Talbott immediately asked a significant question, raising the “Problem of Peratt” yet again, and in yet a different form: was it just possible that
The “wounding” of Mars refers to an actual event? “I remember looking at one of the first Mariner photographs of Mars,” Talbott recalls. “It displayed a stupendous chasm cutting across the face of the planet. Even from a considerable distance, the chasm looked like a scar.... At that moment I ralized that of all the planets and moons in our solar system, Mars alone bore the likeness of the warrior-god’s wound.”117
Behind the myth, in other words, lay a very real event: science and mythology were converging at the very place mythology — if taken seriously from a paleophysical perspective — said it would: Mars.
The wound of the warrior-God, Ares, the Greek’s Mars, was real.
But this immediately provokes two questions, the first of which was asked by Talbott himself:
1. “Could something as massive as Valles Marineris have been carved by interplanetary lightning?”118
2. Did someone - humans or otherwise - actually observe the event from Earth or elsewhere, and record the event?
While the first question indicates that one feature of Talbott and Thornhill’s hypothesis is that these discharges are evidences of gigantic, solar system wide interplanetary “arcing” from a time when the solar system was very young and electrically dynamic, it is important not to lose sight of the question itself: could such a geological feature, massive as it is, be carved by electrical discharge? “Could Valles Marineris have been caused by a thunderbolt?” Talbott asked Thornhill.119
Thornhill replied, “It couldn’t have been anything else.”
“...Valles Marineris was created within minutes by a giant electric arc sweeping across the surface of Mars,” Thornhill claims. “The rock and soil were lifted into space. Some of it fell back around the planet to create the great, strewn fields of boulders seen by both Viking Landers and Pathfinder.”120
The “mighty chasm” of Valles Marineris thus “represents the confluence of two worldviews: the dramatic, historical worldview of mythology and the objective, physical worldview of science.”121
If that is so, however, it raises the second question in no uncertain terms. How is it that ancient mythology, art, and petroglyphic symbols can preserve the legend of planetary scarring, can accurately record the very shape of complex plasma filaments, of stacked toruses, intertwining currents, and of plasma pinching effects?
There are only three real possibilities:
1. The ancients possessed a plasma cosmology and physics themselves, and from laboratory experiments, were well familiar with the patterns exhibited by Peratt’s petroglyphs. They chose, for some strange reason, to disguise their knowledge by creating myths and legends in archaic petroglyphs and mythological symbols. But this implies a technology at least as advanced as our own in order to create plasma effects of the type observed to begin with.
2. Someone else possessed all these things, and actually transmitted this knowledge to ancient man, who subsequently embellished the basic conceptions with mythological hyperbole.
3. Ancient man actually observed and more or less accurately recorded what he saw in myth, artistic symbol, and in the petroglyphs.
Regardless of which version one opts for, one is left with another disquieting aspect of “The Problem of Peratt,” and that is, that whatever catastrophes as ancient mankind appeared to witness and record in his art and mythological archetypes, the catastrophes witnessed appear to fall outside the chronological parameters both of Van Flandern’s Exploded Planet Hypothesis and Hannes Alfvén’s electrically dynamic solar system, for in both cases the events or conditions described in those hypotheses happened some millions of years ago. Yet the artistic symbols, the myths, and Peratt’s petroglyphs themselves are all only thousands of years old.
Any way one slices it, various sciences are involved in the contradiction, in the problematic inherent in the “Problem of Peratt,” for on the one hand, if humans observed these events, then either the described events are much more recent than the two physics theories that can account for them will allow, or mankind is of far greater antiquity than contemporary paleontology, anthropology, and historical theory will allow.122 In the latter case, an additional problem arises, for it would imply that mankind preserved his artistic and mythological archetypes with amazing consistency and accuracy over several million years.
It is this accuracy of the artistic record - of the petroglyphs and ancient art work depicting the “divine weapons” by capturing the subtleties of plasma discharges - that is itself problematic for the catastrophist view, espoused most brilliantly by scholar Alan Alford as we shall see in the next chapter, that would then in turn maintain that all mythological references to the Wars of the Gods are but metaphors for an exploded planet cult. If that were so, why did the ancients, who were certainly capable of depicting planets as circular orbs, not depict them as such? Why give them arms and legs and faces and beards, and thunderbolts that are amazingly accurate depictions of electrical plasma phenomena? And why give the gods not only the technology for such massive displays of power, but ascribe to them personalities and motivations to use it?
Why indeed, unless they are describing real events in a real war.
E. Conclusions
Whatever one makes of the above questions and considerations, a number of important things have emerged in the investigation thus far.
1. Plasma discharge phenomena can account for the vorticular geometry of entire galaxies as well as phenomena that can be simulated and reproduced in a laboratory.
2. These phenomena may be accessed in part by the technology of a plasma focus device, which exhibits both peculiar anti-gravitational “electro-gravitic” effects as well as weaponizable effects, from fusion, to explosion, to streams of high energy negative and heavy ionic radiation.
