William G. Pullin

Greetings. USOs, underwater submerged objects, operating in proximity to underwater alien bases. Is there any tangible evidence to support such a possibility? It all depends on whom you ask. As with so many other aspects of the UFO mythology, the theory of underwater alien bases is void of anything physical which would allow for any sort of scientific inquiry. The theory is built on the frail foundation of anecdotal information coming from true believers. Stories. A subterranean house of cards. Despite this not unexpected situation, there is one image that has set the UFO faithful on fire with fervent religious passion, the image featuring Sycamore Knoll.  Less than three miles off the Ventura County coastline, or just under five miles southwest of Malibu, California in Los Angeles County, Sycamore Knoll is an interesting geologic construct, approximately 2,000 feet below the surface of the Pacific Ocean. The feature is located at geographic coordinates 34° 1’23.31″N 118° 59’45.64″...

Greetings. The Bandwagon Effect. A ticket to ride the UFO train to herd mentality.  The bandwagon effect is a psychological phenomenon in which people do something primarily because other people are doing it, regardless of their own belief structures, which they may ignore, override, or abandon. This tendency of people to align their beliefs and behaviors with those of a larger group is commonly referred to as a herd mentality. Following others' actions or beliefs can occur because of the influence of information coming from others. A substantial majority of the bandwagon effect's influence comes from the desire to 'fit in' with peers; by making similar selections as other people, this is seen as a way to gain access to a particular social club or group. The phenomenon is observed in various fields, such as economics, political science, medicine, and psychology. In social psychology, people's tendency to align their belief structures and personal behaviors with a gr...

Greetings. Christopher Hitchens (April 13th of 1949 - December 15th of 2011) Christopher Eric Hitchens was a British and American author, critic, educator, journalist, and intellectual. During his long, storied, and accomplished career Hitchens wrote 18 books on faith, culture, politics and literature. Born and educated in Great Britain, Hitchens graduated in the 1970s from Oxford with a degree in philosophy, politics and economics. By the dawn of the 1980s Hitchens had emigrated to the United States and wrote extensively for The Nation and Vanity Fair, becoming known for his intelligent and thoughtful approach to various topics of importance. His epistemological razor, "What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence" is still held in high regard in the fields of law, science, and philosophy. Mr. Hitchens steadfastly defended the rights of free speech and of open inquiry, regardless of the particular topic or individual point of view being taken ...

Greetings. The age of the universe.  In classical cosmology, the age of the universe is defined as the length of time elapsed since the Big Bang, the explosion that birthed the universe as we know it. Astronomers have derived two different measurements of the age of the universe: 1. A measurement based on direct observations of an infant state of the universe, which indicate an age of approximately 13.787±0.020 billion years.  2. A measurement based on the observations of the local, modern universe, which suggest a younger age overall. The uncertainty of the first measurement mentioned has been narrowed down to about 20 million years, based on a number of studies that all have reached a scientific consensus showing similar mathematical figures for the universe's age. These studies include long term examinations of the microwave background radiation by the Planck spacecraft, the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe, and other space probes of note. Measurements of the cosmic bac...

Greetings. The question. Are we alone in the universe? That particular query has been on the minds of people for centuries, perhaps since the days of prehistoric humans.  Perhaps no other unanswered question has held such an intense fascination, or such historic ramifications for the human race. Although the vast majority of laypersons and the scientific community believes that extraterrestrial life exists somewhere out in the cosmos, we simply don't know beyond a shadow of a doubt. We just don't know. To a great extent the resulting discussions and considerations have centered around the commonality of potential homes for extraterrestrial life, exoplanets. Thanks to the efforts of astronomers around the world, and the wonderful technology available to them, we now know of thousands and thousands of exoplanets. While the majority of exoplanets have been determined to be gas giants, similar in composition and construction to the Solar System's Jupiter and Saturn, we do know ...

Greetings. The speed of light in a vacuum. 299,792,458 meters per second, or approximately 186,000 miles per second, or 671 million miles per hour. The speed limit of the universe, beyond which nothing with mass can travel.  Thanks to the herculean efforts of the late Nobel laureate Albert Einstein (March 14th of 1879 - April 18th of 1955) we know far more about how the fabric of the universe works, including the intimate relationship between space and time and gravity. According to Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity, which was published in his 1905 paper "On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies," 'c' is the upper limit for the speed at which normal energy and matter can travel through normal space. The theory posits the two following ideas:  1. The laws of physics are invariant (identical) in all inertial frames of reference (that is, frames of reference with no acceleration.) This is known as the principle of relativity.  2. The speed of light in vacuum is ...