Paranormal Studies 313: Ancient Aircraft

Professor Grimes knew something was wrong the moment he set foot inside Corliss Hall. Even though it was not yet ten o’clock, it was now early spring and the weather outside was noticeably warm and humid. Inside the building the air was even warmer. The building’s heating and air unit has gone out, he realized. Just like it did last year. Maybe they’ll finally replace it this time, instead of patching it up and hoping for the best.

The professor made his way to his classroom and opened the door. A blast of hot, stuffy air hit him. He quickly set his papers down on his desk, then walked over to the windows and opened them. A burst of cool air wafted into the room. He knew that the air wasn’t actually cool, but it was so hot inside the room that it seemed cool by comparison. A quick glance at the ceiling revealed a total lack of ceiling fans. They’ll just have to make do with an open window, he thought.

Having done everything he could to make the classroom more tolerable, the professor settled down into the chair behind his desk and waited. To his surprise, when the class started ten minutes later he had six students present. True, the students were complaining about the heat. But they were still there. He found it remarkable that the suffocating heat had no effect on how many people attended class. That told him that the attendance issues were not caused by the room’s outdated fixtures or somewhat uncomfortable chairs, but by a general sense of apathy. People simply did not want to come to class. He suspected that the only way to increase attendance would be to relocate to a different planet – one where young people were more interested in learning, and less interested in partying all night and sleeping in the next day.

“Good morning, class,” the professor said cheerfully.

Dan spoke up. “It’s way too hot to be a good morning. I am roasting in here.”

“As are we all, young man. Consider it an opportunity to build character. After all, air conditioning is a rather recent development. The electrical air conditioner was not developed until 1902. By way of comparison, the Wright brothers did not make their inaugural flight until 1903. In terms of human history, air conditioning is a very recent development. For pretty much everyone who has ever lived, summer was simply a time when people were hot, sticky, and uncomfortable.”

“I still don’t like it,” Dan complained. “I demand the right to be comfortable at all times. This suffering thing is for the birds.”

The professor sighed. “Sadly, the modern educational establishment is committed to keeping you comfortable and unchallenged, even at the expense of your education. I shudder to think what would happen if civilization ever collapsed and people were forced to live as their ancestors once did. It would not be pretty.”

Max spoke up. “Wait a minute. Are you saying that air conditioning actually predates flight? I thought air conditioning was a lot newer than that. It might have been invented in 1902, but I bet it wasn’t until decades later that most people had air conditioners. It couldn’t have been very common back then.”

“For that matter, air conditioning is not common today,” the professor replied. “At least not on a global basis. Only first-world nations are that pampered. The rest of the world is actually cold in the winter and hot in the summer. They experience something called ‘seasons’. But, to get back to something else you said, air conditioning does not predate flight. I only said that it predated the Wright brothers’ flight. There is a difference.”

“No there’s not,” Max said. “Oh, sure, other people claimed to have invented airplanes a few years before the Wright brothers, but they’re not able to prove it. There simply aren’t any other documented claims of earlier flights. Saying ‘I did it first, but I did it privately with no witnesses because that’s just how I roll’ doesn’t cut it. The Wright brothers had the first powered, controlled, heavier-than-air flight, and that’s all that there is to it.”

Professor Grimes smiled. “I will agree that, as far as we have been able to determine, the Wright brothers were the first ones in modern history to successfully achieve controlled, repeatable, heavier-than-air flight. However, modern man is not the inventor of flight. Ancient cultures were building aircraft thousands of years ago – and that’s what we’re going to talk about today.

“One thing historians are often guilty of is glossing over or ignoring evidence that does not fit the current paradigm. For example, people today believe that the Wright brothers invented heavier-than-air flight, so when historians read ancient accounts of powered aircraft they dismiss them out-of-hand. Since they’ve already decided that aircraft couldn’t possibly have existed back then, they ignore everything to the contrary and become blind to the copious evidence that actually exists. For example, the ancient Babylonians had a set of laws called the Halkatha. One of the things these laws say is this: ‘To operate a flying machine is a great privilege. Knowledge of flying is most ancient, a gift of the gods of old for saving lives.’”

