THE FOURTH SOURCE

THE FOURTH SOURCE

Effects of Natural Nuclear Reactors

Robert J. Tuttle

Universal-Publishers

Boca Raton

The Fourth Source: Effects of Natural Nuclear Reactors

Copyright © 2012 Robert J. Tuttle All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system,

without written permission from the publisher

Universal-Publishers Boca Raton, Florida

USA • 2012

ISBN-10: 1-61233-077-0 ISBN-13: 978-1-61233-077-8

www.universal-publishers.com

Front cover: False color image of Venus by radar mapping by Magellan (NASA/JPL/USGS); Spiral Galaxy M74 with a

supernova photo courtesy of Isaac Newton Group of Telescopes, La Palma/Simon Dye (Cardiff University)); Pu’u O’o, Hawai’i (photo by the author); and natural color image of Earth from space by Apollo 17 mission (NASA/JSC/Apollo 17 crew).

Back cover: Image of M51, the Whirlpool nebula, and its companion, by the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope

(© 2002); photo of author (by the author), December 2007.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Tuttle, Robert J., 1935

The fourth source : effects of natural nuclear reactors / Robert J. Tuttle p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-61233-077-8 (pbk. : alk. paper) – ISBN 1-61233-077-0 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Radiation sources. 2. Radiation, Background. 3. Extraterrestrial radiation. I. Title. QC476.S6T88 2012 551.3′9—dc23 2011045154

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PROLOGUE Science progresses by making mistakes. Sometimes abruptly, these mistakes are corrected, and science proceeds on. Understanding the history of science is essential if we are to understand what we understand. The corrected errors may start with a flat Earth, as the center of the Universe, with the stars being distant campfires in the sky. That fit the earliest observations of our ancient predecessors and was consistent with the earliest theories. Observation and theory continued to evolve, each correcting the other. Now, do we know everything, except the smallest details, the insignificant fringes, or is it only what is beyond the fringes that we don’t know? Like every generation prior, are we muddling along, burdened unknowingly by an abundance of unseen errors? What are those errors, what will the next big corrections be? This book makes an attempt to answer some of those questions. I hope the answers will be as exciting for you as they have been for me, and raise as many more new questions. Some of this must remain as an exploration. There are problems I have not been able to resolve but that I think are important enough for further consideration.

for Zoey and Ian,

because of

June

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes. Marcel Proust This is the greatest adventure of mankind: To find something that was never known before, or understood. Irving Stone And the end of all our exploring Will be to arrive where we started And know the place for the first time. T. S. Eliot

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Table of Contents PROLOGUE..............................................................................................................v

LIST OF FIGURES ................................................................................................ xiii PREFACE ............................................................................................................ xvii I. FOUNDATIONS ................................................................................................... 1

INTRODUCTION ...................................................................................................... 1 CONSISTENCY, ERRORS, CORRECTIONS, AND CONTRADICTION .......................................... 1 NUMBERS ............................................................................................................. 2 MASS AND ENERGY ................................................................................................. 3 NUCLEAR PHYSICS .................................................................................................. 4 RADIOACTIVITY ..................................................................................................... 5 NUCLEAR REACTIONS .............................................................................................. 6 NUCLEAR FISSION .................................................................................................. 8 NUCLEAR FISSION REACTORS .................................................................................. 12 NATURAL NUCLEAR FISSION REACTORS ..................................................................... 13 FEEDBACK .......................................................................................................... 18 DETONATION (WITH SUPERFISSION AND ULTRAFISSION) ............................................... 19 ASTRONOMY ........................................................................................................ 22 GEOLOGY ........................................................................................................... 23 ISOTOPE VARIATIONS AND DATING ............................................................................ 25 BIOLOGY ............................................................................................................ 30

SUMMARY OF PART I ........................................................................................... 32 II. THE EARTH ..................................................................................................... 33

URANIUM AND THE CREATION OF PLANETS ................................................................. 33 The lamps are lit... .......................................................................................... 33 ...the stage is set... ......................................................................................... 33 ...let the play begin. ........................................................................................ 34

HOME PLANET EARTH ............................................................................................ 42 KEEPING THE HOME FIRES BURNING .......................................................................... 43 THE FAINT YOUNG SUN PARADOX: COOL SUN, WARM EARTH ........................................... 43 NUCLEAR REACTORS AND THE HISTORY OF THE EARTH .................................................. 46 VOLCANOES, THE EARTH’S HEAT TRANSFER SYSTEM ..................................................... 49

Hotspot volcanoes and mantle plumes ................................................................ 50 Flood basalts, large igneous provinces, oceanic plateaus ....................................... 51 Spreading-ridge volcanoes ................................................................................ 55 Island-arc and Backarc Volcanoes ...................................................................... 55 Explosive Eruptions ......................................................................................... 56

EL NIÑO ............................................................................................................ 56 CLIMATE CHANGE .................................................................................................. 60 ISOTOPIC EVIDENCE FOR THE EARTH'S REACTORS ........................................................ 62

Radiogenic Halos ............................................................................................. 66 Plutonium-244 ................................................................................................ 67

THE GEOMAGNETIC FIELD ........................................................................................ 68 THE SNOWBALL EARTH ........................................................................................... 70

Banded Iron Formations ................................................................................... 73 Phosphoria Basin ............................................................................................. 74 Oceanic Anoxic Events ..................................................................................... 74

CONTINENTAL DRIFT, PLATE TECTONICS, AND EARTH EXPANSION ...................................... 75

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SUMMARY OF PART II .......................................................................................... 85 III. THE SOLAR SYSTEM ...................................................................................... 87

THE NATURE AND POSSIBLE FORMATION OF OUR SOLAR SYSTEM ..................................... 87 FORMATION OF THE SOLAR SYSTEM, THE EARTH AS A GIANT PLANET ................................ 90 THE SUN ........................................................................................................... 103

Uranium reactors in the Sun ............................................................................ 106 The Sunspot Mechanism .................................................................................. 107 Neutrinos and the Solar Neutrino Problem .......................................................... 109

THE INNER PLANETS ............................................................................................ 113 MERCURY .......................................................................................................... 116 VENUS .............................................................................................................. 118

Pancake Domes of Venus ................................................................................. 119 Deuterium and Hydrogen ................................................................................. 123

OUR EARTH AND MOON ......................................................................................... 124 MARS ............................................................................................................... 126

Pancake Domes of Mars .................................................................................. 126 Oceans of Mars .............................................................................................. 128 Deuterium and Hydrogen ................................................................................. 130 Xenon and Iodine ........................................................................................... 133

THE ASTEROIDS .................................................................................................. 133 METEORITES ....................................................................................................... 142

Water ........................................................................................................... 144 Deuterium and Hydrogen ................................................................................. 144 Helium-3 ....................................................................................................... 147 Xenon and Iodine ........................................................................................... 151

THE OUTER PLANETS ............................................................................................. 157 JUPITER AND HIS MOONS ..................................................................................... 161

Moons........................................................................................................... 162 Io ................................................................................................................ 162 Europa .......................................................................................................... 164 Ganymede ..................................................................................................... 164 Callisto ......................................................................................................... 164 Titius-Bode Law for Satellites ........................................................................... 164

SATURN AND HIS MOONS AND RINGS ...................................................................... 165 Rings ............................................................................................................ 166 Titan ............................................................................................................ 167 Enceladus ...................................................................................................... 167

URANUS ............................................................................................................ 168 Titius-Bode Law for Satellites, again .................................................................. 171

NEPTUNE ........................................................................................................... 172 Triton ........................................................................................................... 173

THE OUTER LIMITS .............................................................................................. 175 Pluto and the Kuiperoids .................................................................................. 175

THE TITIUS-BODE LAW FOR A SOLAR SYSTEM WITH 10 PLANETS ...................................... 180 PLANET X AND THE MILKY WAY .............................................................................. 181

a reflection nebula? ........................................................................................ 190 COMETS AND THE OORT CLOUD ............................................................................... 193 DEUTERIUM AND HYDROGEN, MORE AND AGAIN .......................................................... 197 THE LOCAL BUBBLE .............................................................................................. 198 THE SOLAR WIND ................................................................................................ 199

SUMMARY OF PART III ........................................................................................ 200

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IV. LIFE (AND DEATH) ........................................................................................ 205 EVOLUTION BY PUNCTUATED! EQUILIBRIUM ... ............................................................. 207 THE CAMBRIAN EXPLOSION ................................................................................... 210 THE PERMIAN-TRIASSIC TRANSFORMATION .............................................................. 212 TURTLES ............................................................................................................ 215 LIFE, AND DEATH, AT THE K/T ............................................................................... 216

