The Lost Continent of Kumari Kandam

Adam's bridge has nothing to do with any of this as it is a development of the last two thousand years. It really is at present day sea levels and is unrelated to the general rise that took place from 13000 BP through 3000 BP.



Yet the land bridge itself is real enough and provides a natural Ice age route between Southern India and Southern Africa. thus even before we began to consider subsidence at all our core problem is solved.


Once past the sea ridges, though we have pure sea bottom that was never above water. However we do have another issue and that is the Pleistocene nonconformity. This operated along the longitude running north south through India and induced curvature compression resulting in the extra lift of the Himalayas and curvature stretching which likely sank these ridges as well. So there is some credence to the idea, but not to continental scaling.

 

 

The Lost Continent of Kumari Kandam


By Dhwty, Ancient-Origins.net | December 13, 2014

Last Updated: December 13, 2014 11:48 am



The proposed location of the legendary sunken continent of Kumari Kandam in the Indian Ocean. (Wikimedia Commons; edited by Epoch Times)



The universe is full of mysteries that challenge our current knowledge. In "Beyond Science" Epoch Times collects stories about these strange phenomena to stimulate the imagination and open up previously undreamed of possibilities. Are they true? You decide.




Most people are familiar with the story of Atlantis, the legendary sunken city as described by the ancient Greek philosopher Plato. To this day, opinion is still divided as to whether this story should be understood literally or taken merely as a morality tale. Further east in the subcontinent of India is a similar tale. This is the tale of the “lost continent” of Lemuria, frequently connected to the legend of Kumari Kandam by speakers of the Tamil language.




The term Lemuria has its origins in the latter part of the 19th century. The English geologist Philip Sclater was puzzled by the presence of lemur fossils in Madagascar and India but not in mainland Africa and the Middle East. Thus, in his 1864 article titled “The Mammals of Madagascar,” Sclater proposed that Madagascar and India were once part of a larger continent, and named this missing landmass “Lemuria.” Sclater’s theory was accepted by the scientific community of that period as the explanation of the way lemurs could have migrated from Madagascar to India or vice versa in ancient times. With the emergence of the modern concepts of continental drift and plate tectonics, however, Sclater’s proposition of a submerged continent was no longer tenable. Yet, the idea of a lost continent refused to die, and some still believe that Lemuria was an actual continent that existed in the past.




One such group is the Tamil nationalists. The term Kumari Kandam first appeared in the 15th century Kanda Puranam, the Tamil version of the Skanda Puranam (Hindu religious texts. Yet, stories about an ancient land submerged by the Indian Ocean have been recorded in many earlier Tamil literary works. According to the stories, there was a portion of land that was once ruled by the Pandiyan kings and was swallowed by the sea. When narratives about Lemuria arrived in colonial India, the country was going through a period when folklore was beginning to permeate historic knowledge as facts. As a result, Lemuria was quickly equated with Kumari Kandam.





The story of Kumari Kandam is not regarded as just a story, but seems to be laden with nationalistic sentiments. It has been claimed that the Pandiyan kings of Kumari Kandam were the rulers of the whole Indian continent, and that Tamil civilization is the oldest civilization in the world. When Kumari Kandam was submerged, its people spread across the world and founded various civilizations, hence the claim that the lost continent was also the cradle of human civilization.




So, how much truth is there in the story of Kumari Kandam? According to researchers at India’s National Institute of Oceanography, the sea level was lower by 100 meters (330 feet) about 14,500 years ago and by 60 meters (200 feet) about 10,000 years ago. Hence, it is entirely possible that there was once a land bridge connecting the island of Sri Lanka to mainland India. As the rate of global warming increased between 12,000 and 10,000 years ago, the rising sea levels resulted in periodic flooding. This would have submerged prehistoric settlements that were located around the low-lying coastal areas of India and Sri Lanka. Stories of these catastrophic events may have been transmitted orally from one generation to another and finally written down as the story of Kumari Kandam.




One piece of evidence used to support the existence of Kumari Kandam is Adam’s Bridge (also called Rama’s Bridge), a chain of limestone shoals made up of sand, silt, and small pebbles located in the Palk Strait extending 18 miles from mainland India to Sri Lanka. This strip of land was once believed to be a natural formation, however, others argue that images taken by a NASA satellite depict this land formation to be a long broken bridge under the ocean’s surface.












A map showing Adam’s Bridge between India and Sri Lanka. (Wikimedia Commons)









Adam’s Bridge (NASA)



The existence of a bridge in this location is also supported by another ancient legend. The Ramayana tells the tale of Sita, Rama’s wife, being held captive on the island of Lanka. Rama commissions a massive building project to construct a bridge to transport his army of Vanara (ape men) across the ocean to Lanka.


As with most so-called myths, it seems likely that there is at least some truth to the ancient Tamil legends of Kumari Kandam, but just how much, is yet to be determined.

Are You Sensitive to Gluten, or Just Roundup?

We really need to ask that question.  Too much gluten is not a good plan but that should ony cause the intestinal flora to work much harder.  The so called allergy could well be something else altogether.

We certainly have an excellent case for round up interfering in the gut.

This will take careful research to properly resolve.  It really would not be a great idea to toss out wheat without knowing.

 

Are You Sensitive to Gluten, or Just Roundup? American Wheat Often Doused With Toxic Herbicide Before Harvest

By Ethan A. Huff, Natural News | December 12, 2014

The mystery behind skyrocketing rates of Celiac disease, gluten intolerance, and other wheat-related illnesses may not have anything to do with wheat or even gluten, but rather the process by which conventional American wheat is grown and harvested.

Unbeknownst to most consumers is the fact that just before harvest, a vast majority of conventional wheat grown in the U.S. is doused inRoundup herbicide, which ends up poisoning your favorite breads, cereals, cakes, and pastries.

Many conventional wheat farmers in America, driven by greed and carelessness, flood their wheat crops with Roundup just before harvest in order to slightly boost yields and reduce harvest time. But the end result is Roundup being absorbed directly into the wheat kernels that end up processed on your dinner plate.

The Healthy Home Economist‘s Sarah Pope explains in a recent article how the pre-harvest application of Roundup is used to dry conventional wheat and make it easier to harvest. This process helps wheat crops release their seeds more quickly, resulting in moderately higher yields.

But according to wheat farmer Keith Lewis, this practice isn’t licensed, though it is quite common in the U.S. When Roundup-sprayed wheat is eventually processed for human consumption, unknown levels of it end up in the final product.

“A wheat field often ripens unevenly, thus applying Roundup pre-harvest evens up the greener parts of the field with the more mature,” he explained during a 2012 interview with Dr. William Davis, author of the bestselling book Wheat Belly.

“The result is on the less mature areas, Roundup is translocated into the kernels and eventually harvested as such.”

Stop Buying Corporate American Wheat Products

In her report, Pope highlights a graph that was included in a 2013 study published in the journal Interdisciplinary Toxicology, which clearly illustrates a corresponding increase in both Celiac disease incidence and glyphosate use on wheat crops.

Since it first became an option for American wheat farmers in the early 1990s, spraying conventional wheat crops with Roundup just prior to harvest has basically become the norm. The latest U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) figures show that, as of 2012, 99 percent of durum wheat, 97 percent of spring wheat, and 61 percent of winter wheat is doused in herbicides prior to harvest.

“Using Roundup on wheat crops throughout the entire growing season and even as a desiccant just prior to harvest may save the farmer money and increase profits, but it is devastating to the health of the consumer who ultimately consumes the glyphosate residue laden wheat kernels,” writes Pope.

The reason this is problematic is that Roundup damages several key pathways by which the human body processes and absorbs nutrients. Besides inhibiting cytochrome P450 (CYP) enzymes, which detoxifies the body of foreign chemical compounds, glyphosate damages the gut microbiome, which is responsible for absorbing nutrients.

“… just because Roundup doesn’t kill you immediately doesn’t make it nontoxic,” writes Pope. “In fact, the active ingredient in Roundup lethally disrupts the all important shikimate pathway found in beneficial gut microbes which is responsible for synthesis of critical amino acids.”

“In synergy with disruption of the biosynthesis of important amino acids via the shikimate pathway, glyphosate inhibits the cytochrome P450 (CYP) enzymes produced by the gut microbiome. CYP enzymes are critical to human biology because they detoxify the multitude of foreign chemical compounds, xenobiotics, that we are exposed to in our modern environment today.”

The only way to avoid this is to avoid all conventional wheat grown in the U.S., as well as all products made from it. Pope recommends sticking with low gluten, unhybridized Einkorn wheat, or wheat grown in other countries.

2015 A Pivot Year.

 

Another year is upon us and in the midst of all the turmoil out there, i think it is appropriate to make a few important predictions.  Quite honestly the pivot has already occured with the abrupt decline in the price of oil from $95 to $50.  Most expect a recovery.  Do not count on it.  Better yet, organize your life to accommodate the removal of oil from all our lives.  Simple mass manufacturing can displace every oil based engine inside of five years.

There is nothing we do on Earth that is more capable of changing how we all live than the removal of the oil industry that presently generates between ten to twenty percent of the global economy.  This may seem harmful and it certainly is to a serious number of folks who must change their lifestyles radically. Yet every person who owns a car is going to get a serious cash raise as well.  That means no fuel bill at all and sooner or later, a much cheaper car to drive.

We have already demonstrated the hardware that effectively pumps electrostatic energy out of the ambient dark matter that this whole galaxy swims within.  Piecing together an actual motor and a home power plant is readily done by anyone with basic training and a slight understanding.  Recall Tesla promised free energy.  He was not kidding at all. 

Even without that trick, both off the shelf battery technology with Tesla motors and EEStor Capacitors can  already rid the world of oil.  It does not even need our motors and power plants although we will easily do it all incredibly fast.  Thus this prediction it completely real even if i decide to hunt dinosaurs in Northern Australia.  Also remember that the Rockefeller foundation disposed of their ownership in Standard Oil recently.  Someone there understands that it is over also.

Revolution.   Every oil state will lose its external cash flow and that means that all those who failed to reinvest heavily into their people will be running for their lives and leaving others to pick up the pieces.  Even for those who were wise, it will be a massive adjustment and a significant change in direction.  My own recommendation is to use this change over to completely restructure society to eliminate all poverty.  This is possible but likely avoided by most.

Islam will suffer a huge set back in particular and it can be taken advantage of in terms of the elimination of poverty.

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Did Ancient Egyptians Have Airplanes?

It is completely plausible that an individual inventor tackled the problem of flight using mechanical contraptions. After all, we did when our Iron Age was still pretty crude. Such an inventor would and could make simple hand models as gifts and teaching tools. We can also be sure that some form of kite making also existed in Egypt. After all they did have papyrus. Even the paper airplane worked with that.

What was lacking of course was a light weight power plant. All experiments were thus tentative and suggestive only. Yet ample enough to generate the clear evidence we see.


Thus it is not hard to accept the evidence as it stands, but it is not evidence of powered flight.
.
Did Ancient Egyptians Have Airplanes? Mechanical Engineer Thinks So

By Tara MacIsaac, Epoch Times | December 16, 2014

http://www.theepochtimes.com/n3/1146052-did-ancient-egyptians-have-airplanes-mechanical-engineer-thinks-so/

The universe is full of mysteries that challenge our current knowledge. In "Beyond Science" Epoch Times collects stories about these strange phenomena to stimulate the imagination and open up previously undreamed of possibilities. Are they true? You decide.

Oopart (out of place artifact) is a term applied to dozens of prehistoric objects found in various places around the world that seem to show a level of technological advancement incongruous with the times in which they were made. Ooparts often frustrate conventional scientists, delight adventurous investigators open to alternative theories, and spark debate.

The pyramids and other advanced artifacts from ancient Egypt continue to awe archaeologists and archaeology enthusiasts, but is it possible the ancient Egyptians had aviation?

A wooden carving dating from the 3rd century B.C. was found in a tomb in Sakkara (also spelled Saqqara), Egypt, in 1898. It was classified as a bird figure and placed with other bird carvings at the Cairo Museum, until Dr. Khalil Messiha, a medical doctor and Egyptologist, saw it in 1969 and realized it looked like the model airplanes he made as a child.

Professor Emeritus of mechanical engineering at the University of Houston John H. Lienhard explained in an “Engines of Our Ingenuity” episode: “The other birds had legs. This had none. The other birds had painted feathers. This had none. The other birds had horizontal tail feathers like a real bird. … This strange wooden model tapered into a vertical rudder. One can also see that the wing has an airfoil cross-section. It was all aerodynamically correct. Too much about the model was beyond coincidence.”

Some have said that what appears to be the vertical rudder of an airplane instead depicts twisted tail feathers, as shown, for example, on bird figures adorning boat mastheads in the Khonsu Temple relief below:



Messiha’s brother, a flight engineer, made a large reproduction from the model, and it successfully flew, said Lienhard.

Lienhard noted that the 3rd century was a time of great ingenuity. He wrote: “No one could have come this close to the real shape of flight without working on a larger scale. This little wooden model could hardly exist unless someone had worked with large, light models, or even with man-carrying versions.”

MORE: Ancient Egypt Illuminated by Electricity?

Award-winning glider builder Martin Gregorie, tried to replicate the results of Messiha’s brother’s experiment, however, but failed. He said that without a tailplane, which in his opinion the artifact doesn’t seem to ever have had, the Sakkara bird was completely unstable. With a tailplane, “the glide performance was disappointing.” He said he doesn’t think the model was a test piece for a cargo-carrying plane. He suggested it might be a weather vane or a child’s toy.

Whether the Sakkara bird represents a real attempt, or even a successful attempt, at building an aircraft, remains uncertain.





A wooden figure thought by some to be a bird, by some to be a plane, dating from the 3rd century B.C., found in Sakkara (or Saqqara), Egypt. (Dawoud Khalil Messiha/Wikimedia Commons)

Even in Colour, Comet 67P is Grey

So far, so good. As i have posted long before, I expect to have a great deal of elemental carbon which does not lend itself to easy analysis. All evidence conforms to comets been formed from what we class as volatiles which also includes water obviously. Yet water does not have to be nor is likely to be the dominant component at all. That is much more likely to be methane.



Thus when such a body passes close to the sun, the surface temperature sky rockets and the methane and every other organic breaks down driving of the hydrogen while leaving elemental carbon. The elemental carbon will also be likely charged as well.




What then happens is that the water vapor and the hydrogen is preferentially lost to the comets gravity well and the sun's radiation pressure. This allows a surface concentration of grey carbon dust which is what it appears we are observing here.



The comet still likely contains mostly frozen volatiles simply because it displays obvious structural integrity. What we are seeing is the surface dust cloud.



Even in colour, Comet 67P is grey

By Jonathan WebbScience reporter, BBC News12 December 2014 Last updated at 13:50 ET


Scientists superimposed images taken with three different filters

The first colour image from the Rosetta spacecraft shows that Comet 67P is even more dark and monochrome than expected.


Despite being carefully assembled from three images taken with red, green and blue filters, the shot still looks effectively black-and-white.


It comes from the Osiris camera, which is on board the orbiting craft that last month made history by dropping a lander onto the comet's surface.


The Osiris team says 67P is "as black as coal" and surprisingly uniform.


The image was released by the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, which leads the consortium behind the camera.


"We like to refer to Osiris as the eyes of Rosetta," said the instrument's principal investigator Dr Holger Sierks.


But the camera is unlike human eyes, and so the colour image had to be produced by combining three separate shots.


This was no easy task. Rosetta is constantly moving and the comet beneath is spinning, so various changes in angle had to be accounted for.


The result is an image that looks remarkably similar to previous, greyscale views of 67P.


"As it turns out, 67P looks dark grey, in reality almost as black as coal," Dr Sierks said.


By the time the image is brightened enough for us to see the comet's features, it looks much lighter grey - but not what anyone would call colourful.


Using observations from the ground, scientists had already observed that Comet 67P, like many other small bodies in our Solar System, appeared to be grey "on average".


But the new results reveal that it seems to be this dark, coal colour all over - with little variation.


That suggests that its surface composition is fairly uniform and shows no sign of ice patches, which would appear bluish.


The comet's ice is presumably hidden below its dusty, boulder-strewn surface.

Harvard Study: This is What Meditation Literally Does to the Brain

 

Good advice here also.  It is really easier than most make it into.  we need to step back and not stress the mind.  That is how it really works best. 

What we continue to show is that the process of relaxation and intention guides the brain to enhance itself beneficially.  I see no reason to describe this process any other way.  Intent is the one factor that everyone has left out yet is is obvious.

Intend to become smart and voila, it occurs.

A physical assist is also available by hanging a northward pointing magnet around your throat to stimulate the pineal gland.

Harvard Study: This is What Meditation Literally Does to the Brain 

- See more at: http://humansarefree.com/2014/12/harvard-study-this-is-what-meditation.html#more

Numerous studies have indicated the many physiological benefits of meditation, and the latest one comes from Harvard University.

An eight week study conducted by Harvard researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) determined that meditation literally rebuilds the brains grey matter in just eight weeks. It’s the very first study to document that meditation produces changes over time in the brain’s grey matter. (1)

“Although the practice of meditation is associated with a sense of peacefulness and physical relaxation, practitioners have long claimed that meditation also provides cognitive and psychological benefits that persist throughout the day. 

“This study demonstrates that changes in brain structure may underlie some of these reported improvements and that people are not just feeling better because they are spending time relaxing.” – (1) Sara Lazar of the MGH Psychiatric Neuroimaging Research Program and a Harvard Medical School Instructor in Psychology

The study involved taking magnetic resonance images (MRI) of the brain’s of 16 study participants two weeks prior to participating in the study. MRI images of the participants were also taken after the study was completed.

“The analysis of MR images, which focused on areas where meditation-associated differences were seen in earlier studies, found increased grey-matter density in the hippocampus, known to be important for learning and memory, and in structures associated with self-awareness, compassion and introspection.” (1)

For the study, participants engaged in meditation practices every day for approximately 30 minutes. These practices included focusing on audio recordings for guided meditation, non-judgmental awareness of sensations, feelings and state of mind.

“It is fascinating to see the brain’s plasticity and that, by practicing meditation, we can play an active role in changing the brain and can increase our well-being and quality of life.

“Other studies in different patient populations have shown that meditation can make significant improvements in a variety of symptoms, and we are now investigating the underlying mechanisms in the brain that facilitate this change.” – (1) Britta Holzel, first author of the paper and a research fellow at MGH and Giessen University in Germany

How to Meditate

A common misconception about meditation is that you have to sit a certain way or do something in particular to achieve the various benefits that it can provide. All you have to do is place yourself in a position that is most comfortable to you. It could be sitting cross legged, lying down in a bed, sitting on a couch etc, it’s your choice.

Another common misconception about meditation is that you have to “try” to empty your mind. One important factor I enjoyed reading from the study mentioned above is that participants were engaged in “non-judgmental awareness of sensations, feelings and state of mind.”  

When meditating, you shouldn’t try to “empty” your mind. Instead, try to let your thoughts, feelings and whatever emotions you are feeling at the time flow. Don’t judge them, just let them come and go and be at peace with it.

I also believe that meditation is a state of being/mind more than anything else. I feel that one does not have to sit down for half an hour and “meditate” so to speak in order to reap the benefits of it, or to be engaged in the practice itself.  

One can be engaged in meditation while they are on a walk, for example, or the time they have right before they sleep. Throughout the day, one can resist judging their thoughts, letting them flow until they are no more, or just be in a constant state of peace and self awareness. Contrary to popular belief, there is more than one way to meditate.

“You will have to understand one of the most fundamental things about meditation: that no technique leads to meditation. The old so-called techniques and the new scientific biofeedback techniques are the same as far as meditation is concerned. Meditation is not a byproduct of any technique. Meditation happens beyond mind. No technique can go beyond mind.” – Osho

By Arjun Walia, Collective Evolution; | References: Harvard; Princeton; - See more at: http://humansarefree.com/2014/12/harvard-study-this-is-what-meditation.html#more

Global Maps from Orbiting Carbon Observatory

 

 

 

 

  This is very important because it clearly uncouples fossil fuel co2 from the burning of savanna in the southern hemisphere and makes our whole global CO2 story dicey.    Remember we use only Hawaii and now it is clearly driven by rising southern hemisphere CO2.  Worse we can no longer apply that number to the Norther Hemisphere at all.

It could well be that we have been wrong all the way along.  Our proxy may only be measuring the trend in agricultural waste burning in the tropics.  Better yet the only CO2 hot spot is China as fully expected in the northern hemisphere.  What appears worse is that northern CO2 is visually at least an order of magnitude less intensified

There are also anomalies.   Just why India is not providing a signal needs to be understood.  This is all good.

First Global Maps from Orbiting Carbon Observatory

 http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2014/19dec_oco/

Dec. 19, 2014: The first global maps of atmospheric carbon dioxide from NASA's new Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 mission show elevated carbon dioxide concentrations across the Southern Hemisphere from springtime biomass burning and hint at potential surprises to come. 

At a media briefing  at the American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco, scientists from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California; Colorado State University (CSU), Fort Collins; and the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, presented the maps of carbon dioxide and a related phenomenon known as solar-induced chlorophyll fluorescence and discussed their potential implications. 

Global atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations from Oct. 1 through Nov. 11, as recorded by NASA's Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2. Carbon dioxide concentrations are highest above northern Australia, southern Africa and eastern Brazil. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech 

A global map covering Oct. 1 through Nov. 17 shows elevated carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere above northern Australia, southern Africa and eastern Brazil. 

"Preliminary analysis shows these signals are largely driven by the seasonal burning of savannas and forests," said OCO-2 Deputy Project Scientist Annmarie Eldering, of JPL. The team is comparing these measurements with data from other satellites to clarify how much of the observed concentration is likely due to biomass burning. 

The time period covered by the new maps is spring in the Southern Hemisphere, when agricultural fires and land clearing are widespread. The impact of these activities on global carbon dioxide has not been well quantified. As OCO-2 acquires more data, Eldering said, its Southern Hemisphere measurements could lead to an improved understanding of the relative importance in these regions of photosynthesis in tropical plants, which removes carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, and biomass burning, which releases carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. 

The early OCO-2 data hint at some potential surprises to come. "The agreement between OCO-2 and models based on existing carbon dioxide data is remarkably good, but there are some interesting differences," said Christopher O'Dell, an assistant professor at CSU and member of OCO-2's science team. "Some of the differences may be due to systematic errors in our measurements, and we are currently in the process of nailing these down. But some of the differences are likely due to gaps in our current knowledge of carbon sources in certain regions -- gaps that OCO-2 will help fill in."

