only makes use of certain imagery and art that has been inspired by the Comedy over the centuries.  The main subject of the book is actually a matter of extreme importance and urgency for humanity: overpopulation.

As the story goes, there is an international movement or community of academics, scientists and futurists who believe in and work toward achieving a concept known as Transhumanism.  Designated popularly by the symbol H+, transhumanism, which may sound somewhat ominous, is actually a rather optimistic ideal relating to the effort of improving human longevity.  Essentially it speaks of making people immortal through the use of technology.  Most scenarios envision combining biology and technology and thereby eliminating disease, decay and death, and ultimately creating a utopian society where no one dies and everyone lives in a perpetual state of health.  It actually sounds pretty good, if you ignore certain problems.

Those problems of course, tend to be pretty big ones.  Not the least of which is achieving the technical ability to successfully merge our fragile bodies with robust technology, but we may be closer to that goal than you realise.  In any event, there is a much bigger problem to overcome before we even get to that point, and this is the problem that Brown’s Inferno tackles in, I must say, a somewhat elegant way.  Brutal, but also elegant.

That problem is overpopulation.  It’s a massive problem, and it’s one we face right now, regardless of our dream to become cyborgs.  We, as a species, breed a lot, almost exponentially.  To illustrate the significance of that word, consider the story of the man who invented chess, of all things.

According to the Persian poet Ferdowsi, in his epic and ancient poem Shahnameh (which is considered to be entirely apocryphal), the man who invented chess submitted his new invention to the Persian King who was so impressed that he offered to reward the man with whatever he wanted.  The man being a mathematician told the king that he wanted grains of wheat.  Specifically, he wanted the wheat counted on a chessboard: starting in one corner of the board, he wanted one grain of wheat on the first square and two grains on the second square, then four grains on the third and so on, doubling the number of grains with each successive square.  Now, you might think this a reasonable request, as the king certainly did, and he ordered an administrator to count out the wheat and award it to the man.  The problem, which the king did not understand at first, is that the man was requesting an exponential progression of wheat, which, by the time you reach the final square on the board, would result in far more wheat than you might imagine.

The count on the final square would be 18,446,744,073,709,551,615 grains of wheat or 2⁶³ grains.  That’s more wheat than the massive Persian kingdom could have produced in several years.  It’s a huge number.  And unfortunately for the mathematician, who many believe was just offering a joke, the king found no humour in the situation and promptly had him executed.

This, as I said, illustrates how quickly an exponential progression can result in unimaginably huge numbers, and some believe that our collective birthrate is exponential.  It isn’t really, but it’s close.

A popular graph image (shown below) further illustrates the problem, showing that over the past several decades and centuries, our global population has skyrocketed, and the consequences of such growth are catastrophic.  Notice I didn’t say potentiallycatastrophic, as there’s nothing uncertain about it.  Our huge numbers have resulted in environmental disaster; global warming, the depletion of resources like oil and coal and water and food, a constant state of war, and the rapid spread of disease, just to name a few.  Our planet cannot sustain our current population, which is quickly approaching seven billion worldwide.

Some experts estimate that we’ll reach 10 billion by the year 2050, othesr say it’ll happen before then.  And if you fail to see the problem here, I’m really not sure how else to make the point.  Something must be done to curb our breeding progress, though there are those who believe otherwise, the Catholic Church for one.  But with a rational view of the situation, one can hardly deny the importance of not only reducing the rate at which we multiply, but also – and this is the main point of Brown’s book – we have to find a way to essentially cull our current population.

This is a horrific suggestion, I know.  Everyone has a right to exist, to live, to enjoy the fruits of labours past, but the reality is, our planet cannot sustain us.  Some enlightened people, notably people like Carl Sagan, have suggested that our future is in space.  That our only hope of survival is to leave this little blue ball.  Others think that’s much too ambitious, that our technical ability lags too far behind our ability to procreate and that the realisation of that solution will come much too late.

