M.J. Rose

If you’re into space, you’re going to be into this recent news — but it’s still a mystery as to whether this “life” is or is not presently living away its days on this moon or not. However, just the fact that it MIGHT BE is quite astonishing, don’t you think?

Moon geysers

From Motherboard,

We Have Strong Evidence Saturn’s Moon Enceladus Can Support Microbial Alien Life

by Becky Ferreira

“Scientists find potential evidence of methanogenesis, a biological process, on Saturn’s moon Enceladus—which means methane-breathing aliens could be chilling there.
The ocean interior of Saturn’s moon Enceladus may have the “temperatures and chemical energy sources necessary for habitable conditions,” according to new research published in Science on Thursday.

This major finding is the result of an extremely tight flyby of Enceladus conducted by NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, which has been in orbit around the ringed gas giant since 2004. The data sourced from this close encounter adds to Enceladus’ growing reputation as one of the solar system’s leading candidates in the search for alien life, and hospitable worlds beyond Earth.

“We feel pretty fortunate that we got this information about habitability,” said J. Hunter Waite, the principal investigator of the mass spectrometer (INMS) onboard Cassini and the lead author of the paper, in a phone interview with Motherboard. “It will continue to build an interesting case for going back [to Enceladus].”

On October 28, 2015, Cassini zoomed by Enceladus at an altitude of 30 miles above the surface of this tiny moon, which is only 314 miles in diameter, small enough to fit within the length of the United Kingdom. The orbiter passed through one of the billowing plumes of vapor that frequently erupt from this world’s icy surface, and sampled its chemical contents….”

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A 55,000 year old flute! Humans were playing music in the the time of the Neanderthals? Is it possible the Neanderthals also played music? We have so many questions….

From The Vintage News,

The Divje Babe Flute, found in 1995 is 43,000-years-old

“In the Divje Babe archaeological park in northwestern Slovenia, researcher Ivan Turk found a 43,000-year-old cave bear femur that had been reshaped as a flute.

Turk named the flute a “Neanderthal flute,” not because the Neanderthals made it, but because it came from the period when they existed, which was approximately 55,000 years ago.

The Divje Babe archaeological park is located near the town of Cerkno and is one of the oldest archaeological sites in Slovenia.The site is a cave that sits 750 ft above the Idrija River; it is 148 ft long and up to 49 ft wide. So far, researchers working on this very rich site have uncovered over 600 finds in over ten levels in the dig site.

This includes finding 20 hearths and the skeletal remains of cave bears. The scientists have been using the rocks to investigate further into climate changes in the Pleistocene epoch. The flute that was found is possibly from the end of the middle of the Pleistocene epoch and comes from a juvenile cave bear….”

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The oldest book in the world…and it comes with such an incredible, mystery-infused discovery story. Enjoy!

From The Huffington Post,

Buddhism’s Diamond Sutra: The Extraordinary Discovery Of The World’s Oldest Book

By Joyce Morgan

“Ask people to name the world’s oldest printed book and the common reply is Gutenberg’s Bible. Few venture that the answer is a revered Buddhist text called the Diamond Sutra, printed in 868 A.D. Or that by the time Gutenberg got ink on his fingers nearly 600 years later — and his revolutionary technology helped usher in the Enlightenment — this copy of the Diamond Sutra had been hidden for several centuries in a sacred cave on the edge of the Gobi Desert and would remain there for several more.

Its discovery is the result of a series of accidents and its significance realized belatedly. The book unwittingly came to light when a Chinese monk clearing sand from a Buddhist meditation cave in 1900 noticed a crack in a wall. It suggested the outline of a doorway. Plastered over and painted, the entrance had been deliberately concealed.

The monk, Abbot Wang Yuanlu, broke in and discovered a small chamber, about nine feet square and full from floor to ceiling with scrolls. They had been hidden and perfectly preserved in the dark, dry grotto for 1,000 years. Although he didn’t know it, among the nearly 60,000 scrolls was the Diamond Sutra of 868 A.D., a woodblock printed scroll, more than 16 feet long, complete and dated, with an instruction that it be given away for free.

Ironically, this enduring scroll, with its illustrated frontispiece depicting the Buddha teaching his disciples, is about impermanence. The Diamond Sutra, for centuries a revered and popular scripture, distills Buddhism’s central belief: that all is change…”

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