The subglacial fjords in Antarctica

Earlier this year, new data from ice-penetrating radar revealed a complex landscape of mountains and fjords deep beneath the Antarctic ice in the vicinity of Wilkes Land (east Antarctica).

A team of researchers from the University of Texas, the University of Edinburgh, the Australian Antarctic Division, and the Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems Cooperative Research Centre published a letter in the scientific journal Nature entitled "A dynamic East Antarctic ice sheet suggested by ice-covered fjord landscapes." In the abstract to that article, they wrote that "The identification of this fjord landscape, based on new data from ice-penetrating radar, provides an improved understanding of the topography of the Aurora Subglacial Basin and its surroundings, and reveals a complex surface sculpted by a succession of ice-sheet configurations substantially different from today’s."

This article from the BBC News provides some close-up of the topographic map of the fjord channels, buried under 3,000-plus feet of ice and below today's sea levels. That article quotes one of the team members, Professor Martin Siegert of the University of Edinburgh, saying:

The modern ice sheet couldn't possibly have done this; it has to have been the consequence of an ice sheet that was much smaller than today's. Comparing our data with geomorphological evidence from other regions of the world, we can be pretty confident that these fjords were formed by fast-flowing ice at the edge of the ice sheet. It's the first evidence we have of how the ice was in phases of growth and retreat as it marched across this subglacial basin to form the ice sheet we recognise today.

In their abstract to the article published in Nature, the scientists surmise that the ice sheet probably began forming about 34 million years ago, and then went through numerous cycles of advance and retreat (up to thirty such cycles) for the next 20 million years.

Of course, these conjectures are based upon the assumptions of conventional geology, which argue that Antarctica has been covered by its present sheet of solid ice for millions of years -- long before the arrival of modern man. We have already discussed how the hydroplate theory of Dr. Walt Brown -- which explains numerous aspects of the earth more satisfactorily than do conventional theories, and which is particularly helpful in explaining some of the mysterious evidence surrounding Antarctica -- proposes a different mechanism for the origin of a past ice age and the ice now covering Antarctica.

In this previous post, we noted that Dr. Brown argues that in order to achieve an ice age, heavy precipitation over cold continents would be necessary. Warm oceans could provide such heavy precipitation, but the conditions that would yield warm oceans and cold continents are difficult to envision under the conventional uniformitarian theories prevalent today. However, Dr. Brown's hydroplate theory envisions warm oceans immediately after the draining of the floodwaters, as well as higher and colder continents than we have today. The continents would have been higher because after their initial slide and thickening, they would not yet have sunk down into the mantle under their increased weight, and thus the sea levels were also lower than today (note that the recent subglacial radar findings also indicate that the oceans were much lower when these fjords were carved, since they are below today's sea level; previous posts have discussed other evidence for lowered oceans and the way this evidence supports the hydroplate theory more than it does conventional theories: see here and here). The oceans would have been warmer as well, due primarily to the energy released during the sliding of the hydroplates. Thus, for some centuries after the flood, the conditions would have been conducive to heavy cloud cover, precipitation as moist air rose over cold continents, and precipitation in the form of snowfall, which would have led to the formation of ice and advancing glaciers.

Amazingly, there are several medieval maps which appear to depict Antarctica with deep fjords and mountains. This fact is amazing on several levels, not least of which being the fact that Antarctica was not known to modern navigators in the west until the nineteenth century. Even more startling is the fact that many of the coastlines and other details on these maps of Antarctica appear to depict a continent not covered by ice -- or, to be more accurate, to depict it when ice probably covered much of the interior but did not cover the coastline the way it does today.

Among these maps are the Piri Re'is map of 1513 (shown above -- the coastline reputed to be that of Antarctica is along the bottom of the image, below and to the right of the east coast of South America), the Oronteus Finaeus World Map of 1532, and the Hadji Ahmed World Map of 1559. A projection of the Oronteus Finaeus map (see here) compared to the outline on today's maps clearly shows the deep fjords of the medieval map versus the relatively smooth coastline depicted on modern maps based on the ice cap which reaches to the ocean and covers up all the folds of the actual coastline.

In the online version of his book on the hydroplate theory, Dr. Brown discusses these medieval maps and their implications for the timeline of the Antarctic ice cap:

These medieval maps, copied 2–3 centuries before 1819 (when textbooks say Antarctica was discovered) were probably based on much earlier source maps. These and other medieval maps also suggest much lower sea levels before the Ice Age. (The hydroplate theory explains why lowered sea levels were followed by the Ice Age.) The maps provide additional information on Antarctica’s mountain ranges, plateaus, bays, coastal islands, and former rivers—under about a mile of ice today. Obviously, the Antarctic ice cap grew rapidly and recently as humans were exploring the earth. The ice cap did not grow, as taught for the last century, over millions of years or before man allegedly evolved.

The ongoing discoveries in the Antarctic, including the new details revealed by ice-penetrating radar in the Aurora Subglacial Basin and published earlier this year in Nature, appear to provide additional supporting evidence for the accuracy of Dr. Brown's theory and its predictions.

Lake Vostok and the deep liquid lakes on Antarctica

Lying underneath 4,200 meters of Antarctic ice, beneath a point where the coldest temperature ever recorded on earth was taken (−128° F in 1983), are the cold, dark waters of Lake Vostok, the largest of the unfrozen lakes of Antarctica. The ice above it is over 2.6 miles thick, but below that icy cap, the waters continue another 3,000 feet down (almost twice as deep as Lake Tahoe, and that's not counting the ice on top). It makes me cold just thinking about it.

Lake Vostok is a "subglacial lake," and it may amaze some readers to learn that there are over 150 such unfrozen lakes beneath the ice and snow of Antarctica. In fact, the existence of these lakes was not confirmed until the 1990s, although their presence had been postulated as early as the late 1800s. Data evidence for these lakes did not become available until the 1970s.

A scientific paper describing some of the features of Lake Vostok, as well as two more-recently discovered subglacial lakes nearby (known as "Lake 90° East" and "Lake Sovetskaya"), can be downloaded for free in pdf form here. That paper, entitled "Tectonically controlled subglacial lakes on the flanks of the Gamburtsev Subglacial Mountains, East Antarctica" and written by scientists Robin E. Bell, Michael Studinger, Mark A. Fahnestock, and Christopher A. Shuman, was published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters in January, 2006.

The paper's authors admit that the "size, depth and origin" of these two newer lakes "have not been investigated," but they are certain that lakes of these elongate shape and great depth must have a tectonic origin, rather than resulting from glacial scouring or meteorite impacts (page 1). In fact, the scientists assert that "These deep elongate basins probably pre-date Antarctic glaciation and likely contained surface lakes prior to becoming encased in ice" (page 3). They estimate that they have been encased in ice for somewhere between ten and thirty-five million years.

