A BEAST lurches through icy waters in a sighting a paranormal investigator thinks could prove woolly mammoths are not extinct after all.

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Knowledge Increased

“But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased•Strongs 7235: rabah, raw-baw´; a primitive root; to increase (in whatever respect):—(bring in) abundance (x -antly), + archer (by mistake for 7232), be in authority, bring up, x continue, enlarge, excel, exceeding(-ly), be full of, (be, make) great(-er, -ly, x -ness), grow up, heap, increase, be long, (be, give, have, make, use) many (a time), (any, be, give, give the, have) more (in number), (ask, be, be so, gather, over, take, yield) much (greater, more), (make to) multiply, nourish, plenty(-eous), x process (of time), sore, store, thoroughly, very..”
—Daniel 12:4

The animal – thought to have mostly died out roughly 4,000 years ago – was apparently filmed wading through a river in the freezing wilds of Siberia.

The jaw-dropping footage was caught by a government-employed engineer last summer in the Chukotka Autonomous Okrug region of Siberia, it is claimed.

He filmed the elephant-sized creature as it struggled against the racing water.

Its hair matches samples recovered from mammoth remains regularly dug up from the permafrost in frozen Russia.

The official was reportedly in the area surveying for a planned road.

Paranormal writer Michael Cohen said: “Rumours of a handful of mammoths still kicking around in the vast wilderness of Siberia have been circulating for decades and occasionally sightings by locals have occurred.

“Siberia is an enormous territory and much of it remains completely unexplored and untouched by humans. ”

Woolly mammoths roamed the Earth 10,000 years ago during the last Ice Age.

A small pocket remained on and around Wrangel Island, off the coast of Siberia, and these did not die out until 3,500 years ago.

Mr Cohen, 41, added: “It is highly possible that a number of species, extinct elsewhere, survive in the area.

“If surviving woolly mammoths were found in Siberia, it could run against Russia’s plans to further develop and exploit the area’s considerable resources.

“It would be potentially one of the greatest discoveries ever.”

But viewers are divided on the nature of the animal seen in the video. Some have dismissed it as a hoax while others reckon it is an elephant lost in the Siberian wilderness. The third theory is the sighting shows a bear eating a huge fish. What do you think?

MOSCOW (AP) — After more than two decades of drilling in Antarctica, Russian scientists have reached the surface of a gigantic freshwater lake hidden under miles of ice for some 20 million years — a lake that may hold life from the distant past and clues to the search for life on other planets.

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Knowledge Increased

“And the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined•Strongs 2161: zamam, zaw-mam´; a primitive root; to plan, usually in a bad sense:—consider, devise, imagine, plot, purpose, think (evil). to do.”
—Genesis 11:6

Reaching Lake Vostok is a major discovery avidly anticipated by scientists around the world hoping that it may allow a glimpse into microbial life forms, not visible to the naked eye, that existed before the Ice Age. It may also provide precious material that would help look for life on the ice-crusted moons of Jupiter and Saturn or under Mars’ polar ice caps where conditions could be similar.
“It’s like exploring another planet, except this one is ours,” Columbia University glaciologist Robin Bell told The Associated Press by email.
Valery Lukin, the head of Russia’s Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute (AARI), which is in charge of the mission, said in Wednesday’s statement that his team reached the lake’s surface on Sunday.
Lukin has previously compared the Lake Vostok effort to the moon race that the Soviet Union lost to the United States, telling the Russian media he was proud that Russia will be the first this time. Although far from being the world’s deepest lake, the severe weather of Antarctica and the location’s remoteness made the project challenging.
“There is no other place on Earth that has been in isolation for more than 20 million years,” said Lev Savatyugin, a researcher with the AARI. “It’s a meeting with the unknown.”
Savatyugin said scientists hope to find primeval bacteria that could expand the human knowledge of the origins of life.
“We need to see what we have here before we send missions to ice-crusted moons, like Jupiter’s moon Europa,” he said.
Lake Vostok is 160 miles (250 kilometers) long and 30 miles (50 kilometers) across at its widest point, similar in area to Lake Ontario. It lies about 3.8 kilometers (2.4 miles) beneath the surface and is the largest in a web of nearly 400 known subglacial lakes in Antarctica. The lake is warmed underneath by geothermal energy.
The project, however, has drawn strong fears that 60 metric tons (66 tons) of lubricants and antifreeze used in the drilling may contaminate the pristine lake. The Russian researchers have insisted the bore would only slightly touch the lake’s surface and that a surge in pressure will send the water rushing up the shaft where it will freeze, immediately sealing out the toxic chemicals.
Lukin said about 1.5 cubic meters (50 cubic feet) of kerosene and freon poured up to the surface from the boreshaft, proof that the lake water streamed up from beneath, froze, and blocked the hole.
The scientists will later remove the frozen sample for analysis in December when the next Antarctic summer comes.
Scientists believe that microbial life may exist in the dark depths of the lake despite its high pressure and constant cold — conditions similar to those expected to be found under the ice crust on Mars, Jupiter’s moon Europa and Saturn’s move Enceladus.
“In the simplest sense, it can transform the way we think about life,” NASA’s chief scientist Waleed Abdalati told the AP by email.
Scientists in other nations hope to follow up this discovery with similar projects. American and British teams are drilling to reach their own subglacial Antarctic lakes, but Bell said those lakes are smaller and younger than Vostok, which is the big scientific prize.
Some scientists hope that studies of Lake Vostok and other subglacial lakes will advance knowledge of Earth’s own climate and help predict its changes.
“It is an important milestone that has been completed and a major achievement for the Russians because they’ve been working on this for years,” Professor Martin Siegert, a leading scientist with the British Antarctic Survey, which is trying to reach another Antarctic subglacial lake, Lake Ellsworth.
“The Russian team share our mission to understand subglacial lake environments and we look forward to developing collaborations with their scientists and also those from the U.S. and other nations, as we all embark on a quest to comprehend these pristine, extreme environments,” he said in an email.
In the future, Russian researchers plan to explore the lake using an underwater robot equipped with video cameras that would collect water samples and sediments from the bottom of the lake, a project still awaiting the approval of the Antarctic Treaty organization.
The prospect of lakes hidden under Antarctic ice was first put forward by Russian scientist and anarchist revolutionary, Prince Pyotr Kropotkin at the end of the 19th century. Russian geographer Andrei Kapitsa pointed at the likely location of the lake and named it following Soviet Antarctic missions in the 1950s and 1960s, but it wasn’t until 1994 that its existence was proven by Russian and British scientists.
The drilling in the area began in 1989 and dragged on slowly due to funding shortages, equipment breakdowns, environmental concerns and severe cold.
While temperatures on the Vostok Station on the surface above have registered the coldest ever recorded on Earth, reaching minus 89 degrees Celsius (minus 128 degrees Fahrenheit), the water in the lake is warmed by the giant pressure of the ice crust and geothermal energy underneath.
The Russian team reached the lake just before they had to leave at the end of the Antarctic summer season.
____
AP Science Writer Seth Borenstein contributed to this report from Washington.

