Skeptical Humanities

Hi again, everybody! I hope you’re all having a great festive season! All the best for 2013!

More on Reverse Speech:

Many of David Oates’ claims about RS are implausible on linguistic grounds, and he does not appear to have read more than superficially in the linguistic literature. And in fact the RS theory is prima facie implausible; it implies the existence of a major species-wide mental apparatus and a set of unconscious mental processes for which there is no other evidence and no persuasive explanation; and it arguably generates paradoxes with respect to the directionality of time.

Oates claims that the content of the messages produced in RS typically relates in a ‘complementary’ manner to that of the messages concurrently being produced in FS (albeit often couched in metaphors requiring analysis and elucidation). RS thus gives additional information to accentuate or strengthen the message of the associated sequence of FS. It may also reveal the speaker’s unconscious or unspoken thoughts, which may be in contradiction with their more conscious thoughts as expressed in FS. Oates believes that RS – being as it is unconsciously generated, free from conscious manipulation and indeed unperceived by the conscious mind – is always reliable as an indication of the speaker’s true opinions and attitudes; in other words, it is impossible to lie in RS, even while lying on the same issue in the equivalent sequence of FS.

Investigators, including trained phoneticians, typically find reversals much more difficult to hear in the absence of information about the corresponding FS, even after repeated listening. It might be granted that if RS were genuine some training might well be needed in order for it to be understood or even heard; but Oates himself, when questioned on this issue, is inconsistent, sometimes claiming that not only experience but training (by his organization) is required in order to hear RS reliably, but elsewhere stating that newcomers to the subject can immediately hear many cases of RS (perhaps after prompting, on which see below). The case for RS would be materially strengthened if several RS analysts could independently ‘find’ the same RS sequences, across a range of examples, without knowledge of the corresponding FS sequences.

Furthermore, the fact that many alleged reversals are supposedly couched in metaphors frequently renders interpretation difficult, even where the content of the FS is known.

Investigation of Oates’ claims is hindered by a number of obscurities in his discussion. The most important of these involves what appears to be a crucial methodological and theoretical inconsistency.

Oates and his followers seek to determine whether or not alleged cases of RS actually involve what he calls at different times ‘phonetic coincidence’, ‘coincidental reversals’ or ‘constants’, by which he means either a) the ‘accidental’ occurrence of very short sequences (typically single short words) which are (almost) the same in FS and RS (‘phonological palindromes’, such as dad) or b) cases in which the reversal of the FS sequence yields another equally possible sequence, so that there is a pair of corresponding forms, each of which is (approximately) the reversal of the other, such as say/yes. He accepts that in such cases the FS and reversed forms correspond consistently, and does not regard cases such as these as genuine examples of RS. (Oates suggest7 that there are some longer sequences such as Don’t regret (it/this) and I love my husband very much which also constitute phonological near palindromes but which he accepts as genuine RS sequences because of their length. However, these are not phonological near palindromes; the reversal of such an utterance is quite unlike the original.)

There are three major problems with Oates’ ideas at this point. Firstly, Oates is not consistent as to which sequences do and do not count as ‘phonetic coincidences’, ‘coincidental reversals’ or ‘constants’, treating very similar short expressions at times as belonging to this special category and at other times as genuine RS. Secondly, Oates’ explanation of the difference between cases of these two kinds is incoherent. His definition of ‘genuine RS’ involves reference to ‘the phonetic construction of the forward speech sounds as they were said in the instant they were captured on tape’; but this definition applies equally well to his ‘phonetic coincidences’ (etc.), and indeed to any reversal of a FS sequence.

Thirdly, Oates seeks to identify and exclude ‘phonetic coincidences’ (etc.) precisely because, if his general theory is to be deemed valid, he obviously has to claim that, in contrast with such cases, ‘genuine’ cases of RS are characterized by the occurrence of different reversed speech forms corresponding with the same FS form on different occasions. In other words, the very same FS sequence spoken by two different individuals, or spoken by the same individual on different occasions and when in different emotional states, may produce entirely different RS sequences. Oates needs to make this claim because he needs to argue that differences in the feelings and knowledge of different speakers uttering the same phrases (in the same accents), emotional shifts on the part of one speaker, or shifts in the style of the discourse, can be displayed through differences in the RS. However, this claim is quite implausible: there is nothing present in RS other than reversed FS sequences, which will obviously differ only to the extent that the FS differs. Certain differences of phonetic detail (including ‘supra-segmental’ effects such as intonation) might appear auditorily more salient in reverse than they do forwards; but this phenomenon could not account for the global differences between different reversals of the very same FS sequences which Oates often identifies. Neither could minor accent differences in FS have more than minor effects on the form of RS sequences.

