M.J. Rose

 
You’re probably familiar with the Saqqara bird, an ancient Egyptian artifact, bird-shaped but mysterious in terms of possible function because it resembles a perfectly formed model glider more than it does an anatomically correct bird. Ancient astronaut theorists claim that the artifact is evidence that the ancient world was familiar with the principles of aviation and possibly much, much more as far as flying technology goes. Conventional scholars claim that the  artifact is nothing more than a child’s toy, a boomerang, or possibly a weather vane. Martin Gregorie, a builder and designer of free flight gliders, built a replica of the Saqqara Bird made of balsa wood. His findings support the conventional theory. However, alternative theories and research abound. I am a big believer in Atlantis, so it does not seem odd to me that humans would have perfected flight thousands of years ago – and that the knowledge of flight, even after the technology for achieving it was lost in later civilizations, would have been preserved in myth, art, and imagination. To my eyes, the Saqqara bird is a model of a technology that was lost, a technology that the Egyptians were fascinated by and hoped to recreate someday.
 
Here is some beautiful footage of the modern day “Smart Bird” –  Even though we are a civilization that has mastered flight, it is interesting to me that we are still so fascinated by how it works!

 
The subject of religion is, for better or for worse, intimately entwined with the subject of reincarnation. So, as reincarnationists, it serves us to pay attention. Is it possible for humanity to phase religion out entirely, or is religious thought so programmed into us that no matter how logic-based we become, we will never be able to shake off the gods?
 
On the one hand, a team of mathematicians have predicted, in a new paper based on census data stretching back 100 years, that organized religion will all but vanish eventually from nine Western-style democracies. Read the article here. On the other hand, we have increasingly faith-based politics in the U.S., extremists of all faiths abound in what seems like every corner of the world, spiritual concepts are endeavoring to match up beautifully with the most cutting edge scientific concepts, and atheists in China are trying to control the reincarnations of spiritual leaders…

Controlling the Means of Reincarnation

From Eavesdropping on The Times Magazine (The New York Times)
By SCOTT MALCOMSON
 
I’m trying once again to wrap my mind around the idea that an avowedly atheist group (the Chinese Communist Party government) insists on its power to certify reincarnations.
 
The Dalai Lama yesterday renounced his political power to represent Tibetans from his exile in India. (If he were Bob Dole he could have said, “I come before you not as a king, but just a god.”) He has been making this point for a while – the Tibetan government in exile has had an elected prime minister since 2001; the next election is on March 20. But the Dalai Lama seems more serious this time, and the three leading candidates are not monks. The holy man, in short, is trying to take religion out of politics.
 
For the complete article click here.

One of our favorite conspiracy theorists and authors, Erich von Däniken, gives his rather optimistic take on 2012, crop circles, the pyramids, the Mayan long count calendar, and extraterrestrial communications: