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Ancient Statue Found in Albania 8-27-02 BUTRINTI, Albania Aug. 27 � Archaeologists excavating a part of the ancient town of Butrinti found what they said may be a 2,000-year-old statue of the Roman goddess Minerva. The statue is the first major find since the site, 180 miles south of the capital of Tirana, was opened to researchers nearly 75 years ago. It was found last weekend. "We have no other sculpture so big and powerful as this," said chief archaeologist Dhimiter Condi, happily embracing the statue for photographers Tuesday. Condi said he believed the statue is Minerva because of a Latin inscription on a marble slab found near the statue 10 years ago. Others were skeptical that the statue depicts Minerva, the Roman goddess of war and wisdom. "It's definitely a male figure, and it looks like it is a statue that is being remade out of an earlier, larger statue," said Sally Martin of the Institute of World Archaeology in London. Martin said the group is awaiting official confirmation from an archaeologist of the statue's identity. Auron Tare, manager of Butrinti National Park, called the discovery a combination of painstaking research and pure luck. Debate rages over biblical mystery 8-27-02 An archaeological site in southern Israel is at the centre of an ongoing debate over whether it could be the last resting place of biblical prophet John the Baptist. The BBC's Ari Ben Goldberg examines both sides of the argument. The ancients called the Dead Sea, with its great sulphur deposits, "Hayam Hamasriach" - the Stinking Sea. These days, it is hard to distinguish the smell of sulphur from the rotten stench of claims, counter-claims and accusations emanating from the nearby site of Qumran, where the Dead Sea scrolls were found a century ago. For the past two years, almost $1m of equipment has been deployed alongside dozens of researchers and volunteers in Qumran, on the northwest shore of the Dead Sea, 13 kilometres east of Jerusalem. Despite claims that among other things the bones of John the Baptist - or Jesus' brother James the Just - have been found, only one thing is clear - nothing has been proven for certain. The only thing that can be said with certainty is what many people already know - the world of biblical archaeology is a complete mystery to outsiders. The latest controversy revolves around what is called "T (Tomb) 1000", a seemingly ordinary clump of dirt located just outside the perimeter of Qumran's ancient cemetery. Most scholars believe the Qumranites to have been Essenes - a Jewish sect which broke away from the Jerusalem establishment and thrived between the 2nd Century BC and the 2nd Century AD. The Essenes followed a mystical interpretation of the ancient scriptures, and were especially strict about laws of ritual purity. They are believed to have been the authors and compilers of the Dead Sea scrolls. The apocalyptic themes and mysticism in the scrolls along with their date from the time of Jesus suggests the Essenes may have been a link between Judaism and Christianity. For years archaeologists ignored T-1000. They believed to be just a mound of earth outside the cemetery. But this summer, scientists subjected the area to a survey using Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR). Professor Harry Jol, a geomorphologist from the University of Wisconsin at Eau Claire, found that there were unnatural disturbances below the surface and recommended an excavation. At least one scholar believes they have found the grave of the leader of the Qumran sect, whom the Dead Sea scrolls call the "Teacher of Righteousness". "We have an unprecedented structure in the middle of 1,212 other graves," said Professor Richard Freund, coordinator of the Qumran digs in 2001 and 2002. "Since it's the biggest structure around, and since we know it's from the 1st Century, it's not a big leap to assume it's the tomb of the Qumranites' leader," he added. As for the suggestion that the remains are those of John the Baptist, Mr Freund said that some scholars have identified John as an active leader of the Essenes. But he cautioned that evidence that the site is John the Baptist's grave is circumstantial. Robot seeks answer to pyramid mystery 8-27-02 A MYSTERIOUS passage in the Great Pyramid at Giza will be explored by a robot next month in an attempt to unravel one of the final secrets of the last remaining wonder of the Ancient World. The Pyramid Rover will be sent to find out what lies beyond a blocked, 8in-square shaft that has puzzled researchers since its discovery in 1872. The custom-built machine will climb 210ft along the channel, which leads upwards from an unusued and apparently unfinished room known as the Queen�s Chamber, until it reaches a stone plug with two copper handles which ended a previous attempt to chart the passage a decade ago. On arrival, it will use the world�s smallest ground-penetrating radar antenna to look beyond the blockage for the first time since the pyramid, built to house the remains of the Pharaoh Cheops, or Khufu, was completed about 4,500 years ago. If the radar reveals a structure of interest behind the seal, such as a third great chamber, Pyramid Rover will pass a fibre-optic camera through cracks to capture the first pictures. The entire procedure, which is headed by Zahi Hawass, director of Egypt�s Supreme Council of Antiquities, and Mark Lehner, director of the Giza Plateau Mapping Project, will be screened live on the National Geographic Channel, starting at 1am on Tuesday, September 17. It will be repeated at 7pm that night. The Pyramid of Khufu contains two great rooms: the King�s Chamber, holding Khufu�s tomb, and the Queen�s Chamber, which is smaller and directly below it and which, despite