DIR Return Create A Forum - Home
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       FUNDAY
  HTML https://funday.createaforum.com
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       *****************************************************
   DIR Return to: Updates
       *****************************************************
       #Post#: 235--------------------------------------------------
       Mathis on Velikovsky +
       By: Admin Date: December 16, 2018, 6:51 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       1. Mathis on Velikovsky
  HTML http://funday.createaforum.com/mike-messages/1-110/msg235/#msg235
       2. Youthful Atmosphere of Venus
  HTML http://funday.createaforum.com/mike-messages/1-110/?message=237
       3. Nature of Venus' Heat
  HTML http://funday.createaforum.com/mike-messages/1-110/?message=238
       4. Surface Of Venus -- "A Newborn Babe"
  HTML http://funday.createaforum.com/mike-messages/1-110/?message=239
       5. Evidence for the Extreme Youth of Venus
  HTML http://funday.createaforum.com/mike-messages/1-110/?message=240
       6. CutFog Forum Discussion
  HTML http://funday.createaforum.com/mike-messages/1-110/?message=332
       Paraphrasing + Comments on Miles' recent paper, Beyond
       Velikovsky, at
  HTML http://milesmathis.com/vel2.pdf
       (Vel. means
       Velikovsky.)
       _MM -- Vel. is from prominent Jewish families who faked all
       recent history, their modus operandi being to tell only as much
       truth as a project will bear, so where the truth ends,
       misdirection begins.
       _MM -- The intent of Worlds in Collision is "eyes-off", which is
       to give a partial reading of data to prevent a fuller reading,
       like Robin Gardiner's Titanic project, which misdirected
       attention from Lloyd's of London, Astor et al, and the Titanic
       never sank at all. (LK -- Did the Olympic sink in its place?)
       _MM -- Vel. claims Venus was ejected from Jupiter, then appeared
       as a comet and came close to Earth before settling into its
       present orbit. (LK -- And he said Venus is hot because it's a
       new planet.)
       _MM -- The mainstream doesn't admit that Venus must have
       recently experienced a catastrophe; Venus and its spin are very
       round, so there was no collision, but maybe a close pass with
       Earth or another body.
       _MM -- Vel. admits all planets have excess heat, but he gives
       the wrong reason; it's because Venus' poles and/or spin are
       reversed, causing a magnetic effect that spins incoming photons
       up in polar through-charge, causing more heat, and Venus' spin
       will reverse and go in the same direction as other planets, but
       it takes a long time for the Sun's charge field to reverse the
       spin of such a large planet.
       _MM -- Vel. is wrong about Venus nearly colliding with Earth,
       because Earth did not heat up significantly, but only suffered
       darkness and other minor changes, and he's wrong about Venus'
       heat coming from recent formation and the mainstream is wrong
       about the greenhouse effect, because as Vel. said, thick
       Venusian clouds would block solar heat, causing cooling, not
       heating, and Venus reflects most of the light it receives, which
       also prevents heating.
       _MM -- In reality Venus' heat comes up from below via the charge
       field. (LK -- But the charge field comes from the Sun, doesn't
       it, which means it comes from above, not below? If Venus were
       newly formed, as Vel. said, its heat would come up from below.
       It seems more likely that Venus was heated some other way. Maybe
       the flipping of its axis heated it at least partly. Talbott and
       Cardona thought Venus, Mars and Earth were formerly satellites
       of Saturn, that Saturn was a brown dwarf star that flared as a
       nova, and Venus was closest to Saturn, so the nova may have
       heated Venus too.)
       _MM -- The mainstream avoids seriuosly discussing why Venus'
       data is so unusual; evidence indicates Venus has flipped its
       axis recently, but Miles can't yet calculate how recently. (LK
       -- Catastrophists have discussed this and have shown that the
       present rate of heat loss on Venus indicates that it should cool
       to normal levels within a few centuries or millennia.)
       _MM -- It's unlikely that, as per Vel., Venus was ejected from
       Jupiter as a comet. (LK -- I think Vel. thought Jupiter's Great
       Red Spot could have been the birthplace of Venus. John Ackerman
       still thinks so. I think that's unlikely, but I recently noticed
       this article: An exoplanet loses its atmosphere in the form of a
       tail
  HTML https://phys.org/news/2018-12-exoplanet-atmosphere-tail.html
       .
       So, even if Venus wasn't ejected from Jupiter as a new planet,
       it seems entirely plausible that it could have looked like a
       comet, if it lost some of its atmosphere in the form of a tail.
       Mythology around the world says Venus was a comet, which is
       where Vel. got the idea. And it's likely that Earth lost much of
       its atmosphere recently too, because large land animals needed
       the extra buoyancy in order to move under the present gravity
       conditions. And dinosaur bones have been C14 dated to only tens
       of thousands of years, not millions.)
       _MM -- It's also unlikely that Venus was ejected as a moon from
       the Jupiter or Saturn systems (LK -- or others), because the
       present moons of those systems would still be in turmoil. (LK --
       That depends on how long it takes orbits to normalize. Iapetus
       has a 2 million mile radius orbit around Saturn inclined at
       nearly 16 degrees from Saturn's equatorial plane. Dust, gases
       and ions earlier in the systems may have caused the
       circularization of orbits much quicker than without that debris.
       The same applies to Venus' orbit circularization.)
       _MM -- Bode's law corrected explains that smaller planets should
       orbit nearer than large ones, thus Saturn (LK -- etc) tends to
       move below Jupiter's orbit (LK -- and Mars below Earth's).
       _MM -- The asteroid belt was likely caused by close planetary
       encounters in that way, and a similar recent encounter likely
       involved Venus moving from a farther orbit past Earth to its
       present orbit and flipping on its axis while passing.
       _MM -- Mars was probably involved in the asteroid belt event, as
       it's close to the belt, and there's plenty of room above Earth's
       orbit for Venus to have come from there, and Mars appears to be
       moving toward the gap that Venus left.
       _MM -- The moon of Mars is getting closer to it because Mars is
       moving inward, while Earth's Moon is moving farther from Earth
       because Earth is moving outward and Earth's period was likely
       shorter. (LK -- Some ancient records say it was 360 days.)
       _MM -- Venus and Earth did not dance together in Biblical times,
       but they may have much earlier. (LK -- Talbott and Cardona
       independently concluded that indeed the encounter between Earth
       and Venus was at least a thousand years earlier than Vel.
       thought and was not mentioned in the Biblical record. I think
       they expressed perplexity as to how Vel. concluded that Venus
       was involved in the plagues of the Exodus event.)
       _MM -- The Moon may have previously orbited Venus, or it may
       have been on the far side of Earth as Venus passed etc. (LK --
       Some ancient records seem to say Earth initially had no Moon.)
       _MM -- Vel. was likely misdirecting readers away from evidence
       of the photonic charge field. (LK -- I don't know if the ruling
       class's experts knew about the charge field then, in 1950. Vel.
       and his successors, Thunderbolts, have favored electrical forces
       as having major effects. I'm not sure yet that Vel. was trying
       to misdirect. It's possible, but I need better evidence. I know
       some of the Thunderbolts people and it seems they just haven't
       been able to follow Miles' explanations well enough. Some of
       their forum members like many of Miles' ideas, including me, and
       we discuss them there sometimes. But I'm open-minded on whether
       there has been intentional misdirection.)
       _MM -- Thunderbolts is claiming that there are no photons. (LK
       -- I haven't heard that. I'd say most of them consider photons
       as massless. If they've said there are no photons, I'd like to
       see where they say that. On this page
  HTML https://www.thunderbolts.inf
       o/wp/2011/09/02/essential-guide-to-eu-introduction/
       they say: "Electric fields are detectable in two ways:  when
       they accelerate electrons, which emit observable photons as
       synchrotron and Bremsstrahlung radiation, and by accelerating
       charged particles as electric currents which are accompanied by
       magnetic fields, detected through Faraday rotation of polarized
       light." So I think Miles needs to correct the statement.)
       _MM -- The governors wanted to keep the charge field secret,
       except for a few military scientists. (LK -- That would be more
       plausible if there's evidence that military scientists have done
       anything that would likely have only been possible if they knew
       about the charge field.)
       _MM -- Vel. followed the pattern of Ignaeius Donnelly who also
       divulged a lot of good data, but then blackwashing it. (LK --
       I'm interested in what data was blackwashed.)
       _MM -- By burying the data from both of them, the governors
       squelched discussion and research. (LK -- That's very plausible,
       that they intended to make anyone who discussed such subjects
       pariahs. However, they could have done that even if Vel. and
       Donnelly were not controlled opposition.)
       _MM -- To keep control of science, they had to keep everyone in
       the gravity-only, math-based, relativity/QED fog; if the average
       scientist understood the charge field, a real revolution would
       have been quick.
       _MM -- Vel. was wrong on specifics, but right in general, e.g.
       (LK -- cataclysmic) events weren't caused by Venus, since it
       passed Earth earlier, but they may have been caused by comets,
       asteroids and meteors, even according to his evidence.
       _MM -- Vel's theory that Venus and later Mars caused the
       cataclysms is fanciful and unnecessarily complicated. (LK --
       Thunderbolts tries to interpret the mythological records
       accurately and they do seem to indicate that Venus and Mars were
       inner moons of Saturn, which eventually destabilized and the
       pair caused some havoc in the inner solar system, not
       necessarily directly on Earth.)
       _MM -- Vel. was paid to blackwash the truth, i.e. the charge
       field, ancient texts, amateur scientists and the public. (LK --
       Maybe, but the evidence seems slim, and it seems that Vel.
       believed in what he found, and I don't know of evidence that
       anyone else guided or controlled him. He claimed that he made
       his discovery about Venus etc in 1939, I think, when he had the
       theory that Moses, not Akhenaten, was the original monotheist.)
       _MM -- Before WW2 the public had considerable knowledge of
       science, but less and less thereafter.
       _MM -- The Vel. affair pre-blackwashed Miles' findings with help
       from Thunderbolts. (LK -- Miles said almost nothing is said
       about Thunderbolts this time. I wouldn't be surprised if some of
       the moneyed supporters of Thunderbolts are working for the
       governors, but I'd be very surprised if Talbott, Thornhill,
       Scott, Cochrane, Cardona, van der Sluijs and others are working
       for them.)
       _MM -- The governors weren't prepared for someone like Miles,
       because his methods are unprecedented and he has taken advantage
       of their own tools, like the internet. (LK -- I'd like to know
       how Miles was educated. There's an organization called the
       Institutes for the Advancement of Human Potential, which found
       that almost all kids have genius potential, and they've been
       trying to help parents learn how to help their kids develop that
       potential. So I think genius would be common if society would
       learn how to develop it, like IAHP teaches.)
       #Post#: 237--------------------------------------------------
       Re: Mathis on Velikovsky +
       By: Admin Date: December 24, 2018, 5:53 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       The Youthful Atmosphere of Venus [Aeon Journal]
       From: Aeon I:6 (1988)
       _The Youthful Atmosphere Of Venus, Charles Ginenthal
       _In Worlds in Collision Immanuel Velikovsky claimed that Venus
       is a new planet. (1) Analysing mythological and historical
       evidence, Velikovsky concluded that less than ten thousand years
       ago Venus was expelled from the gas giant Jupiter, roamed the
       solar system as a comet, nearly collided with the Earth around
       1500 B.C., and only later settled into its present, highly
       circular orbit. While subsequent research by other
       catastrophists has raised questions about certain specifics of
       Velikovsky's theory, this research has, on the whole, only
       reinforced Velikovsky's original and most fundamental claim that
       Venus appeared in historical times as a comet. Velikovsky's
       thesis concerning Venus' recent birth and cometary past can be
       tested against considerable evidence gathered since the thesis
       was first published in 1950. Among other things, it implies
       that-- contrary to the expectations of astronomers-- the
       atmosphere of the planet should exhibit evidence of extreme
       youth. In this paper I will show that a great deal of
       "surprising" data indicates that Venus' atmosphere is that of a
       very young planet; in fact, according to previously accepted
       tests, this atmosphere suggests the planet has been in existence
       far less than four eons. In 1985 Lawrence Colin stated flatly:
       "The chemical composition of the air [of Venus remains the most
       controversial aspect of our knowledge of the Venusian
       atmosphere." (2) As will be shown, the reason for the
       controversy is that the data simply do not fit the conventional
       model.
       _ABUNDANCE OF SULPHURIC ACID
       _In the course of a decades-long debate, one of the most
       often-cited arguments raised against Velikovsky has involved the
       finding that the clouds of Venus are composed of sulphuric acid.
       Extrapolating from historical sources, Velikovsky himself had
       anticipated a dominance of hydrocarbons, something which has not
       found support in the new data. But the more recent discoveries
       raise entirely new questions. One that has yet to be answered
       satisfactorily is this: can sulphuric acid remain stable in the
       atmosphere of Venus over the time required by the usual models
       of the planet's history? Peter R. Ballinger, a researcher in
       organic chemistry, raised this question in 1965, when he wrote:
       It is likely that sulphuric acid would be gradually decomposed
       by solar radiation of ultraviolet and shorter wavelength,
       particularly in the presence of iron compounds... to give
       hydrogen and oxygen. This process would also be expected to
       result in the preferential retention of deuterium, as discussed
       in another context... Because of this and and other chemical
       reactions, sulphuric acid might well have a relatively short
       lifetime, consistent with a recent installation of the planet in
       its present orbit. (3) There is indeed iron in the Venusian
       atmosphere, as reported in Science in 1979. (4) And if the
       prevailing sulphuric acid model of the clouds is accepted, Venus
       could not be 4.6 billion years old: solar radiation would have
       long ago decomposed its sulphuric acid. Hence, the very presence
       of sulphuric acid is telling evidence of a recently-constituted
       atmosphere.
       _NOT ENOUGH CARBON MONOXIDE
       _Ballinger noted in passing that there were "other chemical
       reactions" indicating the same result, and these too are of
       significance. It is known that ultraviolet rays break down
       carbon dioxide into carbon monoxide and oxygen molecules, O 2-
       Once these molecules of carbon monoxide and O 2 form, they do
       not recombine again easily. Since Venus' atmosphere is about 97
       percent carbon dioxide, one would expect to find a great deal of
       carbon monoxide and oxygen in the upper and middle atmospheric
       layers of Venus. This would be so especially if Venus is
       billions of years old. Thus U. von Zahn et al., emphasised this
       very problem when they wrote-- The central problem of the
       photochemistry of Venus' middle atmosphere is to account for the
       exceedingly low abundance of CO [carbon monoxide and O 2
       [molecular oxygen observed at the bottom of the middle
       atmosphere. In fact, O 2 has not been detected even at 1 ppm
       [part per million level. Due to low abundance Of O 2 and O 3
       [ozone which absorbs ultraviolet radiation solar ultraviolet of
       sufficient energy to photolyse CO 2 penetrates down to 65 km [or
       39 miles above the surface of Venus. The 3-body recombination
       reaction with a rate constant K b [based on temperature is,
       however, spin-forbidden. Consequently, at typical temperatures
       of the Venus middle atmosphere (200K) this [recombination
       reaction has a very small rate...[But at this temperature oxygen
       is convened to molecular oxygen...with a rate constant K c which
       is 5 orders of magnitude higher than K b. Neglecting for a
       moment the effect of trace gases in Venus' atmosphere, CO 2, CO
       and O 2 are nonreactive with each other and we therefore expect
       a fairly rapid transition (on geologic time scales) of the CO 2
       atmosphere to one dominated by CO and O 2, CO 2 would disappear
       from the upper atmosphere within a few weeks and from the entire
       middle atmosphere in a few thousand years. Indeed these
       arguments describe the situation correctly for the upper
       atmosphere of Venus, provided we take account also the various
       dynamic processes exchanging gas between the upper and middle
       atmosphere. The above arguments, however, fall short in
       explaining the composition of the middle atmosphere which at
       least close to its lower boundary is characterised by an extreme
       dearth of CO 2 photolysis [break down that is CO and O 2. (5)
       There is at present no observed or reasonably deduced process to
       explain this situation. So there is an interesting dilemma for
       conventional theorists. In order for the abundance of carbon
       dioxide to persist in the middle atmosphere of Venus, the planet
       must be only a "few thousand years" old.
       _ABSENCE OF WATER
       _Velikovsky pointed out long ago that Venus contains practically
       no water in its atmosphere. Andrew and Louise Young reported in
       1975 that studies at radio wave lengths "have established once
       again that there is no more than .1 or .2 percent water vapour
       in the lower atmosphere, and the true value is probably close to
       .01 [l/l00 of a percent. The cloud tops are drier still." (6)
       But if Venus went through the same early evolution as the Earth
       billions of years ago, it should have, over time, out-gassed an
       ocean of water at least comparable to that of the Earth. Young
       and Young tell us that, "If one assumes that Venus once had as
       much water as the earth has now, it is necessary to explain how
       all but one part per million of it was lost. There is a known
       mechanism by which a planet with abundant water could lose a
       large portion of it: Water vapour in the upper atmosphere could
       be dissociated by ultraviolet radiation and the hydrogen could
       be lost to space, either by thermal escape or through the
       influence of the solar wind. That effect however could not
       produce an atmosphere so thoroughly desiccated as Venus' is. Of
       the water Venus has today, very little reaches the upper
       atmosphere and therefore it is not dissociated; at the present
       rate Venus would not have lost a significant amount [of water in
       the history of the solar system." (7) Venus has either lost
       water inexplicably, or it has simply not yet had time to
       generate the abundance of atmospheric and surface water the
       conventional models would predict (over the assumed billions of
       years). The presently accepted notion for the development of
       oceans is the "outgassing hypothesis" presented by W. W. Rubey
       in 1951. The hypothesis is based on the fact that gases expelled
       by volcanoes and hot springs contain steam, carbon dioxide,
       nitrogen and carbon monoxide. It is believed that this process,
       operating throughout the 4.6 billion year history of the Earth,
       can account for major atmospheric constituents of the earth.
       Also, the depth of the oceans would, under this process,
       steadily increases over the eons. If this is so, even if Venus
       had lost its first atmosphere and oceans, say 3 or 4 billion
       years ago (after the first atmosphere and water of the planet
       were removed by the solar wind and a new atmosphere of carbon
       dioxide had baked out of the surface rock), then outgassing
       during the subsequent 3 or 4 billion years would have produced a
       new ocean of shallower depth. Protected by the new, dense
       atmosphere, this ocean would not have escaped from the planet.
       Thus Lawrence Colin tells us: "Overwhelming evidence suggests
       that in its past Venus had much more water, perhaps as much as
       the Earth today-- a whole ocean." ( 8 ) The same question is
       asked by Kelly J. Beatty in an article titled "Venus: the
       Mystery Continues." Beatty wonders, "Where has all of Venus'
       water gone? Theorists have asked this question for years. It
       doesn't make sense to them that a planet so like the earth in
       size and distance from the sun should have 10,000 to 100,000
       times less water. After all, the pair have comparable amounts of
       carbon dioxide and nitrogen, so the water was probably there at
       the outset but has somehow disappeared." (9) What ever water
       Venus possessed was apparently burned off when Venus was a
       stupendously hot, brilliant comet. The established view, holding
       that Venus is as old as the Earth, requires enormous amounts of
       water vapour in its atmosphere. Why, then, is the required water
       missing? If, as Velikovsky claimed, Venus is a new planet, then
       it has not had time to outgas sufficient water vapour into the
       atmosphere and therefore it should have very little, or
       practically none. In fact, if the amount of Venusian water is
       one-one hundredth of one percent of Earth's (the "more likely"
       estimate of Young and Young), then holding that Venus is as old
       as the Earth, requires enormous amounts of water vapour in its
       atmosphere. Why, then, is the required water missing? If, as
       Velikovsky claimed, Venus is a new planet, then it has not had
       time to outgas sufficient water vapour into the atmosphere and
       therefore it should have very little, or practically none. In
       fact, if the amount of Venusian water is one-one hundredth of
       one percent of Earth's (the "more likely" estimate of Young and
       Young), then Venus could be no older than 10,000 to 20,000
       years.
       _MISSING OXYGEN
       _An added problem is the dearth of oxygen in Venus' atmosphere,
       a condition inexplicable under the present view that Venus is an
       ancient planet. Eric Burgess in his book, Venus an Errant Twin,
       informs us that the missing oxygen is vital to the question of
       what happened to the water: "If water molecules were broken down
       into hydrogen and oxygen, the disappearance of the oxygen has to
       be explained, since very little of this gas is present in the
       atmosphere today. No completely satisfactory explanation is yet
       available for what happened to the oxygen." (10) This particular
       dilemma is aggravated by the problem of photodissociation of
       carbon dioxide into carbon monoxide and oxygen discussed
       earlier, and also by the photodissociation of sulphuric acid
       into hydrogen and oxygen. If Venus' atmosphere is ancient,
       photodissociation of water (into oxygen and hydrogen) in
       conjunction with photodissociation of carbon dioxide (into
       carbon monoxide and oxygen) and sulphuric acid (into water and
       hydrogen) should have given Venus an abundant supply of oxygen.
       However, if Venus is extremely young the absence of oxygen from
       its atmosphere is fully explained. Perhaps a brief analysis of
       the evolution of the Earth will make this concept clearer. It is
       generally held by both geophysicists and biologists that our
       planet's primitive atmosphere lacked oxygen. The reason is the
       well known chemical fact that oxygen would have been fatal to
       any incipient life forms emerging during Earth's early history.
       Jeremy Rifkin gives this overview of the principle: To begin
       with, most scientists agree that life could not have formed in
       an oxygen atmosphere. If the chemicals of life are subjected to
       an oxidising atmosphere, they will decompose into carbon
       dioxide, water, and nitrogen. For this reason it has long been
       assumed that the first precursors of life must have evolved in a
       reducing [oxygen free atmosphere, since an oxidising atmosphere
       would have been lethal. (11) From this reasonable principle it
       follows that, if Venus is a young planet, it should lack
       appreciable oxygen-- as, in fact, it does. The historical
       implication is quite clear and points unambiguously to the novel
       concept first set forth by Velikovsky.
       _HYDROCHLORIC AND HYDROFLUORIC ACID
       _In his well-known attempts to discredit Velikovsky's theory of
       a former cometary Venus, Carl Sagan has stated that the
       sulphuric acid cloud model for Venus, "is consistent with the
       chemistry of the Venus atmosphere, in which hydrofluoric and
       hydrochloric acid have also been found." (12) What Sagan did not
       mention is that these acids, when they react with rocks, are
       quickly neutralised. Thus these gasses, interacting with new
       (volcanic) surface rock, should have been completely neutralised
       over its four to six billion year history. Young and Young
       report that-- Among the more exotic materials proposed for the
       clouds only one has been detected spectroscopically. It is
       hydrogen chloride, and it was found along with hydrogen fluoride
       by William S. Benedict of the University of Maryland in the
       spectra reported by the Connesses. Both gases are highly
       corrosive; when they are dissolved in water, they yield
       hydrochloric acid and hydrofluoric acid. Their abundance is too
       low for them to be the clouds, but that they should be present
       in the atmosphere at all is a surprise. (13) The chart supplied
       by Young and Young shows hydrochloric and hydrofluoric acid
       moving to and from the surface of Venus. It is clear, therefore,
       that these acids interact with the surface rock. The authors go
       on to say, "Such strong acids could not survive for long in the
       Earth's atmosphere; they would react with rocks and other
       materials and soon be neutralized." (14) The amount of water
       vapour in the Venus atmosphere, though small, is sufficient to
       convert hydrogen floride and hydrogen chloride into acids. It is
       therefore assumed ad hoc that the high temperature cooks
       hydrogen chloride and hydrogen fluoride out of the surface rock.
       But this theory assumes that these gases would not be
       neutralised as they formed acids in the rocks. As stated by
       Young and Young, "A number of assumptions are implicit in this
       hypothesis: that the rates of chemical reactions at the surface
       are high, that the atmosphere and the surface are in chemical
       equilibrium and that the effects of circulation in the
       atmosphere are small enough to be neglected." (15) Perhaps with
       enough "ifs" one can fit anything into the gradualist picture of
       Venus' atmosphere and surface. But if one or more of these ad
       hoc explanations is incorrect (and out of three variables this
       is quite probable) then there is no accounting for the existence
       of these gases in Venus' atmosphere-- apart from the possibility
       that a very youthful Venus has not had sufficient time to
       neutralise them. Issues such as noted above must be addressed
       alongside other considerations pointing in the same direction.
