The Book Of THoTH

Chariots of the Gods? Evidence or Pure Theory?

The blurb on the back of the book reads; “This world-famous best seller examines scientific evidence from five continents that proves that Earth has been visited repeatedly by advanced aliens from other worlds.â€�

That is a pretty remarkable statement for a book to make, especially one that was written in 1968.

So the question I asked myself when I began reading this book was “Does it actually PROVE that earth has been visited by ET’s?â€�

I don’t think it proves that statement by any means. Not to say that the book was a completely worthless read. While I found it seriously lacked in evidence, and a lot of the time it seemed like the author forced the examples to fit his theories, those theories were very creative, and thought provoking in their own right.

Von Daniken believes that when man was at the dawn of civilization, we were visited by advanced alien life forms. He speculates that maybe they needed to refuel their ships, or pick up supplies from their long journeys. He also speculates that they may have indeed settled down on this rock for a while, and gave technologies to mankind that allowed them to create some of the most unexplained creations on the Earth, like Easter Island, and the Egyptian Pyramids.

He points to numerous ancient texts, and their descriptions of “chariotsâ€� and relates how they can be interpreted as “space ships.â€� He also questions how certain ancient artifacts could have existed, like the Piri Reis map, when we are taught that man could not have possessed the technologies to create such artifacts at the time.

All in all, Von Daniken does show a lot of “evidenceâ€� that could be interpreted as proof, but that’s all it is, an interpretation. It’s an interesting interpretation, and I’m not one to say that he’s completely off base with that interpretation, but in the end, there is no real, hardcore, scientific evidence to back any of these theories up. But that shouldn’t stop anyone from investigating, or stop anyone with an interest in this subject from reading this book.

Roswell: Cover-Ups and Close Encounters

Every so often when picking up medication, or a late night bar of chocolate I will browse through the bargain bin of DVD's and VHS' at my local Walgreens store. Usually I find nothing more than an over abundance of low budget flicks, and cheesy martial arts films, but occasionally I'll come across a gem. A Star Trek motion picture here, an Arnold Schwarzenegger film there, but this time I cam across something far more interesting.

The DVD version of Roswell: Cover-Ups and Close Encounters. There was a picture of Jonathan Frakes (Commander Riker of Star Trek" The Next Generation) right on the cover (he narrates the movie), and with the price of $3.99 I figured I could afford to give it a try.

When I got home I popped the DVD in immediately, and was a little disappointed in the sound quality. In fact at times I was struggling to hear the very important information that Mr. Frakes was giving me.

Eventually I tired of straining my ears to hear the dialogue and fell right into slumber land. The move sat in it's case for months after that. Until that is I was fortunate enough to equip my home with a surround sound system. I started looking for a DVD that would allow me to test out my new toy, and I happened to grab the Roswell: Cover-Ups and Close Encounters DVD, which special features included Dolby Digital Surround Sound.

This time around the dialogue was much clearer, in fact I could even make out full sentences. With that problem set aside, I began to sit down to what I hoped would be an informative and entertaining documentary.

The documentary was filmed and originally aired in 1997, the 50 year anniversary of the Roswell Incident, and surprisingly enough we find out that some of the residents of Roswell are to this day unaware of what occurred in the past of their little town.

In fact some of you reading this may not know what happened in July of 1947, but do not fear, for Roswell: Cover-Ups and Close Encounters is sure to give you the needed background information concerning this incident. The first half an hour (give or take a few minutes) does a very good job of establishing a historically accurate timeline of what occurred during the Roswell Incident, from the initial discovery of wreckage, to the now infamous image of Jesse Marcell posing with a weather balloon.

The timeline presents merely the facts, but what fun would just facts be? Soon after the timeline is established we get to the good parts, the speculation as to what exactly crashed in the desert that fateful day. Was it an Alien Space craft? A top secret weather balloon as the Air Force claimed? Or could it have even been a top secret government airplane? Some even suggest that nothing crashed, that it was simply a ploy the government used to give the Russians a scare.