Other still, namely Brown’s fictional antagonist, Bertrand Zobrist, suggest that an actual cull of our population is necessary. That is to say that a certain percentage, a large percentage at that, should be eliminated.  Or in other words…killed.  I told you it was brutal.

Fortunately, well it was sort of fortunate, Zobrist came up with an alternative that was no less brutal, but at least it didn’t involve the arbitrary selection of a large number of people for planned genocide.  He developed and released a genetic virus that served to effectively sterilize nearly one third of the global population.  It offered a uniquely elegant (in my view) if not slow acting solution for the overpopulation problem, in that a third of the people on earth would no longer be able to procreate.  It would immediately reduce our numbers (immediate in relative terms) and thus ease some of the pressure on our planetary resources.

Whether you agree that it’s an elegant solution or not (I certainly wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t), one thing Brown neglected to address in his story, was the fact that, in order for a transhumanist future to manifest, our birthrate would have to be reduced to nearly zero.  A one third sterilization would not do the trick.

If the goal of transhumanism is to make us immortal through technology, then even a small birthrate would eventually put us right back in the same situation.  I suppose one could argue that by the time we’re capable of staving off death permanently, we’ll also be technologically matured enough to advance colonies of humanity throughout the solar system, or even the galaxy, but that hardly solves the problem.

Now, before the comment section on this post fills up with righteous condemnation of me and my sick pragmatism, let’s be clear than I’m not suggesting we do any such thing.  I simply see not only how desperate our situation really is, but I also see the value in exploring the various possible solutions, no matter how uncomfortable they make us.  Dan Brown has, as I mentioned earlier, generated rather large criticism, both of his writing (which I personally enjoy, but others don’t’), but also of his ideas.  Many disbelieve the severity of the problem, others deny that it exists at all, but most recognize that we have to do something.

If there were a question I was leading up to with all this, I suppose it would be: if you had the power to turn off the reproductive ability of a third of our population, would you do it, based on the knowledge that our survival depends on it?

Of the many posts on this website, some are more popular than others.  Some topics seem to strike a chord with readers, or perhaps it’s my treatment of those topics that stir the hearts and minds of the few who happen across my work.

One of those popular posts has been what could be called a ‘review’ of the infamous Ovilus.  That’s actually a string of posts, but the latest has gotten more attention than the others overall.  I’m not certain that the Ovilus post is popular because people agree with my point of view, but if the commentary following it is any indication, many do not.  And that’s ok, anyone and everyone is entitled to disagree with me.  I’m generally quite willing to debate the issues and make my own case, and at the same time, I’ll happily listen to your well-reasoned arguments (providing they are well-reasoned, on topic and not personal attacks).

Another post that was popular is my critique of EVP, or electronic voice phenomenon.  I wasn’t exactly charitable with that topic, though I didn’t think I was being particularly harsh either.  I simply said that the evidence gleaned through so-called EVP research isn’t evidence of ghosts.  Or rather that it can’t be considered evidence of ghosts because there are too many other possible causes for the phenomenon.  Though I acknowledge the skeptic explanations of pareidolia or even delusion – which, although it can seem like a dismissive and insulting suggestion, is a good possibility in some cases – I’m actually talking about other environmental causes, like unexpected electromagnetic fields and their effect on recording mediums, as only one example.

Today’s post is connected to that very idea.  Among the tool kit of the modern Ghost Hunter there are numerous pieces of equipment that are considered staples of the endeavour. Flashlights, cameras, micro-recorders and maybe even the Ovilus (much to my own chagrin).  But the one device that nearly every Ghost Hunter relies on in their investigations is the EMF meter, and I question this practice in much the same way as I question the collection of EVP data.

The EMF meter is, for those not already familiar, a device for measuring electromagnetic fields in the general proximity of the device’s sensors.  Electromagnetic fields are everywhere, quite literally.  Our environment, that is the entire planet, is inundated with waves of energy.  The most powerful come from our sun, most of which is absorbed by our atmosphere, but everything that uses electricity in any way also generates an EM field.  Electromagnetic energy is a form of radiation and it is measured along a spectrum – the electromagnetic spectrum – which includes at its extreme ends: Gamma radiation and ELF waves (extremely low frequency).  Along the spectrum between Gamma rays and ELF are frequencies that correspond to radio waves (which includes cellular signals and other communications transmissions) and even the light spectrum that we’re able to detect with our eyes (the visible light spectrum).