In addition, if Oates’ distinction between ‘phonetic coincidences’ (etc.) and ‘genuine’ RS were accepted, evidence that a given FS sequence did not produce the RS sequence posited by Oates when reversed could be countered with the claim that there was no reason why it should produce the same RS sequence on different occasions. This obviously reduces the reproducibility of Oates’ investigations. Although there is no reason to accept Oates’ stance on this issue, careful replications of Oates’ experiments have used the recordings provided by Oates himself, so as to avoid such objections.

As ever, detailed references on request. More on RS next time!

Mark

Goodeveninggoodeveninggoodeveninggoodeveninggoodevening goodeveninggoodeveninggoodevening and welcome to another episode of the Week in Conspiracy. Ours is a friendly environment where I compile the latest in conspiracy theory from around the web.

Honestly, I thought that the big news of the roundup would be the Oregon mall shooting (remember that?), but of course we had a rotten day in the States a few weeks ago, and we see people trying to make sense of it all. A LOT of confused and misleading information came out as the events in Connecticut were unfolding, and these will be the primary sources of the inevitable future conspiracy theories. I anticipate that the theories will come in the usual popular two varieties:

1) The shooter was brainwashed. This plot device allows conspiracy theorists to blame their preferred villain instead of the person who pulled the trigger. In fact, this one has already come out in a weird way. No you have no idea how weird this is. Stay with me. OK, so, Paul McCartney at the Sandy Relief Concert opened his set with Nirvana with “Helter Skelter,” which was the trigger for the shooter at the Sandy Hook School. QED. Some have floated the idea the shooter’s meds caused this. (Do they not see the natural correlation between people who are messed up in the head and psychiatric care?)

2) It’s (another) gun grab ploy by Obama. Dear Lord, hurry up, Obama! (Turns out the President is afraid the gummint is coming for his guns too!)

Mark at the Denialism Blog puts Mike Adams and his ilk over his knee, because the Health Danger wrote this.   Shepard Ambellas, uh, thinks that weaponized nuns pulled off the job.  Rush Limbaugh plugged the tired “Fast and Furious” angle.

I think that the most widespread conspiracy theory to have emerged is that the Colorado theater shooting and the Newtown massacre are somehow related to a financial scandal, and like a classic conspiracy theory, it relies on 1) superficial similarities between events and 2) arcane and irrelevant knowledge blown way out of proportion. But we’re also seeing a couple of anti-Israel conspiracy theories linked to this. Then there is this…odd timeline.

Elsewhere:

• From The Onion: Obama scared government coming for his guns.
• Did North Korea launch an EMP? Probably not.
• Jesse Ventura is spinning yarns about his own show, saying that others are making it look bad so it won’t get renewed. (No, Jesse, you are doing that yourself.) Also, the RFT takes up his recent Illuminati in the Ozarks episode. (My sister thoughtfully recorded that for me to watch while I’m home on break.)
• So, there is such a thing as a 9/11 Truth radio show. Their war chest is up to $20.
• Truthers adopt a highway in Missouri.
• A new scholar hoved into my sights this week. Stephan Lewandowsy and misinformation.
• ATS board members scared of sun dogs. A reply for the ages:

I think that if there were 3 Suns nearby, they would most likely be visible in other places too, and not just in China. (And that’s excluding the fact that we all be dead already.)

Secret documents (freely given) reveal that the vaccine denialist was never just a crazy person and was actually right all along, says denialist.

• Santa Claus is an unlikeable bastard.
• Conservative claims that Obama is eyeing a 3rd term. Fool. He’s eyeing a sixth and seventh!
• Global warming denialists are weaponizing irony!
• Alex Jones, in defending his weird interpretation of the 2nd Amendment, decides to crap on the 1st Amendment. (It’s so strange how so often are what they despise.)  Oh, also, he is clearly figuring out that if you scare people about their health, they will buy your garbage. Here is the Alzheimer’s conspiracy.
• I’m serious, why is Michelle Bachmann not in some sort of institution? Her mind is so damaged.
• Blargh! Blargh! Vaccines! Blargh!
• Alabama says no to imaginary threats by globalist environmentalists.
• Vigilant Citizen has deteriorated to: “Here’s a picture of Anna-Nicole Smith, therefore, Illuminati.“
• Kenya bans Monsanto GMO.