       Anthony Feldman informs us of a "recent discovery about the
       composition of the Venusian atmosphere [which has cast doubt on
       the popular theory accounting for the formation of the solar
       system." He writes-- The innermost planets-- Mercury, Venus,
       Earth and Mars-- are thought to be small and rocky because the
       sun drew their light constituents away. If this idea is correct,
       the closer a planet is to the sun the less likely there is to be
       lighter gases in the atmosphere. But in the atmosphere of Venus
       the opposite is true. In particular, there seems to be 500 times
       as much argon gas and 2700 times as much neon as in the
       atmosphere of Earth. So far scientists cannot explain why these
       gases were not drawn away from the planet during the birth of
       the solar system...Further discoveries about Venus may soon
       force a revision of the most basic ideas about how the Sun and
       the planets were formed. (16) Feldman's remarks are specifically
       corroborated by the finding of argon-36 in Venus' atmosphere.
       Dr. Michael McElroy, a scientist involved with Pioneer
       spacecraft exploration of Venus, is quoted in the Washington
       Post as stating, "The atmosphere of Venus contains as much
       argon-36 as you would expect from a planet's original
       atmosphere." (17) Here, then, is another piece of evidence which
       Velikovsky's critics have let slip under the rug. This
       evidence-- together with the principles of photodissociation of
       sulphuric acid and of carbon dioxide, the extreme dearth of
       water vapour, the extreme dearth of oxygen, and the
       unneutralised hydrochloric and hydrofluoric acid-- point in
       unison to the youth of Venus' atmosphere and provide dramatic
       support for Velikovksy's claim that Venus is a new planet.
       _FRESHLY STREWN ROCK
       _Yet still other lines of evidence are available. Since Venus is
       supposedly as ancient as Earth and has an atmosphere of highly
       corrosive gases, most of its surface rocks should show erosion.
       Eric Burgess informs us that "the rocks of Venus undergo
       different types of weathering. Chemical weathering would be
       expected to decompose olivines, pyroxenes, quartz and feldspars
       into magnesite, tremolite, dolomite and sulphides and sulphates.
       Mechanical weathering would be expected to disintegrate rocks by
       spalding and preferential chemical weathering and possibly by
       wind erosion. "Although winds on Venus near the surface do not
       blow at high velocity they represent the movement of extremely
       dense air by terrestrial standards, sufficiently dense to move
       particles up to several millimetres diameter across the surface
       of Venus." (18) Needless to say, these winds, operating over
       great spans of time, should have drastically eroded surface rock
       materials and blown the resulting debris into basins, forming
       vast sand dunes. To the contrary, however, Burgess tells us that
       "the radar data are...inconsistent with Venus being covered by
       vast areas of windblown debris." (19) Just how rapidly do the
       winds blow on Venus? Isaac Asimov explains that on Venus
       "surface winds were recorded that weren't very fast, only a
       little over 11 kilometres (7 miles) an hour. Since the
       atmosphere of Venus is so dense, however, such winds would have
       the energy of earthly winds blowing at 105 kilometres (65 miles)
       an hour. The 'gentle' wind is just about equivalent to a
       hurricane on earth." (20) These winds of Venus are blowing
       continuously over its entire surface. For an idea of the
       effects, I ask the reader to imagine terrestrial surface winds
       blowing day in and day out at 65 miles an hour. Imagine this
       hurricane blowing for 3 or 4 billion years, remembering also
       that the gases rushing over the surface rock are highly
       corrosive. Based on any reasonable, gradualist suppositions, the
       result would be a global, sandy Sahara! While one might wonder
       if the absence of sand dunes was in the eye of the beholder, due
       to poor resolution of the radar pictures, the undeniable state
       of surface rock was noted in a 1975 Science News article titled
       "Grand Unveiling of the Rocks of Venus." Here the author
       described Venera 9 photographs of the surface: The initial
       photo, apparently taken with the camera looking almost straight
       down (suggesting that mission officials wanted to ensure at
       least one picture before moving anything), contains a remarkably
       clear view of some sharp-edged angular rocks. According to Boris
       Nepoklonov, one of the mission scientists quoted by the Soviet
       news agency Tass, 'This seems to knock the bottom out of the
       existing hypothesis by which the surface was expected to look
       like a desert covered with sand dunes because of constant wind
       and temperature erosion.' In fact, he says, 'even the moon does
       not have such rocks. We thought there couldn't be rocks on
       Venus-they would all be annihilated by erosion --but here they
       are, with edges absolutely not blunted. This picture makes us
       reconsider all our concepts of Venus. (21)
       _THE ENERGY PROBLEM
       _Nor is there a clear explanation for the tremendous energy that
       is moving the dense atmosphere. According to Billy P. Glass,
       "The pressure at the surface [of Venus is approximately 90 bars,
       which is equivalent to the pressure in the ocean on earth at a
       depth of nearly 1 km [3,000 feet below sea level." (22) This
       energy problem ties in with the enigma of Venus' rapid flow
       pattern of its upper atmosphere. Atmosphere flows on Earth take
       weeks to circle our planet at the equator. Though Venus rotates
       much slower (its rotation period is 243 days), its atmospheric
       cloud-- rising 39 miles above the surface-- flows at 100 m/sec
       (about 330 feet per second), circling the planet in only 4 to
       six days. Young and Young thus report: In the earth's atmosphere
       such winds are encountered only in narrow jet streams. Jet
       streams could not, however, account for the rapid atmospheric
       movements observed on Venus, since the Venusian winds seem to
       involve larger regions of the planet... Theoretical attempts to
       explain the generation of the winds have produced several
       possible mechanisms, such as convection caused by the uneven
       heating of the day and night sides of the planet. None of them,
       however, have been shown to be capable of explaining velocities
       greater than a few metres per second. (23) Velikovsky's youthful
       Venus, however, fits this bizarre atmospheric behaviour
       remarkably well. Since Venus was a comet-like body, its tail
       gases and coma atmospheric gases would still have great inertia
       after Venus entered its orbit, the momentum of its massive tail
       being transformed into a dense planetary atmosphere. Thus the
       high velocity still persists in the Venusian upper (lighter)
       atmosphere, while at the surface, where the atmosphere is most
       dense, the gases move more slowly.
       _TEMPERATURE
       _This finally brings us to the oft-discussed matter of Venus'
       atmospheric temperature. One of the major problems with the
       "greenhouse" explanation is the process of convection. Stated
       simply-- hot air rises. Clark R. Chapman explains what is
       basically wrong with the thinking of the meteorologists who
       resort to a supposed greenhouse effect to account for the
       anomalous high temperature of the Venusian atmosphere. It was
       recently pointed out to embarrassed meteorologists who have
       debated the relevance of their greenhouse calculations that this
       effect may not even be important for greenhouses. Outside ground
       warmed by the sun heats adjacent air, which then floats upward
       to where the barometric pressure is less. The air parcel
       expands, cools and settles into equilibrium. Meanwhile at the
       ground the warmed air is replaced by cooler parcels from above.
       This process...warms upper regions and keeps the air near the
       ground from getting too hot. Air on earth begins to convect
       whenever the temperature begins to drop with altitude more
       quickly than about 6 degrees C per kilometre [of altitude. So
       except in an inversion, when the upper air is relatively warm
       [warmer than the surface air convection maintains the 6 degree C
       per kilometre profile which is why mountain tops are cool. The
       reason it is warmer inside than outside a greenhouse is mainly
       that the [glass roof keeps the warmed-up air inside from
       floating away {by} is no lid on Venus and the dense carbon
       dioxide is free to convect. (24) The super hot air of Venus,
       therefore, must rise and carry away the surface heat of the
       planet to the upper atmosphere where there is no covering. There
       the heat will radiate into space. This upward motion or
       convection of gas by heat will allow it to pass right through
       the clouds. Hence, the reality is that Venus would convect and
       radiate its surface heat into space long before its surface
       reached anything like 750 degrees K. Achieving a relatively high
       surface temperature for Venus would require a cover
       encapsulating the entire planet to keep the hot air at the
       surface from mixing with the cold air of the upper atmosphere.
       No such mechanism is available, and this simple fact poses an
       immense problem for the greenhouse theory. The problem becomes
       fatal when it is discovered that Venus' atmosphere actually
       rises and expands over the entire surface and then falls and
       contracts periodically like a pulsating star. A 1973 article in
       the New Scientist noted the work of four scientists at Caltech's
       Jet Propulsion Laboratory demonstrating that Venus shows
       "regular changes in the spectrum of its atmosphere," with marked
       variations in the carbon dioxide lines on a four-day cycle: Over
       20 years ago Gerard Kuiper noted day-to-day fluctuations in the
       infrared spectrum of Venus, but no one has yet got to the bottom
       of the basic cause of these changes. In order to study the
       oscillations A.T., L.G., and J.W. Young and J. I Gerstrahl
       obtained spectra nightly during the autumn of last year [1972.
       Their data on the carbon dioxide line show an unmistakable
       oscillation. The observed variation is not exactly periodic, but
       more akin to a relaxation oscillation in which the amplitude
       builds up on successive cycles and then suddenly collapses. In
       order to produce the observed changes the cloud deck of Venus
       must be moving up and down by as much as one kilometre,
       simultaneously over the entire surface of the planet. Such a
       large atmosphere oscillation requires a high input of mechanical
       energy. This condition is difficult to account for in the case
       of a slowly rotating planet heated uniformly by the Sun's rays
       [Greenhouse effect. Therefore the cycle variations point to some
       unexplained deep-seated property of the atmospheric dynamics."
       (25) Gases expand when heated and contract when cooled. What is
       very apparent is that the surface heat is building up so
       strongly that it cannot be convected away as rapidly as it
       builds up. The superhot air therefore expands and rises, pushing
       the layers above it which also expand and rise. This process
       goes on until the upper air layers have risen sufficiently high
       to permit heat to dissipate more rapidly in the freezing
       altitudes of space, following which the entire atmosphere
       contracts to repeat the process. The amount of energy required
       to accomplish such a feat is far greater than could be produced
       by any "greenhouse" that lacks a cover! It is thus impossible to
       reconcile the observed condition with a thermally balanced
       atmosphere: an ancient planet would have achieved a thermal
       equilibrium long ago. Hence, the fact that the Venusian
       atmosphere is not in equilibrium makes the "greenhouse" effect a
       charade and points to the same conclusion as the other
       considerations reviewed above. In sum, the evidence we have
       presented regarding Venus' atmosphere disputes the
       uniformitarian view that Venus is an ancient member of the solar
       system; in every instance, however, this evidence is completely
       en rapport with Velikovsky's view that Venus is a newcomer to
       the planetary system.
       _References
       #Post#: 238--------------------------------------------------
       Re: Mathis on Velikovsky +
       By: Admin Date: December 24, 2018, 5:57 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       The Nature of Venus' Heat [The Velikovskian]
       ... From: The Velikovskian Vol 1 No 3 (1993)
       The Nature of Venus' Heat, Charles Ginenthal
       _Ever since 1956, when the American team of radio astronomers
       from the U.S. Naval Research laboratory, headed by Cornell H.
       Meyer, discovered that "the surface of Venus is hot --far hotter
       than anyone had previously imagined," (1) (Emphasis added.)
       which fits Immanuel Velikovsky's hypothesis that Venus was a
       newborn planet in the early cool-down stages of its development,
       the scientific community --and, in particular, the astronomers
       --sought a non-Velikovskian, non-catastrophist explanation for
       this surprising finding. It was and still is unthinkable to
       these upholders of a stable solar system that Venus could be a
       recently born, newly acquired member of the solar system's
       family. Ultimately, the only other explanation for the planet's
       high temperature was the hypothesis that Venus was in the grip
       of a runaway greenhouse effect. The early greenhouse model was
       promoted by Carl Sagan in 1960 and 1962. (2)
       _In 1970, S. I. Rasool and C. de Bergh added the "runaway"
       aspect to the model. (3) Thus, the runaway greenhouse theory was
       born and was expected to explain the high temperature of Venus
       by straightforward uniformitarian processes. This model worked
       its way into both scientific thought and nearly every astronomy
       textbook, becoming the only other theory about Venus' high
       temperature besides the catastrophist model presented by
       Velikovsky, in spite of the fact that 20 years after the runaway
       greenhouse model was proposed, Werhner von Braun openly admitted
       that "scientists would like to be sure that the greenhouse
       effect is indeed the cause of the hot surface and lower
       atmosphere [of Venus. So far it is only a theory not yet proven
       by experiment." (4)
       _In the ensuing years, Soviet and American space probes to Venus
       measured and collected evidence which has been used by
       greenhouse advocates to show that Venus is heated by a runaway
       greenhouse effect and that Velikovsky and his followers are
       gravely mistaken to have imagined otherwise regarding its high
       thermal emission. Nevertheless, with respect to Venus' high
       temperature, I will show that the evidence clearly contradicts
       the runaway greenhouse theory and is fully congruent with
       Velikovsky's concept that Venus is a newborn planet still
       shedding its primordial heat. I will show that, on many levels,
       evidence investigated and proposed as supportive by the
       greenhouse advocates is, at best, extremely weak and often
       contradicts the underlying assumptions. The runaway greenhouse
       model is, fundamentally, in direct opposition to physics,
       observations, measurements and the historical theory of
       planetary formation, which is one of the cornerstones of
       science's uniformitarian thinking. The reader will be able to
       understand how impoverished the claimed evidence for the runaway
       greenhouse theory is, how deeply flawed the case for the runaway
       greenhouse mechanism is, upon examination, and how it, in
       effect, strengthens Velikovsky's theory: that Venus' heat is
       derived from its interior.
       _THE ORIGIN OF VENUS' GREENHOUSE
       _A scientific theory that purports to explain Venus' high
       temperature must also explain how and why the process began.
       David Morrison and Tobias Owen explain the origin of Venus'
       runaway greenhouse: The runaway greenhouse is a process through
       which a planet can fundamentally alter the state of its surface
       and atmosphere. Imagine what would happen if we could move the
       Earth into the orbit of Venus. Our planet would suddenly be
       closer to the Sun at 72% of its present distance. Sunlight would
       [deliver about twice as much energy to every square meter of the
       Earth's surface. Most of the Earth is covered by oceans, so the
       immediate result would be an increase in [their
       temperatures....The increase in temperature would lead to
       increased evaporation. More water vapor would be present in the
       atmosphere, which would trap more infrared radiation from the
       Earth's surface. In other words, we would have increased the
       greenhouse effect. This, in turn, leads to a further increase in
       the planet's surface temperature, resulting in more evaporation
       of water and a continuation of the cycle. We have established a
       positive feedback loop, in which the initial disturbance
       --increasing the Earth's surface temperature --produces
       consequences which lead to an enhancement of that disturbance!
       The cycle continues until the oceans literally boil away and all
       water is converted to vapor, [producing an exceedingly hot
       atmosphere. This is the runaway greenhouse effect. (5)
       _This is the concept that must stand up to the evidence. What
       Morrison and Owen have omitted from their discussion is the
       nature of stellar evolution. They have analyzed the behavior of
       ancient Venus in its early evolution by invoking the present
       heat of the Sun upon Venus. Venus must be analyzed with respect
       to the Sun as the Sun actually existed in its early evolutionary
       development. Once done, an entirely different picture emerges
       with respect to this process. Zdenek Kopal makes this clear: The
       entire argument defended by some planetologists [regarding the
       origin of the greenhouse effect contains one fatal flaw --an
       implicit assumption that, in the early days of the solar system,
       the youthful Sun was as bright as it is now. Actually, as a
       zero-age [new Main Sequence star, our Sun should have been
       approximately 40% less luminous than we see it today and its
       surface temperature 10% lower. Venus is 28% closer to the Sun
       than [the Earth is and any element of its surface receives
       almost twice as much heat as we do on the Earth. Even so, the
       early climactic conditions on Venus could not have been much
       warmer than they are in the terrestrial tropics today, and, had
       there once been oceans on Venus, very little of their waters
       could have evaporated. Therefore, we are back where we started.
       (6)
       _The greenhouse theorists are well aware of this problem. What
       is their explanation? James B. Pollack, Sagan's former pupil
       and, later, collaborator says: Over the age of the solar
       system...the Sun's total luminosity...increases by several tens
       of percent --a long-term trend that would have induced dramatic
       changes in the climates of the terrestrial planets.... [This
       suggests that Venus' surface temperature was just on the
       borderline of not being in a runaway state in the early solar
       system, when the Sun's total energy output was [25% to 30% less
       than it is today. The likelihood that Venus had oceans in its
       early history, (albeit) hot ones, improves further when the
       possible effect of water clouds are considered. Clouds reflect
       sunlight back to space better than they trap thermal radiation,
       so early Venus may have experienced a "moist" greenhouse (hot
       oceans) rather than a runaway greenhouse (no oceans) [vaporized
       oceans. (7) (Emphasis added.)
       _The reader will notice two things: Pollack says the Sun's
       temperature was "several tens of percent" cooler than at
       present, but uses figures of 25% to 30% less than present, while
       Kopal uses 40% less luminosity. Pollack also admits that clouds
       would tend to cool Venus, but, on page 101 of his book, tells us
       that his analysis was based on Venus having "cloudless skies."
       Thus, with cloud cover over Venus, its temperature would be even
       cooler than Pollack has computed. It would be below the
       threshold of a "moist" greenhouse. Significantly, his statement
       that "early Venus may have experienced a `moist' greenhouse" is
       tantamount to an admission that it may not have had a moist
       greenhouse. James E. Oberg tells us that Pollack does not
       believe Venus had an early, runaway greenhouse effect. He states
       that, "[ according to Dr. James Pollack, any guesses about the
       early climate of Venus depend strongly on what kind of
       atmosphere the planet possessed." ( 8 )
       _Taking into account the 30% lower solar brightness,
       computations show that a reasonable atmosphere on Venus would
       have led to "` quite moderate temperatures' for more than a
       billion years ...." (9) This means that Venus had a moderate
       climate for a billion years or more and then started its runaway
       greenhouse effect. Let us, nevertheless, allow the assumption
       that the Sun, in its early history or thereafter, was just
       sufficiently hot so as to generate a greenhouse effect on Venus.
       What must follow? Morrison and Owen explain: At this point, the
       atmosphere is so hot that water vapor can easily rise to great
       heights, where it becomes exposed to solar ultraviolet light.
       This is a crucial step. On Earth, water is protected by the
       natural cold trap in the atmosphere. The air at the top of the
       troposphere is so cold that water cannot diffuse upward to
       levels where it could be attacked by ultraviolet light. A
       runaway greenhouse can raise the temperature throughout the
       lower atmosphere, giving water free access to high altitudes.
       Because of the large mass of Venus, only the light hydrogen
       atoms escape into space. The oxygen remains behind to combine
       with rocks on the planet's surface and with other gases that
       have been produced by the intense heating. The runaway
       greenhouse leads to elimination of water from the planet in a
       perfectly natural way....Quantitative studies of this phenomenon
       indicate that water simply cannot remain on the surface of a
       planet at [Venus' distance from the Sun. (10)
       _The escape of hydrogen from the H 2 O molecule into space is
       fundamental to all concepts for the removal of water from Venus'
       atmosphere. Thomas M. Donahue and James B. Pollack state this
       explicitly: "A common feature of all...[water loss mechanisms is
       the implicit requirement that molecular hydrogen readily escape.
       Otherwise, they would be incompatible with the trace amount of
       molecular hydrogen that characterizes Venus' current atmosphere
       of, at most, 10 ppm v/v." (11) The problem of ridding Venus of
       its photodissociated hydrogen is far from simple, due to the
       cold nature of Venus' exosphere. An exosphere is the upper
       region of an atmosphere which has become so thin that atoms and
       molecules rarely, if ever, collide. From here, hydrogen must
       escape from Venus into space. Sagan explains that, "[ if the
       exosphere temperature is very high, then the rate of escape of a
       planetary atmosphere would be very high." (12)
       _What happens to molecules in an extremely cold atmosphere? On
       Earth, the temperature of the exosphere is between 950 K
       [degrees Kelvin to 1,050 K, while the exosphere of Venus is
       about 285 K, or 665 K cooler. On Earth, the temperature of the
       upper atmosphere becomes hot; part of this region is called a
       thermosphere, or hot atmosphere; however, on Venus, the
       temperature of the upper atmosphere falls with altitude and is
       thus called a cryosphere, or cold atmosphere. William K.
       Hartmann states: The H 2 O [water is too heavy to escape
       thermally in the lifetime of the solar system. Thermal escape of
       H [hydrogen produced by photodissociation of the H 2 O was
       thought to have caused the loss of H 2 O from Venus. However,
       Pioneer discovered the [285 K exosphere temperature and
       calculations show that the [hydrogen escape time from such an
       exosphere is 20 Gy [20 giga, or billion, years. So how could H,
       and, hence, H 2 O, have been depleted? If the exosphere had once
       been heated to 1,000 K or so, the [hydrogen escape time could be
       brought to a tiny fraction of the age of the solar system. In
       any case, Pioneer scientists (Stewart A. [et al, 1979
       "Ultraviolet Spectroscopy of Venus: Initial Results from the
       Pioneer Venus Orbiter," Science 203, p. 777) concluded, "If
       Venus ever possessed a large amount of water, it cannot have
       lost it by escape mechanisms known to be operating now." (13)
       _The results, when more fully analyzed, showed that the hydrogen
       loss rate is presently only about 10 7 H cm -2s-1 (ten million
       hydrogen molecules per one hundredth of a centimeter per second
       squared). (14) "At this rate," Donahue and Pollack explain,
       "only...[about 9 meters [30 feet of water could be eliminated
       from Venus over its lifetime." (15) In order to generate a
       greenhouse effect on a body as large as Venus, it becomes
       apparent that a great amount of water, or of some other
       material, must be vaporized in its atmosphere to create a
       greenhouse powerful enough to literally cook the planet's carbon
       dioxide out of its surface rock. But Pollack has also told us
       that the early solar radiation would, if Venus had an ocean,
       produce only a moist greenhouse, or a very moderate one at best.
       Thirty feet, or so, of water on Venus will produce thousands of
       lakes similar to those on the Earth. Most of Venus' surface
       would be land and the moist or moderate greenhouse that Pollack
       proposes under these conditions means no greenhouse, because
       Venus had no oceans. The nightside of the planet's land surface
       would quickly cool and the lost heat derived from the dayside by
       convection would keep the planet cool, so that no runaway
       greenhouse could get started. In the same way that Pollack
       assumed that the Sun must be just sufficiently hot on ancient
       Venus so as to start the greenhouse mechanism, he and the other
       advocates of this heat phenomenon must also assume that the
       escape rate of hydrogen from Venus in the early solar system was
       immensely greater than at present. This is stated by Pollack: "[
       It will be assumed that hydrogen can readily escape to space,
       although, as we have seen, this remains to be demonstrated."
       (16) (Emphasis added.)
       _Furthermore, one cannot remove the remaining water of an ocean
       by having it form hydrate compounds with surface materials.
       Under such circumstances over time, the water would be recycled
       volcanically back into Venus' atmosphere. So far, two
       assumptions have been put forth to establish the credibility of
       the origin of the greenhouse effect. The first assumption posits
       that the Sun was just hot enough to heat Venus' oceans. The
       second assumption posits that an escape mechanism, shown by the
       data to contradict the hydrogen removal processes for escape
       into space, is wrong. What must be pointed out is that a newborn
       planet would be born with little or no water. Zdenek Kopal makes
       this clear: "We are fairly sure that the newly-formed Earth
       contained no water on its surface. It was born dry and its
       oceans have since been exuded from the interior by thermal
       `cracking' [heat removal of water of the hydrates [water-bearing
       minerals." (17) Absolutely no assumption must be made regarding
       the lack of water in newborn Venus' atmosphere. If Venus is a
       newborn planet, as Velikovsky claimed, its lack of water is
       completely in harmony with its present waterless condition.
       _The other problem related to the photodissociation of water and
       the escape of hydrogen is, Where did the residual oxygen go that
       cannot escape into space? After an entire planet's ocean rose
       into the upper regions of Venus' atmosphere and was dissociated
       by ultraviolet light from which hydrogen escaped, the planet was
       left with a lot of oxygen. Morrison and Owen have informed us
       that "[ the oxygen remained behind to combine with the rocks on
       the planet's surface." (18) Billy P. Glass addresses the same
       question, asking, "[ Where is the oxygen? Pioneer Venus probes
       only detected 70 ppm [parts per million oxygen in the lower
       atmosphere. Some of the oxygen to account for a vanished `ocean'
       of water would require that several kilometers of rock be
       oxidized. This would require an extremely geologically active
       planet." (19) Most scientists are skeptical that early Venus
       had, for its first billion years of existence, immense volcanic
       activity. On the Earth, it took an exceedingly long time before
       enough water was vented volcanically from the interior prior to
       ocean formation. The same is also expected for Venus. In this
       respect, Venus would have had to exude its water vapor more
       rapidly and much earlier than the Earth, so as to allow its
       oxygen to unite with molten surface material. In fact, there is
       no such scenario to suggest that, after the Earth formed oceans
       on its surface, the crust --for some inexplicable reason --began
       to ooze giant flows of lava. Hence, this is also a problem
       needing explanation.
