Hypotheses from Dwardu Cardona's book, Metamorphic Star
(Compare with Cardona Interview at https://www.thunderbolts.info/forum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=3824 )
I think Cardona considered most of the following to have occurred about 10,000 BP. —I date them between 6,000 and 4,000 BP.
Cardona's hypotheses are based on efforts to understand ancient myths, supposing like Velikovsky previously, that the ancients didn't just make up nonsense that they then turned into oral, written and ritual traditions and religion, but they witnessed planetary & meteoric events in the sky along with electrical and dust effects that sometimes accompanied global cataclysms, which effects they interpreted as living creatures or immortals.
Before each hypothesis, I'll insert {I} for Improbable (0-33% probability), {M} for Maybe (34-66%), or {P} for Probable (67-100%) based on my own very incomplete research. I also include a few comments.
__PART ONE: THE ANCIENT SKY
{P} Hypothesis #1: SATURN BROWN DWARF: That the present giant gas planet we know by the name of Saturn had previously been a sub-brown dwarf star free floating in space outside the demarcation of the present Solar System.
{P} Hypothesis #2: EARTH, SATURN'S SATELLITE: [Cardona and others found that by tracing the names of the Sun back far enough, that they originally referred to Saturn, such as Sol, Helios, Shamash etc. When Earth left the Saturn system, the name of Saturn was transferred to the Sun.] That Earth was at that time a satellite of Saturn which, because of its proximity, loomed large in the sky as a distinct disk larger than the present apparent size of the full Moon. Also, Venus & Mars were in a linear arrangement between Saturn and Earth.
{M} Hypothesis #3: SATURN'S CHAOS DISK: That, during this period, a nebulous entity, which we have conjectured to have been a circumstellar disk, surrounded Saturn in its equatorial plane. This nebulous cloud seems to have been what our ancient forefathers inter alia alluded to as Chaos.
{M} Hypothesis #4: SATURN'S OCEAN DISK: [I guess it’s the same as the previous hypothesis.] During this same period, Saturn was described as having floated over an apparition which looked like an auroral sheet of eddying celestial water, a cosmic whirlpool of an ocean, which we conjecture to have been the same circumstellar disk.
{P} Hypothesis #5: SOLITARY SATURN: That Saturn was the first, and for a time, the only visible celestial entity that could be seen in Earth's primordial sky.
{P} Hypothesis #6: IMMOBILE SATURN: That, as seen from Earth, Saturn did not rise or set, but remained visibly immobile at all times.
{P} Hypothesis #7: SATURN POLE-STAR: That Saturn's immobility was due to the fact that Earth was stationed directly "beneath" Saturn's south pole and that, from Earth, Saturn would have appeared to be permanently fixed in the northern sky, the very place which is now occupied by the far more distant Pole Star. What this also means is that Earth and Saturn were linearly aligned with both of them sharing the same axis of rotation.
{M} Hypothesis #8: PLASMA JET: That what appeared to be a slow-twirling narrow beam of tapering light connected Saturn to Earth's north polar region. This ray from above was a sustained plasma discharge in the form of Birkeland current, a scaled-down version, or the slowly deteriorating remnant, of a so-called plasma "jet," many of which are presently observed streaming from galactic and stellar objects, and as in fact have been detected emanating from brown dwarf stars.
{M} Hypothesis #10: SATURN'S PLASMASPHERE: That this system was embedded in a plasmasphere that was centered on Saturn, the near opacity of which enabled Saturn's radiation to be reflected to all terrestrial latitudes.
{P} Hypothesis #11: NO STARS: That Saturn's illumination, relatively feeble as it was, together with the plasmasphere's near opacity, were the means by which the stars were kept from visibility. The Sun, on the other hand, was still too far to be seen, while the Moon had not yet been captured.
__PART TWO: ANCIENT EARTH
{P} Hypothesis #9: DARK ORIGINS: That Earth was originally engulfed in what our ancestors persistently referred to as darkness. This was an age which, despite its remoteness, ended up etching itself indelibly in human consciousness. It was an era during which the Sun, the Moon, and the stars were not yet visible in the sky. Saturn ruled alone. That this darkness was not total was also told by ancient man who well remembered the feeble light that Saturn shed on Earth.