• Merle Haggard is slipping. Here’s his anti-scary chemtrails anthem:

This Week in Mark Dice is a Horrible Person:

I stopped following him. He’s a pointless ass-clown.

Best Facebook update about the Sandy Hook shootings:

As much as I love a good conspiracy theory I please please ask my fellow conspiracy theorist friends to stop making yesterdays event into one! I beg of you !!!! I don’t wanna hear it really I don’t !!!!

Twit of the Week:

A level headed analysis of world events or hashtag abuse?

Shameless Smurf™ (@pansgrrl) 12/21/12, 6:08 PM Now the tyrants say “Let them eat genetically modified corn!” #Agenda21 #BilderbergGroup #NDAA #Monsanto #Corruption #GMO #Chemtrails

This one came from my other work, the Burzynski stuff. It just fell out of heaven, so I had to post it:

Jennifer @MadameBourdier @rjblaskiewicz @Malboury Anyway, the USA stole the A-bomb patent. France should steal back the cure for cancer. #Burzynski

Conspiracy theory of the Week:

• William Tapley, the Third Eagle of the Apocalypse and the Co-Prophet of the End Times, continues to deconstruct “Gangnam Style”:

That’s all for now. I hope that we meet under happier circumstances next time.

RJB

Hi again, everybody!

I turn here to another alleged phenomenon involving mysterious aspects of ‘normal’ language: ‘reversals’ and similar phenomena, including ‘Reverse Speech’ and special cases of ‘backward masking’.

Reverse Speech (henceforth RS) is a theory and an associated set of practices developed by David Oates and his followers. Oates, who has no background or qualifications in linguistics or other relevant subjects, is the ‘discoverer’ of RS. Oates began to develop his theory of RS in 1984, when he was managing a ‘half way house’ for ‘street kids’ in Berri, South Australia. He heard that an American evangelist was travelling through Australia preaching that rock and roll was ‘the Devil’s music’ and that if one played such music backwards one would hear strange, evil messages (see later). Oates found himself unable to refute these claims and eventually became convinced that backwards phrases existed not only in music lyrics (whether deliberately inserted or otherwise) but also in all human speech, and often quite spontaneously, with no deliberate insertion being required. He decided that these ‘reversals’ were systematic and of great significance; he and his then colleague Greg Albrecht produced the first book on RS. (Albrecht later claimed that Oates had ‘stolen’ his ideas.) Subsequently Oates produced a further book, and he and his followers have continued to publish on RS. By the mid-1990s there were many leaflets, articles and web-site entries produced by RS devotees, but many of these texts are naïvely expressed and argued, and the content is also rather repetitive.

Oates’ basic theory involves the claim that normal forward speech (henceforth FS), if heard in reverse, often yields short (1 2 seconds) sequences of intelligible syllables, at short intervals (often of only a few seconds). The RS sequences are supposedly accessed by simply recording a passage of FS and playing the tape in reverse. They represent genuine words or grammatically ‘correct’/normal phrases (normally in the same language as the FS; certainly in the language in which an adult speaker is thinking), mixed in amongst the ‘gibberish’ which one would expect to hear in reversed speech.

Oates believes that RS is another product of the important mental processes which generate normal FS. As the brain is constructing and delivering the sounds of speech, two messages are communicated simultaneously. One message (FS) is communicated forward and listeners hear and respond to it consciously, while the other (RS) is communicated in reverse and listeners hear and respond to it unconsciously. According to Oates, the existence of RS partly accounts for the apparent ability of human beings to obtain (sometimes) more information from a conversation or other interaction than is expressed in FS; in other words, it provides a physical basis for phenomena such as ‘intuition’ or ‘the sixth sense’. (Some of Oates’ supporters, such as Jim Stutt, argue that RS arose during the early history of Homo sapiens to compensate for the loss by most humans of active telepathic ability as language – in its FS form – became more important. (Compare the ideas of Julian Jaynes.)