       _Barrie William Jones deals with this question, saying that
       oxygen would not escape to space in appreciable quantities, and
       so [the combination [of oxygen with surface materials provides
       the only repository. However, it is difficult to believe that
       sufficient quantities of suitable substances could have appeared
       at the cytherean [Venusian surface to mop up anywhere near the
       amount of water. Indeed, chemical evidence from the
       sulfur-bearing gases in the lower atmosphere of Venus...indicate
       that the surface rock today does not contain the maximum amount
       of oxygen possible. (20) The germane question is, How much
       crustal rock material must be exuded as molten lava to mop up
       the residual oxygen of a planet's oceans? What must be
       emphasized is that this turning over of Venus' surface crustal
       material had to occur over a billion years or more after the
       planet cooled and its crust had become solid. According to
       Oberg, "Pollack suggests that `runaway conditions were not
       reached on Venus until halfway through its history.'" (21) J.
       Kelly Beatty tells us that to remove all of Venus' atmospheric
       oxygen, as suggested, requires no less than "remnant oxygen
       combined [with materials to a depth of perhaps 450 kilometers"
       (22) [279 miles. Such a depth of volcanic turnover is simply not
       believable. It would require that, after Venus formed a crust
       like that of the early Earth and outgassed an ocean of water,
       the entire crust and mantle remelted to a depth of 280 miles, or
       451 kilometers. But even at a depth of 100 miles, or 161
       kilometers, of melt, there is no geological method presently
       known that would remelt the entire surface of a planet that
       much, particularly that of a planet believed to have a similar,
       early geological history as that of the Earth. What is required
       is based on a uniformitarian geology that is impossible. The
       entire concept lacks support.
       _James Oberg deals with a similar problem --getting rid of all
       the oxygen in Venus' present atmosphere --and concludes that
       this concept simply will not work: Imagine that all the carbon
       dioxide [CO 2 could be converted, in the wink of an eye, into
       free oxygen and carbon soot [as Morrison, Owen and others
       suggest happened to H 2 O on ancient Venus. Now, instead of 90
       bars of carbon dioxide, we have only 60 bars of free oxygen,
       still three hundred times as much as on Earth. To get rid of it,
       we may try to lock it up in surface rocks (the hotter the rocks,
       the faster the reaction); but calculations show that the mass of
       rock needed to absorb that excess mass of oxygen (assuming even
       that the rock was not already partially or, even, predominantly
       oxidized) would cover the planet to a depth of 100 kilometers
       [62 miles or more. That means that the top 100 kilometers of the
       surface of the entire planet would have to be gardened [turned
       over or selectively exposed to air so as to absorb the oxygen.
       On Earth, this process is accomplished by water erosion of
       mountains raised by tectonism over eons of geologic time.
       Something different would be needed on Venus. (23) To remove an
       ocean's oxygen content from Venus by ordinary volcanic processes
       would take much longer than the lifetime of the solar system.
       There is no uniformitarian process by which to rid Venus of an
       ocean! Without water turned to stupendously hot vapor, how does
       one cook the carbon dioxide which had formed carbonates out of
       the Venusian crust?!
       _Some greenhouse advocates claim that the heating of Venus'
       crust and mantle to a great depth would, nevertheless, release
       an enormous amount of carbon monoxide. If the oxygen in the
       atmosphere united with this additional carbon monoxide as well
       as with surface materials, it would generate much of the carbon
       dioxide presently found on Venus. However, Beatty explains that
       "[ excess oxygen probably combined with carbon monoxide driven
       from the interior, although University of Michigan's Thomas
       Donahue admits it would take a `stochastic miracle' [a highly
       improbable set of conditions to match the gases [oxygen with
       carbon monoxide easily." (24) If this process actually occurred,
       there would be, in overwhelming probability, a large, noticeable
       amount of either excess oxygen or carbon monoxide in Venus'
       atmosphere. This, of course, is not the case. The geophysical
       processes employed by the astronomers to remove Venus'
       atmospheric oxygen are either impossible or generally
       implausible or require a stochastic miracle. In this respect,
       Donahue and Pollack admit that "[ even if a vigorous recycling
       of crustal material did occur in Venus' past, the incorporation
       of water into the subducted material is not assured." (25) This
       means that, even with plate tectonic crustal movement, the water
       on Venus would probably still remain on the surface. According
       to Eric Burgess, "[ no completely satisfactory explanation is
       yet available for what happened to the [Venusian oxygen." (26)
       _Let us assume that Venus did have an ocean. In recent articles,
       some astronomers claim that they can see the region where Venus'
       ocean lay. J. Kelly Beatty explains what would be left of the
       Venusian topography after an ocean became vapor: Venus receives
       twice the sunlight we do, enough to have converted all its
       oceans to vapor --the equivalent of 250-300 bars of atmosphere
       on top of its 90 bars of carbon dioxide. At that point, the
       greenhouse effect would have run rampant; calculations show the
       surface temperature would reach 1,500 K. Venus' surface melted
       its lithosphere transformed [to lava into a churning cauldron
       that continuously exposed fresh magma to its atmosphere. (27)
       Simply melting the upper layer of surface rock would not churn
       280 miles, or 451 kilometers, of material. What would happen,
       however, is that all ocean basins and continents would flatten
       at the surface and neither the original oceanic basins nor the
       continents could survive.
       _Modern astronomers are grasping at straws to suggest that they
       can locate the original ocean basins on Venus. As far as I know,
       the greatest problem involved in the removal of Venusian oxygen,
       ozone formation, is never discussed by greenhouse theorists.
       This problem is ignored every time one of the greenhouse
       advocates discusses ultraviolet photodissociation of water
       molecules in Venus' high atmosphere. Morrison and Owen had told
       us that the origin of the greenhouse effect requires "the
       atmosphere...[to become so hot that water vapor can easily rise
       to great heights where it becomes exposed to solar ultraviolet
       light." (28) Of course, greenhouse advocates tell us that
       ultraviolet radiation will photodissociate water into oxygen and
       hydrogen. What these same advocates fail to tell us is that
       ultraviolet light, in Venus' high atmosphere, must generate
       ozone! And every astronomer knows this simple fact. Morrison and
       Owen state: In the upper part of the stratosphere [of Earth, the
       absorption of solar ultraviolet light creates a layer of ozone
       (O 3 ), an unusual form of oxygen with three atoms per molecule
       instead of two. The ozone layer, sometimes called the
       ozonosphere, extends from approximately 20 [kilometers to 50
       kilometers [12 miles to 31 miles. Without it, solar ultraviolet
       light would penetrate to the surface. (29) Valentin A. Firsoff
       focused on the nub of the entire problem as long ago as 1973:
       The mechanism by which Venus is supposed to have lost its water
       is... unconvincing. [Water may be dissociated to hydrogen and
       oxygen by the short [wave ultraviolet, the former [hydrogen
       escaping to space. But the oxygen will not be lost. The
       formaldehyde reaction: CO 2+ H 2 O= H+ CHO+ O 2, also mediated
       by the ultraviolet, should further contribute to the supply of
       atmospheric oxygen while radiation below 160Å [160 Angstroms
       dissociates CO 2. Thus, by any reckoning, free oxygen should
       have evolved in the [Venusian atmosphere, which would shelter
       [water against further dissociation even if there had been no
       clouds and no cold trap to keep it in the lower atmosphere. (30)
       One simply cannot expect to photodissociate an immense amount of
       water vapor into hydrogen and oxygen without creating an
       ozonosphere. Once the ozonosphere forms, it stops the
       dissociation of water vapor dead in its tracks and whatever
       water remained in Venus' atmosphere or oceans could never be
       further dissociated by ultraviolet because ozone has stopped the
       "feedback loop." Based on this evidence, Venus would have lost
       very little water. There is no way around this problem. That is
       probably why it is evaded.
       _What scientists have done is play a game of hide-and-seek with
       ultraviolet radiation processes. Ultraviolet is invoked to
       dissociate water into hydrogen and oxygen. This is the process
       in which ultraviolet is scientifically observed. The fact that
       oxygen, acted upon by ultraviolet, generates ozone is kept
       hidden, conveniently ignored. In order to make the oceans of
       Venus disappear, greenhouse theorists must deny the reality of a
       well-known scientific process. Morrison and Owen state that [the
       most important cloud-forming process on Venus is probably
       photochemistry, chemical reactions driven by the energy of
       ultraviolet sunlight. Photochemical reactions are important in
       the upper atmosphere of planets, including the Earth, where the
       production of ozone from oxygen is an example of a photochemical
       process. (31) But there is never any discussion of the
       photochemical formation of ozone from an ocean of oxygen in the
       early Venus atmosphere. Why does ultraviolet dissociate water in
       Venus' atmosphere but somehow fail to generate ozone? As far as
       I know, neither Morrison, Owen, nor anyone else has addressed
       this question. When discussing Mars, Eric Burgess points out
       that Firsoff's analysis regarding an ozonosphere's ability to
       halt the escape of oxygen is quite correct: "[ A fairly dense
       atmosphere of oxygen might have accumulated on Mars in a period
       of a million years....Incoming solar ultraviolet radiation would
       have further restricted the escape of oxygen into space." (32)
       If ozone restricts the escape of oxygen on Mars, of course, it
       will do precisely the same on Venus.
       _This phenomenon of a lack of oxygen or ozone on ancient Venus
       is unexplained by the runaway greenhouse effect and is further
       evidence in support of Velikovsky's theory. What must be pointed
       out is that, as a newborn planet, Venus would be expected to
       possess little or no oxygen and, therefore, no ozonosphere. This
       is clarified by L. V. Berkner and L. C. Marshall in their paper,
       "The History and Growth of Oxygen in the Earth's Atmosphere":
       The absence of a significant content of oxygen in the primitive
       secondary atmosphere is confirmed by several lines of evidence.
       First, there is no suitable source....Second, the incomplete
       oxidation [oxygen joined with other substances of early
       sedimentary materials [on Earth (three billion years of age) as
       demonstrated Raukama, Ramdohr, Lepp and Goldich, and
       others...suggests very early lithospheric [crustal sedimentation
       in a reducing [oxygen-free atmosphere....Finally, the rapidly
       growing evidence on the origin of life on planet Earth appears
       to forbid significant oxygen concentration. (33) Absolutely no
       specialized process must be invoked regarding the lack of oxygen
       in Venus' atmosphere, based on Velikovsky's hypothesis. Barrie
       William Jones has said that there is no indication that the
       surface rock is saturated with oxygen. Thus, the lack of water
       and oxygen on Venus is evidence one would expect to find on a
       newborn planet and is in full harmony with Velikovsky's concept.
       _Nevertheless, one may raise the argument that we don't need
       water at all in Venus' atmosphere. Venus was simply born without
       it, or very little of it, and that solves the problem. Oberg
       states: Alternately, of course, the ocean theory may be
       completely wrong, and Venus may never have had much water. The
       oceans may never have had much water. Different theories of
       solar system formation can give different ratios of Venusian
       water to terrestrial water. The ocean may never have been there,
       or the temperatures may always have been too high (but then
       another agent for high temperatures would have had to be
       invented). (34) But this suggestion is not a solution. If there
       was no water in Venus' ancient atmosphere, how does the planet
       start the greenhouse effect? One needs either water or an
       inordinate amount of some gas to hold sufficient heat to cook
       the carbon dioxide out of the surface rock. Methane does that
       job well. But methane is a light gas, like water vapor, and, if
       Venus was endowed with methane, it would also have been endowed
       with water. Furthermore, astronomers do not seriously suggest
       that the two planets, Earth and Venus, situated so close to each
       other in the inner solar system, created from the same
       processes, would have totally different inventories of water.
       Morrison and Owen state that "if all the carbon [of the Earth
       were put back into the atmosphere in the form of carbon dioxide,
       the atmosphere would have a pressure of about 70 bars [70 times
       more pressure than at present and a composition [consisting of
       more than 98% carbon dioxide and little more than 1% nitrogen."
       (35) According to Pollack, Venus' 90 bar atmosphere is 96%
       carbon dioxide and 3.5% nitrogen. (36)
       _Pollack also states that "[ when all these reservoirs [of gases
       are taken into account, we find that Earth and Venus have very
       comparable amounts of [carbon and [nitrogen. This similarity
       implies that the two planets initially had comparable amounts of
       water." (37) He concludes that, "[ regardless of the sources,
       these worlds [terrestrial planets obtained comparable initial
       endowments of volatiles. Specially in the cases of Earth and
       Venus." (38) There is no reason to argue whether or not Venus
       lacked water based on all geophysical concepts. To do so is to
       negate the fundamental theories of solar system formation. Oberg
       adds these telling remarks: Even with great amounts of carbon
       dioxide, Venus could have a moderate climate if water was in
       short supply but present in enough amounts to form pools within
       which carbonate rocks could be formed to absorb some carbon
       dioxide. The addition of off-planet substances in trace amounts
       (Pollack suggests "collisions with volatile-rich comets and
       asteroids") may also have had catastrophic climactic effects by
       blocking off hitherto open "windows" in the "greenhouse effect."
       (39) In essence, no natural processes, using Venus' gases alone,
       would lead to a runaway greenhouse effect. Pollack was finally
       forced to invent additional gases from the ad hoc concept that
       comets or asteroids must have brought these additional
       constituents. But this simply will not do! All theories of
       planetary formation suggest that the early planetesimals that
       formed the planets were made of comets and asteroids. So the
       same materials had to exist inside the planets Earth and Venus.
       _This being the case, for Venus to start a greenhouse, some
       other gas or gases must be invoked. And this is precisely what
       Carl Sagan has been attempting to do. To save the process, he
       has sought some other gas to enhance the action of water vapor.
       According to Pollack: Sagan and George Mullen have suggested
       that as little as 10 parts per million of ammonia (NH 3) may
       have produced the desired greenhouse enhancement. However,
       practically no ammonia should have been outgassed by volcanoes
       into the early atmosphere. Moreover, NH 3 is easily broken down
       by ultraviolet radiation into nitrogen and hydrogen, and it is
       very difficult to recombine these two back into the parent
       molecule. Therefore, ammonia is probably not the agent involved
       in the early greenhouse enhancement. (40) It has been more than
       30 years since the greenhouse effect arose as an explanation for
       Venus' high temperature. For over 30 years, the scientists who
       have diligently worked on this mechanism have failed to find a
       valid process that will get it started. In order to begin the
       phenomenon, they have had to turn to exotic enhancement gases
       that are not believed to have existed in the early atmosphere of
       Venus and that cannot survive for very long in the presence of
       ultraviolet light.
       _When a theory is correct, over time, it finds suitable answers
       and the various problems and questions begin to be resolved,
       each element falling into place. This is not the case with the
       evidence regarding the runaway greenhouse effect. Its origin is
       still widely unknown and highly problematic. Its advocates are
       seeking new gases to enhance water vapor and suggest that the
       entire crust of the planet somehow remelted long after it
       solidified so as to remove its oxygen. Its supporters have
       stubbornly failed to come to grips with Firsoff's objection
       regarding the formation of an ozonosphere. These theorists don't
       even know if the early Sun was hot enough to start such a
       process and simply wave their hands in order to make hydrogen
       escape the planet rapidly. None of their processes have been
       validated in any way other than by taking theoretical
       assumptions as facts. As stated earlier, a phenomenon like the
       greenhouse effect has to have an origin. If there is no origin
       for a theoretical concept, it becomes exceedingly difficult to
       accept the hypothesis that is proposed. This is the case for the
       runaway greenhouse effect on Venus: No beginning, no greenhouse.
       Nevertheless, its advocates suggest that, since the process is
       ongoing, we simply have to assume that our knowledge of the
       precise ancient history of planetology is flawed; and, even with
       these difficulties, we can see Venus today in the full throes of
       a runaway greenhouse effect. That the early history of the solar
       system is nebulous is a reasonable, cautious suggestion, but
       before passing such a favorable judgement on this heating
       mechanism, one must be able to demonstrate, fully, that Venus is
       in the midst of a runaway greenhouse effect. The question in
       this instance is, Does the evidence fully support this
       conclusion? Let us investigate this claim, remembering Werhner
       von Braun's admonition regarding the greenhouse model: "So far,
       it is only a theory not yet proven by experiment." (41) What is
       the evidence for a runaway greenhouse effect on Venus?
       _EVIDENCE OF A VENUSIAN GREENHOUSE?
       _Morrison and Owen explain how the greenhouse effect works: Why
       is Venus hot? The answer comes from a phenomenon known as the
       greenhouse effect....In a typical greenhouse, the glass in the
       roof allows visible sunlight to enter and be absorbed by the
       plants and soil within. These objects then heat up and radiate
       at infrared wavelengths just like the Earth itself. The glass of
       a greenhouse, however, is largely opaque to infrared radiation.
       It acts as a color filter, letting short wavelengths [of
       sunlight in through [the glass, but limiting passage of longer
       wave [infrared thermal radiation [out. Since most of the heat
       cannot escape the interior of the greenhouse, it warms the glass
       to balance the energy coming in. A similar effect occurs in a
       car left out in the Sun on a hot day.... The gases in a planet's
       atmosphere can play the same role as the glass in a greenhouse,
       if they have the same property of transparency to visible light
       and opacity to infrared. (42) Therefore, one would expect that
       the gases in Venus' atmosphere can act as does the glass in the
       greenhouse, but, more importantly, that these gases are found in
       sufficient quantities to permit short-wave sunlight to pass
       through them, then act to block infrared thermal radiation from
       escaping. When discussing the composition of the constituents of
       Venus' atmosphere, I pointed out that the components of Venus'
       atmosphere were carbon dioxide, which comprises 96%, and
       nitrogen, which comprises 3.5%, with other gases making up the
       rest of Venus' inventory. The greenhouse theorists insist that
       the three component gases for their greenhouse model are carbon
       dioxide, water vapor and sulfur dioxide. And, indeed, there can
       be no doubt that there is sufficient carbon dioxide to carry out
       this greenhouse function. However, carbon dioxide, even in the
       abundance found on Venus, will not produce the opacity necessary
       to generate a runaway greenhouse. According to Barrie William
       Jones: efficient trapping [of heat cannot be produced by CO 2
       [carbon dioxide alone, in spite of the enormous mass of CO 2 in
       the Venusian atmosphere. This is because CO 2 is fairly
       transparent over certain [short wavelengths [to escape in
       infrared, thermal wavelength ranges [and to [escape in planetary
       [infrared wavelengths. Radiation could escape through these
       "windows" in sufficient quantities [so as to greatly reduce the
       greenhouse effect below that which [presently
       exists....[Additional...windows [closed by SO 2 [sulfur dioxide
       and H 2 O, and by the clouds [and hazes, [are what greatly
       increases the greenhouse effect. (43) Carbon dioxide needs the
       assistance of water vapor, sulfur dioxide, clouds and hazes to
       complete the job that it began. Of significance, then, is the
       contribution each of these gases makes to the greenhouse effect.
       Gary Hunt and Patrick Moore have outlined these contributions:
       CO 2 is responsible for about 55% of the trapped heat [in Venus'
       atmosphere. A further 25% is due to the presence of water vapor,
       while SO 2, which constitutes only 0.02 [2/100 of a percent of
       the atmosphere, traps 5% of the remaining infrared radiation.
       The remaining 15% is due to the clouds and hazes which surround
       the planet. (44) Let us examine the closing of windows with
       respect to the amount of hazes, clouds and sulfur dioxide in
       Venus' atmosphere. These constituents are responsible for
       shutting off the escape of 20% of the thermal radiation left
       open by carbon dioxide and water vapor. According to Larry W.
       Esposito, Pioneer Venus has continued to monitor these
       constituents [haze and sulfur dioxide above the clouds. Over the
       years, a remarkable discovery has emerged: Both the sulfur
       dioxide and the haze have been gradually disappearing. By now,
       only about 10% of the 1978 amount remains. This disappearance
       has also been confirmed by the Earth-orbiting International
       Ultraviolet Explorer [satellite between 1979 and 1987 and by
       other Earth-based observations. The haze and the sulfur dioxide
       are now approaching their pre-1978 values. Analysis of recent
       Earth-based radio observations, by Paul Steffes and his
       colleagues, [also shows less sulfur dioxide below the clouds.
       [Emphasis added than was measured by Pioneer Venus and Venera
       landers, which is also consistent with the decrease of sulfur
       dioxide. (45) Pollack concurs with this observation:
       "Measurements by the Pioneer Venus orbiter show that the amount
       of sulfur dioxide present near the cloud tops declined from
       approximately 200 parts per billion (ppb) in 1978 to about 10
       [parts per billion...in 1986." (46) Morrison and Owen also
       concur, stating that "[ observations over the past [20 years
       have indicated that large fluctuations occur in the
       concentration of sulfur dioxide (SO 2) in the atmosphere of
       Venus above the clouds." (47) The proponents of the greenhouse
       effect admit that the components responsible for 20% of the
       opacity of sulfur dioxide and hazes decline by up to 90% above
       the clouds and, to some lesser percentage, below the clouds. If
       the levels of the hazes and sulfur dioxide in the atmosphere
       fall to significantly lower concentrations above, as well as
       below, the clouds from their former levels, they cannot act as
       influentially to block the entire 20% of the greenhouse windows.
       This evidence could be a blow to the runaway aspect of the
       greenhouse effect. Consider the suggestion that particles in the
       clouds also act as does the glass in a greenhouse. These
       particles are either liquid droplets or tiny, solid particles.
       Therefore, the composition of the Venusian clouds ought to be
       known, so as to determine how influential these particles are in
       blocking heat escape. Greenhouse advocates believe that they
       know the composition of the clouds and use that assumption in
       their calculations. According to A. Seiff, "Pollack and Young
       (1975) assumed 75% H 2 SO 4 [sulfuric acid clouds." (48) This
       is, indeed, the conclusion Carl Sagan proposed when he said:
       Moreover, the question of the composition of the Venus clouds
       --a major enigma for centuries --has recently been solved (Young
       and Young, 1973; Sill, 1972; Young, 1973; Pollack et al., 1974).
       The clouds of Venus are composed of approximately 75% solution
       of sulfuric acid. This identification is consistent with the
       chemistry of the Venus atmosphere, in which hydrofluoric and
       hydrochloric acid have also been found; with the real part of
       the refractive index deduced from polarimetry, which is known to
       three significant figures (1.44), with the 11.2 (and now far
       infrared) absorption features; and with the discontinuity in the
       abundance of water vapor above and below the clouds. (49) This
       statement by Sagan, for all its impressive spectroscopic,
       analytical evidence, is disingenuous to say the least. Zdenek
       Kopal explains why: The reader should, however, be encouraged
       not to take these current cosmochemical scenarios as gospel
       truth. Although the sulfuric acid hypothesis accounts
       satisfactorily for many optical properties of the clouds
       surrounding Venus, it cannot explain one important property
       --the yellowish colors of the planet. The color must be produced
       by some substance that absorbs in the blue and ultraviolet
       regions of the spectrum. Sulfuric acid does not meet the
       requirement, nor does any other likely substance which could be
       considered in this connection. (50) Oberg admits, "The light
       yellow clouds seen from Earth are almost certainly droplets of
       sulfuric acid....The actual cause of the yellow tinge and the
       variable ultraviolet absorption is still unexplained." (51) But
       this assertion proves nothing. It is merely an attempt to evade
       facing the implication that the yellow tinge of the clouds
       denies that they are sulfuric acid in composition. Jones further
       explains: Detailed studies, mainly by spacecraft, have revealed
       the existence of at least three types of cloud particles. First,
       there are the tiny particles....The observations indicate they
       probably (Emphasis added.) consist of nearly pure sulfuric
       acid....These are present in the main cloud and in the hazes
       above and below, but though they are the dominant constituent of
       the haze they are a minor constituent of the main cloud. Second,
       there are larger particles...largely confined to the cloud, each
       particle probably (Emphasis added.) consisting of a liquid
       droplet of rather impure H 2 SO 4 [sulfuric acid with up to 20%
       of other substances. [Third, there are solid particles...largely
       confined to the lower half of the main cloud....This third type
       is the dominant constituent of the main cloud and also accounts
       for most of the opacity. (52) Jones tells us that this third
       constituent produces most of the opacity of the clouds.
