★★★★★ 5
A Fascinating and Engaging Read
Format: Paperback
This book was published in 2012. When it first came on the market I was intrigued by the title “Forgotten Civilizations” and it was written by Dr. Robert F. Schoch, one of the authors that I revere as a brilliant scientist and intellectual with one of the most open minds to alternate explanations of mainstream scientific paradigms in the modern scientific community. But the remainder of the title, “The Role of Solar Outburst in Our Past and Future”, kind of turned me off, as I assumed this was just another December 21, 2012 doomsday book, and after reading scare books on the coming computer disaster of the millennium change from 1999 to 2000, and several books on the coming Armageddon in 2012, where in both cases nothing happened, I was burnt out on doomsday prognostications.
I couldn’t have been more wrong. This book is absolutely fascinating.
I think that Graham Hancock, Andrew Collins, Robert Schoch, and other researchers and authors have adequately explained the cause of the Younger Dryas ice age, that began in 10900 BCE, as being caused by a comet impacting the northern hemisphere of earth, but speculation of what caused the end of it, about 9700 BCE, always appeared to be a pretty weak arguments to me. Here I think Dr. Schoch has nailed a very likely cause, and he has the data to back it up, with clues left from Easter Island through western United States to the middle east of something catastrophic happening in the skies 11,700 years ago. Dr. Schoch typically follows the data no matter where it leads him, even if to controversial conclusions (i.e. the Great Sphinx is much older that the Egyptian civilization, possibly 10,000 to 12,000 years old).
In Chapters #7 and #8 Dr. Schoch provides a detailed history of the sun’s activity to as far back as records have been kept and as deep as ice cores and tree rings can provide empirical data. He documents the sun’s activity and the corresponding periods of abrupt and severe climate change that occurred during periods of high solar activity. Schoch points out that “our sun has been more active over the last few decade (since about the middle of the twentieth century) than it has been for thousands of years previously”. He goes on to say, “the current overall level of solar activity is the highest it has been since about 9500 BCE to 9000 BCE, near the end of the last ice age!” And, “the level of solar activity during the past 70 years is exceptional, and the previous period of equally high activity occurred more than 8,000 years ago”. Global warming? Ya think? And Schoch points out that throughout history periods of abrupt and severe climate change occur during periods of high solar activity.
In Chapter #8 Dr. Schoch discusses the science of “Cosmoclimatology”, the study if how the sun, planets, our solar system, and even events that happen in deep space and in other solar systems, can have an impact on earth. It sounds fishy but Dr. Schoch shows where “changes in greenhouse gases have been correlated with global temperature changes for hundreds of thousands – even millions – of years, long before humans could conceivably have been causing such changes. Indeed, increases in carbon dioxide may in part be a consequence of global warming rather than the cause (Ferreyra 2011). Increases in temperature due to other factors (such as increases in solar activity) may warm the oceans, for instance, resulting in the releases of carbon dioxide and the inability to absorb more carbon dioxide; once the carbon dioxide is in the atmosphere, it may further reinforce global warming.” I’m trading my Toyota Prius in on the biggest pollution belching SUV I can find.
Dr. Schoch points out that, Ilya G. Usoskin, “found that periods of higher solar activity and lower cosmic ray flux tend to be associated with warmer climate and vice versa”, and, “Il-Hyun Cho and colleagues have found additional evidence that solar activity can directly affect the weather and climate on earth.” Research shows that the earth experienced “hot house” conditions around 500, 375, 250, and 100 million years ago and “icehouse” conditions with periodic glaciations around 450, 300, and 150 million years ago. Dr. Schoch says, “According to the new paradigm of Cosmoclimatology (research shows) solar and galactic influences can have major effects on the climate of earth.”
Chapter #12 provides a detailed description of “The Carrington Event”, something I have never heard of before and found fascinating. The Carrington Event deserves a book on its own. Perhaps there is one or Dr. Schoch will write one. The Carrington Event occurred in 1859 when a solar outburst hit the earth like a tidal wave hitting an island, seriously disrupting electrical distributions and communication systems (telegraph) of the time. Dr. Schoch then goes into describing the impact of a similar or greater intensity solar outburst on today’s electrical distribution systems, communication systems, satellites, pipelines, railroads, etc. It’s happened before and if it would happen again today, it could spoil your whole afternoon.
In the last few chapters Dr. Schoch, investigates some new age alternate explanations that challenge the mainstream scientific paradigms in the scientific community. Things like extremely low frequency electromagnetic waves, sound waves, water memory, Zep Tepi, telepathy, levitation, etc. Some of this stuff, like Edgar Chase the “Sleeping Prophet”, I have trouble with, but who am I to debate Dr. Schoch? As I said earlier, Schoch is a scientist with an open mind who does not reject all theories deemed “pseudoscience” out of hand, but rather keeps an open mind, and considers all ideas.
There are five appendixes (26 pages) that should not be skipped, as they are all very interesting and contribute to the understanding of the book.
The only thing negative I can say about Dr. Schoch’s book is that, while Dr. Schoch has done rigorous research and has an extensive bibliography, he has listed his references in parentheses in the text rather than footnotes or numeric references to notes or the bibliography. That, along with Dr. Schoch’s liberal use of parentheses, to add additional information, I found broke my train of thought, and was annoying at first, and maddening by the time I got to the end of the book. Thus four and a half stars rounded to five, but four and a half stars certainly does not reflect the excellent quality and content of the information contained in this book.
If you’re into this stuff like I am I think you will like this book, but if you are a liberal, closed mind, man-made global warming zealot, you ain’t gonn’a exactly fall in love with this book, and you might want to pick up some of Al Gore’s scientific work.
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Reviewed in the United States on February 6, 2017