Size Comparisons ........................................................................................... 220 Pterosaur Ptakeoff .......................................................................................... 232

THE HUMAN EVENT .............................................................................................. 232 THE HOOF AND HABIT OF HORSES ........................................................................... 249 IF SURVIVAL IS A TEST ... ...................................................................................... 249 THE NEANDERTAL CONDITION ................................................................................ 250 MODERN HUMANS ................................................................................................ 259 THE YOUNGER DRYAS, THE END OF THE GREAT ICE AGE .................................................. 260 THE FLOOD ........................................................................................................ 264 THE MEGAFAUNA EXTINCTION ................................................................................. 277 MAGNETIC REVERSALS .......................................................................................... 284 SATURN’S RINGS AND COMETS ............................................................................... 285 ART, MYTHS AND LEGENDS, AND PLATO’S ATLANTIS .................................................... 287

Art ............................................................................................................... 287 Myths and Legends ......................................................................................... 295 Plato’s Atlantis ............................................................................................... 301

THOROUGHLY MODERN HUMANS ............................................................................. 303 Digression to Homo floresiensis ........................................................................ 310

SUMMARY OF PART IV ........................................................................................ 310 V. THE UNIVERSE ................................................................................................ 313

IN SEARCH OF UNDERSTANDING ............................................................................... 313 HISTORY, HARD WORK IN THE DARK .......................................................................... 313 STELLAR DEVELOPMENT: STARS OR STARLETS? ............................................................ 314 THE SUN AND THE STARS ....................................................................................... 316 THE ASTRONOMICAL DISTANCE SCALE ....................................................................... 320 REMOTE DISTANCING ............................................................................................ 322

Triangulation ................................................................................................. 322 Horizontal Parallax .......................................................................................... 323 Trigonometric Parallax .................................................................................... 324 Cepheid Variable Stars .................................................................................... 328

SPIRAL GALAXIES, NEBULAE OR NOT? ..................................................................... 330 WAS THE HUBBLE SPACE TELESCOPE OUT OF FOCUS? ..................................................... 330 GALAXIES OR NEBULAE, HOW FAR, HOW NEAR? ........................................................... 333

Detonated Planets and Starsuns ....................................................................... 334 ASSOCIATIONS OF STARS AND SPIRAL GALAXIES… ..................................................... 336 … AND THE HUBBLE DEEP FIELD ............................................................................. 342 SPIRAL NEBULAE ................................................................................................. 347

The Form of Spiral Galaxies ............................................................................. 350 RANDOM MOTION IN THE UNIVERSE ........................................................................ 353 THE EXPANDING UNIVERSE AND THE HUBBLE CONSTANT ................................................. 365 SOME OF OUR GALAXIES ARE MISSING ..................................................................... 378

Attenuation of Light by Absorption and Scattering ............................................... 381 Disappearing Galaxies ..................................................................................... 385

THE HUBBLE CONSTANT AND THE ACCELERATING UNIVERSE ............................................. 387 THE EXPANDING UNIVERSE ..................................................................................... 389

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FROM PLANET TO SPIRAL GALAXY ............................................................................. 391 ELLIPTICAL GALAXIES, WITH AND WITHOUT GLOBULAR CLUSTERS ..................................... 393 SUPERNOVAS ..................................................................................................... 394

Light Curves .................................................................................................. 395 SUPERNOVA 1987A ............................................................................................. 398

The Early Spectrum of SN 1987A ...................................................................... 400 TELECONNECTIONS, NEAR AND FAR ............................................................................ 406 THINGS THAT GO BUMP IN THE NIGHT: GAMMA-RAY BURSTS ............................................ 406 SUPERLUMINAL MOTION ....................................................................................... 422 COSMOLOGY ....................................................................................................... 423 ANTIMATTER AND ANTIGRAVITY ............................................................................... 424 THE BIG BANG .................................................................................................... 428 OLBERS’ PARADOX ............................................................................................... 431

SUMMARY OF PART V .......................................................................................... 433 VI. CONCLUSION ................................................................................................ 437 VII. APPENDICES ............................................................................................... 439

APPENDIX A: ANTINEUTRINO-INDUCED ELECTRON CAPTURE ........................................... 439 APPENDIX B: STUDIES OF SPECTRA .......................................................................... 460 APPENDIX C: DETAILED ANALYSIS OF SN 1987A ........................................................ 467

Analysis of Antineutrino Data from SN 1987A ..................................................... 467 Chronology of SN 1987A ................................................................................. 468 Mass Estimates For SN 1987A ............................................................................ 475 Fission Fuel ................................................................................................... 475 Temperature Increase ..................................................................................... 475 Gravitational Waves from SN 1987A .................................................................. 476 The Companion .............................................................................................. 478 Further Discussions of Supernova 1987A in the Large Magellanic Cloud .................. 480 The Light Halos of SN 1987A ............................................................................ 482 Panagia’s Ring ............................................................................................... 484

APPENDIX D: NUCLEAR REACTOR ANALYSIS OF V838 MONOCEROTIS ................................ 485 REFERENCES....................................................................................................... 487 INDEX ................................................................................................................ 545

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List of Figures Figure 1. Nuclear-fission chain-reaction. .................................................................................. 8 Figure 2. Energy distribution of protons from neutron decay. ......................................................... 10 Figure 3. Energy distribution of electrons from neutron decay. ........................................................ 11 Figure 4. Energy required for disruption of planets. .................................................................... 21 Figure 5. Schematic arrangement of the modern Earth. ................................................................ 24 Figure 6. Neutron absorption cross sections. ........................................................................... 26 Figure 7. Abundances of uranium isotopes. ............................................................................. 34 Figure 8. Critical masses for uranium hydride in space, Jupiter, and the Sun. .......................................... 36 Figure 9. Critical masses of uranium on and in the Earth. .............................................................. 38 Figure 10. Phase diagram for uranium in iron. .......................................................................... 39 Figure 11. Phase diagram for uranium oxide in steel. ................................................................... 40 Figure 12. Critical masses for uranium oxide on and in the Earth. ..................................................... 41 Figure 13. Heat inputs to the Earth. .................................................................................... 45 Figure 14. Four continental flood basalt eruptions. ..................................................................... 52 Figure 15. Eruptions of the Siberian Traps. ............................................................................. 52 Figure 16. Eruptions of the Central Atlantic Magmatic Province. ...................................................... 53 Figure 17. Eruptions of the Karoo Continental Flood Basalts. ......................................................... 54 Figure 18. Eruptions of the Deccan Traps. ............................................................................. 55 Figure 19. Sea surface temperature and helium-3 concentrations. ...................................................... 57 Figure 20. The Multivariate ENSO Index, MEI. ........................................................................ 58 Figure 21. Comparison of supernova brightnesses and the MEI. ....................................................... 59 Figure 22. Surface temperature of the Earth and supernova brightness. ................................................ 61 Figure 23. 2,000 years of temperature. .................................................................................. 62 Figure 24. Strontium ratios and extinctions. ............................................................................ 65 Figure 25. Continental positions from Plate Tectonics and from Earth Expansion. ................................... 80 Figure 26. Impact craters and sea level drops. .......................................................................... 83 Figure 27. Slumping of continental crust in Japan. ...................................................................... 84 Figure 28. Titius-Bode Law for planets of the Solar System. ........................................................... 89 Figure 29. Solar System objects. ......................................................................................... 90 Figure 30. Planetary masses. ............................................................................................ 97 Figure 31. Giant planet formation in the Solar System. ................................................................. 98 Figure 32. ProtoEarth, and present Earth and Jupiter. .................................................................. 99 Figure 33. The nearest star to the Earth, our Sun. ..................................................................... 103 Figure 34. Escape of a pulse of heat from the center of the Sun. ...................................................... 105 Figure 35. Cumulative heat escape from the center of the Sun. ........................................................ 106 Figure 36. Critical masses for uranium hydride in space, Jupiter, and the Sun. ........................................ 107 Figure 37. Solar brightness. ............................................................................................ 108 Figure 38. Solar radius. ................................................................................................. 109 Figure 39. Images from space of the four inner planets. ............................................................... 114 Figure 40. Comparison of the four inner planets. ...................................................................... 115 Figure 41. Pancake domes on Venus. .................................................................................. 120 Figure 42. Rubble mound from underground detonation. ............................................................. 121 Figure 43. Sedan Crater (nuclear detonation) and Meteor Crater (meteor impact). .................................... 122 Figure 44. Neutron scattering cross sections for ordinary hydrogen and deuterium. .................................. 124 Figure 45. A pancake dome on Mars. .................................................................................. 127 Figure 46. Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter topographic map of Mars. ................................................... 129 Figure 47. Asteroid orbits. ............................................................................................. 134 Figure 48. The asteroid 4 Vesta as imaged by the Dawn spacecraft..................................................... 135