       Greenhouse theorists base their conclusions regarding cloud
       opacity upon this third constituent. One cannot, as Sagan seems
       to suggest, derive a spectroscopic analysis of this deeper cloud
       material for two reasons: One, this material is located much
       deeper in the clouds and light from this region is very
       difficult to see. Two, even if one sees down to these depths,
       these particles do not produce spectroscopic lines. Kopal asks,
       What do the clouds of Venus really consist of? To determine
       their composition is far more difficult than to identify the
       gases constituting the atmosphere, because these clouds must
       consist of particles which are either solid or liquid. Such
       materials, unlike gases, do not produce spectral lines that can
       identify them. (53) Since I am dealing with Sagan's claim that
       the clouds of Venus are composed of sulfuric acid, I will
       complete this discussion using additional information. Billy P.
       Glass shows that Sagan's pronouncement regarding the composition
       of Venusian clouds is highly speculative. He informs us,
       contrary to Sagan, that [the nature of the clouds [of Venus has
       been a question of great interest for a long time. Speculative
       interpretations [regarding the principal constituent of the
       clouds include: water drops, ice, frozen carbon dioxide, carbon
       suboxide, mercury, halite, ammonium nitrate, ammonium chloride,
       silicate, dust particles, carbonate particles, formaldehyde,
       hydrocarbon droplets (Emphasis added.), partially hydrated
       ferric chloride and hydrochloric acid. (54) What becomes
       apparent is that the makeup of the clouds' principal liquid or
       solid component is still in question, no matter how often
       Velikovsky's critics suggest otherwise. Is it, therefore,
       possible that Sagan is still unaware that the composition of
       clouds is disputed? In their book, The Planetary System, David
       Morrison and Tobias Owen have a foreword written by Carl Sagan.
       He lauds the authors as "pioneers in the modern exploration of
       the solar system" whose book is "marked by a judicious and
       comprehensive selection of topics [with clear qualitative
       explanations." (55) What do Morrison and Owen say regarding the
       makeup of the Venusian clouds? Space probes that have passed
       through the clouds have given us a picture...of discrete cloud
       layers. Clouds are seen extending from 30 kilometers to 60
       kilometers [19 miles to 38 miles above the surface. But what are
       the various clouds made of? Are they all sulfuric acid, as are
       the visible [topmost layers? Only the Soviet probes have
       attempted compositional measurements and their results have been
       contradictory. Sulfur or, possibly, chlorine compounds of some
       sort are indicated, but their exact identities are unknown. (56)
       (Emphasis added.) Thus, Sagan's sulfuric acid clouds are nothing
       of the sort. Sagan has disqualified himself from any meaningful
       discussion of Velikovsky's work. Furthermore, with respect to
       the greenhouse effect, one cannot assume anything about the
       opacity of the clouds because their chemical makeup is simply
       not known. With the ability of the hazes, clouds and sulfur
       dioxide to block 20% of the greenhouse windows in question
       because the hazes and sulfur dioxide levels fall to 10% of their
       earlier measured values over periods of years, their efficiency
       in blocking infrared from escaping Venus must also be reduced to
       some level below the full efficiency of 20%. This being the
       case, it becomes critical for the runaway greenhouse theory that
       water vapor be found in sufficient quantity so as to block the
       remaining 25% greenhouse window. The question is, How much water
       vapor is needed to do this? Originally, when Sagan first began
       his work, he believed the surface pressure on Venus was only 4
       bars. From this, he calculated a required water vapor fraction
       of the atmosphere, between 5% and 23%, to close this greenhouse
       window and permit a surface temperature of 600 K. (57) As time
       went on, space probes made more precise measurements of Venus'
       chemical makeup and solar heating values. The parameters of
       pressure changed and, with these changes, the water vapor
       requirement changed. In essence, the greenhouse investigators
       did not know what each of the parameters really was and, thus,
       had to adjust their theoretical requirements accordingly.
       Nevertheless, these parameters are now very well measured,
       though they may vary slightly, and the greenhouse theorists have
       a good idea of the amount of water vapor necessary to reach the
       full 25% window closure needed to support the theory. Yet, years
       of searching for this water vapor constituent on Venus have
       failed to find anything like this necessary component at the
       required level. As recently as September, 1991, it was still
       reported that a research team [had focused on a greenhouse
       puzzle....The absence of water vapor above Venus' clouds
       mystifie[d scientists because models of the planet's strong
       greenhouse effect suggest[ed that vapor play[ed a key role in
       maintaining the warming. Researchers ha[d...looked below the
       cloud deck and down to the surface --and their search ha[d come
       up dry.... Evidence of a dry Venus may force researchers to
       consider whether other chemicals could create and sustain the
       planet's greenhouse effect, said David Crisp of the Jet
       Propulsion Laboratory,...who co-authored the report. (58) Hence,
       the critical, second most important constituent for closing the
       25% greenhouse window is clearly known to be insufficient to do
       its job. As with the problem discussed earlier about finding
       another enhancement gas besides water vapor to start the
       greenhouse mechanism on ancient Venus, we are faced with
       scientists searching for another gas besides water vapor to
       assist in mopping up 25% of the escaping infrared radiation on
       present-day Venus. The composition of the gases in Venus'
       atmosphere is very well-known, except for the constituents of
       the clouds. The constituents of the clouds are what greenhouse
       advocates have at their disposal as enhancement gases. As we
       already know, ammonia cannot be invoked for primordial Venus
       because Pollack has shown that photodissociation by ultraviolet
       radiation of ammonia, into nitrogen and hydrogen, would readily
       occur in the clouds --and these gases are difficult to
       recombine. Earlier, I mentioned that methane could have been
       invoked in the ancient atmosphere as an enhancement gas because
       it is an excellent greenhouse gas. And, in fact, there is
       evidence for methane in Venus' present atmosphere. (59) But, if
       the greenhouse theorists wish to turn to methane as the enhancer
       to close their 25% greenhouse window, they will be opening a
       door for Velikovsky's theory. Based on the research done,
       Velikovsky assumed "that Venus must be rich in petroleum gases.
       If, and as long as, Venus is too hot for the liquefaction of
       petroleum, the hydrocarbons will circulate in gaseous form."
       (60) Methane is the simplest of the hydrocarbon gases. The
       reader will recall Zdenek Kopal's statement that the yellowish
       color of the clouds, as seen in ultraviolet, denies that the
       clouds are composed of sulfuric acid. The question is, Can
       methane account for the yellowish color of Venus' deeper clouds?
       The answer may lie in the nature of a solar system body known to
       have much methane. Kenneth R. Lang and Charles A. Whitney
       discuss Titan, a giant satellite of Saturn: In 1944, Gerard
       Kuiper discovered signs of methane in the spectrum of Titan's
       atmosphere. The presence of nitrogen was firmly established in
       1980, when the ultraviolet detectors aboard Voyager I showed
       that nitrogen molecules account for the bulk of Titan's
       atmosphere. Visible light cannot penetrate Titan's atmosphere,
       for it is covered by an obscuring veil of orange smog (Emphasis
       added.) produced by photochemical reactions as ultraviolet
       sunlight breaks methane and nitrogen molecules apart. Some of
       these fragments then recombine to create the smog, and, in
       Titan's dry cold atmosphere, the smog builds to an impenetrable
       haze. (On Earth, smog also forms by the action of sunlight on
       hydrocarbon molecules in the air.) (61) If Venus' clouds contain
       hydrocarbons, then the same photochemistry occurring in Titan's
       clouds may be occurring in Venus' clouds. Venus has nitrogen
       comparable to that of the Earth; its atmosphere is dry,
       ultraviolet is available and the clouds are very dark at a
       deeper level, as with Titan. Hence, with perhaps fewer reactions
       taking place where there is less methane to create smog, the
       number of reactions may create a yellowish smog rather than an
       orange one. One still cannot dismiss Velikovsky's hydrocarbon
       cloud composition for Venus, because the clouds' chemical
       composition is still not known. Returning to the greenhouse, if
       the clouds of Venus are made up of significant amounts of
       hydrocarbons, just as Velikovsky claimed, then the greenhouse
       advocates may be able to better secure their theory because
       methane --in abundance --may shut all the greenhouse windows
       that may be open. It is a fascinating catch-22 situation;
       Velikovsky's greenhouse critics refuse to claim that the
       Venusian clouds are made of hydrocarbons, because Velikovsky
       would have been right all along respecting this prediction. On
       the other hand, these greenhouse advocates may fail in their
       campaign if they reject hydrocarbon clouds, because their
       greenhouse enhancement gas may not be available. For those
       suggesting that, for Venus, no scientists would propose that an
       early-age planet would possess methane in its atmosphere, I cite
       James Oberg. Discussing how Mars, in its early day, maintained
       water on its surface at a time when the Sun produced 30% to 40%
       less radiation than it does now, he writes: According to [James
       B. Pollack, a Martian greenhouse of carbon dioxide alone would
       not produce a very efficient "greenhouse effect." In fact, a
       surface pressure of 2 bars [double the Earth's atmospheric
       pressure would be required for the globally- and
       annually-averaged surface temperatures to be above freezing.
       However, if the atmosphere were predominantly methane with
       admixtures of ammonia and water vapor, a very effective
       "greenhouse effect" would have been created which would have
       allowed liquid water to form...." (62) (Emphasis added.) If
       scientists suggest the possibility of methane, a hydrocarbon, in
       the early atmosphere of Mars, there is no compelling reason to
       deny that the same exists in Venus' atmosphere, presently, if
       Venus is an extremely young planet. At this stage of analysis,
       it is evident that all the component gases necessary to fully
       generate a runaway greenhouse effect on Venus are not found in
       appropriate amounts to sustain this effect --except for carbon
       dioxide. The amount of water vapor stands as a major obstacle to
       the solution of this problem. To argue that the water is there,
       except that we can't find it, is assuming what must be proven.
       Furthermore, much of the evidence regarding the hazes and clouds
       is simply assumed to be correct, as is, for example, the
       conclusion that they are composed of a 75% solution of sulfuric
       acid; when, in fact, there is enormous disagreement among
       scientists about the composition of the clouds. As we can see,
       all the assumptions must be taken as facts and, even with these,
       one cannot be confident that the greenhouse is a runaway
       greenhouse. But the assumptions are only assumptions "still to
       be proven by experiment," as von Braun stated. Therefore, the
       view that the runaway greenhouse is correct is simply not
       conclusive, and, therefore, ought not be promulgated. The
       conclusion that these gases are doing all that is claimed for
       them (except carbon dioxide) in Venus' atmosphere is tenuous at
       best.
       _ATMOSPHERIC CIRCULATION
       _There are two sources of energy that can circulate air masses
       in a planetary atmosphere. The first source of energy is the
       rotation of the planet. The Earth's winds generally blow in a
       west-to-east direction because of the Earth's rapid west-to-east
       rotation on its axis. Surface topography in contact with the
       atmosphere causes the bottom layer of air to move in the
       direction of the Earth's rotation. This motion at the bottom of
       the atmosphere is transferred by air currents to the rest of the
       atmosphere and imparts the west-to-east motion throughout.
       East-to-west or west-to-east motions are designated as zonal
       motion or zonal circulation. The second source of energy that
       imparts motion in a planet's atmosphere is solar heat. The sun's
       radiant energy heats the dayside of a planet, more so in the
       equatorial regions than in the polar regions. This form of
       radiant input causes the hot air to rise at the equator and, in
       the upper atmosphere, to move toward the cooler polar regions.
       When the air becomes sufficiently cooled, it sinks to the
       surface and then returns, along this surface route, to the hot
       equatorial regions where it is heated to rise and repeat the
       cycle. George Hadley, who explained this motion, has had this
       atmospheric circulation named for him. Such heat-driven motions
       are called Hadley cells. North-to-south and south-to-north
       motions are designated as meridional motion or meridional
       circulation. On the Earth, which is rotating rapidly and is also
       heated by solar radiation, a combination of these two motions
       develops. Air, heated at the equator, rises and blows
       meridionally north in the northern hemisphere and south in the
       southern hemisphere. But the air masses are also feeling the
       influence of the Earth's rotation and, thereby, are forced to
       veer toward the east in both hemispheres as they leave the
       equatorial regions. Because the air masses at the equator are
       moving zonally at 1,000 miles per hour while those air masses
       farther north and south are moving more slowly in relation with
       the Earth's rotation, a pseudo-force is created which causes air
       masses to circulate in a broad, counterclockwise movement in the
       northern hemisphere and to circulate clockwise in the southern
       hemisphere. For example, if we were to slow down the Earth's
       rotation to a sidereal rotation period of 100 days, the Earth's
       air masses would receive almost no push from the surface
       topography and the west-to-east zonal motion would, over time,
       dissipate and almost come to a stop. The Sun would still be
       heating the equatorial regions on such a slowly rotating Earth,
       on the dayside, for longer time periods. This solar heat force
       would generate very powerful Hadley cells and the dominant form
       of atmospheric circulation would be meridional, north and south
       motions. There would be practically no zonal motion in the
       Earth's atmosphere under such conditions. On Venus, we encounter
       the same two forces: planetary rotation and solar radiation.
       However, there is a singular difference between the two planets.
       Venus' rotation rate is 243 times slower than that of the Earth.
       There is no compelling rotational force on Venus to cause its
       atmosphere to rotate zonally, that is east to west. Because of
       this one fact, the other force --solar radiation --becomes the
       only significant, driving mechanism in Venus' atmosphere and
       should induce two giant, hemispheric, meridional Hadley cells.
       This, then, is an excellent way with which to test Velikovsky's
       concept that Venus is heated uniformly from its hot molten core
       not far below its crust and compare it to the concept of solar
       greenhouse heating. If the solar-induced runaway greenhouse
       effect is the dominant source of heat for Venus' atmospheric
       circulation, its atmosphere should exhibit clearly observable,
       directly measurable Hadley cells. In Pioneer Venus we read that
       [thermal contrasts provide the driving mechanism for the general
       circulation, since they set up the pressure differences to drive
       [air flow. The absence of large thermal contrasts in the
       atmosphere of Venus means that there is a very effective
       transport of heat from equator to poles and from the subsolar to
       antisolar points by means of atmospheric circulation; the
       atmosphere must be able to transport heat from the region below
       the Sun to the rest of the planet. (63) If such a circulation is
       not found, or the atmosphere shows practically no or extremely
       small, meridional motions, one may be confident that the
       greenhouse mechanism is not the generating force in Venus'
       atmosphere. If Velikovsky is correct and the entire planet is
       heated fairly uniformly from its subsurface, then Hadley cells
       are not required so as to circulate the air masses. Velikovsky's
       theory requires no such circulation pattern. If Venus' heat is
       derived from below its hot crust, then all that the Venusian
       atmospheric gases have to do is either radiate, conduct or
       convect heat upward. There is no requirement to circulate hot
       air masses from the equator to the poles and back to the
       equator. If the runaway greenhouse effect is correct, there will
       be definite Hadley cells circulating the atmosphere. If
       Velikovsky is correct, few or no Hadley cell motions will be
       observed or measured. Gerald Schubert explains how this Hadley
       circulation works and why it is necessarily expected for the
       Venus greenhouse theory: The basic drive for atmospheric
       circulation is latitudinal imbalance between absorbed solar
       radiation....In equatorial latitudes, more energy is absorbed
       than is reradiated to space. The opposite is true in polar
       latitudes. The atmosphere must redress this imbalance by
       transporting heat poleward. Meridional transport of heat in the
       Earth's atmosphere is accomplished by a Hadley circulation in
       low latitudes and by baroclinic [pressure change eddies in
       mid-latitudes....However, baroclinic heat transport would not be
       expected to dominate in the mid-latitudes of an atmosphere on a
       slowly rotating planet like Venus and a Hadley circulation, on
       Venus, would be expected to extend to high polar latitudes.
       Thus, it would be anticipated that the primary circulation
       mechanism on Venus would be a pair of [north and south
       hemispheric Hadley cells symmetric about the equator, with
       rising motions over the equatorial latitudes, poleward flow at
       high latitudes sinking over the polar regions and equatorward
       flow near the surface. It is, therefore, remarkable that Venus'
       dominant atmospheric circulation is a westward super-rotation.
       However, zonal winds cannot transfer heat poleward, so there
       MUST BE a weaker meridional circulation as well. (64)
       (Capitalization added.) Gerald Schubert fully agrees that the
       greenhouse mechanism requires Hadley cells as the dominant form
       of circulation. To the chagrin of the greenhouse theorists,
       instead of discovering a circulation pattern in harmony with the
       greenhouse theory, one featuring the opposite was found.
       Westward blowing winds, Schubert admits, do not transport heat
       toward the poles and super-rotation means that, at all latitudes
       and altitudes, the wind is moving zonally east to west on Venus.
       Thus, where is the meridional circulation carrying hot air to
       the poles and cooler air back to the equator, if the greenhouse
       effect dominates Venus' atmosphere?! According to Schubert,
       somehow a weak meridional circulation must exist. By saying that
       such a circulation must be proves absolutely nothing. What is
       the evidence for this circulation pattern? Let us examine the
       bottom layers of the atmosphere to see if any turnover Hadley
       cells are operating there. Pioneer Venus reported the following:
       A surprising discovery is that much of the deep atmosphere is
       stably stratified like the Earth's stratosphere or like air in
       the Los Angeles basin on a smoggy day. (Emphasis added.) From
       the clouds down to 30 [kilometers altitude (a layer 23
       kilometers deep) [14 miles and in the lower layer [at the
       surface between 15 kilometers and 20 kilometers[ 9 miles to 12
       miles altitude, the atmosphere is stratified and free of
       convective activity. It does not rise and overturn in the way
       that air does over hot farm or desert land on Earth, or in
       cumulus clouds. This was unexpected, because the high
       temperatures in the deep atmosphere were thought to be a source
       of hot rising gas which would lead to deep convective cells
       [Hadley cells and turbulence. Also, before Pioneer Venus,
       theoretical studies had indicated that, at radiative equilibrium
       much of the lower atmosphere would be unstable and would be
       overturning. (65) (Emphasis added.) There is no Hadley
       circulation in atmospheric layers; one being, from the surface,
       up to 12 miles high and the other from the clouds down, a layer
       14 miles thick. This lack of circulation in the lower atmosphere
       is a fundamental contradiction to the greenhouse mechanism and
       Schubert specifically makes this point: "A direct meridional
       circulation in the deep atmosphere is...needed to balance the
       observed increase in infrared cooling with latitude." (66) If
       there is more heat at the equator and less toward the poles, as
       Schubert claims, where is the circulation of air toward the
       equator that should support this statement? These conclusions
       exist nowhere, except in theory and on paper. For example, on
       the basis of certain readings from one Pioneer Venus Night
       probe, it was quickly determined that there were three layers of
       air in Venus' atmosphere below 40 kilometers (25 miles) where
       winds blow north and south, away from the equator, as giant air
       flows, distributing hot air from the equator very near to the
       poles and the returned cooler air back to the equator. (67)
       Nevertheless, Pioneer Venus probes measured the wind directions
       at other points on the planet and found that "the meridional
       winds below 40 kilometers at the other Pioneer Venus probe
       sites...are not consistent with a three-layer mean circulation
       pattern and probably represent eddies." (68) There is no
       evidence for Hadley cell circulation in the lower atmosphere. Is
       there any solid evidence for air descending at or around the
       poles to the surface, as the greenhouse model requires? We do
       know that the data at all sites showed that the lowest 20
       kilometers of air is stable over the entire planet. That should
       have been enough to eliminate that idea, but we find Hunt and
       Moore suggesting: Infrared observations from Pioneer Orbiter
       have led to the discovery of a significant cloud morphology in
       the north polar region of Venus, which appears as a dipole
       structure. It consists of two clearings in the clouds, in
       locations straddling the pole and rotating around it in about
       2.7 days. The clearings are thought to be evidence for
       subsidence of the atmosphere at the center of the polar vortex.
       (Emphasis added.) The absence of descending [air motions
       elsewhere suggests that a large, single circulation [Hadley cell
       may fill the northern hemisphere at levels near the cloud tops.
       (69) On the other hand, Schubert states that these hot spots may
       be lowering, in the cloud tops associated with descending motion
       near the center of the polar vortex. However, other prominent
       thermal features of the cloud level polar atmosphere are not so
       obviously related to the descending motions of a polar vortex.
       "[ Radiometer measurements at the poles [of Venus appeared to
       confirm theories of a downward-moving polar vortex. But the belt
       of atmosphere above the cloud tops proved to be about 10 C (18
       F) hotter than similar regions at the equator." (71) Therefore,
       cooler equatorial cloud top air masses that are hotter than
       polar air masses, at the same altitude, should not blow toward
       the poles. This type of motion would defy the Second Law of
       Thermodynamics! There are other similar, supposed thermal
       features in other areas of Venus' atmosphere, like those at the
       poles, which show no signs that air is descending. Schubert
       remarks that the "interpretation of the meridional wind
       velocities measured by P.V. [Pioneer Venus probes in terms of
       the mean meridional circulations...is only speculative and is
       guided by other observations of wind speed and atmospheric
       structure and theoretical ideas about the nature of the mean
       circulation." (72) (Emphasis added.) Clark R. Chapman put the
       situation into the clearest perspective when he said that "[
       theorists began to expect there might be traditional Hadley cell
       winds, with greenhouse-warmed air rising in the Venusian
       tropics. But, after Pioneer Venus, the Hadley model remains a
       plausible hypothesis in search of confirmation." (73) All the
       evidence contradicts the notion that solar radiation is moving
       heat to the poles or that cooler polar air is moving to the
       equator. Why, then, are the scientists driven to find some
       meridional Hadley cell circulation? Schubert reasons that, "[
       while there is not actual evidence of indirect meridional cells,
       there are strong theoretical reasons to expect that they exist."
       (74) Chapman stated that greenhouse theorists expect Hadley cell
       circulation. Schubert stated that there are strong, theoretical
       reasons for their existence. This means that the greenhouse
       effect requires them to exist, therefore they must exist. The
       theory is determining what the evidence must say. In the
       following segment of this paper, the reader will see the lengths
       to which the astronomers have gone to make the evidence that
       fully contradicts the greenhouse fit this theoretical belief.
       Here, too, we see the same dismissal of evidence! Pollack sums
       up the case being made: "The east-west winds on Venus blow in
       the direction of the planet's rotation at all latitudes." (75)
       The question that must be answered is, Why is the atmospheric
       circulation on Venus zonal rather than meridional? Velikovsky
       has proposed that this east-to-west circulation is caused by the
       angular momentum of Venus' enormous tail of gas that fell to the
       planet a few thousand years ago when it achieved its present
       orbit. The enormous mass of that body of gas in the tail
       descended, in a sweeping orbit, down and around the planet,
       moving in one direction as it wrapped and enveloped Venus. The
       great, angular momentum created is still moving the Venusian
       atmosphere in a powerful super-rotation at all latitudes and
       altitudes, east to west. According to Schubert: From the
       dynamical viewpoint, the major challenge of the Venus atmosphere
       is to explain its bulk super-rotation. We have seen that this is
       westward at all latitudes and at altitudes between 10 kilometers
       and 100 kilometers. Zonal wind velocity increases steadily with
       height above the surface....The angular momentum density of the
       atmosphere's rotation increases with height from the surface to
       20 kilometers and decreases with height above this level. Most
       of the atmospheric angular momentum is contained in the layer
       between 10 kilometers and 40 kilometers....The problem facing
       the dynamicist is to find the source of the excess atmospheric
       angular momentum, and the processes which transport this
       momentum both vertically and horizontally. (76) Venus' total
       atmospheric angular momentum is greater than that of the Earth
       by almost a factor of 200. This angular momentum would be able
       to change the rotation of the solid planet by several hours.
       This amount of angular momentum, 3.6 X 10 28 kg M 2 S -1, (77)
       does not dissipate quickly. But, over millions, not to say
       billions, of years, it should have dissipated if the greenhouse
       heating effect was operating. The bulk of the atmosphere's
       momentum is found some 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) above the
       surface, up to 40 kilometers (25 miles) high, with an air flow
       that is 19 miles thick. Like an air stream, the greatest force
       of the current is in the region above the stream bed and below
       the upper regions. This region on Venus is where the atmosphere
       is as dense as possible, where the bulk of the atmosphere's mass
       is found, where there is practically no topographical
       obstruction below and where there are the fewest eddy motions.
