12 Year Old Genius Challenges Big Bang Myth

Indystar.com: Genius at work: 12-year-old is studying at IUPUI.

When Jacob Barnett first learned about the Schrödinger equation for quantum mechanics, he could hardly contain himself.

For three straight days, his little brain buzzed with mathematical functions.

From within his 12-year-old, mildly autistic mind, there gradually flowed long strings of pluses, minuses, funky letters and upside-down triangles -- a tapestry of complicated symbols that few can understand.

He grabbed his pencil and filled every sheet of paper before grabbing a marker and filling up a dry erase board that hangs in his bedroom. With a single-minded obsession, he kept on, eventually marking up every window in the home.

Strange, say some.

Genius, say others.

But entirely normal for Jacob, a child prodigy who used to crunch his cereal while calculating the volume of the cereal box in his head.

"Whenever I try talking about math with anyone in my family," he said, "they just stare blankly."

So do many of his older classmates at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, who marvel at seeing this scrawny little kid in the front row of the calculus-based physics class he has been taking this semester.

"When I first walked in and saw him, I thought, 'Oh my God, I'm going to school with Doogie Howser,' " said Wanda Anderson, a biochemistry major, referring to a television show that featured a 16-year-old boy-genius physician.

Elementary school couldn't keep Jacob interested. And courses at IUPUI have only served to awaken a sleeping giant.

Just a few weeks shy of his 13th birthday, Jake, as he's often called, is starting to move beyond the level of what his professors can teach.

In fact, his work is so strong and his ideas so original that he's being courted by a top-notch East Coast research center. IUPUI is interested in him moving from the classroom into a funded researcher's position.

"We have told him that after this semester . . . enough of the book work. You are here to do some science," said IUPUI physics Professor John Ross, who vows to help find some grant funding to support Jake and his work.

"If we can get all of those creative juices in a certain direction, we might be able to see some really amazing stuff down the road."

"My fear was that he would never be in our world"

Teenage college student?

Developer of his own original theory on quantum physics?

Paid researcher at 13?

This is not what Jake's parents expected from a child whose first few years were spent in silence.

"Oh my gosh, when he was 2, my fear was that he would never be in our world at all," said Kristine Barnett, 36, Jake's mother.

"He would not talk to anyone. He would not even look at us."

Child psychologists assessed Jake at the time and diagnosed behavioral characteristics of a borderline autistic child. He was impaired, they said, and had a lack of "spontaneous seeking to share enjoyment," difficulty showing emotion and interacting with others.

Diagnosis: mildly autistic.

"My biggest fear," his mom said last week, with tears welling up in her eyes, "was that he had lost the ability to say, 'I love you' to us."

By age 3, Jake was the focus of a more intense evaluation from a team of psychologists, therapists and a diagnostic teacher.

Their report indicated that while Jake continued to struggle with social activities and physical development, he was showing signs of academic skills that were above his age level.

Diagnosis: Asperger's syndrome, a somewhat milder condition related to autism.

After hearing this, Jake's parents decided to pay closer attention to the things their first-born son was doing -- rather than the things he was not.

For example, Jake often recited the alphabet -- forward and then backward. He used Q-tips to create vivid geometrical shapes on the living room floor. He solved 5,000-piece puzzles (rather quickly). And he once soaked in a state road map and ended up memorizing every highway and license plate prefix.

And perhaps most amazingly, he could recite the mathematical constant pi out to 70 digits.

"I'm at 98 now," Jake said, interrupting his mom during an interview.

And then, a week later, he was up to 200 digits after the decimal point -- forward and backward.

At 3, his head was in the stars

The Barnetts decided it was time to follow Jake's lead, adopting a method that some parents of children with autism use -- floor-time therapy -- to help foster developmental growth. They let their children focus intently on subjects they like, rather than trying to conform them to "normal" things.

For Jake, that meant astronomy. As a 3-year-old, he loved looking at a book about stars, over and over again.

So off they went on a tour of the Holcomb Observatory and Planetarium at Butler University.

Kristine Barnett will never forget the day.

"We were in the crowd, just sitting, listening to this guy ask the crowd if anyone knew why the moons going around Mars were potato-shaped and not round," she recalls. "Jacob raised his hand and said, 'Excuse me, but what are the sizes of the moons around Mars?' "

The lecturer answered, and "Jacob looked at him and said the gravity of the planet . . . is so large that (the moon's) gravity would not be able to pull it into a round shape."

Silence.

"That entire building . . . everyone was just looking at him, like, 'Who is this 3-year-old?' "

After that, the Barnetts began to feed Jake's hunger for knowledge, through more books and more visits to the planetarium. By the time he was 8, he got permission to sit in on an advanced astronomy class at IUPUI.

Meanwhile, his math skills were reaching astronomical levels.

By the time he was in fifth grade, Jake had become bored with elementary math. He was a student, first at Carey Ridge Elementary School and then at Westfield Intermediate School, an experience he now says he enjoyed for a while.

"The first couple of years were great, but then eventually the math started being, like, OK, we've been discussing this for a while, and it really isn't that hard," Jake said. "Can I move on to calculus now? Can I move on to algebra now?"

The boredom did not go unnoticed at home. Jake was coming home from school quiet, huddling in a safe space in the house and starting to show signs of withdrawing.

"I was really afraid we were going to lose him back into the world he was in when he was 2," his mom said.

Frank Lawlis, a Texas-based psychologist who serves as a testing supervisor for the American Mensa organization -- a society for geniuses -- said it would not have been unusual for a child with symptoms of autism to regress backward after a brief time of growth.

"One of the aspects of autism is that these kids' brains grow at an accelerated rate and then, generally speaking, there is kind of a reversal that happens," said Lawlis, who last year wrote "The Autism Answer," a book for parents of children with autism.

"The theory is that the brain reaches a certain capacity, can't grow, becomes inflamed, and then a reversal effect occurs. It's just a theory, but it's very common."

That did not happen to Jake, thanks in part to a third psychological evaluation done nearly two years ago. It showed that this fifth-grader was not regressing but was simply bored and needed to be stimulated -- in a very big way.

As in dropping out of school.

"Indeed, it would not be in Jacob's best interest to force him to complete academic work that he has already mastered," clinical neurophysiologist Carl S. Hale, Merrillville, said in a report provided by the Barnetts.