“So?” Max said. “Big deal! I can go out on the internet and find entire papers written on the ethics of time travel. That doesn’t mean we have time machines.”

“It actually is a big deal. Note that the Babylonians did not view flight as a purely hypothetical thing, which is the way we view time travel. In the statement I just read they claimed that flying machines exist; that operating them is a privilege; and that the technology actually predated the Babylonians and came from a much older culture.”

“And they said it was a gift from the gods,” Max pointed out.

“That’s an interesting point,” the professor agreed. “Throughout history, primitive cultures have tended to describe more advanced cultures in godlike terms. The gap between societies is occasionally so great that the less-advanced tribe assumes it is dealing with some type of superior being. What the Babylonians were really saying was that the society that invented flight was far more advanced than they were. Interestingly, it is common for ancient cultures to describe those who lived before the Flood as gods, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

“To get back to the subject matter: this is not the only evidence we have that the Babylonians knew something about flight. The Babylonian ‘Epic of Etana’ actually has a description of flight, and accurately describes what the Earth looks like at different altitudes. Even though the story dates back to 2400 BC, we were not able to confirm its description of what the Earth looked like at very high altitudes until the 1950s.”

“Did the epic actually describe how the airplane worked?” Max asked.

“Unfortunately, no. According to the story the flight was made on an eagle. That would normally discredit the entire episode if it was not for the astonishing accuracy of the story’s descriptions. Whoever wrote it really did know how the view of the Earth changed at different altitudes, including extremely high altitudes that brushed against the edge of space itself.”

“Yeah, but – an eagle?” Max said doubtfully. “Seriously? You really think they referred to their supposed aircraft as an eagle?”

“I don’t see why not,” the professor replied. “After all, the United States named the craft that landed on the Moon the Eagle. But this is not the only example we have. The Chaldeans actually did describe how their aircraft worked. The Sifr’ ala has a lot to say about the construction and operation of aircraft. It even discusses topics such as wind resistance, gliding, stability, and the perils of flight in the winter. Sadly, only fragments of the text have survived, and we don’t have enough information to reconstruct the machine that is described in the text. But it was clearly meant to be a treatise on how to build an operate an actual flying machine.”

Lora spoke up. “Who were the Chaldeans?”

The professor looked at her, puzzled. “Surely you’ve heard of King Nebuchadnezzar, haven’t you? He was a Chaldean. They ruled over Babylon in the 6th century BC.”

“So they were Babylonians?”

“Yes and no. They did not found Babylon, but they did conquer it and rule over it.”

“What’s the difference?”

“Suppose that the Chinese army invaded and conquered the United States. Would that make them Americans?”

Lora thought for a moment. “Um, I guess not.”

“Quite so. Now–”

“Hold on just a minute,” Max said. “How did the Chaldean aircraft work?”

“It’s impossible to tell, I’m afraid. Not enough of the manuscript survived. Given that the fragments are about four thousand years old that really isn’t too surprising. There is another factor here that is working against us: ancient civilizations viewed flight as a dangerous secret whose knowledge should be suppressed. According to historical records, in 1766 BC the Chinese Emperor Cheng Tang ordered Ki-Kung-Shi to build an airplane. The account tells us that he succeeded and was able to fly from one province to another, but after he built it the Emperor was so worried that the knowledge might fall into the wrong hands that he had the aircraft destroyed.”

“So the secret was lost, then,” Lora said.

Professor Grimes shook his head. “Apparently not. In the 3rd century BC the Chinese poet Chu Yun wrote about his experiences flying a jade-colored aircraft over the Gobi Desert. He apparently made an aerial survey of the area. Also, in the 4th century AD the Chinese writer Ko-Hung spoke of a flying machine made of wood that had rotating blades that propelled the vehicle through the air.”

“Like a helicopter?” Lora asked.