       As Schubert explained above, only one of the four Pioneer Venus
       probes encountered eddy currents below 40 kilometers. (78) What
       is, therefore, observed is a gravitational force like that found
       in an oceanic stream. This is fully congruent with Velikovsky's
       theory because Venus' tail, as it fell, would create such a
       stream. The air masses below and above the stream are forced, by
       contact with it, to move in the same direction, while, at the
       very bottom of the atmosphere, the dense air is harder to move.
       According to Jonathan Weiner, loops or rings of water break off
       from the Gulf Stream into the Atlantic Ocean. These rings flow
       in circles which are many miles in diameter, but they are not
       whirlpools. The water inside and outside the rings is not
       rotating at all. The depth of water rotating in the rings is 900
       feet deep and these rings of motion may continue to flow from
       four months up to several years. (79) If a ring of water flowing
       in the ocean can last for several years, a shallow ocean flowing
       in one direction would flow for tens of thousands of years. How
       do the atmospheric scientists explain this motion? They have
       only two forces with which to create super-zonal rotation. One
       is the rotation of Venus, which is too slow to generate this
       kind of circulation. The other is the Sun, which should produce
       meridional Hadley cell circulation. What these scientists
       suggest is that the very force which will generate Hadley cell
       circulation --the Sun --can create eddies in the upper
       atmosphere that move east to west predominantly and act as a
       torque to create the same east-to-west motions below them. Of
       course, no one believes that the Sun, which has sufficient
       influence to produce super-zonal rotation, is doing this;
       because, if it can do this, its influence would and should
       generate super-meridional Hadley cell circulation by the very
       same process, specially when that is the very nature of the
       circulation that should be generated by the Sun. Oberg sums up
       the unreality of the interpretation of super-zonal atmospheric
       rotation. He finds it is a: puzzle [that awaits explanation, the
       wind velocities in Venus' atmosphere.... Venus rotates at a
       speed of only five mph [miles per hour at its equator, but these
       cloud markings are traveling at a velocity 100 times that. On
       Earth, jet streams in the outer atmosphere may occasionally
       travel [20% or 30% faster than Earth's spin.... How could Venus'
       upper atmosphere be propelled around the planet at such
       disproportionate velocities? Initial meteorological computer
       simulations could not account for speeds [anywhere near as high.
       The dynamics of this atmosphere, which should have been so
       simple, were increasingly puzzling. Although recent computer
       models have been able to simulate the effect thought to have
       been seen on Venus, they are rather strained and artificial.
       (80) In essence, the scientists have explained super-zonal
       rotation by the very force that explains super-meridional Hadley
       cell circulation. The contradiction is so apparent that it
       requires no further attention. As stated by S. S. Limaye, the
       greenhouse model has still failed to explain the super-rotation
       of Venus'atmosphere. (81) Once again, there is a fundamental
       contradiction in what the scientists are proposing and none with
       respect to Velikovsky's concept. After billions of years of
       having greenhouse solar heat pump hot air to the poles from the
       equator, on a slowly rotating planet, and back to the equator
       via Hadley cell circulation, Venus' atmosphere should not
       exhibit any significant zonal circulation at all. The entire
       process, created by the scientists to have the Sun create
       atmospheric zonal motion, is the complete antithesis to its
       action. It is a futile operation, strained and artificial,
       reminiscent of the inventions of Rube Goldberg.
       _BALANCING THERMAL IMBALANCE
       _Ultimately, what is the reason given for support of this
       theory? The answer is that Venus must have a runaway greenhouse
       effect operating because the planet is in thermal balance. If
       Velikovsky was right, Venus, as a newborn planet in the early
       cool down stages of it development, should be emitting much more
       heat than is supplied to it by the Sun. It should have a thermal
       imbalance; the nearer to the planet one measures infrared
       emissions, the greater this imbalance should be between solar
       input and infrared planetary output. Venus is not heated from
       below its surface, we are informed by greenhouse advocates, but
       by the greenhouse effect. It is made clear that measurements
       prove, conclusively, that Venus is known to be in thermal
       balance at all levels in its atmosphere and, therefore,
       Velikovsky is wrong. As Carl Sagan stated: What I think
       Velikovsky is trying to say here is that his Venus...is giving
       off more heat than it receives from the Sun and that the
       observed temperatures, on both the night and day sides, are due
       more to the "candescence" of Venus than to the radiation it now
       receives from the Sun. But this is a serious error. The
       bolometric albedo (the fraction of sunlight reflected by an
       observed infrared temperature of the clouds of Venus of about
       240 K) that is to say, the clouds of Venus, are precisely at the
       temperature expected on the basis of the amount of sunlight that
       is absorbed there. (82) If Sagan's conclusion and analysis of
       the measured data is correct, then, certainly, Velikovsky's
       theory is dead. But Sagan's claim that Venus is in thermal
       balance is contradicted by a series of measurements that show
       that there is no thermal balance observed anywhere in Venus'
       atmosphere, from its cloud tops to its surface!
       _In 1978, George R. Talbott, a physicist whose specialty is
       thermodynamics, carried out a fundamental calculation regarding
       Venus' surface temperature. He did something quite commonly done
       in laboratories all over the world. If a substance is heated to
       candescence and then left to cool, a thermal analysis of its
       properties with regard to heat conduction, radiation, etc., can
       tell how long ago the substance was candescent. Talbott started
       with a candescent Venus, 3,500 years ago, and determined what
       its surface temperature would be after 3,500 years of cooling.
       Of course, Talbott's calculations were much more complicated
       than the simple analysis carried out in laboratories. What he
       discovered after setting up all the possible parameters on a
       computer and running the program was a surprise and a shock. He
       started with a molten Venus with a surface temperature of 1,500
       K and 2,000 K, allowed for heat transfer, internally, by flowing
       cells of magma radiating into a heavy atmosphere, and found that
       Venus' surface temperature, presently, was exactly 750 K --just
       what the surface temperature presently is. (83) Some individuals
       claimed that Talbott could not have reckoned correctly, because
       the parameters governing Venus 3,500 years ago could not be
       known with precision. On the other hand, overestimates of some
       parameters could have been balanced by underestimates of others.
       However, for Talbott to be wrong, as is --supposedly
       --Velikovsky, Talbott's work would have had to be in error by
       100%. Other than that, Venus is in thermal imbalance.
       _As I will show below, the actual measurements of infrared
       emissions from Venus, compared to solar radiation input at the
       Venusian surface, do not contradict Talbott's work. By taking
       the known surface temperature of the Sun and calculating the
       distance to Venus, Venus' thermal balance or imbalance is
       determined. At Venus' distance, the solar radiation will be
       diminished to a particular value. One then calculates the
       diameter of the planet with its atmosphere to determine how much
       area intercepts this solar radiation value. What is most
       important for the rest of the calculations is to determine, as
       precisely as possible, how much light is reflected by the
       planet's clouds and how much light or radiant energy is
       absorbed. This ability of clouds to reflect light is called its
       albedo. The higher the percentage of albedo, the more light is
       reflected; the lower the percentage of albedo, the more light is
       absorbed. This albedo figure must be known precisely, before it
       can be determined, at the cloud top temperature of 240 K,
       whether or not Venus is in thermal balance. Only a few
       percentages of difference, say, 0.76 and 0.78, or 2%, at the
       cloud tops, would have a pronounced effect on Venus and would
       indicate about 10% more heat coming from the planet than is
       supplied by sunlight. What do the measurements actually show? V.
       I. Moroz presented some of the earlier measurement of Venus'
       albedo. G. Muller measured it to be 0.878, or 87.8%, in 1893.
       Andre Danjon derived a spherical albedo for Venus of 0.815 in
       1949, while C. F. Knuckles, M. K. Sinton and W. M. Sinton
       derived a spherical albedo for Venus, of 0.815, in 1961. (84)
       What Moroz did was average the readings to get the best possible
       indication of the actual albedo. The more acceptable
       measurements are the most recent and use the latest technical
       developments, specially those taken from spacecraft orbiting
       Venus. These are fully discussed by F. W. Taylor et al. in an
       article titled, "The Thermal Balance of the Middle and Upper
       Atmosphere of Venus." The albedo found does not indicate thermal
       balance, but thermal imbalance. The reader will learn that these
       readings and their implications of a thermal imbalance were so
       distressing to the investigators that they rejected all the
       measurements showing that Venus was emitting more heat than the
       sunlight was delivering. F. W. Taylor states: Measurements of
       albedo are more difficult to calibrate than those of thermal
       flux, because of the problem of obtaining an accurate reference
       source. Using earth-based measurements, Irvine (1968) calculated
       a (1968) calculated a value for A [albedo of 0.77 0.07, which
       was later revised upward to 0.80 0.07 by Travis (1975). The
       Pioneer Venus infrared radiometer had a 0.4 to 4.0 µm channel
       calibrated by a lamp from which Tomasko et al. (1980b) obtained
       a preliminary albedo for Venus of 0.80 0.02. Another approach to
       determining the albedo is simply to assume that the atmosphere
       is in net radiative balance...[by equation. In this way, a value
       of 0.79+ 0.02- 0.01 has been obtained from Venera radiometry
       (Ksanfomality, 1977, 1980b) and [a value of 0.76 0.006 [has been
       obtained from Pioneer Venus emission measurements (Schofield et
       al., 1982). Clearly the Pioneer measurements of emission and
       reflection are not consistent with each other if net radiative
       balance applies. (Emphasis added.) A source inside Venus equal
       in magnitude to 20% of the solar input (i.e., accounting for the
       difference between A= 0.76 and A= 0.80) is very unlikely, since
       Venus is thought to have an Earth-like makeup, which would imply
       internal heat sources several orders of magnitude less than
       this. Also, even if such sources were postulated, it is
       difficult to construct a model in which these fairly large
       amounts of heat can be transported from the core to the
       atmosphere via a rocky crust without the latter becoming
       sufficiently plastic to collapse of the observed surface relief.
       This could be avoided if the transport was very localized, i.e.,
       via a relatively small number of giant volcanoes. Although
       large, fresh-looking volcanoes do appear to exist on Venus...and
       the composition of the atmosphere is consistent with vigorous
       output from these, a simple comparison with terrestrial
       volcanism shows that the volcanic activity on Venus would have
       to be on an awesome scale to account for the missing 5 X 10 15 W
       [watts, or so, of power. A more acceptable alternative is that
       the preliminary estimate of 0.80 0.2 for the albedo from the P.
       V. [Pioneer Venus measurements is too high, since the
       uncertainty limit is now known from further work to be too
       conservative. (J. V. Martonchik, personal communication.) A
       fuller analysis of the P. V. [Pioneer Venus albedo data --still
       the best, in terms of wavelength, spacial and phase coverage,
       and radiometric precision, which is likely to be obtained for
       the foreseeable future --is likely to resolve this puzzle. In
       conclusion, then, the best thermal measurements of Venus WITH
       THE ASSUMPTION OF GLOBAL ENERGY BALANCE yield a value for the
       albedo of 0.76 0.1; this is the most probable value. (85)
       (Capitalization added. Let us examine what was assumed as the
       truth regarding the reasons for Venus being in radiative
       balance. First, Taylor and his colleagues assumed that each of
       the albedos measured by all the other investigators was wrong or
       that the instrumental error range in every other investigator's
       case was always on the minus side. There were three
       measurements: one by Irvine of 0.77 0.07, revised upward by
       Travis to around 0.80 0.07; another by Tomasko et al., using
       Pioneer Venus instruments to obtain a value of 0.80 0.02; and
       another, based on the assumption that Venus was in thermal
       balance, by Ksanfomality, who used Venera instrumentation to
       calculate an albedo of 0.79+ 0.02- 0.01. Thus, three albedo
       measurements indicated that the reflection of light, in terms of
       albedo, clustered around 0.80, the last two with tolerance
       levels plus or minus well above 0.76, accepted as the emission
       albedo by Taylor and his colleagues. If Venus reflected 80% of
       the light incident to it, but allowed 4% more light than was
       found by the emission albedo of 0.76, then the planet was
       emitting 20% more heat than sunlight delivered. Usually when a
       group of scientific measurements cluster around a particular
       value, as the 80% albedo did, scientists assume that the
       averaged value of these readings is a fairly good indication of
       the actual figure. By averaging the measurements, scientists
       achieve the best approximate value. However, since it was
       unthinkable that Venus could be in radiative imbalance, even
       based on one measurement that assumed balance but arrived at a
       figure of A= 79%, J. V. Martonchik reevaluated the Pioneer Venus
       data that gave an albedo of 80% .02% and recalculated the
       possible instrument error to make it large enough so that, on
       the minus side, it would agree with the lower 76% emission
       albedo. This was presented in a private communication that could
       not be analyzed by other investigators to determine whether or
       not Martonchik's correction was itself without error. Second,
       Taylor and his colleagues assumed that Venus must possess an
       internal heat source almost equivalent to that of the Earth.
       Since the Earth generates an internal heat value much smaller
       than the value that suggests a 20% imbalance on Venus, they
       concluded that Venus, itself, could not be responsible for this
       additional heat. If Venus' emissions were actually this much
       greater, they said, Venus would have to be enormously volcanic,
       and --in the next breath --said Venus appears to exhibit a
       highly volcanic surface. They also admit that the Venusian
       atmosphere appears to contain the gases consistent with
       vigorous, volcanic outgassing. But all these correlations mean
       nothing. Taylor and his collleagues say such agreement between
       thermal imbalance and Venus' volcanic surface and atmosphere is
       too incredible to accept, and reject all of this on the one
       assumption that Venus must be in thermal balance. Yet their
       conclusion states that the 0.76 0.01 albedo is the most probable
       value. There is no evidence to suggest this. Nevertheless, if
       this assumption is correct, it should be corroborated by all the
       other readings taken by Venera and Pioneer Venus probes. These
       readings should exhibit demonstrable evidence of radiative
       balance throughout the rest of the Venusian atmosphere. This, in
       fact, is not the case. In fact, all the other readings deliver a
       death blow to any assertion that Venus ' atmosphere is in
       thermal balance. If the runaway greenhouse effect is correct,
       not only must the cloud tops exhibit thermal balance between
       solar input and infrared thermal output, but the lower
       atmosphere must show the same. If, as Velikovsky claims, the
       greenhouse effect presents only a minor contribution to Venus'
       high thermal emission, then as one gets closer to the surface of
       the planet, the measurements should show an even greater
       radiative imbalance than the 20% suggested by the cloud top
       readings. The nature of establishing radiative balance in an
       atmosphere is explained thus, "Radiative balance occurs [on a
       planet at every level when the amount of downward, directed
       solar radiation that is absorbed is equal to the amount of
       infrared radiation that is emitted upward. When local
       temperature satisfies this balance, the atmosphere temperature
       is maintained." (86) (Emphasis added.) M. G. Tomasko further
       reinforces this concept: In a steady state, the algebraic sum of
       the atmospheric heating and cooling rates due to all physical
       processes should [equal zero at each location. At a given
       location, the heating and cooling rates depend on the state of
       the atmosphere: its temperature, pressure, composition,
       radiation and wind fields. A successful steady-state model for
       the thermal balance of Venus' lower atmosphere will include the
       relationship of the heating and cooling rates to the atmospheric
       state, and show that the atmospheric structure leading to net
       zero heating or cooling at each location is equal to the
       observed structure. (87) What, then, do the Pioneer Venus probes
       that entered the atmosphere show regarding this? According to
       Tomasko, "Among the most accurate measurements of the
       temperature-pressure structure of the lower atmosphere of Venus
       [we find those made by the four Pioneer Venus (PV) probes....The
       probe entry locations...vary in latitude from 30 South to 60
       North [and measure Day and Night...temperature profiles...."
       (88) According to Richard A. Kerr, the editor of Science: When
       Pioneer Venus probes looked at the temperature, each one found
       more energy being radiated up from the lower atmosphere than
       enters it as sunlight....To further complicate the situation,
       the size of the apparent upward flow of energy varies from place
       to place by a factor of [two, which was a disturbing discovery.
       (89) It is impossible to believe that in one area the greenhouse
       effect is twice as efficient as in others. From Velikovsky's
       theoretical viewpoint, parts of Venus' surface, known to the
       scientists as coronea, or hot spots, are much hotter than other
       areas of the surface. This would clearly explain these
       measurements. From the National Aeronautics and Space
       Administration (NASA) publication, Pioneer Venus, we have the
       following: The measured, infrared fluxes [upward from Venus show
       several anomalies, the origin of which is still being debated.
       Taken at face value, the anomalies suggest that parts of the
       atmosphere are transmitting about twice the energy upward than
       is available from solar radiation at the same level. (90) It is
       obvious that wind motions, pressures and all the other
       atmospheric conditions in Venus' atmosphere will not create a
       50% imbalance. While the cloud top indicated a 20% thermal
       imbalance farther down in the atmosphere, the Pioneer Venus
       probes revealed a 50% radiative imbalance. This, of course, is
       in full agreement with Velikovsky's concept that the extremely
       hot planet's surface is the major heat source, indicated by
       greater fluxes of infrared closer to the thermal source. This
       finding was anathema to the investigators, as was the imbalance
       measured at the top of the cloud cover; but, What was to be done
       about these most accurate readings? Tomasko tells us exactly
       what some scientists did and why: The thermal flux profiles are
       surprisingly variable from site to site, in view of the great
       similarity in temperature profiles measured at these sites. In
       addition, at both the Night and North probes sites, they are
       much greater than the globally averaged solar net profile at low
       altitudes, implying a substantive radiative imbalance in the
       lower atmosphere. (Emphasis added.) In view of the large and
       variable nature of these flux measurements, the investigators
       have searched for instrumental problems which could have
       affected the measurements and have found one that could have
       systematically increased the measured thermal net fluxes....The
       authors believe that they understand the vertical dependence of
       the flux errors, and by adjusting the fluxes to reasonable
       values, at low altitudes, they have derived corrected fluxes.
       (91) (Emphasis added.) Corrected values are not really valid
       values. Not only did the scientists correct the two highest
       readings to "reasonable values," meaning thermal balance values,
       they corrected every probe reading because every probe showed
       strong radiative imbalance at all levels of the atmosphere
       --much as was found for the cloud tops. Based on the
       investigators' beliefs, they simply made the data fit the theory
       of a greenhouse in radiative balance. However, one may be quite
       sure that, if the readings corroborated their beliefs of thermal
       balance, we would be showered by this direct confirmation of
       theory. But these measurements did not exhibit any evidence for
       balance. As Kerr admitted, "The much ballyhooed greenhouse
       effect of Venus' carbon dioxide atmosphere can account for only
       part of the heating, and heating, for other mechanisms is now in
       turmoil." (92) In essence, the thermal imbalance at the cloud
       tops was corroborated by Pioneer Venus probes below the clouds,
       so one can be confident that such is also the case throughout
       the entire Venusian atmosphere. What must also be pointed out is
       that the Pioneer Venus probes did not measure radiation all the
       way down to the surface. According to Seiff, "[ temperature data
       were not obtained by the Pioneer probes below 12 kilometers [7
       miles altitude." (93) Tomasko indicates that "[ the data from
       the temperature sensors of all four [Pioneer Venus probes
       terminated at 13 kilometers altitude." (94) From this fact, one
       would expect that, based on Velikovsky's concept, the Venera
       probes that did approach the surface, measuring the solar fluxes
       in and infrared thermal fluxes emitted from the surface, would
       show an even greater radiative imbalance than did the Pioneer
       probes. In fact, that is what they did! Seiff states: The
       heating rates needed to warm the atmosphere from the Day probe
       [Pioneer Venus profile to that of Venera 9 integrated over
       altitude...is 45 times the midday solar heat absorbed at 30
       latitude....This is also true for the Venera 10, 11 and 12 data
       relative to the large probe data, for which necessary heating
       rates integrated over altitude are> [somewhat less than 40 times
       the mean dayside solar input for the albedo of 0.71. (95)
       (Emphasis added.) On page 219 of his article in Venus, Seiff
       essentially admits the same thing. The average reading from the
       Venera probes showed solar radiation absorbed by Venus. The
       surface infrared fluxes emitted were around 40 times more than
       enters Venus' atmosphere as sunlight. The tremendous rise in
       infrared heat nearer to the surface is similar to the heat
       emitted by a white-hot block of metal, in that, as one puts
       one's hand near the block, the heat rises, but, at a certain
       closer distance to the block, the heat rises immensely. This
       makes sense in terms of the greenhouse effect as well. The
       regions where most of the Sun's radiant energy is absorbed
       would, at those altitudes, generate the strongest greenhouse
       effect. Bruce Murray points out that On Venus,...a smaller
       fraction of the incident solar energy penetrates the atmosphere
       all the way to the surface. Most of it is scattered back into
       space to provide the bright image that is seen through the
       telescope; much of the remainder is absorbed within the
       atmosphere. Thus, Venus' atmosphere is heated more at the top
       and middle than at the bottom, and, in this sense, resembles
       more the shallow seas on Earth than its atmosphere. (96) The
       ocean is an excellent greenhouse, but sunlight is primarily
       absorbed at the upper 300 feet and this is the warmest region of
       the oceans. This explains why the solar greenhouse effect is
       greater at the cloud tops compared to Venus' output --by 80% of
       infrared heat energy, while the greenhouse effect's energy
       becomes reduced to 50% well below the clouds, and to 2.44% of
       infrared emissions given off by the planet at the surface. The
       regions of greatest solar absorption have the strongest
       greenhouse effect, compared to that emitted by the planet. The
       regions of least solar absorption have the weakest greenhouse
       effect, compared to that emitted by the planet. This apparently
       is true at Venus. Furthermore, all the readings showed the same
       clustering of values, of nearly 40 times greater than the solar
       radiation input, which strongly suggests that the readings were
       basically correct. The scientists found these measurements so
       repugnant to their theoretical greenhouse concept that they were
       dismissed. Seiff tells us that "it is clear that the Venera 9
       Day probe differences cannot be induced by solar heating but
       must be ascribed to other processes or to measurement
       uncertainties." (97) All, and I stress, all of the measurements,
       from the cloud tops to the lower atmosphere to the surface, gave
       consistent readings of radiative imbalance --contrary to
       everything greenhouse advocates claim. No single set of probe
       readings by Pioneer Venus or Venera suggests, in any way, that
       scientists have clear measurements supporting their contention
       of thermal balance. Every reading is another nail in the coffin
       of their theory. Realizing this, their actions to ignore or deny
       these findings point to a rigidity that has no place in science.
       This rigidity of thought is expounded in Pioneer Venus, a NASA
       publication. Let us remember von Braun's admonition that the
       greenhouse effect is unproven by experiment. One of the primary
       objectives of the Pioneer Venus Multiprobe mission was to test
       thoroughly the belief that the "greenhouse effect" is
       responsible for the high surface temperature. (Emphasis added.)
       [After describing the measured thermal imbalance described
       above, they continue. Possible instrumental errors in this
       difficult measurement may be responsible. A possibility is that
       two of the probes entered regions that are unusually transparent
       to thermal radiation, but this is rather unlikely because much
       of the absorption [of infrared is due to ubiquitous carbon
       dioxide, which makes up nearly all the atmospheric gas. The
       suggestion has been made that heat balance oscillates around an
       average state and that the anomalous measurements were made
       during the heating phase [Venus' temperature goes up and down
       over time with respect to its balance temperature and the
       probes, just by coincidence, descended on Venus during the
       heating period. In spite of these difficulties in interpreting
       some of these observations, the greenhouse effect, coupled with
       global dynamics, is now well-established as the basic
       explanation of the high surface temperature. (98) At every step
       of the investigation, every measurement showed radiative
       imbalance wherever readings were taken in the Venus atmosphere;
       and, at every step, every measurement that contradicted the
       runaway greenhouse effect concept of thermal balance was either
       changed, culled or set side based solely on a theoretical belief
       that Venus must be in thermal balance. We have observed this
       irrational behavior, of setting aside evidence negative to
       greenhouse assumptions, from the beginning of this investigation
       right up to the end, based only on the theoretical greenhouse
       consideration. Why take measurements if the scientists are not
       willing to accept any that contradict their theory? Needless to
       say, one can fully comprehend the nature of what has been going
       on with the evidence as handled by the greenhouse theorists and
       its advocates. It is sheer hypocrisy to suggest that the rules
       of science governed the way this data has been handled. But,
       finally, let us return to George Talbott's analysis of the
       cooling of Venus from a molten state to its present 750 K
       temperature. When we apply the findings of the Venera probe's
       surface measurements to analyze what contribution the greenhouse
       effect makes and what is contributed by the planet, a most
       interesting set of figures emerges. The Venera surface readings
       indicate that Venus emits about 40 times more heat than sunlight
       imparts. Simple algebra shows that X= solar radiation plus 40 X=
       the internal planetary radiation together= 750 K, the surface
       temperature. X+ 40 X= 750 K 41 X= 750 K X= 18.3 K, solar
       radiation input 40 X= 731.7 K, planetary internal heat
       Therefore, Talbott's analysis of the cooling of Venus, to derive
       its present surface temperature from a molten state, illustrates
       a high degree of accuracy. The 18.3 K solar input to the 731.7 K
       planet's internal heat shows that Talbott's percentage of error
       is no more than 2.44%, which is an extremely small value. But
       even if we double this error range, or triple it or quadruple
       it, Venus clearly appears to have an enormous radiative
       imbalance. The entire concept of the runaway greenhouse is
       supported by expediently using procedures that accountants and
       economists call "smoke and mirrors," not to say, pure denial of
       the facts. Velikovsky's theory regarding the thermal nature of
       Venus is in complete harmony with the real evidence and the
       actual measurements. The history of the advocates of the runaway
       greenhouse mechanism has been to give the theory a presumptive
       status precluding the notion that it must stand or fall on the
       basis of the evidence. But, as has been demonstrated, whatever
       the evidence indicates plays little or no role in the status of
       the theory. I suggest that such methods employed to support the
       runaway greenhouse theory are antithetical to any science and
       reflect, instead, the rigid thought processes of its advocates
       rather than inductive science. How else could so much negative,
       inconvenient data be changed or remain unrecognized? At every
       level at which the theory is examined or analyzed, it fails on
       the basis of the evidence. One is forced to assume that no
       conceivable, negative finding that sorely contradicts the theory
       will ever find acceptance by these investigators. Such an
       adherence to theory, as dominant in science, is really only
       dogmatism in disguise. It is extraordinary that scientists can
       allow theory to blind them to the facts. James E. Oberg, a
       strong advocate of the runaway greenhouse effect and vocal
       critic of Velikovsky, stated that "the `runaway greenhouse
       effect' is still in the running." (99) However, Professor Irving
       Wolfe, in a recent telephone conversation, told me what
       Velikovsky claimed would eventually happen. "The greenhouse vill
       go avay," he said. (100) The reader is left to draw his own
       conclusions about whether the runaway greenhouse effect is still
       in the running or will go away. It is quite clear that there is
       a greenhouse effect on Venus --not a runaway greenhouse effect
       --and that Velikovsky's concept is well-supported by the
       evidence.
       _References
       #Post#: 239--------------------------------------------------
       Re: Mathis on Velikovsky +
       By: Admin Date: December 24, 2018, 6:02 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       The Surface Of Venus -- "A Newborn Babe" [Aeon Journal]
       From: Aeon III:1 (Nov 1992)
       _The Surface Of Venus-- "A Newborn Babe", Charles Ginenthal
       _Strange, when you think about it, how a lack of information so
       often grows by leaps and bounds into a belief that has no
       scientific basis but becomes "accepted fact" simply because
       enough people want to believe it. Few things irk men of science
       (and they aren't all that honest) more than having to respond to
       questions with a puzzled look on their faces and a a collective
       shrug of shoulders. People have a nasty habit of assuming that
       scientists should know about those matters on which they're
       questioned-- if for no other reason than that scientists spread
       this belief and spend great sums of money collecting
       information. But with all his instruments and a lifetime of
       study, the scientist doesn't really have the faintest idea of
       what it may be like on Venus. Oh, he's got ideas (most of them
       horribly wrong), but he does not know. If you don't know-- at
       least say something. Don't quite make up out of thin air.
       Deduce. If you have only a shred of cloth, weave yourself a
       magnificent set of clothes by mixing liberal amounts of
       imagination with that shred. That's just about what happened
       with what we thought we knew about Venus. The theories were both
       serious and preposterous. They were sincere and they were
       outlandish. They were well intended and they were based on
       everything we knew about Venus, but people couldn't separate
       minimum fact from maximum imagination, and what emerged was
       gibberish. Martin Caiden, Planetfall (New York, 1974), p. 138 In
       1950, Immanuel Velikovsky claimed that the testimony of ancient
       peoples from all parts of the globe described Venus as a giant,
       brilliant comet. Based on Velikovsky's analysis of this data he
       drew the conclusion that Venus was a newborn planet in the early
       cool-down stage of its development. Therefore, if his
       understanding of the evidence was correct then Venus' surface
       should exhibit all the conditions of a world that was very
       recently molten and is most likely still volcanic and
       geologically active. In 1985, Dr. Lawrence Colin, Chief of the
       Space Science Division at nasa's Ames Research Center and
       co-editor of Venus, wrote:...Our knowledge of Venus was still
       seriously limited in the early 1960s prior to mankind's first
       rendezvous by spacecraft. In 1961 competing views of Venus could
       be classified in seven broad categories: 1. moist, swampy,
       teeming with life. 2. warm, enveloped by a global carbonic-acid
       ocean. 3. cool, Earth-like, with surface water and a dense
       ionosphere. 4. water, massive precipitating clouds of water
       droplets with intense lightning. 5. cold, polar regions with ice
       caps 10 kilometers thick and a hot equatorial region far above
       the boiling point of water. 6. hot, dusty, dry, windy global
       desert. 7. extremely hot and cloudy, with molten lead and zinc
       puddles at the equator, seas of bromine, butyric acid and
       phenols at the poles. From this list it is not obvious that
       scientists were all describing the same planet. For those who
       are impatient about the outcome, speculation 6 appears to
       represent most closely what we now think Venus is like. (1)
       Reinforcing the sixth option Ernest J. Opik, the internationally
       known astronomer of Armagh Observatory in Northern Ireland,
       stated in 1960: The modern picture of Venus...[is a borderless
       desert extending over an area one hundred times that of the
       Sahara...[The Sahara itself would appear a paradise compared
       with the dry and suffocating dust storms raging behind the
       brilliant deceitful face of the Evening Star. (2) Nowhere was it
       ever suggested by establishment scientists that Venus would be
       found to be a volcanic cauldron covered by immense lava flows.
       In fact, as recent as 1989, Isaac Asimov, the late popular
       science writer, remarked: For years astronomers had believed
       that Venus was a geologically dead place. Although quakes,
       volcanoes and other activity surely wracked the planet at one
       time, it seemed certain that Venus was quiet today. (3)
       Therefore, if Velikovsky's analysis of the ancient testimony is
       correct the observations by the Magellan spacecraft should not
       only contradict the previous models of the Venusian surface but
       should also show overwhelming evidence of recent stupendous
       volcanism on a surface that appears to be pristine. One of the
       first indications of this excessive volcanism was presented in
       May 1990 in the Journal of Geophysical Research which analyzed
       the sulfur content of the Venusian clouds. There Na Y. Chan et
       al. state: Results of recent International Ultraviolet Explorer
       (IUE) observations of Venus made on January 20, 1987, and April
       2 and 3, 1988, along with a re-analysis of the 1979
       observations...are presented. The observations indicate that the
       amount of sulfur dioxide at the cloud tops of Venus declined by
       a factor of 84 from 38070 ppb [parts per billion to 5020 ppb in
       1987 and 1988. (4) One of the researchers of this phenomenon,
       Larry Esposito from the University of Boulder Colorado,
       elaborated on this decrease of SO 2 and SO two months later in
       Astronomy: Pioneer Venus has continued to monitor these
       constituents above the clouds. Over the years a remarkable
       discovery has emerged: both sulfur dioxide and the haze have
       been gradually disappearing. By now only about 10 percent of the
       1978 amount remains. This disappearance has also been confirmed
       by the Earth-orbiting International Ultraviolet Explorer between
       1979 and 1987 and other Earth-based observations. The haze and
       the sulfur dioxide are now approaching their pre-1978 values.
       Analysis of recent Earth-based radio observations by Paul
       Steffes and his colleagues show less sulfur dioxide below the
       clouds than was measured by Pioneer Venus and Venera landers,
       which is also consistent with the decrease of sulfur dioxide.
       Inclusive Earth-based data show that a similar phenomenon may
       also have occurred in the late 1950s. The best explanation right
       now for the decrease is that from time to time major volcanic
       eruptions inject sulfur dioxide gas to high altitudes. The haze
       comes from particles of sulfuric acid, which is created by the
       action of sunlight on sulfur dioxide...Being heavy the particles
       gradually fall out of the upper atmosphere, letting conditions
       up there return to normal between eruptions. My calculations
       show that this eruption of the late 1970s was at least as large
       as the 1883 eruption of Krakatoa. The explosion, equal to a
       500-megaton H-bomb, was the most violent of the last century or
       so shooting vast quantities of gas into the Earth's
       stratosphere. (5) Some scientists have already drawn the same
       tentative conclusion posited by Esposito. Thus James Pollock
       states: Measurements by the Pioneer Venus Orbiter show that the
       amount of sulfur dioxide present near the cloud tops declined
       from approximately 100 parts per billion (ppb) in 1978 to about
       10 ppb in 1986. There is also fragmentary evidence of similar
       increases and decreases at earlier times. Such fluctuations
       might be due to episodic injections of SO 2 high in the
       atmosphere by powerful volcanic explosions. (6) David Morrison
       and Tobias Owen put the case even more strongly: Observations
       over the past twenty years have indicated that large
       fluctuations occur in the concentration of sulfur dioxide (SO 2)
       in the atmosphere of Venus above the clouds. When these
       observations are combined with indications of volcanic
       topography and lightning discharges for possible volcanism, the
       case for erupting volcanoes on Venus becomes rather strong. (7)
       This appears to be indirect evidence that at least twice in the
       1950s and 1970s there were major volcanic eruptions on Venus'
       surface.
       _There are, of course, questions and objections related to this
       analysis; nevertheless, the Magellan spacecraft may have already
       observed explosive volcanism. In the December 1990 issue of
       Scientific American appears a photograph made by Magellan which
       appears to exhibit exploded material from one of its craters.
       The caption accompanying the picture states: Explosive volcanism
       may be responsible for the radar-bright deposit that extends
       roughly 10 kilometers from the kilometer-wide volcanic crater at
       the center of the image. The etched pattern of the surrounding
       plains becomes more obscure closer to the crater, which
       indicates that the deposit is thickest near the crater. The
       shape of the deposit suggests that local winds either carried
       the plume southward or else gradually eroded away the plume
       material except for that part located in the volcano's wind
       shadow. These bits of information, though consistent with
       volcanic activity, need to be corroborated by other information
       that will give a more comprehensive picture of a planetary
       surface formed by massive volcanic processes. In this respect,
       we turn our attention to another body in the solar system that
       is in the throes of massive, violent, ongoing volcanism and
       exhibits several notable features related to this Venusian
       phenomenon. That body is Io, the inner Galilean satellite of
       Jupiter. As Io orbits around Jupiter it is constantly being
       distorted in shape by its tidal interactions with the very
       massive Jupiter and its three outer Galilean satellites. As Io
       is distorted and flexed, like the action produced by bending a
       spoon, enormous heat is generated producing volcanism.
       Therefore, Io is molten at a relatively low depth of its surface
       and its thin crust is floating on an ocean of molten magma. The
       amount of heat emitted by Io, according to David Morrison (a
       member of the imaging science team for the Voyager spacecraft)
       shows: "[ An internal heat source-- estimated at 10 14 W--
       needed to drive this volcanism is two to three orders of
       magnitude [100 to 1000 times greater than that expected from
       normal radionucleides..." ( 8 ) Io is the most volcanic body in
       the solar system. According to Billy Glass: The volcanic
       eruptions [on Io appear to be comparable in intensity to the
       greatest terrestrial eruptions which are rare on the Earth...Io
       appears to be volcanically more active than the Earth. This has
       made mapping Io difficult because the active regions undergo
       radical changes in short periods of time. In the four month
       interval between Voyager 1 and Voyager 2, for example, one of
       the largest (200 km diameter) [122 miles eruptive centers on Io
       known as Prometheus was transformed from a heart shaped feature
       to a circular one. (9) Hence, if Venus was an incandescent body
       3500 years ago and then cooled to the point where it became
       molten before it arrived at its present state, it should exhibit
       a topography quite similar to that of Io. In essence the
       volcanic forms observed on Io should generally be representative
       of the surface features seen on Venus. There should, of course,
       be differences between the bodies because Io's temperature is
       not decreasing whereas we presume that Venus' temperature is.
       Furthermore, there will be differences in the materials each
       body contains which will also affect the appearance of their
       surfaces. Before comparing Io and Venus we wish to point out
       that many of the volcanic craters on Io do give the appearance
       of impact craters. According to Carr et al.: Calderas occur in
       every region of Io so far photographed. They are generally
       recognizable by their strong resemblance to terrestrial and
       Martian calderas. In many cases no relief can be detected and a
       caldera is inferred from the presence of a dark circular
       feature....Over 5% of the Ionian surface seems to be part of a
       caldera, either dormant or active. Where relief is discernible
       the calderas are recognized as rimless depressions with steep,
       inward-facing scarps and relatively flat floors. (10)
       _Plains Vulcanism
       _David Morrison describes Io's volcanic features as follows:
       Some of Io's volcanic features look a great deal like their
       terrestrial counterparts: low shield-shaped constructs with
       calderas at their peaks and flows of erupted materials on their
       sides. However, most of Io's calderas are not at the tops of
       mountains but instead appear to be scattered amid the plains.
       (11) Io exudes its magma in this manner because it is
       tremendously hot internally and has an extremely thin crust.
       Therefore if Velikovsky was right that Venus was hot internally
       just below its thin crust it too should pour forth its magma
       after the fashion of Io. Observations should show evidence that
       lava is either presently or has very recently been exuded from
       circular vents on the plains of the Venusian surface. In New
       Scientist we learn that radar shows lava flows on Venus are
       indeed very much like those on Io: The flat plains of Venus
       consist of lava that has flowed from the planet comparatively
       recently, according to latest radar results. And an appreciable
       amount of the planet's heat may escape through these lava flows,
       rather than through large volcanoes and rift valleys that
       geologists have known for some years. In the plains the
       researchers found dozens of small vents, which oozed lava
       without forming volcanic cones. The researchers say, "The large
       number and wide distribution of vents in the lowlands strongly
       suggest that plains volcanism is an important aspect of surface
       evolution and contributed to heat loss on Venus". (12) Thus,
       there is a basic similarity that strongly suggests that Venus is
       venting its internal heat through plains volcanism. This implies
       that Venus, like Io, has a thin crust and is extremely hot not
       far beneath that crust.
       _The Nature of Io's and Venus' Craters
       _Since Io possesses such a thin crust floating on a bed of
       magma, that crust can become deformed. Io's craters are situated
       over the upwellings of the hottest magmatic flows and,
       therefore, distortion of the crust should be in evidence most
       strongly at these sites of upwelling. This, indeed, has been
       well observed by Voyagers 1 and 2. Carr, et al., describe the
       crater caldera shapes in this manner: "Although most [craters
       are nearly circular, they range widely in shape; some have
       scalloped walls suggesting collapse about different centers,
       others have rectilinear outlines, and others have elongate,
       slot-like shapes." (13) One of the first reports from Magellan
       respecting non circular craters on Venus was presented in the
       New York Times for Sept. 18, 1990. There it was reported that a
       kidney-shaped crater had been observed. The explanation given to
       explain this unusually shaped structure was that the
       "kidney-shaped crater appeared unlike any other in the solar
       system. Perhaps an incoming meteor broke up as it passed through
       the dense Venusian atmosphere, causing several large chunks of
       material to strike almost simultaneously in an irregular
       pattern." (14) However, over time more and more irregular shaped
       craters were observed so that the first example could no longer
       be considered unique. Thus an article in Discover states, "Even
       Venus' meteorite craters are intriguing. Some have strange and
       irregular shapes, in puzzling contrast to the round outline
       typical of most impact craters in the solar system." (15) So far
       as is known only two worlds-- Venus and Io-- exhibit very large
       numbers of misshapen craters. This again strongly implies that
       they were created in the same way under similar conditions. That
       is, both Venus and Io are highly volcanic and have thin crusts
       floating on magma: "Lunar craters, like terrestrial impact
       craters tend to be circular, whereas calderas do not." (16)
       Geophysicists have generally considered misshapen craters as
       volcanic structures on the Moon and on Io. However, when they
       observe misshapen craters on Venus in which nearly all craters
       over 12 miles in diameter are observed to be filled with lava
       and in which a percentage have lava rivers emanating from them,
       the scientists have changed their interpretation to suggest that
       the craters are no longer of volcanic origin but of impact
       origin. If Io's and Venus' craters were, indeed, generated by
       similar processes then they should also show common features
       other than their non-circular shapes. For example some of Venus'
       craters are quite deep. Thus Dr. Gordon H. Pettengill, a leader
       of the Magellan radar team, reported that the spacecraft's first
       altimeter measurements were defining the texture of the planet's
       topography. One surprise, he said, "was discovering that a
       previously surveyed impact crater named Colette is more than two
       miles deep-- far deeper than any crater seen on the Earth or any
       other planet." (17) On Io, too, we find that "some calderas are
       several kilometers deep" (18) Moreover, there is another level
       of resemblance between the craters of Io and Venus that strongly
       suggests that Venus' craters are of volcanic rather than impact
       origin. Because Io's craters are accepted as having been
       produced by volcanism the outflows of rivers of lava from them
       is not considered enigmatic to the space scientists. In this
       regard it is reported: One of the most striking aspects of Io's
       calderas is the associated albedo patterns. The floors of most
       are very dark and the low reflectivity of many is accentuated by
       bright haloes around the craters....[Sulfur rendered molten by
       heat from silicate magmas...may be the source of some of the
       river like features that snake across Io's surface...The flows
       from one of Io's craters are very long stretching for hundreds
       of kilometers. (19) R. Stephen Saunders reports of one Venusian
       crater: "The crater's flat, smooth floor hints that it has been
       flooded with lava." (20) Saunders exhibits photographs of
       Venusian craters which show dark floors with bright halos around
       them and then informs us that: "River-like erosion features
       running from the largest crater in the image are as yet
       unexplained." (21) The reason for this difficulty is, of course,
       that the interpretation of these long river-like structures from
       the craters suggests that the craters are not impact formations
       but volcanic creations. With respect to this long river, Andrew
       Chaikin writes: One of the most bizarre features yet identified
       on Venus is a remarkably long and narrow channel that Magellan
       scientists have nicknamed the river Styx. Although it is only
       half a mile wide, Styx is 4,800 miles long. What could have
       caused such a channel is unclear. Water, of course, is out of
       the question. Flowing lava is a possibility but it would have to
       have been extremely hot, thin and fluid. (22) One further
       resemblance between the craters of Io and Venus is their general
       size or diameter. Billy Glass observed that the craters
       depressions on Io are "up to 200 km in diameter." (23) On Venus
       it is assumed that any crater larger than 300 km would settle by
       rheological flow in about one billion years. (24) Sulfur is the
       fluid suggested as being responsible for river structures on Io.
       However, the River Styx runs up as well as downhill. What is
       clearly implied, if this feature is a flow, is that the surface
       topography has shifted greatly since the flow ceased.
       Furthermore, Science News reports recent changes on Venus that
       have been attributed to wind blown debris but a deep regolith
       has not been seen anywhere on Venus and the scientist who
       discovered the changes also suggests that the differences
       between the 1991 image and another taken months later "may stem
       from an actual surface change." (25) The largest craters so far
       observed are about 275 km in diameter. This implies that a
       molten body like either Io or possibly Venus would produce
       craters of this size and smaller. This, of course, is still to
       be determined by the full scale observation of Venus by
       Magellan. If this evidence holds up it will again imply that
       Venus is molten at shallow depth. This however, does not negate
       the possibility that tidal forces on solid bodies such as the
       Moon may generate larger craters such as the Maria basins. In
       summarizing the information about craters one notes that their
       shape, depth, size, and bright halos around craters and dark
       flat centers bearing river-like lava flows on both Io and Venus
       are strong indications that volcanism is the cause of these
       surface features. One can also add that both Io and Venus
       possess craters with central peaks and craters without central
       peaks which can be seen in any good collection of photographs
       made of these bodies. To some extent confusion reigns in the
       analysis of Venus' craters as impact structures. Consider the
       problems posed by the crater known as Cleopatra. Here Burnham
       points out: Cleopatra is an impact crater surrounded by terrain
       that has been extensively modified by volcanism, probably
       induced by the impact. According to present thinking, if there
       was enough volcanic material available close to the surface so
       that it could spill out after the impact, then Maxwell [a nearby
       mount itself would have softened and slumped to a much lower
       elevation. What is the answer? No one knows yet. (26) In no
       manner at all does impact cratering explain Cleopatra. Rather,
       as is the case with most volcanic craters, a vent made its way
       up to the slopes of Maxwell Montes and broke through the surface
       creating a large crater and pouring lava over the surface.
       Significantly, Burnham reports that, "All craters larger than
       about 20 kilometers across have interiors at least partially
       flooded with lava." (27) [italics added. From this it is quite
       clear that volcanism rather than impact is the dominant cause of
       cratering on Venus.
       _Pancake-Shaped Domes and Other Anomalies
       _Among the strangest features found on Venus is a series of
       pancake-shaped domes. This surprising discovery was recounted in
       the New York Times as follows: At the news conference yesterday,
       Dr. R. Stephen Saunders, the [Magellan project's chief
       scientist, showed pictures of...pancake-shaped domes which he
       said were "features never seen before" on any planet. In one
       region, seven domes remarkably similar in size stretch out in a
       line remarkably straight for nature...They were presumably
       formed by extreme viscous lava pouring out of volcanic vents.
       The pattern "is telling us something about the eruption
       mechanism, the viscosity and the eruption rate.' But that was as
       far as geologists ventured in the interpretation. (28) The
       unusual shape of these features should have struck a chord
       somewhere among the planetary geologists because pancake-shaped
       domes have also been observed on Io. Thus Carr et al., inform
       us: While most calderas [on Io do not seem to be within sharply
       defined edifices, a variety of positive relief features are
       recognizable. Most are puzzling and difficult to relate to
       terrestrial landforms. Among the more comprehensible because of
       their resemblance to low volcanic cones, are two pancake-like
       constructions...They are nearly circular, and surrounded by low
       escarpments. Each has a bright-floored small crater in the
       middle. The albedo [reflection of light by the material of the
       main edifice is uniform and close to that of the surroundings.
       (emphasis added) (29) Once again two worlds-- Venus and Io--
       share a unique feature seen nowhere else. Of course, normal
       volcanic domes have also been observed on Venus. Here Eberhart
       reported: Beneath Venus' acrid clouds which perpetually shield
       its surface from the eyes of Earth-bound observers, lie tens of
       thousands of low dome-shaped features. For several years
       planetary scientists have pondered the origin and significance
       of these gentle mounds, which have appeared in radar images made
       of the planet since 1983. Apparently the result of volcanism,
       the domes constitute "the most abundant geological feature on
       the planet" says Jayne C. Aubele of Brown University: "I'm
       excited about the domes and other scientists are beginning to be
       also" Aubele says "the presence of a volcano on the surface of a
       planet always tells us something about the planet. The presence
       of tens of thousands of volcanoes overwhelms me". (30) Although
       the number of domes on Venus of volcanic origin may turn out to
       be smaller in number when Magellan completes its survey, the
       great number clearly indicates how abundantly volcanic Venus
       must be. One researcher sums it up this way: "Magellan's radar
       survey of Venus found thousands of small volcanoes dotting the
       mostly flat landscape, as well as mountainous volcanic
       structures several hundred kilometers in diameter and evidence
       of massive outpourings of lava." (31) Later we are informed
       that, "Magellan has found no evidence of gradual resurfacing."
       This suggests that Venus lava flows were immense in scale, which
       is what Velikovsky's concept requires.
       _Hot Spots
       _For some time now it has been known that certain areas on Io
       are far hotter than the surrounding surface terrain. Such areas
       are described as "hot spots." Here Morrison tells us, "In Io's
       case nature has aided us by channeling much of the heat flow
       into a few small areas resulting in hot-spots with temperatures
       far higher than the ambient background." (32) Alfred McEwen et
       al., suggest that, "Observations...show that most of the hot
       spots [on Io have remained relatively stable in temperature,
       location and total power output at least since the Voyager
       encounters and possibly for the last decade." (33) Hotspots have
       been associated with surface features on Venus for a very long
       time; they were originally found by Earth-bound radar and
       confirmed by Venera spacecraft. (34) James Head asks: The
       question with arguably the broadest implications is simply how
       has Venus chosen to get rid of its internal heat (emphasis in
       original). Does Venus cool itself by sending magma directly from
       the interior to the surface? Then we would expect to see
       widespread volcanic deposits and numerous "hot spots," like
       those on Jupiter's satellite Io. (35) Thus the presence of
       hot-spots suggests that Venus-- like Io-- is venting its heat
       via hot-spot volcanism. This, in turn, suggests that Venus--
       similar to Io-- is molten at a shallow depth. One of the great
       enigmas of the "runaway greenhouse effect" is the problem of
       explaining the source of Venus' high surface temperature. Based
       on this analysis it now seems highly probable that the high
       surface temperature has little if anything to do with a
       greenhouse effect. Velikovsky's conclusion that Venus' surface
       heat is derived from its molten core appears to be correct.