No real evidence is put forward for this estimated age, or even for the assertion that they were probably lakes that somehow became trapped in ice, although it is only to be expected that scientists who accept the tectonic theory would believe that tectonics somehow formed the deep basins in which these mysterious lakes now rest. The details of how liquid lakes could form in Antarctica, which is so cold that no month averages above freezing, and which receives so little precipitation (only two inches per year in the interior), are left unexplained. Some scientists have postulated that the pressure of so much ice might melt water at the bottom, but this begs the question of why huge subglacial lakes are not then found all over Antarctica, as well as in warmer climates that also contain glaciers.

In fact, the problem of so much ice and snow on Antarctica poses a king-sized problem for conventional tectonic theorists, let alone the massive system of lakes entombed beneath that ice. These enormous lakes (Lake Vostok is estimated in the above referenced paper to contain 5,400 cubic kilometers, which is larger than Lake Michigan) form yet another data point which should cause scientists to question the foundations of the tectonic theory (many others are listed in this previous blog post, and since the publication of that post, several others have been discussed, including the origin of water-carved features on Mars, the origin of comets, and the origin of asteroids).

Just as is the case with the rest of those data points, it appears that the hydroplate theory of Walt Brown offers a more satisfactory answer than the conventional tectonic theory for the origin of Antarctica's subglacial lakes. In the 8th edition of his book, Dr. Brown discusses the Antarctic lakes in some detail, on page 347 and following. He argues that the events surrounding a cataclysmic global flood would account for all of the evidence we find on Antarctica and the lakes that have been discovered there:

• How could a lake form on Antarctica?
• After all these years, why would even one Antarctic lake still be unfrozen?
  

The flood provides an obvious answer to the first question. When the flood waters drained into the newly formed ocean basins, every continental basin, including those on Antarctica, were left full of water -- some with warm and salty water. Therefore, Antarctica had lakes immediately after the flood. [. . .] The second question is answered when one realizes that for centuries after the flood, snowfall rates would be orders of magnitude greater than today, and many postflood lakes would be salty and deep. The more a lake freezes, the greater the salt's concentration becomes in the remaining liquid, so its freezing temperature drops.

The mechanism that caused the ice age -- warmer oceans after the flood and higher, colder continents than we have today -- is explained in Dr. Brown's book, and I discussed it briefly in this interview on Red Ice Radio, as well as some of the problems conventional theories have with explaining how an Ice Age would ever start and how one would ever stop.

Dr. Brown explains that when this Ice Age began and the water left on the Antarctic continent developed even a thin layer of ice and began to be exposed to the heavy precipitation in the form of snowfall that initiated the Ice Age, a "race" would develop between the growth of ice downward into these lakes, and the insulating property of the snow building upward on top of the ice:

The winner [of this race] will determine if the lake becomes a solid block of ice or a deeply buried liquid lake. Each year, the ice will grow downward and thicken, at a steady but diminishing rate. Simultaneously, snow will build up above the lake. If the snow's thickness reaches about 2,000 feet before the downward growing ice touches the lake bottom, the lake will be insulated enough to retain its heat and not completely freeze; the slight amount of geothermal heat coming up through the floor of the lake will then prevent it from freezing solid.

Those who hold to the tectonic theory would have to explain how that race would not be won by ice instead, as it would be today in Antarctica's extremely cold climate with extremely low precipitation. The Wikipedia entry for Lake Vostok (hardly a scholarly source, admittedly) confidently asserts that "Africa separated from Antarctica around 160 million years ago, followed by the Indian subcontinent, in the early Cretaceous (about 125 million years ago). About 65 million years ago, Antarctica (then connected to Australia) still had a tropical to subtropical climate, complete with marsupial fauna and an extensive temperate rainforest."

Details for how Antarctica moved south are nonexistent in this description, as is any explanation of how these tropical or subtropical lakes would have gathered successive insulating blankets of snow after they moved down to the latitudes of present-day Antarctica where such little precipitation ever falls. Even more troublesome is the question of how, if Antarctica drifted to its present location at very slow, tectonic rates, the remnants of the "marsupial fauna and tropical rainforest" became frozen and preserved to this day, instead of rotting away over the centuries or millennia that such an Antarctic drift south must have taken.

We have already examined these problems of fossil evidence on Antarctica, where skeletons of turtles and other warm-climate animals are found, and where the wood from large trees that could never grow in the latitudes of the Antarctic is still frozen and not fossilized but can actually be thawed out and burned to this day. In that previous post and the follow-up post discussing similar fossils near the Arctic Circle on the other end of the earth we saw why such evidence is a huge problem for the conventional tectonic theory but perfectly understandable by the hydroplate theory. Rather than supporting a tectonic explanation for the Antarctic lakes, as the Wikipedia entry authors want you to believe, this evidence only points more clearly to the hydroplate explanation.

The mysterious lakes of Antarctica, deep beneath thousands of feet of glacial ice, join the long line of evidence which is extremely troublesome for the proponents of the conventional tectonic theories but which accord perfectly with the events postulated by the hydroplate theory.

Sunken ruins near Cuba would fit hydroplate theory

Earlier this month, Archaeo News published a short article entitled "An ancient 'lost civilization' in Cuba?" discussing the discovery of what are alleged to be the ruins of large structures submerged in waters off the western end of Cuba.

The article references an earlier piece published in National Geographic in 2002 ("New Underwater Finds Raise Questions About Flood Myths," by Brian Handwerk). That article notes that the structures are located in waters at depths between 1,900 feet and 2,500 feet. It also cites a geologist who declares, "If I had to explain this geologically, I would have a hard time" (in other words, he would find it difficult to come up with geological processes that could have created the structures, rather than the deliberate hand of man).

The National Geographic article leaves the impression that the end of the Ice Age and the rising seas that would result can explain sunken ruins, this explanation runs into some problems. Most importantly, unlike the man-made ruins located off the coast of Japan and India, these ruins are under thousands of feet of water. The melting of the Ice Age ice sheets would probably be able to account for no more than three hundred feet of sea level rise world-wide.

Another problem conventional explanations encounter is the fact that current theories of mankind's ancient history argue that man was a primitive hunter-gatherer during those distant millennia before the ice sheets melted, and only began to live in cities and have division of labor and the ability to construct sophisticated stone monuments much later.

Nevertheless, the National Geographic article confidently declares: "While images of catastrophic floods are popular, many scholars argue that the real rising sea level slowly invaded the Stone Age hunting territories for thousands of years, and the stories compress this event into overnight floods, storms, and destruction," apparently without realizing the contradiction of describing "Stone Age hunting territories" and submerged ruins built by a civilization that was clearly not a bunch of Stone Age hunters.

If these Cuban ruins are in fact genuine remnants of human civilization, they create big problems for conventional theories (perhaps this is why the academic community does not seem to be in any particular hurry to examine them more closely).

