PART SEVEN
by Immanuel Velikovsky
In 1950 - as it is still largely today - it was generally accepted that the theory of uniformity must be true and that no process which is unobservable in our time could have occurred in the past. It was also believed that celestial bodies, the Earth included, travel serenely on their orbits in the void of space for countless eons. In Worlds in Collision (1950), however, I offered these theses: '( 1) there were physical upheavals of a global character in historical time; (2) these catastrophes were caused by extraterrestrial agents; and (3) these agents can be identified' (from the Preface). These claims were termed a 'most amazing example of a shattering of accepted concepts on record' (Payne-Gaposchkin).
The consequences of the theory affected almost all natural sciences and many social disciplines. Especially objectionable was the assertion that events of such magnitude took place in historical times.
Worlds in Collision describes two (last) series of cataclysmic events that occurred 34 and 27 centuries ago. Not only the Earth, but also Venus, Mars, and the Moon were involved in near encounters, when the Morning Star, then on a stretched elliptical orbit following its eruption from the giant planet Jupiter, caused turmoil among the members of the solar system before settling on its present orbit.
The description was derived from literary references in the writings of ancient peoples of the world. The archaeological, geological, and paleontological evidence for the theory was collected and presented separately in Earth in Upheaval (1955). In order to explain how certain phenomena could have taken place - how, for instance, Venus, a newcomer, could obtain a circular orbit, or the Earth turn over on its axis - the theory envisaged a charged state of the sun, planets, and comets, and extended magnetic fields permeating the solar system. This appeared even more objectionable since celestial mechanics had been solidly erected on the notion of gravitation, inertia and pressure of light as the only forces acting in the void, the celestial bodies being electrically and magnetically sterile in their inter-relations. Worlds in Collision, in its Preface, was acknowledged as heresy in fields where the names Newton and Darwin are supreme.
The only quantitative attempt to disprove one of my main theses was made by D. Menzel of Harvard College Observatory (1952) [1] . He showed (' if Velikovsky wants quantitative discussion, let us give him one'), on certain assumptions, that were I right the sun would need to hold a potential of 10 to the 19th power volts; but, he calculated that the sun, if positive, could hold only 1800 volts, and, if negative, it follows from the equation, no more than a single volt.
In 1960-61, V. A. Bailey calculated that to account for the data obtained in space probes (Pioneer V) the sun must possess a net negative charge with the potential of the order of 1019 volts [2] .
In 1953 Menzel wrote: 'Indeed, the total number of electrons that could escape the sun would be able to run a one cell flashlight for less than one minute. ' [3] My affirmation of electromagnetic interactions in the solar system became less objectionable with the discovery of the solar wind and of magnetic fields permeating the solar system.
My thesis that changes in the duration of the day had been caused in the past by electromagnetic interactions was rejected in 1950-51 [4] . In February 1960, A. Danjon, Director, Paris Observatory, reported to l'Académie des Sciences that following a strong solar flare the length of the day suddenly increased by 0.85 millisecond. Thereafter the day began to decrease by 3.7 microseconds every 24 hours [5] . He ascribed the fluctuation in the length of the day to an electromagnetic cause connected with the flare. His announcement 'created a sensation among the delegates to the General Assembly of the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics' that year in Helsinki [5] .
V. Bargmann of Princeton University and L. Motz of Columbia University claimed for me the priority of predicting radio-noises from Jupiter, the existence of a magnetosphere around the earth, and the high ground temperature of Venus [6] . They stressed also that these discoveries later came as great surprises, though I have insisted in my published works, in my lectures, and in my letters that these physical conditions are directly deducible from my theory.
These claims were not made casually or in a veiled form. Some of my arguments for Jupiter sending out radio-noises can be learned from my correspondence with A. Einstein. I could add that if the solar system as a whole is close to neutrality, and the planets possess charges of opposite sign to that of the sun, Jupiter must have the largest charge among the planets. Rotating quickly the charged planet creates an intense magnetosphere.
In the last chapter of W. in C. (' The Thermal Balance of Venus') I insisted that ' Venus is hot' and 'gives off heat' as a consequence of its recent origin and stormy history before settling on its orbit. In 1954, R. Barker suggested that a layer of ice on the night side of Venus is responsible for the ashen light [7] . It is more probably a visible sign of incandescence. When in 1961 the temperature of Venus was found to be ca. 600 deg K, it was admitted that neither radioactivity nor greenhouse effect suffices to explain why Venus is so hot.