“Or a propeller-driven plane,” the professor replied. “Those also use rotating blades to drive the craft forward. Nor were the Chinese the only ones who reported using heavier-than-air machines. In the same century that Ko-Hung took to the air, the Buddhist monk Gunarvarman flew from Ceylon to the island of Java – a distance of 2,300 miles. A rather remarkable achievement.”

Max spoke up. “This is all crazy! Look. In order to build a heavier-than-air machine you have to have some kind of engine. Building an engine that is light enough to put on a plane, but powerful enough to get it into the air, is not an easy task. The Wright brothers could do it because they were building on the work of the Industrial Revolution. You can’t just invent planes from nowhere – you need an industrial civilization first. You can’t tell me that the Babylonians and the Chaldeans and the Chinese had industrial civilizations.”

“No, you’re quite right,” the professor agreed. “But I am not claiming that they invented the airplane; I am only saying that they had them. By way of analogy, the American Indians had guns and rifles, but they didn’t invent them – they got them from a far more advanced civilization. The main reason the Indians lost is because they had no manufacturing base. They ultimately depended upon Westerners for their weapons, and when you find yourself depending on your enemy in order to get the weapons you need to fight them, well, I’m afraid you are doomed. Likewise, I believe that these ancient cultures got the technology for powered flight from someone else.

“In fact, the historical records itself hints at this. There is a manuscript from Nepal that dates back to the 12th century. The manuscript has the gripping name Budhasvamin Brihat Katha Shlokasamgraha and is apparently a written record of a story that is much, much older. In this account there is a king who wishes to build an airplane. The court designers attempt to build one, but fail. They tell their king that the only people who can build such things are the ‘Yavanas’.”

“Aliens?” Lora asked.

Professor Grimes smiled. “No, I’m afraid not. Yavana is the Sanskrit name for the lighter-skinned people who lived in the eastern part of the Mediterranean. The term itself comes from the name Javan, who was one of Noah’s grandsons. The descendents of Javan populated Greece and the Mediterranean islands in the centuries after the Flood. Apparently they were the only ones who knew how to build aircraft. In the story the king managed to get one of the Yavanas to build him a plane. While he did get it, he was never told how it worked. The Yavans kept the plane’s inner workings a secret.”

“That’s sure convenient,” Max commented.

“It’s actually quite revealing. It would seem that in the ancient world there was a conscious effort to control heavier-than-air technology, much like modern nations try to control nuclear technology. The societies that had that knowledge kept it under tight control and were not interested in sharing it. In fact, it was so tightly controlled that apparently even having a working airplane was considered an unreasonable security risk.”

Max shook his head. “Isn’t that just a fancy way of saying that we have a lot of hearsay evidence, and that’s it? Are we just supposed to take these people’s word for it?”

The professor shook his head. “Not at all. In fact, we actually do have physical evidence. While we have not found any actual working aircraft, we have found scale models. For example, in 1898 an odd artifact was discovered in a tomb near Saqqara, Egypt. The artifact dated to around 200 BC. When archaeologists dug it up no one could tell what it was, so they just filed it away and forgot about it. It wasn’t until 1969 that someone ran across it again. Dr. Kalil Messiha was cleaning out the museum’s basement when he ran across it again, and he immediately realized that it looked very much like a model airplane. There’s a picture of it in your textbook, for those who care about such things.

“A research committee was formed to investigate it, and they began their work on December 12, 1971. What they found was quite remarkable. The model’s wings are aerodynamically shaped, the model’s body is tapered and terminates in a vertical tail fin, and there is a separate slotted piece on the tail – precisely like the back stabilizer of a modern airplane. According to the aerodynamic engineers on the panel the artifact was designed for flight. Besides its aerodynamic shape, the wing itself was counter-dihedral, which provided a great deal of lift at low speeds. The artifact was apparently a scale model of a cargo plane, and was designed to carry large amounts of cargo while requiring very little power. Unfortunately, we don’t know what powered it. The lower part of the tail is jagged, so it’s possible there was once something there that was broken off.”

“So they found a model,” Max said. “Big deal.”

