Showing posts with label Stephen Hawking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Stephen Hawking. Show all posts

Thursday, January 14, 2021

Alien Radio Signal From Proxima Centauri?

Alien Radio Signal From Proxima Centauri


     Nobody believes it was ET phoning, but radio astronomers admit they don’t have an explanation yet for a beam of radio waves that apparently came from the direction of the star Proxima Centauri.

By Dennis Overbye
New York Times
12-31-20
“It’s some sort of technological signal. The question is whether it’s Earth technology or technology from somewhere out yonder,” said Sofia Sheikh, a graduate student at Pennsylvania State University leading a team studying the signal and trying to decipher its origin. She is part of Breakthrough Listen, a $100 million effort funded by Yuri Milner, a Russian billionaire investor, to find alien radio waves. The project has now stumbled on its most intriguing pay dirt yet.

Sunday, March 18, 2018

Stephen Hawking on Alien Life, ET and the Possibility of UFOs Visiting Earth

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Stephen Hawking on Alien Life, ET and the Possibility of UFOs Visiting Earth

     Physicist Stephen Hawking died at his home in Cambridge, England, on Wednesday.

[...]

By Andrew Whalen
Newsweek
3-14-18
In 2010, Hawking ... describing the dangers of first contact with aliens in a Discovery Channel documentary. “If aliens visit us, the outcome would be much as when Columbus landed in America, which didn’t turn out well for the Native Americans,” Hawking says. “We only have to look at ourselves to see how intelligent life might develop into something we wouldn’t want to meet.”

“Such advanced aliens would perhaps become nomads, looking to conquer and colonize whatever planets they can reach,” Hawking said in the documentary, Into the Universe with Stephen Hawking. documentary. “We only have to look at ourselves to see how intelligent life might develop into something we wouldn’t want to meet.”

“Such advanced aliens would perhaps become nomads, looking to conquer and colonize whatever planets they can reach,” Hawking said.

Monday, September 04, 2017

Stephen Hawking's Mission to Find Alien Life Detects Mystery Signals

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Stephen Hawking's Mission to Find Alien Life Detects Mystery Signals

     LONDON: A mission to explore intelligent alien life in the universe has recorded some mysterious signals coming from a galaxy three billion light years away, according to an Indian-origin scientist working on the ambitious project co-founded by Stephen Hawking.
The Economic Times
9-2-17

[...]

"We really have no idea about where they come from," Gajjar, one of the scientists from the University of California Berkeley Research Centre, told The Daily Telegraph.

He noted: "If some form of life would like to produce a signal that is detectable to another civilisation this could be a way to do it ....

Friday, October 21, 2016

Strange Signals From 234 Stars Being Investigated By Alien-Hunting Project

Strange Signals From 234 Stars Being Investigated
These light pulses "have exactly the shape of an Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence signal", and now Stephen Hawking's alien-hunting mission is on the case to confirm or disprove these claims.

      Astronomers have been analysing light signals from 2.5 million stars observed by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, and have detected strange 'strobe-like' bursts coming from not one, but 234 stars.
By www.businessinsider.com
10-18-16

The pair went so far as to suggest that these light pulses "have exactly the shape of an Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence signal", and now Stephen Hawking's alien-hunting mission is on the case to confirm or disprove these claims.

Thursday, September 22, 2016

Stephen Hawking Wants To Find Aliens Before They Find Us

Stephen Hawking Wants To Find Aliens Before They Find Us

The famed cosmologist is all in on searching for signals from E.T.,
but warns that we should be careful about inviting aliens over

     Stephen Hawking is again warning about announcing our presence to any alien civilizations that might be out there, especially those that could be more technologically advanced.
By Eric Mack
www.cnet.com
9-22-16

In his new half-hour program "Stephen Hawking's Favorite Places" on science-themed subscription service CuriosityStream, the world's most famous theoretical physicist flies by the potentially habitable exoplanet Gliese 832c in a CGI spaceship as part of his hypothetical dream itinerary for a tour of the universe.

The super-Earth is only 16 light-years away and just the sort of world the Hawking-supported Breakthrough: Listen initiative hopes to scan for signs of alien signals using our most sensitive radio telescopes. ...

Friday, April 15, 2016

Stephen Hawking's Plan To Hunt For Aliens | VIDEO

Stephen Hawking's Plan To Hunt For Aliens

     The famed physicist Stephen Hawking is partnering with Russian billionaire Yuri Milner to look for intelligent life with a fleet of postage stamp-sized spacecraft.
By Story Hinckley
www.csmonitor.com
4-13-16

Do aliens exist? Using small spaceships the size of postage stamps, famous physicist Stephen Hawking, Russian billionaire Yuri Milner, and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg plan to find out.

Through their $100-million project named Breakthrough Starshot, the three board members plan to send thousands of light-propelled nanocraft to Alpha Centauri, the closest star system to Earth. Traveling at 20 percent the speed of light, the nanocraft fleet would likely reach Alpha Centauri (which is 4.37 light years away) in the next 20 years.

Equipped with cameras and communication and navigation equipment, the nanocrafts will hopefully answer whether or not habitable planets – and even alien life – exists.

Wednesday, April 13, 2016

Starshot Mission to Alpha Centauri Unveiled | VIDEO

Starshot Mission to Alpha Centauri Unveiled

     Fueled by an initial $100 million from Russian billionaire Yuri Milner, a team laden with big names laid out a multi-decade plan to send flurries of smartphone-sized probes to the Alpha Centauri system, powered by laser-driven light sails.
By Alan Boyle
www.geekwire.com
4-12-16

“For the first time in human history, we can do more than just gaze at the stars,” Milner said today at a New York news conference where the Breakthrough Starshot project was unveiled. “We can actually reach them. It is time to launch the next great leap in human history.”

Eventually, the plan will require billions of dollars more in funding – and much more planning as well. But the Starshot team boasts some top-drawer supporters: In addition to Milner, the board includes British physicist Stephen Hawking and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. [...]

Saturday, October 03, 2015

Nomadic Aliens Might Crush Us, says Stephen Hawking

Nomadic Aliens Might Crush Us, says Stephen Hawking

By Chris Matyszczyk
CNET
9-30-15


The famed physicist says that simple math makes him believe there are aliens out there.

      Many of Stephen Hawking's recent pronouncements have been slightly dire.

He worries about artificial intelligence. We evolve so slowly that it could simply stomp us out, he said last year.

But there are other threats. In an interview with Spain's El Pais, the world-renowned physicist said he feared aliens might destroy us. He said it might be worse that when Columbus turned up in the Americas.

"Such advanced aliens would perhaps become nomads, looking to conquer and colonize whatever planets they can reach," Hawking told El Pais. "To my mathematical brain, the numbers alone make thinking about aliens perfectly rational. The real challenge is to work out what aliens might actually be like." [...]

Tuesday, September 29, 2015

'Breakthrough Message' to Those Extraterrestrials

'Breakthrough Message' to Those Extraterrestrials

Hello? We're probably not here

By Billy Cox
De Void
9-22-15

“To Whom It May Concern:”

     This is how I would begin my “Breakthrough Message” to those extraterrestrials who are just like us and are currently scanning infinite space for intelligent radio or laser signals generated by societies that happen to be just like them. I’ve decided to enter the contest because I know how aliens just like us think, and if my letter gets chosen to represent all of humanity, I can win a million bucks.
“When you get this message, I will be dead. My children, my grandchildren, their children, and their children’s children will be dead, too. When and if you choose to reply, I can’t vouch for the character of who’ll be reading your response. But I can assure you that, posthumously, as far as I’m concerned, this was the happiest day of my life.”
Oh wait – did you miss it? Over the summer, with the support of celebrity physicist Stephen Hawking, Russian jillionaire Yuri Milner decided to rejuvenate the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence with a $100,000,000 gift. A fraction of the greenery goes to whoever produces the best “Breakthrough Message.” The UK SETI Research Network decided to enter the sweepstakes a few weeks ago, so game on, I’m in.
“This dispatch emanates from a world called Earth [see attachment for coordinates]. Point the best telescopes you’ve got in the direction of our G2V yellow dwarf star and we're the third rock out. We're the planet with the junkyard haze of satellite debris in permanent orbit, our own little welcome-mat of hurtling shrapnel. Since you’ve acquired and deciphered this signal, that means by inference you’re using the kind of technology that likely went obsolete here several hundred years ago, or however long it took you to confirm our presence. I say ‘likely’ because there may not be much left of us now.

“We’ve been randomly ejaculating a mishmash of our own unique noise into the universe for nearly a century, but the decision to send an intentional focused message is probably as much a eulogy as it is an act of faith. We are, from all appearances, genetically predisposed toward migration and colonization on Earth, but when we sent explorers to our moon – you should have a moon, since you're just like us – we couldn’t find anything to easily exploit so we decided it wasn’t worth the effort to send Earthlings back there. And that was nearly half a century ago. Our decision to hang back and stick with the known world defied some of the most fundamental impulses of our species. But the truth is, when it comes to making collective sustained commitments to much of anything anymore, we’re about as reliable as hogs on ice [photo of hogs included in attachment]. We did manage, however, to dispatch robotic probes on photo-recon missions of our solar system. We even peered deep into impossibly distant galaxies, but all that did was make us feel irrelevant. So mostly we just decided to stay put and fall back on our insecurities and our languages and our gods and our tribes and our nations and our legends and our history, which has a perversely reassuring way of repeating itself.

“Are you noticing unidentified flying objects coursing randomly through your atmosphere, without authorization? So are we. But if you’re like us, you're ignoring them because life is complicated enough already. However, considering how Earth is probably at least a few hundred years ahead of your technology, here’s a remote but possible explanation for what's going on upstairs: They could be ours. Really. Because at the time we sent this message, our planet was on the front end of a calamitous environmental transition that none of us had much enthusiasm for confronting. Our sea levels are on the rise due to global warming trends created by our proliferation and negligence. The high ground is reserved for only the most privileged members of our civilization. What you may be seeing in your air space could be their escape modules, dispatched without fanfare before the flood. There shouldn’t be many of them -- it takes a lot of money to break the laws of physics -- but their values could present a danger to critical thinking, so just ignore them and they’ll probably go away. As for the unorthodox things flying around in our own skies, we not only haven't figured that out, we couldn’t care less because we know for a fact they can’t possibly be you.

“So this is the historic crossroads we've all been waiting for. If they're still alive, our distant progeny, to whom you will hopefully respond hundreds of years from now, are dying to hear back. Choose your words carefully. Be gentle, be smarter, and -- once again -- greetings from Earth.”
I'm so money. But if you think you’ve got a better “Breaththrough Message,” now’s the time to air it out. [...]

Saturday, September 12, 2015

British Experts Crafting a Message to Aliens

 
 
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British Experts Crafting a Message to Aliens

By Nitya Rajan
The Huffington Post (UK)
9-11-15

      A group of researchers from the UK have decided to pen a message to aliens, in the hopes of making contact.

The decision was put to a vote at the UK Seti Research Network (UKSRN) conference in Leeds on 7 - 8 September.

Their to bid to make contact will enter an international competition titled Breakthrough Message -- an initiative launched in July by Stephen Hawking and Russian billionaire Yuri Milner.

The aim would be to create a digital message representing humanity and planet Earth. And the grand prize for accomplishing such a feat is $1,000,000. [...]

Friday, July 24, 2015

Major Cash Transfusion for SETI

Major Cash Transfusion for SETI

By Billy Cox
De Void
7-22-15

     Damn – how about that $100 million wad Russian venture capitalist Yuri Milner dropped on the SETI crowd Monday? This is real money, folks. You could buy nearly eight dozen Bradley Fighting Vehicles with that kind of loot. More than half a century of scanning the heavens for a single intelligent radio signal without a glimmer of hope. Now. Suddenly. “This is beyond my wildest dreams,” veteran radioastronomer Dan Werthimer of U-Cal Berkeley gushed on Monday.

Talk about your reversal of fortune. It was just last year that Werthimer and SETI colleague Seth Shostak visited Capitol Hill to make fruitless pleas for chump change from the dim lights on the House science committee. Today, the SETI buffs are so flush with cash, it makes the $25M that Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen sunk into building 42 radiotelescopes in the California outback look stingy

Code-named Breakthrough Listen, Milner’s pricey gambit on some fancy supercomputers hopes to succeed where 55 years of ET signal-hunting have drawn blanks. Milner says he was motivated by the burgeoning number of exoplanets being discovered in theoretically habitable zones around distant stars. So he’s vested in an amazing package. SETI operatives working telescopes in Australia and West Virginia will now be able to filter cosmic noise through 10 billion channels simultaneously, and do it 100 times faster than active programs. They’ll be targeting one million Milky Way stars closest to our solar system, and 100 other galaxies. Or so we’re told.

The announcement was designed for maximum impact, timed as it was to coincide with another Apollo 11 anniversary, and featuring luminary physicist Stephen Hawking at London’s venerable Royal Society. On hand were pioneer planet-hunter Geoffrey Marcy, SETI godfather Frank Drake (“It’s just a miracle”), and Lord Martin Rees, whose title is Astronomer Royal of the United Kingdom.

You may remember Lord Rees. None of these SETI boosters appear to know beans about UFOs and, in fact, they’re often quick to tout their disinterest in The Great Taboo. But they seem to know an awful lot about how space aliens think, that their ET counterparts are all sitting in front of digital consoles, just like us, hoping to confirm the existence of the elusive Nobel Prize-winning “Wow!” signal. In 2012, Lord Rees likely spoke for the whole field when he said, “I dismiss [UFO reports] because if aliens had made the great effort to traverse interstellar distances to come here, they wouldn’t just meet a few well-known cranks, make a few circles in corn fields, and go away again.” De Void wondered how Lord Rees knew so much, and asked via email if ETs might also choose to communicate with us via robotic artificial intelligence probes, a theory proposed by NASA historian Steven Dick in a 2003 edition of the International Journal of Astrobiology. Lord Rees responded with a quick blow-off: “Thank you for these interesting thoughts. Best regards Martin Rees.”

So yeah, SETI’s got it all figured out and radio/laser signals are the only way to go and that’s why the world should celebrate its $100 million windfall. And it's not costing us a cent. Still, De Void can’t help but recall an observation made last year by maybe the only House committee member who actually paid attention to what Werthimer and Shostak were saying in their pitch for federal funding. Maryland’s Donna Edwards, a former systems engineer with Lockheed Martin at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, made her own pitch -- for alternative thinking: “What’s intriguing about this conversation is the idea that – and it’s a little bit of hubris, right? – somehow we’re waiting to find them as opposed to them finding us. And maybe that’s just the nature of homo sapiens because that’s kinda what we do.” The ranking Democrat on the committee had heard it all before, and concluded, “I think I’ll just go back to watching my movies.”

Anyhow, SETI, good luck with all that Russian money, maybe you’ll get finally get lucky. In the meantime, De Void wonders what just one percent of that cash could do for a shoestring nonprofit like the National Aviation Reporting Center on Anomalous Phenomena, led by a retired NASA scientist who coordinates research projects with foreign governments. These guys work with actual data.

Whoops, oh yeah, P.S.: A second component of Milner’s initiative is a PR stunt called Breakthrough Message, which will invite Earthlings to frame messages to send to ET. A million bucks in prize money will be awarded for the best questions. Let me go ahead and disqualify myself right now: “Yo, Planet Zyrtec, what’s up with UFOs?”

Thursday, July 23, 2015

Russian Billionaire Bankrolls New Search for Alien Life

Yuri Milner

By Alejandro Rojas
openminds.tv
5-21-15

     Scientists working on the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) got an unprecedented boost in funding that will greatly increase their ability to listen for aliens. The announcement was made Monday at the Royal Society in London.

Russian billionaire Yuri Milner shared the stage with Stephen Hawking to make the announcement. Milner has pledged to donate $100 million over the next ten years. The funding will help gain access to two of the largest and most powerful telescopes in the world, the Green Bank Telescope in West Virginia and the Parkes Telescope in Australia.

It will also allow SETI to scan a larger amount of the radio spectrum. Currently SETI gets around 36 hours a year with each telescope, and they scan about 20 to 50 megahertz of the radio spectrum. This new project will allow SETI to access thousands of hours with the telescopes, and allow them to scan the entire 10 gigahertz radio spectrum. . . .

Wednesday, July 22, 2015

New Search for Alien Life Launched with $100m By Stephen Hawking & Yuri Milner | VIDEO

 
 
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New Search for Alien Life Launched with $100m By Stephen Hawking & Yuri Milner

By Lee Billings
www.scientificamerican.com
7-20-15
Milner, a tech start-up entrepreneur and philanthropist, is partnering with scientists around the world to search for life among the stars
     SETI—the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence—has been one of the most captivating areas of science since its inception in 1960, when the astronomer Frank Drake used an 85-foot radio telescope in the first-ever attempt to detect interstellar radio transmissions sent by beings outside our solar system. Yet despite its high public visibility and near-ubiquity in blockbuster Hollywood science fiction, throughout most of its 55-year history SETI has languished on the fringes of scientific research, garnering relatively scant funding and only small amounts of dedicated observation time on world-class telescopes.

Today, in a live webcast originating from London and set for 6:30 am Eastern, the Russian entrepreneur Yuri Milner, along with the physicist Stephen Hawking, is announcing his intentions to change that. Watch the live streamed event below, starting at 6:30 am.

Tuesday, September 16, 2014

Time Travel Simulation Resolves “Grandfather Paradox”

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Time Travel

Time Travel Simulation Resolves “Grandfather Paradox”


By Lee Billings
www.scientificamerican.com
9-2-14
What would happen to you if you went back in time and killed your grandfather? A model using photons reveals that quantum mechanics can solve the quandary—and even foil quantum cryptography
     On June 28, 2009, the world-famous physicist Stephen Hawking threw a party at the University of Cambridge, complete with balloons, hors d'oeuvres and iced champagne. Everyone was invited but no one showed up. Hawking had expected as much, because he only sent out invitations after his party had concluded. It was, he said, "a welcome reception for future time travelers," a tongue-in-cheek experiment to reinforce his 1992 conjecture that travel into the past is effectively impossible.

But Hawking may be on the wrong side of history. Recent experiments offer tentative support for time travel's feasibility—at least from a mathematical perspective. The study cuts to the core of our understanding of the universe, and the resolution of the possibility of time travel, far from being a topic worthy only of science fiction, would have profound implications for fundamental physics as well as for practical applications such as quantum cryptography and computing.

Closed Timelike Curves

The source of time travel speculation lies in the fact that our best physical theories seem to contain no prohibitions on traveling backward through time. The feat should be possible based on Einstein's theory of general relativity, which describes gravity as the warping of spacetime by energy and matter. An extremely powerful gravitational field, such as that produced by a spinning black hole, could in principle profoundly warp the fabric of existence so that spacetime bends back on itself. This would create a "closed timelike curve," or CTC, a loop that could be traversed to travel back in time.

Hawking and many other physicists find CTCs abhorrent, because any macroscopic object traveling through one would inevitably create paradoxes where cause and effect break down. In a model proposed by the theorist David Deutsch in 1991, however, the paradoxes created by CTCs could be avoided at the quantum scale because of the behavior of fundamental particles, which follow only the fuzzy rules of probability rather than strict determinism. . . .

Sunday, January 26, 2014

"No Black Holes Exist," says Stephen Hawking?


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Black Hole

Stephen Hawking Says No Black Holes Exist

By Brent Matsalla
guardianlv.com
1-25-14

     Stephen Hawking is the most famous living scientist in the world and he gained much of his notoriety from the bizarre space objects known as “black holes.” Now Hawking is saying that no black holes exist in our universe.

A black hole is a theory from physicists that regions of space and time in our universe can become so dense that nothing can escape their grasp including light. The density increases until the huge gravity of a black hole eventually generates what is known as an “event horizon.” Stephen Hawking then took those theories and applied quantum mechanics to black holes back in 1974. Hawking’s point of view sparked much controversy in the scientific community and that controversy still continues today.