Several of the sensors of Mariner II were beyond their capacity to report temperatures before the nearest point to Venus was reached, 'because temperatures beyond their designed scale were encountered, ' as reported by C. W. Snyder to the meeting of the American Geophysical Union, December 28, 1962 [8] . On December 15, 1962, a day after Mariner II passed the point of closest approach, the 'temperature had inexplicably started to drop' [9] .
It is interesting also to know why the temperature of the upper cloud layer of Venus measured in the 1920's by Pettit and Nicholson (-33 deg C for the dark side, -38 deg C for the bright side) [10] was found in the 1950's by Stinton and Strong to be a few degrees lower (ca. -40 deg C for both sides) [11] . Could it be that Venus cools off at this rate ? It would point, too, to its youth as a celestial body.
In 1950 the critics of W. in C. emphatically objected to the notion that Venus is a young Planet or that it erupted from Jupiter.
R. A. Lyttleton (1959-60) showed why the terrestrial planets, Venus included, must have originated from the giant planets, notably Jupiter, by disruption [12] . W. H. McCrea (1960) calculated that no planet could have originated by aggregation inside the Jovian orbit [13] .
R. M. Goldstein and R. L. Carpenter reported to the meeting of the American Geophysical Union at Palo Alto, the last week of December 1962, that radar probes from Goldstone Tracking Station between October 1 and December 17, 1962, confirmed earlier indications that Venus rotates very slowly and retrogradely. According to the press, this led to the following surmises: 'Maybe Venus was created apart from other planets, perhaps as a second solar explosion, or perhaps in a collision of planets. ' [14] To this, compare W. in C., p. 373: 'The collision between major planets... brought about the birth of comets. These comets moved across the orbits of other planets and collided with them. At least one of the comets in historical times became a planet - Venus, and this at the cost of great destruction on Mars and on the earth. '
In the section 'The Gases of Venus' in W. in C. (1950), I concluded that Venus must be rich in hydrocarbons. This theory was termed 'surprising' (H. Shapley, 1946) when, a few years in advance of the publication of my book, I requested that Harvard College Observatory make a spectral search for hydrocarbons in Venus's atmosphere [15] . In 1955, Fred Hoyle proposes, on theoretical grounds, that Venus is covered by oceans of oil and that its atmosphere is clouded by hydrocarbon droplets [16] . I, however, wrote: '... as long as Venus is too hot for the liquefaction of petroleum, the hydrocarbons will circulate in gaseous form. ' (W. in C., p. 169).
The extraterrestrial origin claimed in my book for at least part of the petroleum deposits, notably those of the Mexican Gulf area, was scorned (C. R. Longwell, 1950) [17] , and it was asserted that petroleum is never found in recent sediments (J. B. Patton, 1950). [18] However, soon thereafter, P. V. Smith (1952) [19] reported the 'surprising' fact that the oil of the Gulf of Mexico is found in recent sediment and must have been deposited during the last 9,200 plus or minus 1,000 years.
Hydrocarbons were subsequently found on meteorites, a fact termed by H. H. Nininger (1959) [20] also 'surprising': 'These resemble in many ways some of the waxes and petroleum products that are found on the earth. ' Several months ago, A. T. Wilson (1962) [21] postulated an extraterrestrial origin of the entire terrestrial deposit of oil. In W. in C. (p. 55), presence of hydrocarbons on meteorites was anticipated. The experiment in which high molecular weight hydrocarbons were compounded from ammonia and methane with electrical discharges (Wilson, 1960) [22] supports the view that the planet Jupiter (rich in ammonia and methane) was the source of the hydrocarbons on Venus, on meteorites, and in some of the earth's deposits (W. in C., 'The Gases of Venus').
My contention that Mars's atmosphere must be rich in argon and neon and possibly nitrogen was made early in my work (lecture titled 'Neon and Argon in the Atmosphere of Mars'). A few years later, Harrison Brown, on theoretical grounds and independently, arrived at the same conclusion concerning argon: 'In the case of Mars, it might well be that argon is the major atmospheric constituent. ' [23] But he thought that rare gases 'are essentially non-existent' on meteorites. In recent years neon and argon have been repeatedly discovered on meteorites (H. Stauffer, 1961) [24] , as anticipated in W. in C. (pp. 281 ff, 367).