The professor shook his head. “They have not found a model. So far they have found a total of 14 models in various tombs throughout Egypt. This means more than you think. As you may recall, Egyptian tombs were filled with models of things that existed in real life. If they placed models of aircraft in their tombs, one is left with the very real possibility that the Egyptians had actual life-sized aircraft as well. It should be noted that the model was very well designed; the experts who investigated it remarked that a lot of thought and knowledge had been put into it, and it was obviously the result of a great deal of experimental work. Whoever built it knew what they were doing and had built other aircraft before.”

Max shrugged. “It’s impressive, I’ll admit, but not that impressive. Didn’t you say it was designed to fly at low speeds?”

“About 60 MPH,” Professor Grimes replied.

“Exactly. So we’re not talking about high-performance supersonic aircraft. The average car can go faster than that.”

“In the case of the Egyptians, you are correct. But other artifacts have been found as well. For example, a small artifact was discovered in northern Columbia and is attributed to the Sinu civilization – a pre-Inca culture that lived between 500 AD and 800 AD. Once again, there is a picture of it in your textbook. As you can see, the artifact looks very much like an aircraft. This aircraft, though, was apparently a tail-engine jet, designed to fly at supersonic speeds. It has deltoid wings with straight edges, the wings are at the rear of the craft, and the wings tilt downward slightly – a feature specific to high-powered, high-performance aircraft. Another fascinating detail is that on the tail of the plane is an insignia that is on the left face of the rudder – precisely where you can find identification marks on many modern aircraft. What’s especially remarkable about the insignia is that the letter on the tail was not Columbian, but the Hebrew letter ‘beth’ – indicating that the plane was not built in Columbia, but in the Middle East. It’s also worth noting that six of these models have been found, with the same aerodynamically designed fuselage, wings, and triangular rudder.”

“But that doesn’t make sense!” Max complained. “Even today there are many countries that can’t make high-performance supersonic aircraft. You can’t tell me that back in 500 AD there was some guy in the jungle cranking out jet engines. That’s preposterous! Now, I can buy the Egyptian plane story. If the Wright brothers were able to build a dinky little engine in their bicycle shop then maybe somebody else, somewhere else, could do the same thing. All the Egyptians had was some low-powered plane that didn’t go very fast. But a supersonic jet is a whole other story. Nobody had that capability before the 1940s. If they did they could have ruled the world.”

“And yet the Sinu artifact still exists,” the professor pointed out. “Keep in mind that these artifacts are not forgeries. Aside from a total lack of evidence of fraud, there is the rather telling fact that the artifacts were discovered before we knew how to make those kind of planes. The Egyptian artifact wasn’t even recognized until decades later because when it was found heavier-than-air flight didn’t exist! Yet, you do have a point. Whoever built the Sinu model was clearly familiar with high-performance aircraft. Since it is highly unlikely that the Sinu people could have built it themselves, the only other alternative is that they came into contact with a civilization that could.

“I would also like to challenge the idea that supersonic technology was too difficult for ancient civilizations to master. It is true that they most likely couldn’t have built jets the way we build them today. A modern jet engine is a remarkably complex thing. But why are we assuming that they solved the problem the same way we did? The historical accounts we’ve discovered that describe how ancient aircraft work reveals a completely different technique.”

“Hold on,” Max said. “There are more ancient accounts of aircraft?”

“Actually, yes. In–”

“So not only have many ancient cultures claimed to have built aircraft, and not only do accurate models of ancient aircraft exist, but we even have their manufacturing documents? Why haven’t I heard about this before?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Professor Grimes asked. “We’ve talked about this before. The idea that ancient cultures had aircraft goes against the prevailing paradigm, so of course all information that supports it is buried and ignored. There is likewise copious evidence that dinosaurs and man lived together, that pterodactyls were common in Medieval Europe, and that ancient Colombian cultures actually tamed some dinosaurs and used them as beasts of burden. I even wrote a book on that very subject. Yet you will never see any of this evidence on TV or in the papers. The powers that be have decided that man and dinosaur did not live together and so, therefore, any and all evidence to the contrary can be simply dismissed. All evidence that goes against their theory is rejected, on the grounds that if it disagrees with their theory it must somehow be wrong, phony, or fraudulent.”