"He needs work at an instructional level, which currently is a post college graduate level in mathematics, i.e., a post master's degree. In essence, his math skills are at the level found in someone who is working on a doctorate in math, physics, astronomy and astrophysics."

The Barnetts were blown away. They knew Jake was smart, but doctorate-level smart?

"I flunked math," Kristine said with a laugh. "I know this did not come from me."
Off to college, where he tutors classmates

Encouraged by this new assessment, the Barnetts made the tough decision to pull Jake out of Westfield Washington Schools and enroll him in IUPUI's early college entrance program that caters to gifted and talented kids -- although typically they are advanced high school students, not 12-year-old whiz kids.

As he prepared for the more rigorous work of a college class, Jake decided he ought to make sure he could master all high school-level math that would be required in college.

"In one two-week period, he sat on our front porch and learned all of his high school math," Kristine said. "He tested out of algebra 1 and 2, geometry, trigonometry and calculus."

At this point, Jake's math IQ -- which has been measured at 170 (top of the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children) -- could not get any higher.

"You could tell right off the bat, his performance has been outstanding," said Ross, who, at age 46 with a Ph.D. from Boston University, has never seen a kid as smart as Jake.

"When he asks a question, he is always two steps ahead of the lecture," Ross said. "Everyone in the class gets quiet. Poor kid. . . . He sits right in the front row, and they all just look at him.

"He will come to see me during office hours and ask even more detailed questions. And you can tell he's been thinking these things through."

Jake is driven by Mom or Dad from his home in Hamilton County to IUPUI's campus, where he attends classes a few days each week. In between classes, he spends time at the Honors College lounge, where he has become a go-to guy for much older classmates needing tutoring.

"A lot of people come to him for help when they don't understand a physics problem," said Anderson, his class partner. "People come up to him all the time and say, 'Hey Jake, can you help me?' "

"A lot of people think a genius is hard to talk to, but Jake explains things that would still be over their head."

His professor has noticed.

"Is he a genius? Well, yeah," Ross said. "Kids his age would normally have problems adding fractions, and he is helping out some of his fellow students."

If Jake stays on track, Ross could see him working someday at a government lab or an observatory. Maybe he'll be a professor or a highly respected researcher.

"He can do anything he wants."

A normal boy, except for the numbers

Despite this new experience, his parents insist that Jake remain close with his friends in Westfield. Social activity is important, they know.

For Jake, life is not all centered on math and astrophysics.

He also likes playing video games. ("Guitar Hero" and "Halo: Reach" are his current favorites.) He plays basketball with friends, has a girlfriend and recently attended his first dance.

He likes music -- classical, which he plays by memory on a piano, but he also plays some contemporary songs he hears on the radio. He loves sci-fi movies and the Disney Channel. He watches documentaries on the History Channel.

A normal kid.

But then, late at night, when the TV is off, the homework is done and everyone in the house is sleeping, the numbers start to percolate again.

They percolate so much that he has trouble sleeping. His parents got so worried a few years ago that they took him for medical tests, but no malady was diagnosed. He just can't fall asleep easily.

"A lot keeps me awake," Jake said. "I scare people."

The numbers that keep him from snoozing are the same that led him to develop his own theory of physics -- an original work that proposed a "new expanded theory of relativity" and takes what Einstein developed even further.

His mom, still not sure whether her son was truly a genius at work or a kid at play, decided to send a video of Jake explaining his theory to the prestigious Institute for Advanced Study near Princeton University, one of the world's leading centers for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry.

That's where astrophysics Professor Scott Tremaine does his work. Tremaine is one of the world's leading scientists and is an expert in the evolution of planetary systems, comets, black holes, galaxies -- all the stuff Jake really likes.

In a letter to the Barnetts, Tremaine confirmed the brilliance.

"I'm impressed by his interest in physics and the amount that he has learned so far," Tremaine wrote in an email, provided by the family. "The theory that he's working on involves several of the toughest problems in astrophysics and theoretical physics.

"Anyone who solves these will be in line for a Nobel Prize."

He then encouraged Jake to spend as much time as possible to learn more and to further develop his theory.

Contacted by The Indianapolis Star, Tremaine confirmed the exchange of notes.

"I have seen a YouTube video in which Jake describes his theory, and I have spoken with his mother and corresponded with both her and Jake by email," Tremaine said. "I hope that Jake continues his interest in physics and mathematics."

Thinking big is what he does

Meanwhile, Jake is moving on to his next challenge: proving that the big-bang theory, the event some think led to the formation of the universe, is, well, wrong.

Wrong?

He explains.

"There are two different types of when stars end. When the little stars die, it's just like a small poof. They just turn into a planetary nebula. But the big ones, above 1.4 solar masses, blow up in one giant explosion, a supernova," Jake said. "What it does, is, in larger stars there is a larger mass, and it can fuse higher elements because it's more dense."

OK . . . trying to follow you.

"So you get all the elements, all the different materials, from those bigger stars. The little stars, they just make hydrogen and helium, and when they blow up, all the carbon that remains in them is just in the white dwarf; it never really comes off.

"So, um, in the big-bang theory, what they do is, there is this big explosion and there is all this temperature going off and the temperature decreases really rapidly because it's really big. The other day I calculated, they have this period where they suppose the hydrogen and helium were created, and, um, I don't care about the hydrogen and helium, but I thought, wouldn't there have to be some sort of carbon?"

He could go on and on.

And he did.

"Otherwise, the carbon would have to be coming out of the stars and hence the Earth, made mostly of carbon, we wouldn't be here. So I calculated, the time it would take to create 2 percent of the carbon in the universe, it would actually have to be several micro-seconds. Or a couple of nano-seconds, or something like that. An extremely small period of time. Like faster than a snap. That isn't gonna happen."

"Because of that," he continued, "that means that the world would have never been created because none of the carbon would have been given 7 billion years to fuse together. We'd have to be 21 billion years old . . . and that would just screw everything up."

So, we had to ask.

If not the big bang, then how did the universe come about?

"I'm still working on that," he said. "I have an idea, but . . . I'm still working out the details."

Yahoo News: For 12-year old astrophysics prodigy, the sky’s the limit.

In some ways, Jacob Barnett is just like any other 12-year-old kid. He plays Guitar Hero, shoots hoops with his friends, and has a platonic girlfriend.