All of these hypotheses are debated by people on both sides of the coin. We have authors Kevin Randall and Don Schmidt who say they have hundreds of witness testimonies proving that what crashed wasn't a weather balloon. Lee Shargel claims to have a piece of the crashed UFO's engine, which is made from a metal which he said could not have been made in 1947 due to the lack of technology.

During the hour and a half long program we get to see clips from an interview that nuclear physicist and UFO expert Stanton Friedman conducted with the late Jesse Marcell, the first of many Air Force personnel to visit the crash site, and examine the wreckage.

The program has its fair share of skeptics and de-bunkers however, including Richard Weaver, who under the authority of the US Air Force conducted another investigation of the Roswell incident in 1994, and maintains that it was indeed a weather balloon that crashed.

The program ends with some celebrity comments on the UFO phenomena as a whole, including Will Smith and Jeff Goldblum.

All in all, if you are familiar with the Roswell incident and the theories as to what really occurred Roswell: Cover-Ups and Close Encounters doesn't really present any new information to the case, but I would defiantly recommend this DVD to anyone who is new to the incident, because in my opinion it presents both sides of the argument fairly and equaly.

Roswell: Cover-Ups and Close Encounters can be purchased online at amazon.com, and other online retailers.

There are many spiritual books available these day which promise you a new and improved outlook on life. Many of these books give you guidelines to live by, and spiritual revelations to ponder. In this sense The Celestine Prophecy; An Adventure by James Redfield is much like the other books in it's genre.

The Celestine Prophecy; An Adventure, does however manage to take all those similarities, and spin them into something much more creative and inventive than your typical spiritual self help book. One of the more prominent things that set this book apart from the rest, is the way it presents its vital information to you. Rather than just throwing the guidelines at you, this book weaves all of it's nine insights into spiritual revelation, in to much like the title of the book implies, An Adventure.

During the book, you follow and un-named man through the rain forests of Peru, while he searches for an ancient manuscript. At critical points in the story the main character somehow meets just the right people in order to discover each of the nine spiritual insights the book contains. We get to see how the character process each insight, how he reflects on it's meaning, and how he applies each to his life, and his current situation. I feel like the book is written in such a way that as the main character evaluates the insight, the reader is also processing the information, reflecting upon it, and applying it to their own lives as well.

The reader gets involved with the drama and I believe if they picked up the book with the intention of getting a new spiritual perspective, it is not hard to achieve their goal.

The book wrapped me within it, I wanted to find out what the next insight would be, I wanted to discover how it would relate to all the other insights, and how it would relate to my life.

If you do read this book with the intention of getting the most out of it I would recommend that The Celestine Prophecy: An Experiential Guide, be used in conjunction with the book. The Experiential Guide, provides very simple exercises one can do in order to further their understanding of each insight.

This book would be helpful to those looking to expand their horizons, but I would venture to say that I think what you take from the book is directly related to what you are looking for, so keeping an open-mind about what you will find is suggested.

Also with this book, as any other piece of information you read, I suggest that you take what you need an leave the rest.

The Truth About Witchcraft by Scott Cunningham

If you have ever been interested in the facts about witchcraft, or have ever had to deal with non-understanding friends and family members, this book is perfect for you.

Written by Scott Cunningham, author of over 30 books, this book is very clearly and concisely written. At only 56 pages one might overlook this book as a worthwhile source of information, but Cunningham does an excellent job of outlining the various types of magic, the traditions and rules of witchcraft, and the rituals and holidays of the religion.

One of the best parts of this book is how Cunningham dispels the myths and misconceptions of witchcraft by disassociating it from Satanism, and by showing the positive message witchcraft sends. There is a lot of focus on the Wiccan rule of “An it harm none, do what you will.â€�

He also covers the history of witchcraft, and how it came to have the negative societal connotations that some people have, as well as giving advice to overcome the judgments that may be passed.