Concerning the Moon, I asserted that its surface had been subjected to stress, heating (liquefaction) and bubbling activity in historical times. 'During these catastrophes the moon's surface flowed with lava and bubbled into great circular formations, which rapidly cooled off ... In these cosmic collisions or near contacts the surface of the moon was also marked with clefts and rifts' (W. in C., 'The moon and Its Craters'). H. Percy Wilkins (1955) described numerous domes that might be regarded as examples of bubbles which did not burst. ' [25] .
Signs of tensional stresses have been detected on the Moon (Warren and Fielder, 1962) [26] ; volcanic activity has been unexpectedly discovered by Kozyrev (1958) [27] . Sharp outlines of lunar formations could not have persisted for millions of years in view of the thermal splintering due to great changes in temperature, over 300 degrees, in the day-night sequel and during the eclipses. H. Jeffreys (1959) [28] drew attention to this evidence for the youth of the surface features, but made it dependent on the presence of water in the rocks. Since there seems to be volcanic activity on the Moon, water is most probably present in the rocks.
Assertions that the Earth's axis could not have changed its geographical or astronomical position constituted one of the main arguments against Worlds in Collision [29] . They gave place to the theory of wandering poles. Th. Gold (1955ff) [30] shows the error in the view of G. Darwin and Lord Kelvin on the subject, and stresses the comparative ease with which the globe could - and did - change its axis, even with no external force applied.
Confirmed is also the conclusion that advanced human culture would be found in the today uninhabited area 'on the Kolyma or Lena rivers flowing into the Arctic Ocean' in northeastern Siberia (W. in C., p. 329) in the region where herds of mammoths roamed. Already in 1951, A. P. Okladnikov [31] making known the results of his research in northern Siberia, wrote: 'about two to three millennia before our era, neolithic races... spread to the very coast of the Arctic Ocean in the north and the Kolyma in the east. ' Twenty-five hundred years ago copper was worked in the taiga of Yakutsk.
Under the heading 'The Reversed Polarity of the Earth' (W. in C., pp. 114ff.) is written: 'In recent geological times the magnetic poles of the globe were reversed. ' The phenomenon that could cause it was described, and the question was asked 'whether the position of the magnetic poles has anything to do with the direction of rotation of the globe. ' Complete and repeated sudden reversals of the magnetic poles were postulated by S. K. Runcorn (1955) [32] and P. M. Blackett (1956) [33] . Runcorn wrote: 'There seems no doubt that the earth's field is tied up in some way with the rotation of the planet. And this leads to a remarkable finding about the earth's rotation itself... The planet has rolled about, changing the location of its geographical poles. ' Complete reversals would change the rising and setting points, west becoming east, as described in many ancient sources collated in W. in C. The pioneers in paleomagnetic studies, G. Folgheraiter and P. L. Mercanton [34] , found a reversal of the earth's magnetic field in the Central Mediterranean area in the 8th century before the present era, recorded in the magnetic dip of the Etruscan and Attic vases; their position in the kiln is learned from the flow of glaze. This find is in harmony with the events described on pp. 207-359 of W. in C.
Radiocarbon analysis, besides disclosing that some petroleum is of recent origin and deposit, verified also the claim (W. in C., 'The Ice Age and the Antiquity of Man') that the last glacial period ended less than 10,000 years ago. One of the first and most important results of the new method was the reduction of the time of the last glaciation. 'The advance of the ice occurred about 11,000 years ago... Previously this maximum advance had been assumed to date from about 25,000 years ago, ' reported W. F. Libby and Frederick Johnson in 1952 [35] . Later this figure was still more reduced; furthermore, it refers to the advance, not the end of the retreat of the ice cover.
Possibly the most clear-cut case of vindication concerns the antiquity I assigned to the Mesoamerican civilizations (Mayas, Toltecs, Olmecs). G. Kubler of Yale University wrote (1950) [36] :
The Mesoamerican cosmology to which Velikovsky repeatedly appeals for proof did not originate and could not originate until about the beginning of our era.
