A Continuing Tale of Two Cities

First, let's clean up a few items ...

As we stated in our initial analysis ("A Tale of Two Cities") of NASA’s July 24, 2002 infrared Cydonia release, Keith Laney downloaded a very different version of this highly controversial THEMIS image the next evening: July 25, 2002. Only he didn’t know it at the time. As we also reported, Laney was "tremendously disappointed in the blurry, blocky image" he received the night of the 25^th, just as he had been disappointed the previous day on seeing the long-awaited Cydonia IR Odyssey release, because it was not presented on the NASA/ASU website as the standard false color composite promised by the Odyssey Project Scientist, Steve Saunders a few days before. Instead, it was posted as a set of nine, oddly slanted images set within a graphic frame -- making even independent processing into a standard multi-spectral composite abnormally difficult.

It was not until Laney was subtly coached (by a mysterious "Bamf," visiting Enterprise from ASU) in the true scientific value of the IR release, and how to deal properly with multi-spectral images, and had secured the appropriate commercial software (ENVI 3.5, from Research Systems, Inc.), that his initially highly negative impressions of the THEMIS Cydonia release radically improved. After a few false starts, within a couple weeks (aided by the comprehensive tutorials included with the software), Laney was turning out properly ratioed and decorrelated composites of the nine-band THEMIS image -- and producing visually spectacular results (below).

But it was not until a month later -- on Sunday, August 25^th -- as we were trying to reconcile Laney’s remarkable multi-spectral products with those significantly inferior results being independently produced by Holger Isenberg in Germany, from the same data, that all of us suddenly realized --

There had to be at least two separate versions of this crucial THEMIS Cydonia image -- downloaded from the same ASU website on July 24^th/25^th!

With this stunning realization, Laney began a series of immediate experiments attempting to reproduce Holger’s inferior results -- initially, by deliberately degrading his own July 25^th downloaded version in various ways. Unfortunately, in making multiple copies and experimenting with a range of filters and sharpening tools, Laney inadvertently applied a slight Gaussian blur (0.42 ) to one of the images open on his desktop … and then inadvertently saved it over his July 25^th original!

This is the blurred "real" Tiff version, still carrying the date of Laney’s original download (July 25^th) from ASU and the unique Unix headers, published in our first article.

Fortunately, because we were all clamoring that night to compare versions of each image, Keith sent unaltered copies of his original to several members of the Enterprise team before his unfortunate mistake. And it is one of those unaltered Tiff copies of his July 25^th original (dated August 26^th -- the night it was created) that we have now provided here (top).

Since our original article, there have been some questions raised as to why we have waited so long to provide both this explanation and an unfiltered copy of the "real" image for independent processing. The answer is extremely simple.

On the night of August 29, Enterprise Principal Investigator Richard Hoagland appeared on "Coast to Coast with Art Bell" and challenged any members of Bell’s nationwide listening audience to come forward with their own downloaded versions of the THEMIS image from July 25^th. By initially publishing the slightly blurred original (which contained the crucial Unix headers), Enterprise was providing a visual standard by which others could judge if their own downloaded versions were the same. But by withholding the unblurred copy, we guaranteed that whatever versions were eventually submitted would indeed be separately downloaded versions of the "real" image … and not simple duplicates of our own published image! So Laney's mistake actually turned out to be a good thing, because it gave us a baseline with which to compare any possible "frauds" sent by those just clamoring for attention.

Over 60 days have now elapsed since Laney’s original "real" version was published by Enterprise. In that time, only one additional variation of the THEMIS Cydonia IR image has been uncovered. Remarkably, it was downloaded not on the evening of July 25^th, but on August 30^th -- one day after Hoagland asked for independent verification from the national Bell audience. Thus, there are now at least three separate versions of what has been officially represented by NASA and ASU as one Cydonia daytime infrared image of Cydonia. The political and legal implications of this extraordinary fact have only begun to be fully appreciated.

One of our readers, Charles Creager, has done a comprehensive study of the lettering of the various graphics containing these multiple image versions: the "official version" (presently on the NASA/ASU website), "Keith's current version" (the copy of the July 25^th original), and "Keith's July 25^th original" itself. As you can see from the comparison (below), they are all subtly different, but none of them is identical to "Keith's current," which we now take to be the best (closest) version of the "real" dataset.

And again, the application of the mild Gaussian blur (0.42) to the image Keith inadvertently saved over his July 25^th original has had no appreciable effect on the final infrared processing of that version (when compared with products created from the unblurred copy). This is most easily seen in terms of spectral differentiation of the various materials making up the image, after decorrelation (see details, below).