This map shows solar-induced fluorescence, a plant process that occurs during photosynthesis, from Aug. through Oct. 2014 as measured by NASA's Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2. This period is springtime in the Southern Hemisphere and fall in the Northern Hemisphere. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech 

Carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has no distinguishing features to show what its source was. Elevated carbon dioxide over a region could have a natural cause -- for example, a drought that reduces plant growth -- or a human cause. At today's briefing, JPL scientist Christian Frankenberg introduced a map using a new type of data analysis from OCO-2 that can help scientists distinguish the gas's natural sources. 

Through photosynthesis, plants remove carbon dioxide from the air and use sunlight to synthesize the carbon into food. Plants end up re-emitting about one percent of the sunlight at longer wavelengths. Using one of OCO-2's three spectrometer instruments, scientists can measure the re-emitted light, known as solar-induced chlorophyll fluorescence (SIF). This measurement complements OCO-2's carbon dioxide data with information on when and where plants are drawing carbon from the atmosphere. 

"Where OCO-2 really excels is the sheer amount of data being collected within a day, about one million measurements across a narrow swath," Frankenberg said. "For fluorescence, this enables us, for the first time, to look at features on the five- to 10-kilometer scale on a daily basis." SIF can be measured even through moderately thick clouds, so it will be especially useful in understanding regions like the Amazon where cloud cover thwarts most spaceborne observations. 

The changes in atmospheric carbon dioxide that OCO-2 seeks to measure are so small that the mission must take unusual precautions to ensure the instrument is free of errors. For that reason, the spacecraft was designed so that it can make an extra maneuver. In addition to gathering a straight line of data like a lawnmower swath, the instrument can point at a single target on the ground for a total of seven minutes as it passes overhead. That requires the spacecraft to turn sideways and make a half cartwheel to keep the target in its sights. 

The targets OCO-2 uses are stations in the Total Carbon Column Observing Network (TCCON), a collaborative effort of multiple international institutions. TCCON has been collecting carbon dioxide data for about five years, and its measurements are fully calibrated and extremely accurate. At the same time that OCO-2 targets a TCCON site, a ground-based instrument at the site makes the same measurement. The extent to which the two measurements agree indicates how well calibrated the OCO-2 sensors are. 

Additional maps released today showed the results of these targeting maneuvers over two TCCON sites in California and one in Australia. "Early results are very promising," said Paul Wennberg, a professor at Caltech and head of the TCCON network. "Over the next few months, the team will refine the OCO-2 data, and we anticipate that these comparisons will continue to improve."

NASA monitors Earth's vital signs from land, air and space with a fleet of satellites and ambitious airborne and ground-based observation campaigns. NASA develops new ways to observe and study Earth's interconnected natural systems with long-term data records and computer analysis tools to better see how our planet is changing. The agency shares this unique knowledge with the global community and works with institutions in the United States and around the world that contribute to understanding and protecting our home planet. 

For more information about NASA's Earth science activities this year, see: http://www.nasa.gov

Pope Francis is the Man who Would Not be King

The church was never meant to anoint a king. Now we have a pope who clearly understands that. In fact applying his influence correctly, the church could usher in the true kingdom of heaven as an imitation of Jesus and his brilliant demonstration of the Rule of Twelve.


We are due also. The current econimic model is literally about to dissolve, just as fast as we can produce automobile motors. That ends the fuel tax on all incomes globally and hte surplus of cash washing around the economy will underwrite a total rebuilding of our economy.


As one can expect change is coming so persuasive that no one is even able to imagine it except to be fearful of their own small piece of it. The surprising thing is that the Church itself could be the best agency to manage this huge revolution.



As an aside, it has always bemused me that Popes so easily accepted the accoutrements of high office. It was rightly thought of as a form of hypocrisy that was unbecoming. That the church at times became a true petty crown in the medieval sense did not help matters much although it must be said that such bred reaction that physically cleansed the church and has led to far more universally devout organization we see today.


In what other way could such true moral leaders have ever arisen?



Pope Francis is the Man who would not be King


WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 26, 2014

BY GORDON MACRAE


http://www.speroforum.com/a/ZXBHBDAQLZ44/75362-Pope-Francis-is-the-Man-who-would-not-be-King#.VIvngivF-no


Media reports about the Vatican Synod on the Family inflamed divisions in the Church. Pope Francis drew fire for accommodations to the left and capitulations to the right.