Oates and his followers have applied the analysis of RS in various practical domains, some of them involving matters of great sensitivity and potential harm. If RS is not genuine, this work is valueless at best and quite possibly extremely damaging. The areas in question include child psychology, alleged cases of child molestation, other alleged criminal offences (this includes the ‘O. J. Simpson’ case) and the analysis and treatment of sexual and other personal problems and issues more generally. In addition, the RS enterprise has come to have an overtly commercial character. At one stage, one hour of tape analysis (typically involving much less than one hour of analysable tape) cost as much as $US125, or $US200 if performed by Oates himself.

As ever, detailed references on request. More on RS next time!

Mark

So apparently facebook has a feature that directs messages from people you’ve never been in contact with into a mailbox called “other”. If you look at the left-hand side of the screen under “messages,” the folder is in there. I had nearly 70 messages, and, let me tell you, I am a popular guy. (A shout out to Atlanta homegirl Angie Mattke who alerted me to this feature. You are sorely missed up here in the middle of the snowpocalypse!)

Here’s one that came to me in November, from Padz Evans from Petersburg, VA, apparently after I wrote something about Stanislaw Burzynski, the notorious cancer quack out of Houston.

I’m glad you liked the article, Padz!

I was quite pleased to learn today that a complaint I sent to the ombudsman of PBS was quoted in Michael Getler’s column. It was about PBS putting up promotional material that seemed to be pushing a rather crummy and unconvincing straight-to-internet documentary on their website. Here’s the original letter:

I wanted to alert the viewer advocate about something that I saw on the PBS website and register a complaint. I notice that on the list of the most watched online videos at the PBS website that a 9/11 Truther video is currently very near the top. I understand that member stations maintain their independence, and that this is crucial to the mission. I do not see how it follows, however, that a video which is so misleading and factually inaccurate should be made available through PBS’s national website. It seems to violate basic program quality standards which PBS is known for. I am not advocating censorship, merely that PBS should examine the decision/process that led to this appearing on the national website and see if it aligns with the mission of public broadcasting to produce a better educated populace. I appreciate your attention to this matter.

Bob Blaskiewicz, Chippewa Falls, WI

Well, Jeff Sellars did not like what I wrote.

The individual is handicapped by coming face to face with a conspiracy so monstrous he cannot believe it exists. The American mind simply has not come to a realization of the evil which has been introduced into our midst. It rejects even the assumption that human creatures could espouse a philosophy which must ultimately destroy all that is good and decent…The conscientious citizen asks, “How can one be sure what the truth is?”…[We] must ascertain for [ourselves] what the facts are. [We] must accept nothing less than the facts— neither the majority version nor the minority version. [We] must view all the evidence until the face of truth is plain.
—President J. Edgar Hoover

Your cognitive dissonance is blocking your ability to accept Newtonian Physics. Building 7 collapses in 6-7 seconds at free fall speed. There’s nano sized thermite in the dust. www.RememberBuilding7.org

“Who is more foolish, the child afraid of the dark or the man afraid of the light?”

There were a number of birthday invites that I missed (which is probably why I’m such a social pariah), honest questions about things I’ve written, and other missives (as well as stuff so abusive that facebook automatically deleted it).

Ah, modern life on the Internet!

RJB

Hi again, everybody!

If extraterrestrial aliens genuinely visit Earth, it is obviously possible in principle that they may be able to learn to use contemporary human languages, and indeed it is frequently reported that aliens have been able to learn and use the languages known by the witnesses, or other human languages ancient or modern. For example, Marc Tolosano reports a (single-witness) case where ‘ufonauts’ allegedly encountered in 1983 in France spoke French fluently (and claimed that their species was familiar with all human languages).

There is a sub-set of cases of this general nature which involve alleged contemporary extraterrestrial knowledge of unexpected human languages, notably ancient languages such as Latin and Greek. M.H. Edwards (see earlier) discusses several cases of this kind. Obviously, one possible explanation for such ability (if genuine) involves visits to Earth in ancient times and the subsequent transmission of the knowledge acquired at that time (or the retention of the knowledge by aliens with very long life-spans).

John Dean reports contact with aliens from various planets, notably one known as Korender. His account involves a common interplanetary language called Galingua, which, is allegedly the source of Latin by way of ancient contact, or else has a common ancestor with Latin. Galingua and the language of Korender are both spelled alphabetically (with thirty-nine wholly novel letters with names bearing no relation to their phonetic values) and ‘phonetically’ (presumably this means ‘phonemically’); in Korendian, however, pronouns and numerals (cardinal and ordinal) are apparently represented logographically, with single symbols, despite being polyphonemic. Dean offers (often using non-standard terminology) a brief summary of Korendian grammar (very regular but otherwise suspiciously Indo-European in character, with only a few intriguing features) and punctuation, and a vocabulary.

