From: randolph@est.enet.dec.com (Tom Randolph)
Newsgroups: alt.alien.visitors
Subject: Re: Siriusly....
Date: 14 Sep 92 16:04:41 GMT
Organization: Digital Equipment Corporation


In article <chameleo.07hv@amiganet.chi.il.us>, chameleo@amiganet.chi.il.us
(Nick Molinari) writes...
> They knew that sirius b was a small and heavy star
> , that it revolved around Sirius A every fifty years in an elliptical
> orbit ,and that it rotates on it's axis....
> 
> So how could men with no instruments at their disposal could know the
> movements and certain characteristics of stars which are totally invisible
> to the naked eye????
> 
> What is this BAD ASTRONOMICAL DATA of which you speak???
> 
> R.H.

Below is a brief report on the Dogon/Sirius affair which I wrote several
years ago. It is, I'm afraid, a prime example of an author exploiting the
public's ignorance of astronomy and history. See the last two paragraphs for
the "bad data". If it's true that the Dogons claim a third star in the Sirius
system, then it proves rather conclusively that they were fed the information
by some explorer before the antroplogists got to them.

***** Begin report *****
I did an hour's research on the Dogon mystery last night (not as big a deal as
it sounds, I have a pretty decent collection of astronomy books and periodicals
at home), I learned quite a bit. This may get a little long...

Apparently the originator of the mystery is Robert K.Temple in the 1975 book,
"The Sirius Mystery". He says that the Dogon have a traditional belief in Sirius
B, which claim that it's made of a material called "sagala" (translation:
"strong") "so heavy that all earthly beings combined cannot lift it". The Dogon
also accept the idea that the Earth revolves around the Sun, and are aware of
the 4 Galilean moons of Jupiter and Saturn's rings. As in the previous reply,
this was all discovered in the 1930s, when the Dogon were anthropologically
investigated.

Ok, so what did western civilization know about these things by 1930? Sirius B
was discovered in 1862 (not 1962) by Alvan Clark as he was testing the new lens
he'd made for Dearborn Observatory's 18 1/2 inch refracting telescope. He at
first thought he'd found a defect in the lens, but he finally realized he'd
discovered the companion star that had been suspected since 1844. From 1834 to
1844 F.W.Bessel had noticed a wavy irregularity in the motion of Sirius against
the background stars, and had concluded that it had an invisible companion. The
orbit of the proposed compainion had been calculated in 1851 by C.H.F.Peters. By
1910 astronomers began to realize that there were a class of stars, eventually
called white dwarfs, which were very small and dim, yet very massive, which
meant they had to be incredibly dense. In 1915 the first spectrum of Sirius B
was obtained by W.Adams at Mt.Wilson, which is all that would have been needed
to classify it as a white dwarf. However, I couldn't find any information on
when it was indeed realized that Sirius B was a white dwarf.

Saturn's rings and Jupiter's Galilean moons had been known since the invention
of the telescope. By 1930 four more of Jupiter's moons had been discovered,
however, the fifth was found as late as 1892 by E.E.Barnard, and the rest
followed as photography came into use as an astronomical tool around the turn of
the century.

As for a third star, Phillip Fox reported in 1920 that the image of Sirius B had
appeared to be double, using the same 18 1/2 inch refractor with which Clark
discovered B. R.T.Innes in S.Africa and van den Bos, a renowned double-star
observer, also reported the 3rd star. I should note here that these were visual
studies, and the object in question is at the very limit of what can be observed
with a telescope. In 1973 a study by I.W.Lindenblad at the U.S.Naval Observatory
concluded that there is no astrometric (measurement of irregularities of motion
against the background, probably on photographs) evidence for a 3rd star.

My conclusions: Nothing extraordinary need be invoked to account for the Dogon's
knowledge. Someone probably gave the Dogons the information, probably after
1920. I admit there are inconsistencies: anyone astronomically knowledgeable
enough to know about Sirius B would most likely have known about the additional
moons of Jupiter, but then again, so would any hypothetical visitors from
beyond. Also, why did the Dogons claim that this was part of their traditions?
By the way, I could not confirm the Dogons knowledge of a 3rd star. This is
unfortunate, as it would prove beyond doubt that they were given all this
information by someone, as the modern study showed no such star.

-Tom R.