Free Republic

Did a Comet Cause the Great Flood?The universal human myth may be the first example of disaster reporting. by Scott Carney11-15-2007 The Fenambosy chevrons at the tip of Madagascar. Image courtesy of Dallas Abbott The serpent’s tails coil together menacingly. A horn juts sharply from its head. The creature looks as if it might be swimming through a sea of stars. Or is it making its way up a sheer basalt cliff? For Bruce Masse, an environmental archaeologist at Los Alamos National Laboratory, there is no confusion as he looks at this ancient petroglyph, scratched into a rock by a...

German town wants its own Great Pyramid By Bojan Pancevski in Berlin, Sunday Telegraph Last Updated: 12:17am BST 02/09/2007 The pharaohs may have set the standard, but German entrepreneurs are hoping to challenge Egypt's pre-eminence in monumental self-indulgence by building the world's largest pyramid. The pyramid of tombstones planned at Dessau They have secured €90,000 (£61,000) in state funding to assess the feasibility of building a 1,600ft tall "Great Pyramid" near the town of Dessau, in the impoverished east German state of Saxony-Anhalt. Like the original Great Pyramid at Giza in Egypt, this would be a place of burial. But...

Among the 110 Hoquiam High School seniors who will graduate tonight is one remarkable young woman. Hope Hunderfund is known as a star on the High School’s golf team, one of the school’s top scholars, a dedicated volunteer, member of the Renaissance Club and president of the Future Business Leaders of America. “There are a lot of people in school … who probably think I’m just some preppie, popular kid,” the 18-year-old said. “They have no idea.” Indeed, Hope, with big blue eyes and an ever-present smile, could have grown up to be the stereotype she knows she resembles. As...

How Alexander the Great used 'Mother Nature' By Roger Highfield, Science Editor Last Updated: 1:45am BST 15/05/2007 Alexander the Great had ''Mother Nature'' on his side when he conquered the island fortress of Tyre in 332 BC, says a study published today. A bust of Alexander the Great Tyre, in present day Lebanon, was then a strategic coastal base in the war between the Greeks and the Persians. Now archeologists have at last worked out how Alexander's engineers managed to build a causeway to enable his army to conquer what had become a bastion of resistance. All previous settlements on...

Law enforcement officers in Tennessee make the greatest underground discovery since Tutankhamen’s tomb was unearthed in the Valley of the Kings.

Source: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Date: March 23, 2007 The Next Great Earthquake Science Daily ? The 2004 Sumatra-Andaman earthquake and resulting tsunami are now infamous for the damage they caused, but at the time many scientists believed this area was unlikely to create a quake of such magnitude. In the March 23 issue of the journal Science, a geophysicist from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute urges the public and policy makers to consider all subduction-type tectonic boundaries to be "locked, loaded, and dangerous." Subduction Zones (blue curves) and tectonic boundaries (brown curves) with filled circles showing locations of known earthquakes of M7.5...

Scientists have unearthed remains of a primate that could have been ancestral not only to humans but to all great apes, including chimps and gorillas. The partial skeleton of this 13-million-year-old "missing link" was found by palaeontologists working at a dig site near Barcelona in Spain. Details of the sensational discovery appear in Science magazine. The new specimen was probably male, a fruit-eater and was slightly smaller than a chimpanzee, researchers say. Palaeontologists were just getting started at the dig when a bulldozer churned up a tooth. Further investigation yielded one of the most complete ape skeletons known from...

How do I create a tagline? Couldn't find directions anywhere. Thanks!

Source: University of Washington Released: Mon 07-Aug-2006, 15:10 ET Ancient Bison Teeth Provide Window on Past Great Plains Climate, Vegetation Scientists have devised a way to use the fossil teeth of ancient bison as a tool to reconstruct historic climate and vegetation changes in America's breadbasket, the Great Plains.The third molar from a bison jawbone grows to 3 inches in length and has several times more surface area than a quarter. Newswise — A University of Washington researcher has devised a way to use the fossil teeth of ancient bison as a tool to reconstruct historic climate and vegetation changes...

Under tremendous pressure, mullahs agree to renovate tomb of "Cyrus the Great" May 29, 2006 Thanks to Iranian arab-parast, tomb of founder of Iran Zamin covered with dust but tomb of their beloved cowered arab imam whom ran away to Iran for dear life, covered with gold Under tremendous pressure by Iranian People, mullahs agree to renovate tomb of "Cyrus the Great". A team of experts have recently began renovating the tomb of Cyrus the Great at the ancient site of Pasargad in southern province of Fars. Several megaliths of the tomb have been stolen over time and the renovation...

Ancient engraved chessboards found on Great Wall Archaeologists have found two ancient engraved chessboards probably used by soldiers on the Great Wall more than 700 years ago at Qinhuangdao, North China's Hebei Province. The two boards, one for Chinese chess and the other for the ancient game "Tiger Eats Sheep", were engraved on a stone in front of a Great Wall beacon tower possibly in the Song Dynasty (960-1279), said officials with the provincial department of cultural relics. Archaeologists believe that soldiers from all parts of ancient China used to play chess to while away the time on the remote...