However, they would not pose a problem for the hydroplate theory of Walt Brown, discussed in previous posts. According to Dr. Brown's theory, the events surrounding a cataclysmic global flood led to continents being violently buckled like train cars in a train wreck, which thickened the continental plates and led to a period during which the continents were higher and the seas lower. Over time, the force of gravity caused the continents to sink and the sea floors to experience a corresponding rise, which raised the sea levels by thousands of feet.

The hydroplate theory explains many geological mysteries around the globe, but it has been largely ignored as an explanation for the many archaeological mysteries of mankind's ancient past. Alternative theorists have largely focused on theories such as a near miss from a planet or the crustal-displacement theory. The Mathisen Corollary discusses the possibility that the hydroplate theory could explain mankind's ancient past much better, and certainly better than the prevailing theories, which are full of contradictions, as we can see from this discussion of the undersea Cuban ruins.

The mysterious Baltic Sea Object (objects)

You may have been following the fascinating case of the "Baltic Sea Object," reported by the Ocean X team of Sweden earlier this year.

Ocean X Team is a deep-sea "treasure-hunting" outfit created by Peter Lindberg and Dennis Åsberg of Sweden, which searches for shipwrecks which contain salvageable items that they can recover and sell. In 1997 the team recovered champagne from a 1916 wreck which they report being able to sell for record prices through Christie's of London.

Earlier this year, Ocean X released images and descriptions of an object they discovered in the Baltic Sea between Finland and Sweden which has captured the imaginations of viewers around the globe. The team actually took the original imagery in June of 2011 but only noticed the anomaly later on when reviewing the footage. Sonar images appear to show a nearly circular object, as well as what may be a long "track" along the sea-floor stretching away from the object in one direction. The team reports that the object is approximately 60 meters (close to 200 feet) in diameter.

The team has conducted two further expeditions to the site this year. Due to the visibility conditions of the Baltic Sea, which can be quite limited, visual images of the object (which rests on the seafloor at a depth of approximately 275 feet) had to be taken from quite close on these expeditions, and the team also reported electronic difficulties and equipment problems. However, divers passing close above the object photographed what appears to be a circle or ring of about 25 to 30 stones on one side of the circular object.

A photograph of that circle can be seen in this article by Linda Moulton Howe on her Earthfiles website. That site also discusses a secondary object or formation seen in the Ocean X side-scan sonar about 600 feet from the circular object. Ocean X reports that closer examination of this other formation revealed numerous right angles, as well as what appear to be large "stairs" leading up to it from the ocean floor.

Ocean X reports that both objects are elevated from the sea-floor itself, the circular object by as much as 50 meters (164 feet) and the angular object by about 10 meters (almost 33 feet).

Below is an interview with Peter Lindberg of Ocean X on Red Ice Radio in which he describes the two objects and some of the theories that have been put forth so far by various people in reaction to the findings:

That interview is conducted by Henrik Palmgren of Red Ice, an excellent interviewer who has a great talent for adapting his interview questions to his guest and allowing the guest to tell his or her story, while offering insightful questions that help to bring out some of the most interesting aspects of the subject at hand.

One possibility discussed in the interview is the possibility that the formations might be volcanic or the remnants of an ancient volcanic flow or eruption. At about 16:30 in the interview above, Peter Lindberg notes that geologists have been quite skeptical of this possible explanation, as it does not accord with the tectonic paradigm which currently dominates most geological analysis.

Other possible explanations which have been put forward include some kind of military project from the Second World War, perhaps the wreck of an advanced experimental German "saucer"-shaped aircraft, or some kind of an anchor for a large anti-submarine net that would have been affixed to the bottom of the sea to prevent submarine incursions into the Baltic during that war.

However, in the interview (around 34:00), Peter Lindberg points out that there are some problems with explaining it as a human construction from any recent century. For one thing, if that circle of stones on top of the circular formation was created by humans rather than being a random arrangement of stones (and it certainly appears to be deliberate), then the object must have been there for a very long time, from a time when its current location was not below the level of the sea.

When was the sea so much lower that a point that is now lying beneath 275 feet of seawater was dry land? The answer one gives to that question depends on the geological paradigm one uses, but in any case it was a very long time ago -- certainly prior to World War II. Of course, one could argue that someone went down in more recent years and placed the stone ring there, but since it was only discovered recently, that explanation seems to be unlikely (unless Ocean X is being less than truthful about the entire object). If Ocean X is not pulling an elaborate hoax, then it would seem that the object has been there for a very long time -- and if it is indeed man-made then it would argue for a quite remote date of construction for what appears to be a fairly advanced structure (certainly not what those operating within the paradigm of conventional history would expect human beings to be building at that time).

Another "non-human construction" explanation has been that the objects are large meteorites. Peter Lindberg points out that there does not appear to be any sort of crater around the objects on the sea-floor, but does say that if the meteorites hit during the Ice Age and struck a thick layer of ice, they might have made a huge crater in the ice and then later settled to their current location when the ice melted.

And of course there is the most sensational explanation, that the object (especially the circular one) is related to extraterrestrial activity -- based on its "spaceship-like shape" it has invited the description of "Baltic Sea UFO." In the interview above, Peter Lindberg points out: "I should say we never have said it was a UFO" (at about 12:00), and later on he reiterates: "we don't know what it is." Ocean X has taken samples from the site to Stockholm University and are currently awaiting results from their analysis, and they have expressed interest in conducting another expedition this year before weather conditions become too difficult later this fall, and hoping "to have some real scientists" from various disciplines accompany them to help guide the search for clues. In other words, it does not appear that Ocean X is pushing a sensational interpretation of the object's origin -- far from it. In fact, it appears that they are sincerely interested in getting opinions and analysis from those who can honestly help to come up with the explanation that best fits the evidence.

The UFO theory that dominates much of the coverage of this story does not seem like a necessary conclusion based upon what has been found so far, but for further discussion of possible evidence of extraterrestrial contact with ancient humans, see for example the previous post "Supernatural or Extraterrestrial." So far, it seems difficult to definitively argue that the object or objects must represent alien technology and could not have been built by ancient humans -- if indeed they are not natural geological formations of some sort.

More interesting in light of the subject matter discussed on this blog is the question of when the oceans would have been low enough to allow the possibility that these objects (or at least the stone ring, if it was put there by humans) were built by people when the area was dry land. Because they are at a depth of 275 feet, conventional theories can explain possible human construction by noting that the end of the Ice Age could explain sea-level rise of up to 300 feet.

As discussed in numerous previous posts (such as this one), the hydroplate theory of Dr. Walt Brown also provides an explanation for greatly lowered sea levels and higher continents as well -- conditions which were intimately connected to the causative mechanism for the Ice Age (see also this post for more discussion of that concept). The hydroplate theory, in fact, appears to explain some of the other "anomalous" sea-level-related evidence around the world (including other undersea structures that may also be man-made, and the alleged Antarctic contours shown on the Piri Re'is map) far better than conventional theories do. Thus, the ongoing examination of the Baltic Sea Object(s) is of great interest for any clues it may offer that could shed light on the explanatory powers of the hydroplate theory versus other theories.