At the price of $1.99 US, it is a handy book to have to give to friends and family with questions and concerns about the Witches path, or if you are just curious about what witchcraft is really about.

Nefertiti is known around the globe for her magnificent beauty, and as a powerful queen, ruling as co-regent along side her "Heretic King" husband, the pharaoh Ahkenaten.

Part of her infamy may be related to her mysterious disappearance from the royal family during Ahkenaten's reign as king of Egypt. Theories run wild regarding Nefertiti's fate. Some believe the outcast members of Egypt’s once strong priesthood murdered her. Yet, others believe that she changed her name in order to rule after her husband’s death.

British Egyptologist Joanne Fletcher wants to turn theory into fact.

The documentary Nefertiti Resurrected, originally aired on the Discovery Channel, follows Fletcher on her journey to discover the Queen's corpse.

Following clues left behind over thousands of years, Fletcher tracks down a wig that matches the style worn by the royal women of Egypt around the time of Nefertiti's life. Like a detective on a cold case, the Egyptologist tracks down the origin of the wig to a tomb in the Valley of the Kings. Specifically to tomb KV35, and is miraculously granted permission by the Egyptian government to open the tomb.

Armed with a range of equipment ranging from delicate brushes to high tech digital x-ray equipment, Fletcher and her team set out to tomb KV35, determined to discover the mummy of Nefertiti.

The documentary not only follows Fletcher on her journey, but also gives a glimpse of what Egyptologists believe Nefertiti's life may have been like. It paints a portrait of a powerful woman with a military mind, one who is seen by the god Aten, and the Egyptian people as being a god, much like her male counterpart. She is portrayed very much as the women behind Ahkenaten’s rule credited with keeping the nation strong while Ahkenaten revolutionized the Egyptian religion.

Her power, and how the Egyptian people viewed her could be the reason why there is so much speculation as the whether the queen was murdered.

Lady X, the mummy in tomb KV35, thought to be Nefertiti, is found with wounds to her face and abdomen. Could this be proof that the woman was murdered?

The show climaxes with a facial reconstruction of the mummy, and the conclusion that the mummy is a royal female. Some like Fletcher believe that it is indeed Nefertiti's corpse, while the evidence presented does not convince others. There may never be a way to know 100% who the mystery mummy belongs to, but Nefertiti Resurrected lets you take in all of the evidence Joanne Fletcher uncovers and decide for yourself.

Whether she is or isn't the great queen, the glimpse into Egyptian life makes the program more than worthy of renting, and for the Egyptian aficionado it's a great addition to the collection.

Subtitled "recovering the lost wisdom of the ancient world", this work by Colin Wilson is a veritable cornucopia of information on a staggering variety of edge and paranormal topics.

For the student of Egyptology or ancient and speculative history this book would be worth the purchase price just for it's two page bibliography, but that "further reading list" is merely the icing on the cake.

The topics Wilson expertly synopsises in this book are too many to list, but a random sampling, in the order they come to mind are: The West/Schoch sphinx weathering controversy, origin and background of paleontology, ancient maps and the Hapgood story related to them, synchronicity, scientific bases of perception, achieving and understanding altered states, shamanism as related to a unique worldview, Egyptian mysteries, south american mysteries, questions of the validity of current egyptology, the atlantis myth, the genesis of darwinism and it's current state, the "forbidden archaeology" controversy, and a seemingly endless list of other topics.

This work is not simply drawn from Wilson's extensive reading and scholarship (the man owns over 20,000 books), it is also where possible based on direct contact or correspondence with the authorities he cites. In consequence, the book is loaded with tidbits not found elsewhere, leaving the reader always wondering just when the next little gem will pop up.

This book is so well researched and presented that in four years of on and off reference to it I have yet to find any thing it presents as fact which has not been born out by independent research of the sources. If it's in here, you can count on it to be an accurate recounting of the source material.