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Figure 49. Lightcurve of a rotating asteroid and a classical pulsating Cepheid variable star. ........................... 141 Figure 50. D/H ratios in meteorites. ................................................................................... 147 Figure 51. Distribution of helium-3 in the meteorites Grant and Carbo. .............................................. 148 Figure 52. Uranium-235 content in meteorites and Oklo ore. ......................................................... 155 Figure 53. The four outer planets. ..................................................................................... 158 Figure 54. Giant planets in the Solar System. .......................................................................... 159 Figure 55. Giant planet sizes. .......................................................................................... 160 Figure 56. Critical masses for uranium hydride in space and in the center of Jupiter. ................................. 161 Figure 57. Moons of Jupiter. ........................................................................................... 162 Figure 58. Infrared spectra of Io and a reference star. ................................................................. 163 Figure 59. Large moons of Jupiter. ..................................................................................... 165 Figure 60. Larger moons of Uranus. ................................................................................... 171 Figure 61. Titius-Bode Law for the Solar System....................................................................... 181 Figure 62. Cornelius Easton's concept of the Milky Way. ............................................................. 187 Figure 63. Reflection magnitudes of Solar System planets. ............................................................ 192 Figure 64. D/H ratios in the Solar System. ............................................................................ 197 Figure 65. Solar wind between the Sun and Earth. ..................................................................... 199 Figure 66. Solar wind radial velocity. ................................................................................... 200 Figure 67. Eryops from the Permian and Euparkeria from the Triassic. ................................................ 213 Figure 68. Early upright dinosaur forms................................................................................ 214 Figure 69. Size comparisons of Mesozoic and Modern animals. ....................................................... 222 Figure 70. Radius of an expanding Earth. .............................................................................. 223 Figure 71. Ancient animals with specialized features that may have aided respiration. ................................ 227 Figure 72. Reconstructions of Tyrannosaurus rex. ....................................................................... 228 Figure 73. Sizes of mammals from the Late Cretaceous to the Late Pleistocene. ...................................... 230 Figure 74. Impact craters and abrupt sealevel drops. .................................................................. 231 Figure 75. Karyotypes of humans, chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans. ............................................ 235 Figure 76. Aberration caused by radiation from a nuclear fission detonation. ......................................... 235 Figure 77. X chromosome banding of humans, chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans. ................................... 236 Figure 78. Two autosomes of humans, chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans. ....................................... 237 Figure 79. Fossil record for primate development. ....................................................................... 239 Figure 80. Fossil record for human development. ..................................................................... 239 Figure 81. Fossil record of human brain size. .......................................................................... 242 Figure 82. mtDNA differences among modern humans, Neandertals, and Denisova. ................................ 244 Figure 83. Skeletons of Neandertal and Australian Aborigine. ......................................................... 255 Figure 84. Oxygen isotope curves from Greenland and Antarctica. ................................................... 261 Figure 85. Methane concentration curves from Greenland and Antarctica. ........................................... 262 Figure 86. Elevations of snowlines. .................................................................................... 273 Figure 87. Profiles across submarine canyons and the dry-land Grand Canyon. ....................................... 276 Figure 88. Supernova and Moon, Baja California. ..................................................................... 288 Figure 89. Cave painting from Amazonia, showing a detonation hidden by the Moon. ............................... 289 Figure 90. Painting in Chauvet Cave, France, showing the expanding debris cloud. ................................... 291 Figure 91. Two-toned (flash burned) humans in Baja California. ...................................................... 292 Figure 92. Carvings on an ancient bone. ............................................................................... 293 Figure 93. Rock painting labeled as “The Swimmers”, in the Sahara desert. ........................................... 294 Figure 94. Egyptian tomb paintings of Osiris and Isis. ................................................................ 298 Figure 95. Turkic Altaic depiction that may show the sequence of the detonation. ................................... 299 Figure 96. Stela of Melishipak II, with symbols assigned to Venus, Moon, and Sun. .................................. 300 Figure 97. Images of Venus, the Moon, and the Sun to the same scale. ............................................... 301 Figure 98. True surveyor's triangulation. ............................................................................... 323 Figure 99. Horizontal parallax as attempted for astronomical distance measurements. ................................ 324

List of Figures xv

Figure 100. Trigonometric Parallax, foundation of the astronomical distance scale. .................................. 325 Figure 101. Conceptual presentation of trigonometric parallax as triangulation. ...................................... 327 Figure 102. Defocusing effect for Hubble Space Telescope with an asteroidal “star”. ..................................... 333 Figure 103. Hubble Space Telescope Deep Field, showing a multitude of galaxies. ....................................... 342 Figure 104. Low-surface-brightness galaxies and the Freeman Law. ................................................... 344 Figure 105. Malin 1, a low-surface-brightness galaxy. .................................................................. 345 Figure 106. The Cartwheel Galaxy. .................................................................................... 346 Figure 107. Reflection magnitudes of Solar System planets. ........................................................... 348 Figure 108. Spiral galaxy NGC 5457, M101. ........................................................................... 350 Figure 109. The Great Nebula in Andromeda and companions. ...................................................... 352 Figure 110. Spiral galaxy NGC 628 in visible light and in 21-centimeter radiation. .................................... 353 Figure 111. Net radial velocity of galaxies. ............................................................................. 355 Figure 112. Volumetric density of galaxies. ............................................................................ 357 Figure 113. Radial velocities of bright stars............................................................................. 358 Figure 114. Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution derived for bright stars. ................................................. 359 Figure 115. Spectrometric velocities of Milky Way globular clusters. .................................................. 360 Figure 116. Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution for radial velocities of globular clusters. ................................ 361 Figure 117. Velocities of nearby galaxies. .............................................................................. 362 Figure 118. Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution for radial velocities of nearby galaxies. ................................. 363 Figure 119. Galaxy number densities. .................................................................................. 364 Figure 120. Velocity distributions for distant galaxies and neutrons from the VIPER reactor ........................ 365 Figure 121. Measurements of galaxy rotation by van Maanen and Lundmark. ........................................ 369 Figure 122. Planetary rotations and rotations measured by van Maanen. .............................................. 370 Figure 123. Comparison of the redshift/distance relation. ............................................................. 376 Figure 124. Measurements of the Hubble Constant. ................................................................... 377 Figure 125. Modern measurements of the redshift/distance relation. ................................................. 378 Figure 126. Astronomical passbands. .................................................................................. 379 Figure 127. Galaxy spectra. ............................................................................................ 380 Figure 128. Doppler shifted spectra. ................................................................................... 381 Figure 129. Blue Star, Red Star. Attenuation of a stellar spectrum. ................................................... 382 Figure 130. Dust attenuation of a B2 III star. .......................................................................... 383 Figure 131. Attenuation of light by small grains. ....................................................................... 384 Figure 132. Attenuated galaxy spectrum. ............................................................................... 385 Figure 133. Dimming by dust. ......................................................................................... 386 Figure 134. Measurements of the redshift/distance relation with Type Ia supernovae. ............................... 388 Figure 135. Comparison of redshift/distance measurements. ......................................................... 390 Figure 136. Whirlpool Galaxy (M51) and NGC 7753/7752. ........................................................... 393 Figure 137. The observed light curve of the supernova in the Andromeda Galaxy. ................................... 395 Figure 138. The observed light curve of the supernova SN 1937C. ................................................... 396 Figure 139. The observed light curve of the supernova SN 1987A . ................................................... 396 Figure 140. Spectra of Supernova 1987A. .............................................................................. 400 Figure 141. Light curve of SN 1987A. ................................................................................. 401 Figure 142. Energy flux spectrum for SN 1987A. ..................................................................... 402 Figure 143. SN 1987A image by Hubble Space Telescope. ................................................................. 404 Figure 144. Schematic diagram of the SN 1987A system. ............................................................. 405 Figure 145. Power flux from GRB970228 and GRB970508. .......................................................... 409 Figure 146. Gamma-ray spectrum from GRB910503 compared to a fission spectrum. ............................... 410 Figure 147. The field of objects around the spiral galaxy NGC 4235. ................................................. 412 Figure 148. Redshifts of quasars and Hubble’s Law for field galaxies. ................................................. 414 Figure 149. Clusters of quasars related to the Milky Way Galaxy. ..................................................... 416 Figure 150. Distribution of quasars and pulsars in the Milky Way Galaxy. ............................................ 419