It is a “myth” that regularly eating fried foods causes heart attacks, researchers have found, as long as you use olive oil or sunflower oil.

!–more–>

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Knowledge Increased

“But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased•Strongs 7235: rabah, raw-baw´; a primitive root; to increase (in whatever respect):—(bring in) abundance (x -antly), + archer (by mistake for 7232), be in authority, bring up, x continue, enlarge, excel, exceeding(-ly), be full of, (be, make) great(-er, -ly, x -ness), grow up, heap, increase, be long, (be, give, have, make, use) many (a time), (any, be, give, give the, have) more (in number), (ask, be, be so, gather, over, take, yield) much (greater, more), (make to) multiply, nourish, plenty(-eous), x process (of time), sore, store, thoroughly, very..”
—Daniel 12:4

They say there is mounting research that it is the type of oil used, and whether or not it has been used before, that really matters.
The latest study, published in the British Medical Journal, found no association between the frequency of fried food consumption in Spain – where olive and sunflower oils are mostly used – and the incidence of serious heart disease.
However, the British Heart Foundation warned Britons not to “reach for the frying pan” yet, pointing out that the Mediterranean diet as a whole was healthier than ours.
Spanish researchers followed more than 40,000 people, two-thirds of whom were women, from the mid 1990s to 2004.
At the outset they asked them how often they ate fried foods, either at home or while out. They then looked to see whether eating fried foods regularly increased the likelihood of falling ill from having coronary heart disease, such as a heart attack or angina requiring surgery.

Dividing participants into four groups, from lowest fried food intake to highest, they found no significant difference in heart disease.
There were 606 incidents linked to heart disease in total, but they were split relatively evenly between the four groups.
The authors concluded: “In a Mediterranean country where olive and sunflower oils are the most commonly used fats for frying, and where large amounts of fried foods are consumed both at and away from home, no association was observed between fried food consumption and the risk of coronary heart disease or death.”
Commenting on the findings in the BMJ, Professor Michael Leitzmann of the University of Regensburg in Germany said two other studies – one from Costa Rica and another by an international team – had also failed to find strong evidence of a link.
He said: “Taken together, the myth that frying food is generally bad for the heart is not supported by available evidence.
“However, this does not mean that frequent meals of fish and chips will have no health consequences.”
Fried food did contain more calories, he said, while it had also been linked to high blood pressure and obesity.
The authors of the Spanish study noted that the findings could only really be extrapolated to other Mediterranean countries with similar diets, whose people tended to fry ‘fresh’ with olive and sunflower oil.
Fried foods from modern American-style takeaways were different, they argued, because these tended to have been cooked in re-used oils, higher in transfats.
In addition, such takeaways tended to contain much more salt, known to increase blood pressure and heart disease risk.
However, more and more people in Britain are now frying with olive oil or sunflower oil. Britain now consumes around 28 million litres of olive oil a year – double that sold a decade ago.
Half British households now use it regularly in some way, although not necessarily for frying, compared to a third 10 years ago.
Victoria Taylor, senior heart health dietitian at the British Heart Foundation, said: “Before we all reach for the frying pan it’s important to remember that this was a study of a Mediterranean diet, rather than British fish and chips.
“Our diet in the UK will differ from Spain, so we cannot say that this result would be the same for us too.
“Participants in this study used unsaturated fats such as olive and sunflower oil to fry their food.
“We currently recommend swapping saturated fats like butter, lard or palm oil for unsaturated fats as a way of keeping your cholesterol down and this study gives further cause to make that switch.
“Regardless of the cooking methods used, consuming foods with high fat content means a high calorie intake. This can lead to weight gain and obesity, which is a risk factor for heart disease.
“A well-balanced diet, with plenty of fruit and veg and only a small amount of high fat foods, is best for a healthy heart.”