As a confirmed parnaormal BS'er who loves to gab and play what-if, this book is one of a very few I keep immediately to hand for reference. If I can't recall a name or incident for certain, this book is like a tourist guide to the para; a quick look and the disremembered details are located for ready use.

While I find considerable disagreement with the conclusions Wilson reaches and infers, I have nothing but praise for the masterful scholarship and presentation of this wealth of information. It must be said also that Wilson draws a clear distinction between his own opinions and the source materials he cites. Unlike may authors in this field their is no attempt to confuse and mingle his own musings with the established information he presents.

Highly recommended for anyone from the idly curious to the old timer who has been interested in the paranormal for years.


WhiteTiger

Discovery Channel has aired a program called Unsolved History: Roswell, in which they have discussed three early UFO cases: Arnold Sighting, Roswell Incident, and Thomas Mantell Encounter.

As expected it is a skeptical show. I have always maintained that there is nothing wrong for being skeptical, but Discovery Channel should have done better than this. In general I feel that the show was not very well researched.

The program started with the Kenneth Arnold Sightings in 1947. On June 24, 1947, Kenneth Arnold saw something that would mark the start of the modern UFO era. Kenneth Arnold was a recreational private pilot. He was returning home from a flight in Wyoming when he received a radio signal requesting assistance in the Yakima, Washington area. It seems there was a missing troop transport and an aerial search party was being assembled. At 3:00 p.m., flying at 9,000 feet, a bright flash of light caught Arnold's attention. Turning to look out of the side window of his airplane, Arnold was amazed to see 9 objects flying in formation. The objects were brightly lit from reflection of the Sun. He commented that the object moved as if “skipping on the water like saucerâ€�. From this the term Flying Saucer was coined.

Unsolved History: Roswell reconstructed the scene by flying over the mountain area and retaking the routes Kenneth Arnold had taken more than 50 years ago. They had discovered that Kenneth Arnold had made a mistake when judging the altitude of the UFOs. Arnold claimed that the UFOs were at about 10000 feet high, i.e. the same height as the mountain which is at the same height as he was. They showed that this is erroneous because the mountain is not that high. Hence they concluded that Kenneth Arnold judgment of high and distance is unreliable. So far so good, maybe Arnold did make a mistake or maybe he did have a poor judgment of altitude.

However, Arnold also mentioned the incredible speed of the UFOs, which if his account is to be believed, is close to twice the speed of sound, which is not possible for Earth aircraft to perform in 1947. Arnold estimated the speed of the objects by keeping track of how long the objects took to travel from one mountain height to another. The distance between the two mountains’ top was of course, known. I do not understand how the Discovery Channel was able to conclude that this estimate is wrong just because Arnold may have made a bad estimate of altitude. In this case Arnold only needs to know the time the objects took to travel, which he did record down in details up to seconds. It is a vastly different skill from judging altitude.

Then the expert raised the doubt of no sonic boom was reported even though the UFOs were supposedly travel at near Mach 2. They said that UFO believers would likely claim that an alien advanced enough to visit Earth would know how not to produce sonic boom, which according to them is somewhat not true because everything must obey the law of physics. I must at this point, ask, what laws of physics are they suggesting? We have had Newtonian Physics only a couple hundred years ago, and we had quantum physics less than a century ago. Astronomers have estimated that if extraterrestrial civilizations exist, some of them would be far more advanced than us: thousands, millions, even billions years far ahead than us. How are we supposed to comprehend what can or cannot be done by a civilization that advanced? A billion years ago the most advanced life form on Earth is the worm. How arrogant are we to judge the capability of beings with physics a billion years more advanced than us? We may forget about all these arguments however and just concentrate on what is being raised: the lack of sonic boom. Former NASA scientist Paul R. Hill had already mentioned in his well written book “Unconventional Flying Objects: A Scientific Analysisâ€� that with force field technology one could possibly break the sound barrier without creating sonic boom. Yet Discovery Channel made no mention about this piece of research.