Paul von Ward ascribes special status and universal applicability to the devanagari script used for Sanskrit and to the language itself. Like many non-mainstream writers on Indian matters, he ignores/rejects what has been learned about the Indo-European origins of the language, and he implausibly interprets Sanskrit and its script as the ultimate ancestors of all later languages and alphabets, which have allegedly deteriorated and suffered from loss of phonetic range and expressive power. He attributes the invention of devanagari to ‘Advanced Beings’, extraterrestrial or inter-dimensional beings whose activities are reflected in myths around the world. Von Ward is more widely read in linguistics (as in some other disciplines) than most such promoters of ‘ancient astronauts’, but his ‘understanding’ of the subject is very uneven and idiosyncratic.

One example of alleged extraterrestrial knowledge of ancient human languages involves the work of Paul Potter, who upholds the veracity of the very strange ‘messages’ which well-known abductee Betty Andreasson (now Luca) reportedly received (over a long period) from alien entities. Those which are not in English are simply strings of words familiar or otherwise, drawn (often with some distortion) from Latin, Greek and other languages; most of them are Latin or Greek words or English/pseudo-English words based or apparently based on these languages. Where a word exists in inflected forms in the source language, the citation (dictionary) form is virtually always the one which appears here, and there is no grammatical structure. The sequences do not exemplify language in use; they are lists of words. Potter translates the ‘messages’, adding grammar as is convenient to his proposed message. It is not at all clear why aliens would communicate like this; if they knew Latin or Greek, they could surely write in these languages. Human fakers (who may not actually be familiar with Latin or Greek but who could easily possess dictionaries and a conversion table for the Greek alphabet) must be suspected.

There are in fact other cases involving UFOs where a string of the citation forms of words taken from a foreign language is presented as if it were a meaningful sentence. One such case arose in the Garden Grove abduction case of 1975, later acknowledged as a hoax. The sequence (allegedly channelled) was nous laos hikanō (early Greek: ‘mind’, ‘people’ as in we the people, ‘[I] come’). A gloss ‘I come in the mind of man’ was offered; but all three forms are citation forms, and the grammar has merely been added by the translator. (See Larson, 2002.) Another case involves what appears to be a single Modern Greek word (in Greek script) in the written material displayed on artefacts supposedly associated with the Roswell Incident/Alien Autopsy case. However, the word includes a common spelling error grounded in the ignorance of many less-educated native speakers about the origin of the form. This again suggests the possibility of fakery.

Other UFO advocates also proclaim human languages (ancient or modern) as currently used by aliens. Often, the actual origin of the favoured language is said to be extraterrestrial (which would obviously require adjustment to accounts of the relevant human language ‘families’). The best current example is the Aetherius Society, founded by George King. The Society – like von Ward (see above) and other non-mainstream writers on India – ignores what has been learned about the Indo-European origins of Sanskrit, and regards it not merely as the ancestor of all human speech but as vastly ancient and the main lingua franca of a whole series of inhabited planets. They consider that it was ‘scientifically and metaphysically’ devised and is derived from fifty primeval sounds (which, by way of misconceptualisation, they confuse with the ‘alphabetic’ letters used to write the sounds of the language); these sounds themselves are derived from features of the Chakras (supposed energy vortices in the ‘subtle’ body of a human being).

The extraterrestrial ‘master’ Aetherius was extensively channelled by King, providing links with this complex inhabited universe and normally using King’s own Southern English English. The skeptical astronomer Patrick Moore exposed King’s claim that Aetherius/King could handle questions in any human language; the medium was nonplussed by very simple questions in Norwegian and even French.

As matters stand, the provisional skeptical conclusion on the reality of extraterrestrial languages (spoken and/or written) and on extraterrestrial knowledge of human languages must be that no known case is truly convincing.

As ever, detailed references on request. More next time!

Mark

Hi again, everybody!

Some reports of entire UFO-related languages involve alleged ancient visits to Earth by extraterrestrials; otherwise unknown scripts presumably encoding otherwise unknown languages of alien origin are described. For example, George Hunt Williamson reports that some Amerindian tribal peoples live close to rock faces (some of them known as ‘Rocks of Writing’) upon which mysterious ‘hieroglyphs’ are carved; they deny any connection with these symbols, regarding them as ‘timeless’. (Shades of the Bradshaw Paintings of Western Australia!) Williamson attributes the symbols to extraterrestrial entities who visited the area in ancient times. However, it is not in fact clear that these symbols are linguistic or even symbolic in character, still less that they are of genuinely mysterious origin.