Another clarification:

The second item we’d like to clear up is the question of the MOLA data we published in our story on the 5th of September (see "Ghost Town, and the Darkness"). Richard made a decimal conversion error in his tabulation of the MOLA IR frequency in the article as well as the graphic we created. In the original version, the stated MOLA data wavelength was "10.6 microns." In fact, it is only 1.06 microns. How this affects the end result of the altimetry data is, flatly, -- it doesn't.

What it does change, however, is the penetration characteristics of the beam. At that relatively short wavelength, just beyond the red end of the visible spectrum, the MOLA laser should not be penetrating any "dusty" layer … unless that layer is extremely thin (mere microns -- millionths of a meter). And there are even issues with it penetrating a visually translucent material, like ice. What remains a mystery is the fact that the MOLA laser is recording an uneven surface deeper than the Grand Canyon, while the visible light images (like Viking’s 35A72 -- taken when even slight surface relief was casting long shadows, because of the low sun angle when the image was acquired) show no indication of this enormous trough. So, how to reconcile these two facts is a mystery we are currently working very hard to clear up. In fact, according to Richard, his initial inadvertent wavelength mistake has become a source of critical new insight in precisely how to resolve this apparent paradox -- a laser beam which should NOT be penetrating to any significant depth beneath the surface … but apparently is. And tracing out the outlines of the buried buildings beneath.

Hopefully, the mystery will be adequately resolved by the time he publishes our official Technical Report on the THEMIS Cydonia IR image.

Another reader wrote to complain that the MOLA data we referenced was inherently flawed because we:

"... failed to read the Archive Description and Usage Notes for Marosweb site from which the MOLA tracks were taken ,which includes the following: "Note that you may notice a small difference in latitude between MOLA features and their equivalent features in the Viking images (e.g. on crater rims). This can be attributed to a less than 0.1 deg. discrepancy between the MGS and Viking coordinate systems."

This reader went on to claim that this meant that the data track should be adjusted so that it crossed the crater in the image, and this then explained the "huge trough" in the MOLA track.

Wrong.

Contrary to what he wrote, we did read the usage notes. They just don't have any relevance to the issue at hand.

If he had read them, he might have noticed a key word in the disclaimer: "latitude." In the MOLA track graphic we prepared (above), latitude is a left-to-right adjustment, not a top-to-bottom adjustment. So, when the 0.1 deg. latitude adjustment is made, it makes absolutely no difference at all to the placement of the extended "MOLA trough" in the "screen vertical." The baffling MOLA "trough" we cite as being an independent confirmation of the "THEMIS buried city" is miles north of the crater he cites -- and of a much larger horizontal dimension.

On another issue:

We continue to pursue the raw Soviet IR data from Phobos 2. In addition to sending our own e-mails to key Russian investigators on the original Phobos 2 Team, we have enlisted the assistance of our Washington political contacts in this effort. Even the Premiere Radio Networks, the parent network for the Art Bell program, has been alerted to assist if necessary. We hope to get the images -- as well as some official scientific commentary from the Russians on this key confirmation of our own THEMIS analysis -- and soon.

We also saw another update a few weeks ago from Alan Boyle of MSNBC, who's been tracking this story. He posted a few of the usual inane "it's just rocks" responses from the usual suspects, but he also published an image doctored up by a person named Mark Easter. Easter has caused problems in the past for Art Bell, and is well known as something of a nut-case who is constantly inserting himself into various issues. In this case, Easter sent us a doctored up image superimposing Richard Hoagland's face on a mesa in one set of our IR ratioed THEMIS Cydonia bands.

He then produced a "morph" of this face into Richard's and threatened to send it around to "the whole world" -- if we didn't "reveal it" to the world ourselves. To our surprise, some people actually took the whole thing seriously, so we decided to include it in this update. But let's Face it -- this is nonsense.

For one thing, the "face" does NOT appear in any of the "raw" THEMIS bands. It is only apparent on ONE ratioed and decorrelated version of one particular band combination. And Hoagland’s likeness in this literal "trick of light and shadow" is a product of Easter’s own fevered imagination. If we are spring-loaded to recognize our own image, of all facial resemblances, it is most telling that Hoagland personally handled this particular band ratio for weeks before we made it public, even sending it to Art bell’s webmaster (where Easter saw it) the night of the program (September 5) – all without once "recognizing" what Easter later claimed is Hoagland’s own face, blatantly staring out of the image!

In fact, it was Easter who superimposed Hoagland’s image on the chance pattern of light and dark "blocks" making up this ratioed image … thus "confirming" his own outrageous theory.

Easter subsequently claimed that this likeness "proved" that the real IR data was forged, when in fact all it proves is that some people will go to any lengths to attack something as threatening as this data. But while we're at it, we may as well chime in with Keith Laney's own unique "take" on the whole non issue (below) ....