The Discovery Channel crew retracing Arnold flight path also managed to film a reflection image on the window of the airplane which they said look like UFO, and proceeded to say that Arnold’s UFOs were probably reflections too. However there were 9 objects allegedly flying in formation, not a single image of reflection which is quite obvious to be reflection anyway, especially to a pilot.

The program then moves on to discuss the famous Roswell Incident. In July 1947 something crashed in New Mexico. This later became the most well known UFO incidents. Stories told of crashed craft and alien bodies were retrieved by the US military. Being an elaborate and relatively well known story, I shall not give the background of the case. If you wish to learn more about Roswell Incident background story you may refer to the UFO Casebook website: http://www.ufocasebook.com/Roswell1.html

The US military most recent explanation of the Roswell Incident is that the object that crashed was a balloon, but not a weather balloon as claimed in the 1947 cover story. It was presumably balloon from Project Mogul. The spy balloon in Project Mogul was being developed to eavesdrop on soviet atomic tests. The military also claimed that test dummies had been dropped from high altitude in many missions in New Mexico, and the experiments were so top secret that not even the New Mexico military bases personnel was informed. It is then argued that witnesses may have mixed up the balloon crashed incident and the test dummies being retrieved and combined it into one story of alien bodies and UFO crash.

The Discovery Channel demonstrated the fallibility of human memories by conducting a simple experiment in charged by a cognitive psychologist. The experiment is well designed and it did demonstrate what it intended to. In fact it is well known that memories are reconstructive, not videotaped, and hence they are not accurate and may distort even only after one month. Yes, I agree that this means we must always be careful of witness testimonies. It is a well known fact in forensic psychology. However the Discovery Channel’s attempt in explaining away the Roswell Incident based solely on the acceptance of the Project Mogul and dropped test dummies explanations and the fallibility of human memories is very superficial. There is no mention whatsoever of research conducted by serious researchers like nuclear physicist Stanton Friedman. There was also no mention of an article from the “International UFO Reporterâ€�, Summer 1998, Volume 23, Number 2, which is written by a civil engineer. The article presented some doubts over the Project Mogul explanation. Discovery Channel is clearly bias or at least not well informed. They also have reconstructed scenes of what they believed had happened: that of a dropped dummy being retrieved. Ridiculously the test dummy was sealed up in a body bag and carried as if it was real body!

Next is the Thomas Mantell fatal UFO encounter on January 7, 1948. In brief, Thomas Mantel was a military pilot who crashed and died while pursuing a UFO at high altitude. Most probably he lost consciousness due to the lack of oxygen and the plane crashed.You may refer to the UFO Casebook website for the details of the case: http://ufocasebook.com/Mantell.html. The Air Force claimed that Mantell had been chasing planet Venus, which was not at high altitude on that day. Also it was in broad daylight and planet Venus which was only half magnitude that day is virtually invisible. They then turned to a balloon and Venus, then even two balloons as explanations. Most recent explanation is the top secret Skyhook balloon, which the military who tried to give explanation to the case was not aware of at that time.

The Discovery Channel again recreated the scene of what could have happened to Mantell. They showed how a Skyhook balloon would look like at high altitude under precise lighting condition of that fateful day. I must admit this is a good job but again they did not perform sufficient research to establish whether it is in fact a balloon after all that Mantell had encountered.

According to information compiled by Lee R. Trail from Kentucky MUFON, a Skyhook balloon has been reported by retired balloon scientist Charles Moore as having been launched from Camp Ripley, Minnesota, the day before. Skyhook, when fully inflated, was 105 feet tall and 73 feet in diameter. “The balloon lifted to 90,000 feet. If over Franklin at 90,000 feet (If Skyhook could have been seen 85-miles away on a clear, hazy day) it should have been seen at nine degrees above the horizon from Ft. Knox, KY. At nine degrees above the horizon (if over Franklin at 90,000 feet) as viewed from Godman Field, the reported 45 degrees makes no sense. Also, reports of movement of the object seen at Godman were toward the west. The 85 miles high balloon [at 45 degrees from Ft. Knox] should have been perceived as moving from right to left, getting lower and smaller as it moved away. These glaring inconsistencies are not reconciled by balloon-proponents who are willing to dismiss everything except that a balloon was somewhere in the general area, sometime during the day.