Martin Barillas, the devoutly Catholic editor of Spero News for which I am an occasional columnist, recently gifted me with a set of leather-bound Latin breviaries published in 1927, and are in superb condition. I am struck by how foreign it feels to pray the Divine Office in Latin, and yet how strangely familiar and wonderful. In prison, I had forgotten how beautiful and majestic prayer in Latin can be. Martin has given me a wonderful reminder that the treasures of Catholic Tradition must be preserved and guarded.


I am also most grateful to Carlos Caso-Rosendi for his guest post “Love Through the Tempest” while I have been stranded with limited means to write. The comments on that post were excellent, and helped put to rest the unease of many readers struggling to understand Pope Francis and his agenda for the Church. The ongoing tensions between traditionalist and progressive Catholics arose anew as the media filtered Pope Francis during and after the recent Synod on the Family.


While Carlos penned his post from his home in Buenos Aires, Argentina, I was busy writing “Pope Francis and the Scandal of Listening“as a follow-up to it forTheseStoneWalls. Neither Carlos nor I knew in advance what each other would be writing, but it came as no surprise to me that we both focused on the tempest surrounding Pope Francis.


So what is this pope really up to, and why? From the first days of his papacy, the first non-European to sit in the Chair of Peter in over 1,200 years drew the cheers of progressives and the unease of traditionalists. He declines to wear those papal red shoes. He insists on living in a Vatican guest house instead of the Apostolic Palace. He seems, for lack of any better description, the pope who would not be king.


ON THE COVER INSTEAD OF DUCKING FOR COVER


Meanwhile, some very worldly accolades have been thrust upon Pope Francis. Forbes just listed him as one of the four most powerful men on Earth. He was on the cover of Time magazine as “Man of the Year” for 2013. When Fortune magazine announced its 2014 list of the world’s fifty most effective leaders, Pope Francis topped the list at number one.



It is most suspect that much of the Western World’s left-leaning news media finds this pope to be fascinating. The news media seems to have forgotten, as have our uneasy Catholic traditionalists, that just two years ago, news about the pope took the form of things like SNAP’S attempt to indict him at the International Criminal Court in The Hague for a media-hyped charge of “Crimes Against Humanity.”


It was an ignorant and bigoted attack on the papacy and the person of Pope Emeritus Benedict that I wrote of in “SNAP’s Last Gasp” Most Catholic progressives and traditionalists were silent. When Pope Benedict XVI, still beloved of most of us, went to England for the Beatification of John Henry Cardinal Newman, celebrity atheist Richard Dawkins created a media spectacle by calling for his arrest and imprisonment when he set foot on British soil. Most Catholic progressives and traditionalists were silent.


And when that hapless United Nations committee I described in “The U.N. in the Time of Cholera” aimed its sights at Pope Emeritus Benedict, despite its being the height of hypocrisy, most Catholic progressives and traditionalists were silent.


Were we better off when scorn and derision were the face of the Church and papacy? Have traditionalist Catholics become so accustomed to anti-Catholic slurs in the media that we find it suspect when the Pope and Church are honored? In just a year and a half, Pope Francis has changed the image of the papacy with approval ratings that the U.S. President must envy right about now.


I get it – and we should all get it – that the world’s “approval ratings” should not be of any concern to this Pope. There’s an argument to be made that the world’s approval comes at a price we should not pay. It may be for good reason that the accolades of the world thrust upon Pope Francis make a lot of us, the Catholics in the trenches who are living and defending our treasury of faith, most uneasy.


As I alluded at the end of “Pope Francis and the Scandal of Listening,” my Catholic traditionalism begins with the most fundamental tradition of belief about the occupant of the Chair of Peter. He is chosen by the Spirit working within the Church despite our discomforts, and despite media misrepresentations he endures.



“GOD IS NOT AFRAID OF NEW THINGS!”


Of course God is not afraid of new things! For all the rest of us, however, change can be suspect, especially when it appears to surrender ground in a long, hard-fought culture war. I know that Pope Francis raises the alarm of Catholic conservatives when he engages culture in a dialogue of inclusivity. He is listening to people and issues many of us would prefer that he not hear from so willingly.



But let’s face it, a dialogue of Catholic Exclusivity has harmed the Church far more. Yes, this Pope’s recent sound bite, “God is not afraid of new things,” has been endlessly quoted out of context by the Catholic left. But to be fair, that other now famous papal quote, “Who am I to judge?” has been a repeated and cynical taunt of the Catholic right.



It isn’t that we fear change so much as we reverence the things that this world would casually, callously dump by the wayside of history to accommodate and feed a frivolous, self-indulgent culture. The Catholic Church in America, especially, has seen that ground taken by fiat, legislated from the bench in a sort of judicial eminent domain. Like all things American, judicial fiats of commission, like Roe v. Wade, and omission, like the Supreme Court’s recent nod to same-sex marriage, spread unquestioned through the Western World.



