Intervention Theory: An alternative to Darwinism and Creationism

[BADecker]

Dr. Silver and Lloyd Pye think alike!


..........

Yet all of this thinking goes back to cause and effect.

Is it simply that we don't have any idea what was the Great First Cause? Or are we simply trying to get away from the God truth in a different way?

[CoinCube]

Intervention theory is simply a method to sidestep the issue. Intervention doesn't tell us where the universe comes from. It only tells us that someone or something intervened in the universe that was already there. Then you gotta figure out where the interveners came from - who created them.

Fun playing. But stupid if you want to get down to basics.

I pretty much agree with most of what you said here BADecker.

Intervention theory even if it was true exactly as written above would indeed remain a tangent perhaps even a potentially self-destructive one.

It may be the case that intervention theory is completely false and growing scientific knowledge will make this utterly clear with time. It may also be the case that there are aspects of it that are true but we are as a whole better off not delving too deeply at this time for as you mentioned it potentially takes our eyes and efforts away from where they need to be. What is true for the aggregate, however, is not necessarily true for all parts.

I find the theory interesting because I cannot immediately dismiss it. I present it as an intellectual exercise.

[CoinCube]

Harvard Scientists Theorize That Fast Radio Bursts Come From Alien Space Travel
http://www.popularmechanics.com/space/a25609/fast-radio-bursts-alien-space-travel/

Fast radio bursts (FRB) are perhaps the most mysterious phenomena we observe in the cosmos. Earlier this year, astronomers announced they had pinpointed an FRB for the first time in a dwarf galaxy that sits three billion light-years away. These intense blasts of radio waves last only 1 to 5 milliseconds, and they have perplexed astronomers since the first one was discovered in 2007.

The leading theories suggest that FRBs come from incredibly volatile cosmic events, such as material being ejected from supermassive black holes, the explosions of superluminous supernovae, or rotating magnetars that lash surrounding material with their immense magnetic fields. But researchers at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA) have proposed a much more enticing theory. What if FRBs aren't natural phenomena at all, but rather come from a massive artificial structure used to power alien spacecraft?

"Fast radio bursts are exceedingly bright given their short duration and origin at great distances, and we haven't identified a possible natural source with any confidence," said Harvard professor Avi Loeb in a press release. "An artificial origin is worth contemplating and checking."

The idea is that FRBs come from an immense alien power plant that is used to propel ships using light sails. A powerful beam of light can propel a reflective surface in the vacuum of space, which is the basis for light sail technology. Current human light sail experiments use light from the sun, but scientists are also working to develop a worldwide system of lasers that could propel small nanoprobes to about 20 percent the speed of light. Such technology, called photonic propulsion, could send a probe to Alpha Centauri, the closet star system to us, in roughly 20 years.

It's possible that a more advanced alien species uses photonic propulsion to power much larger spaceships. Loeb and fellow Harvard researcher Manasvi Lingam found that if an object twice the size of the Earth were harnessing solar power and converting the energy into a laser beam to propel spacecraft, then the radio emissions from it would be detectable even across billions of light-years. Such a planet-sized power system would be capable of accelerating a spaceship weighing a million tons, which is about 20 times bigger than the biggest cruise ships.

"That's big enough to carry living passengers across interstellar or even intergalactic distances," says Lingam.

The team's findings are outlined in a paper titled, "Fast Radio Bursts from Extragalactic Light Sails," which has been accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal Letters. To accelerate a spaceship's light sail, the device would need to constantly aim its beams of light at the craft. On Earth, we would see this from time to time as a quick flash of high intensity radio waves rather than a sustained signal because the movement of distant galaxies and planets means the laser would only line up with our planet for a split second.

The fast radio burst that we located earlier this year actually was detected nine times over the course of six months, which, if the signal is coming from an alien power plant, could be an indication that the device lines up with us regularly, or we could be seeing the planet-sized laser system being switched on and off.

Of course, this is all highly speculative theory. The new study simply outlines the fact that it is possible that FRBs are from an alien propulsion system according to our current laws of physics. Our species is nowhere near achieving such advanced technology, but perhaps a more advanced race has unlocked large-scale interstellar travel.

Loeb was asked whether he really believes FRBs come from an advanced alien civilization, to which he responded: "Science isn't a matter of belief, it's a matter of evidence. Deciding what's likely ahead of time limits the possibilities. It's worth putting ideas out there and letting the data be the judge."