But in other ways, he's a little different. Jake, who has an IQ of 170, began solving 5,000-piece jigsaw puzzles at the age of 3, not long after he'd been diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome, a mild form of autism. A few years later, he taught himself calculus, algebra, and geometry in two weeks. By 8, he had left high school, and is currently taking college-level advanced astrophysics classes—while tutoring his older classmates. And he's being recruited for a paid researcher job by Indiana University.

Now, he's at work on a theory that challenges the Big Bang—the prevailing explanation among scientists for how the universe came about. It's not clear how developed it is, but experts say he's asking the right questions.

"The theory that he's working on involves several of the toughest problems in astrophysics and theoretical physics," Scott Tremaine of Princeton University's Institute for Advanced Studies—where Einstein (pictured) himself worked—wrote in an email to Jake's family. "Anyone who solves these will be in line for a Nobel Prize."

Atheism to be Forced on 4 Year Olds

Darwinists reject separation of atheism and state.

Daily Mail: Children as Young as Four to be Educated in Atheism.

Reverend Kevin Logan, a local journalist, author and religious community leader, said: 'It is quite a change but it is completely right to recognise atheism and humanism.

'They are religions like any others. It is just that people worship man instead of a god.

'I am certainly not worried about Christianity. It can stand against any belief and come out in a good light.'

Jordan Battles to Regain "Priceless" Christian Relics

Pigott, R., Jordan Battles to Regain Priceless Christian Relics, BBC, Mar 29th

They could be the earliest Christian writing in existence, surviving almost 2,000 years in a Jordanian cave. They could, just possibly, change our understanding of how Jesus was crucified and resurrected, and how Christianity was born.

A group of 70 or so "books", each with between five and 15 lead leaves bound by lead rings, was apparently discovered in a remote arid valley in northern Jordan somewhere between 2005 and 2007.

A flash flood had exposed two niches inside the cave, one of them marked with a menorah or candlestick, the ancient Jewish religious symbol.

A Jordanian Bedouin opened these plugs, and what he found inside might constitute extremely rare relics of early Christianity.

That is certainly the view of the Jordanian government, which claims they were smuggled into Israel by another Bedouin.

The Israeli Bedouin who currently holds the books has denied smuggling them out of Jordan, and claims they have been in his family for 100 years.

Jordan says it will "exert all efforts at every level" to get the relics repatriated.

The director of the Jordan's Department of Antiquities, Ziad al-Saad, says the books might have been made by followers of Jesus in the few decades immediately following his crucifixion.

"They will really match, and perhaps be more significant than, the Dead Sea Scrolls," says Mr Saad.

"Maybe it will lead to further interpretation and authenticity checks of the material, but the initial information is very encouraging, and it seems that we are looking at a very important and significant discovery, maybe the most important discovery in the history of archaeology."

They seem almost incredible claims - so what is the evidence?

The books, or "codices", were apparently cast in lead, before being bound by lead rings.

Their leaves - which are mostly about the size of a credit card - contain text in Ancient Hebrew, most of which is in code.

Aposematism Associated With Athleticism

Science Daily: Treadmill Tests for Poison Frogs Show Toxic Species Are More Physically Fit.

ScienceDaily (Mar. 29, 2011) — The most toxic, brightly colored members of the poison frog family may also be the best athletes, says a new study.

So-named because some native peoples use their skin secretions to poison their darts, the poison dart frogs of the Amazon jungle are well known for their bitter taste and beautiful colors. The spectacular hues of these forest frogs serve to broadcast their built-in chemical weapons: skin secretions containing nasty toxins called alkaloids. Like the red, yellow and black bands on a coral snake or the yellow stripes on a wasp, their contrasting color patterns warn would-be predators to stay away, said lead author Juan Santos of the National Evolutionary Synthesis Center in Durham, NC.

As it turns out, the most boldly-colored and bad-tasting species are also the most physically fit, the authors report this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

In forests in Colombia, Ecuador, Venezuela, and Panamá, Santos subjected nearly 500 poison frogs -- representing more than 50 species -- to a frog fitness test. He measured their oxygen uptake during exercise using a rotating plastic tube, turning the tube like a hamster wheel to make the frogs walk.

Santos estimated the frogs' metabolic rates while at rest, and again after four minutes of exercise. The result? The most dazzling and deadly species had higher aerobic capacity than their drab, nontoxic cousins.

"They're better able to extract oxygen from each breath and transport it to their muscles, just like well-trained athletes," Santos said.

Poisonous species owe their athletic prowess to their unusual foraging habits, explained co-author David Cannatella of the University of Texas at Austin. Unlike snakes and other poisonous animals which make their own venom, poison frogs get their toxins from their food.

"They acquire their alkaloid chemicals by eating ants and mites," Cannatella said.

Because of their picky diet, poisonous frogs have to forage far and wide for food. "Nontoxic species basically stay in one place and don't move very much and eat any insect that comes close to them," Santos said. "But the bright, poisonous frogs are very picky about what they eat."

"It's not like a buffet where they can get everything they need to eat in one place," Cannatella added. "Ants and mites are patchy, so the frogs have to move around more to find enough food."

This combination of toxic skin and bold colors -- a syndrome known as aposematism

Scientists to Drill to Earth's Mantle

"The interior of the Earth is a problem at once fascinating and baffling, as one may easily judge by the vast literature and the few established facts concerning it." -- A. Francis Birch, geophysicist, 1952

National Geographic: Scientists to Drill Earth's Mantle, Retrieve First Sample?

It may not be a journey to the center of the Earth, but it could be the closest thing yet.

Scientists are planning to drill all the way through the planet's miles-thick crust to Earth's deep, hot mantle and retrieve samples for the first time. The samples, they say, would rival moon rocks for sheer scientific import—and be nearly as hard to get.

"That has been a long-term ambition of earth scientists," geologist Damon Teagle told National Geographic News.

But a lack of suitable technology and insufficient understanding of the crust have long tempered that ambition. (Get an overview of Earth's magma and other layers).

Now, better knowledge of the Earth's shell and technological advances—for example, a Japanese drill ship equipped with six miles (ten kilometers) of drilling pipe—have put the goal within reach, according to a commentary in this week's issue of the journal Nature, co-written by Teagle, a geologist at the U.K.'s University of Southampton.

