User:Ichthyovenator/Cydonian civilization

"Cydonian civilization" redirects here. For the Ancient Greek city-state, see Kydonia.

Overview of a portion of the Cydonia region on Mars, featuring the "Face on Mars" (top right), the "Cydonian city complex" (lower left) and the "D&M Pyramid" (bottom right)

The Cydonian hypothesis is a pseudoscientific fringe hypothesis which states that various natural structures on Mars, many in the region called Cydonia, were in actuality constructed by an advanced, approximately Bronze Age level, ancient and extinct Martian civilization of humanoid extraterrestrials, referred to by proponents of the hypothesis as the "Cydonian civilization" or "Cydonians". The Cydonian hypothesis is based on examinations of photographs of structures on the Martian surface taken by early orbital satellites. Higher resolution photographs taken by later satellites have revealed the structures to be completely geological in origin, with the scientific consensus being that the artificial appearance in some of the early photographs is due to the interplay of lights and shadows, the low resolution of the photographs themselves, and pareidolia, the phenomenon of seeing meaningful patterns (often faces) where there are none.

Though the supposed Cydonian civilization has been compared by proponents to the Old Kingdom of Egypt, the structures interpreted as buildings and monuments are often several kilometres across, with the larger Cydonian "pyramids" being a thousand times larger than the greatest pyramids of Ancient Egypt.

Background

Supposed observations of Martian civilizations

Early 20th-century map of Mars by Percival Lowell, featuring Martian canals and oases of vegetation

Mars has been a target of fascination in the search for extraterrestrial life for a long time. The earliest claims of seeing structures of artificial origin on Mars were the claims forwarded by various astronomers in the late 19th and early 20th century of seeing great "Martian canals" on the planet's surface. The "canals", what astronomers believed were long and straight structures across vast distances, were first viewed in 1877 by the Italian astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli. As Schiaparelli was an otherwise distinguished astronomer, for instance having been the one to demonstrate that the Perseid meteor showers were caused by the comet Swift-Tuttle, his claims of Martian geography, including both the canals and that the dark regions of Mars were oceans, were initially taken seriously. Schiaparelli's early canals were broad and non-uniform formations more similar to structures on Earth like the red sea, but his later interpretations were ruler-stright and thin lines arranged in a geometric network.

Belief in the canals was initially widespread, as they were seemingly confirmed by other astronomers across the world. Some astronomers even reported seeing signal lights emitting from the planet, interpreted as Martians attempting to contact Earth. The 1891 will of a french widow, Anne Emilie Clara Goguet, established the Prix Guzman, a price of 100,000 francs to the first person that successfully established contact with another planet, but Mars was explicitly excluded, allegedly because "it was too easy to establish contact with". One of other the astronomers who saw Schiaparelli's canals was the otherwise distinguished Percival Lowell, who constructed an observatory with the express purpose of viewing the canals. Through public lectures, magazine articles and three books published from 1895 to 1906, Lowell made his vision of Mars, which had even more canals than the ones Schiaparelli had initially reported, famous.

Lowell believed the canals had been constructed by "an intelligence not unlike ours" for the purpose of transporting water from the planet's polar regions to elsewhere on the planet where water was scarcer. Though there was doubt in regards to Lowell's explanations of the canals, his observations were initially widely seen as credible, support declined after he reported similar structures on Venus and many former proponents retracted their support. It is known today that Mars does not have canals and though some canals reported by Lowell match later examined natural formations, such as the canal called "Agathodaemon", which matches the canyon system Valles Marineris, many of them were nothing more than figments of his imagination. This meant that part of the problem were that the more detailed observations astronomers were able to make, due to better tools and viewing conditions, the less visible were the purported canals. Despite the canal hypothesis being discarded, Lowell's vision of Mars came to define the planet in popular imagination for nearly the entire 20th century.