After the recent synod, the news media would have us believe that the story of pope Francis is simple: a left-leaning Pope whose progressive social agenda has been held back by stodgy traditionalist Catholics who “won this round.” It’s the media view, but it’s by no means an accurate view. One surprising source of sanity and accuracy was a recent TIME article by Elizabeth Dias entitled, “Sorry, but Media Coverage of Pope Francis is Papal Bull,” (TIME, October 29, 2014):



“Every news outlet both major and minor has got the story wrong proving once again that the mainstream media has no understanding of the Church, and this madness shows no signs of stopping.”



It’s a madness that goes far beyond mistranslating this Pope. The news media has an agenda, and its reporting is very much in the service of that agenda. I believe that Catholic writers, including and especially Catholic bloggers, have a sacred duty to rise above partisanship to write in service of the Church and the truth, and not just in service of their particular mindset, right or left.


This recently posted statement by Cardinal Raymond Burke portrays the harm that can be done when agendas rule our allegiance:


“I did not state that Pope Francis has harmed the Church… Sadly, confusion, such as that generated by this particular interview, has been used to portray those opposed to Cardinal Kasper’s thesis as motivated by a personal animus against the Holy Father. This is just not the case, though it no doubt helps those with certain ideological axes to grind to make this appear so” (Interview with Raymond Cardinal Burke).


THE LEFT AND RIGHT IN AN UNCIVIL WAR


A week or so before the U.S. elections on November 4, I had a telephone conversation with a life long friend I grew up with in Massachusetts. She had seen my post, “Dangerous Liaisons,” in which I described efforts by Martha Coakley, a prosecutor who just ran unsuccessfully for Governor of Massachusetts, to keep wrongly convicted people in prison. TSW readers may readily see why I had such a concern.


My friend agreed with me that this was a HUGE problem, that it created a great conflict for her, but added that she had no choice but to vote for Martha Coakley. When I asked why, she said, “Because she’s the Democrat; right or wrong, she’s the Democrat.”


It was a stark reminder of something that played out in the background during our most recent Catholic tug-of-war between left and right: the midterm elections in the United States. If you had the misfortune of watching even a half-hour of American television during the last two months, then you observed first hand the negative attack ads and the obsession with winning and losing into which our politics have degraded. America is descending into an ideological civil war.


The evidence for this might have been a global scandal in a more just and even-handed world. It might have been a scandal if not for the fact that the news media is itself so ideologically driven. In this month’s midterm elections, the political left and right spent more than $4 billion attacking each other in television ads. That $4 billion for a single partisan election is without precedent in American history.


Three Senate races, in Kentucky, North Carolina, and Tennessee, each spent in excess of $100 million for TV attack ads. And for what? For the simple and simply base purpose of one party dominating over another? To no longer serve American interests, but party interests?


Like all things American, this great divide now dominates Western Culture. Just look at how quickly and seamlessly the American social change over same-sex marriage – a change imposed by judicial fiat – swept the Western World. It should come as no surprise that the Catholic Church in America is also descending into this ideological civil war.


I have many questions and some grave concerns over this Pope’s challenges to Catholic Traditionalists. I am very concerned about the justice and charity in the handling of the Franciscan Friars of the Immaculate, and other groups that have held fast in expressions of Catholic Tradition. But above all, Traditionalists must respond with grace and charity, not leave the Gifts of the Holy Spirit upon the field of battle.


Pope Francis is very fond of the Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32). He employs its imagery often and, for what it’s worth, so do I – most recently in “Pope Francis has a Challenge for the Prodigal Sons Older Brother.”


Francis has said that within that parable can be found the entire Gospel. The parable is also about the always faithful older brother concerned that the doors of his Father’s house are opening to the one who left to squander his inheritance on the peripheries.


The symbolism is very rich. In issuing his protest in the parable, the faithful older brother stands outside the house while his brother celebrates inside. “You have always been with me,” pleads his Father, “and everything I have is yours, but your brother was lost, and now he is found” (see Luke 15:31-32).


That, for me, is the key to being a faithful Catholic Traditionalist. There is no problem with our expressions of concern, or even our protests. But we must never issue them while standing outside the house. The great challenge is to stand with Francis – cum Petra - in trust of the Holy Spirit even as the waves of anxiety about the forces of this world crash over us.


That takes certain grounding in another unassailable truth of the Gospel: Standing with Peter, the Gates of Hell cannot prevail against us.