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Dr Christensen, we presume?

Now again, what bothers us about this silliness is not that someone would stoop to such a level to try and attack us, but that anyone would take it seriously for even a moment. Ever since we have released this data, a number of people, even some of our supposed "friends" in the anomalist community, have been engaging in a line-by-line "reductionist" approach to the dismissing all aspects of this phenomenal data. "Reductionism," sometimes called the reductionist method, seeks to isolate each and every data point in a given argument and break it down without reference to the greater context. This approach is commonly used by debunkers, who emphasize what they consider the weakest point of an argument over the strongest ones, and then seek to impugn that particular point by any means necessary.

We are not surprised by this reaction from those who only pretend they want to know the truth about Cydonia, but are in fact chilled to the bone when Faced with the reality of it. They have desperately searched for any way to make the ASU image "real," usually by invoking idiotic comparisons, misrepresenting our own claims, and ignoring contradictory evidence that undermines their stance.

Usually, such tactics are transparent and only reveal the biased, vacuous nature of those making the reductionist attack. But when it comes from one of our own, someone who is supposedly on "our side" in all this -- the side of the truth -- it carries a bit more weight than it might normally.

A painful recent case in point -- Dr. Mark Carlotto.

Shortly before we published our revelation of the existence of (at that time) two THEMIS Cydonia IR images, on August 29th, 2002, Carlotto put out his own analysis of the Cydonia multispectral image. From the beginning, we were concerned about the contents of the Carlotto "analysis." For one thing, there were simple errors (for instance, the IR image is referred to as "E0201847.gif," which is the wrong file name for the multispectral Cydonia image, "20020724A"). In addition, there were numerous misspellings and other obvious mistakes -- which gave the whole project an air of haste and sloppiness about it. It did not seem to be up to Carlotto's usual thorough standards -- at least, as Richard had remembered them from working with Carlotto years before.

But as we got into the content of the article, it seemed to stray into even odder territory. Carlotto started out by comparing the Odyssey Martian THEMIS data to terrestrial Landsat images, a very inaccurate comparison to say the least. Landsat is a 1970's era technology that produces primarily surface reflectance data in the visible region of the spectrum, as compared to THEMIS, which concentrates on extracting data primarily from intrinsic thermal infrared emissions from surfaces and objects. Landsat, in contrast to THEMIS, has virtually no "ground penetration" capabilities at all. A far better comparison would have been made to a new Earth orbiting instrument (1999) called ASTER (Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission And Reflection), which has very similar near-infrared capabilities (see example below) to THEMIS.

Carlotto went on to make some even stranger "errors" in his article. He proceeded to conclude that there were various clays making up the composition of the region surrounding the Face. However, Carlotto surely must have known that he could make no such conclusions, since the calibration data for either the official version or the "real" version of the Cydonia IR data had yet to be released. He also failed to perform a decorrelation stretch, a step that is crucial for separating the thermal data from the composition information in the image. However, even if he had, it would have made no difference, since without the crucial calibration data his conclusions about the specific composition of Cydonia were meaningless. Beyond that, he completely ignored the overwhelming amount of noise in the official image and seemed more than satisfied with the poor quality of it.

Even as we tried to make sense of Carlotto's seeming "brain fade," our attention was drawn to another recent item posted on his new web site. In it, he directly addressed the issue we had raised concerning the discrepancy between the two IR datasets, the "official" and the "real" one obtained by Keith Laney. Carlotto declared that "clearly" the "real" version we had posted was a degraded version of the "official" one.

We knew this, of course, to be utterly laughable.

In his "analysis" of the two images, Carlotto had taken only a single unnamed band from the "real" data, and compared it to a single unnamed band from the "official" version. He had not done a full composite of the "real" image bands, not done any color ratios, nor performed a decorrelation stretch to enhance the data. All he did was make a simple visual inspection of two grayscale bands without performing any of the accepted processes for enhancing false color thermal IR data.

From "New Frontiers in Science.com"

This, as we have said, is flatly not how you handle thermal IR data. As we pointed out in our own IR analysis (" Ghost Town, and The Darkness"):

"Since we are all used to working with data in the visual light spectrum, we have been taught to assume that ‘sharper is better.’ Which it is -- if you are working in the visible light bands looking only at reflected light for information. However, visual resolution in the IR does not equate to thermal infrared sensitivity, or information ‘richness.’"

This is perfectly illustrated by a single band thermal IR image of a human being (below).

