Cardona Interview on Saturn Theory
This is from my interview of Cardona in late 2010.
ABRAHAM
LLOYD: {Quoting his book, God Star} You said: "according to [Velikovsky], Earth was held in an equatorial orbit around the larger planet ... , Saturn, [which] then suffered a near contact with the planet Jupiter, which event resulted in the freeing of Earth from Saturn's gravitational embrace and the ejection of the planet Venus from Jupiter's core." {Velikovsky thought Earth had been in orbit around Saturn and Venus was ejected from Jupiter, but Cardona and Talbott concluded eventually that Earth followed Saturn like a train and Venus had an encounter with Mars, not Jupiter.}
- I remember a long article you wrote in Kronos magazine in the early 80s, called "Jupiter, God of Abraham." I think you mentioned in that article that the fire and brimstone that the Bible says destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah was electric discharge and sulfur from Io or Jupiter and that the Earth apparently flipped over, making Jupiter appear to replace Saturn at the north pole. Did I phrase that correctly? And, if so, do you still hold to any of that?
REPLY: The Abrahamic events came long after the dissolution of the proto-Saturnian system and, until I reach that point in my chronological reconstruction, I really cannot comment further on them. As I have often said, and will undoubtedly say many more times, I'm as curious as the next guy in finding out what really happened.
LLOYD: Re: "The Abrahamic events came long after the dissolution of the proto-Saturnian system", was Abraham much more than 200 years after the breakup of the proto-Saturn System?
REPLY: Good question. I haven't worked that out yet.
{Jupiter could have encountered Earth a few times, such as at the time of Abraham, after the Saturn System broke up.}
WATER IN SATURN’S POLAR COLUMN
... LLOYD: And did the polar column suck up much of the ocean water shortly after Earth’s formation? {Maybe I should have said “after the polar column formed.”}
REPLY: Probably — but I would not say "much".
LLOYD: And were the waters in the column released only once during the Saturn System breakup about 5,000 years ago? Or did the polar column likely suck up Earth’s ocean water more than once and release them more than once, i.e. during flare-ups?
REPLY: Since it's obvious that it released the water it had held during the last event of that kind — which mankind remembers — I would say that it would have released whatever it sucked up during every flare-up.
ANCIENT CONFUSION
... LLOYD: > After the Saturn System breakup their progeny didn't well comprehend their elders' descriptions of the scenes in the former sky and their confusion is apparent in many of the ancient myths. Only after thousands of years with the recent development of more holistic science and comparative mythology have moderns finally now begun to understand what the ancients saw and to clear away the confusion.
CARDONA: More or less—yes.
DOT IN CIRCLE = SATURN SYSTEM
LLOYD: 25 Ancient depictions of the Sun in a circle were actually of Saturn. And the depictions show that Saturn was green. I don't think I'd heard that before. I thought it was originally seen to be maroon and later yellow. Did it appear green before it became yellow? Or did it change color often, such as at different stages of its movement toward or away from plasmaspheres?
CARDONA: As is actually indicated in the book itself, to say nothing of its cover, proto-Saturn seems to have originally appeared as having been reddish. But, yes, it did go through a change of color once it commenced on its series of visual changes following its major flare-up. The color green was introduced early on in order to stress that the Egyptian Ra could not have originated as a solar deity. One thing to keep in mind is that GOD STAR, the first volume of the STAR series, serves to lay down the basics for what follows. The actual series of events do not start to unfold in their proper chronological sequence until the second volume, i.e., FLARE STAR.
SATURN CAUSED CONFLAGRATION
... LLOYD: 72 The Phaethon myth was based on periodic widespread conflagrations on Earth. Those conflagrations occurred during proto-Saturn's flare-ups; didn't they?
CARDONA: The Phaethon myth belongs much later in time and refers to the cosmic tribulations that took place during the proto-Saturnian system's break-up [5,000 years ago, I think - LK].
PLANETS’ AXES BEFORE & AFTER FLAREUP
... GOD STAR p. 381 Saturn's axis is tilted about the same as Earth's and it points the same direction as Earth's, toward the North Star. Neither axis has changed since at least the Tertiary.
LLOYD: Did the Saturn System breakup have no effect on the axis orientations?
CARDONA: I cannot go into this in any detail right now, but, although it looked quite chaotic to onlookers on Earth, the break-up resulted from an ordered sequence inherent in plasmatic dispersal.
SUN SEEN AFTER FLAREUP
... LLOYD: Was the Sun seen before or after Saturn's flare?
REPLY: After.
LLOYD: How soon did it disappear? I think you said it did not re-appear until after the Saturn System break-up. Right? If so, did the ancients know the newly visible Sun after the break-up was the same as the small star they saw millennia earlier? If not, how would they have been able to say that the small star they first saw was the later Sun?