[signature200]

Large speed is good,but people will not physically survive such acceleration. In General, I believe that life on earth originated from space.

[BADecker]

In general, where did life come from? It could not have been from any kind of evolution that we know. Evolution is based on random chance, and life is so extremely complex that random chance is out of the question. The kind of random chance that life needs is way beyond any kind of probability we understand of existing. In other words, evolution is science fiction.

Consider what I said at https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1796373.msg17917526#msg17917526

Think about life. Think about one living cell. How many atoms and molecules are in one living cell?

If all these atoms in a non-living, inanimate form had to come together in just the right way to form a living cell, what are the odds against it ever happening... especially if there was no life around at all? The odds against this happening are so great as to render it impossible.

But, let's imagine that it happened. Let's say that all the atoms and molecules of a simple living cell happened, by chance, to come together, in just the right places with relation to each other, to form what a living cell would be like if it existed. It still wouldn't be alive.

Next, the inanimate atoms and molecules would have to be "kick-started" into motion, all at the same time, and in just the right way, for life to exist. The odds against this happening are so great, as well, as to be literally impossible.

But let's say that both of the impossible things happened. The atoms and molecules lined up, and were somehow kick-started into motion in just the right way to form a living cell. Then what would happen? Nature and the chemicals around this new living cell would immediately destroy the life. The odds that the life would not be destroyed by nature around it are so greatly in favor of the destruction, that the life would absolutely and certainly be destroyed. It is impossible that the life would keep on living.

However, if the living cell somehow kept on living, then the cell would have to gain a whole bunch of extra molecules and atoms in just the right places and at just the right times, and with just the right motions for this cell to divide, thereby forming reproduction. The odds against this happening would be so great that it would be impossible. The cell would die of old age, or of chemical actions in nature surrounding it.

The story of Evolution is a story that says that these impossible-to-happen things happened. Evolution is impossible over and over and over again. Life in nature, through Evolution, is so extremely impossible that there isn't even a hint of a chance that it could happen. Why in the world would anyone believe in evolution science fiction?

Now, some will say that this is abiogenesis, not evolution. But the fact is that their evolution would be a lot more impossible because it would include random changes in far more atoms and molecules, making the odds against their evolution even greater than the odds against abiogenesis, as expressed above.

In addition, nobody has ever found anything that is pure random. Everything operates by cause and effect. Whatever exists and changes does so according to the laws of cause and effect, which exsit all around us all the time.

Evolution is foolishness. The ignorant are caught by it. Scientists and universities are getting rich by spreading their science fiction evolution.

Scientists and universities have an evolution religion going for themselves. And they don't ask for donations. Rather, they scam students by making them pay to learn evolution stupidity. Then, when the students fail in their loan payments, Government covers it, and we all pay through taxes. Evolution is the religion that is scamming us all!

In other words, if life came about by intervention, then whatever intervened is way different that anything that we see in the universe today. And, it had supreme capabilities. We're back to God.

[Lieldoryn]

No one came back to God. If we assume that life on earth was brought from space, what does God do? You want to say that the aliens did people and clay? Do not tell me.

[BADecker]

No one came back to God.

What does this mean? What does going back to God have to do with anything in intervention theory?

If we assume that life on earth was brought from space, what does God do?

If life was brought to earth from space, the focus is simply life on earth. It still doesn't tell us how life came into being. And that is the important part. How did life get its start.

Life is so complex that if aliens started it, then aliens are essentially God.

Several people have asked who started God; who made God? We don't know enough about the universe to even guess this. And, if God is outside of the universe, we can't really begin to even think what that means. The answer to where God came from, or what He is about is way beyond anything that we can even consider.

If the aliens that brought us here (assuming intervention theory is accurate) are from the universe, than who or what created their life? We don't see anything else other than God?

You want to say that the aliens did people and clay? Do not tell me.

What is clay? Clay is the elements, like the thing that people are made up of. It's all over the place. It is inanimate. Certainly it wasn't aliens that made people out of clay. But if it is, they are in a position that you might as well call them God. Because that's how great they are.

