NASA Scientist Fired - Promises Disclosure

reply to post by buddhasystem


Rendering is not a resource intensive project at all. I render videos of all my family pictures (using Vegas and/or AcidPro), and i can put together a DVD with a soundtrack in about 30 minutes, give or take.

if i want to go in and alter the photo's (change color balance, hue, saturation, contrast, redeye....) it can take quite a bit longer, but i could still likely produce completed projects fairly quickly.

Look, if you think men built the pyramids, then you cannot honestly want people to believe that rendering NASA images is too labor intensive. They built the Hoover dam in only 7 years, and nothing even close to that had ever been attempted before.

reply to post by bigfatfurrytexan


Dear BFT,

rendering a family movie amounts to application of typically simple filters and transitions between scenes. It does not involve dynamic cuts of the lunar sky and replacing it with a different object. Think about it.

And I don't see how it is related to the pyramids at all. I've seen the pyramids and I don't see how they relate to pattern recognition algorithms. I'm trying to imagine 100,000 slaves with airbrushes editing the frames and gluing them together and that's a comic image. Thank you.



[edit on 21-11-2007 by buddhasystem]

When I first heard another ex-NASA employee was coming forward, pictures, stories, and all, I have to admit my reaction was hardly inspiring. I shared the news stories with my friends and added something to the effect of, "It doesn't matter if the guy has pictures of aliens have a picnic with the astronauts, this won't go anywhere, and nothing will be accomplished in the mainstream." That said, anyone with a "big enough pair" to come forward in any form and share anything they have, be it testimony, pictures, personal experience, anything, is very brave, and is "better than nothing." We're dependent on these people to come forward, so we can further sort through the non-sense and have at least a chance of getting the basics of what is going on behind closed doors.

Thanks to everyone for posting!

Originally posted by buddhasystem
reply to post by bigfatfurrytexan

 

Dear BFT,
And I don't see how it is related to the pyramids at all. I've seen the pyramids and I don't see how they relate to pattern recognition algorithms. I'm trying to imagine 100,000 slaves with airbrushes editing the frames and gluing them together and that's a comic image. Thank you.



[edit on 21-11-2007 by buddhasystem]

How droll.

reply to post by buddhasystem


Are you serious? I mean, i understand your point and all, but....

Listen, I understand high end graphics. I get what you are saying. But the computing power and training of a person like myself (who does work that is completely unrelated to any sort of graphics processing, and who is using the low end Dell Dimension desktop with a Celeron processor) is nothing compared to the individuals who work at NASA.

I have been fortunate enough in my life to have friends among people who DO have experience in these sorts of things (graphic design for television, requiring real time image rendering, as well, with inferior equipment when compared to NASA).

Would it be easy? LIkely not, but neither is space travel. But i bet that if someone is smart enough to put a few thousand pounds of man and his equipment into space, they are smart enough to figure out how to explain away any delay in data delivery (or cover it up entirely, making it appear seamless to the end user).

You have to decide if scientists are capable or not. You cannot argue both sides of the aisle as it meets your current need. It surprises me that a physicist (a discipline involving theory) would have such a lack of imagination.

Originally posted by bigfatfurrytexan
Listen, I understand high end graphics. I get what you are saying. But the computing power and training of a person like myself (who does work that is completely unrelated to any sort of graphics processing, and who is using the low end Dell Dimension desktop with a Celeron processor) is nothing compared to the individuals who work at NASA.

I have been fortunate enough in my life to have friends among people who DO have experience in these sorts of things (graphic design for television, requiring real time image rendering, as well, with inferior equipment when compared to NASA).

Now I'm confused, are we still talking about NASA's ability to render fake motion graphics in real time... 40 years ago? I agree that anything might be possible with video given today's technology, but processors as we know them didn't even really exist then... and are we still talking about NASA faking the color of the sky because some of you believe there's air on the moon?

Losing track of what everyone's point is... whether they never went, they went all the time, they went but they lied about the blue sky...

A question, in general: If the black sky was totally faked, then why are we looking at the fake sky in the background for evidence of mile-high glass castles and towers all the time? Can we stop that now? I mean, if it's fake anyway?

Originally posted by sherpa
Maybe not the same anti-grav but anti-grav nonetheless.

"anti-gravity' is another one of those 'generic' terms

I prefer 'gravity shielding' Anti gravity like anti matter implies and equal and opposite force to gravity... but all we need is a way to 'shield' us from the gravity on the ship

A magnetic field like in a maglev train surely negates gravity, but is limited...
Now if you had a small light power source that produced a lot of energy and was portable... you would be on to something... like the Element 115 drive John mentioned A lot of output, but a small light device...