3. Such plasma phenomena additionally appear to be intricately linked to even more fundamental scalar physics properties via the non-linear and rotational properties of plasmoids. Given that such plasma phenomena may be accessed by technology, as in point 2 above, it is then conceivable that the phenomena may be coupled to or accessed at a celestial scale, and weaponized at that scale.123
4. Celestially scaled plasma discharge phenomena appear to have been recorded, if not witnessed, by ancient mankind in a variety of mythological symbols, petroglyphs, and legends.
5. In certain cases these myths actually point to the planet Mars, ancient “god of war”, as being the central location for some of these phenomena.124
One has with plasma phenomena, on the one hand then, a physics sufficient to the task of significantly scarring, if not exploding, a planet, a basic technology in the plasma focus that can access some of the most significant phenomena of plasmas, and on the other hand a mythological tradition that clearly and unequivocally maintains that this physics was once accessed, used in a war for the deliberate destruction of one or more planets, and for the massive scarring of the surface of another, leaving its collateral damage strewn throughout the solar system.
It seems to me that there might be a fundamental difficulty with plasma cosmology, and this is its maintenance that vast electrical-plasma filaments connect and bind together whole galaxies in galactic clusters. But such bonding could only occur at the velocity of light, and would therefore seem insufficient as a basis of their bonding. Something else must therefore be transferring information between galaxies in order to form these clusters in such a way that the filamentary connections of galaxies emerge as its signature. Thus, extending this speculation a bit further, it might be that the phenomenon of galactic clusters and their filamentary bonding is a large scale version of photon entanglement, and a very large demonstration of the non-local nature of the medium. In this, then, plasma cosmology would seem to point to an even deeper physics, which we have followed Bearden in calling “scalar” physics. As this chapter has averred, the connec
tion between the two models is quite strong.
But why would ancient mankind employ such a diffuse and complex symbolism to convey all these things? And when broken down to its basic motifs, what constitutes the various layers of that symbolism? As will be seen in the next chapter, the second question is actually the means to answer the first....
3.
THE CATASTROPHE OF CATASTROPHISM
“A torrent of large stones coming from the sky, an earthquake, a whirlwind, a disturbance in the movement of the earth - these four phenomena belong together. ”
Immanuel Velikovsky125
“In the exploded planet, then, we have a primary ‘Myth of all myths’ which was not only extremely profound, but also, allegedly, true. ”
Alan Alford126
A. The Catastrophist Problematic
Ever since Immanuel Velikovsky first wrote his classic masterpiece Worlds in Collision, catastrophism has been the dominant model in the paleophysical interpretation of ancient myths. Indeed, Velikovsky’s book was perhaps the first real attempt to do what I call “paleophysics,” that is, an examination of ancient mythological texts and legends for the possibility that they encode scientific, physics related knowledge and a comparison of that knowledge with existing scientific theory. Velikovsky’s goal was, for all that, not scientific but historical, for he sought to illumine overlooked areas of cosmological history. Nonetheless, his works - notwithstanding the outcry against them from a scientific priesthood locked into its own astronomical dogmas - struck an elegant balance between science and history that has not been exceeded by any, and equaled by none but a few.
Where Velikovsky earned - even if undeservedly - the ire of the “scientific” community was his use of the ancient mythological texts to make scientific predictions and to formulate new scientific hypotheses, the two most famous being his assertion that Venus was once a large comet, and that the solar system was not electrically neutral. As physicist Anthony Peratt and others in the plasma physics school have amply demonstrated and ably argued, the latter hypothesis appears to have some support within contemporary thinking. So whatever one makes of Velikovsky’s hypothesis that Venus was once a comet, he stands at least partially vindicated. And if the work of Clube and Napier and others regarding meteor and comet impacts and near misses, or if Van Flanden’s Multiple Exploded Planets hypothesis is considered, then even Velikovsky’s former hypothesis appears partially vindicated as well: comets can, and moreover, did, wreak untold destruction in the solar system subsequent to the initial planetary explosion. But the problem of explaining that initial explosion remains.
What Velikovsky discerned, in ancient legends spanning the globe from the Mayans to the Hebrews, was a discernible pattern of celestial, cosmic catastrophe that had dire consequences for the earth’s life, climate, geography, topography, and even its own celestial mechanics. His examination of these mythological traditions led him to observe “A torrent of large stones coming from the sky, an earthquake, a whirlwind, a disturbance in the movement of the earth - these four phenomena belong together.”127 But it was what Velikovsky discerned as the cause of these phenomena that gave birth to a whole new school of reading such ancient texts and interpreting them as containing elements of science:
It appears that a large comet must have passed very near to our planet and disrupted its movement; a part of the stones dispersed in the neck and tail of the comet smote the surface of our earth a shattering blow.128
These words gave birth to a whole new school of mythological interpretation - catastrophism - and one need only replace the word “comet” in the above quotation with “meteor” or “asteroid” and one will have its contemporary version.