The professor sighed. “People today have no idea how science works. What should happen is that if evidence is found that disproves the theory, the theory should be thrown out. Instead it is the evidence that gets rejected. It is utter and total insanity, but it is the way things are today. People do this just as often in the hard sciences of biology and physics as they do in history and economics.

“But to get back to my point. There is an ancient Hindu text called the Samaranga Sutradhara. The text dates back to the 11th century, but it’s apparently a compilation of documents that are far older than that. One of the things the text contains is information regarding flight. It actually goes into a great amount of detail, covering everything from how the flying machine was powered, to the type of clothing pilots should wear, to what pilots should be fed. The text discussed aircraft design, function, and performance. The details are quite fascinating; you can read them in your textbook. The part that I want to focus on is the source of power for these aircraft. According to the text, the airplane was powered by ‘the energy latent in mercury’.”

“Mercury?” Max asked. “As in, the atomic element mercury? What energy latent in mercury?”

“That is another excellent question! As it turns out, ancient alchemists thought very highly of mercury. Isaac Newton believed that it was an element of immense power. He once said this: ‘Because of the way by which mercury may be impregnated, it has been thought fit to be concealed by others that have known it, and therefore may possibly be an inlet to something more noble, not to be communicated without immense danger to the world.’”

“Mercury may be impregnated?” Lora asked, puzzled.

“In this context ‘impregnated’ means that mercury may be filled with energy. Either that, or something can be done to mercury to extract energy from it. Newton saw mercury as a tremendous source of energy and power. In fact, Newton thought that mercury immensely dangerous – so dangerous that the world itself would be in danger if anyone ever found its secret. Apparently he did a good job of hiding it because no one in the modern world has any idea how mercury could be used to power anything.”

Max spoke up. “Now hold on. If we can’t do it, doesn’t that mean it probably can’t be done?”

“Why would you think that?” the professor asked. “Do you believe that we know all there is to know?”

“C’mon, professor! There are, like, 7 billion people in the world today. If it could have been done someone would have done it by now. I find it really hard to believe that mercury could have some amazing properties that no one has ever discovered.”

“Really? Did you know that when superconductivity was first discovered, no one had any idea why it worked? In fact, even though the phenomenon was discovered in 1911, no one was able to explain why it worked until 1950. Even the theory that they finally came up with only explains some aspects of it, and there are some types of superconductivity that cannot be explained today. We know it works and we can demonstrate it, but we don’t really know why it works – and that’s despite all of our technology, and despite the fact that it has been studied by some of the most brilliant minds in the world. People are still earning Nobel prizes over this.

“By comparison, how many people are trying to use mercury as a power source? In the ancient world the answer was ‘a lot’; in the modern world the answer is ‘pretty much zero’. Since Newton didn’t record how the process worked, we dismiss the entire thing as a hoax – even though Newton is possibly one of the top five most brilliant men of all time. He was no fool. Just because we can’t do it doesn’t mean it can’t be done. It’s quite possible that the reason we can’t do it is because we’re not trying.”

“Ok, fine,” Max said. “But there’s a bigger issue here. You say that the Egyptian airplane was the product of a lot of earlier design work. I’m sure that applies even more to the Sinu one. After all, nobody starts out by building a supersonic aircraft. But you can’t tell me that the Egyptians and the Colombians invented airplanes. Where did the technology come from? From the mysterious Yavanas?”

Professor Grimes shook his head. “I think it’s a bit older than that. You were quite right when you pointed out that an invention as complex as powered flight requires an advanced civilization. I think that all of this technology originally came from the pre-Flood world. When the Flood happened Noah probably preserved as much technology as he could. It’s worth noting that all of the animals he took with him would have taken up only 1/3rd of the Ark. That leaves plenty of room for lots of other things. I doubt he had enough room take an actual aircraft, but he certainly could have taken blueprints, documents, books, and so forth.”