Generally, quantum mechanics does not play well with any other grand theories of general relativity or physics. It is even more complicated when combined in situations where both of the grand theories are relevant. When the quantum mechanics was applied to the theory of black holes, Hawking was able to determine that black holes are not actually black. However, what Hawking did find is that the phenomena will emit radiation in small quantities that would cause them to eventually shrink and evaporate.

The black hole radiation theory also made suggestions that when a black hole finally dies, it will take everything inside of it. However, this theory is disproved by quantum mechanics. According to physics information matter is never destroyed even if it is devoured by a black hole. Some other theories are that the black hole releases this information when it dries up and evaporates. Hawking disagreed with the theorists originally, but has now changed his mind by explaining how it just might be possible. It has taken him 30 years, but Hawking has now had to concede to a wager made seven years ago with another physicist. . . .

Wednesday, June 20, 2012

Noted Scientists Jill Tarter (SETI) and Stephen Hawking (Theoretical Physicist) at Odds Over Aliens & First Contact


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Scientists Debate Nature of Extraterrestrials

UFO? 'E.T' or 'Alien'? Scientists debate nature of extraterrestrials

By BARBARA VANCHERI
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
6-18-12

     At one extreme in alien-invasion movies, there's the slimy, razor-toothed, grotesque creature full of powerhouse violence -- and a too-eager desire to feast on human filet. These aliens, never cordial in social settings, are the worst-nightmare kind of beast that one finds in the "Alien" series or "The Thing," among many others.

At the other extreme are kinder, gentler alien visitors -- "E.T.: The Extra-terrestrial," "Paul" and "Close Encounters of the Third Kind," along with those using human form to hide their extraterrestrial identities as happened in "Starman" and "Cocoon."

And as crazy as it sounds, those extremes reflect opposing positions of an actual scientific debate about extraterrestrial invaders, or at least a well-publicized intellectual disagreement that occurred this spring between two renowned scientists, Jill Tarter and Stephen Hawking. . . .

Saturday, October 29, 2011

The Gigantic Stone Head of Guatemala; is it Evidence of an Alien Race?

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By Philip Coppens
www.philipcoppens.com

     Some archaeological findings appear and then soon afterwards disappear again, even though they generate tremendous interest at the time of their initial announcement. This was definitely the case for a gigantic stone head "somewhere in the jungle of Guatemala". One of the first people to speak about this Guatemalan stone head was Dr. Oscar Rafael Padilla Lara, in 1987. Padilla was a doctor of philosophy, as well as a lawyer and notary – though many seem to mainly define him as a man interested in UFOs. With this known interest in the mysterious, on August 16, 1986, he received a photograph of a monolith located somewhere in the jungles of Guatemala. The photograph was taken in the 1950s by the owner of the land where the huge stone sculpture was located, but as he had died, Padilla had been unable to determine the exact location.

The story was first printed in the Ancient Astronaut Society newsletter Ancient Skies, in 1987. The article included the important photograph that sat the centre of the controversy. For controversial it was. The stone head had very fine features: thin lips, a large sharp nose, leaving an overall Caucasian interpretation. They eyes of the head were closed, though if they were open, they would be looking towards the sky. Its size is enormous, at least 30 feet, as can be calculated from the three men sitting on top and the car parked in front of the statue.

Some initial questions were posed: was the structure just a head, or was there a body underneath? Though unlikely, it could be. If therefore most likely “just” a head, was there a rapport with the stone torsos of Easter Island? That seemed unlikely, but was asked at the time – specifically given the audience that would read the report.

Friday, October 28, 2011

UFO NEWS | Mayan Filmmaker Offers Photo as Proof of Aliens, Says [Professor Stephen] Hawking Agrees

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By Steve Pond
The Wrap
10-26-11

     The filmmakers behind "Revelations of the Mayans 2012 and Beyond," who said that their film will reveal evidence of contact between the Mayans and extraterrestrials, have now released to TheWrap what they claim is photographic evidence of a pre-Mayan, alien civilization.

And they claim they’ve got Stephen Hawking on their side

The monument, according to an accompanying letter by archaeologist Hector E. Mejia, dates back to between 3500 and 5000 B.C. and is evidence of a superior civilization unlike any known to have lived on Earth. . . .