Strange science 😦

[Fake Messiah]

Oh no, Shroud of Turin has been debunked yet again. I'm sure that believers in it will accept the latest findings and be grateful that the truth has come to the surface.

Using open-source 3D modeling software, one researcher showed that, had the cloth really been laid on a real human being, the impression it left would have looked markedly different than what is actually on the sheet source

[Fake Messiah]

Have you ever wondered about the exact number of times you let it rip during the day? Wonder no more because now the scientists have developed smart underwear that can send the exact number to your phone. And who knows, maybe one day we could all get one and have a little competition here on AF.

How Often Do You Fart? This ‘Smart Underwear’ Can Keep Track, Because Figuring Out a Baseline Is Important for Science

Studying flatulence has medical value, however, and measuring how frequently someone passes gas is harder than you might expect.

“Up until now, studying flatulence meant either asking people to count their own farts—which doesn’t work well—or bringing them into a clinical setting and using extremely invasive techniques like rectal tubes for short, controlled measurements,” Brantley Hall, a biologist at the University of Maryland, tells Gizmodo’s Gayoung Lee.

Hall and his colleagues created the first wearable continuous fart-measuring device. This “smart underwear” is a coin-size gadget that snaps into any pair of undies right around where you’d imagine a fart-measuring tool should go.

Now, the researchers want adults all over the country—and fart spectrum—to try it out. Hall has launched the Human Flatus Atlas, a research study recruiting smart underwear users to learn about people’s flatulence patterns and align them with what they eat and the makeup of their microbiomes.

No accurate fart baseline exists, so it’s hard for doctors to know when a patient’s numbers are off, which could be caused by an underlying health problem. Estimates often cite that people tend to pass gas about 14 times per day.

Most people’s farts are mainly made of hydrogen, carbon dioxide and nitrogen. The smart underwear measures hydrogen, specifically, because it’s produced only by the wearer’s gut microbes.

“It tells you how active your microbes are, how much of the food you eat is being metabolized by your gut microbes,” Hall tells WTOP News’ John Domen. “So, someone who farts more is either eating a lot of high fiber food, which is reaching the microbes, which turn into flatus, or maybe they have a condition like small intestine bacterial overgrowth. … So, it tells us a lot about how your digestion is working.”

For the Human Flatus Atlas project, the researchers are seeking individuals from various groups established in previous work: zen digesters who fart very little despite eating lots of fiber, hydrogen hyperproducers who experience frequent flatulence and normal farters who are in between.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-new...180988198/

[Fake Messiah]

Heaven Has a Physical Location, a Physicist Claims—And He Thinks He Knows Where in the Universe It Is

Drawing on basic cosmological ideas—such as Hubble’s law, which holds that distant galaxies recede faster than nearby ones as space expands, and the cosmic horizon, the theoretical limit of what we can ever observe—Michael Guillén, PhD, a former Harvard physics lecturer extended that relationship to the edge of the observable universe. Pushing that reasoning outward, he wrote that what many religious traditions call “heaven” could lie roughly 273 billion trillion miles away (about 439 billion trillion kilometers), beyond the cosmic horizon.

The claim fused modern cosmology with biblical imagery—and set off a rapid scientific backlash. Multiple outlets published follow-up pieces quoting astronomers who expressed disbelief at efforts to drape the observable boundary with physical or theological significance. Alex Gianninas, PhD, an associate teaching professor of astronomy at Connecticut College, is one of the scientists pushing back.

“The cosmic horizon is not a physical place, but a finite boundary beyond which we simply cannot see or communicate,” Gianninas says. That limit exists not because the universe ends there, but because light takes time to travel and the universe has a finite age, he explains. The universe is about 13.8 billion years old, and light moves at roughly 300,000 kilometers per second—meaning we can only observe regions whose light has had enough time to reach Earth. Some regions are simply too far away: their light hasn’t arrived yet—or never will.

Guillén treats the cosmological limit as a natural stopping point for the physical universe—after which a “divine realm” may begin.

Gianninas says precisely the opposite: that space almost certainly continues beyond it. “Likely as a continuation of the universe filled with planets, stars, and galaxies, but there is no scientific basis to claim that it is the realm of God, the gods, or the peak of Mount Olympus.”

In a recent Popular Mechanics feature, University of Nevada physicist Michael Pravica, PhD, imagined concepts like heaven or hell—and even religious figures such as Jesus—as potentially hyperdimensional or liminal, emphasizing that he was speaking in metaphysical, not testable, terms. When I asked him about attempts to locate heaven beyond the farthest visible limit for this article, Pravica “had a little bit of a chuckle.”

