The Dark Star: The Planet X Evidence (37 page)

The area of real concern for me is whether the catastrophic end of
the last Ice Age some 11,000 years ago marked a shift into a new Interglacial
period, or whether it catastrophically plunged the Earth out of the
long-standing Ice Epoch. If it is the latter, which seems likely, given the
scientific evidence cited by many catastrophists, as well as in the traditions
recorded by many ancient peoples in their myths, then the complete recession of
the 4 million year old Ice Epoch should eventually lead us towards a point
where all of the world's ice disappears over time, and global warming gets a
firm grip on the entire planet.

The ice caps will become a thing of the past once again, and the
planet's global climate will return to the sort of warmth that allowed the
dinosaurs to thrive, even at the poles of the Earth! It's an alarming thought.

These complex issues are not new. Before the realization dawned on
the scientific community, and our wider society, about the consequences of
accelerated global warming, the consensus was that the Earth would likely cool
again. This was because the interglacial period currently enjoyed was simply
one of a number of such warm intermissions, set within a three to four million
year long Ice Epoch. Those interglacial periods were determined solely by
orbital considerations, in other words, the Milankovitch Cycles. Because
previous interglacial periods had begun to wind up after about 10,000 years,
then it was expected that glaciers would start to grow once again during this
modern period.

However, more recent research has indicated that this is by no
means a 'normal' interglacial period. In fact, our world has continued to
slowly warm long after it should have started to cool. It has been suggested
that this shift from the normal climate-change pattern, associated so closely
with the Milankovitch Cycle, began as long ago as 6000 BCE. Concentrations of
carbon dioxide and methane in the atmosphere are already starting to appear
anomalously high 8,000 years ago, and have continued that trend since then.

Although the cause is not known, it seems clear that the general
principle of the Milankovitch Cycle, that has dominated our global climate for
4 million years, has been broken. Such a change is coincident with the
ascendance of human civilization, and has been linked to the invention and
early promulgation of agriculture.
¹⁶
But it should also be
remembered that Ice Epochs have drawn to a close before. Humans were not around
at those points in time. Such major shifts in global climate call for solutions
related to the Earth's place in the Cosmos.

The scientific community has a fairly detailed record of Earth's
geo-history that shows that it is incredibly unstable as far as climate is
concerned, and that breath-taking changes can occur in just decades. This adds
uncertainty to an already chaotic picture regarding the Earth's present global
climate changes. That uncertainty means that science cannot predict whether the
Earth will warm steadily towards a runaway greenhouse effect, or whether the
balance of climate regulation on the planet will be self-correcting, or whether
we will eventually be plunged back into a new Ice Age.

This is why it is so vital to discover whether there is a Dark
Star orbiting the sun. If there is, as I firmly believe, then I contend that
its presence is the causal factor between the comings and goings of Ice Epochs.
Put simply, the Earth's distance from the sun should no longer be considered a
constant, but is instead a variable. During periods of hundreds of millions of
years, it was close enough to the sun to banish all ice from the surface of
this planet.

We may now be returning to those times. During the Ice Epochs, the
Earth orbited slightly further away from the sun. This caused the
inter-continental glaciers to form, broken up occasionally only by the vagaries
of the Earth's wobbles and eccentricities.

The reason why the Earth's radius of orbit varies is because of
the instability of the Dark Star's own loosely-bound orbit. The energies of the
orbits of all the planets in the solar system are necessarily interwoven, and
the Dark Star holds the key to them all. If the Earth is now warming up out of
a four million-year old Ice Epoch, then it reasonable to assume that Mars is
similarly warming from its own Ice Epoch. Maybe that explains recent evidence
of water movements on the red planet.

Venus should also be warming catastrophically, perhaps implying
that during its own “Colder Epoch” conditions on this inner planet were once
not so extreme. (It would be quite wrong to associate the word “ice” with
Venus. A colder period on this hellish planet would simply amount to turning
the oven temperature down a notch.)

If we have fully emerged from the last Ice Epoch, rather than
simply enjoying a warm interglacial interlude, then this is directly
attributable to a fairly recent shift in the orbit of the Dark Star. The
consequences of this shift are significant.