{P} Hypothesis #12: WARM EARTH: [Cardona misdated the Pangaea breakup, but the Earth had probably been warm before the Flood and remained warm for a time after the Flood. And Pangaea likely broke up just before the Flood ended.] That Earth would have received enough heat to sustain life, which heat would have radiated directly from Saturn's close proximity above Earth's northern hemisphere. The southern latitudes would also have received sufficient warmth, even if a feebler light, from the radiation that would have been reflected off the inner surface of Saturn's plasmasphere within which Earth would have been enveloped. In the northern hemisphere, this indirect radiation would have added to the direct heat and light received from above Earth's northern pole. Thus, during this time, Earth's climatic environment would have been one without seasonal change, luxuriating in one single season of eternal spring, even though there would have been slightly different latitudinal temperatures. Tropical and/or sub-tropical flora and fauna were thus able to thrive in Earth's northern region, even within the present Arctic Circle, and the possibility exists that this flora and fauna originated in these very regions before migrating to more southerly latitudes.
{P} Hypothesis #14: NO TIME MEASURES: That, due to Saturn's immobility, and the absence of the Sun, ancient man had nothing at his disposal by which he could calculate the passage of time.
{M} Hypothesis #34: CREATION ATTEMPTS: [I moved this up from near the bottom. These would likely have occurred long or shortly before the Great Flood. I need to reread his evidence some time, maybe.] That this series of events was remembered by those whom it touched and passed on to their descendants as a number of aborted attempts at what became known as the Creation, with each attempt having been thwarted due to a re-accumulation of terrestrial ice.
{I} Hypothesis #13: AURORAL GLACIATION: [I'm not ruling this out, but I'll have to reread his evidence before deciding more firmly. I believe he misdated the breakup of Pangaea and the Flood which led to the brief Ice Age.] That the much more energetic dust-laden formations of what have now turned into auroral ovals were responsible for casting ribbons of lands, south of the Arctic and north of Antarctica, into perpetually colder climates which, through the ages, resulted in the miles-deep glaciation that account for Earth's series of ice ages.
__PART THREE: SATURN FLARE-UP
{I} Hypothesis #15: PLASMASPHERE CLASHES: [The Sun's plasmasphere doesn't seem to have a distinct boundary. Saturn's plasmasphere may have clashed with the Sun's heliospheric current sheet, which I would rate as {M}.] That, as the Saturn system drew closer to the present Sun's domain of influence, their plasmaspheres came in contact with each other, electrical potentials clashed, and cosmic sparks began to fly. Thus commenced a protracted series of rebounds, deviations, and crossovers of the respective plasma sheaths, with Saturn emitting flashes of radiating light and heat at each and every contact, while also emitting clouds of dust, some of which beclouded the terrestrial atmosphere.
{I} Hypothesis #16: GLACIATION SERIES: [I hope to reread his evidence, but I think the aftermath of the Flood was responsible for the Ice Age.] It was the sudden heat released by Saturn's outbursts in this series of plasmaspheric interactions that was directly responsible for the string of interglacials toward the end of the Pleistocene epoch. The reversal back to cold at the end of each interglacial was mainly due to Saturn's own return close to its previous temperature, while also aided to an extent by its temporary shielding by the accumulated dust in Earth's atmosphere.
{I} Hypothesis #17: SATURN FLARE-UP: [I would rate Saturn flare-ups as {M}, but due to encountering the heliospheric current sheet, not the heliosphere.] That, eventually, Saturn succeeded in penetrating the Sun's heliosphere and, finding itself electrically imbalanced within this new domain, suffered a much more drastic disruption than its previous bursts of power.
{P} Hypothesis #18: PLASMA JET INSTABILITY: That the first signs of this electrical imbalance were manifested by the jet-like Birkeland column which joined Saturn to Earth, which jet was seen to undergo a series of visible instabilities the likes of which mankind had never seen and which he commenced to reproduce in his sacred art down through the ages.
{P} Hypothesis #19: PLASMA JET RETRACTION: That, following this series of awe-inspiring volatilities, the jet was seen to retract itself and disappear within the very planet Saturn that had originally spewed it forth.
{P} Hypothesis #20: SATURN BRIGHTENING: That, due to the disproportionate electrical energy between Saturn and the Sun, the former flared up in a glorious burst of light that belittled its previous flares, while it dispelled the gloom, an event that went down in the mytho-history of mankind as Day One.
{P} Hypothesis #21: SATURN DUST: That this major Saturn blast shed a vast amount of dust, belittling what it had shed in its previous minor outbursts, some of which dust was eventually captured in Earth's atmosphere due to gravitational attraction.
{M} Hypothesis #22: SATURN'S DISK: That this super flare-up managed to scatter most of the detritus that had been contained within Saturn's circumstellar disk, and that what remained formed a much less dense accumulation with a wide gap between its inner edge and Saturn.
__PART FOUR: RESULTING CATASTROPHES ON EARTH
{M} Hypothesis #23: ATMOSPHERIC LOSS: That the flare-up was also responsible for the blowing away of Earth's auroral toroids together with a portion of the terrestrial atmosphere.