Pravica is explicit that ideas about hyperdimensional spiritual realms belong not to physics but to metaphysics, a philosophical branch that deals with concepts so abstract they may have no foundation in reality, such as identity and the nature of being. “In the future, perhaps, if we develop techniques for accessing hyperdimensional tunnels or connections—absolutely, perhaps [we could measure heaven], " he says.

But not at the present time. “I cannot measure an energy that exists outside our spacetime bubble. We live inside the bubble. We’re talking about what’s outside it.” It would be great to pinpoint the postal code of the great hereafter using cosmological tools, but such attempts are destined to fail, because “heaven wouldn’t be tethered to normal energy or matter at all,” Pravica says. It wouldn’t obey gravity or ordinary physical interactions, because “it’s a different energy, one that exists outside the universe we know,” he says.

https://www.popularmechanics.com/science...of-heaven/

[Paleophyte]

Heaven Has...

Please learn the difference between Strange Science and Whackadoodle Bullshit. While the boundary may occasionally be a bit fuzzy, this is clearly the latter. Just because a 'scientist' has a psychotic episode doesn't make it science.

[Fake Messiah]

Aliens may have been trying to contact us for decades - we've been looking for the wrong thing

For decades, we've been looking to the skies for any sign of aliens – but it turns out we may have been missing attempts at contact.

A new study has cast doubt on our radio signal detection methods, arguing that 'space weather' could be distorting incoming transmissions.

Until now, most experiments have focused on identifying spikes in radio frequency – signals unlikely to be produced by any other natural processes in space.

But experts have highlighted an overlooked complication.

Even if an extraterrestrial transmitter produces a perfectly narrow radio signal, it may not remain narrow by the time it leaves its home star's atmosphere.

This distortion, which happens near the point of origin, can 'smear' the signal's frequency, meaning it can be missed by our detectors that are primed to search for more focused radio waves.

'Searches are often optimized for extremely narrow signals,' Dr Vishal Gajjar, astronomer at the SETI Institute and lead author of the paper, said.

'If a signal gets broadened by its own star's environment, it can slip below our detection thresholds, even if it's there, potentially helping explain some of the radio silence we've seen in technosignature searches.'

The discovery could lead to better detection methods that take this into account.

It means even when signals are not 'perfectly razor–thin' by the time they reach Earth, they could still come from extraterrestrial life.

'By quantifying how stellar activity can reshape narrowband signals, we can design searches that are better matched to what actually arrives at Earth, not just what might be transmitted,' Grayce C. Brown, co–author of the study, said.

Writing in The Astrophysical Journal, the researchers concluded: 'The so–called Great Silence, when extended to the radio technosignature searchers, is not solely evidence for the absence of transmitters, but also a reflection of our detection limitations arising from a mismatch between the assumed signal morphology and the broadened line shapes.

https://www.msn.com/en-xl/news/other/ali...r-AA1XF1sL

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Aliens may have been trying to contact us for decades - we've been looking for the wrong thing

For decades, we've been looking to the skies for any sign of aliens – but it turns out we may have been missing attempts at contact.

A new study has cast doubt on our radio signal detection methods, arguing that 'space weather' could be distorting incoming transmissions.

Until now, most experiments have focused on identifying spikes in radio frequency – signals unlikely to be produced by any other natural processes in space.

But experts have highlighted an overlooked complication.

Even if an extraterrestrial transmitter produces a perfectly narrow radio signal, it may not remain narrow by the time it leaves its home star's atmosphere.

This distortion, which happens near the point of origin, can 'smear' the signal's frequency, meaning it can be missed by our detectors that are primed to search for more focused radio waves.

'Searches are often optimized for extremely narrow signals,' Dr Vishal Gajjar, astronomer at the SETI Institute and lead author of the paper, said.

'If a signal gets broadened by its own star's environment, it can slip below our detection thresholds, even if it's there, potentially helping explain some of the radio silence we've seen in technosignature searches.'

The discovery could lead to better detection methods that take this into account.

It means even when signals are not 'perfectly razor–thin' by the time they reach Earth, they could still come from extraterrestrial life.

'By quantifying how stellar activity can reshape narrowband signals, we can design searches that are better matched to what actually arrives at Earth, not just what might be transmitted,' Grayce C. Brown, co–author of the study, said.