Remember when the military actually put human beings in the cockpits of its planes? They still do, but in far fewer numbers. According to a new congressional report acquired by Danger Room, drones now account for 31 percent of all military aircraft.

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Knowledge Increased

“And the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined•Strongs 2161: zamam, zaw-mam´; a primitive root; to plan, usually in a bad sense:—consider, devise, imagine, plot, purpose, think (evil). to do.”
—Genesis 11:6

To be fair, lots of those drones are tiny flying spies, like the Army’s Raven, that could never accommodate even the most diminutive pilot. (Specifically, the Army has 5,346 Ravens, making it the most numerous military drone by far.) But in 2005, only five percent of military aircraft were robots, a report by the Congressional Research Service notes. Barely seven years later, the military has 7,494 drones. Total number of old school, manned aircraft: 10,767 planes.

A small sliver of those nearly 7,500 drones gets all of the attention. The military owns 161 Predators — the iconic flying strike drone used over Pakistan, Yemen and elsewhere — and Reapers, the Predator’s bigger, better-armed brother.

But even as the military’s bought a ton of drones in the past few years, the Pentagon spends much, much more money on planes with people in them. Manned aircraft still get 92 percent of the Pentagon’s aircraft procurement money. Still, since 2001, the military has spent $26 billion on drones, the report — our Document of the Day — finds.

The drones are also getting safer. (To operate, that is; not for their targets below.) Drone crashes get a lot of attention; 38 Predators and Reapers have crashed in Iraq and Afghanistan thus far; most recently, Iran looks like it got ahold of an advanced, stealthy RQ-170 Sentinel. But the congressional report finds that the Predator, for instance, has only 7.5 accidents per 100,000 hours of flight, down from 20 accidents over that time in 2005 — meaning it’s now got an accident rate comparable to a (manned) F-16.

But the report doesn’t mention some of the unique vulnerabilities of the drones. There’s no mention of the malware infection that reached into the drone cockpits at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada, a story Danger Room broke. Nor does it go into the workload problems for military imagery analysts caused by the proliferation of the drones full-motion video “Death TV,” which is pushing the military toward developing selective or “thinking” cameras. The ethical issues attendant to remote-control war also go unexplored.

Still, the report does explore the downsides of the Pentagon’s drone obsession. There are way too many redundant drones, it finds, and the expensive sensors they increasingly carry drive the costs of a supposedly cheap machine up. They’re also bandwidth hogs: a single Global Hawk drone requires 500 megabytes per second worth of bandwidth, the report finds, which is “500 percent of the total bandwidth of the entire U.S. military used during the 1991 Gulf War.” And it also notes that a lot of future spy missions might go not to drones, but to the increasing number of giant blimps and aerostats, some of which can carry way more sensors and cameras.

And the current fleet of flying robots is just the start. The Navy’s developing a next-gen drone that can take off and land from an aircraft carrier. Future missions, the report finds, include “stand-off jamming” of enemy electronics; “psychological operations, such as dropping leaflets” over an adversary population; and even measuring the amount of radiation in the earth’s atmosphere. The military’s working on increasingly autonomous drones — including tiny, suicidal killers — and on increasing the number of drones a single ground station can operate.

The Air Force even holds out hope for a “super/hyper-sonic” drone by 2034. It’s a good time to be a flying robot.

Congressional Research Service reports typically aren’t public. But we’re embedding it here, so you can read it in full for yourself. It compiles and updates a lot of useful information about military drones:

US researchers said Thursday they have created the world’s first mixed-embryo monkeys by merging cells from up to six different embryos, in what could be a big advance for medical research.

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Knowledge Increased

“And the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined•Strongs 2161: zamam, zaw-mam´; a primitive root; to plan, usually in a bad sense:—consider, devise, imagine, plot, purpose, think (evil). to do.”
—Genesis 11:6

“Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain•Strongs 3154: mataioo, mat-ah-yo´-o; from 3152; to render (passively, become) foolish, i.e. (morally) wicked or (specially), idolatrous:—become vain.
•Strongs 3152: mataios, mat´-ah-yos; from the base of 3155; empty, i.e. (literally) profitless, or (specially), an idol:—vain, vanity. in their imaginations•Strongs 1261: dialogismos, dee-al-og-is-mos´; from 1260; discussion, i.e. (internal) consideration (by implication, purpose), or (external) debate:—dispute, doubtful(-ing), imagination, reasoning, thought. , and their foolish heart was darkened.”
—Romans 1:21

“And he had power to give life unto the image•Strongs 1504: eikon, i-kone´; from 1503; a likeness, i.e. (literally) statue, profile, or (figuratively) representation, resemblance:—image. of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak, and cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed.”
—Revelation 13:15