REPLY: I do not believe I ever said it disappeared again. In fact I do not believe it did.
MOON FIRST SEEN DURING BREAKUP
... LLOYD: 6. Moon: Did the Moon first become visible in Earth orbit after the Saturn System break-up, or before?
REPLY: I would say DURING the break-up as part of it.
STARS SEEN AROUND PROTO-SATURN
... LLOYD: 8. Other: Which moons of Jupiter or Saturn were likely visible before and after the Saturn System break-up?
REPLY: The break-up was too complex for those who were watching—while running for cover—to remember all the fine details of what actually took place. I mean, good heavens, do you really think they would have taken out their note books (or clay tablets) to record it all for posterity while they were running for their lives?
(LLOYD: Apparently, Dwardu wasn't thinking about Dave T's Saturn Theory, which I think stated that 7 or 9 small stars were seen around Saturn during the Golden Age. I had thought that Dwardu's theory included that as well. I'll try to ask him that later. I had assumed that the 7 or 9 small stars were moons of Saturn, but may have included our Moon, Mercury and maybe Pluto or some of Jupiter's present moons.)
SATURN SYSTEM’S SPIRALING ORBIT
… LLOYD: Does it seem likely that proto-Saturn could have been in an orbit that took it in and out of such an electric current in space?
REPLY: It does not seem that the proto-Saturnian system was in orbit around anything while it was traveling through space. Stars, dwarf and otherwise, are now known to travel alone. More than that, they travel in a poleward direction, which eliminates the possibility of orbital motion unless captured by other bodies..
- It thus seems that the proto-Saturnian system wandered too close to our present Sun and was eventually captured by it. Once within its electro-gravitational embrace, proto-Saturn WOULD have been pulled into a slowly closing spiraling orbit around the solar orb. It would also have brushed against, and bounced off, the boundary of the heliosphere (that is, the heliopause) more than once, with minor flaring at each brief contact. So, at least, according to both Wallace Thornhill and Donald Scott.
{I think it was the heliospheric current sheet that Saturn encountered that also caused its flareup. If it’s spiraling orbit was not entirely within the ecliptic, it would have moved in and out of the current sheet, possibly causing a flareup each time.}
SATURN SYSTEM CAME FROM ANOTHER GALAXY
REPLY: It gets weirder because proto-Saturn's capture involved the collision of the Milky Way with a foreign galaxy. Orthodoxy is well aware of this collision, the signs of which are still etched across the sky.
… LLOYD: Re my idea that proto-Saturn's possible motion in and out of Birkeland currents may have caused its flare-ups, you said: "It gets weirder because proto-Saturn's capture involved the collision of the Milky Way with a foreign galaxy."
- That's indeed very weird. I remember a TB forum discussion about the Sun possibly having been from the other galaxy. Have you been able to determine whether it was probably the Sun or proto-Saturn, or neither, that came from the other galaxy? It would be quite incredible, if, not only was Earth etc not part of the Solar System over ten thousand years ago, but that it or the Sun was not even part of this galaxy.
REPLY: Astrophysicists have been shying away from the problem. But, to judge by what has been discovered so far, the Solar System's cosmic neighborhood is still quite chaotic, with the System itself dangerously close to instability. Stellar clues indicate that quite a few stars are actually foreigners within the Milky Way. These stars belong to the invading galaxy, now named Sagittarius, which is slicing through the Milky Way at right angles in the very area occupied by our Solar System. Traffic in our cosmic neighborhood is quite heavy, with bodies in the Kuiper belt bearing the imprint of recent disruption by a passing larger body, which could very well have been proto-Saturn on its spiraling way toward the Sun. There is no indication yet that our present Sun belonged to Sagittarius, but, at least in my opinion, Earth and proto-Saturn definitely did. The evidence is all out there, and some of it is scary.
PROTO-SATURN WAS A BROWN DWARF STAR
LLOYD: > Your theory says that proto-Saturn was a Brown Dwarf Star with a Circumstellar Disk, Bipolar Jets and an invisible {translucent?} Plasmasphere that blotted out the stars. Did you find that brown dwarf stars have all of those features?
REPLY: Yes I have, and yes they do.
… LLOYD: You said that something like "the impact of Shoemaker-Levy 9 could easily happen here on Earth" and that some of "the bodies contained within the Kuiper belt [display] chaotic behavior". Does the Kuiper belt seem to be something like the theoretical Oort cloud?
REPLY: I have no idea what the theoretical Oort cloud is supposed to look like.
LLOYD: Do you think a comet like SL-9 could come from the Kuiper belt and strike Earth?
REPLY: Why not?
PROTO-SATURN HAD A CIRCUMSTELLAR DISK
LLOYD: > Did you say that the ancients saw the disk as an ocean that proto-Saturn sailed on?