Palace of Darius the Great Discovered in Bolaghi Gorge Discovery of remains of a gigantic palace in Bolaghi Gorge and its similarity to the constructions of the time of Darius I, Achaemenid King, in Persepolis show that it was built during the same period of time. Tehran, 15 May 2006 (CHN) -- Iran-French joint archeology team at Bolaghi Gorge succeeded in discovering and identifying the remains of a gigantic palace, believed to be from the Achaemenid era (648 BC–330 BC), during their second season of excavations in the area. “Before the start of this season of excavations, our geophysical tests...

Wolves, wolf-hybrids suspected culprits in bloody predations... his herd of 700 sheep. But something had gotten there before him. Everywhere he looked, it seemed, there was a sheep that had been attacked and bloodied. "It was terrible," he said. "Some of them just had a chunk of flesh tore out, in some cases clear to the bone, the size of an orange. A few were bit in the neck." A few of the sheep could be doctored, but many of them died... of the 60 that were attacked, 21 died and 39 were injured. On top of that, the percentage...

As the scent of burning electrical wire and the pulverized dust settled over Manhattan in the wake of the 2001 World Trade Center attack, a certain book disappeared from New York City bookstore shelves. Within a week, that book rocketed from No. 8,000 to No. 125 on Amazon.com rankings. It described the nature of fanatics, offering a powerful window of understanding into the people capable of blowing up those two towers. "The True Believer" was published in 1951. Its author, Eric Hoffer, was a self-educated longshoreman born in New York City to a German cabinetmaker and his wife. His keen...

WASHINGTON, March 1, 2006 – U.S. military reserve forces are better trained and at a higher state of readiness than they've ever been as they continue to take on their new operational role in the war on terror, senior reserve-component leaders said here today. "We've all been to the battlefield; we've all been out to see our people, and I have to tell you, they are the best of the best. We have never had a fighting force like we have today," said Army Command Sgt. Maj. Lawrence W. Holland, senior enlisted advisor in the Office of the Assistant Secretary...

TBN EXPOSED! Hal Lindsey Refuses to Compromise to Stay on Air!Here is the letter written by Hal Lindsey to Paul and Jan Crouch, of TBN....(way to go Hal!) Hal Lindsey Leaving TBN http://www.hallindseyoracle.com/articles.asp?ArticleID=12286 Refuses to Compromise to Stay on Air January 1, 2006 Dear Paul and Jan, Paul, Jr. relayed your message to me that you are both in agreement on the policy of nothing negative being said on TBN about Muslims. Hearing that you also warned John Haggee, Perry Stone, Jack VanImpe and others of this policy caused me to realize that your are not going to modify your...

January 2, 2006 Memorial of Saint Basil the Great and Saint Gregory Nazianzen, bishops and doctors of the Church Psalm: Monday 4 Reading I1 Jn 2:22-28 Beloved:Who is the liar? Whoever denies that Jesus is the Christ. Whoever denies the Father and the Son, this is the antichrist. Anyone who denies the Son does not have the Father,but whoever confesses the Son has the Father as well. Let what you heard from the beginning remain in you. If what you heard from the beginning remains in you,then you will remain in the Son and in the Father. And this is...

Romans may have learned from Chinese Great Wall: archaeologists The construction of the Roman Limes was quite possibly influenced by the concept of the Great Wall in China, though the two great buildings of the world are far away from each other, said archaeologists and historians. Although there is no evidence that the two constructions had any direct connections, indirect influence from the Great Wall on the Roman Limes is certain, said Visy Zsolt, a professor with the Department of Ancient History and Archaeology of the University of Pecs in Hungary. Visy made the remarks in an interview with Xinhua...

The economic indicators are painting a very bullish picture of the U.S. economy. In fact, the ongoing flow of good-news data has led President Bush to proclaim that the U.S. economy continues to gain strength and momentum, “thanks to good old-fashioned American hard work and productivity innovation, and sound economic policies of cutting taxes and restraining spending.” Fifty percent sound economic policy (in particular lower tax rates) is better than nothing. The U.S. economy grew faster during the third quarter of 2005 than initially thought. The seasonally adjusted annual growth rate of 4.3 percent was much stronger than the 3.8...

BAGHDAD, Dec. 8, 2005 – Iraqi and coalition officials have great hopes for the success of Dec. 15 national elections, officials here said on background today. Senior American officials said the elections are another important step in the evolution of Iraq from a country beat down by 30 years of tyranny to a functioning democracy. The elections are another opportunity for the Iraqi people to separate themselves from the terrorists who continue to try to intimidate Iraqis. The Iraqi people understand that al Qaeda in Iraq and other terrorist groups have only an incidental interest in the country, officials said....