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Figure 151. Rotation rates of pulsars. .................................................................................. 420 Figure 152. Rotation rates of fast pulsars. .............................................................................. 420 Figure 153. Rotation rates of slow pulsars. ............................................................................. 421 Figure 154. Abundances of nuclides produced by the Big Bang. ...................................................... 429 Figure 155. The expansion of space, without expansion of bound objects. ........................................... 433 Figure 156. Spectrum of the white dwarf star Sirius B. ................................................................ 460 Figure 157. Critique of earliest spectrum of SN 1987A. ............................................................... 461 Figure 158. Comparisons of model spectra to SN 1987A. ............................................................. 462 Figure 159. The spectrum of WX Ceti. ................................................................................ 463 Figure 160. Composite spectrum of Blue Horizontal Branch Stars. ................................................... 464 Figure 161. The long-wavelength spectrum of NGC 7027. ............................................................ 465 Figure 162. Spectrum of supernova SN 2005cs. ....................................................................... 466 Figure 163. Comparison of spectra of SN 1987A and SN 2005cs. .................................................... 467 Figure 164. First pulse of antineutrinos from SN 1987A. .............................................................. 470 Figure 165. Second pulse of antineutrinos from SN 1987A. ........................................................... 470 Figure 166. Antineutrino fluences from SN 1987A for different detectors. ........................................... 471 Figure 167. Detection efficiency for the antineutrino detectors. ....................................................... 472 Figure 168. Observed and modeled antineutrino spectra from SN 1987A. ............................................ 473 Figure 169. Bolometric light curve of SN 1987A. ...................................................................... 475 Figure 170. Temperature of the cooler object in SN 1987A. .......................................................... 476 Figure 171. Comparison of fission decay heat with SN 1987A light curve. ............................................ 479 Figure 172. Early portion of SN 1987A light curve. ................................................................... 480 Figure 173. Schematic diagram of the SN 1987A system. ............................................................. 481 Figure 174. Expansion of halos around SN 1987A. ................................................................... 483 Figure 175. Expansion velocities of SN 1987A halos. ................................................................. 484 Figure 176. The power trace of V838 Monocerotis. ................................................................... 485 Figure 177. Reactivity derived from the power trace of V838 Monocerotis. ........................................... 486

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Preface In ancient times, when people looked at the skies and wondered about their world, the high priests told them stories to explain what they saw. We call those stories myths and legends. In modern times, when people look at the skies and wonder about their world, scientists tell them stories to explain what they see. We call those stories theories and models. As myths and legends are questioned, and as both the questioners and the answerers gain knowledge, the stories become more clearly based on facts, and approach more closely to the reality that they try to explain. But sometimes, because an effect is overlooked or misinterpreted, the stories go off-course and the people are led astray. That seems to be so for our current stories of the Universe, from the Earth and its fellow planets, to our Solar System neighborhood, to the most distant reaches we can imagine. Our Universe has been described in myths and legends invoking many mysterious forces, but we now explain it by theories and models using just three major sources of energy: gravity, nuclear fusion, and electromagnetism. Because of our limitation to these three energy sources, our explanations are often incomplete and confused, sometimes overwhelmingly complex, and we must invent phenomena never seen. Our theories have become increasingly creative and ingenious, calling on unobservable objects and processes, such as black holes, neutron stars, and inflationary cosmology, to explain our Universe. We struggle with inconsistencies and confusion in the stories of our world. While our concepts of reality are shaped by our perceptions, our perceptions are directed by our concepts. In some cases, the currently accepted models have become so firmly entrenched as to constitute “paralytic paradigms”. These concepts are so strongly held and so severely control our thoughts, that contrary or alternate theories cannot be considered, and contradictory observations are not recognized. Three sources of energy have long been known: gravity, that controls the motions of all bodies, heavenly, Earthly, and human; nuclear fusion, that provides the power to light the stars; and electromagnetism, that carries energy throughout the Universe and holds the atoms together. Our current explanations of the Universe are based on these three sources. Things could be simpler... Something was missed along the way that can clarify much of the current confusion. That something is nuclear fission. We have been trying to explain effects that are caused by nuclear fission without including the process of nuclear fission in the explanations. Including nuclear fission as the fourth source of energy brings unity and clarity to our stories of the world, from the planets of the Solar System to the galaxies of the Universe. This book provides some new solutions to old, solved problems. The omission of nuclear fission from our understanding of the Universe is an interesting philosophical question. You probably know very little about nuclear fission, other than that it is a very energetic process, used in weapons and power plants, and you probably know little about nuclear weapons and nuclear power plants. We have a concept that nuclear reactors must be very complicated, because those that we make are complicated, but Nature ran reactors in the bottom of a river delta for 600,000 years, 2 billion years before we discovered nuclear fission. So, how hard can it be, with the right stuff, and enough time? Excluded from academia by anti-war sentiment, hidden from curiosity by extreme governmental secrecy, nuclear fission has languished in an intellectual limbo. It is well known, well understood, by its practitioners, but it is a will-o-the-wisp to outsiders. My research, leading to a new understanding of the Universe by including the effects of nuclear fission, began in 1989 as a simple personal search for a better understanding of the impact of natural radioactivity on our world and our lives. It became a self-guiding tour, with a life of its own, in 1993, as I began to discover possible effects due to nuclear fission, and how poorly many of these observations were explained by present theories. Each discovery led naturally to more. At times, I was startled by the weakness of arguments that decided fundamental questions of reality, and how those decisions have not been re-examined as our knowledge and our observational techniques have improved. On the other hand, it is impressive that the fundamental observations were made so well, reported so honestly, and kept so accessible, that a stranger to the specialists' worlds can still glimpse reality clearly. The results of this research have been quite contrary to many of our current models, but provide the key to understanding our knowledge more completely. The reader of this book will be faced with a pair of basic questions: 1. If what I propose is true, is it likely to be important? and 2. If what I propose is important, is it likely to be true? Each reader's answer to these questions will prove whatever worth this book may have. As I came to an understanding of the presence and probable source of excess energy in the early eons of Earth, my search for its source took me into space, into our Solar System and far beyond. And then, surprisingly, I was brought back to Earth, with a clearer understanding of the puzzle of evolution, and how and when we became us. What was expected to be,