Writing in The Astrophysical Journal, the researchers concluded: 'The so–called Great Silence, when extended to the radio technosignature searchers, is not solely evidence for the absence of transmitters, but also a reflection of our detection limitations arising from a mismatch between the assumed signal morphology and the broadened line shapes.

https://www.msn.com/en-xl/news/other/ali...r-AA1XF1sL

The Zoo Hypothesis is my personal favourite. If we ever do manage to decipher a message from the ETs, it may be something along the lines of ‘Please Don’t Feed The Earthlings.’

Boru

[Fake Messiah]

Scientists Have Released NASA Rover Photos Showing Possible Insect and Reptile Life Forms on Mars

A study of NASA’s Mars rover images has raised intriguing possibilities about extraterrestrial life on the Red Planet. Ohio University Professor William Romoser has identified what he believes to be insect- and reptile-like creatures.

For years, scientists have used the Mars rovers to look for signs of past or present life on the planet, focusing primarily on chemical signatures or microbial fossils. However, the findings present an alternative theory: that Mars could harborinsect- and reptile-like creatures. His analysis, based on images from Curiosity, suggests that some of the features seen in the photos bear striking resemblance to terrestrial arthropods and reptiles.

The study, focused on images from NASA’s Curiosity rover, where he claims to have identified several insect-like creatures in flight or at rest. These organisms, which Professor William Romoser refers to as“bees,” appear to possess features similar to terrestrial insects, including segmented bodies, wings, and jointed appendages. In one of his findings, a creature is seen performing an acrobatic flight maneuver, diving steeply before leveling off, much like an insect on Earth.

“The ‘bees’ appear to vary in size and type. Several characteristic insect/arthropod anatomical features were identifiable, not all on the same individual, but as a mosaic among individuals.”

The anatomical structures observed in these images, such as compound eyes and specialized legs, are consistent with arthropods, a large group that includes insects. Romoser has also noted that:

“The insect-like fauna observed appeared to be sheltering/nesting in caves, in burrows beneath the surface, and in specialized structures.”

image

---

---

Romoser has also uncovered what he believes to be reptile-like fossils among the rover photos. One of his key findings involves a specimen that bears similarities to an Eastern King Snake, with a distinct head and bilateral punctate structures. The fossilized creature appears to have a large mouth capable of gaping, further supporting the hypothesis that reptile-like organisms once existed, or may still exist, on Mars.

The reptile-like forms discovered show symmetry and anatomical traits that parallel Earth’s reptiles. These observations have led Romoser to propose that Mars may have supported or may still support life forms similar to those on Earth. In some images, the reptile-like creatures seem to be preying on the insect-like organisms.

image

---

---

Romoser’s presentation of these findings in 2019 at the National Meeting of the Entomological Society of America sparked both interest and skepticism. No matter what the final verdict is, his research is bound to stir up more conversations about life on Mars and the possibility of discovering not just microbes, but more complex organisms.

image

---

---

https://dailygalaxy.com/2026/03/mars-rov...t-reptile/

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

^ Funny that the article refers to Romoser in the present tense. Wikipedia says he died almost five years ago. I doubt very much that there was more than one entomologist of that name at an Ohio university who thinks he found bugs on Mars.

Boru

[Fake Messiah]

Researchers have created tiny devices called metajets that can be lifted and steered in multiple directions using lasers.

For the first time, optical propulsion systems can achieve true 3D maneuvering.

If this scales, it could make missions to Alpha Centauri, about 4.37 light years away, feel far less impossible.

Concepts built on this approach suggest spacecraft could reach speeds of up to 20% of the speed of light (0.2c), cutting travel time to roughly 20 years.

In other words, this could open the door to fuel-free, laser driven spacecraft capable of reaching another star within a human lifetime.

https://interestingengineering.com/space...uri-travel

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Researchers have created tiny devices called metajets that can be lifted and steered in multiple directions using lasers.

For the first time, optical propulsion systems can achieve true 3D maneuvering.

If this scales, it could make missions to Alpha Centauri, about 4.37 light years away, feel far less impossible.

Concepts built on this approach suggest spacecraft could reach speeds of up to 20% of the speed of light (0.2c), cutting travel time to roughly 20 years.

In other words, this could open the door to fuel-free, laser driven spacecraft capable of reaching another star within a human lifetime.

https://interestingengineering.com/space...uri-travel

‘If this scales’ is a tremendous ‘if.’ I imagine that traveling at ~20%c would introduce all kinds of relativistic and communications concerns.

Boru