“Are you serious?” Max asked.

“I am perfectly serious. It makes sense. Ancient cultures attributed their knowledge to the Yavanas, who were descendents of Noah. If the Yavanas did not invent flight themselves then they must have got it from an earlier civilization. That points directly to the pre-Flood world. It’s worth noting that 16 centuries passed between Adam and the Flood. Those people were not dummies. Genesis 4 tells us that in the lifetime of Adam they developed farming, animal husbandry, music, and could work brass and iron. In the space of less than 9 centuries they went from absolutely nothing to the Iron Age. The Bible doesn’t tell us what they did with the next 7 centuries, but it’s worth noting that it only took the West about 4 centuries to go from the Medieval period to what we have today. Given the immense lifespans that people had back then, the pre-Flood world could easily have surpassed ours. It’s impossible to know exactly how far they got, but the few pre-Flood artifacts we’ve found are intriguing. They indicate a rather sophisticated degree of technology.”

“What pre-Flood artifacts?”

“Well, take the Coso artifact, for example. It was discovered on February 13, 1961 by a man named Mikesell in California. He was out hunting for rocks one day, and when he cracked open one of his finds he found a curious metal object inside the rock. When the artifact was examined people realized that it looked a lot like a spark plug. There’s a picture of it in your book, for those who are curious. Conventional dating techniques claim that the artifact is about a half-million years old, which is preposterous. But it could easily have come from the pre-Flood world. If that ancient civilization did have spark plugs then that says a great deal about their technological capabilities. There have been a number of other fascinating items, found encased in rocks and coal deposits, that offer glimpses at that lost world. It is entirely possible that it was as advanced as our own. That, however, is a topic for another time.”

“As advanced as our own?” Max asked. “Isn’t that going a little too far?”

“Do you not remember what Solomon wrote in the book of Ecclesiastes? ‘The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun. Is there any thing whereof it may be said, See, this is new? it hath been already of old time, which was before us.’”

“Yeah, but he was speaking metaphorically,” Max replied. “I mean, come on. You can’t tell me that Noah had an iPhone and watched basketball games on his 73” HDTV.”

The professor shook his head. “You are confusing the implementation of an idea with an idea itself. The ancients may not have had an iPhone, but they might have had an effective method of long-distance communication. Very little survived the Flood, so all we can do is look at the technological capabilities of the civilizations that immediately followed it. What we find is remarkable. We’ve spent today’s class discussing airplanes, but there is a great deal more. There is quite a lot of evidence that ancient civilizations had mastered nuclear power and even possessed nuclear weapons. It is possible that they were able to create plutonium. That, however, is a topic we will explore later.

“Modern man thinks a great deal of itself. We assume that we are the very pinnacle of knowledge and wisdom, and that all those who came before us were savages. We ignore the very real evidence that we are not the first ones to travel down this path. There was another civilization that came long ago – the first civilization. They, too, dominated the world. They, too, had tremendous knowledge and power. However, they were utterly corrupt and evil, and the Lord came and destroyed them. Their great technology did them no good when the Lord God reigned down judgment upon them.

“History is about to repeat itself. For the second time mankind has created a high-technology civilization. For the second time mankind has dominated the entire globe. And also, for the second time, mankind has become utterly corrupt and evil. We will soon be at the point that Genesis 6 describes, when ‘the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually’.”

“So?” Max asked.

“As Jesus said, ‘But as the days of Noah were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.’ We are rapidly approaching the point when mankind has returned to what it was like in the days of Noah – if we are not already there. According to history, and according to the words of Jesus Himself, the next thing that happens is the return of an angry God who judges the world for its transgressions and wipes out the prevailing civilization. I fear that we are rapidly approaching that point. Mankind has achieved great heights before and was thrown down to the ground for its wickedness. Do not think that it cannot happen again.”

The professor looked up at the clock. “I see that’s all the time we have for today. Class, you are dismissed! Don’t forget your reading assignments. See you next week!”