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and intended to be, a short article in a technical journal grew to be something that was too large, too broad, too interdisciplinary to fit into any journal. Instead it has become a book, for the curious members of Homo sapiens sapiens to discover their world. This is not so much a science book as it is a book about gaining knowledge and understanding. That knowledge and understanding is the right of every citizen of this planet, and should not be restricted to an elite of scientists, by virtue of being written in an arcane language. Here, there are few equations (except in a special Appendix), no integrals, no calculus. There are graphs and plots. These are like maps to help you see where we are, and where we might be headed. This book is filled with observations and ideas, with the hope that you will gain knowledge and understanding. The math and the science are there, but behind the scenes, available if you wish to discover them, but not demanding your attention. The equations are embedded in the physics. If you need the equations, you probably already know them. If you don’t already know them, you probably don’t need them. You can find them in the references, if you want. In the references, I have tried to provide readily available publications that are acceptable to the specialist and others that are more accessible to the novice. We are all novices in most fields. While the artists of the Renaissance ground their own pigments and formulated their own paints, fabricated their own brushes and canvasses, you do not need to do that to appreciate a Rembrandt or a Reubens or a Titian. The Universe is a beautiful masterpiece and I want you to enjoy this book about it. Since this is not a science book, I have tried wherever possible to write in ordinary English, translating and interpreting as much of the official technical language and jargon as I can. The experts will not approve, and will use this as evidence that I don’t even know what I’m writing about. I’m sorry. I think it is more important for more people to understand what they are reading about, than to present the information in an officially satisfactory but obfuscated way. By avoiding technical terminology, interpreting and explaining in ordinary language, I hope to gain in accuracy of understanding what may be lost in precision and correctness. Perhaps this book can be read without a dictionary in your lap. This book is an exploration, rather than a declaration, and in some cases the reader must be left to choose the best answers. To offer a solution from a foreign field often appears to be an appeal to magic, or more bluntly, to be crackpot science. If the foundation for an explanation is not known, recognized, or understood, that explanation may appear to be nonsense. Nuclear fission and radiation physics are foreign fields to most researchers, just as their fields are foreign to me. In those foreign fields I can only offer the insight of an outsider, glimpses of ideas that are based on knowledge that is unknown to the resident experts. Every expert in every field that this book addresses knows more about his field than I do. My only advantage is that I haven’t known so much that is wrong. Until you have read this book, you may not be familiar with many of these problems, which leads to my quip that “those who understand the solution don’t know the problems, and those who know the problems don’t understand the solution.” The purpose of this book is to get those two populations, each understanding part of the situation, together. To a large extent, this book is a story of catastrophe. In the all-too-often either/or world of science, Catastrophism lost out to Uniformitarianism. Most of the Earth has certainly been formed and shaped by the slow, steady progress of processes that can be seen in action somewhere on the Earth at the present time. Still, some catastrophes can be recognized and accepted, rare as they have been. In our current view, large volcanic eruptions are local catastrophes. Recent eruptions are insignificant compared to major eruptions in the distant past, which were truly global catastrophes. The mass extinctions, in which nearly all life on Earth was terminated, or at least altered irreversibly, must be viewed as catastrophes, whatever the cause. Impacts by asteroids or comets are now accepted as one possible catastrophic cause. Natural physical processes are proposed here to explain, by catastrophe, what has not been explainable by uniformity. The basic framework for studying the structure and form of the Earth was established on the assumption that the Earth is cooling and contracting (shrinking). The contraction led to the formation of the mountains of the continents as “wrinkles”. In spite of evidence to the contrary, for example, the expansion of the ocean floor at mid-ocean ridges, contraction has continued to be an underlying concept. Mountain-building has been transferred to the contraction caused by collision and subduction of crustal plates. The apparent success of this Plate Tectonic Theory has blocked consideration of alternatives. Some of the ideas in this book are soft and speculative. I must overwork the word “suggest” to convey the sense of possibilities worth exploring, rather than dogmatic facts to be accepted. I take that as my privilege as a visitor, an intruder, an explorer in fields where I lack the specialists’ knowledge and authority. Lacking the authority to establish ideas as facts, I shirk the responsibility to present these ideas in a fully rigorous manner. I hope that there is enough rigor where it is appropriate that the promise of the soft ideas will be recognized. One of the symptoms of crackpot science is the solution of problems in widely unrelated fields, often by the use of strange and obscure techniques. At first glance, that criticism might be very easily applied to this book. But it is important to recognize that this book does not try to explain all things as the result of nuclear fission. Many (in fact, most, by far) of our observations are well explained by fully developed theories and need no help, from fission or anything else. And there are other problems that seem to be beyond the help of nuclear fission, such as the initial origin of life. (We will make occasional detours to examine these.) This book attempts to explain those observations that appear to me to be poorly explained at

Preface xix

present, and are clearly related to the effects of nuclear fission. Some of the detours will insist on intruding, but I hope they help rather than hinder our understanding. Moreover, everything in the book is only physics. I have simply applied the methods of physics to problems that became unveiled once the possibility of natural nuclear fission reactors became clear. These methods and knowledge are straightforward and well-founded. I have invented little that is in this book. Mainly, I have interpreted and integrated other researchers’ ideas by the use of the methods of physics. What I present here is no more complicated, inherently, than gravity. Things fall. Reactors happen naturally, natural reactors sometimes explode. In the 1950s, Immanuel Velikovsky wrote some outrageously speculative books, based on what he saw as poorly explained events that were described in myths, legends, and religious writings [Ginenthal 1995]. He invented a mechanism to explain these observations, but the mechanism was judged, quite objectively, to be a crackpot idea. (Unfortunately, his books were rejected much more emotionally and his perceptions were thrown away.) In the first part of the 20th Century, Alfred Wegener collected observations that showed many of the continental coastlines had at one time been adjacent to each other, but had drifted apart [Wegener 1928]. His mechanism for this “Continental Drift” was also quite unreasonable, physically, and his entire concept was repeatedly rejected. Drifting blocks of continents was scientifically unacceptable, until oceanographers discovered spreading ridges in the middle of the oceans, and invented the theory of Plate Tectonics, where continental and oceanic scum is carried across the globe by giant convection cells in the mantle. Just as the mechanisms invented by Velikovsky, Allan and Delair, Carey, and Van Flandern, were physically implausible for their observations, so Wegener’s drifting continents was also crackpot science. Unfortunately, his collection of observations was also rejected as not requiring consideration or explanation. When the scientific establishment came across a surprisingly convincing observation, ocean spreading ridges, Plate Tectonics was developed to accommodate the drift of continents. Over 400 years ago, Galileo saw mountains on the Moon, spots on the Sun, handles on Saturn, and stars around Jupiter, at a time when these were known to be impossible nonsense. Alfred Wegener proposed that continents drifted through the oceanic crust, to explain the undeniable matching of the continental shelflines and geology. The meaning of his observations was denied for 50 years. Edwin Hubble showed that the spiral nebulae were outside of the Milky Way Galaxy, and therefore were vast Island Universes of stars, just like the Milky Way Galaxy, because Galileo had said the Milky Way was made of innumerable stars. Immanuel Velikovsky said that Venus was extremely hot and that Jupiter had a magnetic field, because Venus had been ejected from Jupiter just thousands of years ago. Pioneers and crackpots, missionaries and explorers. How can we separate the wheat from the chaff if we can’t tell them apart? Time proved Galileo to be mostly correct. We have had to reinterpret some of his words, but that was done so gently it is hardly noticed. His use of the telescope for direct observation of the heavens is the foundation of modern astronomy. Wegener had to propose a physically unrealistic process for Continental Drift, that the continental plates moved through the surface of the oceanic crust. His fundamental observations finally won acceptance, and it was decided that oceanic plates dived beneath the continental crust. Velikovsky built his ideas on religious writings and invented mechanisms that were thoroughly impossible to explain the observations. He may have seen some truths, but the fallacies of his explanations drew such vehement attacks, it was not acceptable to explore what he had found. Just as the mechanisms that were invented to explain the observations of Wegener and Velikovsky and others, such as Carey, Allan and Delair, and Van Flandern, were physically implausible, their work became crackpot science. Scientists tend to reject an observation if a reasonable explanation for its cause cannot be provided. “If we can’t imagine how it happens, it must not happen.” That is bad science, but it happens over and over. That puts great pressure on an observer to provide an explanation of the process. Often, the observations have great merit, but the forced explanation is so artificial that the entire story fails to convince. In this book I present a mechanism, the formation and action of natural nuclear fission reactors, that has been omitted from consideration in our exploration of the Universe, and I show that this mechanism can explain many existing observations better than our present stories. I hope that I have also shown that this mechanism is physically reasonable and plausible. Part of this voyage of discovery was a stumbling attempt to find out what had gone wrong in astronomy and cosmology, for we have certainly gone astray. Some of these paths have been clearer than others: remarkably, as I was struggling to prepare a decent sketch of the Milky Way Galaxy and the Solar System, for I am a poor artist, I found that one had already been done, by Cornelius Easton, in 1900. Other signposts and way-markers required more careful reading. Many of our most important astronomical explanations invoke monsters that have never been seen, and worse yet, can never be seen. In some of these cases, I can only act as a tour guide, pointing out where nuclear fission has had effect, and saying “Isn't that interesting, probably the result of ...” and leave the detailed exploration of the sidetrack as an exercise for the reader. Hopefully, someone who has greater resources to investigate these possibilities will become interested in exploring these suggestions. More detailed developments of the application of the fission process in explanations of observations are welcomed, sought, encouraged, and requested. The result of this research has been to produce a revised view of the Universe, and our place in it, that rather resembles a fisherman's net in terms of intellectual structure. It is a mixture of evidence for the effects of natural nuclear fission reactors and suggestions as to how these natural reactors explain various observations. Facts are connected and cross-connected in a