The Baltic Sea Object (or objects) thus offers yet another example of the need for good critical, but open-minded, analysis. So far, it would appear that these structures may well invite explanations that are outside of the conventional tectonic geological paradigm, as well as outside of the conventional paradigm of ancient human history. Like a "Scooby Doo mystery" (or a Sherlock Holmes story), it would appear wise to keep an open mind in this case, and investigate all the possible explanations carefully before rejecting any of them.

We wish Ocean X and all those involved in the analysis the very best with their continuing efforts in the Baltic Sea.

How do you explain coral atolls?

Coral atolls consist of submerged volcanic mountains, often at great depths below the surface, upon which huge formations of coral have grown.

Scientists and engineers have drilled deep into several atolls and have been able to determine the size of the coral cap and the depth of the top of the volcanic seamount underneath the coral of the atoll. On Funafuti Atoll in Tuvalu, drilling determined that the depth of the volcanic rock was nearly a thousand feet below the surface (see for instance Geology and Hydrogeology of Carbonate Islands, page 582). On Bikini Atoll, the coral cap goes down over 3,200 feet. Drilling has found that the mountain beneath Eniwetok Atoll is over 4,600 feet below the surface in some places.

Reef-building corals cannot survive and build reefs at depths below about 160 feet at the most, because they require sunlight for photosynthesis. Therefore, the great depths of some of the volcanic mountains supporting huge coral atolls poses something of a geological mystery. How could a mountain whose top is over 3,200 feet below the surface support the Bikini Atoll? How could a mountain whose top is over 4,600 feet below the surface support the Eniwetok Atoll? Even the atolls in Tuvalu, whose tops are just under a thousand feet below the surface pose a problem, since corals cannot begin their construction at anything near those depths. A related question concerns the existence of guyots or tablemounts, which are huge undersea volcanoes with flat, truncated tops, possibly sheared off by violent wave action, but often located many thousands of feet below the surface.

As it happens, Charles Darwin was aware of this mystery and proposed an explanation, which (according to this educational webpage from the University of Arizona) is still largely accepted today. He put the problem like this in the Structure and Distribution of Coral Reefs (1842), which can be read online in its entirety here:

What cause, then, has given to atolls and barrier-reefs their characteristic forms? Let us see whether an important deduction will not follow from the consideration of these two circumstances,—first, the reef-building corals flourishing only at limited depths,—and secondly, the vastness of the areas interspersed with coral-reefs and coral-islets, none of which rise to a greater height above the level of the sea, than that attained by matter thrown up by the waves and winds. I do not make this latter statement vaguely; I have carefully sought for descriptions of every island in the intertropical seas; and my task has been in some degree abridged by a map of the Pacific, corrected in 1834 by M.M. D'Urville and Lottin, in which the low islands are distinguished from the high ones (even from those much less than a hundred feet in height) by being written without a capital letter: I have detected a few errors in this map, respecting the heights of some of the islands, which will be noticed in the Appendix, where I treat of coral-formations in geographical order. 90.

Darwin's proposed explanation was simple: the existence of coral atolls is "quite inexplicable, excepting on the theory, that the bases on which the reefs first became attached, slowly and successively sank beneath the level of the sea, whilst the corals continued to grow upwards" (98).

Of course, Darwin was writing before the tectonic theory had even been suggested, and his explanation as to what could cause the mountains that formed the bases for these reefs to sink or subside into the depths below is pretty vague. He basically summed up the proposed cause of the subsidence as "subterranean disturbances beneath them" (98).

Unfortunately, in the ensuing period of over a century and a half, the explanation has not gotten much better. This article from the California Academy of Sciences declares that lower sea levels due to ice ages, followed by sea level rise after the end of an ice age, contributed to the ability of coral to grow to such heights (see the section entitled "Formation of Coral Reefs"). However, as we have discussed in previous posts, no ice age theory can account for 4,600 feet of sea level rise from ice melt alone. Further, if the ice had melted too rapidly and the ocean level had risen faster than the coral could grow upward, Eniwetok and other atolls could never have formed, because the sea-level rise would have "outrun them."

Other explanations are equally vague. The formation of Midway Island, a coral atoll located northwest of the Hawaiian Islands, is often attributed to subsidence due to the weight of the island and the coral, but clearly the Hawaiian Islands would have even more size and weight and should have sunk as well (some theories argue that they will, if we just give them enough millions of years, which function as a kind of magic wand for many theories that are short on details).

This webpage from the US National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) shows a helpful graphic of a coral reef growing upwards and a volcanic island sinking downwards, but the explanation of how this takes place is fairly unhelpful: "As the reef expands, the interior island usually begins to subside and the fringing reef turns into a barrier reef." Why does it "usually begin to subside"? This sentence makes it sound as though the reef expanding has something to do with it.

In their description of the significance of Midway Island, the US Fish and Wildlife Service was forced to concede: "Midway is an example of atoll formation, a poorly understood geological process that can contribute to our understanding of the relationship between climate, reef development, and carbon sequestration" (3-4).

However, it is possible that in this case, Darwin was correct about the idea that coral reefs of such great heights grew atop volcanic mountains that once were near or above the surface, and then slowly subsided. While the tectonic theory has trouble explaining why they would subside, the hydroplate theory actually provides a very robust explanation.

Central to the hydroplate theory is the formation of the Mid-Oceanic Ridge, where the basement floor sprang upwards in response to the removal of tons of material by the jetting eruption of the waters that initiated the global flood. This upward movement would not have created a huge air pocket in the middle of the earth, but rather would have pulled or sucked the earth upwards on the opposite side from the bulge -- which is exactly what happened to create the deep basins of the Pacific and Indian Oceans.

This downward motion would explain the characteristic "arc-and-cusp" patterns of many deep ocean trenches in the Pacific, as well as the gravity anomalies beneath these deep trenches, which have far less gravity than the tectonic theory would predict. The violent downward buckling of the Pacific and Indian oceans would have also created massive friction and melting of rock deep under the surface, creating vast reservoirs of magma, much of which either seeped upwards and formed volcanoes and volcanic mountains and islands (note that the "Ring of Fire" marks the edges of the part of the earth that was sucked inwards according to this explanation), or else it would have sunk deeper into the earth to contribute to the liquid outer core beneath the mantle, according to Dr. Brown's hydroplate theory.

As we have explained in previous posts, the sea levels would have been much lower after the events surrounding the flood, but would have slowly risen in the centuries thereafter, as the continents sank downwards. At the same time, the Pacific floor and many of the volcanic formations on it would have also experienced sinking, due to the entire mantle sinking into the liquid of the magma that was created by the intense friction of the event just described.