Toy makers have the Levitron, kids in garages are making 'lifters', sonic levitation is interesting but you need air and earplugs but it still works..

Go snoop around LLNL, DTIC and LLNL Use "gravity shielding' and 'electrogravitics' in the search not just 'anti gravity. Levitation too... there are all kinds of working projects just in the 'backyard' labs... just imagine what the big boys play with...

Like airplanes that require no ailerons, but use a plasma flow instead... yeah that is at the AFRL

There is so much out there and it is not that hard to find, but each door you open leads to 10 more and it gets to a point you can not keep up with it... and still try to present it in an orderly fashion.

Gimme three secretaries, an archivist and a web programer (and someone to keep the coffee coming ) and we might get something that shows the whole picture...

weedwacker just stated that we only have achieved fission so far... I find that statement incredulous in the face of all we have presented. The Sandia Lab announced years ago that they have achieved fusion... and documents have been surfacing steadily now that show there are a lot of projects in the works.

Since the Russians invented the Tokamak in the 50's... all those billions that have been sunk into it for research and there are no results after 50 years? I don't buy that for a second...

And IF it WAS true... why are we letting them waste our taxes?

There seems to be a severe case of osterichitus running around here... lets hope its not contagious

Originally posted by sherpa
This I found interesting regarding anti-grav,

Peter King? from Nottingham?

I like this guy already

The researchers, who announce their results today in the New Journal of Physics, are working with Rio Tinto to develop the technique to sort precious stones from soil. The US space agency Nasa is also interested as it offers a cheaper way for zero gravity research.

Sorting gemstones using anti gravity I like that!!

One of our members here is working on a similar project... nice to see it getting media exposure



[edit on 21-11-2007 by zorgon]

Originally posted by skip_brilliantine

and are we still talking about NASA faking the color of the sky because some of you believe there's air on the moon?

Some of YOU? Some of YOU? Skip, you mean there is someone else besides myself that believes there is a breathable atmosphere on the Moon? Holy Cow!

A question, in general: If the black sky was totally faked, then why are we looking at the fake sky in the background for evidence of mile-high glass castles and towers all the time?

Excellent question. The technology used was indistinguishable from magic.

Thanks for the post.

If we can return to the theme of the top of this thread, there are some interesting developments you might be interested in. Bara's own blog no longer posts my research results, so here they are:


Jim Oberg responds: Re “The Dark mission Blog”, by Michael Bara
darkmission.blogspot.com...

1. Central to the highlighting of the importance of Johnston’s lunar image stash is the claim that he was in CHARGE of Apollo mission imagery, and so had direct access to all of the original photographs – scenes that are advertised as confirming existence of anomalous lunar structures.

2. Johnston certainly worked IN the ‘Lunar Receiving Laboratory’ in bldg 31 during the later Apollo landing missions – that has never been in dispute. Nor has it been disputed that he received several sets of mission imagery – from the REAL imagery team in Building 8, the folks who were REALLY in charge of all mission imagery.

3. Posted credentials [on Bara's blog] support Johnston’s presence at the LRL, but make no mention of him being in CHARGE of anything image-related. The ABSENCE of such documentation can be surmised to imply that such documentation does not exist, since if it did, you can bet Mr. Bara would have posted it here, by now.

4. Contemporaries of Johnston’s at the LRL tell me that he, as a junior employee with no experience in astronomy, imagery, or other relevant skills, performed an important but low-level clerk task associated with distribution of lunar samples to scientists, samples that were accompanied by photographs of the samples taken in the LRL as well as any scenes showing the samples on the lunar surface. As far as I can tell, it was only such images – obtained by Johnston from the real imaging team elsewhere – that he worked with. It was important work and we are all grateful to him for doing it, but it was NOT the kind of responsibility -- and SPECIAL access to scenes unavailable to everybody else on the Apollo team – that has been widely misreported.

5. Validating Johnston’s professional credentials, especially in light of the wildly exaggerated nature of widespread claims over his most important job function, is a standard process of any investigation, whether journalistic, scientific, or even merely personal. First one checks out the published claims with other sources, and then (and usually, ONLY then) do you ask the individuals making such claims about any discrepancies.

6. The mere fact of even performing this validation checking has been attacked by Mr. Bara on the grounds that it is unethical to ask questions about somebody’s background, especially in the alleged circumstances that I “was a colleague of Johnston’s during the Apollo program” and hence “already knew” all his reported credentials were authentic.