xx The Fourth Source

somewhat untidy manner at present, and that makes an orderly presentation difficult. The distinction between evidence and a suggestive explanation may at times be somewhat fuzzy. Turns must be taken and backtracks made in order to cover the territory fully. This voyage has been a search for patterns in the observations, searching for and trying to understand what causes underlie similarities and differences. The reader's patience in dealing with such an exploration is sincerely requested. But science itself is a net, with weak meshes and strong meshes holding the structure together. Sometimes these meshes get distorted, unknowingly disconnected from reality, but representing a reasonable consistency of their own. It should be clear from the start that this book is barely a beginning and that much more work still needs to be done. But it opens doors to a view of a new Universe, which you are welcome to visit and study; after all, you live here, too. Many details have been left as exercises for the reader. I hope that you will welcome the challenge. In science, we have to name something before we can understand it, but naming by itself does not guarantee understanding. “Quasars” and “gamma-ray bursters” are clear examples. These names describe the observations, but do not explain what the underlying objects are. This book will describe several objects from a new viewpoint, from an understanding of nuclear fission. I will try to give them names that provide a new understanding. The basic concept used in this research is that if the results of a process provide an explanation for observations, then the observations provide evidence for the existence of the process. Science appears to progress by a combination of the two opposing theories of science. Francis Bacon proposed that science observes and formulates a theory to explain the observations, while Karl Popper considers that science formulates a theory and observes to test the predictions. For example, we are assured of the existence of gravity, even though no specimen of gravity has ever been isolated, inspected, weighed, measured, or its color determined. It is observed that things fall to the ground, and gravity explains this, and how things fall to the ground, and more. The process of gravity is not perfectly understood, and current theories do not perfectly explain all the observations. Yet the principle of the process of gravity is deeply ingrained in our theories of the Universe. Its explanations are essential to our understanding of a multitude of observations. So too, for electromagnetism and nuclear fusion. This book presents evidence that nuclear fission must also be included with these other three sources in order to prepare a correct model of our Universe. There are several ways in which science uses knowledge to understand our world. We may know how something can happen, such as why icebergs float in the ocean: ice is less dense than water, and gravity forces the lighter to float on the heavier. We may know how something cannot happen, so that airline pilots never need keep watch for icebergs at 37,000 feet, even over the North Atlantic in the winter. Sometimes, however, we simply don’t know how something could happen, and presumptuously claim that therefore it can’t happen. If we don’t know how something cannot happen, we may at least be more open to the possibility that it could happen. Development of this book progressed by two considerations: 1. If nuclear-fission chain-reactions could cause a certain effect, have the consequences of that effect been observed,

and particularly, are they poorly explained at present? 2. If an observation is poorly explained at present, could it have been caused by the effects of nuclear-fission chain-

reactions? Some of what is presented here is clearly speculation. That speculation is intended to show directions in which good research should be able to make good observations, and either confirm or refute the proposed possibilities. Our existing paradigms, an expanding Universe, Plate Tectonics, stellar galaxies, gradual evolution, are so deeply embedded in our science that it may only be from some sweet accidents that the ideas in this book are recognized, proven, and accepted. This book reexamines several concepts in modern science that most of us, certainly this author, thought had been clearly settled long ago, if I was aware of them at all. I found that the settlement was often not that clear, and was determined more by the personal strength of ego of the participants than by factual reasoning. There are many things in our science that are well founded, well considered, and well settled. Those successes have led on to the remarkable success that science has shown in explaining most of our world. However, to insist that long-settled concepts should not be reexamined, as some critics will, is to pretend that science is thoroughly correct, at this moment at least. History proves this wrong. A mistake often made in scientific controversies, is to structure them as though they were debates in logic, with pre-established choices for conclusions, argued much as a flamboyant trial lawyer might, with victory won by the loudest voices. Specious arguments, apparently plausible but truly misleading, are built by changing words without changing meaning. For many of those involved in a scientific controversy, being right is important to their careers, assuring grants, tenure, and publication. For us, understanding our world is more important. Unfortunately, the either/or structure that most controversies must create, for the sake of identifying a “winner”, means that most of us, and science, lose. When any scientist wins or loses, science is the poorer, possibilities have been eliminated. An unfortunate aspect of many scientific controversies is that one side will specifically define the other side’s position, and then proceed, quite successfully, to demolish that self-defined position. This battle with a strawman is always gloriously won by the constructor of the strawman, who then claims that he has defeated the other idea’s champion. No prejudice is intended here. The tactic works both ways, for new and old, and is distressingly prevalent.

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There are many arguments in science, between scientists, few dialogues, and almost no joint explorations of differing ideas. Unfortunately, for us and for science, many scientific arguments are produced by strong opinions based on the firm support of personal attitudes. In the arguments (hardly a debate) between the Creationists and the Evolutionists, much effort has been spent on proving that the other side is wrong. Little effort is spent in attempting to extract an understanding of reality from what is known. Both sides distort the interpretations and explanations of the other, to discredit the foundation of the enemies’ understanding. This detracts from the integrity of the two groups and distracts from our efforts to understand our world. This work offers reconciliation between religion and science. Miraculous, catastrophic events have occurred, as told by many religions, that were caused by understandable processes, as studied by science. Re-united, these two ways of thought may help us to more completely understand our world, spiritual as well as physical. Perhaps religion was created by people at a time of crisis, to serve as a means for preserving their knowledge through a foreseeable disastrous time. Now, we see science as the finder of knowledge, becoming religious. Science has its defenders of the faith, who seem to feel that (nearly) all that can be known is already known, and that only they will find any new knowledge themselves. In other times, in other cultures, these intellectual protectors would have sought out the heretics and burned them at the stake. This is seen most often in conflicts between true believers and debunkers, both of whom seem to take their status as proof of their correctness. Attempting to find common agreement among the true believers and the debunkers is like trying to be comfortable with your feet in the fire and your seat in the snow. In fact, the positions and arguments of both sides become so extreme it is difficult to determine which side are the debunkers and which are the true believers. A shortcoming, sometimes a fatal flaw, of science is the need to make assumptions in the absence of knowledge. Often we simply do not know what we do not know. Usually the assumption is simply a continuation of what we think we know, either by observation or by theory, or by imagination. The folly is then that these assumptions become firmly embedded in our theory, our theory shapes our interpretations, our interpretations determine our observations, and what we assume becomes what we know. When an assumption, no matter how apparently secure, is used as a foundation for knowledge, the uncertainty and the potential for error must be recognized as an integral part of the assumption and everything derived from it. Science often must accept what has been decided in the past, to form a foundation for progress into further discoveries and understanding. We do not need to prove 2 + 2 = 4 over and over, when we balance our checkbooks. But because the foundation determines the shape of the growing structure, a false foundation leads us astray. Our foundations are always incomplete because they must constantly be rebuilt of new material. This book presents some new material for a sounder foundation. This book describes a world that is quite different in some respects from the world described over the last few centuries. It uses knowledge from the most recent 80 years, knowledge of the nuclear age that was unimaginable to the founders of our sciences. Like many voyages, this exploration will have a few side trips. These are excursions to consider topics that do not seem to relate directly to natural nuclear fission reactors, but seem to be essential parts of the story. There are two major side trips which we must take, to explore some complicated effects. Even though these effects do not seem to relate to nuclear fission, their consequences are so important they demand investigation. These are the expanding Universe (it isn’t), and the expanding Earth (it is). The standard view of these problems became locked into our science before enough was known for us to be aware of the possible alternatives. This book addresses the possibility that there are significant fundamental errors in our understanding of the Universe. These errors developed because of perceptions that were expressed long before our more complete knowledge of the details of the physical world. Theories of the Universe were cast in place before nuclear fission was known, before antimatter had been recognized, and were shaped by the attitudes of our ancestors. Specifically, it will be shown that our concept of the distance scale of the Universe is wrong because of a misunderstanding of the fundamental technique for measuring distances, Plate Tectonics is wrong because a fundamental fact in the formation of the Solar System was overlooked, and our understanding that the Sun is a star led to the misleading belief that all stars are suns. Specific cases provide evidence for these errors, when scientific judgment led our ideas astray. An incorrect estimate of a perturbing mass in the Solar System, based on the wrong mass for Pluto, led to the rejection of the perturbation analysis. Assumptions that some observations of Supernova 1987A in the Large Magellanic Cloud were meaningless and could be ignored prevented a fuller understanding of that event. Careless and prejudicial review of the measurements by van Maanen, showing physically real rotational motions in nearby spiral galaxies, justified rejection of those measurements. Cleaning out the errors will lead to a fuller understanding of the place where we live. In this new view of the Universe, there are no miracles, and no matters of faith must be invoked. This new Universe consists of the straightforward effects of well known processes, and no strange monsters are needed to explain our observations. In a cultural world of experts and specialists, I claim to be one only in the fields of nuclear fission, radioactivity, and radiation. This has come from my education, at Caltech, and my work experience, at Atomics International and Rocketdyne,