Dr. Brown explains this process in relation to the formation of seamounts and atolls (which are found almost entirely in the Pacific directly on the other side of the globe from the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, right where his theory says they should be, as well as to a lesser extent in the Indian Ocean):

All the fracturing and shifting deep within the earth produced frictional heating, gravitational settling, and huge amounts of heat and magma. Most of that magma now constitutes the earth’s outer core. [. . .] For years after the flood, much magma escaped upward along faults, especially in the Pacific, which had the fastest-sinking and most fractured portion of the crust. Volcanic cones rapidly rose, many reaching the ocean’s surface, where large waves leveled the volcanic peaks. Over the next few years, the mantle below the Pacific plate sank even further into the growing liquid outer core, because the Pacific plate was loaded with thick, dense magma. That sinking pulled tablemounts down 3,000–6,000 feet below sea level. The tablemount and trench region is several thousand feet lower than the average depth of the Pacific. [. . .] Clustered tablemounts sometimes differ in elevation and depth by 1,000–2,000 feet, so they apparently formed at different times while local ocean depths were changing rapidly. This probably happened during the years after the compression event as the mantle below the Pacific plate sank into the growing liquid outer core. When new cracks permitted magma to escaped upward, seamounts grew from different depths. Therefore, the first tablemounts that formed were usually shorter than tablemounts that formed after the plate had been pulled deeper. Earlier tablemounts were then pulled down farther than those that formed later. Consequently, short tablemounts can be far below sea level, while nearby, taller tablemounts can have their tops at shallower depths. From the online edition; see the full explanation from which the quoted section above was cited here.

Dr. Brown provides much more discussion which supports this explanation of the formation of tablemounts. While Darwin appears to have deduced the correct explanation as well, he could not provide a solid geological explanation for the mechanism that would have caused the subsidence of the areas of the Pacific containing tablemounts and atolls. The hydroplate theory does.

This is yet more evidence that the hydroplate theory should be carefully considered as a possible explanation for the many features we see in the world around us, features that are difficult or impossible to explain with the reigning tectonic theory (numerous others are listed here). The ability of the hydroplate theory to explain such widely varied geological mysteries is truly impressive. As one might expect, if the hydroplate theory is indeed correct, it would also help shed light on numerous mysteries of mankind's ancient past as well, which is the subject of the Mathisen Corollary. The case of the coral atolls should be seen as a very strong argument in its favor.

Palm trees discovered in Antarctica!

Scientists drilling through thick ice in Wilkes Land, in East Antarctica (the part of Antarctica facing towards Australia) have reported evidence of "the growth of highly diverse, near-tropical forests characterized by mesothermal to megathermal floral elements including palms and Bombacoideae [a subfamily of the mallow plant or malva]" according to an article published earlier this month in the science journal Nature.  Here's another description of the discovery.

The astonishing aspect of this story is that the evidence of these ancient palms and mallows and other near-tropical flora was discovered by drilling through ice sheets ranging from 1.9 miles to 2.5 miles thick!  

That's quite a contrast in climates!  The article published in Nature by the scientists asserts that these near-tropical forests once grew on this continent that is today covered in ice and characterized by temperatures that drop well below 100° below zero (Fahrenheit -- that's colder than Celsius, which pegs its zero at 32° Fahrenheit) because somehow the global climate back then was a "greenhouse world" and "winters were extremely mild (warmer than 10° C) and essentially frost-free despite polar darkness."

They do acknowledge that this assertion about the ancient climate may require some adjustments to "climate models." 

Let's pause to think about that again.  Antarctica is so cold that no month of the year has an average temperature above 0° F.  It is located so far south that the tilt of the earth's axis plunges it into sunlessness for long months.  It is one of the driest places on earth today, with extremely low levels of precipitation (the coastlines get only 8 inches of precipitation per year, and further inland the precipitation levels are even less, with some areas receiving essentially no precipitation for thousands of years, according to scientists).  And yet scientists have discovered ancient palm trees and mallow plants under two miles of ice.

One explanation is that the world was so warm back then that Antarctica was like a tropical island, so hospitable that luxuriant forests could survive there even through sunless winter months.  This appears to be the only option discussed in the recent article.

However, this certainly is not the only explanation -- nor is it a particularly good one.  However, because most scientists are wedded to the tectonic theory, they are pretty much stuck with it, because explaining how Antarctica could have "drifted" to its current location poses some other problems, as discussed in previous posts on this topic (such as this one). 

If all of Antarctica were on a single tectonic plate, it could perhaps have drifted from a more temperate climate.  However, it would still be difficult to explain why all the palm trees and mallow plants did not decompose and rot away during such a proposed tectonic drift from the tropics (unless it was on a really fast tectonic plate that did not give the mallows time to disappear). 

The hydroplate theory of Dr. Walt Brown does not have difficulty explaining this fossil discovery -- in fact, this newest finding of sub-tropical fossils under miles of Antarctic ice accords perfectly with the timeline of events proposed by the hydroplate theory. 

According to that theory, which explains the geological evidence of our planet by a catastrophic mechanism rather than by the gradual mechanism favored by conventional tectonic theory, the continents slid one time in the distant past, as part of the events surrounding a global flood.  The violent buckling these continents underwent at the end of that rapid drifting created huge mountains and in places great thickening of the continents.  

The region of the highest mountains and greatest thickening is now the part of our planet with the highest elevations -- the Himalayas (home of Mount Everest and numerous other peaks, all the highest in the world).  The sudden creation of this region caused a major roll of the entire planet, in accordance with the known principles of physics.  Earth continued to rotate upon its axis, but the entire orientation of the planet was altered dramatically by this past event.  The roll caused by the Himalayas moved the regions of the planet that were at the poles by as much as 35° to 45°, and at the same time it moved regions down to the Antarctic and up to the Arctic that had not previously been Arctic or Antarctic at all.

Further, the aftermath of this event was characterized by very warm oceans and much colder continents than we have today, creating the conditions for heavy precipitation, much of it falling in the form of snow and creating great sheets of ice.  This was the Ice Age, which later retreated as the oceans cooled and the continents sank into the mantle in the centuries after the cataclysm.  However, the very different weather patterns following the flood could explain why Antarctica, which today receives so little precipitation, has such massive ice sheets.  The "Big Roll" of the planet also explains why scientists continue to find the remains of near-tropical flora in such an unlikely location as Wilkes Land.

Previous posts have discussed this "Big Roll" of our globe in greater detail (see "Earth's Big Roll" and "90° East Ridge" for example).  

This most recent discovery of palm trees and mallows is by no means the only discovery of distinctively non-Antarctic remains that have been found under the ice either.  Previous posts have discussed the discovery of the remains of turtles and marsupials in Antarctica, as well as the remains of Titanosaurs -- huge plant-eating dinosaurs that weighed up to 100 tons!  

The hydroplate theory may strike some as extreme, but you can decide for yourself if you believe it is more likely than the conventional arguments that want you to believe that a rainforest once grew and all these near-tropical animals (and enormous dinosaurs) once cavorted upon a warm Antarctica with mild frost-free winters.  