Kubler showed a discrepancy of over 1,000 years and asserted that events I ascribed to the 8th-4th centuries before the present era could not have taken place until rather late in the Christian era. But on December 30, 1956, the National Geographical Society, on its own behalf and that of the Smithsonian Institution, announced:
Atomic science has proved the ancient civilization of Mexico to be some 1,000 years older than had been believed. The findings basic to Middle American archaeology, artifacts dug up in La Venta, Mexico, have been proved to come from a period 800 to 400 or 500 A. D., more than 1,000 years later. Cultural parallels between La Venta and other Mexican archaeological excavations enable scientists to date one in the terms of the others. Thus the new knowledge affects the dating of many finds. Dr Matthew W. Sterling, Chief of the Bureau of American Ethnology at the Smithsonian Institution, declared the new dating the most important archaeological discovery in recent history.
P. Drucker and his co-workers have elaborated on the subject in Science (1957) and in the report of the excavation (1959) [37] .
H. E. Suess, because of an accumulation of certain discrepancies in the radiocarbon dates, assumes that natural events caused a radical change in the intensity of the magnetosphere and in the influx of cosmic rays sometime in the second millennium before the present era. Several other researchers came to the same conclusion [38] . This is also in harmony with the story related in my book.
Oceanographic research brought several confirming data. H. Pettersson of Goteborg found so much nickel in clay of the oceanic bed that he inferred that at some time in the past there had been a prodigious fall of meteorites [39] . In W. in C., the descent of enormous trains of meteorites and meteoric dust and ash (pp. 51ff) of land and sea is narrated, with reliance on ancient sources. In 1958, J. L. Worzel found a layer of white ash, 5 to 30 cm thick, very close to the bottom, evenly spread over an enormous area of the ocean bed in the Pacific, and he thought of a 'fiery end of bodies of cosmic origin' [40] . M. Ewing cites evidence that the same ash layer of 'remarkable uniformity of thickness' found by Worzel in the Pacific underlies all oceans and assumes 'a cometary collision' [41] . It could hardly be without some recorded consequences of global extent, ' Ewing concluded. To this a line from W. in C. (' the Darkness') can be quoted: 'The earth entered deeper into the tail of the onrushing comet' with its 'sweeping gases, dust, and cinders' and 'the dust sweeping in from interplanetary space. '
In 1950 a past collision of the earth with a comet was denied, and comets were also regarded as very tenuous and light masses incapable of causing much damage [42] . R. Wildt claimed that the largest comet would have a mass equal to one millionth of that of Venus [42] . But N. T. Bobrovnikoff (1951) [43] Director of Perkins Observatory, took a different view. Several comets seen in the 19th century moved in very similar orbits and 'in all probability, are the result of decomposition of one single body. ' He estimated that: 'If put together' these comets 'would make something like the mass of the moon. '
Before Ewing, a cometary collision was postulated in 1957 by H. Urey to explain the tektites and their distribution [44] . G. Baker insists that Australian tektites (australites) have lain in place no longer than 5,000 years [45] .
3,500 years ago the oceans suddenly evaporated and the water level dropped about twenty feet, a fact first noted by R. Daly and later confirmed by Kuenen [46] . Rubin and Suess found that 3,000 years ago glaciers in the Rockies suddenly increased in size [47] . Scandinavian and German authors date Klimastürze at 1500 and 700 B. C. - the very period of great perturbations described in W. in C. [48] .
In the ocean floor B. Heezen discovered (1960) [49] a ridge split by a deep canyon, or 'crack in the crust that runs nearly twice around the earth. ' He wrote: 'the discovery at this late date of the midocean ridge and rift has raised fundamental questions about basic geological processes and the history of the earth and has even had reverberations in cosmology. '
Prof. Ma (Formosa) claims that there was a sudden and total shift in the crust only 26 and 32 centuries ago, as evidenced by the shift of marine sediments (1955) [50] . It was argued that in global catastrophes of such dimensions no stalactites would have remained unbroken, but within one year after the atomic explosion, stalactites grew in the Gnome cavern, New Mexico: 'All nature's processes have been speeded up a billionfold. ' [51]
Claude F. A. Schaeffer of College de France, in his Stratigraphie Comparée [52] on which he worked not knowing of my simultaneous efforts, came to the conclusion that the Ancient East, as documented by every excavated place from Troy to the Caucasus, Persia, and Palestine-Syria, underwent immense natural paroxysms, unknown in modern annals of seismology; cultures were terminated, empires collapsed, trade ceased, populations were decimated, the earth upheaved, the sea erupted, ash buried cities, climate changed. Five times between the third and the first millennia before the present era the cataclysms were repeated, closing the Early and the Middle Bronze Ages in their wake. The number of catastrophes and their dates relative to historical periods coincide in Schaeffer's estimate and in my own. From source material of a different nature - archaeological - he found that the greatest catastrophe terminated the Middle Kingdom in Egypt (Middle Bronze). Thus we are in agreement to a day. The catastrophe that ended the Middle Kingdom in Egypt is the starting point of Worlds in Collision (and of Ages of Chaos, my reconstruction of ancient chronology).