Until now, rodents have been the primary creatures used to make chimeras, a lab animal produced by combining two or more fertilized eggs or early embryos together.
Scientists have long been able to create “knock-out” mice with certain genes deleted in order to study a host of ailments and remedies, including obesity, heart disease, anxiety, diabetes and Parkinson’s disease.
Attempts to create melded primates have failed in the past, but scientists in the western state of Oregon succeeded by altering the method used to make mice.
The breakthrough came when they mixed cells together from very early stage rhesus monkey embryos, in a state known as totipotent, when they are able to give rise to a whole animal as well as the placenta and other life-sustaining tissues.
“Knock-out” mice are typically made by introducing embryonic stem cells that have been cultured in a lab dish into a mouse embryo, but that method failed in monkeys.
Primate embryos do not allow cultured embryonic stem cells to become integrated, as mice do.
Combining primate cells apparently requires more potent, early stage cells from a living embryo, said lead researcher Shoukhrat Mitalipov of the Oregon National Primate Research Center at Oregon Health and Science University.
The experiment produced three healthy male rhesus monkeys they named Roku, Hex and Chimero, with gene traits from all of the separate embryos used to meld them.
“The cells never fuse, but they stay together and work together to form tissues and organs,” said Mitalipov. “The possibilities for science are enormous.”
The research is published online ahead of the release of the January 20 issue of the journal Cell.
Scientists use rhesus monkeys to study HIV/AIDS drugs, research vaccines for rabies, smallpox and polio, and to study potential uses for embryonic stem cells. They have also been launched into space on test missions by the US and Russia.
“We cannot model everything in the mouse,” Mitalipov said. “If we want to move stem cell therapies from the lab to clinics and from the mouse to humans, we need to understand what these primate cells can and can’t do.”
Researchers at the same Oregon facility in 2000 created the first genetically modified monkey, ANDi, who was carrying an extra bit of DNA that was inserted while he was an unfertilized egg.
That experiment was described in Science in 2001.

U.S. economic growth was slower than previously estimated in the third quarter on a sharp drop in healthcare spending, but stronger business investment and a fall in inventories pointed to a pickup in output in the current period.

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Perplexity

“…upon the earth distress•Strongs 4928: sunoche, soon-okh-ay´; from 4912; restraint, i.e. (figuratively) anxiety: — anguish, distress. of nations, with perplexity•Strongs 640: aporia, ap-or-ee´-a; from the same as 639; a (state of) quandary:—perplexity.
•Strongs 639: aporeo, ap-or-eh´-o; from a compound of 1 (as a negative particle) and the base of 4198; to have no way out, i.e. be at a loss (mentally):— (stand in) doubt, be perplexed….”
—Luke 21:25

Jobless claims, meanwhile, posted another weekly drop in another sign that the thawing of the labor market is progressing. The fall to 364,000 was the lowest level in more than three years.

Gross domestic product grew at a 1.8 percent annual rate in the third quarter, the Commerce Department said in its final estimate on Thursday, down from the previously estimated 2 percent.

Economists had expected growth to be unrevised at 2 percent. Though spending on healthcare dropped by $2.2 billion, spending on durable goods was stronger than previously estimated, indicating household appetite to consume remains healthy.

Healthcare spending had previously been reported to have increased at a $19.7 billion rate. Healthcare spending subtracted about 0.1 percentage point from the GDP change in the final revision, whereas the previous estimate had it adding 0.61 percentage point to growth.

Even as much of the rest of the world is slowing down and a mild recession is forecast in Europe next year, the U.S. economy remains resilient.

The labor market is improving, households continue to spend, home building is picking up and factory output is expanding, putting the economy on course for at least a 3 percent growth pace in the fourth quarter.

That would be the fastest pace in 18 months.

The number of people applying for unemployment benefits dropped last week to its lowest level since April 2008, extending a downward trend that shows the job market strengthening.

The Labor Department says new applications for unemployment benefits fell last week by 4,000. It was the third straight weekly decrease. The four-week moving average, a less volatile measure, dropped to 380,250, the lowest since June 2008. The average has decreased in 11 of the past 13 weeks.

Unemployment applications are a measure of the pace of layoffs. Job cuts have fallen sharply since the recession, though employers have been slow to start hiring. The four-week average is falling near 375,000 — a pace that usually signals that hiring is strong enough to reduce the unemployment rate.

Despite the downward revision, last quarter’s growth is still a step-up from the April-June period’s 1.3 percent pace. Part of the pick-up in output during the last quarter reflects a reversal of factors that held back growth earlier in the year.

A jump in gasoline prices had weighed on consumer spending earlier in the year, and supply disruptions from Japan’s big earthquake and tsunami in March had curbed auto production.

The government revised consumer spending to a 1.7 percent growth rate from 2.3 percent because of adjustments to healthcare services, in particular nonprofit hospitals.

Spending on durable goods was, however, revised up to a 5.7 percent pace from 5.5 percent.

Business inventories dropped $2.0 billion, which sliced off 1.35 percentage points from GDP growth. Inventories had previously been estimated to have declined $8.5 billion.

The drag from inventories was offset by strong business spending, which increased at a 15.7 percent rate, instead of 14.8 percent.

Excluding inventories, the economy grew at a still brisk 3.2 percent rate, revised down from 3.6 percent pace. Final sales increased at a 1.6 percent pace in the second quarter.