If an extreme event such as the "Big Roll" really did take place (and there is extensive evidence to support the conclusion that it did), then the hydroplate theory is not extreme at all, but rather the best way to understand the discovery of palm trees in Antarctica.

Chemtrails and methane hydrates: a chilling theory proposed by Dane Wiginton

Previous posts on this blog have discussed the "chemtrail" or "geoengineering" phenomenon, which is often dismissed as a "conspiracy theory" (see for example the patronizing Wikipedia article on the subject).

The first direct mention of this topic on the pages of this blog was on July 03, 2013, in a post entitled "Due your own due diligence: Geoengineering."  That post noted that while many "debunkers" loudly deny that any deliberate spraying is taking place, "if deliberate geoengineering is taking place without informing the human beings who are potentially impacted by that activity, then there are potentially enormous ramifications.  Because the potential ramifications are so severe, everyone should take the time to investigate this issue for himself or herself."

Less than six months later, an article appeared in California newspapers describing deliberate "cloud seeding" operations involving the use of aircraft spraying chemicals such as silver iodide into the atmosphere in order to impact weather patterns and precipitation!  Here is a blog post from November of 2013 discussing that article, which openly admits to ongoing aircraft-based climate modification programs, quoting people involved in this aerial spraying program (one of whom has the official-sounding title of "director of weather modification").

In spite of the clear evidence that such spraying is in fact taking place, on such a scale that some individuals actually have job titles like "director of weather modification," Wikipedia and other sites continue to make fun of the "chemtrail conspiracy theory" and assert that "This theory has been refuted by the scientific community: such trails are simply normal contrails" (screen shot below from Wikipedia entry "Chemtrail conspiracy theory," accessed 03/19/2014):



The fact that these spraying programs are going on is undeniable: the real questions are "Why?" and "What impact will these programs have?"  The illegality of such programs should not really be in question, as discussed in the previous post entitled "Who has the right to spray silver iodide on his or her neighbors?" -- a question which natural law answers with a resounding: "No one."

Recently, Dane Wiginton of Geoengineeringwatch.org appeared on Red Ice Radio to outline a frightening thesis which he believes explains the deliberate, worldwide spraying campaigns, and it is a bombshell.

Every individual who cares about investigating this topic should listen to it in its entirety, and visit Geoengineeringwatch to learn more about it, but Dane's thesis in short is that the perpetrators of these massive spraying campaigns have seen data suggesting that warming temperatures worldwide, and particularly warming ocean temperatures, are releasing methane hydrates which are trapped in ice beneath the surface of the world's oceans, and that these methane hydrates entering our atmosphere will contribute to a cycle of further warming, releasing even more methane hydrates in a runaway cycle that could threaten all life on earth.  The massive, unauthorized, unannounced, secretive, and illegal spraying campaign (according to Dane's theory) is the desperate attempt by state actors to slow the cycle before it is too late.  (Another place to hear the interview is on this page from Geoengineeringwatch itself).

Geoengineeringwatch has several articles discussing the methane hydrate threat, many of which can be found on this page (which is a page of search results for the term "methane" on that website).  This article in particular, entitled "Methane and the risk of runaway global warming," gives a good outline of the potential danger Dane describes in his interview and in other talks and presentations which can be found on the Geoengineeringwatch site.

Methane hydrates are very real, and they are actually a phenomenon which Dr. Walt Brown discusses in some detail in his books about the hydroplate theory.  As the Geoengineeringwatch articles explain, our planet contains massive reserves of methane hydrates, most of them trapped in subsurface ice along the continental shelves of most of earth's continents, as well as beneath the Arctic ice cap.  Dr. Brown's book explains that origin of these vast quantities of methane hydrates poses something of a problem for conventional geological theories, but (as with so many other pieces of evidence on our planet, some of which are listed at the end of this post*) the hydroplate theory has a very satsifactory explanation for these methane collections.

At the bottom of this page in the online version of his book on the hydroplate theory, Dr. Brown describes the earth's methane hydrate reserves:

Since 1970, methane has been discovered inside ice molecules mixed within sediments lying up to 1000 feet below the deep ocean floor off coastlines.  The ice molecules form microscopic cagelike structures encasing one or more methane molecules.  The total energy value of this methane-ice combination, called methane hydrate, is at least twice that of all the world's known coal and oil combined! 

Later, in the section of this page entitled "Recovery Phase," Dr. Brown describes the forces which he believes led to the creation of all these methane hydrates -- the massive sediments which were released during a catastrophic worldwide flood poured off the continents at the end of the catastrophic flood event and into the massive depressions of the ocean basins, which had been created as a consequence of the sequence of events he describes in the previous phase of the catastrophe:

Sediments, mixed with organic matter and its bacteria were swept with draining flood waters onto the new ocean floors.  There, the bacteria fed on the organic matter and produced methane.  Much of this methane combined with cold, deep ocean waters to become vast amounts of methane hydrates along coastlines.

Elsewhere (in caption below the image of flaming ice, which is burning because it contains methane, and which is shown at the bottom of the page with the first methane hydrate quotation above), Dr. Brown explains that "water will freeze at slightly warmer temperatures if it is under high pressure and contains dissolved methane," and that "such temperatures and pressures exist 2,000 feet or more below sea level.  There, vast methane deposits are found trapped in ice on and under the deep seafloor, primarily along coastlines."  These principles of chemistry and physics explain the mechanisms which caused the methane hydrates to form, and Dr. Brown's hydroplate theory and the evidence that the earth once experienced a catastrophic global event which flooded the earth and which caused massive amounts of sediments infused with the remains of pre-flood vegetation explains the original source of the methane.

Whatever the source of the methane, however, Dane Wiginton's theory that the massive chemtrail campaign is a desperate attempt to prevent this methane from escaping due to warmer ocean temperatures has some logical coherence, and deserves to be examined further to see if it fits the available evidence better than alternative explanations for the undeniable geoengineering efforts that have been taking place for many decades, but which appear to have accelerated in recent years.

If readers choose to reject his explanation, then the question remains: what reason do we propose in its place?  The reason for the spraying can be debated, but the fact of the spraying should be beyond debate at this point.  If the situation really is as dire as Dane Wiginton and the articles on Geoengineeringwatch.org suggest, then investigating this issue is extremely important for every man and woman on the planet.

For those who argue that the recent freakish waves of cold weather, snow and ice experienced by the eastern US should dispel any arguments that the earth or its oceans are heating up, Dane presents evidence in his talk and on his site that these "polar vortices" and other unusual winter weather events are being deliberately and artificially engineered to hit the eastern portion of North America, while simultaneously creating warmer and drier conditions along the western portion of the continent and up into Canada, Alaska and the Arctic itself.  He argues that California's current historic drought conditions are probably part of this phenomenon.  He also believes that if the chemtrails are in fact being sprayed in order to try to stop a runaway methane-hydrate release, they are actually doing more harm than good and will have the effect of destroying the earth's natural systems and preventing the planet from healing itself, while threatening to create all kinds of new and unforeseen problems at the same time.