REPLY: Not quite. I have never stated it in those terms. Some of the ancients did liken the disk to whirling water because, among other things, that is what it looked like. And, naturally enough, to them, proto-Saturn did appear to float—but not sail—on this water. "Sailing" would connote motion across, or around, the disk.
… LLOYD: Re proto-Saturn's circumstellar disk, do you think it was formed in the same way it seems to be formed now, from "geysers" on its moons ejecting matter into the rings? You said the disk was blown away each time proto-Saturn flared up every few thousand years and that it reformed each time. If it reformed from moon geysers, the moons must not have been blown away. Right? Or were new moons ejected from the brown dwarf each time it flared up?
REPLY: I do not think so. Circumstellar disks and Birkeland jets are blown out of existence when stars go supernovae, but they re-form again. This seems to be a natural response to the stars' electric discharge—a backlash, if you wish—which has to be intrinsic. But much more needs to be done in order to unravel the real impetus behind cosmic flare-ups.
- In any case, this is not really my department, which is why, on matters such as this, I have had to rely, as I will continue to rely, on the work of those who are better equipped to handle these matters—such as Ralph Juergens, Wallace Thornhill, Donald Scott, Anthony Peratt, and the late Hannes Alfven. There have been others, of course, and I'm sure there will be more in the future. At least I hope so.
PROTO-SATURN’S POLAR COLUMN
LLOYD: > And was one of the bipolar jets what they saw as the Polar Column?
REPLY: But of course.
PROTO-SATURN FLAREUPS
REPLY: No, on the contrary, the Sun's electrical potential was much higher than proto-Saturn's, which is why proto-Saturn ended up in a flare-up, as originally proposed by Ralph Juergens back in 1977.
LLOYD: Did the ancients say anything that suggested there were a few such bounces?
REPLY: No, this follows from known plasmatic behavior.
YOUNGER DRYAS
… That said, quite a few seemingly disconnected events reported by our ancient ancestors actually fill the bill. See here, especially, the events associated with what we now refer to as the Younger Dryas, as described in the volume I am presently writing.
GREAT FLOODS
LLOYD: In Thoth newsletter I think you or Dave T had said that the Great Flood came from the north with the collapse of the polar column, which had held the flood water till then.
REPLY: Yes, I pointed that out in a paper—"The Demands of the Saturnian Configuration Theory"—that I read at the SIS Silver Jubilee Conference in September of 1999, which paper was then published in SISR (2000:1), with a fuller version appearing in AEON a year later.
LLOYD: Now you're saying that there was a Great Flood each time proto-Saturn flared up. Aren't you? If so, was life set back much during each flood?
REPLY: To an extent, since not all proto-Saturnian flares were drastic enough to sever its polar column. But, yes, there would have been many of these floods and life WOULD have been "set back," to say the least, especially since the floods would have been accompanied by other disasters.
{More recently I found that there were likely at least 3 Great Floods, but the last Flood of about 2300 BC would have occurred after the Saturn System breakup and after its last flareup. The 3300 BC and the 2600 BC Floods may have involved Saturn flareups, but it’s not clear yet.}
PROTO-SATURN DEBRIS ON EARTH
LLOYD: Re: "There is no doubt that detritus from proto-Saturn ended up on Earth", could the detritus arrive on Earth by any other means than proto-Saturn's flare-ups?
REPLY: I hate to be adamant about anything, but I doubt it. - David Talbott, on the other hand, sees some—maybe even much—of it having come from Mars.
LLOYD: Would the detritus have covered the entire Earth? Or would it have covered mostly just one side? If so, which side?
REPLY: All of Earth.
{It now appears to me that if any Saturn debris fell onto the Earth, it would be the iridium layers that may have included clay etc. Maybe the clay is more likely from volcanic eruptions. But in that case, the iridium etc may have also been volcanic. There’s also quite a bit of algae-covered charcoal, glass spherules etc, if I recall right. I guess the glass spherules may not be volcanic. Firestone et al considered most of that to be impact debris. If it’s global, maybe it’s more likely from Saturn flareups.}
PETROLEUM
LLOYD: Primordial Star has 2 sections called Planetary Hydrocarbons and The Origin of Petroleum. Do you consider the source of petroleum to be biotic or abiotic?
REPLY: Abiotic.
LLOYD: Does it originate at depth or on the surface?
REPLY: Some of it was dumped on the surface. This was mostly sticky stuff, some of which came down in flames. Some of it is indigenous and forms at depths. And this is mostly liquid. But it's more complicated than all that.
{I now think the Great Flood produced most of the petroleum and coal, but comets sometimes seem to emit hydrocarbons which fall to Earth, which likely caused the Chicago fire around 1871.}