The Department also said after-tax corporate profits increased at a 2.7 percent rate, revised down from 3.0 percent. After tax profits increased at a 4.3 rate in the second quarter.

Export growth was stronger than previously estimated, rising at a 4.7 percent rate instead of 4.3 percent. Imports increased at a much faster 1.2 percent rate rather than 0.5 percent.

Trade contributed 0.43 percentage point to GDP growth. Elsewhere, residential construction grew at a 1.3 percent rate instead of 1.6 percent. Government spending fell at an unrevised 0.1 percent.

The GDP report also showed some inflation pressures in the economy. A price index for personal spending rose at an unrevised 2.3 percent rate in the third quarter.

That compared to a 3.3 percent rate in the second quarter. A core inflation measure, which strips out food and energy costs, rose at a 2.1 percent rate rather than 2.0 percent. The measure — closely watched by the Federal Reserve — grew at a 2.3 percent rate in the prior three months.

Jobs Picture Brightens

The economy has shown signs it is gaining steam as the year ends, although the recovery still could be derailed by any big flare up in Europe’s debt crisis. The economy also faces risks from the fight in Congress over extending special unemployment benefits and a payroll tax cut.

The prior week’s claims data was revised up to 368,000 from the previously reported 366,000.

Economists polled by Reuters had forecast claims rising to 375,000 last week.

The level of unemployment claims has fallen in recent weeks, and analysts say fewer layoffs means employers are probably more likely to hire.

Economists at Goldman Sachs said earlier in the week that weekly claims below 435,000 pointed to net monthly gains in jobs. Their research was based on figures available through October.

In November, the jobless rate dropped to a 2-1/2 year low of 8.6 percent. The Federal Reserve last week acknowledged an improvement in the jobs market, but said unemployment remained high and left the door open for further measures to help the economy.

A Labor Department official said claims were not estimated for any states, and that there was nothing unusual in the data.

The four-week moving average of claims, considered a better measure of labor market trends than the headline number, fell 8,000 to 380,250 — the lowest since June 2008.

The number of people still receiving benefits under regular state programs after an initial week of aid fell 79,000 to 3.546 million in the week ended Dec. 10.

Economists had forecast so-called continuing claims holding steady at 3.6 million.

As of Dec 3, a total of 7.150 million people were claiming unemployment benefits under all programs, down 299,738 from the prior week.

—The Associated Press contributed to this report.

The Dead Sea Scrolls may have been written, at least in part, by a sectarian group called the Essenes, according to nearly 200 textiles discovered in caves at Qumran, in the West Bank, where the religious texts had been stored.

To view popup window put your cursor on the blue words

Knowledge Increased

“But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased•Strongs 7235: rabah, raw-baw´; a primitive root; to increase (in whatever respect):—(bring in) abundance (x -antly), + archer (by mistake for 7232), be in authority, bring up, x continue, enlarge, excel, exceeding(-ly), be full of, (be, make) great(-er, -ly, x -ness), grow up, heap, increase, be long, (be, give, have, make, use) many (a time), (any, be, give, give the, have) more (in number), (ask, be, be so, gather, over, take, yield) much (greater, more), (make to) multiply, nourish, plenty(-eous), x process (of time), sore, store, thoroughly, very..”
—Daniel 12:4

Israel in the Last Days

“And he shall set up an ensign •Strongs 5251: nace; from 5264; a flag; also a sail; by implication, a flagstaff; generally a signal; figuratively, a token:—banner, pole, sail, (en-)sign, standard.
•Strongs 5264: naw-sas´; a primitive root; to gleam from afar, i.e. to be conspicuous as a signal; or rather perhaps a denominative from 5251 (and identical with 5263, through the idea of a flag as fluttering in the wind); to raise a beacon:—lift up as an ensign. for the nations, and shall assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth.”
—Isaiah 11:12

