Dec 26 2006
|
|
After The Martian Apocalypse (review)
Two and a half years after it was published, I have just finished reading Mac Tonnies’ book.
Yes, I know him, and I wouldn’t have published a review unless I actually liked it, but not only do I like it, I think it’s one of the best examples of the “new” sort of thinking on anomalies that is the hallmark of good fortean, nay skeptical writing. Tonnies drops all predetermined opinions about Mars, and asks us to do the same.
Skepticism, according to one Wikipedia definition is “an attitude of doubt or a disposition to incredulity either in general or toward a particular object.” This indicates that when examining an issue (in this case the supposed artificial geoforms observed by our Mars probes) the researcher neither buys into the hype created by pundits like Richard Hoagland, nor the smug denunciations of debunkers.
Tonnies begins his examination (as indeed he must) with a tour of the enigmatic Cydonian “face.” NASA unintentionally created a furor when it released its first photo of the enigma, imaged in 1976 by the Viking orbiter. When it was re-photographed in 2001 (for the most part to mollify the cries of “coverup”) most of those who were still on the fence decided that yes, the face effect was a trick of the light on a natural formation. Tonnies takes a closer look and reports the discovery of an uncannily precise “eye” structure exactly where one would expect to find it by a member of the Society For Planetary SETI Research (SPSR). “Ironically enough,” he writes, “official reticence to deal with the Face objectively might have more than a little to do with the disquieting possibility that it might be real.”
But this is not the end. The Cydonia plain is home to a host of other strange landforms that defy ordinary assumptions of what geology and erosion can accomplish. Other features, such as an enigmatic “fort,” numerous pentagonal “pyramids,” and the “Cydonia Hilton,” (a sizable collection of rectilinear forms) are concentrated in one area of the planet unlike any other. If these features were spread randomly across the surface of Mars, fundamentalist skeptics might be forgiven their rallying cries of “coincidence” or criticism of belief in the reality of mere simulacra.
One telling result of the effect of this book is the disdain that it has engendered in supporters of Richard Hoagland. In response to one of Tonnies’ careful online analyses, he was surprised to find an email comment which read something like, “Go back to the sandbox and let the adults get on with the real work.”
Probably the best chapter in the book, and perhaps its most enduring, is entitled “Memespace.” A meme is an infectious idea that catches on in popular consciousness and spreads like a virus. Tonnies mixes and matches ideas about the anomalies of Mars and examines how these have affected popular beliefs, and more importantly, each other. With a deft overview much akin to that of Keith Thompson in Angels And Aliens, Tonnies looks at the memes given birth by NASA, Hoagland, CSICOP, and SPSR and how they have battled each other for legitimacy. A “good” meme appears legitimate, and may actually be correct, but it also catches on in the popular imagination at a basic, almost subconscious level. Most of the time, it also speaks to the way we want things to be. This doesn’t automatically make it factually wrong, but in the world of fringe ideas vying for attention, it gives the meme a fighting chance. Hoagland’s Enterprise Mission is presented as one of the best meme generators in the field. Others, like CSICOP, who stated in Skeptical Inquirer that all Face believers thought that the Face was the work of time travelers from the future, are held up as examples of unskilled meme creators, due to both the meme’s ridiculous nature, and its de-evolutionary attitude. (Apparently this “fact” was simply made up by the CSICOP writer.)
If we assume the reality of the Martian monuments, Tonnies speculates, we can also take a few educated guesses about why the Martians became extinct. He proposes (among other scenarios) a planetary emergency that dried up all the liquid water and forced the population underground while they were still building their megaliths. There, they waited for the slow death of their planet while planning for their legacy. Perhaps the Face and the other structures were built specifically as a signal to any spacefaring races who could get close enough to see the features. This “Martian Apocalypse” may be a warning to Earth.
The fact that no one on either side of the Mars anomalies debate has come out in support of Tonnies’ book or website is the best evidence that he is onto something. I do the book a disservice by discussing only a minute part of an eloquent overview. Taken as a whole, After The Martian Apocalypse arranges the issues on a playing field that is almost perfectly level. Perhaps the only complaint I have about the book is the lack of more photos and illustrations that are referenced the text. This may have had more to do with editorial and copyright decisions than anything else.