This is of course not to say that what Mantell saw was not a balloon because it could be. No one could ever be sure what Mantell had seen that day before he crashed to his death. So for this case the Discovery Channel probably did a much better job than their coverage on Arnold Sighting and Roswell Incident. This however is because of the nature of the case, not that they had actually did any better job in term of investigation technique.

Then at the end of the show the "expert" claimed that Government cannot keep secret for decades, and that if they did retrieve a crashed alien craft, the news will travel probably in 10 minutes or so. This is completely bogus. Somehow the "expert" does not realise that secret can be kept, and they had been, and will always be some secrets that remained "classified". That's what security clearances are for. If no secret could be kept, why bother to classify anything? For example, stealth fighter projects were kept secret for decades and some of these crafts contributed to some UFO reports of those days. As a whole, the program is poorly done. As an educational channel, they should have presented a much more balance view regarding the cases they presented.

Ong Yen Chin MUFON 3 February 2005

Micheal Norman and Beth Scott have put together an awsome collection of american ghost stories based on eye witness accounts , interviews , unearthed ancient archives , overheard tales and actual paranormal visitations. Explorations on spectral lights in New England to beyond the grave occurrences in the Badlands .Haunted Heritage is a great read. This book is the latsest in the Haunted America series a must have for your ghost libary. My personal favorite story was about the ghost lovers. Check this book out! " Two thumbs up"

For anyone interested in the history, myth or otherwise, about King Arthur and Avalon, would do well to grab a copy of this book. I found this in my local library recently and had to read it straight through. It is written by two Welshmen-Steve Blake and Scott Lloyd-who have done extensive research into the history of Arthur. Was he a mere myth? Not so. Was he ever King of England? Not so! He was a true blooded Welshman. You may think that that was going to be obvious coming from two Welshmen, but don't you poopoo this. The research is thorough, they have travelled extensively over the UK and Europe looking for documentation, local stories (folklore) songs, rumours, place names and more! The book has a lot of Welsh names, obviously, which can be a bit daunting, but you can do what I do and invent your own pronunciation(this is to speed up the reading) I did however, fall in love with the language! In the book we learn that Arthur was conceived at a place called Dindagol, not Tintagel. That Avalon was really Gwent(sp?) in North Wales, not Cornwall.(I can verify that N.Wales is definately the 'land of the mist'!) He spent most of his time fighting for lands in Wales or fighting the English(Anglo Saxons). The name Brittania is proved to be an ancient name for Wales, so the Welsh were the ones who were British. The notion of Arthur travelling as far as Hadrians wall is a myth, the 'wall' is elsewhere, he didn't fight the Scotts in or near their own land. I won't spoil the story by saying too much, I have given you some hints and those interested can go and read the book. Blake and Loyd go into a lot of cross referencing, giving tables of the mis-translations from Welsh to Latin to English, and taking pains to explain how one words gets transcribed incorrectly and we end up with another picture. There is also a vein of deceit, skullduggery and myth-making in our past history which is revealed by the authors. If you don't mind following the technical bits then this book is a must for all 'Arthurians'. It leaves you with the question 'What the hell was the true English history if this era was based on a fabrication! There is also a juicy hint that the story of Joseph of Aramathea (now linked with the famed Glastonbury) can also be re-written. But the guys are saving this discovery for another book! There is loads more to read in this delicious tome, so grab your chocolate, your tipple and your fave chair 'cause you'll get engrossed in the mystery and conspiracy of this enjoyable book.

Troy Taylor has done it again! This book disscuses death customs from long ago to present day and proven sightings.Find out about the last resting place of some truely famous people. Beyond the Grave is a definite must have for ghosts fans and investigators alike. Great book!