       _The Age of Venus' Surface
       _In Worlds in Collision Velikovsky suggested that Venus' age was
       to be measured in thousands of years rather than billions. In a
       recent article in Science a leading astronomer offered the
       following observation regarding the age of Venus' surface: The
       planetary geologists who are studying the radar images streaming
       back from Magellan find that they have an enigma on their hands.
       When they read the geologic clock that tells them how old the
       Venusian surface is they find a planet on the brink of
       adolescence. But when they look at the surface itself, they see
       a newborn babe...(emphasis added) Magellan scientists have been
       struck by the newly minted appearances of the craters
       formed...Only one of the 75 craters identified on the 5% of the
       planet mapped shows any of the typical signs of aging, such as
       filling in with lava of volcanic eruptions or being torn by the
       faulting of tectonic disruption. But by geologists usual measure
       these fresh-looking craters had plenty of time to fall prey to
       the ravages of geologic change. (36) Based on the assumption
       that Venus is an ancient body the scientists estimate the
       surface of Venus to be on the order of 100 million to 1 billion
       years old. In short, even though they are confronted with a
       surface that is pristine scientists nevertheless interpret the
       evidence according to the theory that Venus is 4.5 billion years
       old. Thus Billy Glass tells us that in analyzing Venus' history
       planetary scientists accept, "the geologic history of
       Venus...based primarily on what we have learned about the other
       planets and is necessarily highly speculative. We assume that
       Venus was formed 4.5 x 10 9 y ago." (4.5 billion years ago) (37)
       _The Missing Venusian Regolith
       _Geophysicists, in order to explain the physical nature of the
       Venusian surface, offer the supposition that between 100 million
       and a billion years ago the entire planet turned itself inside
       out. If one were to accept this assumption it would require that
       over that period of time between the covering of the surface
       with lava flows and the present, erosional forces would break
       down the surface rock into detritus to form a regolith. The
       problem for the space scientists is that there is no evidence of
       a regolith covering the Venusian surface. Moreover, in view of
       the nature of the highly acidic nature of the atmosphere it is
       obvious that there has been significant erosion of the surface.
       According to Bruce Murray et al., "there can be little doubt
       that chemical weathering must be very effective on Venus'
       surface." (38) Venus' atmosphere is known to contain
       hydrochloric and hydrofluoric acid, both of which are very
       corrosive. Paolo Maffei explains further that, "the atmosphere
       of Venus also contains-- although in small amounts-- hydrogen
       chloride and hydrogen fluoride, which reacting with sulfuric
       acid [known to exist in Venus' atmosphere could form
       fluosulfuric acid, a very strong acid capable of attacking and
       dissolving almost all common materials including most rocks."
       (39) According to the scientists, Venus has been subjected to
       this intense weathering of its surface for at least 100 million
       years. Over this period of time the planet should have developed
       a covering of weathered material. Nevertheless, George McGill et
       al., inform us that: Radar and Venera lander observations imply
       that most of the surface of Venus cannot be covered by
       unconsolidated wind blown deposits; bulk densities on near
       surface materials are not consistent with aeolian sediments.
       Thus present-day wind-blown sediments cannot form a continuous
       layer over the entire planet. (40) Thus, despite the fact that
       erosional processes are clearly at work on Venus' surface, there
       is no evidence of a regolith. Bruce Murray, in dealing with this
       enigma wonders: Russian close-ups of Venus were surprising. I
       had presumed that its surface was buried under a uniform blanket
       of soil and dust. Chemical weathering should be intense in such
       a hot and acid environment. Unknown processes of topographic
       renewal evidently manage to outstrip degradation and burial (41)
       [emphasis added. In order to explain the lack of a Venusian
       regolith the scientists imagine a process that has no scientific
       basis for its action to reconsolidate the detritus on Venus.
       Nevertheless, let us assume that Venus' erosion rate is
       extremely weak and that it is not turned back into rock at the
       surface by unknown processes. What do we find? If we allow a
       tiny erosion rate of one millimeter per hundred years, then in
       100 thousand years we produce one meter of loose material on the
       surface of Venus, which is equal to about 40 inches. However, in
       100 million years we generate a kilometer of detritus, which is
       over 3000 feet of this loose material. Under no known condition
       can this much matter at the surface be turned to solid rock, and
       this is admitted by the scientists. What we find at the surface
       of Venus is the detritus of an erosion rate that is only a few
       thousand years old. Only by ignoring this clear evidence can the
       astronomers support the view that Venus' surface reflects events
       tracing to processes occurring between 100 million and one
       billion years ago. Although Magellan has cast doubt upon most of
       the scientific establishment's predictions regarding the nature
       of Venus' surface, a belief in a 4.5 billion year old age of the
       planet Venus is still enshrined as dogma. In accordance with
       this theory, it is believed by the space scientists that the
       degradation of craters on Venus' surface must have occurred over
       hundreds of millions of years. As the situation on Io proves,
       however, degradation does not require long time periods. Io's
       craters decay over extraordinarily short time periods measured
       in weeks or months. On Venus this period might take years. Based
       on the indications (cited above) that both Venus and Io are
       molten at shallow depth and are highly volcanic, Venus' craters
       would by no stretch of the imagination require millions of years
       to degrade. How then do scientists explain the fact that Venus'
       craters look so pristine? Here Kerr observes: Magellan
       scientists strove to explain the paradox of young looking
       craters on a relatively old surface. They raised the possibility
       that several hundred million years ago, a planet-wide outpouring
       wiped the slate clean, drowning any existing craters in a flood
       of lava. Then the flood would have had to turn off fairly
       abruptly so the craters formed by subsequent impacts would
       remain pristine. But such a global episode of volcanism
       generates another mystery. How could Venusian volcanic activity
       ebb so abruptly? (42) No doubt there will be other, equally
       imaginative, scenarios advanced in order to explain away this
       dilemma of so few craters showing signs of decay. To return to
       Kerr: But surface remodeling is going on after all, Magellan
       scientists told a large crowd at the AGU [American Geological
       Union meeting. More recent images show the ravages of time, but
       in a fashion that leaves few aged craters."(emphasis added) This
       is not so much an explanation of the findings as a directive
       that the evidence is to be interpreted as such. This is not the
       only problem, however. Again we cite Kerr: The expanded view
       reveals four nearly continent-sized areas, ranging from a few
       million to 5 million square kilometers, that have no impact
       craters at all. According to Magellan team member Roger Phillips
       of Southern Methodist University in Dallas, the absence of
       impact craters-- despite a steady rain of asteroids and comets
       onto the Venusian surface-- means that in the recent geologic
       past the craters were wiped out either by lava flooding across
       these areas or by tectonic faulting, stretching and compression.
       The volcanic activity required to resurface the crater-free
       regions would be impressive by any standards, Phillips says. For
       example, it took at least a million cubic kilometers of lava
       over a few million years to produce the 66-million-year-old
       Deccan Traps of India. But the lava-covered areas already
       uncovered on a small part of Venus by Magellan must have all
       formed within the past few tens of millions of years to have
       escaped being marked by impact craters. (43) So Magellan
       scientists are still left with an enigma. What is clearly
       implied by the radar and photographic evidence is that immense
       outpourings of lava have occurred over huge areas of Venus'
       surface, covering over everything including craters. The
       scientists still cannot explain why there are so few craters
       that are degraded or flooded or why Venus suddenly poured out
       its lava in oceanic amounts. But all of this is clearly what one
       would expect to find from the theory that Velikovsky advanced in
       Worlds in Collision whereby Venus was only recently subjected to
       tremendous stresses and participated in numerous clashes with
       other planets.
       _Iron
       _As a newborn planet, Venus would not have fully differentiated
       so it remains possible that all its iron has yet to sink to its
       core. Accordingly, it was reported in Astronomy that: Maxwell
       Montes...poses a big problem in interpretation. Parts have
       electrical properties that indicate the surface contains
       "flakes" of some unknown mineral, most likely iron sulfides,
       iron oxides, or magnetite. Iron sulfides (" fool's gold") fit
       the observations best, but studies have shown that they would be
       quickly destroyed by the corrosive Venusian atmosphere. Iron
       oxides (such as hematite) and magnetite are also possible, but
       the presence of either is not easy to account for. (44) If
       indeed iron is to be found upon the surface of Venus it would
       support the claim that it is a youthful planet in the early
       stages of cooling. (45) A planet that had differentiated its
       iron into its central core would not be expected to pour iron
       onto the surface with volcanic materials. The reason that the
       iron compounds have not completely corroded in Venus' corrosive
       atmosphere, most probably, is that these outpourings of iron are
       extremely recent surface coverings measured in perhaps a few
       years. Iron on Venus' surface is clear evidence that supports
       Velikovsky.
       _Argon
       _The superabundance of 36 Argon, and the tiny amount of 40 Ar,
       are glaring puzzles for the conventional view of Venus' history
       but perfectly consistent with Velikovsky's view that Venus is a
       youthful planet. As Glass explains, the 40 Argon builds up over
       time by the breakdown of 40 Potassium: The ratio of the mass of
       radiogenic 40 Ar to the mass of Venus is smaller by amount of a
       factor of 15 than the value for the Earth. Since 40 Ar within a
       planet increases with time due to radio active decay of 40 K,
       the amount of 40 Ar should be higher if the primary outgassing
       took place late in the planet's history. (46) If Venus did not
       outgas much 40 Ar over time why did it outgas so much 36 Argon?
       If Venus lost nearly all its 40 Ar why did it retain 36 Argon?
       If, on the other hand, the great outflowings of lava released
       great amounts of 36 Argon why didn't these outpourings also
       release large amounts of 40 Ar?
       _Oxygen
       _Ultraviolet radiation photodissociates CO 2, SO 2 and H 2 O;
       over millions of years oxygen should have become plentiful in
       Venus' atmosphere, but it remains a minute constituent. Venus'
       water vapor cannot have escaped in less than 20 billion years.
       Where then is Venus' water? To argue Venus had no water but
       retains other volatiles is a basic contradiction. Moreover,
       Venus' middle atmosphere should have been converted to CO 2 and
       O 2 over a few thousand years, yet this is not the case. To
       argue that the Sun's magnetic flow implants and removes gases is
       based on assumptions that have never been proven and does not
       address all the problems of the other gases which exist and are
       unrelated to the solar wind. A similar problem surrounds the
       prevalence of hydrofluoric and hydrochloric acids. Both of these
       acids are neutralized by new surface rock; oxygen, on the other
       hand, will unite with new surface rock. If nearly all of Venus'
       oxygen was removed by uniting with new outflows of molten rock
       why didn't these great outflowings neutralize all the
       hydrochloric and hydrofluoric acid? The lack of abundant oxygen
       on Venus and the existence of hydrochloric and hydrofluoric acid
       are only congruent with one theory-- that of Immanuel
       Velikovsky.
       _The Greenhouse Effect
       _For years the scientific community has maintained that the
       great heat of Venus is derived from an atmospheric greenhouse
       effect. Gary Hunt and Patrick Moore outline the ingredients
       necessary to generate a large and powerful greenhouse on Venus:
       CO 2 is responsible for about 55% of the trapped heat. A further
       25% is due to the presence of water vapor, while SO 2 which
       constitutes only 0.02% [2/100 of a per cent of the atmosphere,
       traps 5% of remaining infrared radiation. The remaining 15% of
       the greenhouse is due to the clouds and hazes which surround the
       planet. (47) While carbon dioxide is certainly present on Venus,
       it can account for only 55% of the greenhouse effect. As Barrie
       Jones explains, other factors are also necessary to make the
       greenhouse work: Efficient trapping [of heat cannot be produced
       by CO 2 alone, in spite of the enormous mass of CO 2 in the
       atmosphere. This is because CO 2 is fairly transparent over
       certain wavelength ranges to planetary wavelengths. Radiation
       could escape through these "windows" in sufficient quantities to
       greatly reduce the greenhouse effect below that which exists. It
       is by blocking of these windows by SO 2, by H 2 O and by the
       clouds that greatly increases the greenhouse effect. (48) In
       short, it is crucial to the runaway greenhouse effect that there
       be sufficient water, sulfur dioxide, and haze to maintain the
       heat holding capacity of the planet. Respecting water,
       especially in the lower atmosphere, the scientists have been
       looking for this vapor for a very long time. As late as
       September 1991, water vapor has not been found in anything like
       that amount needed to support the contention that the greenhouse
       is a foregone conclusion. According to R. Cowan: A research team
       has focused on the greenhouse puzzle...The absence of water
       vapor above Venus' cloud banks mystifies scientists because
       models of the planet's strong greenhouse effect suggest that
       [water vapor plays a key role in maintaining the warming.
       Researchers have now looked for water below the cloud bank and
       down to the surface-- and their search has come up dry. Evidence
       of a dry Venus may force researchers to consider whether other
       chemicals could create and sustain the planet's greenhouse
       effect, says David Crisp of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, who
       coauthored the new report. (49) Now when a vapor responsible for
       25% of the efficiency of the greenhouse-effect has been sought
       in vain for some 20 years it implies that a major problem exists
       with the model in question. Furthermore, in our earlier
       discussion of the SO 2 and haze in the Venusian atmosphere we
       have shown that measurements indicate that these materials are
       transient products and do not sustain themselves for long
       periods of time. With this additional undermining of the
       greenhouse effect the process becomes more and more difficult to
       imagine. One of the major theoretical supports of the greenhouse
       model is the belief that Venus is in thermal balance. Over and
       over we are told that measurements of the cloud tops for
       infrared emissions show conclusively that the amount of sunlight
       incident on the planet is equal to the infrared radiation
       emitted by Venus. However, this must also be supported by in
       situ measurements throughout the atmosphere: Radiative balance
       occurs [on a planet at every level when the amount of
       downward-directed solar radiation that is absorbed is equal to
       the amount of infrared radiation that is emitted upward. When
       local temperatures satisfy this balance the atmospheric
       temperature is maintained. (emphasis added) (50) Not only must
       there be thermal balance at one level of the atmosphere, this
       thermal balance must exist at all levels throughout the
       atmosphere to confirm thermal balance. That this is not the case
       upon Venus has been known for some time. As long ago as 1980
       Richard Kerr reported in Science that: When [4 Pioneer Venus
       probes looked at the temperature, each one found more energy
       being radiated up from the lower atmosphere than enters it as
       sunlight. To further complicate the situation, the size of the
       apparent upward flow of energy varies from place to place by a
       factor of 2 which was a disturbing discovery. (51) Kerr adds a
       telling and fundamental observation in this regard: "The much
       ballyhooed greenhouse effect of Venus can account for only part
       of the heating." (52) [emphasis added This simply means that the
       measured evidence from in situ probes precludes the possibility
       that Venus is in thermal balance. Since this evidence was
       confirmed by four probes it is highly unlikely that each probe
       could have been in error. What is most significant is the
       variation from place to place, the amount of heat rising varying
       at some places by a factor of 2. Thus, if in one region of
       Venus' atmosphere the temperature was x degrees, in another area
       it was 2x degrees. This means that there was at least twice the
       amount of heat coming up at 2x than could have been supplied by
       the greenhouse effect. It is most unlikely that in one region of
       Venus' atmosphere the greenhouse effect is twice as strong as in
       the other regions.
       _Conclusion
       _A fair reading of history will show that conventional
       astronomers have a very poor record when it comes to predicting
       the surface conditions of Venus. Such is not the case with
       regards to the thesis outlined by Immanuel Velikovsky in 1950.
       As this essay has sought to show, the evidence from Venus is
       fully consistent with the thesis of its anomalous origin and
       tumultuous recent history as set forth in Worlds in Collision.
       Indeed, it is this author's sincere hope that the day will come
       when members of the scientific community will find the courage
       and integrity to call for a full and proper investigation of
       Velikovsky's hypothesis.
       *** References
       #Post#: 240--------------------------------------------------
       Re: Mathis on Velikovsky +
       By: Admin Date: December 24, 2018, 11:44 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       Evidence for the Extreme Youth of Venus [SIS C&C Review]
       From: SIS Chronology& Catastrophism Review (1994) "Proceedings
       of the 1993 Cambridge Conference"
       _Evidence for the Extreme Youth of Venus, Wal Thornhill
       _"The purpose of the Universe is the perpetual astonishment of
       mankind."- Arthur C. Clarke "Person who say it cannot be done
       should not interrupt person doing it."- spurious Chinese proverb
       _Introduction
       _The planet Venus is the brightest object in the sky- after the
       Sun and the Moon. Astronomers repeatedly refer to it as Earth's
       'twin' [1. They should not- for twins are always born close
       together in time and there is no evidence to support their
       assumption that the two planets are of the same age. I will show
       instead that Venus has the hallmarks of a recent genesis. What
       do I mean by 'recent'? By recent I mean too recent to be
       measured in millions, let alone billions of years: more likely
       the event occurred within human memory and its age can be
       measured in thousands of years. What is meant by 'genesis'? At
       least it means the final chapters of the interaction between an
       errant, cometary Venus and other planets of the Solar System and
       its final settlement into a highly regular, planetary orbit
       about the Sun. At most it hints at the parturition of one of the
       gas giant planets to form the new planet Venus. The implications
       of such a late and spectacular event in the Solar System are
       profound. It will be difficult to contemplate by those who have
       built the current cosmogonic consensus. That consensus is built
       upon ad hoc additions to centuries-old ideas. It relies on
       gravity as the aggregating force acting over millions of years
       upon widely dispersed material to form the Solar System.
       Clearly, in the current steady state of the Solar System,
       gravitational theory seems to predict planet orbits accurately.
       Not only does the clockwork certainty make life easier for the
       mathematicians but it also makes the world seem safe. However,
       reality has a way of being much more complex than mathematical
       models: there is evidence, in particular from the behaviour of
       comets, that non-gravitational forces are also at work in the
       Solar System. Establishing a very recent and drastic change in
       the Solar System would cause reverberations in every field of
       study. As a recent example, scientists have pointed to the
       hellish surface conditions on Venus and have warned that the
       Earth could suffer the same fate as a result of rapacious human
       activity. Such an argument assumes that the genesis of Venus was
       similar to that of Earth but that the two evolved very
       differently. A quite different interpretation would result from
       the youthful Venus theory: that the Earth's biosphere seems to
       have a remarkable capacity to recover from catastrophe attendant
       upon a recent rearrangement of the inner Solar System. In turn,
       this would indicate that the biosphere, even now, may not be in
       a steady state, which has been suggested on theoretical grounds
       [2. Venus, Earth's twin? If Venus is a newcomer to its present
       orbit in the inner Solar System, it is necessary to dismiss the
       oft-quoted idea of it being a twin of Earth. This idea arose
       from their relative proximity in the inner Solar System and
       almost equal size and mass. Couple these facts with the nebular
       theory of planet formation (from a disk of gas and dust
       encircling the proto-sun) and we have Earth being formed at
       nearly the same time and from almost the same materials as
       Venus. The mean distances of the two planets from the centre of
       the Sun differ by about 25%, which would lead to an expected
       initial difference in composition of the same order. Then why
       does Venus have almost no water and Earth an abundance? Why does
       Venus have a much higher content of primordial inert gases? The
       astronomer V. A. Firsoff wrote: "I once described Earth and
       Venus as 'non-identical twins'. It used to be thought that their
       differences were more apparent than real. But in the words of
       Sherlock Holmes, 'Eliminate the impossible and what is left,
       however improbable, is the truth'. And it would be hard to find
       a more improbable planet than Venus." [3 Predictably, planetary
       geologists take the 'Earth's twin' approach and are thereby
       forced to make the faintly absurd pronouncement: 'The overall
       impression is that Venus is a dynamic world that has been shaped
       by processes fundamentally similar to those that have taken
       place on the Earth, but often with dramatically different
       results' [4. This can only be true if one accepts qualifiers
       like 'somehow' and 'mysteriously' as scientific descriptions of
       processes on Venus. More likely it indicates that our ideas of
       the relationship between geological cause and effect on the
       Earth may be wrong. Dr S. R. Taylor, a planetologist of the
       Australian National University Research School of Earth
       Sciences, summed up a lecture titled 'Venus:- a twin planet?' [5
       by stating: "You are not looking at a twin planet to the Earth
       at all; there are very many substantial differences....the
       differences are so great it makes you wonder whether you could
       ever produce a twin of the Earth in some other solar system when
       you can't do it in your own." Venus, the improbable planet So,
       what is now known about Venus? The following sections give a
       brief summary of the space age findings and the accepted
       interpretations:-
       _1. Magnetosphere
       _A planet's magnetosphere is the region in space surrounding the
       planet where its magnetic field dominates. Under the influence
       of the solar wind it is compressed on the sunward side of the
       planet and stretches away behind the planet like a comet's tail.
       The dynamo theory of planetary magnetic fields supposes that
       they are generated by an internal dynamo created by fluid
       motions in a metallic outer core. The early Mariner spacecraft
       provided a surprise when they found an extensive 'cometary'
       magnetotail stretching behind Venus [6 along the Sun-Venus line.
       It is longer than that found for any other planet. The 'scale
       length' of the tail is about 700, compared to Earth's less than
       300. [The scale length is the {} of Earth, the tail wake
       stretches for 3000 Earth radii (R E) and the magnetosphere
       varies between 10 and 15 R E. Atmospheric ions are stripped away
       from Venus in its tail. Venus appears to have no intrinsic
       magnetic field. This finding was unexpected because the dynamo
       theory would predict a small field for Venus, given its slow
       rotation and molten core. (The dynamo theory also fails to
       explain why slowly rotating Mercury has a magnetic field. That
       planet is not believed to have a molten core). The magnetic flux
       of the solar wind appears to interact directly with the
       ionosphere of Venus. This was not anticipated either, and is
       unlike all other planets in the solar family. Spikes in the
       Pioneer Venus orbiter magnetometer readings were interpreted as
       twisted magnetic field lines wrapped around each other like
       ropes. Alternatively, the magnetic field spikes may be induced
       in the ionosphere by electric current flows in the solar wind.
       Another major surprise is the presence of an ionosphere on the
       night side of Venus. Ionospheres are thought to be created by
       dissociation of atoms in the upper atmosphere by the action of
       solar ultraviolet (UV) radiation. It was thought that the long
       Venusian night would be long enough for recombination to take
       place and for the ionosphere there to disappear.
       _2. Rotation
       _Venus has a retrograde axial rotation period of 243 days. It is
       assumed, because it so different to the Earth's rotation rate,
       that it must have been similar at some time in the past and then
       drastically modified as a result of a of a very large collision.
       There is no generally accepted theory to explain planetary
       rotation or axial tilt. Strangely, Venus always presents the
       same hemisphere to the Earth at times of inferior conjunction.