[Okurkabinladin]

OP,

so the "intervention" is basically way to abridge differences between Darwinian and creationist theory? Well, it is seems possible. Afterall, those are all merely theories as they cannot be verified by reconstruction. Possible yes. Thank you for this fun topic and do not get too worried about local trolls pretending to understand Darwin.

[CoinCube]

OP,

so the "intervention" is basically way to abridge differences between Darwinian and creationist theory? Well, it is seems possible. Afterall, those are all merely theories as they cannot be verified by reconstruction. Possible yes. Thank you for this fun topic and do not get too worried about local trolls pretending to understand Darwin.

Your welcome thanks for the encouraging comments. Thankfully this thread has been remarkabally light on trolls.

BadDecker above is appears to simply be worried that the idea is very speculative and if accepted might distract people from needed spiritual growth. I understand this concern but do not share it for the following reason.

If intervention theory is true then monotheism may have been introduced as a part of said intervention. Any intervening agent would presumably have done so by gifting humanity a simplified version of its own philosophy/religion as a known functional template.

If an unimaginably advanced intervening agent believes in God that is hardly an argument for atheism. I see nothing incompatible with the idea that divine will manifest itself indirectly first via influencing  higher order entities which in turn influence us.

That said this thread is extremely speculative. As both you and BadDecker have noted it is fun stuff. Interesting but also unproven.

[CoinCube]

Does God Guide World Affairs?
https://www.tomorrowsworld.org/magazines/2008/may-june/does-god-guide-world-affairs

RISE AND FALL OF NATIONS

In the 1400s and 1500s, Portuguese and Spanish navigators set out to explore and claim parts of the world and spread their Roman Catholic faith. From Rome, the pope in 1500ad intervened to settle their competing claims to the "new world." He awarded most of the new territory to Spain, but what is now Brazil and most of Africa went to Portugal. Over the next century, the Dutch, French and English also explored and claimed new territories.

The nations that have dominated our modern world began to emerge as powers when Philip of Spain launched his Armada against Britain in 1588. Philip sent 130 ships, 2,500 cannons and 30,000 men in an attempt to bring Protestant England back into the Roman Catholic fold. But a heavy storm pummeled the Armada before it arrived, and faster English ships with longer-range cannons peppered the Armada as it moved up the English Channel, causing the Spanish ships to flee north toward Scotland—trailed by English ships that had nearly run out of ammunition. As they sailed around Scotland and Ireland, many of Spain's ships floundered and were lost in a north Atlantic storm—a storm that the English viewed as God's intervention. "The defeat of the Spanish Armada marked the decline of Spain and the rise of England as a world power" (The Battle 100, p. 54, Lanning).

Remember, God foretold the descendants of Joseph would become great—and the Spanish are not descendants of Joseph. God was beginning to fulfill His ancient promises.

In the mid-18th century, competing claims in Canada and the Ohio Valley led to conflict between the English and the French. At the Battle of Quebec in 1759, English troops defeated the French and by treaty gained all the land France had claimed east of the Mississippi River and north of the Great Lakes. This meant that all of Canada belonged to England. Between 1759 and 1805, the English navy decisively defeated the French navy at Quiberon Bay and Trafalgar. In 1815, a combined army of British, Dutch, Belgians and Prussians, led by the British Duke of Wellington, defeated Napoleon at the battle of Waterloo. A rainstorm on the night before the battle forced Napoleon to delay his attack, which allowed time for the Prussians to arrive and tip the balance of power to the British. Napoleon's defeat, aided by a rainstorm, brought an end to French domination of Europe.

In a prophetic sense, the contests at Quebec, Quiberon Bay, Trafalgar and Waterloo were contests between Ephraim (Britain) and Reuben (France). God foretold that Ephraim would become great and prevail, but that Reuben "shall not excel" (Genesis 48:19; 49:3–4), according to God's plan.

At about the same time, the United States was beginning its ascent to greatness. During the late 1700s, the American colonial army under George Washington withstood and outmaneuvered the more powerful British, often with the help of favorable changes in the weather at just the right time (as at the battles of Long Island and Yorktown), and by a combination of bold decisions by Washington (as at Trenton) and bad decisions by British commanders (as at Saratoga). The 1781 surrender of the British at Yorktown, one of the most influential battles in history, led to the independence of the United States and launched America on the road to becoming the world's most prosperous nation and eventually the only superpower. In prophetic terms, Manasseh (America) and Ephraim (England) were to become two separate nations—a great nation and a great company of nations—which is exactly what happened as a result of the American Revolution. In spite of losing the American colonies, England continued to amass an overseas empire "upon which the sun never set"—becoming a great company or commonwealth of nations—just as God predicted thousands of years earlier.