7. The only conceivable source of this assertion is Johnston himself. And since it is patently false, and easily debunked (I did not arrive at the NASA Houston center until after the final Apollo mission in 1975), it ought to raise questions about the accuracy of Johnston’s memories and statements. Mr. Bara has been provided all relevant evidence about my career timeline but has to date still refused to retract his erroneous allegation.

8. Two secondary but still significant claims regarding Johnston’s professional skills and accomplishments dealt with his status as a “Marine jet pilot” and as the holder of a PhD degree in “Meta Physics” (per his JPL-posted biography). I felt it appropriate – and now in hindsight even more strongly feel that way, in light of what my checks uncovered – to ask around, prior to contacting Mr. Johnston directly.

9. I discovered, for example, that .... [continued next post]

[continued]

9. I discovered, for example, that the institution that Johnston claims to have earned a PhD from does not, and has never, granted PhDs. There has been no response to this from Mr. Bara, although I provided him with that institution’s website. He has ignored this revelation.

[actually he did later respond, and provided a facsimile of a diploma (spelled 'deploma' on the jpg name) claiming a PhD from the "Reform Baptist Seminary" of Colorado. I have been unable to even confirm the existence of this alleged institution, much less the requirements or accreditation of such a degree]

10. I also had found Johnston’s pre-Apollo timeline too compressed to be credible – considering his age, I could not see how he could insert a jet pilot stint into his life, during the 1960s, and asked around regarding any existing documentation that supported the as-published career timeline. Mr. Bara’s has posted ‘credentials’ (darkmission.blogspot.com...) that fully confirm my initial suspicion: Johnston only completed ‘pre-flight’ pilot orientation in early 1965, and by 1966 he was starting work as a LM pilot training specialist in Houston
(darkmission.blogspot.com...) – no time for 13 months of jet school and a duty tour. I also note with great interest Mr. Bara’s inability to post ANY documentation on supposed jet school graduation and specific jet aircraft qualifications. The implications of the absence of such ‘credentials’ are eyebrow-raising.

11. In any case, the [Bara blog visitor] comment that “you are being swamped with documents that attest to … his having flown (solo) a multitude of aircraft,” has baffled me, because I haven’t seen a SINGLE such document in the series that Mr. Bara has posted that gives ANY indication of Mr. Johnston soloing in ANY aircraft. If somebody can help me resolve this reality clash, I’d appreciate the help.

[Ditto Johnston's claims to having been a NASA test pilot -- apparently without ever having had to leave the ground]

12. Regarding earlier posts laying blame on me for consequences of some of these inquiries, I have to repeat my incredulous question at the preposterous notion that somehow it was me, and me along, that let the ‘cat out of the bag’. Mr. Bara seems to propose that NASA otherwise would never have caught on that Mr. Johnston, while desiring to maintain his honorable status as a designated ambassador of NASA to the public, was secretly for years been opining to the public that NASA was falsifying the fundamental history of the Apollo program. Supposedly – and this is ROTFLOL moment for sure – NASA never realized this.

13. Bottom line: is the origin of the Apollo photographs provided by Mr. Johnston in any way ‘privileged’? Do they deserve to be described as ‘internal’ or ‘original’ versions? That is, should those prints (and the fundamental interpretations based on them) be given higher credence than other currently-available versions of them? Based on what I have discovered about the credibility of professional claims attributed to Mr. Johnston, that issue is subject to dispute.

It must also be added that I have been drawn much more deeply into this dispute than I originally intended, and as a consequence have found – and now am distributing – much more interesting background information about principals in this debate that I might not otherwise have taken the energy, or interest, to discover. The only reason for this is that Mr. Bara chose, arguably based on existing long-standing personal animus (see for example his essay and its accusations: www.lunaranomalies.com... and my rebuttal at www.jamesoberg.com...), to make me personally an issue and a target, arguably as a smokescreen to distract attention from questionable features concerning his own ‘expert witnesses’ and ‘whistleblowers’. He chose to create and distribute delusional defamations about me, and when confronted with refutations, refused to retreat or retract.

Such verbal viciousness, not unprecedented, has served to alert many journalists and investigators that it’s most prudent to avoid this subject entirely, and to just steer clear of this entire controversy, because debate and dissent creates venomous ferocity. This can be seen in the responses from many of Mr. Bara’s associates in recent blog postings here. They are to an alarming degree obscene and phantasmagorical (and embarrassingly misspelled – even Bara can’t spell correctly the name of an astronaut he cites as endorsing Johnston [he corrected the misspelling after my attempted post pointed this out]). This tends to isolate and ghettoize these themes even further, radicalizing proponents and raising questions of the degree to which they might be willing to go to vent their fury at heretics and to punish them for expressing their objectionable doubts and disagreements.