Some of the early hypotheses would endure longer than the idea of canals, notably that the darker patches of the Martian surface were in fact covered in plantlife, an idea that endured even among credible astronomers until the first images of the Martian surface were returned by the Mariner 4 spacecraft in 1965. The images revealed that Mars was heavily cratered and devoid of canals and plantlife and also demonstrated that the planet's atmosphere was far thinner than would have been necessary for Earth-like life. The reaction to Mars being dead was disappointment: as described in a 1977 landmark study on volatile compounds on Mars by Edward Anders and Tobias Owen, "the thinness of the Martian atmosphere has been one of the great disappointments of the space age". According to the NASA planetary scientist Kevin J. Zahnle, Mars "probably being dead" is still difficult to accept for scientists and the public alike, and search for life remains a central objective within NASA's exploration programme of the planet.

Early claims of photographed alien structures

Cropped version of the original 1976 image containing the "Face on Mars"

A new generation of claims of artificial structures on Mars has followed with the many detailed photographs taken of the planet's surface since Mariner 4. This is not unique to Mars, as UFO enthusiasts have pored over photographs of the surface of the Moon as well, the earliest example being the amateur astronomer Hugh Percy Wilkins discovering what he throught resembled a man-made bridge on the Moon in 1953. UFO enthusiasts held the "bridge" to be proof of life on the Moon and astronomers who stated that they could not see such a structure, such as Donald Howard Menzel, were dismissed as collaborators of a government conspiracy. Though the idea of bridges on the Moon was thoroughly debunked after the Apollo missions obtained detailed photographs of the lunar surface, the UFO enthusiast George H. Leonard claimed that Moon bridges were among "the least controversial things about the Moon" as late as 1976 and the myth still lingers on in fringe circles. Similar claims were made that there were "spires", interpreted as radio beacons or spacecraft, on the moon after 1966 photographs were found to contain objects casting long shadows. These structures were later found to be regular boulders, with sunlight hitting them at low angles having caused the long shadows.

Structures on Mars were first posited in 1977, when the electrical engineer Vincent DiPietro examined 1976 photographs of the Martian surface taken by the Viking program spacecrafts. DiPietro was stunned by what would later be referred to as the "Face on Mars", a mesa-like structure in the Cydonia region on Mars, and at first thought the picture was a hoax. Planetary scientists had emphasized that the structure was natural since the photograph was released shortly after being taken in 1976. In 1982, DiPietro published a book, Unusual Martian Surface Features, alongside computer scientist Gregory Molenaar, who used image enhancement to look on details of the supposed face. Though DiPietro and Molenaar admitted that the face could have been produced through erosion, they suspected that it had been created by intelligent beings and believed that the enhanced imagery showed an eyeball with a pupil in the right eye of the face as well as a teardrop below the eye. Other structures later associated with the Cydonian hypothesis would be "uncovered" shortly thereafter, with, for instance, the collection of structures associated together as the "Cydonian city complex" first being discussed in an anonymous article in the magazine Omni in 1985.

Hypothesis and proponents

The term "Cydonian hypothesis" was first introduced in an 1991 article by the plasma physicist John E. Brandenburg, alongside DiPietro and Molenaar, in the Journal of Scientific Exploration, a magazine that has been criticized for publishing pseudoscience and promoting fringe theories. In their article, Brandenburg, DiPietro and Molenaar advanced the hypothesis that Mars had once been the home to a rich biosphere and an intelligent humanoid species that constructed large monuments similar to those of the Old Kingdom of Egypt. In addition to the structures they perceived to be artificial, including what they believed to be three separate monumental depictions of humanoid faces, they based their hypothesis on two additional points: firstly, that the biosphere and civilization of Earth should not be assumed to be unique in the universe and that the discovery of a dead civilization on Mars would thus not be surprising, and secondly that chemical and geological data from Mars corroborated that the environment on the planet had once been more favorable to Earth-like life, with a denser atmosphere and abundant liquid water. The second point of Mars once having had a denser atmosphere and large quantities of water is also accepted within the scientific community: Mars was once very different, with an atmosphere rich in oxygen, great oceans, and functioning plate tectonics, but the evidence indicates that Mars lost its oceans and its dense atmosphere billions of years ago.

Besides his advocation for the Cydonian hypothesis, Brandenburg has made significant contributions to science, and on studies related to Mars specifically, for instance having been the first, in 1987, to suggest that the northern hemisphere of Mars had once been home to a large, ancient ocean (a "Paleo-Ocean").