It would mean that the complete ice caps of the planet Earth are
under considerable threat. This threat has been massively added to by our own
industrial activities of the last few hundred years. The coastal and lowlying
areas of the Earth's landmasses will become permanently flooded as the caps
melt, probably catastrophically at some point...maybe soon.

Our planet as a whole is going to be getting a lot warmer -
whether we inadvertently contribute to that effect or not - through our
emissions of greenhouse gases. This is a very serious situation, one whose
understanding rests completely upon the detection of the sun's binary solar
companion. There is simply no time to waste.

¹
J. Hills “The Passage of a “Nemesis”-like Object through the
Planetary System” Astron. J. 90, 1876 (1985)

²
Correspondence with Dr. Daniel Whitmire and Dr. John Matese, 5th
March 2001, reproduced with their permission given at the time of
correspondence.

³
B. Greene “The Elegant Universe” Jonathan Cape 1999

⁴
Correspondence with Dr.
R. Fitzpatrick, 29th January 2002

⁵
J. Gribbin & M. Gribbin “Ice Age” Allen Lane, the Penguin
Press 2001

⁶
Grayson (Ed) “Equinox: The Earth”: 'Ice Warriors' by P. Simons,
pp126-7, Channel 4 Books, 2000

⁷
Jet Propulsion Laboratory “Scientists see Earth Move in
Antarctica”
http://geodynamics.jpl.nasa.gov/antarctica/mblproject.html
14th December 2000

⁸
M. Edwards “Glacial Records Depict Ice Age Climate In Synch
Worldwide” National Science Foundation 24/3/04, With thanks to James Monds

⁹
Horizon “Snowball Earth” Shown on BBC2, 22nd Feb 2001

¹⁰
Illinois State Museum “Ice Ages”
http://www.museum.state.il.us/exhibits/ice_ages/

¹¹
G. Hancock “Fingerprints of the Gods” p490-495 Mandarin 1995

¹²
D.S. Allan & J.B. Delair “When the Earth Nearly Died” p16,
Gateway Books, Bath 1995

¹³
R. & R. Flem-Ath “Atlantis and the Earth's Shifting Crust”
http://www.flem-ath.com/del1.htm

¹⁴
R. & R. Flem-Ath “When the Sky Fell” Stoddart, Canada 1995

¹⁵
R. Flem-Ath & C. Wilson “The Atlantis Blueprint” Warner 2001

¹⁶
W. Ruddiman “How did Humans First Alter Global Climate?”
Scientific American, Vol. 292, No. 3, p34-41, March 2005

19. Is This Our Nemesis?

In this book I have set out my own particular view of the Dark
Star. I have placed this within its proper historical setting, drawing upon the
various other ideas about Planet X, which have been talked about by scientists
and members of the general public alike. My Dark Star is very similar to the
concept of Nemesis, at least in terms of its stellar qualities. However, my
Dark Star is right at the bottom of the range of objects that might constitute
Nemesis.

In the mid 1980s, the concept of a binary companion called Nemesis
was big news. Discussion about whether it could be a real possibility filled
serious scientific journals of the day. It even made the front cover of Time
magazine.
¹
Media coverage was not always particularly kind, probably
because the idea seemed so speculative, yet awesome in its magnitude.

I wonder whether people are all that comfortable with the thought
that scientists might be able to predict apocalyptic events through their study
of astronomy. Perhaps it drags Science into the realm of Religion, especially
the controversial Christian vision of “Armageddon”. This is an area that many
scientists themselves feel less than comfortable delving into. So, it is little
wonder that scorn was also poured upon the “Nemesis” theory by many scientists
at that time.

Dr. Richard Muller, one of the scientists who first proposed
“Nemesis”
²
, still thinks that the hypothesis remains viable, despite
a widespread misconception that the case for Nemesis had been disproved. He
concedes that the orbital path of Nemesis would be currently unstable. However,
its variability over time answers this problem because, as his astronomical
colleague Piet Hut showed, its initial lifetime at the beginning of the solar
system was 6 billion years.
¹

I think that Dr. Muller is quite right to argue that the case for
Nemesis is still an open one. Indeed, our more up-to-date knowledge of brown
dwarfs has re-ignited the debate. I think that Nemesis is a very small brown
dwarf, not a significantly larger red or brown dwarf as initially envisioned.
That makes questions about its current lack of detection easier to counter.