The recent finds in astronomy, especially in radioastronomy (sun, Venus, Jupiter), have given confirmation from above; oceanography, radiocarbon, paleomagnetism, and archaeology have carried their shares from below.
1. D. Menzel, Proc. Amer. Philos. Soc. (October, 1952).
2. V. A. Bailey, Nature, May 14, 1960; January 7, 1961; March 25, 1961.
3. Menzel, Flying Saucers (Harvard University Press), 1953, p. 236.
4. J. Q. Stuart, Princeton University Observatory, in Harper's, June, 1951.
5a. New York Times, July 30, 1960.
6. Science, December 21, 1962.
7. R. Barker, J. B. A. A., 64, 60 (1954).
8. New York Times, December 29, 1962 (West coast ed.).
9. U. P. I. dispatch from Washington, D. C., in Philadelphia Inquirer, December 16, 1962.
11. Sinton and Strong, Science, 123, 676 (1956).
13. H. H. McCrea, Proceedings, Royal Society, Series A, Vol. 256 (May 31, 1960).
14. The National Observer, December 31, 1962.
15. H. Shapley to H. M. Kallen, May 27, 1946.
16. F. Hoyle, Frontiers of Astronomy, 1955, pp. 68-72.
17. C. R. Longwell, Am. J. of Science, August, 1950.
18. J. B. Patton quoted by F. E. Edmondson, Courier-Journal, Louisville, Ky., April 23, 1950.
19. P. V. Smith, Science, October 24, 1952.
20. H. H. Nininger, Out of the Sky (Dover Publ.), 1959, pp. 89- 90.
21. A. T. Wilson, Nature, October 6, 1962.
23. H. Brown in The Atmospheres of the Earth and Planets, ed. Kuiper, 1949, p. 268.
24. H. Stauffer, J. Geoph. Res., 66 #5 (May, 1961).
25. H. P. Wilkins, The Moon, 1955, p. 42.
26. B. Warren and G. Fielder, Nature, February 24, 1962.
27. N. A. Kozyrev, November 3, 1958. Cf. Z. Kopal, The Moon (1960), p. 96.
28. H. Jeffreys, The Earth, 4th ed.( 1959), p. 377.
29. C. Payne-Gaposchkin, Popular Astronomy, June, 1950.
30. Th. Gold, Nature, 175, 526 (March 26, 1955); Sky and Telescope, April, 1958.
32. S. K. Runcorn, Scientific American, September, 1955.
33. P. M. Blackett, Lectures on Rock Magnetism, Jerusalem, 1956.
35. F. Johnson in W. F. Libby, Radiocarbon Dating (University of Chicago Press), 1952.
36. G. Kubler, Am. J. of Science, August, 1950.
39. H. Pettersson, Scient. American, August, 1950; Tellus, I, 1949.
40. J. L. Worzel, Proc. Nat. Acad. of Sc., Vol. 45 #3 (March 15, 1959).
41. M. Ewing, Proc. Nat. Acad. of Sc., Vol. 45 #3.
42. R. Wildt, Amer. J. of Science, August, 1950.
43. N. T. Bobrovnikoff, in Astrophysics, ed. Hynek, McGraw-Hill, 1951, pp. 310-311.
44. H. Urey, Nature, March 16, 1957.
45. G. Baker, Nature, January 30, 1960.
46. P. H. Kuenen, Marine Geology, 1950, p. 538.
47. Rubin and Suess, Science, April 8, 1955.
49. B. Heezen, Scient. American, October, 1960.
50. T. Y. H. Ma, Alterations of Sedimentary Facies on the Ocean Bottom, 1955.