Scholars are divided about who authored the Dead Sea Scrolls and how the texts got to Qumran, and so the new finding could help clear up this long-standing mystery.
The research reveals that all the textiles were made of linen, rather than wool, which was the preferred textile used in ancient Israel. Also they lack decoration, some actually being bleached white, even though fabrics from the period often have vivid colours. Altogether, researchers say these finds suggest that the Essenes, an ancient Jewish sect, “penned” some of the scrolls.
Not everyone agrees with this interpretation. An archaeologist who has excavated at Qumran told LiveScience that the linen could have come from people fleeing the Roman army after the fall of Jerusalem in A.D. 70, and that they are in fact responsible for putting the scrolls into caves.
Iconic scrolls
The Dead Sea Scrolls consist of nearly 900 texts, the first batch of which were discovered by a Bedouin shepherd in 1947. They date from before A.D. 70, and some may go back to as early as the third century B.C. The scrolls contain a wide variety of writings including early copies of the Hebrew Bible, along with hymns, calendars and psalms, among other works. [Gallery of Dead Sea Scrolls]
Nearly 200 textiles were found in the same caves, along with a few examples from Qumran, the archaeological site close to the caves where the scrolls were hidden.
Orit Shamir, curator of organic materials at the Israel Antiquities Authority, and Naama Sukenik, a graduate student at Bar-Ilan University, compared the white-linen textiles found in the11 caves to examples found elsewhere in ancient Israel, publishing their results in the most recent issue of the journal Dead Sea Discoveries.
A breakthrough in studying these remains was made in 2007 when a team of archaeologists was able to ascertain that colorful wool textiles found at a site to the south of Qumran, known as the Christmas Cave, were not related to the inhabitants of the site. This meant that Shamir and Sukenik were able to focus on the 200 textiles found in the Dead Sea Scroll caves and at Qumran itself, knowing that these are the only surviving textiles related to the scrolls.
They discovered that every single one of these textiles was made of linen, even though wool was the most popular fabric at the time in Israel. They also found that most of the textiles would have originally been used as clothing, later being cut apart and re-used for other purposes such as bandages and for packing the scrolls into jars. [Photos of Dead Sea textiles]
Some of the textiles were bleached white and most of them lacked decoration, even though decoration is commonly seen in textiles from other sites in ancient Israel.
According to the researchers the finds suggest that the residents of Qumran dressed simply.
“They wanted to be different than the Roman world,” Shamir told LiveScience in a telephone interview. “They were very humble, they didn’t want to wear colorful textiles, they wanted to use very simple textiles.”
The owners of the clothing likely were not poor, as only one of the textiles had a patch on it.”This is very, very, important,” Shamir said. “Patching is connected with [the] economic situation of the site.”
Shamir pointed out that textiles found at sites where people were under stress, such as at the Cave of Letters, which was used in a revolt against the Romans, were often patched. On the other hand “if the site is in a very good economic situation, if it is a very rich site, the textiles will not be patched,” she said. With Qumran, “I think [economically] they were in the middle, but I’m sure they were not poor.”
Robert Cargill, a professor at the University of Iowa, has written extensively about Qumran and has developed a virtual model of it. He said that archaeological evidence from the site, including coins and glassware, also suggests the inhabitants were not poor.
“Far from being poor monastics, I think there was wealth at Qumran, at least some form of wealth,” Cargill said, arguing that trade was important at the site. “I think they made their own pottery and sold some of it, I think they bred animals and sold them, I think they made honey and sold it.”
Who wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls?
Scholars are divided about who authored the Dead Sea Scrolls and how the texts got to Qumran. Some argue that the scrolls were written at the site itself while others say they were written in Jerusalem or elsewhere in Israel.
Qumran itself was first excavated by Roland de Vaux in the 1950s. He came to the conclusion that the site was inhabited by a religious sect called the Essenes who wrote the scrolls and stored them in caves. Among the finds he made were water pools, which he believed were used for ritual bathing, and multiple inkwells found in a room that became known as the “scriptorium.” Based on his excavations, scholars have estimated the population of the site at as high as 200.
More recent archaeological work, conducted by Yitzhak Magen and Yuval Peleg of the Israel Antiquities Authority, suggests that the site could not have supported more than a few dozen people and had nothing to do with the scrolls themselves. They believe that the scrolls were deposited in the caves by refugees fleeing the Roman army after Jerusalem was conquered in A.D. 70.
Magen and Peleg found that the site came into existence around 100 B.C. as a military outpost used by the Hasmoneans, a Jewish kingdom that flourished in the area. After the Romans took over Judaea in 63 B.C. the site was abandoned and eventually was taken over by civilians who used it for pottery production. They found that the pools de Vaux discovered include a fine layer of potters’ clay.
There are other ideas as well. Cargill argues that while Qumran started out as a fort it was later occupied by a sectarian group whose members were deeply concerned with ritual purity. “Whether or not they are the Essenes, that’s a different question,” he said. This group, much smaller than earlier estimates of 200 people, would have written some of the scrolls, while collecting others, he argues.
Other groups, not part of the Qumran community, may also have been putting scrolls into the caves, Cargill said.
Can clothing solve the mystery?
The new clothing research may help to identify the writers of the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Shamir told LiveScience that it is unlikely the scrolls were deposited in the caves by Roman refugees. If that were the case, the more-popular textile in ancient Israel, wool, would have been found in the caves along with other garments.
“If people run away from Jerusalem they would take all sorts of textiles with them, not only linen textiles,” she said. “The people who ran away to the Cave of Letters, they took wool textiles with them.”
Peleg, the archaeologist who co-led the recent archaeological work at Qumran, told LiveScience he disagrees with that assessment. He said he stands by the idea that there is no connection between Qumran and the scrolls stored in the caves.
“We must remember that almost all the textiles were found in the caves andnot at the site. The main question is the connection between the site and the scrolls,” Peleg wrote in an email. “I can find alternative explanations for the fact that scrolls were found with linen.”
For instance, linen could have been chosen as scroll wrapping for religious reasons or perhaps priests were responsible for storing the scrolls and they wore linen clothing. “The clothes of the priests were made from linen,” Peleg wrote.
In their paper, Shamir and Sukenik say that the clothing found in the Dead Sea Scroll caves is similar to historical descriptions of the clothing of the Essenes, suggesting that they in fact lived at Qumran. They point to an ancient Jewish writer, Flavius Josephus, who wrote that the Essenes “make a point of keeping a dry skin and always being dressed in white.” (However, Josephus never said anything about the clothing being made of linen, Peleg points out.)
Josephusalso wrote that the Essenes were very frugal when it came to clothing and shared goods with each other.
“In their dress and deportment they resemble children under rigorous discipline. They do not change their garments or shoes until they are torn to shreds or worn threadbare with age. There is no buying or selling among themselves, but each gives what he has to any in need and receives from him in exchange something useful to himself …”
(Translation from “Jewish Life and Thought Among Greeks and Romans: Primary Readings,” Louis Feldman and Meyer Reinhold, 1996.)
In their paper, Shamir and Sukenikalso point to another ancient writer, Philo of Alexandria, who wrote that the Essenes wore a common style of simple dress.
“And not only is their table in common but their clothes also. For in winter they have a stock of stout coats ready and in summer cheap vests, so that he who wishes may easily take any garment he likes, since what one has is held to belong to all and conversely what all have one has.”
(Translation from the “Selected Writing of Philo of Alexandria,” edited by Hans Lewy, 1965.)
Cargill said that the clothing is further evidence that there was a Jewish sectarian group living at Qumran.
“You do have evidence of a group that raised its own animals, pressed its own date honey, that appears to have worn distinctive clothes and made its own pottery, and followed its own calendar, at least a calendar different from the temple priesthood,” he said. “Those are all signs of a sectarian group.”
He also noted the presence of mikveh (ritual baths) at the site and the fact that the residents could make pottery that was ritually pure.
This group appears to have wanted to separate itself from the priests based at the temple in Jerusalem. “There is a congruency within many of the sectarian documents that appears to be consistent with a sectarian group that has separated itself from the temple priesthood in Jerusalem,” Cargill said.
According to Cargill’s theory, the people of Qumran would have written some of the scrolls, while collecting others. “Obviously they didn’t write all of the scrolls,” Cargill said. Dating indicates some of the scrolls were written before Qumran even existed. One unusual scroll, made of copper, may have been deposited after Qumran was abandoned in A.D. 70.
Cargill says it’s possible that some of the scrolls may have been put in caves from people outside the community. If that’s true, some of the textiles could also be from people outside of Qumran.
“[If] not all of the Dead Sea Scrolls are the responsibility of sectarians at Qumran then it would follow that not all of the textiles that are discovered in the caves are [the] product of a sect at Qumran,” Cargill said.
Were there women at Qumran?
The new research may alsoshed light on who created the textiles.
The textiles are of high quality and, based on the archaeological finds at Qumran itself, where there is little evidence of spindle whorls or loom weights, the team thinks it’s unlikely they would have been made at the site.
“This is very, very important, because this is connected to gender,” Shamir said, “spinning is connected with women.”
She explained that the textiles were likely created at another site in Israel, with women playing a key role in their production. This suggests that there were few women living at Qumran itself. “Weaving is connected with men and women, but spinning was only a production of women, [and] we don’t find this item at Qumran.”