Those interested in the public debate might enjoy visiting Amazon’s discussion area on the book, at www.amazon.com...=cm_cr_pr_redirect

Here's another message rejected by Bara -- about the alleged PhD diploma he posted for Johnston:

Reply filed by Oberg, 1:15 PM Nov 21 – rejected by Bara


Well, here's what my internet searching found -- or didn't. No documentary evidence of the existence of any "Colorado Reform Baptist Church" seminary.

I need to remind Mr. Bara that on his own blog, Mr. Johnston had stated, "I hold .. two advanced degrees from the Reformed Baptist Seminary, one in Theology and the other PhD in Metaphysics...".

Perhaps now Mr. Bara is criticizing me for carelessly believing that Johnston correctly named the school when I should have KNOWN he really meant the 'Colorado Reform Baptist Church' seminary of Denver, instead. My telepathic powers are clearly not as advanced as Mr. Bara insists they be. When Mr. Johnston posted a written message claiming a degree from the "Reformed Baptist Seminary", clearly I was unjustified in assuming he could remember the name of the school correctly (and if not, what ELSE has he not remembered correctly?).

Trying to track down the seminary of the ‘Colorado Reform Baptist Church’, I found this “Reformed Baptist Church of Northern Colorado” in Longmont (www.rbcnc.com...) and talked with the pastor. Mr. Doug Vanhorn.

I told him I was trying to locate “the seminary of the ‘Colorado Reform Baptist Church’, in Denver”, and his immediate response was, “The WHAT?? I’ve never heard of such a thing.” He continued: “We’re definitely not associated with anything like that, and I’ve lived in Denver my whole life.”

Some historical records do indicate the existence of a “Colorado Reform Baptist Church” in Denver, founded in 1981 and still in existence in 1993 (date of the report). A search of the current Colorado on-line directory assistance showed 77 entries for "Baptist" in the Denver area, but no “Reform Baptist” anything.

A call to the "Denver Association of Southern Baptist Churches" got the response that maybe that institution had merged with the "Colorado Christian University", but a search of that school's website (and the Wikipedia article about its history) showed no mention of it. Besides, the church is missionary-oriented and offers no PhDs, and no degrees in 'metaphysics' at all.

Johnston's diploma was signed by a number of individuals. "Charles Lee Meininger" was identifed as 'Bishop, Colorado Reform Baptist Church', but his obituary (he died May 14, 2007, in Wheatfield, Colorado) merely mentions that he "spent many years in radio broadcasting" - no mention of any church activity, or any seminary. "Robert K. Whitsit" was listed as "Chairman of the Faculty", but the only man of that name (even without the middle initial)on the Internet is now president of an auction company.

The piece of paper that Mr. Bara has presented, so far, stands only for its PDF image, with no independently verifiable background information that anything on it is accurate.

It could well turn out to be some short-lived diploma mill, non-accredited like those that used to be advertised on the back cover of 'Science & Mechanics', or even a genuine school that vanished too soon before the arrival of the Internet, to leave any paper trail at all (with all of its works vanishing without any ripples). But the burden of proof of its existence (and the true nature of the 'PhD') should now have shifted to those who claim it did exist -- in my view, sufficient 'reasonable doubt' has been raised.

Here's another reply that Bara refused to post on his blog -- it goes to the center of the claim that Johnston had access to, and was ordered to destroy, special moon photos.

To thread "stupid blog posts - 2", sent 3:40 PM, Nov 23….

Rich_Riggs asks, "Lost in the attempt to obfuscate by focusing on the personalities involved are questions that I want JimO or someone to answer..."Is it true that Ken was told to destroy original material from the taxpayer funded moon missions?" And, "upon whose authority was that done?" And. "Why?", "

This is a good question and central to the importance of the claims. Here's what I've found:

The first item posted under 'A Question of Credentials - 3', references Dr. Jeffrey Warner, whose task Mr. Johnston took over beginning with Apollo-14.

Johnston has described his task as being in charge of all Apollo mission imagery (a status that supposedly gave him 'insider' access to unique Apollo imagery, as well as the power to delete imagery from the master archives -- Rich's question). Press reports based on Dark_Mission press releases describe Johnstone as 'director of Apollo photo archives'.

