This was sent to me by the A.R.E. to advertise the magazine "Earth Changes Udate."


EARTH CHANGES UPDATE and Julia

Searching For Truth Within Pshychic Visions and Scientific Insight


Volume 1, No. 2. Editor, William Hutton. March 1998


Pole Shift 2000

Latest Scientific Research

Geophysicists meeting in San Francisco last December gave several talks on "pole shift" in a session on true polar wander (TPW). TPW is usually conceived as the shifting of the mantle and curs relative to the stars. The sudden blossoming of research--especially via numerical modeling techniques in the hands of knowledgeable geoscientists--is encouraging to those of us who wish to understand Cayce's psychic visions of a pole shift in 2000 A.D. Here's a composite of interesting findings from the December session, as they were reported by R. Showstack in EOS (1997, vol. 78, no. 47).

A recent 10º shift that may be due to TPW over the last 30 million years could still be in progress. Present-day TPW is occurring at a rate of about 11 cm per year. The Earth's dynamism and constant rearrangements of its internal mass indicate a strong potential for rapid shifts due to TPW. Rapid TPW could allow a continent "to swing from pole to equator in as little as 5 to 10 million years, and new data are beginning to support...the theory."

Interesting indeed, but the Cayce readings suggest an Earth even more dynamic than the scientists do, one that could experience several pole shifts over, say, a 300,000 year interval. We'll now cover the latest thinking about a potential new pole shift, beginning with the views of a popular author who just happens to have picked 2000 A.D. as the year in which a pole shift will lead to a "worldwide disaster in our lifetime!" The author makes no mention of the coincidence of this date with the year 2000 pole-shift vision in Cayce reading 826-8.

Afraid of Pole Shift 5/5/2000?

Richard W. Noone has written a well-promoted book entitled 5/5/2000, Ice: The Ultimate Disaster (Three Rivers Press, New York, 389pp., 1982 (New Preface, 1995)). It's one of those deceptive concoctions in which a lot of sizzle is used to sell a woefully inadequate steak. The sizzle is the book's title and several emotion-arousing statements on the front and back covers. The steak is the text. But no one need fear any aspect of this book.

An assertion on the book's cover states, "On May 5 in the year 2000, the Sun, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn will be aligned with the Earth and her Moon. On that day the ice buildup at the South Pole will upset the Earth's axis--sending trillions of tons of ice and water sweeping over the surface of our planet. Not since the days of Noah has humankind been faced with the ultimate catastrophe." Except for one diagram showing the posistion of the planets on 5/5/2000, the main text contains no discussion of th dreaded planetary alignment, let alone how it could cause a ple shift. Most of Noone's book is filled with information of various sorts about the Great Pyramid of Giza. The closest the text gets to the title of the book is this non sequitur (p. 314): "In light of the facts Hapgood [a proponent of ice-induced pole shift] establishes in his book, ancient history must be rewritten and reopened and reexamined, or history may repeat itself on 5 May 2000." Note that Noone's book is being promoted by the Survival Center in McKenna, Washington, to drum up business for its survivalist product lines, like emergency food for long-term storage.

In a preface to the 1995 reissuance of his 1982 book, Noone says that astronomer James E. Summers found that a new moon "will move into alignment with the planets on the night of 5/5/2000." Noone goes on to say that a gentle tug "exerted horizontally on the earth [due to the moon and planetary alignment] will shove it in a given direction on 5/5/2000." That's the sum total of Noone's hypothesis. He gives a reader only as assertion and provides no reasoning based on factual information or mechanical analysis to allow a reader to make an informed judgement.

Planetary Alignments

It's extremely doubtful that a pole shift in the year 2000 could be induced by a planetary alignment. We've heard before predictions of disturbances to Earth b such alignmemnts. In 1974, John Gribbin, an editor of Nature , the international journal of science published in London, and Stephen Plagemann published The Jupiter Effect. Gribbin received his doctorate there also, where he worked at the Institute of Theoretical Astronomy. These men are intellectual heavy-weights. In The Jupiter Effect (Walker, New York), they spent much time on a planetary alignment, including especially Jupiter, that would cause a great (M 8.0+) earthquake on the San Andreas fault in California in 1982. On page 116, we read:

Now we can predict this apocalyptic date to within a couple of years. A remarkable chain of evidence, much of it known for decades but never before linked together, points to 1982 as the year in which Los Angeles region of the San Andreas fault will be subjeced to the most massive earthquake known in the populated regions of the Earth of this century. At the end point of the chain, directly causing this disaster, is a rare alignment of the planets in the Solar System. By disturbing the equilibrium of the Sun, which in turn disturbs the whole Earth, the planets can trigger earthquakes.