Even so, drilling into the mantle would be "very expensive" and would require new drillbit and lubricant designs, among other things, according to the paper.

But if all goes as planned, drilling could begin by 2020, Teagle said. As soon as next month, the team will begin exploratory missions in the Pacific, where crews will "bore further into the oceanic crust than ever before," the paper says.

Texas Considers Protecting Those Who Question Darwin

Texas is considering legal protection for creationists who face academic discrimination from Darwinist bigots.

Unruh, B., Texas Considers Protecting Those Who Question Darwin, World Net Daily, March 19th 2011

A Texas lawmaker has proposed a legal protection for those in academia who question Charles Darwin's beliefs that man evolved from sludge and today's world is a result of the survival of the fittest.

State Rep. Bill Zedler told WND today that his House Bill 2454 is a pre-emptive effort to make sure problems don't arise in Texas with established scientific communities discriminating against someone who challenges their beliefs.

His plan is short and to the point:

An institution of higher education may not discriminate against or penalize in any manner, especially with regard to employment or academic support, a faculty member or student based on the faculty member's or student's conduct of research relating to the theory of intelligent design or other alternate theories of the origination and development of organisms.

"Isn't it amazing in the halls of academia you can almost believe anything and espouse everything and they go right along with you. But lo and behold if someone talks about intelligent design, all of a sudden, we need to get rid of you," Zedler told WND.

Such actions already have been documented, and have produced court cases.

But is man really just a product of cosmic accidents and processes? Get Ray Comfort's "Nothing Created Everything" to expose the inconsistencies of evolution theory.

In Texas, it was several years ago that Baylor University Professor Bob Marks, whose research indicated a challenge to Darwin's theory of evolution, was ordered taken off the Internet by his employer.

Walt Ruloff, the executive producer of Premise Media, who worked with actor Ben Stein on the project called "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed," about the monopoly Darwinian beliefs hold in academia, wrote in the Baylor student newspaper about his concerns at the time.

"As many of you have heard, Marks, a distinguished professor of electrical and computer engineering, has been conducting research that ultimately may challenge the foundation of Darwinian theory. In layman's terms, Marks is using highly sophisticated mathematical and computational techniques to determine if there are limits to what natural selection can do," he wrote. "At Baylor, a Christian institution, this should be pretty unremarkable stuff. I'm assuming most of the faculty, students and alumni believe in God, so wouldn't it also be safe to assume you have no problem with a professor trying to scientifically quantify the limits of a blind, undirected cause of the origin and subsequent history of life?

"But the dirty little secret is university administrators are much more fearful of the Darwinian Machine than they are of you," he said.

Zedler said the flow of research and information in academia sometimes is stifled because of the entrenched censorship of intelligent design questions by established scientists.

WND has reported on several other cases in which the intense criticism of anything related to intelligence design has created controversy. In one case, a NASA lab was accused of cracking down on one person's opinion.

David Coppedge, an information-technology specialist and systems administrator on the NASA Jet Propulsion Lab's Cassini mission to Saturn, contended he was discriminated against by managers and demoted because he shared intelligent design videos with co-workers.

"For the offense of offering videos to colleagues, Coppedge faced harassment, an investigation cloaked in secrecy and a virtual gag order on his discussion of intelligent design," said attorney Casey Luskin of Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture.

Luskin was consultant to the Coppedge lawsuit, which was being handled by Los Angeles First Amendment attorney William J. Becker Jr. of the Becker Law Firm and included allegations of free-speech violations and wrongful demotion.

"Coppedge was punished even though supervisors admitted never receiving a single complaint regarding his conversations about intelligent design prior to their investigation, and even though other employees were allowed to express diverse ideological opinions, including attacking intelligent design," Luskin said.

Zedler's proposal has been referred to committee and he couldn't provide to WND an estimate for when, or if, it could reach the House floor for debate and vote. He said sometimes the politics are more important than the issue.

But he said the issue is something that needs to be raised as the dominance of the opinion supporting evolution in colleges and universities leaves those who disagree, or even just have questions, as targets.

"There are people that want to say something but [are] afraid to because there are people around the country that have been discriminated against," Zedler said.

It was just weeks ago when the University of Texas paid a settlement of $125,000 to astronomy professor Martin Gaskell, who alleged he was denied a position at least partly because he expressed questions about evolution.

He told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, "I think that it is important that the state of Texas stands firmly behind academic freedom."

Also, WND reported when Iowa State University regents, who had ruled against accepting evidence or hearing testimony from a professor in a dispute over the school's denial of his tenure, turned down his appeal.

The case involved Guillermo Gonzalez, an honored assistant professor of astronomy who had been actively working on theories of intelligent design, an effort that ultimately cost him his job, supporters say. Tenure is roughly the equivalent of a lifetime appointment.

The school has continued to deny the handling of Gonzalez' case was related to his support of ID, even though the Des Moines Register documented emails that confirmed Gonzalez' colleagues wanted him flushed out of the system for that reason.

"I think Gonzalez should know that some of the faculty in his department are not going to count his ID work as a plus for tenure," said one note, from astronomy teacher Bruce Harmon, before the department voted against tenure for Gonzalez. "Quite the opposite."

The newspaper reported what was revealed in emails was "contrary" to what ISU officials said when they rejected Gonzalez' request for tenure.

WND also reported recently on biochemist Christian de Duve, who suggested the forces of natural selection in evolution instilled mankind with an innate "original sin" that if not overcome could lead to humanity's extinction.

De Duve, a professor emeritus at New York City's Rockefeller University and 1974 winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, said in an interview with NewScientist that the essential problem … is selfishness.

"Natural selection has resulted in traits such as group selfishness being coded in our genes," de Duve explains. "These were useful to our ancestors under the conditions in which they lived, but have become noxious to us today."

Unfortunately, de Duve says, that while evolution favored the survival of early tribes with a me-first nature, there are dire consequences to the success of a selfish race.

Put more simply, he says, natural selection "doesn't care about your grandchildren."

"The cost of our success is the exhaustion of natural resources, leading to energy crises, climate change, pollution and the destruction of our habitat," he continues. "If we continue in the same direction, humankind is headed for some frightful ordeals, if not extinction."

De Duve has written a book, "Genetics of Original Sin," in which he explains how he sees the intersection of his theories with the Bible.