The Cydonian hypothesis supposes the presence of humanoid extraterrestrials on ancient Mars. In their original 1991 paper, Brandenburg, DiPietro and Molenaar stated that the presence of intelligent humanoids on Earth, per the mediocrity principle, should not be considered remarkable or unique, and that the discovery of traces of a humanoid civilization on Mars would not be surprising. Although humanoid extraterrestrial beings are common in science fiction, wherein aliens are often exotic reflections of humanity, and convergent evolution could theoretically produce human-like lifeforms elsewhere, [unlikely that aliens would be humanoid]

Purported artifical structures

Faces

Face on Mars

See also: Face on Mars

Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter photograph of the "Face on Mars" structure (2007), demonstrating it to be a natural mesa, compared to the original 1976 photograph (bottom right)

The "Face on Mars", also known as the "Face of Mars", the "Face in Cydonia" or just "the Face", is the supposed artificial structure that has attracted the most attention. The structure is vaguely rectangular in shape and in the original photograph appeared to show bilateral symmetry and be a depiction of a human (or humanoid) face. It is estimated to be 2 to 3.6 kilometres (1.2–2.2 miles) long and 1.5 to 1.6 kilometres (0.9–1 mile) wide and stands about 400 metres (1300 feet) above the ground. The face lies close to what has been interpreted as an ancient Martian shoreline, with erosion being the cause of many of the features of the structures in the region, but proponents of the Cydonian hypothesis postulate that erosion alone cannot explain the features of the structure.

Other faces

• Brandenburg's two other faces
• "Nefertiti", the Nefertiti image, in the Phoenicus Lacus region near Syria Planum. Compared to Egyptian queen Nefertiti, who reigned in the 1200:s BC. The head is 750 metres across and the crown is 1.6 kilometres long.
• The crowned face, the crowned head, located near Syrtis Major, is 18 kilometres wide.
• The avian headress face

https://www.tsijournals.com/articles/bearded-profile-with-avian-headdress-within-the-southeastfacing-slope-ofan-impact-craterin-the-utopia-planitia-region-of-mars.html

https://www.express.co.uk/news/weird/783585/Mars-alien-bearded-face-avian-headdress-Journal-Of-Space-Exploration

(in total 6 structures)

Rebuttal for the "crowned face": http://www.oocities.org/alreaud/M0203051/M0203051_Analysis.htm

Link with stuff that points to more sources: http://www.trumtrum.se/Pages/mars.html

Rebuttal: https://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2014/11/22/the-two-faces-of-je-brandenburg

D&M Pyramid

The "D&M Pyramid", as photographed by Viking 1 in 1976

The region surrounding the original "Face on Mars" contains a number of angular peaks that on first glance appears to have various geometrical shapes. Some of these structures were noted by DiPietro and Molenaar during their examinations of the Martian photographs and they referred to them as "pyramids". A large example of one of these structures in particular attracted considerable interest, located south-west of the face. Dubbed the "D&M Pyramid" by Hoagland in honor of DiPietro and Molenaar, the structure stands approximately 500 metres (1640 feet) tall (based on the surrounding shadows) and is roughly pentagonal in shape, apparently possessing bilateral symmetry. Additionally, the angles of the supposed pyramids points to the other features of interest in the vicinity, with the "main axis" pointing to the face, the south-west angle pointing towards the "city complex" and the north-west angle pointing towards a circular structure dubbed the "tholus", a term derived from supposed resemblances to beehive tombs ("tholos tombs") from the ancient Mediterranean and Middle East.

Although several remarkable mathematical relationships have been suggested for the angles of the structures and the ratios between, including numbers such as e/π, √2 and √3, these hypotheses hinge on the assumption that one of the faces of the structure was at some point damaged and that the portion that is covered in shadows is as smooth as the other portions of the "pyramid". Several of the calculations are based on enhanced imagery produced by Carlotto, which interpolated data between the pixels in the low-resolution original photographs. There is an inherent margin of error with the low pixel count of the original images, not accounted for with Carlotto's enhancement, and careful pixel-by-pixel examination of the originals shows that the supposedly straight lines of the pyramid diverge at several points and that they are of unequal length. Though no more recent complete photographs of the structure have been produced, a portion was photographed by the Mars Orbital Camera in 1998, showing that the pyramid's base was not made up of straight lines and that its sides were not smooth, as would have been expected of an actual artificial structure. The structure is cruder than many pyramid-like formations that have been determined to be natural, and not artificial, on Earth.