The European Commission has issued new guidelines for the use of naked body scanners at European airports. Only scanners that use millimeter wave technology, a type of low-energy radio wave that does not cause radioactive damage, will be permitted for use in the EU — the backscatter X-ray variety commonly used in the US will be off limits due to safety concerns.

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Perplexity

“…upon the earth distress•Strongs 4928: sunoche, soon-okh-ay´; from 4912; restraint, i.e. (figuratively) anxiety: — anguish, distress. of nations, with perplexity•Strongs 640: aporia, ap-or-ee´-a; from the same as 639; a (state of) quandary:—perplexity.
•Strongs 639: aporeo, ap-or-eh´-o; from a compound of 1 (as a negative particle) and the base of 4198; to have no way out, i.e. be at a loss (mentally):— (stand in) doubt, be perplexed….”
—Luke 21:25

Knowledge Increased

“But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased•Strongs 7235: rabah, raw-baw´; a primitive root; to increase (in whatever respect):—(bring in) abundance (x -antly), + archer (by mistake for 7232), be in authority, bring up, x continue, enlarge, excel, exceeding(-ly), be full of, (be, make) great(-er, -ly, x -ness), grow up, heap, increase, be long, (be, give, have, make, use) many (a time), (any, be, give, give the, have) more (in number), (ask, be, be so, gather, over, take, yield) much (greater, more), (make to) multiply, nourish, plenty(-eous), x process (of time), sore, store, thoroughly, very..”
—Daniel 12:4

Unlike the US Transportation Security Administration (TSA), which continues to insist that the backscatter machines are safe, EU regulators have admitted that this is not the case. Not only are these ionizing radiation machines now restricted throughout Europe, but the use of even millimeter wave machines also continues to remain optional for nation states that choose to use them.

“In order not to risk jeopardizing citizens’ health and safety, only security scanners which do not use X-ray technology are added to the list of authorised methods for passenger screening at EU airports,” says the commission’s press release announcement. “All other technologies, such as that used for mobiles (sic) phones and others, can be used provided that they comply with EU security standards.”

This approach to public safety is a far cry from the one US regulators are taking. Even though backscatter X-ray machines are not at all necessary, the TSA, under the umbrella of the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS), continues to bend over backwards in support of the machines, even when this includes openly denying the fact that they can cause cancer (http://www.naturalnews.com/030607_n…).