One especially dramatic case of this kind (albeit ultimately lacking any corroboration) involves not written language but 716 grooved stone disks thirty centimetres in diameter, hardened with cobalt and displaying central holes, which were reportedly discovered in the Bayan Kara Ula mountain range in Western China in the period 1938-1962. It is suggested that these disks can be compared with vinyl records and may contain much data. The story presented recounts that a scholar called Tsum Um Nui (whose existence has not been confirmed) claimed that the grooves contained script and eventually announced a decipherment; the translation offered (the details were later disputed) indicated that the disks were artefacts of the inhabitants of an extraterrestrial spacecraft which landed in the area around 12,000 years BP and was unable to take off again. The oral legends of local tribes-people apparently referred to a massacre by their remote ancestors of small-statured, ‘ugly’ newcomers; this description was interpreted as referring to the aliens. The case was allegedly published in 1965 by Chi Pu Tei as ‘The Grooved Script Concerning Spaceships Which, as Recorded on the Discs, Landed on Earth 12,000 Years Ago’. This matter has been a ‘favourite’ among believers in extraterrestrial visits to Earth.

One Karyl Robin-Evans (1980), supposedly published posthumously, allegedly contacted a small-statured tribe known as the Dropa in the same general area. The Dropa believed that their ancestors were not human but had come from the Sirius system; after a crash-landing in the remote past which brought them to Earth, many were massacred, but the community was able to survive and eventually became the Dropa. This legend was interpreted as referring to the Bayan Kara Ula event. The story appeared suspicious to interested parties of all persuasions, and much later David Gamon (1995) admitted that he had been the hoaxer. It appears probable that the entire case is itself a hoax; but, in any event, if the disks ever existed they have now apparently disappeared, and further study is thus (at present) impossible.

Some other claims of this general type are even more extreme, for instance the utterly implausible claims (linguistic and other) surrounding ‘Mantong’, which (as I have recounted elsewhere) is said to be an ancient language/script reconstructed from the English names of the letters of the Roman alphabet and various short English words associated with these. The background story (often termed ‘the Shaver Mystery’) involves alleged subterranean humanoid but non-human beings known as the ‘dero’ (degenerate and wicked) and the ‘tero’ (good), the products of a disaster which occurred 20,000 years BP.

In like vein, Alexandre St. Yves d’Alveydre reported that the ancient ‘Vattanian’ language, along with an alphabet of 22 letters (suspiciously corresponding one-to-one with those featured in Indian, Hebrew, Roman and other human scripts), was revealed to him in 1885 by a race of beings living in the paradise of Agartha. The Vattanian vocabulary allegedly expresses archetypal notions and some of its words and concepts supposedly persist in human languages; there is, predictably, little attention to matters of grammar.

Some Latter-Day Saints sources continue to promote the veracity of the ‘Reformed Egyptian’ in their Book of Abraham and other texts associated with The Pearl of Great Price. Some of the texts are read as referring to other inhabited planets, which feature in LDS theology (notably, the supreme planet ‘Kolob’. When the early LDS leaders claimed that this was the language of the plates which an angel lent to them to be mystically translated, Egyptian had not yet been deciphered, but the small pieces of genuine Egyptian text presented in LDS sources were already known at the time and have subsequently been interpreted quite differently.

There are also cases where alien linguistic items are said to have been ‘borrowed’ into human languages (spoken and/or written) – or where humans themselves are said to be of extraterrestrial origin, which is reflected in some linguistic features. For instance, Brian Crowley and Anthony Pollock hold that the builders of the alleged monuments on Mars (such as the ‘Face on Mars’) were themselves human; the species initially evolved (contrary to all appearances) on Mars and only later migrated to Earth as local conditions worsened. They trace various names and other words, found in Welsh, Irish Gaelic, Egyptian, South American languages, etc., to a Martian language. Of course, as with channellers of ‘Atlantean’ and other such material, they are free to propose any forms which they believe might lie behind the human language data, claiming that their extraterrestrial sources provide corroboration.

As ever, detailed references on request. More next time!

Mark