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for a while a combined division of Rockwell International Corporation, and later of The Boeing Company. I am a stranger to the other fields into which this research has intruded, and therefore a layman, as you readers are also in many of these fields. This work has benefited immeasurably from the cooperation and help that I received from many experts, even though my research led me away from accepted models. For this, I am deeply grateful. Perhaps, in these days, the only danger I may face, unlike Galileo and Giordano Bruno, is the annoyed rejection by colleagues who are unable to face a new Universe. It is not proper in science to tell everybody else that they're wrong. Most of this book does that. I worry only that this book will be seen as attacking problems that are not recognized with explanations that are not understood. At the risk of seeming melodramatic, I am comfortable with the words of the philosopher Immanuel Kant, in his “Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens,” (1755): “I have ventured, on the basis of a slight conjecture, to undertake a dangerous expedition; and already I discern the promontories of new lands. Those who will have the boldness to continue the investigation will occupy them, and may have the satisfaction of designating them by their own names.” [Crowe 1994] I also wish to express my appreciation specifically to G. Subbaraman, F. C. Dahl, R. T. Hammock (and Lydia, Zoey, and Ian), and T. E. Dix for assistance in completing this work, and to several technical libraries, especially those of the California State University, Northridge, and of Rocketdyne, for providing essential stores of knowledge, the raw material for this study. The SAO/NASA Astrophysical Data System Abstract Service was especially valuable in retrieving scientific publications through a long range of time. I must express my appreciation to the past and present editors (F. W. Walker, J. R. Parrington, and F. Feiner, and now E. M. Baum, H. D. Knox. and T. R. Miller) of the General Electric “Chart of the Nuclides,” for providing an invaluable road map to the nuclear world, and to Katharina Lodders and Bruce Fegley Jr. for doing the same with the Solar System. I wish to thank researchers around the world for their generous cooperation. I particularly appreciate the efforts of Gene Watson to keep my mind open to other people's new ideas. Valuable comments were provided along the way by Ray McGinnis, Don Erway, and Duane Doty. Original graphs were prepared using PSI-Plot from Poly Soft International, and ProbPlot from Rad Pro Calculator. The book was prepared in Microsoft WORD and most of the analytical interpretations were done with Microsoft EXCEL. The Internet and email service were essential aids. This research has made use of the NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database (NED) which is operated by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Reviews of the partially completed manuscript by Harry Pearlman, Earl Curtis, Carolyn Mallory, Gail Kennedy, and Arden Wray are greatly appreciated. This work benefited from the intellectual climate established by the people of Atomics International and Rocketdyne. Some of the ideas that I had thought were my own, and new, I found to have been preceded by the thoughts and work of Paul Kuroda, Robert Driscoll, and Marv Herndon. This book has some grim parts, and some hard parts, but mostly, it should be fun. Do we live at a special moment in time, a special place in space? The Copernican Principle says not, but for us personally and collectively, it must be special. Personally, this is the only time we have here. Collectively, humans did not exist more than a few million years ago, and Earth, now, is the only place we know of where we can live. What we see around us must be special, and rare, and will be different from what was before and will be hence. This is a special time and place, and we must learn from it, while we can. We are all more or less aware of our surroundings, our environment, our world. Awareness leads to observations, observations produce data. Data can yield information, and information gives us knowledge. With knowledge we can achieve understanding, and understanding is the foundation of wisdom. Our world seems to need some more wisdom, and we seem to be the only creatures capable of providing it. The Universe is far different from what we have thought, and far more fatally dangerous than we have imagined. As our knowledge and understanding grow, we are forced to become the caretakers of Life. I hope that what may at first be seen to be foolish misinterpretations of our established observations will be accepted as more nearly correct reinterpretations that will lead us to a clearer understanding of our world. Because this has been a very personal, almost solitary, exploration for me, I will write the book in the first person singular, almost as an expedition logbook. When we have finished this book’s voyage, we will still not know all that is right, but we will know less that is wrong. Sometimes, our knowledge grows to force us to leave behind our old world, and enter a new world. You are now entering the future, a new world newly known. Please embark on a voyage of discovery, with new eyes open to a new view of our Universe. I hope that you will enjoy the voyage. Moorpark, California January 22, 2012

1

I. FOUNDATIONS You have to learn a lot

to know a little. Charles de Secondat

There is no such thing as useless knowledge.

Virginia Trimble, 1996

Introduction It is expected that nearly everyone who chooses to read this book will be a layman in some or many of the fields that we need to explore. Because of this, I have tried to write for the non-specialist throughout. I hope that specialists will forgive my treatment of their fields in this manner, for the benefit of improved understanding of what I have written in fields in which they have no special knowledge. I have probably failed most in this attempt in my own fields, falling prey to the specialist's assumption that what is common knowledge is commonly known. There are some major obstacles to understanding that must be overcome before we begin our voyage. These obstacles are in the form of technical terminology and tools of the trade, that intrude and obscure the meaning of what has been discovered and understood. Much of this work deals with things that are nuclear, and that word is only slightly removed from unclear. It is hoped that this introduction to terms and tools will help to make this voyage of discovery easier. While the emphasis will be on the usage exercised in this book, some alternative forms will also be discussed, since independent review of the research literature by the reader will provide powerful confirmation of this discovery. There are times when we will struggle for a word, searching for the right word when there may be none. A helpful book for this purpose is “Planet Earth,” by Cesare Emiliani [Emiliani 1992]. It is about as long as this present book, and is a science book, and so forms a fine foundation for understanding what is to come. Perhaps most importantly for the spirit of this voyage (which is grim at times), Emiliani plays with our vast store of knowledge. Knowing about our world should be fun. He describes science as resting on three legs: facts, figures, and theories. To that trio must be added thought, for it is thought that links the other three and helps us to tell one from the other. (Truly, that is a recurring theme in Emiliani's book.) The reference list includes both technical literature and writings intended for the general public, often with some duplication. This was done to promote accessibility to all, and particularly across the compartmental walls of specialized science. Excellent articles and books exist for the generalist, and the authors of those pieces have worked hard to make the matters understandable to those readers without the specialist's knowledge of the field. (An unfortunate accident of this present work being done by someone somewhat outside the research establishment is that many of the references are to secondary sources, and so only indirectly credit the individuals responsible for the research. For those unintended slights, I apologize in advance.) Sometimes, even often, this independent review will require the reader to develop an independent conclusion, different from that provided by the researcher, an alternative interpretation of the meaning of the observations. This same approach should be applied to this book, as well.

Consistency, Errors, Corrections, and Contradiction Science is a continuing effort to achieve consistency of our models and theories with the reality of the Universe, and often with very small and limited parts of it. We attempt to achieve this by identifying errors, correcting them, and avoiding contradiction. An important measure of our success is self-consistency: are the models and theories consistent with each other? It is difficult to imagine contradictory theories that are both consistent with a single reality. (General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics may be excellent examples of this problem; they cannot agree.) Astronomy has a rich history of developing theories that have been self-consistent, and even consistent with observations, as a result of careful theoretical work. But these were not valid representations of reality. However, each new theory brought us closer, in some ways, to the truth. In some cases, it will be found that the observations are generously consistent with more than one model, and the value of consistency in recognizing reality vanishes. Consistency is an important test, but can be a dangerous trap that predetermines the outcome of analytical thought. The exercise of consistency and its ready appearance can hide errors. Observations that don’t match our expectations often carry the grim label “discrepancy.” Initially, such a disagreeable measurement provides the observer with considerable personal trauma: observations are supposed to be better than before, not different! Indeed, a discrepancy may be the result of poor technique, instrument malfunction, or any of many other artifacts that may be identified and corrected, often to the observer’s embarrassment and dismay.