But, that's where my agreement with the Nemesis theorists ends. I
don't think that an orbit of 26, or 30, million years is the answer. Instead, I
see a much closer bound object as a more viable prospect. An orbit of thousands
of years, rather than millions, makes more sense.

It seems to me that the extinction cycle, proposed by Raup and
Sepkoski
³
, remains unproven, because the data it relies upon is too
narrow in its scope. It may turn out to be correct in time, perhaps as our
knowledge of cratering patterns on other worlds adds to this data. However, I
would argue that we should not pin the whole of the Nemesis/Dark Star argument
onto the back of this particular beast. The alleged cyclical pattern of comet
bombardment may be a statistical illusion. Profound changes to our planet over
time are not.

In the Chapter,Ice Age, I proposed that the variability of the
Dark Star was itself the causal factor for catastrophe. The nature of its
loosely bound, eccentric orbit leads to change over time that has momentous
implications for climate and life on this planet. I hope that this concept may
help to move the debate about Nemesis onto a new footing. After all, the stakes
could hardly be greater. There are changes afoot on planet Earth which urgently
require an explanation.

Mankind has an amazing propensity for self-inflicted wounds, but our
appetite for destruction sometimes pales into insignificance, when placed
against the kinds of disasters occurring in Nature. The tsunami unleashed by
the shifting of tectonic plates below the Indian Ocean on 26th December, 2004,
killed thousands along many stretches of coastline in the area. The plight
caused by this catastrophe seemed to capture the sympathy of our entire global
population: billions of dollars were raised by the general public, shaming
governments whose initial reactions were less then forthcoming.

The cause of this tragedy is a reminder of the fragility of our
life on this planet, and how close we may all be to potential disaster. For
decades, Catastrophists have argued the case for there having been repeated
devastation of our world in prehistorical times. They wonder whether our
emergence from caves to civilization may not have been the smooth and
relatively recent transition alluded to in the history textbooks. Many have
wondered whether our progress has been less graduated, more stop/start; that
our human predecessors may have repeatedly fallen afoul of natural disasters
that have affected our planet and environment.

This latest disaster affected coastal areas peripheral to the
epicenter of the sub-oceanic earthquake, which measured 9.0 on the Richter
scale. A collapse of the sea bed caused a ripple effect across the Indian Ocean
that culminated in 30 foot waves in shallow waters: these waves then crashed
into islands and coastal areas causing devastation. It seems difficult to imagine
a worse scenario.

Yet, similar events in recorded history have seen tsunamis
substantially greater, culminating in the movement of oceanic waters deeper
into land areas.

It is a fact that human settlements have always preferred coastal
areas to inhabit. Such areas are richer in good soils and wildlife, and
generally enjoy less extreme climates than more inland, continental lands. But
the risk associated with a substantial fraction of the human population living
near coastal areas is that the sea might one day unleash devastation commonly
affecting them all.

Many have wondered: is it possible that a worldwide disaster might
have been caused by a global tsunami? It would have to be a very substantial
wave indeed, one that originated from a devastating catastrophe in oceanic
waters. Not only that, but the epicenter of such an event would have to have
been positioned in such a way, that the wave was able to access all oceans and
seas without having its momentum broken by a substantial landmass. This could only
have taken place, then, if the epicenter was in the Southern Oceans in the
vicinity of Antarctica. And the most likely source of such an event would be an
oceanic comet strike.
²
15 million years ago, an asteroid greater
than 1 kilometer in diameter, crashed into the South-East Pacific Ocean.
Scientists have been able to draw this conclusion from evidence from the ocean
floor, which shows damage over hundreds of square kilometers.
^4,5,6
The devastating impact created a massive tsunami that, after only five hours,
was about 70 metres high. It continued from the impact point to move at the
speed of an aircraft across the Pacific and South Atlantic Oceans, devastating
coastal areas from Australia and Asia to South-West Africa.