Tonnies is now poised to turn the Ufological world on its ear with the forthcoming publication of his book on the Cryptoterrestrial hypothesis. I predict that it will have the impact of John Keel’s Operation Trojan Horse, but that this will not be recognized by the community at large until some of the doctrinaire old-timers are gone.
This entry was posted
on Tuesday, December 26th, 2006 at 2:03 am and is filed under Books, Breaking News, Reviews, Wake Up Down There. You can follow responses via RSS 2.0 feed.
You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is not allowed.
del.icio.us Digg Reddit BlinkList Google Ma.gnolia StumbleUpon Technorati Yahoo! Help
- Related News Stories:
- Next Step For Private Spaceflight »
- Mac Tonnies On Coast To Coast AM »
- Flying Saucer Music #30 »
- Martian or Rock? »
- Mac Tonnies on Radio Misterioso Sunday »
- LAPIS - A Review »
- Cosmic Controversies »
- Fortean Times Review »
- Mac, UFOs & More »
- Flying Saucer Music #12 »
|
December 26th, 2006 at 6:59 am
Greg
Great post.
December 26th, 2006 at 9:45 am
Greg:
Indeed - well said.
Paul
December 26th, 2006 at 1:29 pm
Thank you. I’m always worried about what I write, and how it communicates what I’m actually thinking. On this site, I haven’t always been adhering to the “one day rule” which is my method of assuring that things make sense. What I’ll do is finish a piece and leave it alone for at least a day before going back to editing. On the re-read, many’s the time I’ve wondered what the hell I was thinking!
December 27th, 2006 at 8:09 pm
That is a great post and now I very much want to get this book. The Mars Cydonia / viking probe thing has been near and dear to my heart since I was a young UFOlogist with my first Junior MUFON investigator card. (Insert joke here) Actually all kidding aside, as entertaining as Hoaglands video was it was nothing compared to the brief statement Prof McDaniel of Sonoma State University in California that he put out in 1992 after that multidisciplinary committee looked into it. “the anomalies may not be natural.” That sliver of doubt opened up tomes of new writing and some really fascinating thought. Alot of it may be pure rubbish of course.
Nothing quite shocked me as much as listening to evangelical christian Chuck Missler at a prophecy conference. He went into a lenghty review of Cydonia, the angular shapes found within the anomolies, the correlations to Earth’s ancient artifacts and then went on to say that Earth shared a common orbit with Mars at one time. He also said “the Shepherd Kings” who built the pyramids may have also built the Cydonia site. He talked about a time when Mars was so intense in the night sky it had the same apparent magnitude and diameter as the moon. Supposedly when Mars appeared like this great geological upheaval would occur on the Earth. See the theories of Immanuel Velikovshy and his “Catestrophic History.” further claims were that Mars changed orbit when Venus was forcibly ejected from Jupiters core and that this event correlated to the biblical flood account and the creation of Earths moon. The next theory that Missler got into is something that I think has some merit, it has to do with the Genesis account, chapter six specifically, and these strange guys called Nephillim or “mighty men of old.” He said that the greys of the UFO lore were in fact nephillim, human angel hybrids. Not a bad theory! Who am I to say that he is wrong? I think Missler is a very bright guy but I wonder about his methods… Anyways church had never been so interesting and when that Russian probe got destroyed that made things even more fascinating.
My guess is that we will never know the TRUTH about Cydonia (natural or engineered) until we put “boots on the ground”
December 30th, 2006 at 1:25 am
Dingodog,
It’s almost predictable what Fundamentalist Christians will say about any given subject, but this one takes it to the next level. Your post tells me that you would really like Mac’s book, as he comes to the same conclusion about “boots on the ground.”
Of course, anything they find will be covered up as well!
January 3rd, 2007 at 8:28 pm
If you are referring to “they” as NASA then you are correct. We wont find out much. But the recent advances in private space flight give me hope that the lumbering NASA wont be the first to get there.