remnants of the creators of Iapetus?
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Discovery of a Two Billion Year Old Nuclear Reactor

http://pureinsight.org/pi/articles/2003/4/28/1582.html



The remnants of nuclear reactors nearly two billion years old were found in the 1970s in Africa. These reactors are thought to have occurred naturally. No natural reactors exist today, since the relative density of fissile uranium has now decayed below that needed for a sustainable reaction. Pictured above is Fossil Reactor 15, located in Oklo, Gabon. Uranium oxide remains are visible as the yellowish rock. Oklo by-products are being used today to study the stability of the fundamental constants over cosmological time-scales and to develop more effective means for disposing of human-manufactured nuclear waste. Photo by: Robert D. Loss, WAISRC
I-4 Nuclear Reactor from Two Billion Years Ago

[PureInsight.org] In 1972, a French company imported some uranium ore from Oklo in the Gabon Republic in Africa. Surprisingly the uranium concentration in the ore was as low as spent uranium fuel from a nuclear reactor. The finding led scientists to believe that the uranium had already been used for energy production. This discovery shocked the world and attracted scientists from many countries to go to Oklo for further investigation. The results showed that the uranium mine was an ancient nuclear reactor. The ancient reactor consisted of five hundred tons of utilized uranium ore in six different areas. Its output power was estimated to be approximately one hundred kilowatts. The reactor was perfectly preserved and its layout was very rational. It is estimated that the reactor had been in operation for around 500,000 years. Furthermore, nuclear wastes produced in this reactor had not spread all over the surrounding areas. Instead, they were confined within the separate sections. From the perspective of modern nuclear technology, this ancient reactor used very advanced techniques.

According to geological dating, the Oklo uranium mine was formed about 2 billion years ago. Shortly after formation, the nuclear reactor commenced operation. The research results made scientists seriously consider the possibility of prehistoric civilization. Such a nuclear reactor could be a product of a civilization from long ago, although scientists have proposed completely natural mechanisms by which the chain reactions could have taken place.

Human beings have only made use of nuclear power for a couple of decades. This discovery raised the intriguing possibility that a technologically more advanced civilization existed two billion years ago and it had advanced knowledge of nuclear fission. But if this assumption were correct, one would ask why such an advanced civilization did not perpetuate its own existence. Instead, it disappeared for unknown reasons, leaving only ancient relics. How should we view such a discovery? A large unaccounted-for time gap exists between two billion years ago and our present historical human civilization. What could have happened during that time?

If we neglect relics of prehistoric civilization, there is no way we can broaden the scope of our present knowledge. We will neither know what caused prehistoric civilizations to degenerate, or how they finally came to disappear. Moreover, we should carefully examine whether our current method of scientific development is following the same disastrous road. This is surely a subject worthy of serious consideration.



I read somewhere else that the catholic church and the USA government wanted this to be covered up as quickly as possible..."We will fight the manipulators"

I really don't know what to make of this but I do believe there existed an advanced civilization within the realm of ancient history. Graham Hancock, author of "Fingerprints of the Gods", suggests that a civilization needs roughly 10,000 years to develop to that stage where it is possible. Along with resources and some kind of protection from war mongering tribes...if you think about it, an island continent like Antarctica or Australia would have been perfect.
Charles Hapgood suggests Antarctica was inhabited by an advanced race before a cataclysmic pole shift turned it into an icy pole. There is even a famous map showing the correct geography, a copy made in the the 15th century! How would they have known that? Obviously the real version was much much older...like at least before the great flood around 7500 years b.c. It would be amazing to find out what archeological treasures lay buried underneath all that ice...if global warming continues we may get our wish...Doh!(Homer Simpson impression)

Great new topic, Sun.. wow, you got me with something I never knew about. Awesome stuff!! You've posted a fascinating new research topic for me.


Have you seen this ancient Hindu text from about 24,000 years ago? It may be connected to your post (even though the text is recent compared to billions of years ago, it talks about ancient civilzations). If you've posted it before please accept my apology. The topic of vimanas was talked about on another post but I found this other verse..

"Gurkha, flying a swift and powerful vimana (fast aircraft)
hurled a single projectile (rocket) charged with the power
of the Universe (nuclear device). An incandescent column of
smoke and flame, as bright as ten thousand suns, rose with
all its splendor.
It was an unknown weapon, an iron thunderbolt, a gigantic
messenger of death, which reduced to ashes the entire race
of the Vrishnis and the Andhakas.
The corpses were so burned as to be unrecognizable.
Hair and nails fell out; Pottery broke without apparent cause,
and the birds turned white.
...After a few hours all foodstuffs were infected...
...to escape from this fire the soldiers threw
themselves in streams to wash themselves and their
equipment."
The Mahabharata

It's worth remembering that 2,000,000,000 years ago, only the most primitive of lifeforms existed in Earth's proto-oceans.

Which doesn't deny the possibility that aliens landed on a relatively barren planet and built a nuclear reactor.

As far as we know or they tell us that is. How many human civilisations are hidden under the earth?

I've heard about it, and it was already explained as a natural occuring nuclear reactors.
Since Uranium decays throughout millions of year slowly into Lead, it is only sensible to assume that 2 billion years ago there was much higher concentration of U-235, the isotope of Uranium that is actually needed for a fission reaction to occur.
In normal, unfissionable deposits of Uranium today, there are 720 atoms of U-235 for every 100,000 atoms of U-238. In enriched Uranium, the kind of Uranium used in nuclear bombs and reactors, the U-235 is raised to 3,000 atoms for every 100,000 atoms of U-238 (or, in short, 3%).
If we'll check the half-life of U-235, we'll see that 2 billion years ago, it was at about 3,000 atoms per 100,000 U-238 atoms, meaning natural occuring fission could have occured.
Today, ofcourse, it can't happen .

So really, how many civilisations are we yet to find of the human family that may stretch up to 6 bil years ago?

Wait a minute...

Are people here thinking that this was some kind of processing plant or some kind of man-made device, or something?

These reactors are naturally occuring, not man-made.