But nothing of the sort happened. Why not? In 1983, Gribbin and Plagemann published The Jupiter Effect Reconsidered (Vintage, New York). In this book, the authors consider many reasons why their predictions for 1982 failed. Then (p. 161), they say:

Almost everything we forecast for 1982 actually happened--two years early. Events came to the boil in the second half of 1979, as the Sun's activity rose rapidly toward peak levels. Sticking only with the western seaboard of the United States, the region we concentrated on in our original forecast, three moderate earthquakes in the Transverse Ranges near Los Angeles in 1979 were put in the shade by a pair of jolts that struck near Gilroy, south of the San Francisco Bay area, on Monday, August 7, 1979.

The authors then go on, justifying further their two-years-too-soon Jupiter-effect prediction. They cite quakes in 1979 near Livermore, California, and the 1980 Mt. St. Helens volcanic eruption. But to conclude this section, it's an enormous jump from hypothesizing that a planetary alignment can cause a pole shift. Don't waste your time on Noone's book unless you are interested in lore about the Great Pyramid.

What Causes Earthquakes?
There is some credible and interesting information in portions of Gribbin and Plagemann's second book. It consists of several examples of historical correlations among earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and the posistions of the planets, the sun, and/or moon. These examples lend support to the following Cayce reading, given in 1936 (no. 270-35):

Q What is the primary cause of earthquakes...?
A....The causes of these, of course, are the movements about the earth; that is, internally--and the cosmic activity or influence of other planetary forces and stars and their relationships produce or bring about the activities of the elementals of the earth; that is, the Earth, the Air, the Fire, the Water--and those combinations make for the replacements in the various activities.

This reading says that even the posistions of stars (probably in conjunction with the planets, moon, and sun) are important to earthquake generation! I know of no credible research in this area and would welcome any scientific insights readers might care to offer.

As for the other "elemental" causes listed in the reading, Earth would refer to movements of plastic mantle rocks, Fire would refer to the heat constantly being generated by radioactive decay within the Earth, Water would refer to lubricating capabilities of this "elemental" substance, and Air would refer to gases within the crust that might facilitate earthquake events. In 1997, fluid was injected from the surface into the German Continental Deep Drilling Borehole, to a depth of around 28,000 ft. This pressurized fluid induced almost 400 microearthquakes at distances up to 2,200 ft. from the borehole. Geoscientists have recently determined that at more than 250 miles inside the Earth there may be enough water to replace the surface oceans more than ten times (New Scientist, 8/30/97). So, there's enough water in the crust to play a major role in earthquake, volcano, and crustal-swelling processes.

A role for gases in earthquake generation may strike one as a little strange. But the New Scientist for 11/22/97 carries an article subtitled "Gases Under Incredible Pressure Could Cause California's Quakes." The article covers work by a team of geologists at the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) who show that carbon dioxide, at earthquake-focus depths, in the San Andreas fault, is under such pressure that it could push apart the lithospheric plates on either side of the fault sufficient to reduce friction and produce earthquakes every century or so. "That time scale means it's possible that this gas could alone be the trigger behind the earthquakes," says geologist Y. Kharaka, USGS team leader.

Role of Earth's Core

Here's more on a possible relationship between extraterrestrial bodies and the predicted pole shift in 2000, as inferred from two Cayce readings.