Warner does not remember it that way. In an email to me recently, he wrote:

"I was part of the Curator's office during all the Apollo missions. Over the
years I had different assignments. During Apollo 11 and 12, among other
things, I was in charge of lunar sample photographs in the Lunar Receiving
Laboratory (LRL). BRN [JEO: Johnston's employer] technicians took photographs of lunar rocks, the photographs were processed in the JSC photo lab, and the prints came to me. A BRN employee technician named Marion (I disremember his last name, but it must be in the records) was my assistant in dealing with rock photographs. I did this as part of my duties as Associate Curator - there was no special or identified office. For Apollo 14-17, dealing with photographs became quite routine, and was handled by the Curatorial BRN support staff... [JEO: I think Warner is referring to Johnston and his co-workers here]

"There never was an 'office of Apollo mission photography' in the LRL. As you know, mission photographs went directly to the JSC photo lab where
they were processed and where prints were made. Mission photographs were never curated in the LRL. The only mission photographs we had in the LRL were copies of prints that we used to document specific rocks on the lunar surface."

JimO resumes comment: It seems that there has been major misrepresentation and deliberate confusion regarding Mr. Johnston's duties and responsibilities regarding lunar photographs.

He reports having received a number of sets of Apollo imagery, clearly from the office responsible for it in another building. Once the LRL stopped receiving new Apollo samples, it went througfh a major down-sizing and consolidation of records and elimination of duplicative (and no longer useful) mutli-copy material. It was under those circumstances, apparently, that Johnston was directed to clean out the cabinets and trash the images.

I don't know why he would have been told he couldn't keep them -- perhaps there were regulations that material generated for NASA internal use was not for public release, and public access to lunar photos would be through the public information office. In any case, I've seen no indications that the LRL photo sets that Johnston seems to have been custodian of (but not originator of) were different in any substantive way from the master files, which have always been fully accessible to researchers (and the press) at depositories such as the Lunar Science Institute.

Anyone reading JimO's comments here should be aware that if JimO is really Jim Oberg, Oberg has been, in my opinion, NAZA's chief of disinformation for many years although he is retired now.

He is much more knowledgeable than Phil Klass was. Phil was more the, "It was the Planet Venus" type of debunker.

Oberg is infinitely more knowledgeable on every detail of the Apollo and other NAZA programs and therefore is able to fabricate 'debunking' stories that normally one would believe.

However, as I said above, I respectfully caution any member of ATS reading JimO's opinions to take them (the posts that go on and on and on) with a grain of salt as I suggest you do with mine.

Yeah, I see I just won my bet about which looney would be first out of the box on the 'paid disinformation agent' smear. I sure wish somebody would give me the charge number and address to send my invoices to, 'they' probably owe me a LOT of money. Some years ago, an IRS clerk called me up about a 'snitch letter' he had received, claiming I had not reported my six gazillion simoleon annual pay-off from the dark forces, and the would-be 'rich snitch' wanted his cut for turning me in for my back taxes. It didn't take long for me to explain to the polite caller what planet those kinds of wierdos came from, and he admitted he should have seen the first clue, that the letter had been written in crayon. Was that your letter, John??

And did you get any of your advanced degrees from the same non-existent institute that it seems "Dr'" Johnston got HIS from? Should be easy enough for you to locate information about that 'seminary', if it ever really existed. Try.

Let's do some REAL verifiable research here. But please, don't ask me about earth-moon neutral points or secret lunar atmospheres.... I fall off my chair too easily these days.

Originally posted by JimO
Yeah, I see I just won my bet about which looney would be first out of the box on the 'paid disinformation agent' smear.

Considering the odds on a bet of that sort....you're still not dragging down much extra income, are ya'?

Sure thing all the way.

I had no idea you'd joined ATS, Jim. Welcome aboard!

Hmm. John Lear and Jim Oberg having at it in a thread debate. As Flounder once famously said, "Oh, boy, is this great...!"

I'm gonna date myself but that was MY pledge class year (different frat -- I was a Teke, alpha mu chapter). And I got my own pledge name, which will remain off the record for now...

I don't see any value in 'debating' for fun -- I'd like to see what we can find out about this Colorado Reform Baptist Church seminary that Mike Bara claims Ken Johnston got his PhD in "Meta Physics" from. It was when Johnston was asked by JPL about the bio data he had posted on their website -- about his advanced degrees and his jet pilot experience in particular -- that he suddenly offered to resign. So let's dig along those lines.

BTW, his given name is Ralph Kennedy Johnston, goes by "Ken", so that explains the false-positive 'hits' on earlier searches assuming his name was 'Kenneth Johnston'. Folks who knew him thought he also might have had a brother working at NASA -- he might be a useful witness to track down and interview.

Here's where Bara posted the 'deploma', as he calls it:

bp1.blogger.com...

This looks about as legit as Dan Rather's
'Bush national guard' letter.... Naaah....