Cydonian city complex

The structures of the so-called "Cydonian city complex" as photographed by Mars Global Surveyor in 1998

The structures as interpreted as massive buildings and monuments by proponents of the Cydonian hypothesis

Slightly north of the "Face on Mars" lies an area of geological features dubbed the "Cydonian city complex", or just "the city". The supposedly gridlike pattern of the structures has been interpreted by proponents of the Cydonian hypothesis as suggesting it represents an ancient lost city, the features within the "city complex" being large monumental buildings rather than natural formations. Most of these supposed buildings are additional "pyramids", typically with three or five faces rather than the four of human pyramids in Egypt and elsewhere. The larger "pyramids" in the city complex are a thousand times larger than the greatest pyramids of ancient Egypt.

The assertions of these structures representing buildings in an ancient city suffers from the same issues of the "D&M Pyramid", if the margin of error inherent with the low pixel count of the original photographs is accounted for, the structures can not be considered to be as regular as proponents of the Cydonia hypothesis presume them to be. The north-eastern most structure was dubbed the "fortress" by DiPietro and Molenaar, who saw a row of cellular structures along the "building"'s east-facing edge. These structures are far too small to see in the original Viking photographs of the area, which means that they are image artefacts created during the image enhancement process, not structures that are actually present on the site. Photographs by the Mars Orbital Camera have revealed that the "fortress" is a natural hill that has experienced erosion, with there even being evidence of recent landslides.

Other structures

others

(???)

Thermonuclear explosion: https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/1723/86503de4c08a3433b07a19f2163084546743.pdf?_ga=2.221493336.193799560.1612900887-981090513.1612900887

See also

• History of Mars observation
• Xenoarchaeology
• Ancient astronauts
• List of topics characterized as pseudoscience

References

Bibliography

• Brandenburg, John E. (1987). "The Paleo-Ocean of Mars". In Baker, Victor; Carr, Michael; Fanale, Fraser; Greeley, Ronald; Haberle, Robert; Leovy, Conway; Maxwell, Ted (eds.). MECA Symposium on Mars: Evolution of its Climate and Atmosphere. Houston, Texas: Lunar and Planetary Institute. p. 20. Bibcode:1987meca.symp...20B.
• Brandenburg, John E.; DiPietro, Vincent; Molenaar, Gregory (1991). "The Cydonian Hypothesis" (PDF). Journal of Scientific Exploration. 5 (1): 1–25.
• Brandenburg, John E. (2014). "Evidence of a Massive Thermonuclear Explosion on Mars in the Past, The Cydonian Hypothesis, and Fermi's Paradox". Journal of Cosmology. 24 (13): 12229–12280. S2CID 41820304.
• Kalichman, Seth C. (2005). Denying Aids: Conspiracy Theories, Pseudoscience, and Human Tragedy. New York: Springer. ISBN 978-0387794754.
• Murray, Stuart (2004). Mars. DK Eyewitness Books. DK. ISBN 978-0756607661.
• Pigliucci, Massimo; Boudry, Maarten (2013). Philosophy of Pseudoscience: Reconsidering the Demarcation Problem. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0226051826.
• Schnabel, Jim (1997). Remote Viewers: The Secret History of America's Psychic Spies. New York: Dell Publishing. ISBN 978-0440614050.
• Scott Bakker, R. (2017). "On Alien Philosophy". Journal of Consciousness Studies. 24 (1–2): 31–52.
• Zahnle, Kevin (2001). "Decline and Fall of the Martian Empire". Nature. 412 (6843): 209–213. doi:10.1038/35084148. PMID 11449281. S2CID 22725986.

Web sources

• Gardner, Martin (1985). "The Great Stone Face and Other Nonmysteries" (PDF). Skeptical Inquirer. 10 (2): 14–18. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2005-04-28. Retrieved April 18, 2013.
• Fitzpatrick-Matthews, Keith (2012). "Alien Archaeology on Mars?". Bad Archaeology. Retrieved 11 February 2021.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
• Lang, Kenneth R. (2010). "Mars". NASA's Cosmos. Retrieved 9 February 2021.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)