its name, was probably not meant for his wife. It is unique not only for its size, but also because it was built with two small shafts running diagonally upwards from the two chambers. The shafts running from the north and south wall of the Queen�s Chamber are especially curious because they are blocked at each end. There are many theories as to their purpose. It seems unlikely that they were for air or water, being blocked at both ends. Some experts believe that they are �star shafts� pointing to Sirius and the constellation Orion: it is widely thought that the layout of the three pyramids at Giza mimics the stars in Orion�s belt. Another explanation is that they are �soul shafts�, built to allow a soul to escape to heaven. Again, however, the passages are blocked, and archaeologists do not think that the Queen�s Chamber ever held a tomb. One popular theory is that the room was originally designed for Khufu before it was decided to build a larger chamber for the pharaoh and abandon the lower room. Some experts even believe that the southern shaft, the longer of the two, leads to a third, undiscovered chamber. It ends 54ft from the outer face, leaving ample space for a room, and the seal is made of Tura limestone, a rock found only in the central chambers. Kate Spence, of the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research at Cambridge University, said that Pyramid Rover�s mission ought to shed important new light on the mystery, even if all it does is to debunk some of the most outlandish theories. �Opinion is very divided as to what the shafts are for,� she said. �It�s the only pyramid that has this sort of shaft so we have nothing to go on in terms of comparison. The huge question is why they are blocked. It is incredibly difficult to say. �My own expectation is that there won�t be anything behind the blockage, but we just don�t know. It�s possible they just stopped building, but if that�s the case, why did they plug it so elaborately? �The great thing is that whatever they find, even if they find there�s nothing there, that�s absolutely fascinating. You can�t lose. It�s going to be interesting whether there�s nothing there or a chamber full of treasure and statues.� Shedding new light on lightAustralian scientists are proposing that Albert Einstein's theories may not be as enlightened as first thought.A team of Australian scientists has proposed the speed of light may not be a constant, a revolutionary idea that could unseat one of the most cherished laws of modern physics - Einstein's theory of relativity. The team, led by theoretical physicist Paul Davies of Sydney's Macquarie University, say it is possible that the speed of light has slowed over billions of years. If so, physicists will have to rethink many of their basic ideas about the laws of the universe. "That means giving up the theory of relativity and E=MC2 and all that sort of stuff," Mr Davies said. "But of course it doesn't mean we just throw the books in the bin, because it's in the nature of scientific revolution that the old theories become incorporated in the new ones." Mr Davies, and astrophysicists Tamara Davis and Charles Lineweaver from the University of New South Wales (UNSW), published the proposal in a scientific journal. The suggestion that the speed of light can change is based on data collected by UNSW astronomer John Webb. He posed a conundrum when he found light from a distant quasar, a star-like object, had absorbed the wrong type of photons from interstellar clouds on its 12 billion-year journey to earth. Mr Davies says fundamentally Mr Webb's observations mean the structure of atoms emitting quasar light is slightly but ever so significantly different to the structure of atoms in humans. The discrepancy could only be explained if either the electron charge, or the speed of light, had changed. The Mysterious Voynich Manuscript 8-27-02 Astronomy Picture of the Day : The ancient text has no known title, no known author, and is written in no known language: what does it say and why does it have many astronomy illustrations? 'Meteorite' hits girl 8-27-02 The odds against being hit by a meteorite are billions to one - but a teenager in North Yorkshire may have had one land on her foot. Siobhan Cowton, 14, was getting into the family car outside her Northallerton home at 1030 BST on Thursday when a stone fell on her from the sky. Noticing it was "quite hot", she showed it to her father Niel. The family now plan to have the stone analysed by scientists at Durham University. "I saw it fall from above roof height," Siobhan told BBC News Online. "It looked very unusual, with a bubbled surface and tiny indentations like volcanic lava. "It was shiny on one side and looked rusty as if it contained iron. "I've seen shooting stars before - but nothing like this. This does not happen very often in Northallerton." Mr Cowton, 45, told BBC News Online he would take the stone to be analysed himself. "After all it is not every day you get hit by a meteorite. "The odds of winning the Lottery are better." The stone could have come from Mars, according to expert on Earth impacts Dr Benny Peiser, of Liverpool John Moores University. "It could be billions of years old and come from the earliest formation of the solar system," he told the Daily Mail newspaper. Most meteors are between five and 60 centimetres (1.95 in and 1 ft 11.5 in) long, according to Durham University physical geography lecturer Dr Ben Horton. <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance�not soap-boxing�please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'�with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds�is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. 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