Q. Will Italy adopt a more liberal form of government in the near future?
A. Rather that of a more monarchal government than that of the liberal. Italy, too, will be broken by what NOW is an insignificant or small power [known to us today as Germany] that lies BETWEEN those of the other LARGER, or those of the MOMENT that are of the larger. These will not come, as we find, as broken, before the catastrphes of outside forces to the earth in '36, which will come from the shifting of the equilibrium of the earth itself in space, with those of the consequential effects, upon the various portions of the country--or world--affected by same.
[Underline added] 3976-10 (February 8, 1932)

Q. What will be the type and extent of the upheavals in '36?
A. The wars, the upheavals in the interior of the earth, and the shifting of same by the differentiation in the axis as respecting the posistions from the Polaris center.
5748-6 (July 1, 1932)

It's possible that the "catasrophes of outside forces" might, physically speaking, reflect a particular configuration of astronomical bodies (no. 1602-3). And the "differentiation in the axis" could refer to either a subtle shift--for the whole-Earth rotational axis--or for the rotational axis of the independently spinning core of the Earth. It there is anything to the upcoming whole-Earth pole shift mentioned in Cayce's readings, I think it will most likely be caused by the following sequence of events: (1) production of instablities near the core/mantle boundary in 1936, (2) development of rising poleward-directed thermal plumes in the mantle, and (3) an eventual change in mass distributions in Earth's upper mantle and lithosphere sufficient to induce a gradual shift in the poles via TPW. As inferred from the readings, rising mantle plumes would require 62 years--from the time of the catastrophe of outside forces (in 1936) to the present (1998)--to engender a whole-Earth pole shift.

As for early manifestations at Earth's surface of these mass redistributions in the mantle, we have the following extract from reading 3976-15:

The upper portion of Europe will be changed as in the twinkling of an eye...Ther will be the upheavles in the Arctic and in the Antarctic that will make for the eruption of volcanoes in the Torrid areas, and there will be shifting then of the poles--so that where there has been those of a frigid or the semi-tropical will become the more tropical, and moss and fern will grow.

But how do "upheavals in the Arctic and in the Antarctic" link to the sequence of events outlined above? Why would upheavals be located in the polar regions? A possible answer is found in a paper published by M.G. St. Pierre entitled "On the Local Nature of Turbulence in Earth's Outer Core" (1996, Geophys. Astrophys. Fluid Dynamics, vol. 83, pp. 293-306). I'll quote directly from the paper's abstact, putting readings-related quotes in brackets.

Numerical simulations are described that strongly suggest that any large buoyant mass in the Earth's outer core [an upheaval in the interior of the Earth] will be rapidly broken up into plate-like structures elongated in the directions of the rotation axis and of the prevailing magnetic field...[that is, elongated towards the Earth's polar regions].

Now in the text of his paper St. Pierre is not saying that hypothetical buoyant masses actually manifest themselves beyond the core-mantle boundary. But his findings prompt one's thinking process. There may be characteristics of flow in the outer fluid core that lead t symmetrical pulsings of the lower mantle in the northern and southern regions o the core-mantle boundary. Such internal pulsing could induce rising mantle plumes to be directed toward Earth's polar regions. Years later, "upheavals" would occur at the surface in the Arctic and Antarctic areas.

Geophysicists are leaning now toward top-to-bottom mixing of the Earth's entire mantle. This means that the mantle plumes rising near to the surface in the polar areas and movements of the lithospheric plates there. And compensatory mantle return flows will affect the lithosphere in other areas. But what do we know about (1) any accelerating upward crustal movements ("upheavals") in the Arctic and Antarctic and (2) any increasing frequency of volcanic eruptions in the torid areas?

Polar Upheavals and Torrid-Area Volcanism

Reading 3976-15 above says that "The upper portion of Europe will be changed as in the twinkling of an eye." This statement relates well to the part of the reading that says there will be "upheavals in the Arctic." There is an "upper portion of Europe" that lies above the Arctic Circle. It consists of northernmost Norway, Sweden, Finland, and (European) Russia. But here, the rates of ongoing post-glacial uplift of this portion of Europe seem slow enough to require that if upper Europe is to change suddenly, only a rising mantle plume could cause it.

As for acceleration in upward crustal movements in Antarctica, I referred in Coming Earth Changes (p. 39) to the fact that T. James and E. Ivins mentioned in their 1995 paper on present-day Antarctic ice mass changes and crustal motion that:

If Antarctic deglaciation history portrayed in the ICE-3G crustal rebound model is realistic... then a vast geographical region in West Antarctica is uplifting at a rate in excess of 20 mm/yr, and the predicted changes in polar motion are quite substantial. [Edited composite of quotes from the paper]

Updates to the latest (ICE-4G) crustal-rebound model have been made since 1995. They show predicted uplift rates that are somewhat smaller than those first given for crustal upheavals due to the slowly melting Antarctic ice sheet. But according to James, "the newly computed uplift rates are still quite substantial" (personal communication).

Note that volcanic eruptions can reflect the onset of crustal upheavals. In April 1997, French scientists visited the Beerenberg volcano on Jan Mayen Island, above the Arctic Circle. It is the northernmost active volcano in the world. Eruptions on Beerenberg occurred in 1732, 1818, 1970, and 1985. The latest two were within the readings' 1958 - 1998 time period for gradually increasing Earth changes. The French group found only weak emissions of gas and steam on their visit. But in a September 1997 paper in EOS (vol. 78, no. 35) entitled "Center of the Iceland Hotspot Experiences Volcanic Unrest," we are reminded that the volcanoes of Iceland, located near the Arctic Circle, can "produce catastrophic events of global importance...[and]... there is every reason to worry when they become restless." Simply put, a plume of deep mantle material may be getting ready to erupt extensively in Iceland.

In the south polar region, Mt. Erebus, on Ross Island, is the most active volcano in Antarctica and the world's southernmost active volcano. A lava lake has been active within the crater for at least several decades. No special activity is occuring at Mt. Erebus at the present time. But in 1992, scientists detected currently active volcanoes beneath the Antarctic ice in both the Marie Byrd Land and the Transantarctic Mountains areas.

Finally, evidence is accumulating for accelerating volcanic eruptions in the torrid areas, lying roughly between the equator and the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn (latitudes 23.5ºN and 23.5ºS, respectively). Loihi, a giant submarine volcano just south of Hawaii's Big Island, is the world's most active Torrid-Zone volcano. It has been in essentially continuous eruption since 1982. Merapi, on Java, is the most active volcano in Indonesia. Its current eruption began in 1994. The Rabaul calera in New Guinea also erupted strongly in 1994. Normally submerged Metis volcano in the Tonga Islands erupted in June 1995, building a cinder cone island. Barren Island, in the Andaman Islands, erupted in December 1994, and Fogo volcano in Cape Verde also erupted in 1995. And described below is the increasingly stronger submarine eruptive activity on the East Pacific Rise (EPR).

El Nino Link to Reading 3976-15

Here's the (speculative) long link leading from "There will be the upheavals in the Arctic and in the Antarctic that will make for the eruption of volcanoes in the Torrid areas..." to El Ninos and world-wide weather extremes. Assume that the upheavals in the polar areas will be caused (a) by ongoing crustal rebound due to deglaciation there and (b) by rising poleward-directed mantle plumes developed by the "upheavals in the interior of the earth" that began in 1936. These two events will lead to increasing masses of mantle rock in the polar regions. In 1998, the mass changes will produce centrifugal momentum sufficient to cause the Earth's north pole to begin to shift toward the equator. There's no telling how far or how fast this motion will proceed.

As the hot, plastic mantle material that makes up Earth's equatorial bulge begins to be stressed by the slowly moving pole shift, torrid-area volcanoes--which lie above the equartorial bulge--will begin to erupt. A prime place to check for eruptions of torrid-area volcanoes is the East Pacific Rise (EPR), between 20º - 35ºS and 100º - 120ºW. Here, vast quantities of heat are being released through submarine volcanism and hydrothermal activity. And, if periodic deep eruptions along this part of the EPR can modify the natural oscillations of sea and atmosphere, El Ninos could result.

Complete nonsense, you say? Well, consider that observed coincidences often lead to significant discoveries in Earth science. And consider that Daniel Walker, a seismologist lately retired from the University of Hawaii, has been observing since 1964 the coincidences between episodes of intense seismicity--which indicates seafloor volcanism on the EPR--and the times of the last six El Ninos. In January 1995, he wrote (EOS, vol. 76, no. 4):

A key indicator of Ninos is a measure of the difference between sea-level pressure values of the high-pressure cell centered near Easter Island and a low-pressure cell centered near Darwin, Australia. Massive submarine volcanic activity along portions of the EPR may play an important role in disrupting the east-to-west interactions of the cells, thereby triggering the onset of Ninos.

walker's finding and speculations have been explained beautifully in an article by W. Broad in the April 25, 1995, New York Times.

What about the current El Nino? Dr. Walker kindly sent me the earthquake location and magnitude data for 65 EPR earthquakes that occured from January 2, 1996, to December 25, 1997. About half of these were on one side and the other half on the Tropic of Capricorn. Thus, all occur in a reading-designated "torrid area." Walker's seismic data show that the present 1996 - 1997 sesmic episode on the EPR was quite sufficient ot trigger the present, massive El Nino. (He also notes that the seismic activities at 18º and 22.5ºS described in his 1995 report were "phenomenal and important.")

Thus, we appear to have completed the link between "the catastrophes of outside forces" that reading 3976-10 said affected the Earth in 1936 and the gradual, but irregularly increasing intensity of El Ninos that have occured between 1965 and 1998. Could the widespread extreme weather effects due to these increasingly strong El Ninos reflect Earth's attempts to throw off some of the "sickness" it has developed due to humankind's mistreatments? As said by Rolling Thunder (see Coming Earth Changes, p. 211), "This [Day of Purification] is really going to be like fever or vomiting, what you might call physiological adjustment." And this Day will involve 40 years of "both fire and water." Could we be facing decades of El Nino impacts due to eruptions of EPR volcanoes?

Note that Worldwide Fund for Nature just reported that "more tropical forests burned in 1997 than ever before" [due in part to El Nino-caused droughts] and that a gigantic El Nino-inspired ice storm in early January left three million people in Canada and New England without power. Finally, in the 1600's El Ninos used to occur every six years or so. But recently, they've been coming every 2.2 years.


Volcano Watch


Long Valley, California

This important caldera volcano is located near the ski resort of Mammoth Lakes, about 200 miles east of San Francisco. It last erupted (three times) some 550 - 600 years ago. In 1982, the U.S. Geological Survey issued a volcanic hazard alert for the volcano when seismic data indicated that magma had ascended to within one mile of the surface. Seismologists felt that an eruption might be imminent, but none occured. The volcano became restless again in 1992, and later quieted down. Last November 22, a swarm of 1,000 small seimic events were recorded as originating beneath the caldera, and in mid-January some 739 tremors occurred during just three days. This sounds ominous. But the energy released in all of the quakes since last July equals that of just one M 5.3 quake. More important may be the measured swelling of a resurgent dome within the caldera's central section due to lava pressure from below. Sudden large lava eruptions sometimes ensue at calderas, as with Rabaul on 9/19/94, after only 27 hours of small quakes. Thus USGS is concerned and has instituted a Web site for hazard warnings. And Los Angeles officials are concerned because two-thirds of the city's water supply comes from the Long Valley area.

Soufriere Hills, Montserrat

This dangerous torrid-area volcano erupted again on December 26, 1997, sending a widespread, destructive pyroclastic surge cloud down its flanks and a plume of ash to 36,000 feet. Its dome is currently in a rebuilding phase.

Kilauea, Hawaii

In a brief event, the summit rapidly expanded last January 14. Lava surged from existing vents and tubes and flowed to two ocean entry points.
Mt. Etna, Sicily

A new lava flow is running down the southeastern flank.

Loihi, Hawaii

Eruptions continue in this world's most active torrid-area volcano.

Mt. Pelee, Martinique

No reports of seismic or volcanic activity.

Mt. Vesuvius, Italy

No activity, but the nearby Campi Flegrei caldera (see Coming Earth Changes, p. 41) shows increased temperatures at vapor-emitting vents.

Rabaul, New Guinea

Ongoing slow expansion of this caldera.

Arenal, Costa Rica

Semi-continuous, molten lava-blob explosions and lava effusions continue since this volcano's first historical eruption in 1968.

Popocatepetl, Mexico

New ash plumes. Lava extrudes from vents in the summit crater.


Earthquakes, Tsunamis, and Crustal Movements


Of more than 6,000 earthquakes detected yearly, only about 15 wreak death, destruction, and damage. We continue to direct our attention to earthquakes or tsunami-forming conditions--or to recent occurrences of such events--as are relevant to the Cayce readings.

Alabama

An M 4.9 earthquake occurred on October 24, 1997, followed by an M 3.7 aftershock. Both events were felt strongly in the Brewton area of Escambia County in far southwestern Alabama. The M 4.9 event was the largest ever recorded in the area and amongst the strongest to occur in the southeastern U.S. where the average quake is only about M 2.6 (A. Nouroozi, 1997, Southeastern Geology, vol. 37, no. 1, fig. 2). These quakes may be important because Cayce reading 311-9 says that the sinking of portions of Alabama begin as early as 1936 - '38 in the northwestern and extreme southwestern parts of the state. A qualification as to the form and speed that the changes might take was that much depended on residents' "application of the spiritual laws in their associations with indivduals" (311-10).

One would think that earthquakes would accompany any "sinking of portions with the following up of the inundations..." (311-10). Note also that on July 19, 1993, an M 3.7 quake occurred about 75 miles north of Mobile, in far southwestern Alabama, and on December 12, 1997, an M 4.0 quake occurred near Jasper, in the northwestern part of the state.

California Speculations

A U.S. Geological Survey researcher claims that new studies indicate that the Hayward fault running along the eastern side of San Francisco Bay has experienced a major quake about once every 210 years. "We're there, or beyond," Mr. D. Schwartz said to the December meeting of geophysicists in San Francisco. The Hayward fault is similar to the one in Kobe, Japan, which was struck by an M 7.2 tremor in 1995, causing $130 billion in damages and 6,000 deaths. If the Hayward and nearby Rogers Creek faults are found to be connected, a quake could set the ground shaking for as long as 30 seconds, or about four times longer than the disastrous Loma Prieta quake of 1989.

A team of Russian, Mongolian, and U.S. scientists is suggesting a worst-case scenario in which the San Andreas slip-fault would move suddenly along its trend, while the thrust-fault systems to either side would rupture simultaneously. The team's analog to this process is the 1957 Gobi-Altay earthquake in which precisely such concurrent movements occured. "And since the fault system in the Gobi desert bears a strong resembalnce to the terrain around Los Angeles, the possibility of a similar disater striking southern California is not as far-fetched as it might seem" (Geotimes, Nov. 1996). But some seismologists discount the comparisons between the Gobi and southern California fault systems, noting that the San Andreas fault coincides with a plate boundary while the great Gobi fault does not.

If the Cayce readings on the "breaking up" of western U.S. are to be realized, however, such breakups would be expeceted to take place on existing fault systems, as suggested by the worse-case scenario above. And reading 1152-11's prediction that "Los Angeles, San Francisco, most all of these will be among those tht will be destroyed before New York even," would be realized.

Western Washington State

According to a recent paper in the Journal of Geophysical Research (12/10/97), the Puget Lowlands lies on a north-directed thrust sheet whose edges may be faults along the base of the Cascade Range on the east and the Olympic Mountains on the west. The study's authors suggest that the Seattle fault, oriented east-west beneath the city of Seattle, has a length an slip rate sufficient to generate a devestating M 7.6 quake.

A 1998 Alert for Caribbean and Atlantic Ocean Shores?

"Tsunamis are a true threat to the Caribbean region. According to Jim Lander of the University of Colorado, since 1530, tsunamis have caused more deaths in the Caribbean than in Alaska, Hawaii, and the U.S. east coast combined" (EOS, 12/16/97). Tsunami sources include volcanic activity, submarine landslides, and tectonic movements of the seabed. And if reading 3976-15 is correct, that there will be "new lands seen off the Caribbean Sea," rising of the sea floor might well cause large tsunamis that could wreak destruction on shorelines and low-lying lands at various places around the North Atlantic and Caribbean ocean basins.