Like so many other issues of great importance facing men and women on the planet today, there appears to be an active disinformation campaign surrounding the existence and purpose of geoengineering, and individuals will have to do their own research and analysis and arrive at their own conclusions, without "outsourcing" that analysis to traditional media outlets (or to websites such as Wikipedia).  The correct way to proceed is to examine the evidence, examine the competing theories which attempt to explain that evidence, and conduct analysis to determine which theory best explains the preponderance of the evidence available at this time.  This process is recommended by Dr. Brown himself (who invites readers of his theory to conduct that type of analysis on all the assertions that he makes using the hydroplate theory), and it applies to the subject of chemtrails no less than it does to the subject of the earth's geological features and formations.

Below are some photographs of palm trees under severe duress due to the ongoing drought conditions in California, with chemtrails visible in the background.  Below those photographs is a "footnote" containing links to previous posts discussing evidence worldwide which supports the hydroplate theory.

* Some of the evidence supporting the hydroplate conclusions, discussed in previous posts:

• evidence for earth's "Big Roll" found in Antarctica, the Arctic, and 90 East Ridge.  One amazing piece of evidence is the presence of unfrozen lakes trapped deep beneath the ice of Antarctica.  Another is the evidence of ancient palm trees under miles-thick ice sheets in Antarctica.
• The strata found around the world.  See also here.
• The Grand Canyon (see also here and here and here).  Also, the extensive piles of petrified wood found in the same part of the world.
• Fossils (any fossils), but especially fossils such as those discussed here and here and here and here.  And don't forget the crinoid fossils found at the top of Mt. Everest, or the Titanosaurs in Antarctica.
• Extensive undersea canyons found all over the world which were probably carved by runoff from the flood event before they were covered up by the rising ocean.  Here are some more.
• The findings of what may well be undersea ruins from human civilizations at depths that cannot be explained simply by sea level rise after an Ice Age.  Here is another discussion of the same topic.
• Recent reports of the discovery of vast offshore fresh groundwater reserves under the seafloor.
• The phenomenon of "deep earthquakes."
• Discoveries about the spin in the earth's core.
• The discovery of plant fossils in deep ocean trenches.  The very existence of deep ocean trenches, especially those with "arc-and-cusp" shapes.  Also, the gravity anomalies detected above the deep ocean trenches.

And many, many more.

The Parshah Noach

In Judaism, there are regular weekly scripture portions or passages known as parshiyot, in which the entire Torah is divided up into 54 portions to be read throughout the year.

The second of these portions is the Parshah Noach ("the portion of Noah") which covers Genesis 6:9 through 11:32, and it falls this week. That passage of scripture tells of a cataclysmic worldwide flood, the preservation of Noah and seven other people in an ark with animals and birds, and the repopulation of the world afterwards.

In previous posts, we have examined extensive evidence that a cataclysmic worldwide flood in fact did take place and that such an event in fact explains the geological evidence we find around the world better than do other theories. Much of this discussion follows the work of Dr. Walt Brown, whose book on the subject can be read online in its entirety. A partial list of the evidence we have examined includes:

• The evidence for earth's "Big Roll" found in Antarctica, the Arctic, and 90° East Ridge. One amazing piece of evidence is the presence of unfrozen lakes trapped deep beneath the ice of Antarctica.
  
• The strata found around the world.
• The Grand Canyon and the extensive piles of petrified wood found in the same part of the world.
• Findings of dinosaur fossils and other fossils which still contain soft tissue.
• The presence of difficult-to-explain fossils of creatures such as jellyfish.
• Extensive submarine canyons found all over the world which were probably carved by runoff from the flood event before they were covered up by the ocean.
• The findings of what may be undersea ruins of human civilizations at depths that cannot be explained simply by sea level rise after an Ice Age.
• The existence of an Ice Age in earth's past at all, which is difficult to explain with conventional theories but which is quite clearly accounted for in the conditions after a world-wide flood as postulated in the hydroplate theory.
• Certain clues in other bodies in the solar system, including the moon, asteroids, and comets.

Additionally, there appears to be extensive evidence from ancient civilizations which can be best explained by this geological theory of a great flood, which is the subject of the Mathisen Corollary book and many other posts in this blog.

Certain clues raise the possibility that this cataclysmic flood took place only thousands of years ago rather than millions or hundreds of millions of years ago, including the presence of the soft-tissue fossils mentioned above and also the presence of ancient writings which appear to indicate first-hand human knowledge of some of the events that took place in the aftermath of the flood, including the draining of the Vale of Kashmir.

Regardless of whether you agree that such a flood took place within human memory, accepting the possibility of a global flood would cause some fairly obvious and quite severe problems to the traditional Darwinian explanation of biological origins (which is no doubt the prime reason that the very suggestion that a global flood took place on earth is vehemently denied and savagely ridiculed by conventional academia).

A global flood within the past several thousand years would cause even more severe problems for Darwinian theory.

However, we have already discussed other evidence which indicates that belief in either supernatural origins or extraterrestrial origins are more reasonable alternatives, in light of the evidence, than the storyline proposed by conventional Darwinism.

A discussion of the Jewish cycle of reading Torah portions throughout the year can be found at this website. Note that the description there begins with this very notable declaration: "Each week we read (or, more accurately, chant, because it is sung) a passage from the Torah."

Isn't that interesting? The passage is not actually read but rather it is chanted or sung! Where have we encountered that idea before?

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

(mobile readers please scroll down to read the post)

In the previous post, we looked at evidence which indicates that bottlenose dolphins give themselves distinctive individual names, and the implications of that startling revelation.  In particular, the recent studies indicating individual self-awareness in dolphins may cause us to consider in a new light the violence done to animals every day:

Thinking about the fact that dolphins appear to "give themselves names," it seems that doing violence against dolphins really highlights what Simone Weil wrote in her treatise against violence, that it "turns anybody who is subjected to it into a thing."  It turns, as she says, a "somebody" into "nobody" -- it robs its victims (and ultimately its perpetrators as well) of their personhood -- the very thing that an individual name represents!  

This subject appears to resonate strongly with the themes explored in Samuel Taylor Coleridge's famous poem, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (first published in 1798 and revised slightly by Coleridge throughout his life -- here is an online edition of the 1834 version).  The poem describes the aftermath of the mariner's unthinking and callous killing of an albatross, which has reverberations which reach into the supernatural world.

Readers who are unfamiliar with the poem should read it in its entirety -- it really deserves several close readings in order to perceive the layers of detail and meaning woven into the poem by the artist.

The first appearance of the Albatross is framed in the poem in a manner which hints at the theme at hand:

At length did cross an Albatross,

Thorough the fog it came;

As if it had been a Christian soul,

We hailed it in God's name.

