WikiLeaks: new diplomatic cables contain UFO details, Julian Assange says
Assange said there were some references to extraterrestrial life in yet-to-be-published confidential files obtained from the American government. He did not disclose what information was contained in the diplomatic memos obtained by the whistleblowing website. It also remains unclear when they will be published.
Mr Assange said his website, under considerable strain in recent days over its “Cablegate” series of leaks, received emails from “weirdos” claiming to have seen UFOs.
Mr Assange’s comments were made during a webchat with The Guardian, during which he confirmed his team were taking security precautions due to “threats against our lives”.
Full article at Telegraph
The Skeptic’s Dictionary Short and Irreverent E-dition
Some of the definitions in the Skeptic’s Dictionary will bring a smile to anyone’s face. I (Phillis) own a copy and whilst it reads a little like a joke book of debunking, it’s always interesting. Not to be taken too seriously it’s a lot of fun and if you want a nice little taster the website is featuring it’s favourites. Here’s a few of ours:
Angel therapy: pretending to get messages from angels to guide patients; good way to avoid liability.
Dolphin-assisted therapy: swimming with animals that may be diseased and may bite in order to enhance one’s sense of wellbeing.
Mozart effect: marketing strategy for a number of devices, including music CDs: claim listening to Mozart’s music while in the womb will make your child smarter; recommended by 9 out of 10 politicians ignorant of science and basic human development.
More at Skepdic
Dictionary available from Amazon here
Hundreds of CIA Brainwash victims win claims
HUNDREDS of mentally ill patients who were subjected to barbaric CIA-funded brainwashing experiments by a Scottish doctor could be entitled to compensation following a landmark court ruling. Doctor Ewan Cameron, who became one of the world’s leading psychiatrists, developed techniques used by Nazi scientists to wipe out the existing personalities of people in his care.
Cameron, who graduated from Glasgow University, was recruited by the CIA during the cold war while working at McGill University in Montreal, Canada. He carried out mind-control experiments using drugs such as LSD on hundreds of patients, but only 77 of them were awarded compensation.
Now a landmark ruling by a Federal Court judge in Montreal will allow more than 250 former patients, whose claims were rejected, to seek compensation. Gail Kastner, who underwent electroshock treatment at a Montreal psychiatric institute in 1953, and whose claim was rejected 10 years ago, successfully appealed the judgment.
Last week, Alan Stein, of Montreal law firm Stein and Stein, which represented Kastner, confirmed he was in the process of contacting former clients who could now renew their appeal. Kastner was a 19-year-old honours student suffering from mild depression when she first underwent “treatment” in 1953. On returning home she sucked her thumb, demanded to be fed from a bottle, talked in a baby voice and urinated on the floor.
She was ostracised by her affluent family, who were unable to cope with her changed state, and her marriage in 1955 quickly broke down due to her difficulties.
Full story at The Times Online
FOX FAIL: The planet Jupiter confused for UFO
DISCOVER Blogs reports: “ I know a lot of the media do their best when it comes to reporting science and astronomical-related stories, but sometimes they seem to go way out of their way — or, more accurately, not go out of their way at all — to report nonsense.
Case in point: Fox News in New York City. Yesterday, there were UFO reports from all over the city. Not to keep you in suspense, but those UFOs were actually hundreds of balloons released on Broadway to celebrate a visit by Madrid officials. You can see more about this by my friend Ben Radford and at Science-Based Parenting.
Pay attention around 35 seconds in. That star she spends a lot of time talking about is the planet Jupiter.”
To see their full story along with further evidence of really awful reporting check out Bad Astronomy.
Chief scientist who questioned evolution theory fired
“The Education Ministry’s chief scientist, Dr. Gavriel Avital, was dismissed on Monday following a scandal-filled trial period of less than a year.
Sources familiar with the affair said Avital was fired over past statements he had made, in which he questioned evolution and the global warming theory.
Avital, who was named chief scientist in December 2009, said Darwinism should be analyzed critically along with biblical creationism.
“If textbooks state explicitly that human beings’ origins are to be found with monkeys, I would want students to pursue and grapple with other opinions. There are many people who don’t believe the evolutionary account is correct,” he said.
“There are those for whom evolution is a religion and are unwilling to hear about anything else. Part of my responsibility, in light of my position with the Education Ministry, is to examine textbooks and curricula,”
Avital added, “If they keep writing in textbooks that the Earth is growing warmer because of carbon dioxide emissions, I’ll insist that isn’t the case.”"
Read more at Y Net News
Life of a Navy surgeon: Rum, worms and tobacco cures
“Blood letting, tobacco smoke blown into the lungs, rum rubs and even the sight of Australia were some of the treatments used – with varying degrees of success – by surgeons of Britain’s Royal Navy to treat patients from the late 1700s to the late 1800s, government records released Friday show.