MIRACLES AND WORLD WAR

Some of modern history's most stunning examples of divine intervention occurred during the "dark days" of World War II. In the summer of 1940, the German blitzkrieg had pushed 400,000 Allied troops to the European coast near Dunkirk, France, where British military planners were expecting the greatest military disaster in their history. Yet, in a tactical blunder, Hitler suddenly halted the advance of the German tanks just as they were closing in for the kill. The King of England announced a National Day of Prayer, and thousands flocked to churches. During the nine days of the Dunkirk evacuation, the normally stormy English Channel remained as calm as a millpond—while a storm broke over Flanders, grounding Germany's Luftwaffe. These unexpected events allowed nearly the whole Allied army of 338,000 irreplaceable soldiers to survive and fight again—an amazing development which British Prime Minister Winston Churchill called a "miracle of deliverance," when thousands of Englishmen gave the credit to God, as Walter Lord wrote in The Miracle of Dunkirk (pp. 272–274).

The British thanked God, and appealed to Him for His intervention. During the Battle of Britain, as German and British planes fought in the skies over Britain and the English Channel, the King declared another National Day of Prayer. Prime Minister Churchill announced on a radio broadcast, "Bearing ourselves humbly before God, but conscious that we serve an unfolding purpose, we are ready to defend our native land…" (We Have a Guardian, Grant, p. 13). After the Battle of Britain, the commander of the Royal Air Force observed, "I say with absolute conviction, that I can trace the intervention of God, not only in the battle itself, but in events leading up to it… it was all part of a mighty plan" (Grant, p. 19).

When British troops were massed in Egypt for the Battle of El Alamein, another National Day of Prayer was called in Britain. General Bernard Montgomery, who led the British army at El Alamein, exhorted his troops that, "The soldiers must have faith in God," and he proclaimed: "Let us pray that the Lord, mighty in battle, will give us the victory" (Grant, pp. 30–31). The British saw the hand of God in how events transpired—not only was German commander Erwin Rommel away in Germany as the battle began, but his temporary replacement General Georg Stumme died of a heart attack on his way to the front. The German Africa Corps later withdrew after suffering heavy losses.

When the Allies landed troops on the Atlantic coast of Morocco, the shores of Sicily and the beaches of Normandy, the hand of God was visible in the remarkable circumstances of these endeavors. For the invasion of North Africa in late 1941, a fleet of 650 ships from America and Britain sailed to Casablanca, unnoticed by German planes or submarines, because many of the ships were obscured by "a squall that seemed to be traveling with our ships" (Grant, pp. 31–34, 49). Bad weather had been predicted, which would have made the landings difficult or unsuccessful—yet the Allies' ships arrived to find a calm, smooth sea! The Allied naval commander termed it "incredible"—and many recognized the hand of God at work.

In July 1943, U.S. General Dwight Eisenhower launched his invasion of Sicily with a prayer and a comment: "The die is cast, and the events are in the hands of God" (Grant, p. 38). During the night, gale force winds buffeted Allied ships, but the wild weather also caused Italians defending Sicilian shores to discount any signs of enemy activity. By the next morning, however, the sea suddenly calmed in a way that "seemed miraculous" (Grant, p. 39) and Allied troops could easily take the beaches.

Similarly, in June 1944, a temporary break in nearly a month of stormy weather allowed the Allies to mount their D-Day invasion at Normandy on June 6, while the Germans were still caught off guard by the continuing bad weather. On D-Day, Rommel was once again in Berlin—this time celebrating his wife's birthday. Considering these dramatic events, the soldiers who planned the invasion and the writers who recorded it spoke of "The Miracle of D-Day" (Daily Telegraph, April 7, 1947) and observed: "Only the thoughtless can fail to realize how great a part Providence has played in the swift and successful transformation of the great war" (Daily Mail, November 14, 1942).

