THIS BLOG ATTEMPTS TO SHOW HOW SCIENCE IS CATCHING UP WITH REVEALED RELIGION

THIS BLOG IS AN ATTEMPT TO PUT ALL THE COOL STUFF THAT I BUMP INTO ABOUT THE SECOND COMING OF CHRIST AND EVENTS THAT LEAD UP TO IT INTO ONE LOCATION.
THE CONTENTS WILL BE FROM AN LDS PERSPECTIVE. IF YOU DISAGREE WITH ANYTHING IN HERE, I DO NOT PARTICULARLY CARE TO ARGUE, UNLESS YOU CAN ADD TO THIS BODY OF WORK. I HAVE AN OPEN MIND, THAT IS WHY I READ STUFF FROM ALL DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVES AND SEEK LEARNING FROM THE BEST BOOKS. I JUST AM NOT HERE TO ARGUE ABOUT IT - BUT TO PUT IT OUT THERE WHERE OTHERS CAN PERUSE/PURSUE IT. I TAKE PARTICULAR INTEREST IN HONEST SEEKERS OF TRUTH AND BELIEVE THAT SCIENCE IS REVEALED RELIGION'S BEST ALLY. YOU WILL SEE ALOT OF TOPICS IN THIS BLOG THAT SHOW SCIENCE BACKING - AND SLOWLY CATCHING UP WITH - REVEALED RELIGION.
ENJOY!!

Sunday, March 17, 2013

FOUND - VIKING SUNSTONE USED FOR NAVIGATION

Wow - I did a piece last September that I lifted from Dayla Taylor's blog about Vikings using crystals to navigate.  The photos they had of the crystals were just guesses as to what they were.

Here is an actual picture of one - and a fascinating look at how people down thru history have used stones to their advantage:

First evidence of Viking-like 'sunstone' pulled from shipwreck

Alderney Museum
Researchers say this crystal found at the Alderney shipwreck near the Channel Islands could prove that fabled Viking sunstones really did exist.
By Megan GannonLiveScience
Ancient lore has suggested that the Vikings used special crystals to find their way under less-than-sunny skies. Though none of these so-called "sunstones" has ever been found at Viking archaeological sites, a crystal uncovered in a British shipwreck could help prove they did indeed exist.
The crystal was found in the wreckage of the Alderney, an Elizabethan warship that sank near the Channel Islands in 1592. The stone was discovered less than 3 feet (1 meter) from a pair of navigation dividers, suggesting it may have been kept with the ship's other navigational tools, according to the research team headed by scientists at the University of Rennes in France.
A chemical analysis confirmed that the stone was Icelandic Spar, or calcite crystal, believed to be the Vikings' mineral of choice for their fabled sunstones, mentioned in the 13th-century Viking saga of Saint Olaf.
Today, the Alderney crystal would be useless for navigation, because it has been abraded by sand and clouded by magnesium salts. But in better days, such a stone would have bent light in a helpful way for seafarers.
Alderney Museum
This image shows the original calcite crystal alongside Elizabethan navigation dividers on top of a cannon. All of these artifacts were raised from the site of the Alderney wreck.
Because of the rhombohedral shape of calcite crystals, "they refract or polarize light in such a way to create a double image," Mike Harrison, coordinator of the Alderney Maritime Trust, told LiveScience. This means that if you were to look at someone's face through a clear chunk of Icelandic spar, you would see two faces. But if the crystal is held in just the right position, the double image becomes a single image and you know the crystal is pointing east-west, Harrison said.
These refractive powers remain even in low light when it's foggy or cloudy or when twilight has come. In a previous study, the researchers proved they could use Icelandic spar to orient themselves within a few degrees of the sun, even after the sun had dipped below the horizon.
European seafarers had not fully figured out magnetic compasses for navigation until the end of 16th century. The researchers say the crystal might have been used on board the Elizabethan ship to help correct for errors with a magnetic compass.
"In particular, at twilight when the sun is no longer observable being below the horizon, and the stars still not observable, this optical device could provide the mariners with an absolute reference in such (a) situation," the researchers wrote online this week in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society A.
No such crystals have been found yet at Viking sites. The team notes that archaeologists are unlikely to find complete crystals as part of a group of grave goods, since the Vikings often cremated their dead.
But recent excavations turned up the first calcite fragment at a Viking settlement, "proving some people in the Viking Age were employing Iceland spar crystals," the researchers wrote.

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