2 The Fourth Source

However, many unresolved discrepancies survive, some to become part of our history, others to be dismissed, hidden, and forgotten. These small problems slip from our consciousness, surviving only in the ever-older, out-of-date literature, ignored. Centuries ago, discrepancies in the observed positions of the five known Solar System planets (other than Earth) led to the invention of orbital epicycles. In time, more, and more complicated, epicycles were required for the elimination of the observational discrepancies, until finally it became clear that a drastically different model of the Solar System could be applied. The Sun is at the center! Unresolved discrepancies are Nature’s way of saying, “You just don’t understand me.” Now, in our current astronomy, the Sun has lost its place at the center of the Universe, but discrepancies persist. Where is the missing mass? What is the Dark Matter? Where is the heat? Discrepancies in the orbital positions of Uranus led to the discovery of Neptune [Burgess 1991, Moore 1995], and then Pluto [Asimov 1991, Reeves 1997, Stern and Mitton 1998]. Small, uncertain discrepancies in the orbital positions of Uranus and Neptune suggest other discoveries [Littman 1988, Watters 1995], but, as the discrepancies appear to fade with time, our interest fades, and the opportunity may be lost [Standish Jr. 1993, Quinlan 1993]. Perhaps we just don’t understand. Least Squares, Myles Standish’s method of analysis, smears the residuals over the orbit, and makes the perturbations average out. Least Squares gives the best result for the chosen model, but does not prove that the chosen model is correct. Discrepancies in the precession of Mercury’s orbit led to a confirmation of Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity. Few similar opportunities have been found, but the observations of two pairs of binary stars, DI Herculis and AS Camelopardalis, contradict this proof [Naeye 1995]. Is our theory wrong? Perhaps not, even the conventional prediction fails for DI Herculis. We may be applying the theory improperly. In the theory of the expanding Universe, the Hubble Constant has so far been found to be far from constant [Trimble 1996]. Different measurements, as good or as bad as they may be, give different results. The results conflict with other results, and the Universe seems to be younger than its oldest stars. With great effort, this discrepancy seems to have been conquered. Is our theory wrong? Perhaps, but at present, most efforts are directed toward reducing or eliminating the discrepancies. This is a one-sided approach that risks hiding the truth. The best observed star, our Sun, continues to present discrepancies. Why do we not observe enough neutrinos, where did all the angular momentum go, how did it lose so much of its lithium, why doesn’t it have enough beryllium? Is our theory wrong? Perhaps, perhaps not. We might just have our assumptions wrong. SN 1987A, the best-observed supernova yet, produced a glorious collection of discrepancies [Goldsmith 1990, Marschall 1988, Murdin 1990, Woosley and Weaver 1989, Keishner 1988]. A neutron star/pulsar was expected [Lindley 1988], found and lost [Kristian et al. 1989], and rejected [Anderson 1990]. Some of these have been authoritatively dismissed as having no significance or reality, because we don’t understand them [Bahcall 1989; Mann 1997; Cumming and Meikle 1993]. That misses the point. A discrepancy cries out for attention, because we don’t understand it. A discrepancy that survives easy resolution should be treasured, protected from arbitrary dismissal. These are the clues that lead to a new understanding of our world. Nature is saying: “Pay attention. You just don’t understand me.”

Numbers Since our discussions must range from the submicroscopic to the cosmological, and consider the energy of a single electron and that of stars, we need a way to manage the numbers that represent values that cover an extreme range. For that purpose, so-called scientific notation will be used whenever normal numbers do not easily cover the span. This uses a number followed by a multiplying factor of 10 raised to a numerical power. The power explains how many places to move the decimal point, and the sign, positive (usually omitted) or negative, shows in which direction. In most cases in this book this format will be used where it will be clear that a positive (or unsigned power) will be associated with a very large number, while a negative power will represent a very small number. As an example, the average distance from the Earth to the Sun can be represented by these values: 1 Astronomical Unit or 149,597,900,000.0 meters or 1.495979 x 1011 meters. Since scientific notation also allows us to present numbers without using more digits than required for the purpose, or reflected by the accuracy with which the value is known or exists, this distance might be represented approximately by 1.5 x 1011 meters. Towards the other end of the scale, we could consider the wavelength of green light as 0.00000556 meters or 5.56 x 10-7 meters However, to make a rule, break a rule, so wavelengths of visible light will usually be seen as nanometers, 556 nanometers for green light, or with the historical unit, the angstrom, 5,560 angstroms in this case.

I. FOUNDATIONS 3

Units will be used that are natural to the field being explored, with some additional clarification for particularly obscure situations. In most cases, these will be the metric units (“SI” for Systeme Internationale) consisting of the kilogram for mass, meter for length, the familiar second for time, with metric fractional units for short times and metric multiples of the year for long times. Usually, long time-spans will be so long and vague that the refinement of what kind of year is meant, calendar or mean or leap or Solar or sidereal, will be irrelevant and will be ignored. In some cases, ordinary English (American English, here) has special names for large numbers. These are, 1,000 thousand 103 1,000,000 million 106 1,000,000,000 billion 109 1,000,000,000,000 trillion 1012 1,000,000,000,000,000 quadrillion 1015 For simplicity and familiarity, I’ll use these named numbers whenever suitable.

Mass and Energy A bewildering variety of units have been developed to describe quantities of mass and energy. Because different units are natural to the particular uses and are so widely used in the technical literature, we will use several different units here. The reference unit for mass is the kilogram, equal to about 2.2 pounds. The gram is one-thousandth of the kilogram, and is roughly one-thirtieth of an ounce. The atomic mass unit is approximately the mass of a proton or a neutron, and is 1.66 x 10-27 kilograms. (A very small mass.) The reference unit for energy is the joule, representing the energy released at a rate (power) of 1 watt for 1 second, and therefore the joule is 1 watt-second of energy. This is similar in concept to the unit used for billing electrical service, the kilowatt-hour. A kilowatt-hour is the energy released at a rate of 1,000 watts for 1 hour, or 3,600 seconds. Thus, a kilowatt-hour is 3,600,000 watt-seconds (or joules) or 3.6 x 106 joules. One of the great accomplishments of Albert Einstein was the establishment of the equivalence of mass and energy. His truly famous equation states: E = mc2 The energy content of matter is equal to the mass times the square of the speed of light. This lets us calculate how much energy would be released if a certain amount of mass were destroyed, actually, converted into energy, since the energy can also be converted into matter. 1 kilogram = 3.5 x 1042 joules 1 atomic mass unit = 931 million electronvolts The energy content of light varies with the frequency or wavelength of the light, so that light with higher frequency (shorter wavelength) has more energy. Light comes individually packaged as photons, and 1 photon of blue light (wavelength of 450 nanometers, frequency of 6.66 x 1014 cycles per second, or hertz) = 2.76 electronvolts 1 photon of red light (wavelength of 700 nanometers, frequency of 4.28 x 1014 cycles per second, or hertz) = 1.77 electronvolts Notice that the unit of energy for a photon of light (electronvolt) is a million times smaller than that used for an atomic particle (million electronvolts). The unit for frequency, the hertz, is just the same sort as is used for radio broadcasting as the kilohertz or the megahertz. Red light has a longer wavelength (and lower frequency) than blue light, and this extends throughout the range of light, or electromagnetic radiation. Higher energy X-rays and gamma rays have shorter wavelengths (and higher frequencies) than do the colors of visible light, and visible light has shorter wavelengths (and higher frequencies) than does infrared light, microwaves, and radio waves. The long-wavelength end of the spectrum is always termed “redder” even when it is far beyond red, and the short-wavelength end is “bluer”, even though it may be far past blue. Otherwise, all electromagnetic radiation is the same, regardless of its energy or name. Its interactions with matter will be greatly affected by its energy. In the nuclear world, a unit derived in the early days of research, the electronvolt, is the supreme unit. It is equal to 1.6 x 10-19 joules. We will tend to use the metric multiples of the kilo-electron-volt (1,000 electronvolts, keV) and the mega-electron-volt (1,000,000 electronvolts, MeV). Energy can be related to temperature in many cases, usually in the absolute or kelvin scale, as the cold of space (3 kelvin, or simply 3 K) and the heat of the Sun (5,600 kelvin). Standard body temperature is 310 kelvin, water normally freezes at 273 kelvin and boils at 373 kelvin. Cerenkov radiation is a special form of light produced by high-energy electrons, traveling faster than the speed of light in a transparent medium. This radiation is completely independent of temperature. Plasma Cerenkov radiation is a low energy (radio-wave) radiation produced by electrons in a plasma [Cohen 1961], such as the cloud of protons and electrons that would exist around a nuclear fission detonation. The spectrum is roughly opposite that of the optical Cerenkov effect,