In light of the fact that we now have scientific evidence of animals giving themselves personal names, this is a very interesting commentary by Coleridge.  He has the Mariner describe the Albatross "As if it had been a Christian soul," a phrase which hints at the truth and yet -- by the inclusion of the framing words "as if" -- shows that the Mariner and his fellows deny that level of "personhood" to the bird.

Note that in English culture, individual names are linked to the possession of an immortal soul, and in previous generations were often referred to as one's "Christian name." 

In an act of senseless violence, of which he repents later, the Mariner shoots and kills the Albatross.  The act itself is not described at all -- the Mariner only blurts out the confession that he did it, without giving any description of his motives or frame of mind.  Prior to his confession of guilt, the listener in the poem (the Wedding-Guest) elicits the confession by noting the visibly evident anguish that comes over the Mariner as he describes the daily visits of the cheerful bird, which visits the ship "for food or play," forming a close bond with the crew:

'God save thee, ancient Mariner!

From the fiends, that plague thee thus!—

Why look'st thou so?'—With my cross-bow

I shot the ALBATROSS.

Just prior to this, the Mariner was describing the role the bird seemed to play in guiding the ship through the ice at the South Pole (more on this in a moment), and in bringing "a good south wind" to propel the voyagers past the pole and into the Pacific Ocean on the other side.  By detailing these images, and giving no extended description of the shooting itself, the reader receives an even more powerful impression of the thoughtlessness of the killing of the friendly Albatross.

The deed, of course, has fateful consequences.  As Simone Weil wrote in her famous 1940 essay, "The Iliad, or the Poem of Force" (available in its entirety online here, translated into English from the original French by Mary McCarthy) the use of force reduces both its object and its perpetrator from a being possessed of a soul into "a thing":

Such is the nature of force.  Its power of converting a man into a thing is a double one, and in its application double-edged.  To the same degree, though in different fashions, those who use it and those who endure it are turned to stone.  22.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poem extends this concept to the animals around us and, by extension, to the natural world and in fact the entire universe.  This idea is a hallmark theme of the Romantic movement, of which The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is often considered an opening work of art.

The extension of the pain inflicted by the Mariner's thoughtless shooting of the Albatross to the extended universe, by the way, is present in the poem.  In a "waking dream" state (described by the Mariner as a "fit" he has fallen into), the Mariner hears two spirits discussing his guilty deed:

'Is it he?' quoth one, 'Is this the man?

By him who died on cross,

With his cruel bow he laid full low

The harmless Albatross.

The spirit who bideth by himself

In the land of mist and snow,

He loved the bird that loved the man

Who shot him with his bow.'

The "spirit who bideth by himself" had been perceived by the crew earlier as the being who "nine fathom deep beneath the keel" was impelling the ship along the seas on its strange journey.  Thus, the Mariner eventually grows to understand the full import of his deed -- not only was he wrong in denying a "soul" to the bird, but his senseless destruction of the friendly creature brought pain not only to the bird but to the Spirit of the world of ice who also delighted in the Albatross.

Later, the Mariner receives an absolution of sorts when he, without even knowing why he does so, perceives the beauty in the sea creatures swimming in the wake of the vessel, and blesses them:

Within the shadow of the ship

I watched their rich attire:

Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,

They coiled and swam; and every track

Was a flash of golden fire.

O happy living things! no tongue

Their beauty might declare:

A spring of love gushed from my heart,

And I blessèd them unaware:

Sure my kind saint took pity on me,

And I blessed them unaware.

This marks a major change from his initial description of the Albatross (marked by the words "as if") and shows us that he now believes the animals around him -- and the natural world that they inhabit -- are worthy of being blessed (a word, of course, which carries obvious spiritual implications).  To underscore the significance of this change in the Mariner, he tells us that at that moment he is able to pray again, and the body of the Albatross, which had been hung around his neck like "a cross" falls off of him:

The self-same moment I could pray;

And from my neck so free

The Albatross fell off, and sank

Like lead into the sea.

Above is an illustration of an 1870 edition of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Gustave Dore, who provided 43 fantastic illustrations for the poem.  It depicts the Albatross leading the ship through the towering ice as it crosses through the southern regions.  The voyage is described as going south (the ship sails with the rising sun to the left) and then through the ice into the Pacific, after which the ship goes to the north (with the rising sun to the right).  In other words, on this amazing journey, the vessel appears to sail right through Antarctica as if it were all ocean and no land!

The reason the ship is able to pass through the pole without any mention of land, only mighty bergs, is significant.   The Rime of the Ancient Mariner was first written in 1798.  As Graham Hancock demonstrates in Fingerprints of the Gods, the continent was only "discovered" again in 1818, although it had clearly been known in previous ages and appeared on some Renaissance maps.  Thus, it is not surprising that a poem first penned in 1798 would treat the ocean at the South Pole as if it were essentially like the ice-bound ocean we find at the North Pole.

Interestingly enough, Professor Charles H. Hapgood proves in his landmark work Maps of the Ancient Sea Kings: Evidence of Advanced Civilization in the Ice Age (first published in 1966) that ancient maps, following cartographic conventions of some lost civilization, depict extremely accurate renditions of Antarctica, some even appearing to demonstrate knowledge of the Antarctic coastline before it was bound in ice as it is today.  This information actually appears to support the hydroplate theory of Dr. Walt Brown (see discussion in this previous blog post on the topic).

Finally, it is also noteworthy that the evocative illustration by Gustave Dore depicted above appears to incorporate clear parallels to the images of the Orion Nebula which scientific instruments would not be capable of recording for another hundred years!  Readers of Danny Wilten's amazing work on the Orion Nebula and art (including the frescoes of Michelangelo) will immediately recognize in the Gustave Dore illustration above many of the elements that these works have in common with each other and with the Orion Nebula.  For a previous blog post on the subject, see "Danny Wilten and the Orion Nebula."  

In particular, in the Dore illustration from the poem, there is an arch, as well as a "glory."  In his e-book, Mr. Wilten demonstrates that a bird is sometimes present in the glory, such as in the Adoration of the Trinity from around 1647 - 1649, a work of art which Mr. Wilten discusses:

(mobile readers continue to scroll down to read the rest of the post)

We can also see parallels to the details of modern satellite telescope imagery of the Orion Nebula in other works by Gustave Dore.  Below is a comparison of Gustave Dore's Creation of Light (circa 1866) to the imagery of the Orion Nebula (taken in 2006 with the Hubble Telescope):

Readers of Mr. Wilten's e-book will notice the obvious presence of the "crescent moon" motif in the correct position of Dore's engraving (the "9-o'clock" position), found in all of the art discussed in Mr. Wilten's e-book (beginning on page 27; he does not discuss Gustave Dore specifically but gives so many other very clear examples that this phenomenon cannot be dismissed as coincidence).

This resonance between art and universe is really quite incredible.  In conjunction with the theme of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, it can perhaps only be interpreted as further confirmation of the message of the poem.  In other words, not only are the animals and birds around us, and even the icy waters of the Antarctic infused with "spirit," but the rest of the universe as well!