With Timbuktu Myth Is Reality

BBC: Search on for Timbuktu's twin, Oct 2006

'Mythical place'

Mr Redler, who comes from Taunton in Somerset, said many Britons are a unaware of the existence of Timbuktu, let alone its culture, history and achievements.

A survey of 150 young people undertaken ahead of the exhibition found 34% did not think Timbuktu existed, and the remaining 66% considered it to be "a mythical place."

Prometheus the Neaderthal

Science Daily: Neanderthals Were Nifty at Controlling Fire.

ScienceDaily (Mar. 15, 2011) — A new study involving the University of Colorado Boulder shows clear evidence of the continuous control of fire by Neanderthals in Europe dating back roughly 400,000 years, yet another indication that they weren't dimwitted brutes as often portrayed.

The conclusion comes from the study of scores of ancient archaeological research sites in Europe that show convincing evidence of long-term fire control by Neanderthals, said Paola Villa, a curator at the University of Colorado Museum of Natural History. Villa co-authored a paper on the new study with Professor Wil Roebroeks of Leiden University in the Netherlands.

"Until now, many scientists have thought Neanderthals had some fires but did not have continuous use of fire," said Villa. "We were not expecting to find a record of so many Neanderthal sites exhibiting such good evidence of the sustained use of fire over time."

A paper on the subject was published in the March 14 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Shrew Mole Vicariance Proves Plate Tectonics A Lie

"The mole genus Urotrichus [Urotrichini] is confined to Japan and California." -- S. Warren Carey, geologist, Earth, Universe, Cosmos, 1996

EncyclopaediaBritannica.com -- Urotrichus

Asian, Japanese, and American shrew moles (genera Uropsilus, Urotrichus, and Neurotrichus, respectively) differ from typical moles in that they resemble shrews and are much less specialized for burrowing. Their tails are nearly as long as the body.

"... 3) the Urotrichini, containing Neurotrichus." -- Terry L. Yates and Ira F. Greenbaum, zoologists, Biochemical Systematics of North American Moles (Insectivora: Talpidae), Journal of Mammology, Volume 63, Number 3, Pages 368-374, Aug 1982

Yates, T.L., and Moore, D.W., Speciation and Evolution in the Family Talpidae (Mammalia: Insectivora), Progress in Clinical and Biological Research, Volume 335, Pages 1-22, 1990

"Yates and Greenbaum (1982) suggested that the morphological similarity between Neurotrichus and Urotrichus, found on the opposite side of the Pacific, in Japan, may be the result of convergence. Subsequently, however, Yates and Moore (1990) indicated that the chromosomal data support an earlier view that the two are more closely related to one another than either is to any other living genus." -- Robert M. Nowak, zoologist, Walker's Mammals of the World, Volume 2, Insectivora: Talipidae, 1999

"The Urotrichini (Urotrichus, Dymecodon and Neurotrichus)...." -- Masaharu Motokawa, zoologist, Phylogenetic Relationships Within the Family Talpidae (Mammalia: Insectivora), Journal of Zoology, Volume 263, Pages 147-157, May 2004

"Chinese (Scaptonyx), Japanese (Urotrichus and Dymecodon) and North American (Neurotrichus) shrew moles closely resemble each other in external appearance and habits (Allen, 1938; Reed, 1951). These diminutive animals commonly excavate shallow tunnel systems in the leaf mold of soft loamy soils and appear to occupy an ecological niche between those of the shrew-like and fossorial talpids." -- Akio Shinihara, zoologist, et al., Evolution and Biogeography of Talpid Moles from Continental East Asia and the Japanese Islands Inferred from Mitochondrial and Nuclear Gene Sequences, Zoological Science, Volume 21, Number 12, Pages 1177-1185, Dec 2004

"... the Urotrichini, including the Asian Urotrichus, Dymecodon, and the North American Neurotrichus (van Valen, '67; Hutchison, '68; Yates and Moore, '90)" -- F. David Carmona, zoologist, et al., The Evolution of Female Mole Ovotestes Evidences High Plasticity of Mammalian Gonad Development, Journal of Experimental Zoology Part B: Molecular and Developmental Evolution, Volume 310B, Issue 3, Pages 259–266, May 2008

Citations

Van Valen, L.M., New Paleocene Insectivores and Insectivore Classification, 1967

Hutchison, J.H., Fossil Talpidae (Insectivora, Mammalia) From the Later Tertiary of Oregon, 1968

Hutchison, J.H., Notes on Type Specimens of European Miocene Talpidae and a Tentative Classification of Old World Tertiary Talpidae (Insectivora: Mammalia), Geobios, Volume 7, Issue 3, Pages 211-256, 1974

CNN Earth Expansion Coverup

CNN: Quake Moved Japan Coast 8 Feet, Shifted Earth's Axis.

(CNN) -- The powerful earthquake that unleashed a devastating tsunami Friday appears to have moved the main island of Japan by 8 feet (2.4 meters) and shifted the Earth on its axis.

"At this point, we know that one GPS station moved (8 feet), and we have seen a map from GSI (Geospatial Information Authority) in Japan showing the pattern of shift over a large area is consistent with about that much shift of the land mass," said Kenneth Hudnut, a geophysicist with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS).

Reports from the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology in Italy estimated the 8.9-magnitude quake shifted the planet on its axis by nearly 4 inches (10 centimeters). ...

The quake occurred as the Earth's crust ruptured along an area about 250 miles (400 kilometers) long by 100 miles (160 kilometers) wide, as tectonic plates slipped more than 18 meters, said Shengzao Chen, a USGS geophysicist.

CNN deliberately doesn't tell you what direction Japan moved because if they did it would falsify Plate Tectonics.

Early Humans Migrated From Antarctica to South Africa

Kinver, M., Early Humans Began in Southern Africa, Study Suggests, BBC, Mar 2011

Modern humans may have originated from southern Africa, an extensive genetic study has suggested.

Data showed that hunter-gatherer populations in the region had the greatest degree of genetic diversity, which is an indicator of longevity.

It says that the region was probably the best location for the origin of modern humans, challenging the view that we came from eastern Africa.