Many have followed in Velikovsky’s footsteps, but none is more capable nor as broadly read as is Alan Alford, who is perhaps the most learned and articulate spokesman for this school.
1. The Interpretive Paradigm of Alan Alford
Alford’s case for catastrophism is ably set out in three masterful tomes: The Phoenix Solution: Secrets of a Lost Civilisation, The Atlantis Secret: A Complete Decoding of Plato’s Lost Continent, and perhaps the most important study of the three, When the Gods Came Down: The Catastrophic Roots of Religion Revealed. Indeed, as the last title reveals, Alford’s intention is somewhat different than Velikovsky’s, though both men consult a similar range of texts. Whereas Velikovsky aims merely at explaining a broad cosmological history in terms of the physics that his texts suggest, Alford’s aim is narrower, seeking to explain the origin of those myths and texts, and the religions based upon them. In other words, for most catastrophists, the paradigm is used to explain certain types of physical evidences, and certain types of statements in texts, on the basis of physical theory. In a new twist on philosophical naturalism and materialism, however, Alford uses the catastrophist paleophysical paradigm to explain the origin of religions and certain types of expressions in religious texts themselves.
This caveat notwithstanding, it is safe to say Alford’s works constitute the most scholarly and well-researched continuation of the catastrophist paradigm of mythological interpretation since Velikovsky first gave it textual flesh and bones. Here our concentration will be on his Atlantis Secret and When the Gods Came Down, for it is in these works that he makes the most sweeping claims for the interpretive power of this paradigm. Indeed, in The Atlantis Secret Alford is quite explicit about the universal explanatory power that he claims for his version of catastrophism:
In this book, I present not only a complete decoding of the lost continent of Atlantis, but also a complete decoding of ancient Greek religion in its entirety. I am able to decode the myths of the Olympian gods and their associated mystery cults; I am able to decode the myth of the golden age and the fall of man; I am able to to decode the scientific cosmogonies of Thales, Anaximander, Heraclitus, Anaxagoras, Empedocles and Philolaos; I am able to decode the ‘soul religion’ of Orpheus, Pythagroas, Parmenides, Socrates and Plato; and I am able to decode Plato’s Theory of Forms, his account of creation by the Demiourgos, and his story of Atlantis. Behind all of these ideas there lies a single secret of stunning simplicity - the age-old myth of exploded planet. 129
In other words, behind all the complex imagery and themes of the Greeks, behind all their arcane and well-reasoned philosophy, behind all the arcane rituals of their mystery schools, lies one simple concept
for which they are all metaphors and allegories: all of it is but “the age-old myth of the exploded planet.”
But lest one think that the catastrophist paradigm is restricted merely to the Greeks, Alford pointedly states that the same applies to the other religions of the region: “The religions of the ancient Near East are best described as ‘exploded planet cults,’”130 even, as we shall see, Judaism and Christianity in their very core doctrines. Lest one think that Alford is unaware of the sweeping nature of his claims for the universal explanatory power of the catastrophist paradigm, he spells it out explicitly:
• The exploded planet was invisible by nature, thus explaining the ancients’ worship of visible substitutes - meteorites, statues, fertility-gods, weather-gods, Sun, Moon and stars.
• The worship of the gods in anthropomorphic form was an entirely predictable offshoot of the exploded planet cult.
• The exploded planet cult was as profound as profound gets, involving the death of a living planet and the rebirth of life on another planet - the Earth. There is no need to suppose any deeper, hidden meaning to the ancient myths.
• The mythical (Exploded Planet Hypothesis) is entirely separate from the scientific (Exploded Planet Hypothesis) and does not require the actual explosion of a planet. There is no law that requires ancient religious beliefs to be scientifically true.131
However, it is this last point that highlights the problematic inherent in Alford’s version of catastrophism, and indeed inherent in most catastrophist interpretations of ancient myths, and that is, if the texts are not to be correlated with any scienti
fic theory - ancient or modern - of an exploded planet in nearby space, then how and why would the ancients, across such a broad diversity of cultures and dispersion of this one theme, hit upon the idea in the first place? And if this scenario is, as Alford says, “one of a ... world that was once saturated with the cults of numerous exploded planet deities, each personifying exactly the same idea, but expressed in a variety of different ways,”132 then why employ such a confused jungle overgrowth of symbols to portray it? The ancients, on Alford’s problematical view, were obsessed across cultures and religions with this one idea to such an extent that this obsession itself must be explained. As will be seen, this, too is another problematic inherent in Alford’s approach.
a. Chimeras as Meteorites
Alford produces a veritable blizzard of thematic motifs and references in his books in support of his contention that most if not all such motifs refer to the “hidden” truth of an exploded planet. A basic formula, however, underlies all the motifs he explores in his works, and that is that anything referring to mountains, cities, or islands in the “sea” or “the deep” is a metaphor for a planet, which is an “island” or “mountain” in the midst of the “deep” or “sea” of space.
The Cosmic War: Interplanetary Warfare, Modern Physics and Ancient Texts Page 8