       _3. Isotopic anomalies
       _Three isotopes of argon are considered important in
       investigations of planetary atmospheres. 40 Ar is produced by
       the decay of radioactive potassium( 40 K) in the planet's rocks
       and is outgassed into the atmosphere over time. Venus has only
       of the amount of 40 Ar found in the Earth's atmosphere. The
       other isotopes, 36 Ar and 38 Ar are thought to be primordial
       gases, present when the planet formed. 36 Ar appears in
       proportions up to 100 times that found on Earth or Mars. Since
       it cannot be created after a planet's formation, if Venus was
       formed in the way the Earth and Mars were it should have an
       equal or lower concentration. There is also about 45 times more
       neon and 3 times more krypton in the atmosphere of Venus. Its
       atmosphere shows a deuterium to hydrogen ratio of about 100
       times that of the Earth which, it is argued, might be consistent
       with the loss of oceans of water and the preferential outgassing
       of the lighter hydrogen. But such a mechanism does not easily
       remove the last vestiges of water to leave such a dry
       atmosphere. The isotopic abundances do not follow the expected
       pattern for planet formation from a nebula. For example, Venus,
       being nearer the Sun than Earth and Mars, should have lost more
       36 Ar to the early, strong solar wind than those planets.
       _4. Atmosphere
       _None of the the characteristics of the Venusian atmosphere were
       predicted by prevailing cosmogonic theories. Venus has a
       planet-wide cloud cover and massive atmosphere which is
       remarkably uniform in temperature and pressure at all latitudes
       and in both day and night hemispheres. With a gravity 90% of the
       Earth's and being closer to the Sun, Venus would be expected to
       have retained less volatiles and hence have a thinner (not
       thicker) atmosphere than the Earth. The Venusian atmospheric
       composition is shown below. Atmosphere Earth Venus 77% nitrogen
       21% oxygen 1% water vapour 97% carbon dioxide 2% nitrogen 1%
       oxygen Ammonia (0.1 percent) was detected by the Soviet probe,
       Venus 8, at the height of the clouds. Hydrocarbons of many sorts
       showed up in the initial evaluation of the mass spectrometer on
       board the Pioneer atmospheric probes but were discounted as
       lingering instrumental residues [7. Clouds occupy several
       discrete layers, at heights typically 46, 47-49, 50-55, and
       56-62 kilometres above the surface (clouds on Earth rarely top
       15km altitude), with the uppermost, yellowish, cirrus-like haze
       made from droplets of concentrated sulphuric acid. Since
       sulphuric acid does not account for the yellowish colour of the
       clouds, this deduction is suspect. It is this uppermost layer
       that is responsible for the markings visible in UV images. It
       has also been found that a major constituent of large cloud
       particles is chlorine. The highly reflective upper haze
       effectively hides lower levels rather like a veil in bright
       sunlight hides a bride's face. The clouds below are not as
       opaque as earthly clouds but are more akin to photochemical
       smog. Investigators had expected that only 2% of the total
       incident sunlight would reach the surface and that the
       atmosphere would be super-refractive. Neither is the case: it is
       surprisingly bright at the surface and pictures by Veneras 9 and
       10 showed the horizon 200-300m distant. Cloud movements show a 4
       day rotation period of the upper atmosphere at the equator which
       declines to 2 days towards the poles. This is explained by a
       constant wind velocity on a reducing perimeter as the upper
       atmosphere spirals up to the poles. However, with a rotation
       period of the planet of 243 days retrograde and sluggish surface
       winds, the upper atmospheric movement is incomprehensible. The
       negligible variation in surface temperature is explained
       theoretically in astronomical textbooks by slow winds in the
       dense lower atmosphere of 1 to 2 metres/sec from the poles to
       the equator [8. There are three reasons why this explanation is
       unsound: i). Since the planet is now the same temperature
       overall there is no heat engine to drive the lower atmosphere.
       ii). Moving patterns detected in two specific windows for
       infrared radiation through the carbon dioxide atmosphere
       indicate that the lower clouds are patchy and move at velocities
       up to 250kph [9. iii). Winds at the surface are slow (about
       6kph) and always in the direction of rotation, not from pole to
       equator. In 1972, a 'breathing' phenomenon was discovered in the
       Venusian atmosphere [10. It is as if the cloud cover is acting
       like the lid on a kettle of boiling water; the infrared CO> 2
       lines swing through a four day cycle akin to a relaxation
       oscillation which builds up slowly during each cycle and then
       collapses. This indicates that the cloud deck moves up and down
       through 1 km over the entire planet. Such a phenomenon requires
       considerable energy input- which is difficult to account for on
       a very slowly rotating planet if solar energy is the only
       source. The 'breathing' has been confirmed by the Magellan
       orbiter which underwent variable atmospheric braking at the
       lowest point of its orbit, with a 4 day cycle. Explanations of
       the Venusian atmosphere have required large numbers of
       assumptions and special conditions to be imposed on the
       hypothetical early solar nebula and the activity of the
       proto-sun. Many anomalies remain.
       _5. Heat balance
       _The rocks of the Earth contain radioactive uranium, thorium and
       potassium-40 which in the process of decay provide energy to
       heat up the planet's interior. The potassium/uranium ratio is
       about the same on Venus as on the Earth. It is therefore
       assumed, on the grounds that the two planets are twins, that the
       internal heat production is the same. The very high surface
       temperature of Venus of 750 K or 900 F is usually explained by
       the 'greenhouse effect' of CO 2, or even the 'runaway greenhouse
       effect', first suggested by Fred Hoyle in 1955 and worked out in
       detail in the late 1960s by Ingersoll and Pollack of Caltech.
       Such explanations also rely on the assumption that both Venus
       and Earth have had largely parallel development (twins again)
       and that therefore something went seriously wrong with the
       atmospheric evolution on Venus. Firsoff noted:  "Earth's seas
       are not boiling hot, despite the total greenhouse effect of
       water and average sunlight stronger than at the ground level of
       Venus. Nor is it at all clear how such a condition could have
       become established" [11 Venus receives 1.9 times more solar
       radiation than Earth but its clouds reflect about 80% of that
       sunlight, so that Venus actually absorbs less solar energy than
       the Earth. Solar radiation measured at the surface is 10-20W/m 2
       (compare this with 340W/m 2 at the Earth's surface in the
       tropics). Even with the maximum greenhouse effect, the effective
       surface temperature of Venus should be low enough to freeze
       water [12. What is being asked of the 'runaway greenhouse
       effect' is equivalent to expecting a well-insulated oven to
       reach a temperature sufficient to melt lead by having only the
       pilot light switched on! The humorous but sadly apt inversion,
       'I'll see it when I believe it', seems to apply to the
       interpretation of results relayed to Earth from all four Pioneer
       lander probes as their radiometers began to give anomalous
       results as they descended through the atmosphere. "Taken at face
       value, the anomalies suggest that parts of the atmosphere are
       transmitting about twice the energy upwards that is available
       from solar radiation at the same level." [13 Despite the obvious
       interpretation that the laws of thermodynamics are not being
       violated and that, simply, Venus is intrinsically hot and still
       cooling, the investigators are able to blandly state in the same
       paragraph: "In spite of these difficulties in interpreting some
       of the observations, the greenhouse effect, coupled with global
       dynamics, is now well established as the basic explanation of
       the high surface temperature." On the night side of Venus where
       sunlight reflected from the uppermost haze cannot dazzle the
       observer, it is possible to see surprisingly deeply into the
       planet's atmosphere. The only illumination is the infrared
       radiation from the planet's hot surface which is almost
       sufficiently intense to be seen as a very dull red glow. Cloud
       patterns picked out in infrared are intense enough to be seen
       during inferior conjunction (in broad daylight) from Earth using
       a suitably equipped 20cm telescope. The emissivity of the
       surface at the Magellan radar wavelength, which corresponds to
       surface electrical properties and surface temperature,
       correlates strongly with altitude. There are some exceptions to
       this pattern. High altitude temperatures are often much lower
       than would be expected on the basis of the adiabatic lapse rate
       of minus 9 K/km. The conventional view is that the higher
       emissivity is largely due to the surface chemical composition
       being different in the highlands. The greenhouse effect would
       have the surface temperature conforming to the lapse rate.
       Figure 1. A typical Venusian sinuous rille. The scale bar= 10km.
       They tend to grow narrow and shallow towards their termini. They
       are widely distributed in the equatorial regions.
       _6. Lightning
       _"The most striking [the pun seems unintended observations made
       by the Galileo spacecraft during its flyby of Venus was evidence
       of lightning." [14 The surprise is curious. Earlier reports of
       lightning were discounted, it seems, because they did not fit
       the pattern of earthly lightning. The Venera spacecraft found
       'continuous lightning activity from 32km down to about 2km
       altitude, with discharges as frequent as an amazing 25 per
       second' [15. The highest recorded rate on Earth is 1.4/sec
       during a severe blizzard [16. The Pioneer lander recorded 1000
       radio impulses. Thirty-two minutes after landing, Venera 11
       detected a very loud (82 decibel) noise which was believed to be
       thunder. Garry Hunt suggested at the time that:'... the
       Venusians may well be glowing from the nearly continuous
       discharges of those frequent lightning strokes' [17. A
       'mysterious glow' was detected coming from the surface at a
       height of 16km by 2 Pioneer probes as they descended on the
       night hemisphere. The glow increased on descent and may have
       been caused by a form of St. Elmo's fire and/or chemical
       reactions in the atmosphere, close to the surface. Lightning is
       poorly understood. The mechanism of charging of storm clouds
       remains a mystery. Because lightning is conventionally
       associated with violent vertical cloud movement on Earth, it was
       a surprise when investigators found strong evidence of lightning
       in the quiescent atmosphere of Venus. 'On Venus the clouds tend
       to resemble fogbanks,.... You don't see much lightning in fog.'
       [18
       _7. Volcanism
       _Venus seems to have about 4 times more sulphuric acid in its
       atmosphere than Earth. It also has minute concentrations of
       hydrochloric and hydrofluoric acids. These findings suggest
       lively, recent volcanic activity on the planet. There are
       between 100,000 and 200,000 small basaltic domes (averaging a
       few hundred metres high and 2km across), rather like underwater
       sea mounts. Some appear to have explosively erupted, judging by
       radar-bright deposits or 'plumes' of material broadening away
       from them. Venus apparently has very fluid lavas. Venusian
       sinuous rilles have been identified (Figure 1) in large numbers.
       These rilles are thought to be due to erosional processes
       involving very hot, fluid lavas. Smooth basaltic plains and lava
       flows, relatively unmarked by craters, make up 80% of the
       planet's surface- indicating its extreme youthfulness. There are
       430 volcanoes of 19km or more diameter and tens of thousands of
       small ones. There is an enigma in that there are relatively few
       craters which have been encroached upon by lava. This would
       suggest that the craters, most of which look very new, are of
       more recent origin than the global lava flows. There is no
       satisfactory explanation for a resurfacing event which involved
       the entire planet. The word 'resurfacing' itself assumes there
       once existed an older cratered terrain- but, again, there is no
       evidence for that. There are many curious features on Venus
       which are attributed to upwelling lava. For example, there are
       large circular domes (750 metres high and averaging 25km
       diameter), often arranged in a chain, with craters and a complex
       pattern of 'fractures' on top. See Figure 2. These objects are
       interpreted as a thick lava flow which welled up through
       openings on level ground, although it is difficult to understand
       why they should all be so near perfect circles. Such circularity
       requires too many special conditions to be plausible. The lava
       orifice would need to be circular, the surface dead level with
       no obstructions, and the lava viscosity and cooling rate within
       very narrow limits. Compare the domes with the lobate structure
       of a true lava flow in Figure 3. The dome fractures are thought
       to be caused by the cracking of solidified surface lava by
       further outflows. It is strange that the fractures seem to be of
       relatively uniform width on widely separated domes. Also some
       'fractures' in the surrounding plain appear to climb the wall of
       a dome and continue across the top (see Figure 2). Small craters
       appear on top of  the domes, generally in the centre and even
       smaller craters seem to populate the fractures. The surrounding
       plain is unmarked by craters, with the notable exception being
       along the floors of fractures. Figure 2. Seven circular 'domes'
       averaging 25km in diameter with maximum heights of 750m in Alpha
       Regio. North is at the top. The linear features are termed
       'fractures'. Note the small craters populating the floors of
       some of them. The long channel in the southeast has a secondary
       channel along its floor. Figure 3. Multiple eruptions appear in
       this volcanic structure, located on the plains between Artemis
       Chasma and Imdr Regio. The central dome structure is 100km wide
       and about 450m thick on average. Note the usual uneven, lobate
       form.
       _8. Cratering
       _Craters are randomly distributed on Venus with some areas of
       higher or lower density. Surprisingly, most are in pristine
       condition. As expected, most craters are described in the Jet
       Propulsion Laboratory's images as 'meteorite impact craters' and
       their features as 'typical..., including rough (bright) material
       around the rim, terraced inner walls, and central peaks.' [19
       The central peaks are termed 'rebound' peaks. The largest
       craters may show concentric rings. Venus has a relatively low
       crater count which is attributed to both a global volcanic
       resurfacing event and the planet's thick atmosphere acting as a
       shield against small meteors. However, small craters do exist
       and are found populating the floors of the numerous linear
       'fractures', which argues against their formation by impact. The
       insistence on describing craters as impact-generated is more due
       to the fact that it is geologists making such pronouncements and
       that they have difficulty matching the craters with volcanoes
       observed on Earth. Significantly, astronomers tend to ascribe
       the craters to volcanic activity, which indicates that neither
       group feel comfortable with an explanation based on processes
       with which they are familiar. Two characteristics of so-called
       impact craters which beg explanation are their near-perfect
       circularity and the melted floors of large, recent craters,
       clear of impact debris. Despite this, counting craters is the
       main technique for determining the age of a planet's surface. It
       also relies on assumptions about the past population of
       orbit-crossing comets and meteors in the inner Solar System.
       "The planetary geologists who are studying the radar images
       streaming back from Magellan find they have an enigma on their
       hands. When they read the geologic clock that tells them how old
       the Venusian surface is they find a planet on the brink of
       adolescence. But when they look at the surface itself, they see
       a newborn babe... Magellan scientists have been struck by the
       newly minted appearances of the craters formed...." [20 Crater
       counting and the random distribution puts the entire surface age
       at 500 million years. It is therefore generally concluded that
       any old surface was wiped clean by a cataclysmic event at that
       time and remained volcanically quiet since then. The high degree
       of circularity of most craters suggests that whatever created
       them acted largely perpendicular to the surface, which is highly
       unlikely for impacts. Such crater circularity is also a feature
       on our Moon, the moons of Mars (Figure 4), oddly shaped
       asteroids, and the nucleus of comet Halley where the cratering
       process may have been observed in action  (Figure 5). Figure 4.
       View of the 17km long asteroid 951 Gaspra (top), taken by the
       Galileo spacecraft. The smallest details are 55 metres across.
       Deimos (left) and Phobos (right), the moons of Mars, are shown
       for comparison. Note the craterlets on the rim of the large
       crater on Phobos. Figure 5. An artist's enhancement of the
       images of the nucleus of comet Halley taken by the Giotto
       spacecraft. Notice the bright circular spots and jets. Figure 6.
       Three large craters with diameters from 37 to 50km are seen in
       this image from the Lavinia region. Note the truncated ejecta
       fields around the craters. Asymmetric ejecta patterns have been
       cited as evidence for impact at an angle to the vertical. Some
       craters (Figure 6) have a flower-like ejecta blanket which did
       not travel very far, presumably due to the high atmospheric
       density. Mars shows similar features which were attributed to
       the action of water. Since Venus has no water that theory cannot
       be relevant. There are a number of asymmetric craters which do
       hint at impact. They show possible effects of the thick
       atmosphere on the way that meteors reach the surface or the
       manner in which the ejecta blankets are distributed. Many
       craters seem to be flooded from below with lava which is
       presumed to exist in hot layers just beneath the thin crust of
       Venus.
       _9. Plate tectonics
       _The surface of Venus has been described as 'spotty'. There are
       no apparent equivalents of our continental plates. There is only
       flimsy evidence for some form of plate subduction around the
       rims of pimple-like elevations called coronae but the origin of
       the coronae is a mystery. They have been described as magma
       extrusion features. There is no evidence of a mid-ocean type
       ridge on Venus to generate new crust. The situation was summed
       up recently in New Scientist: "The high-resolution radar images
       Magellan has produced show no evidence of the long chains of
       volcanoes, and no mid-ocean ridges or other features that would
       indicate a global system of plates." [21 Venus has rocks similar
       to those on Earth and possibly more internal heat which would be
       expected to lead to more dynamic tectonic activity. One
       suggestion is that the surface of Venus is too hot to sustain
       rigid plates and that the surface puckers and wrinkles in
       response to interior forces. Another flimsy idea is that the
       lack of water on Venus means that it lacks the essential
       lubricant for sliding crustal plates [22. The many differences
       between the crusts of Earth and Venus suggest an unusual event
       to have caused the observed continental rifting on Earth. The
       assumed driving mechanism for continental drift is mantle
       convection due to internal radiogenic heat. But it is a very
       unsatisfactory explanation given the rigidity of the crust and
       modest heat input which would lead to a low velocity of
       convection [23. There is no good evidence that anything other
       than settling movements between plates are now taking place on
       Earth, long after some past catastrophic rifting 'event(s)'.
       Rifting is most easily explained by external torques on the
       Earth. Surface features on Venus, interpreted as fractures,
       suggest crustal expansion with few signs of compression. The
       size and spacing of wrinkles is believed to give an indication
       of the crustal thickness. Venus has 'smaller, more closely
       spaced features than any previously seen' [24, which argues for
       a thin crust. But there is another possibility- that the
       so-called fracture lines are not fractures at all but channels,
       gouged out  of the surface by a mechanism to be described later.
       Gravity mapping is to be undertaken by Magellan after its orbit
       is lowered by atmospheric braking, and then circularised. Such
       mapping should provide more clues to the structure of Venus.
       Already it is believed that the prominent Maxwell Montes region
       should subside under self gravity in a relatively short time.
       _10. Channels and valleys
       _Venus appears to be laced with fractures, ranging from
       elaborate networks of fine cracks that extend over large areas
       of the planet to extensive canyons  thousands of miles long. Up
       to 200 channels of various types (some clusters being counted as
       a unit) have been counted. They are concentrated in the
       equatorial regions and particularly the highlands, rift and
       fracture zones associated with large shield volcanoes, and the
       uniquely Venusian coronae. Twelve valleys have been counted.
       They have been classified as either labyrinthic, rectangular,
       and irregular or pitted. Some valleys graduate into channels.
       Simple, non-branching channels have been classified as sinuous
       rilles, channels with flow margins, and canali [25. Figure 7a.
       The meandering channel known as the river Styx. It is 6,800km
       long but practically constant in width at about 2km. The scale
       bar= 50km. Figure 7b. Detail of river Styx. Note the indications
       of a smaller channel in the bed of the 'river'.Sinuous rilles
       generally originate in depressions up to a few hundred meters
       deep. The channel is cut into the terrain and grows narrower and
       shallower distally, with no outflow deposit. They  are the most
       numerous channel type and seem to be concentrated near coronae
       and arachnoid features. They are thought to be due, in some
       degree, to "a process of lava drainage channel deepening and
       widening through thermal-mechanical erosion by high temperature,
       low viscosity lava during a sustained eruption at high effusion
       rates" [26. There are severe problems with this proposal. For
       example, outwash deposits are generally lacking and the channel
       narrows rather than widens at the lower end. The channels are
       often preferentially cratered compared with  the surrounding
       terrain. They are probably too deeply cut into the surface
       (several hundred metres) to be explained by lava drainage. The
       dimensions of the Venusian sinuous rilles are far greater than
       any lava channels seen on Earth. Channels with flow margins
       occur on volcanic flow deposits. They are shallow and do not cut
       into the terrain like sinuous rilles. They are consistent with a
       lava flow origin. Canali are the next most common channel type.
       They are extraordinarily long, have remarkably constant width
       and depth  and a lack of complex branching. Canali are found on
       the smooth plains and trend in random directions. The longest
       canali are confined to specific plains. There is generally no
       way of distinguishing which end of the channel is the source and
       there is no evidence of ponding. Narrow levees can be discerned
       on some of the radar images. Suggestions for their origin
       struggle with enormous flows of long duration of exotic, highly
       fluid lavas on a scale not seen on any other body in the Solar
       System. Since  there is no evidence of any outflow of the canali
       it is suggested that successive outflows of lava or weathering
       has obliterated the sources and sinks of the canali! One of the
       most bizarre canali is the remarkably long and narrow Hildr
       Fossa, which Magellan scientists have nicknamed the River Styx
       (Figure 7). The feature has no analogue on Earth. With a
       constant width of less than 2km, Hildr is 6,800km long! Slightly
       longer than the Nile, it is the longest channel known in the
       Solar System. What is even more weird for a channel which is
       assumed to have been formed by the flow of some unspecified
       extremely hot, thin liquid is that it runs up hill and down dale
       by as much as a kilometre in a roller-coaster fashion. It has
       been suggested that the terrain must have undergone uplift since
       the channel was formed. But practically all of the many 'rifts'
       and channels on Venus exhibit the same disregard for gravity
       without signs of channel disturbance which would be expected
       from extensive  ground movement. In the searing heat and
       crushing pressure at the planet's surface, it is impossible to
       imagine any substance that could remain liquid long enough to
       carve out such a lengthy, uniform channel, to somehow disappear
       along the way and defy gravity in the process! Unremarked by
       investigators is a secondary, even more sinuous, channel
       meandering along the floor of Hildr (and most other channels and
       fractures where image resolution allows) with what appears to be
       small craterlets dotted along its length. This looks like a
       more extensive form of the sinuous rilles. The bright radar echo
       from both sides of these channels and the shadow behind the top
       of the radar illuminated bank suggests that the banks are
       narrow, raised levees [27. The channels and valleys on Venus are
       assumed to be erosional features caused by a flowing liquid. The
       only liquid expected at the surface temperature of Venus is
       lava. Few of the features observed can be explained by lava
       flows.
       _11. Surface age
       _It is to be expected that the surface has not suffered from
       much erosion. With a year-round temperature at the surface of
       470 degrees C, surface water, if there ever was any, has long
       ago boiled away leaving a totally dry and arid landscape. Winds
       in the lower atmosphere are also very sluggish due to the even
       temperature and high atmospheric density near the surface. So
       impact craters and scars from geologic events should remain
       visible for millions or billions of years. Using accepted
       assumptions about impact cratering rates in the inner Solar
       System, it is assumed that the surface age can be determined by
       crater counting. Scientists were surprised to find a distinct
       shortage of craters, which indicates a young planet. An early
       report of the Magellan findings stated: "The Venusian surface
       appears to be 100 million to 1 billion years old, quite ancient
       by terrestrial standards" [28 but very young when compared with
       the Moon or Mercury which also suffer little erosion. The
       craters on Venus all appear to be new. There is no evidence of
       an old, heavily cratered terrain. It was simply suggested that
       the planet's outer layers have been 'reworked and erased
       relatively recently' [29 without any cause being given. The
       erasure of the planet's features must have stopped abruptly for
       there to be little sign of encroachment of lava upon the
       craters. Clearly, the age will be too high if cratering rates
       were greater in the recent past. The detailed nature of the
       surface, revealed by panoramic photographs from Venera 9 after
       landing, was a surprise. There were no signs of a dust cloud on
       touch-down at 24 kph and the stones were sharp-edged and recent
       looking. Even if the erosion rate on Venus were a fraction of a
       percent of that on Earth, a soil measured in metres would be
       expected to form in 100 million years. In addition, some of the
       slopes on Venus, determined by the Magellan orbiter, are
       remarkably steep. There are slopes of 1 in 4, which is near the
       limit of stability. Such slopes  obviously cannot have existed
       for long. They are remarkably young. It is assumed that
       resurfacing by basaltic lavas is responsible for the apparent
       youthfulness of the surface. This requires some unknown
       mechanism based on unproven convection in the mantle to cause
       widespread resurfacing of the planet, followed by quiescence. It
       seems to be asking too much for some indeterminate internal
       process to create planet-wide lavas and then shut down for
       hundreds of millions of years while cratering takes place. Of
       course, all of this presupposes that Venus has a  history prior
       to the 'global resurfacing event'. 12. No satellite Venus has no
       satellite. The Earth is unique among the inner planets in having
       a moon which would not appear out of place among the satellites
       of the giant outer planets. It suggests a quite different
       history for Earth compared to Venus. How are planets formed?
       Before any discussion can take place about the age of Venus, the
       method of planet formation needs to be determined. The accepted
       nebular theory of the birth of the Solar System does not allow
       much leeway from a figure of 4.5 billion years. If Venus was
       added to the solar family of planets very recently, then a new
       cosmogony must be proposed which does not require that all
       planets be created at the same time. This would be a radical
       departure from astronomical thinking today and would result in a
       completely new perspective in cosmology as well as cosmogony.
       The better we understand our own back yard, the better are the
       chances that we will eventually unravel the mystery of our
       origins, and the solution will come sooner if our minds are
       prepared to accept the truth when it is found, however fantastic
       it may be. It we are guided by our reason and our scientific
       method, if we let the Universe describe its wonder to us, rather
       than telling it how it ought to be, then we will soon come to
       the answers we seek, perhaps even within our own lifetimes.' [34
       _References
       #Post#: 332--------------------------------------------------
       Re: Mathis on Velikovsky +
       By: Admin Date: August 13, 2021, 11:07 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       I discussed at
  HTML https://cuttingthroughthefog.com/2018/11/09/current-events-discussion-thread/comment-page-2/#comments
       and
  HTML https://cuttingthroughthefog.com/2018/11/09/current-events-discussion-thread/comment-page-3/#comments
       etc
       *****************************************************