But this speculation should be tempered perhaps by a reading (1602-3) in 1939, in which Cayce was asked, "Is Atlantis rising now?" The answer was that "In 1998 [emphasis added] we may find a great deal of the activities as have been wrought by the gradual changes that are coming about" [and that]... "This is a gradual, not a cataclysmic activity in the experience of the earth in this period."

Past Catastrophic Crustal Movements

As mentioned on pp. 248 - 250 of Coming Earth Changes, many of Cayce's readings on Earth changes are too catastrophic to be accepted by geologists who have been trained to believe in the doctrine of uniformitarianism. This doctrine asserts that throughout the long history of our planet, the Earth and its life have been shaped by the same slow processes that can be seen today wearing away mountains, causing sea levels to rise and fall, and the like. Because no one in recorded history has witnessed a sudden acceleration or deviation of any of the various processes, uniformitarians regard as outlandish any explanations of Earth history that involve sudden or unusual variations in natural processes. A catastrophist, on the other hand, caters to the notion that sometimes violent, relatively short-lived events outside of our present experience or knowledge have affected Earth's surface.

Since about 1980, with the gradual acceptance of the comet--or meteorite-impact hypothesis as being responsible for some significant Earth changes, more and more scientists are receptive of catastrophism as part of their worldview of geologic change. Until now, however, this view did not include mountain-building, thought to proceed at a very slow rate, geologically speaking. At the meeting of the Geological Society of America in October 1997, Prof. K. Hodges of MIT presented his work entitled, "Rates of Orogenic [mountain-building] Processes and the Role of Catastrophe." The abstract for his paper concludes, "Recent advances in geochronology and geodesy permit unprecedented precision in evaluating the time scale of tectonic processes. Studies in active [mountain] belts, such as the Himalaya, indicate that mountain ranges can evolve dramatically over very short periods, on the order of hundreds of thousands of years. Whether or not these rates are characteristic of orogenic [mountain-building] processes in general remains a fundamental question in geologic research."

Professor Hodges might perhaps someday agree with the catastrophic bent of reading 5748-2 that says that over the last 10,500,000 years many lands "have appeared and disappeared again and again." Here we find, once more, that the Cayce Earth-changes readings are becoming less and less "outlandish" as geologists tease out the specific details of past crustal movements.

Earth-Changes Scoreboard for 1998

By the end of January, no major (M 7.0 - 7.9) or great earthquakes had occurred worldwide. And no Cayce- readings-type crustal movements had taken place. At least five eruptions of torrid-area volcanoes had occurred since 1/1/98, while Mt. Vesuvius and Mt. Pelee were dormant.


Cayce "Gold Reading" Verified


Mrs. X, a 44-year-old aviatrix, had a reading on July 1, 1935, soon after she had flown to Bimini in the Bahamas to look for a well of healing water. The following is a fragment from her reading (no. 587-4):

For it [Bimini] could be established as a center for two particular purposes; a regeneration for those with certain types of individual ailments... and a center for archaeological research. And as such activities are BEGUN, there will be found much more gold in the lands under the sea than there is in the world circulation today!

At the time of this reading there was no observational or theoretical basis for believing that gold could be found in "lands under the sea." In the 1970's it became apparent that small amounts of gold might be found on the ocean floor. But in 1989, the first visible gold, in sulfides from active vents on the sea floor, was found west of the Tonga Trench. And, as described by W.J. Broad (New York Times, 12/26/97), Australians have now obtained mining claim to exploit other such deposits, in New Guinea territorial waters off Papua. There, rich metal deposits containing around one ounce of gold and seven ounces silver per ton have been found. R. Binns, a scientist who helped discover the deposits, is quoted as saying, "If you found this deposit on dry land, you'd call these bonanza figures." The minerals being sought by today's deep-sea mining companies are found along volcanic fissures that trend for upwards of 40,000 miles across the global sea floor. S.D. Scott, a geologist who also helped discover the Papua metal zones, says that their gold content is "incredibly high." Since thousands of such deposits are certain to occur worldwide, we have confirmation of the last sentence in the above reading fragment. See also p. 179 of Coming Earth Changes for a conjectured volcanic link to the vein of gold on Bimini, as described in reading 996-12.


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