Britain’s National Archives has cataloged and made available to the public journals and diaries from surgeons who served on ships and in shore installations from 1793 to 1880. The archive represents “probably the most significant collection of records for the study of health and medicine at sea for the 19th century,” said Bruno Pappalardo, naval records specialist at the National Archives.
Rum was the treatment of choice aboard HMS Arab during a voyage to the West Indies in 1799 and 1800. A surgeon writes that “application of rum” to the area of a scorpion or centipede bite helps prevent paralysis. The same surgeon mixed rum with oil to treat a tarantula bite.
Aboard HMS Princess Royal in 1801, tobacco was thought to have curative properties. A man who had fallen overboard and was submerged for 12 minutes was brought back aboard the Princess Royal with the appearance of a corpse, surgeon Ben Lara wrote. The victim was dried and warmed by hot water bottles and then tobacco smoke was pumped into his lungs through a tube. After almost an hour of treatment, a pulse was detected and the man lived, according to the journal.
Aboard the convict ship Albion in 1828, surgeon Thomas Logan wrote that the spirits of the convicts when they catch first sight of their destination in New South Wales, Australia, is lifted so much that “the horde of trifling cases which were used daily to assail us has disappeared. They seem to have left off getting sick, or are become indifferent about being cured!””
Read more at CNN (Thanks @XxLadyClaireXx)
The Bronnikov Method
As looked into during Derren Brown Investigates – The Man With The X-Ray Eyes, The Bronnikov method has also been investigated by EsoTV.
(Thanks Alexander)
Residents phoned 999 dozens of times over ‘ghost and UFO worries’
“Worried residents phoned 999 to report sightings of ghosts and UFOs, including a man who claimed to have seen the spirit of actor Paul Newman, a force has disclosed. Officers say one emergency call came from a man who rang police claiming to have seen the ghosts of ”two old ladies in a white Fiesta” on a dual carriageway. Other worried calls came from people who spotted ghosts or poltergeists on CCTV cameras and another who said he’d seen a ghost which could ”make me a million quid”. Dozens more calls were also made claiming to have seen aliens including one man reporting that his wife and dog were being abducted by Martians.
More than 150 calls, details of which were released under the Freedom of Information Act, claimed to have seen spooks or UFOs were made to Devon and Cornwall Police over the past 15 years. One caller claimed a spectre gave him a ”horrible hairstyle and some dodgy photos. Ghost is Paul Newman.” In one case in October 2003, the force recorded: ”Caller states he has got a ghost on CCTV. Caller wanted advice on who he could contact as the footage was going to make him a million. Advised to go to the press.” In July 2004 someone from Newton Abbot in Devon reported seeing a ”ghost driver” on the A38. The police log recorded: ”Two old ladies in white Fiesta – come onto the A38B carriageway on the off slip facing the wrong way. Stopped on the hard shoulder, trying to reverse back up the off slip.” A man in Callington, Cornwall, reported his wife and dog being abducted by aliens, while another said he’d seen UFO over a pie factory in Okehampton, Devon.
Other 999 calls were made to report ”a long, white cylinder thing like a train in the sky” and ”orange balls moving slowly upwards and in all different directions”. A spokesman for Devon and Cornwall Police said most of the incidents were logged as ”non attendance” or ”routine” although in some cases officers were forced to respond. ”Our call centre operators take many types of calls and the vast majority are for emergencies or relate to non urgent inquiries of one type or another,” he said. ”There are occasions though when a more unusual call is received. “These are all dealt with professionally by our highly trained staff who access and process them in an appropriate way.” ”
Read more at The Telegraph
Mafia using football show to send messages to jailed bosses
The Telegraph is making the claim that Italian gangsters are using a TV’s shows text ticker to send coded messages to their jailed bosses.
The Italian programme, which is hosted by a former showgirl, allows football fans to send SMS text messages which then run along a ticker tape at the bottom of the screen when the show is being broadcast.
Anti-mafia prosecutors believe that members of organised crime gangs have caught onto the interactive feature, sending seemingly innocuous comments and remarks which in fact contain important messages for imprisoned mafia godfathers, many of whom continue to run their criminal empires despite being behind bars. One of the messages, allegedly of significance for a jailed criminal mastermind, simply read: “All is well, Paolo”. Full article here.
This is not the first case of an incident like this – in the past there have been multiple claims about hidden codes displayed in public such as the very recent FBI accusations about Russian spies using US newspapers to hide messages in newspapers. This was also a main theme of the film A Beautiful Mind based on the life of John Nash, the inventor of Game Theory. So whilst it may seem inventive for some, the idea stetches back to the 1930′s.
The Diana Conspiracy – an alternative viewpoint
When you put it like this you see the Diana conspiracy claims in a different light. From the awesome Mitchell and Webb look.
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