One would think that the US, which is supposed to be the “land of the free,” would be more likely than the EU, which is largely socialist, to protect its citizens from cancer-causing radioactive devices. But not only does the EU not force its citizens to go through naked body scanners like the US does, but it has also now taken a proactive approach to protecting citizens’ health by banning these radioactive devices from airports.

Most Americans seem to have no problem complying with unconstitutional mandates to walk through radioactive naked body scanners — in fact, many still think the procedure is done for their own safety. And as long as the population at large continues to accept this tyranny in the name of safety and security, freedom and liberty will continue to rapidly disappear at the hands of the nation’s rogue federal government.

To view popup window put your cursor on the blue words

Knowledge Increased

“But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased•Strongs 7235: rabah, raw-baw´; a primitive root; to increase (in whatever respect):—(bring in) abundance (x -antly), + archer (by mistake for 7232), be in authority, bring up, x continue, enlarge, excel, exceeding(-ly), be full of, (be, make) great(-er, -ly, x -ness), grow up, heap, increase, be long, (be, give, have, make, use) many (a time), (any, be, give, give the, have) more (in number), (ask, be, be so, gather, over, take, yield) much (greater, more), (make to) multiply, nourish, plenty(-eous), x process (of time), sore, store, thoroughly, very..”
—Daniel 12:4

“And the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined•Strongs 2161: zamam, zaw-mam´; a primitive root; to plan, usually in a bad sense:—consider, devise, imagine, plot, purpose, think (evil). to do.”
—Genesis 11:6

Children most likely to be born in Asia-Pacific region
Fears over pressure on food supply and medical care

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Perplexity

“…upon the earth distress•Strongs 4928: sunoche, soon-okh-ay´; from 4912; restraint, i.e. (figuratively) anxiety: — anguish, distress. of nations, with perplexity•Strongs 640: aporia, ap-or-ee´-a; from the same as 639; a (state of) quandary:—perplexity.
•Strongs 639: aporeo, ap-or-eh´-o; from a compound of 1 (as a negative particle) and the base of 4198; to have no way out, i.e. be at a loss (mentally):— (stand in) doubt, be perplexed….”
—Luke 21:25

The world’s population looks set to smash through the seven billion barrier in the next few days, according to the United Nations.
It comes just 12 years since the total reached six billion – with official estimates saying the figure will top eight billion in 2025 and 10 billion before the end of the century.
And it is most likely the baby will be born in the Asia-Pacific region – where the population growth rate is higher than anywhere else in the world.

Experts say the pace of growth – which has seen the number of people on the planet triple since 1940 – poses an increasing danger to citizens.
With more people to feed, house and provide medical care for, they say the world’s resources look set to come under more strain than ever before.
As populations stabilise in the industrial world, almost all growth in the near future is expected to take place in developing countries.

Of the 2.3 billion people the UN believes will be added by 2050, more than one billion will live in sub-Saharan Africa. The Indian subcontinent will add some 630 million people.
It will mean less land and water available for each person. Poorer people, who tend to depend more on natural resources, will bear the brunt as they will not be able to compete with the rich.
The major issues will be how to feed the new arrivals, which will see the need for new varieties of improved crops.

Ageing populations are also set to pose a problem with some industrial countries, such as Japan, nearly doubling its share of the population aged 65 and over in the past 20 years.
This will put increased pressure on pension and healthcare systems.
The report states: ‘Another two billion people may be added to the world population by mid-century, many of them in places where hunger, poverty, and environmental degradation are already taking a high toll.
‘Supporting the world’s human population will mean eliminating poverty, transitioning to an economy that is in sync with the earth, and securing every person’s health, education, and reproductive choice.
‘If we do not voluntarily stabilize population, we risk a much less humane end to growth as the ongoing destruction of the earth’s natural systems catches up with us.’

But despite the problems the world is facing, Under-Secretary-General of the UN Dr Noeleen Heyzer said the seventh billion child of the world has a better chance than decade ago of surviving past the age of five than a decade ago.
The life expectancy for both women and men has also increased in every Asian and Pacific country during the past decade, Dr Heyzer added.

And although the pace of development is 1.1 per cent in 2011 – meaning an extra 78 million people will live on the planet by the end of this year – it has slowed down slightly from its peak of 2 per cent in 1968.
Professor David Bloom, from the department of economics and demographics at Harvard University, said in a report earlier this year that the issues would also affect developed countries.
He said: ‘Population trends indicate a shift in the ‘demographic centre of gravity’ from more to less developed regions.
‘Already strained, many developing countries will likely face tremendous difficulties in supplying food, water, housing, and energy to their growing populations, with repercussions for health, security, and economic growth.
‘The demographic picture is indeed complex, and poses some formidable challenges.
‘Those challenges are not insurmountable, but we cannot deal with them by sticking our heads in the sand.
‘We have to tackle some tough issues ranging from the unmet need for contraception among hundreds of millions of women and the huge knowledge-action gaps we see in the area of child survival, to the reform of retirement policy and the development of global immigration policy.
‘It’s just plain irresponsible to sit by idly while humankind experiences full force the perils of demographic change.’
Britain is mirroring the world’s expansion. In 1801, its population was 10.5 million – and is now close to 62.5 million.