The study appears in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Alien Robots

Hadhazy, A., Scientists: If Aliens Arrive, Expect Robots, CBS News, Mar 10 2011 (Hat tip: irrationaltheorist)

"If an extraterrestrial spaceship ever lands on Earth, I bet you that it is 99.9999999 percent likely that what exits that ship will be synthetic in nature," said Michael Dyer, a professor of computer science at the University of California, Los Angeles (appropriately enough).

In civilizations advanced enough to travel between the stars, it is quite likely that machines have supplanted their biological creators, some scientists argue. Automatons -- unlike animals -- could withstand the hazards to living tissue and the strain on social fabrics posed by a long interstellar voyage.

Furthermore, nonliving beings would not have to worry all that much about the environmental conditions at their destination -- if the planet is hot or cold, bacteria-ridden or sterile, has oxygen in the air or is airless, machines would not care.

In short, don't expect cuddly, squishy E.T.s to come calling someday; instead, picture robots descending from the sky.

Ancient Chemical Warfare

"And then the Aryans -- if we may believe that good man Bramachari Bawa -- knew a branch of science (Viman Vidya) about which the West is now speculating much, but has learnt next to nothing. They could navigate the air, and not only navigate but fight battles in it, like so many war eagles combating for the dominion of the clouds. To be perfect in aeronautics, as he [Bramachari Bawa] justly says, they must have known all the arts and sciences related to that science, including the strata and currents of the atmosphere, their relative temperature, humidity and density, and the specific gravity of the various gases. At the Mayasabha, described in the Bharata, he tells us, were microscopes, telescopes, clocks, watches, mechanical singing birds, and articulating and speaking animals. The Ashta Vidya -- a science of which our modern professors have not even an inkling -- enabled it's proficients completely to destroy an invading army by enveloping it in an atmosphere of poisonous gases...." -- Henry S. Olcott, theosophist, India Past Present and Future, 1880

LiveScience: Buried Soldiers May Be Victims of Ancient Chemical Weapon.

Almost 2,000 years ago, 19 Roman soldiers rushed into a cramped underground tunnel, prepared to defend the Roman-held Syrian city of Dura-Europos from an army of Persians digging to undermine the city's mudbrick walls. But instead of Persian soldiers, the Romans met with a wall of noxious black smoke that turned to acid in their lungs. Their crystal-pommeled swords were no match for this weapon; the Romans choked and died in moments, many with their last pay of coins still slung in purses on their belts.

Nearby, a Persian soldier — perhaps the one who started the toxic underground fire — suffered his own death throes, grasping desperately at his chain mail shirt as he choked.

These 20 men, who died in A.D. 256, may be the first victims of chemical warfare to leave any archeological evidence of their passing, according to a new investigation. The case is a cold one, with little physical evidence left behind beyond drawings and archaeological excavation notes from the 1930s. But a new analysis of those materials published in January in the American Journal of Archaeology finds that the soldiers likely did not die by the sword as the original excavator believed. Instead, they were gassed.

As Long As It's Not in the Bible

"Man will believe anything, as long as it's not in the Bible." -- Napoleon Bonaparte, emperor, 19th century

Quoted in:

Comfort, R., Scientific Facts in the Bible, 2001

Comfort, R., God Doesn't Believe in Atheists, 2002

Two Planets Sharing Same Orbit?

Chown, M., Two Planets Found Sharing One Orbit, New Scientist, Issue 2801, March 6th 2011

Buried in the flood of data from the Kepler telescope is a planetary system unlike any seen before. Two of its apparent planets share the same orbit around their star. ...

The two planets are part of a four-planet system dubbed KOI-730. They circle their sun-like parent star every 9.8 days at exactly the same orbital distance.

Sharuhen: Another Exodus Clue

Sharuhen is mentioned in the Book of Joshua: Joshua 19:6

And Bethlebaoth, and Sharuhen; thirteen cities and their villages:

Sharuhen of the Hyksos was destroyed by Pharaoh Ahmose I whose reign (the beginning of the New Kingdom) has been radiocarbon dated to 1570 and 1544 B.C.

Ramsey, et al., Radiocarbon-Based Chronology for Dynastic Egypt, Science, Volume 328, Number 5985, Pages 1554-1557, Jul 2010

Our radiocarbon data indicate that the New Kingdom started between 1570 and 1544 B.C.E.

Therefore the Exodus must have preceded the reign of Ahmose I, and therefore also preceded the traditional Exodus date of 1450 B.C.

The Pharaoh preceding the Exodus was Pepi II Neferkare and the Exodus occurred circa 2200 B.C.

Exactly 430 years before Pepi II Neferkare and the Exodus lived Vizier Joseph (aka Imhotep) and his Pharaoh Djoser.

"Now the sojourning of the children of Israel, who dwelt in Egypt, was four hundred and thirty years." -- Exodus 12:40

Cyanobacteria Found In Carbonaceous Meteorites

Hoover, R.B., Fossils of Cyanobacteria in CI1 Carbonaceous Meteorites, Journal of Cosmology, Vol 13, 2011

Dr. Hoover has discovered evidence of microfossils similar to Cyanobacteria, in freshly fractured slices of the interior surfaces of the Alais, Ivuna, and Orgueil CI1 carbonaceous meteorites. Based on Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscopy (FESEM) and other measures, Dr. Hoover has concluded they are indigenous to these meteors and are similar to trichomic cyanobacteria and other trichomic prokaryotes such as filamentous sulfur bacteria. He concludes these fossilized bacteria are not Earthly contaminants but are the fossilized remains of living organisms which lived in the parent bodies of these meteors, e.g. comets, moons, and other astral bodies. The implications are that life is everywhere, and that life on Earth may have come from other planets.

Members of the Scientific community were invited to analyze the results and to write critical commentaries or to speculate about the implications. These commentaries will be published on March 7 through March 10, 2011.
Official Statement from Dr. Rudy Schild,
Center for Astrophysics, Harvard-Smithsonian,
Editor-in-Chief, Journal of Cosmology.

Dr. Richard Hoover is a highly respected scientist and astrobiologist with a prestigious record of accomplishment at NASA. Given the controversial nature of his discovery, we have invited 100 experts and have issued a general invitation to over 5000 scientists from the scientific community to review the paper and to offer their critical analysis. Our intention is to publish the commentaries, both pro and con, alongside Dr. Hoover's paper. In this way, the paper will have received a thorough vetting, and all points of view can be presented. No other paper in the history of science has undergone such a thorough analysis, and no other scientific journal in the history of science has made such a profoundly important paper available to the scientific community, for comment, before it is published. We believe the best way to advance science, is to promote debate and discussion.