There may be no better example of a sudden turn of events than the Battle of Midway in the Pacific in June 1942. A Japanese task force of four heavy carriers, 80 support ships, and hundreds of technically superior aircraft flown by experienced pilots had begun to attack and bomb the strategic American-held island of Midway. They faced an American force consisting of outdated planes, inexperienced pilots and three older carriers. Waves of American planes attacked Japanese carriers without scoring a hit, and many American squadrons were nearly destroyed by Japanese gunfire. Yet when the Japanese admiral finally spotted American ships, he ordered his pilots to return to their carriers for more fuel and torpedoes. Then, suddenly—as if out of nowhere—a group of American dive-bombers dropped out of the sky to deliver their bombs onto the wooden flight decks of Japanese carriers littered with bombs, torpedoes and fully fueled airplanes. In just five or six minutes, three heavy carriers—the pride of the Japanese fleet—were ripped by tremendous explosions, engulfed with smoke and flames and headed for the bottom of the Pacific. A fourth carrier soon fell, along with 275 airplanes and 4,000 irreplaceable soldiers—including experienced pilots and one of Japan's brightest commanders who chose to go down with his ship. This sudden, dramatic and unexpected reversal changed the course of the Pacific war in a matter of minutes. "Before Midway, Japan experienced only victory; after the battle, they met a succession of defeats" (Lanning, p. 150).

Many modern writers describe these incidents as amazing bits of luck. However, when viewed as part of a bigger picture, it illustrates how God has repeatedly intervened to guide the outcome of world events to accomplish His purpose.

[CoinCube]

Tiny Solar Activity Changes Affect Earth's Climate
http://www.space.com/19280-solar-activity-earth-climate.html

Even small changes in solar activity can impact Earth's climate in significant and surprisingly complex ways, researchers say.

The sun is a constant star when compared with many others in the galaxy. Some stars pulsate dramatically, varying wildly in size and brightness and even exploding. In comparison, the sun varies in the amount of light it emits by only 0.1 percent over the course of a relatively stable 11-year-long pattern known as the solar cycle.

Still, "the light reaching the top of the Earth's atmosphere provides about 2,500 times as much energy as the total of all other sources combined," solar physicist Greg Kopp at the University of Colorado told SPACE.com. As such, even 0.1 percent of the amount of light the sun emits exceeds all other energy sources the Earth's atmosphere sees combined, such as the radioactivity naturally emitted from Earth's core, Kopp explained.

To learn more about how such tiny variations in solar energy might impact terrestrial climate, the National Research Council (NRC) convened dozens of experts in many fields, such as plasma physics, solar activity, atmospheric chemistry, fluid dynamics and energetic particle physics.

Many of the ways the scientists proposed these fluctuations in solar activity could influence Earth were complicated in nature. For instance, solar energetic particles and cosmic rays could reduce ozone levels in the stratosphere. This in turn alters the behavior of the atmosphere below it, perhaps even pushing storms on the surface off course.

"In the lower stratosphere, the presence of ozone causes a local warming because of the breakup of ozone molecules by ultraviolet light," climate scientist Jerry North at Texas A&M University told SPACE.com.

When the ozone is removed, "the stratosphere there becomes cooler, increasing the temperature contrast between the tropics and the polar region. The contrast in temperatures in the stratosphere and the upper troposphere leads to instabilities in the atmospheric flow west to east. The instabilities make for eddies or irregular motions."

These eddies feed the strength of jet streams, ultimately altering flows in the upper troposphere, the layer of atmosphere closest to Earth's surface. "The geographical positioning of the jets aloft can alter the distribution of storms over the middle latitudes," North said. "So the sun might have a role to play in this kind of process. I would have to say this would be a very difficult mechanism to prove in climate models. That does not mean it may not exist — just hard to prove."

In addition, climate scientist Gerald Meehl at the National Center for Atmospheric Research and his colleagues suggest that solar variability is leaving a definite imprint on climate, especially in the Pacific Ocean.

When researchers look at sea surface temperature data during sunspot peak years, the tropical Pacific showed a pattern very much like that expected with La Niña, a cyclical cooling of the Pacific Ocean that regularly affects climate worldwide, with sunspot peak years leading to a cooling of almost 1 degree Celsius (1.8 degrees Fahrenheit) in the equatorial eastern Pacific. In addition, peaks in the sunspot cycle were linked with increased precipitation in a number of areas across the globe, as well as above-normal sea-level pressure in the mid-latitude North and South Pacific.
...

A photograph of the aurora over Mason City, Iowa, 18 September 1941.