{M} Hypothesis #24: CONFLAGRATION: [There is evidence of great widespread fires, but the source is uncertain. They could have been cometary, like the Chicago fire.] That immediately upon and due to Saturn's major flare-up, Earth and its inhabitants were subjected to an appalling heat-wave which caused worldwide forest fires while engulfing all and sundry in a tremendous sheet of cosmic radiation, including X-rays and other potentially harmful beams and particles.
{M} Hypothesis #25: MAGNETIC FIELD INSTABILITY: That the Saturn system's encounter with the Sun resulted in the reversal of Earth's magnetic field - or, more correctly, its dipole - which was due to the combined reaction of the Sun's super-flare-like discharge together with Saturn's own flare-up. This culminated in a boost of the terrestrial field which would then have commenced to decay once more in its attempt to adjust to the Sun's own field of influence.
{M} Hypothesis #26: EARTH'S ROTATION CHANGES: That, very much like the Sun's flares achieve at present on a much smaller scale, Saturn's flare-up braked Earth's rotational speed, with its former rate resuming not long after.
{P} Hypothesis #27: OCEANIC INCURSION: That this temporary braking resulted in the oceans' incursion over large areas of the land as well as additional heat due to the friction between Earth's crustal layers which also caused tremendous tectonic activity including global volcanism, earthquakes, landslides, and various other upheavals.
{M} Hypothesis #28: METEORIC BOMBARDMENT: [There was surely meteoric bombardment, as can be seen on the Moon and somewhat on Earth, but it's not certain if the meteors came from a Saturn flareup.] That, together with the emitted dust, Saturn also expelled quantities of substantial rock-hard rubble some of which bombarded Earth, exploding in its atmosphere, the shards and bursts from which scarred the terrestrial surface in various localities with north-oriented craters some of which were later filled with water, plants, or both.
{P} Hypothesis #29: MASS EXTINCTIONS: That the calamities incurred by Earth throughout these events were responsible for great loss of life among both beasts and man. Vast hordes of animals which had existed during the Ice Age were completely exterminated, never again to grace the land or the oceans they once inhabited.
{P} Hypothesis #30: SURVIVAL: That, despite the above, some species, including some of the mammoths, did manage to survive in isolated pockets just as tribal units of mankind also did.
{M} Hypothesis #31: RADIATION MUTATIONS: That the cosmic radiation released by Saturn's flare-up would have also resulted in the birth of mutated offspring both among surviving animals and humankind, but that, with some possible exceptions, including racial diversions among humans, these mutations were not passed on to following generations.
{P} Hypothesis #32: RAPID GLACIAL MELTING: [The melting appears certain, but not the source, whether a Saturn flare or cometary or meteoric impacts.] That, due to the ensuing heat-wave, the glaciers of the Pleistocene Ice Age commenced to melt, thus raising oceanic levels all over the world, while causing further floods and mud slides. Previous glaciated areas were thus reclaimed and, in time, the greening of these regions added tremendously to the habitability of Earth's northern hemisphere.
{P} Hypothesis #33: YOUNGER DRYAS COLD: Mainly due to Saturn's return close to its previous cooler temperature, but partly aided by the enshrouding dust that had collected in the terrestrial atmosphere, Earth was once again plunged into a colder environment, that of the Younger Dryas, which was not, however, as freezingly cold as the Ice Age out of which it had emerged.
{P} Hypothesis #35: EARTH REWARMING: That, with Saturn's dust settling on the land, Earth returned to warmth as suddenly as it had temporarily slipped back into the cold.
Distances between Saturn System Planets
https://www.thunderbolts.info/forum3/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=13&p=8311#p8255
If Saturn looked 3 times as big as the Moon does now, it would have been about 3 million miles away from Earth. Then Venus would have been at 1.5 million miles and Mars at 900 thousand miles, over 3 times the Moon's present distance of 240 thousand miles.
Here's a poor man’s diagram of the ancient Saturn System (Moon wasn’t visible).
Saturn (S) 3M Mi, Venus (V) 1.5 M Mi, Mars (M) 900k Mi, [Moon (,) 240k Mi] Earth (E)
S---------.---------.---------.---------.---------V---------.---------M---------.---------.---,-----E
The ancients saw just Saturn in the sky at the north pole, but it was very dim and reddish initially and Earth didn't receive much light from it, but enough red and blue light to permit plant growth on Earth. When Saturn arrived close enough to the Sun to reach the heliospheric current sheet, the electrical charges between them seem to have caused Saturn to brighten like a nova, as per ancient myths and the Bible. That may have led to the cataclysms that Earth experienced in ancient times.
My Thunderbolts forum thread at https://www.thunderbolts.info/forum3/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=13&p=8311#p8311 has a lot more material on all this, but it's a patchwork. I'm trying to get it organized as I improve the science.