FoxNews: Exclusive: NASA Scientist Claims Evidence of Alien Life on Meteorite.

“I interpret it as indicating that life is more broadly distributed than restricted strictly to the planet earth,” Hoover told FoxNews.com. “This field of study has just barely been touched -- because quite frankly, a great many scientist would say that this is impossible.”

In what he calls “a very simple process,” Dr. Hoover fractured the meteorite stones under a sterile environment before examining the freshly broken surface with the standard tools of the scientist: a scanning-electron microscope and a field emission electron-scanning microscope, which allowed him to search the stone’s surface for evidence of fossilized remains.

He found the fossilized remains of micro-organisms not so different from ordinary ones found underfoot -- here on earth, that is

“The exciting thing is that they are in many cases recognizable and can be associated very closely with the generic species here on earth,” Hoover told FoxNews.com. But not all of them. “There are some that are just very strange and don’t look like anything that I’ve been able to identify, and I’ve shown them to many other experts that have also come up stumped.”

Other scientists tell FoxNews.com the implications of this research are shocking, describing the findings variously as profound, very important and extraordinary. But Dr. David Marais, an astrobiologist with NASA’s AMES Research Center, says he’s very cautious about jumping onto the bandwagon.

These kinds of claims have been made before, he noted -- and found to be false.

“It’s an extraordinary claim, and thus I’ll need extraordinary evidence,” Marais said.

Knowing that the study will be controversial, the journal invited members of the scientific community to analyze the results and to write critical commentaries ahead of time. Though none are online yet, those comments will be posted alongside the article, said Dr. Rudy Schild, a scientist with the Harvard-Smithsonian's Center for Astrophysics and the editor-in-chief of the Journal of Cosmology.

"Given the controversial nature of his discovery, we have invited 100 experts and have issued a general invitation to over 5,000 scientists from the scientific community to review the paper and to offer their critical analysis," Schild wrote in an editor's note along with the article. "No other paper in the history of science has undergone such a thorough vetting, and never before in the history of science has the scientific community been given the opportunity to critically analyze an important research paper before it is published, he wrote."

Dr. Seth Shostak, senior astronomer at the SETI Institute, said there is a lot of hesitancy to believe such proclamations.

When I Heard the Learned Astronomer

WHEN I HEARD THE LEARNED ASTRONOMER

When I heard the learn'd astronomer,
When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me,
When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide,
and measure them,
When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with
much applause in the lecture-room,
How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick,
Till rising and gliding out I wander'd off by myself,
In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,
Look'd up in perfect silence at the stars.

Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass, 1892

The Habiru

"I [Idrimi] took with me my horse, my chariot, and my groom, went away and crossed over the desert country and even entered into the region of the Sutian [Sutu in Syria] warriors. I stayed with them overnight in my covered chariot, but the next day I moved on and went to the land of Canaan [Lebanon]. Ammia [hills of Byblos] is situated in the land of Canaan; in Ammia there lived natives of Aleppo, of the country of Mugisse, of the country of Niyi, and also warriors of the country of Amae. When they discovered that I was the son of their overlord, then they gathered around me. Thus I said, 'I have become chief!' I stayed for a long time; for seven years I lived among the hapiru." -- Idrimi, hapiru warrior, The Autobiography of Idrimi, 15th century B.C. (quoted in Pomegranites and Golden Bells)

"All of my towns that are in the hills and on the sea coast have gone over to the hapiru. Byblos with two other towns remain under my control." -- Rib-Haddi to Pharaoh Amenhotep III, The Amarna Letters, 14th century B.C. (quoted in Pomegranites and Golden Bells)

"Should we do like Labayu when he gave the land of Shechem [Nablus] to the hapiru?" -- Abdi-Kheba of Jerusalem to Pharaoh Amenhotep IV, The Amarna Letters, 14th century B.C. (quoted in Pomegranites and Golden Bells)

"Some Egyptian monuments mention an enigmatic people: the 'Apiru'. In one of these was carved on the stone walls a scene depicting men working at a wine press. Beneath the picture was a title which ran: 'Straining out wine by the Apiru'. The date of the monument is believed to be during the reign of queen Hatshepshut and Tutmose III, about the year 2290 (1470 b.c.e.). Scholars immediately recognized the similarity of the word 'Apiru' to 'Hebrew', with a scene depicting manual labour, as described in Exodus for Hebrew people under bondage in Egypt. From the Papyrus Leiden, dated to the reign of Ramose II, about the year 2510 (1250 b.c.e.), the following statement is made in a letter: 'Issue grain to the men of the army and to the Apiru who draw stone for the great pylon of Ramses II'. Again we see Apiru in bondage in Egypt down to the time of Ramose II. They were being used as quarrymen and manual labourers. These references to the Apiru in Egyptian documents and on monuments show their presence in Egypt, and their social importance, for more than three centuries. The same people are called elsewhere 'Habiru' or 'Habiri'." -- The Mysterious 'Habiru' and the Hebrews

"By 2000 B.C.E., if not considerably before, these people were widespread, and already an established part of different societies and different kingdoms." -- Israel A History, The Akkadians and the Habiru

Are the Habiru the Hebrews?

Many say No

"The king of Jerusalem pointed to the roving tribes penetrating from the wastes of Trans-Jordan, and called them 'Habiru'. 'Habiru' is derived from the Hebrew root 'haber', 'a member of a band', and 'habiru' means 'bandits,' and is used for 'companions of thieves' in Isaiah 1:23, 'troops of robbers' in Hosea 6:9, and 'companion of a destroyer' in Proverbs 28:24. This meaning of the word 'Habiru' should have been suggested by the fact that 'sa-gaz', which is translated as 'bandits,' 'cutthroats,' is interchanged with the term 'Habiru.' The various theories about Habiru ('Khabiru') of the el-Amarna letters -- that it signifies 'Ivri' ('Hebrew'), or 'apiru' (miners), or 'Afiru' (from the Babylonian region of Afiru) -- are thus found to be without foundation." -- Immanuel Velikovsky, polymath, Ages in Chaos, Volume I, 1952

"It is time to clarify for BAR readers the widely discussed relationship between the habiru, who are well documented in Egyptian and Near Eastern inscriptions, and the Hebrews of the Bible. There is absolutely no relationship!" -- Anson F. Rainey, professor, Shasu or Habiru: Who Were the Early Israelites?, Biblical Archaeology Review, Volume 34, Number 6, Nov/Dec 2008

I say Yes

"The Tell-el-Amarna letters carry on the general picture of Palestinian and Syrian life almost to the entrance of the Jews into the valley of the Nile. It is probable, though not certain, that the 'Habiru' spoken of in this correspondence were the Hebrews." -- Will Durant, historian, The Story of Civilization, Volume I, Our Oriental Heritage, 1935

"The equation Habiru-Hebrews is still accepted by a large number of scholars...." -- Immanuel Velikovsky, polymath, Ages in Chaos, Volume I, 1952

"Julius Lewy, in an article entitled 'Origin and signification of the biblical term Hebrew', demonstrated most convincingly that the term 'ibrim is to be taken as signifying the Habiru." -- J. Weingreen, Saul and the Habiru, Volume 4, Number 1, Pages 63-66, 1967

"To the amazement and delight of scholars, the so-called Amarna Letters included correspondence from the warlords and chieftains of the land of Canaan that, intriguingly, contained intelligence reports about the threat of a newly arrived band of marauders called the Habiru (or Apiru, as the term is sometimes rendered in English) who were waging a war of conquest throughout Canaan. 'The Apiru plunder all the lands of the king,' complained a Canaanite chieftain named Abdu-Heba, who ruled the city-state of Jerusalem as a vassal of Pharaoh and who begged the Egyptian king to send an expeditionary force to protect him from the plunderers. 'If there are archers here in this year, the lands of the king, my lord, will remain intact; but if there are no archers here, the lands of the king my lord will be lost.' Suddenly and dramatically, the archaeological record seemed to corroborate some of the crucial events described in the Bible. The existence of the Habiru in Egypt had already been reported in a few non-provocative pieces of evidence -- two papyri from the reign of Ramses II, for example, depict a work-gang of Habiru 'dragging up stone for temples built by [the pharaoh]' -- and now the Amarna Letters placed the Habiru in Canaan at a date that was consistent with the chronology of the Exodus as reported in the biblical text. Some scholars began to argue that the Habiru of the Amarna Letters and the Hebrews of the Bible were one and the same. When the Canaanite ruler of Jerusalem complained to Pharaoh about the threat of Habiru invaders, as T. Eric Peet wrote in 1922 in Egypt and the Old Testament, 'we are to see the Hebrews under Joshua entering Palestine.'" -- Jonathan Kirsch, historian, Moses: A Life, 1999

Also see Eric Levy's Habiru Links.

And Idrimi: The Movie.

Canaanites = Phoenicians

"In the same day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates: The Kenites, and the Kenizzites, and the Kadmonites, And the Hittites, and the Perizzites, and the Rephaims, And the Amorites [in Alalakh], and the Canaanites [Phoenicians], and the Girgashites, and the Jebusites [Hurrians/Mitanni in Jebus/Jerusalem]." -- Genesis 15:18-21

"And I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land unto a good land and a large, unto a land flowing with milk and honey; unto the place of the Canaanite [Phoenicians], and the Hittite, and the Amorite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite." -- Exodus 3:8

"The people shall hear, and be afraid: sorrow shall take hold on the inhabitants of Palestina. Then the dukes of Edom shall be amazed; the mighty men of Moab, trembling shall take hold upon them; all the inhabitants of Canaan [Phoenicia] shall melt away." -- Exodus 15:41-15

"And I will send hornets before thee, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite [Phoenicians], and the Hittite, from before thee. I will not drive them out from before thee in one year; lest the land become desolate, and the beast of the field multiply against thee. By little and little I will drive them out from before thee, until thou be increased, and inherit the land. And I will set thy bounds from the Red sea even unto the sea of the Philistines, and from the desert unto the river: for I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand; and thou shalt drive them out before thee." -- Exodus 23:28-31

"According to the Persians best informed in history, the Phoenicians began to quarrel. This people, who had formerly dwelt on the shores of the Erythraean Sea, having migrated to the Mediterranean and settled in the parts which they now inhabit, began at once, they say, to adventure on long voyages, freighting their vessels with the wares of Egypt and Assyria. They landed at many places on the coast, and among the rest at Argos, which was then preeminent above all the states included now under the common name of Hellas. Here they exposed their merchandise, and traded with the natives...." -- Herodotus, historian, The History, Book I, 440 B.C.

"Interrogati rustici nostri quid sint, Punice respondent, Chanani." -- Augustine, bishop, Opera 3,932, 4th century

"All these stories Thabion, who was the very first hierophant of all the Phoenicians from the beginning, allegorized and mixed up with the physical and cosmical phenomena, and delivered to the prophets who celebrated the orgies and inaugurated the mysteries: and they, purposing to increase their vain pretensions from every source, handed them on to their successors and to their foreign visitors: one of these was Eisirius the inventor of the three letters, brother of Chna the first who had his name changed to Phoenix." -- Philo of Byblos, philosopher, 1st century, quoted in Eusebius of Caesaria, bishop, Preparation For the Gospel, Book I, 4th century

"The Phoenicians appear to have known their country by no other name than that of Canaan. According to Hecataeus and Stephanus Byzantinus, Chna, an evident contraction of the oriental form, was the previous name of Phoenicia; and Sanchoniatho says that the name of Chna was changed to Phoenix. The Septuagint frequently renders Canaan and Canaanite in the Hebrew by Phoenicia and Phoenician, and even the Carthaginians in their African settlements called themselves Canaanites." -- John Kenrick, historian, Phoenicia, 1855

"Historically and biblically, Phoenicia and Canaan are identical. The first Phoenician cities arose before 3000 BC ...." -- Life Magazine, The Phoenicians: Rovers of the Sea, Mar 1957

"The Phoenicians actually called themselves Canaanites and their land Canaan, at least until the 1st century AD as documented in the New Testament where it is written that Jesus reached the borders of Tyre and Sidon and cured there a Canaanite woman." -- Asher Kaufman, historian, Reviving Phoenicia, 2004