EMF meters are generally designed to measure AC currents that are generated by electric appliances with frequencies between 50 and 60 Hz, with obvious variation between different models, but they can all detect EM fields outside of those generated by AC current.

Now, to be perfectly clear, I’m not qualified to argue about the technical specifications of EMF meters, nor am I an expert on electromagnetic theory, but I do have a working understanding.  I submit though, that such knowledge isn’t necessary to see the flaw in this situation.  I’ll explain.

It’s really as simple as this: there are many possible causes of EMF fluctuation in a given space, and as long as there is doubt about what caused the reading, it cannot be attributed to any one phenomenon.

The more experienced among you will already be gearing up to type out a comment pointing out that you, specifically aren’t claiming that these readings are attributed to one phenomenon and/or that baseline readings are always taken (though I doubt the word “always” applies) to differentiate those readings from what are commonly called emergent EM fields (that would be an unexpected field of electromagnetic energy that doesn’t appear to have been caused by sources that contributed to the baseline reading.  Unexpected and unexplained.)  If that’s you, the one getting ready for a fight, relax, I’m not referring to you.

With some exception, the Ghost Hunter will claim that this emergent field is evidence of the presence of a ghost, or more reasonably evidence of a paranormal event.  It is not.

Well, let me hedge my bets a bit here; it probably is not.  Even with the utmost care taken to minimize the influence of electrical appliances in the area, there are errant EMF fields everywhere, fluctuating, cancelling each other out and permeating every structure and every living body.  They’re there, and they can be measured by an EMF meter.  Cheaper meters are much more susceptible to interference from errant EMF than are the more expensive meters, which generally work in a different way than say, the K2 meter.

But all of this is beside the point.  Unless the source of the field can be identified, it cannot be attributed to any one phenomenon.  But I repeat myself.

Much of this boils down to a problem the paranormal community is dealing with in a most ineffectual way.  The question is, why do Ghost Hunters use EMF meters in their investigations?  I’ve asked around, and I got some weird answers.  Some talked about the likelihood that an unexplained field was direct evidence of the paranormal; basically saying that if baseline sources are ruled out, it must be paranormal.  Others said, indirectly, that they do it because someone else does (not in those words of course, but when one says that they don’t understand it well enough to explain it, so go check so-and-so’s blog for an answer, the logical inference is that they only do it because so-and-so made them think it was a good idea).

And this leads me to the real point: having not had the opportunity to survey the entire community of Ghost Hunters around the world, I’m stuck with generalizations, but from what I have seen and the conversations that I’ve had, a large portion of that community really doesn’t understand what it is they are measuring with an EMF meter.  Many use models that don’t even given them an actual EMF reading, they just have lights that turn on when a field is detected.  What, if anything, does this tell you about what is causing the field?

The presence of an unexpected or unexplained electromagnetic field is an anomaly.  It may or may not be relevant to the investigation at hand, but in order to determine its relevance, one must identify its source.  It answers no questions to simply squeal and declare that there be ghosts here.

From a scientific standpoint, there may be some merit to the idea that certain phenomena can be identified and/or tracked using a measurement of electromagnetic energy.  However, for that endeavour to bear fruit, the researcher must have both an understanding of what the meter is measuring, how it measures it and what that measurement means in relation to every element of the environment in which it was observed.  Pointing your meter into a dark room and declaring that any readings you get are the result of ghosts is quite silly.

So, I said it.  I meant it.  And I fully expect that many will disagree.  I know that there are also quite a few who agree with me, and I cordially invite both groups to voice their opinion on the matter in the comment section below.  If you don’t wish to enter the argument, then I ask that you simply ask yourself, if you use an EMF meter to search for ghosts or for paranormal activity: why?