The Geomagnetic Blitz of September 1941
https://eos.org/features/the-geomagnetic-blitz-of-september-1941

Seventy-five years ago, on 18–19 September 1941, the Earth experienced a great magnetic storm, one of the most intense ever recorded. It arrived at a poignant moment in history, when radio and electrical technology was emerging as a central part of daily life and when much of the world was embroiled in World War II, which the United States had not yet officially entered.

The illuminated night sky exposed an Allied convoy to German attack.Auroras danced across the night sky as voltage surged in power grid lines. A radio blackout interrupted fan enjoyment of a baseball game, while another radio program was interrupted by private phone conversations. Citizens, already on edge, wondered if neon lights were some sort of antiaircraft signal. And far away in the North Atlantic, the illuminated night sky exposed an Allied convoy to German attack.

These effects raised awareness within the scientific community and among the public of the societal significance of the effects that the Sun and outer space can have on the Earth—what we now call space weather.

Solar-Terrestrial Interaction
On 10 September 1941, during the declining phase of solar cycle 17, astronomers saw an unusually large, low-latitude group of sunspots on the eastern limb of the Sun. The spots had formed, as they all do, with the buoyant emergence of a concentrated bundle of magnetic field lines from the Sun’s interior through the photosphere. Over the course of the next week the spots grew, and the Sun’s rotation brought them near the center of the solar disk as viewed from Earth [e.g., Richardson, 1941]. The sunspot group was large enough to be seen with the naked eye.

At 08:38 universal time (UT) on 17 September 1941, the Greenwich Observatory spectrohelioscope recorded a solar flare above this sunspot group [Newton, 1941]. The emitted ultraviolet and X-ray radiation abruptly enhanced the ionization of the Earth’s atmosphere, causing a sharp perturbation known as a “crochet” in dayside ground-based recordings of the geomagnetic field and temporarily interfering with high-frequency radio communication. Subsequently, scientists at the Mount Wilson Observatory in California observed another solar flare at 16:26 UT

On the basis of daily sunspot reports supplied by the U.S. Naval Observatory, the Department of Terrestrial Magnetism at the Carnegie Institution of Washington formally issued a warning to radio operators that they could expect significant disturbances to ionospheric and geomagnetic conditions beginning on about 18 September [McNish, 1941a]. This prediction, which turned out to be accurate, is a noteworthy development in the historical development of methods for reliably forecasting space weather.

Less than 20 hours after the flare was reported by Greenwich, a magnetic storm commenced at 0412 UT on 18 September with the arrival at Earth of a coronal mass ejection. This mass ejection abruptly compressed the magnetopause and generated a magnetic impulse that was recorded by observatories around the world [Newton, 1941]. The magnetic superstorm that followed was complex, intense, and of long duration.

A magnetic observatory in Cheltenham, Md., operated by the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey, registered six separate occurrences of geomagnetic storms with a K index of 9 (the most intense value possible). Five of these occurred consecutively over a 24-hour period. In terms of a related global index , the level of geomagnetic activity over a 24-hour period has not since been matched
...
The popular press provided vivid accounts of the auroras. The Brooklyn Eagle [1941] described celestial “neon lights.” The Chicago Tribune [1941a] reported that a “cosmic brush painted the Chicago sky with light” and that motorists parked on the highways had caused a traffic jam as they sought a clear view of the celestial spectacle.

According to the Washington Post [1941a], some people wondered if the celestial events had something to do with national defense: “Was it an antiaircraft search battery?” These were, after all, difficult times. The United States was already being drawn into World War II [e.g., Heinrichs, 1988], and many citizens anticipated even greater involvement.

Auroras were also seen in Europe, but not surprisingly, most newspaper articles focused on wartime events. Newspapers, for example, succinctly reported that the British Royal Air Force carried out a raid on a German supply base on the Baltic Sea [Washington Post, 1941b] and that the Germans bombarded Leningrad [Chicago Tribune, 1941b], each under the lights of the aurora borealis.

When the magnetic storm finally subsided and the aurora faded, a New York Times [1941c] article described the events, in war terms that were common at the time, as an “ethereal blitz.” Some readers even optimistically saw the auroral displays as a representation of hope for victory [New York Times, 1941d].

Aurora over Bergenfield, N.J., September 1941