In this example, even though the IR resolution is obviously inferior to a visible light image because of the far longer wavelength (we see no apparent facial features), we can easily infer the blood circulation efficiency within the human subject – which is considerably lower in the nose area and fingers, because these areas show up as darker (cooler) regions in the image. The (warm) blood flow is NOT transporting internal body heat efficiently to these areas -- according to this IR image.

[CLICK TO VIEW]

This is higher-order IR information, compared to a simple "pretty picture." Even though it is lower resolution data, it is information totally unavailable from even much higher resolution visual images. Which is what makes lower resolution thermal IR THEMIS data such a potential breakthrough on the 30-plus-year Cydonia problem … even at ~100 meters per pixel ….

It is this fundamental fact of infrared optical physics which made us from the beginning believe Laney’s July 25^th "blurry" Cydonia IR image was in fact the "real deal" … and the July 24^th apparently much higher resolution "official" image was, in fact, the "doctored" version.

The "real" image, while it may look a bit blurry, in fact contains far more data than the "official" version, no matter what the "official" version looks like on first (naked eye) visual inspection. That's why the processing and enhancement tools used for multi-spectral (more than one band) imaging, to accomplish exactly that, are crucial to extracting that "hidden" signal from this set of IR images.

Carlotto, it seemed, was making the same elementary error that some of our readers were making -- assuming that "sharper is automatically better" -- as it is for visible light images. And curiously, he did not do the other crucial steps (as Keith Laney had, and which the "IR imaging ASTER enhancement bible" from JPL specifically calls for), which would have instantly shown him that the "real" (July 25^th) images contained far more, and far better quality, data than the official version did (see Keith Laney's ENVI 3.5 data). This simple analysis in and of itself would have immediately disproved his core hypothesis -- for how can "degraded" data produce quantitatively better results (in a superb program like ENVI 3.5), under proper analysis, than its supposed "source data," and with infinitely less noise?

The simple answer is that it can't.

But that's not what really bothered us. What troubled us in the extreme was that Dr. Carlotto -- a world-class imaging expert, and DOD contractor on a host of classified imaging analyses -- should have known all this.

So, given this decidedly odd state of affairs -- a well known and respected imaging specialist, who at least used to be curious about Cydonia and suspicious of NASA, making not only a seemingly colossal error in judgment, but compounding that error by failing to simply put it to the test -- we decided to consider our options. Richard Hoagland, Keith Laney and Mike Bara conferenced about Carlotto's article on the night of September the 3rd. The general consensus was that Carlotto had effectively "polished a turd" and declared that he "discovered a pearl" -- all without even considering the field of gems which had been placed right in front of him.

Hoagland, however, refused to buy into the notion that Carlotto was as incompetent as his analysis made it seem. He staunchly defended Carlotto's skills and professionalism, insisting that there must be some other reason for his reticence to properly process the THEMIS images. Considering Carlotto's membership in SPSR, (a group of self-serving "serious" Cydonia researchers who refuse to admit that NASA has ever been dishonest in any of its dealings vis-à-vis Cydonia, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary), we decided it was possible that Carlotto had simply fallen in with the "honest but stupid" crowd which forgives every NASA transgression, yet holds Enterprise to much higher standards. The decision was taken to reach out to Carlotto -- if only to save him the embarrassment of a public response pointing out his lack of thoroughness. Enterprise associate researcher Mike Bara subsequently e-mailed Carlotto, informing him he'd made several errors in his article, and advising him to pull it, at least until we published our own analysis.

Carlotto responded via email and pointed out that he had plenty of experience working with thermal images, that the "real" image was "obviously" degraded, and that his paper had been "peer reviewed" (by Dr. Horace Crater, a statistical analyst who has no working experience we are aware of with thermal IR). Mike's response back was basically "suit yourself, but if we had peer reviewed your paper, it would not be published right now." Carlotto e-mailed Bara back, got Richard's phone number, and the two men had a chat on the 4th of September.

According to Hoagland, what Carlotto seemed most concerned about was that his previously published paper would be made obsolete by our article. After a wide ranging discussion, which included Carlotto pointing out that he'd written his own decorrelation stretch algorithm, Carlotto agreed to take the "real" image, perform all of the proper steps (composite, color ratios and decorrelation stretch) on it, and either call or e-mail Hoagland with his results.

That never happened.

We have no way of knowing if Carlotto ever did the analysis he agreed to do, but after more than a week of waiting, Carlotto's only response was to publish yet another "update," in which he dug himself into an even deeper scientific and ethical hole.

Instead of following the proper protocols for processing thermal infrared data as he'd agreed to do, Carlotto decided instead to take the "official" version of the Cydonia THEMIS image and subject it to a series of contrast and blur filters in an apparent attempt to "prove" the Laney image was generated by degrading the official one. He did this by taking only a single band image, not a composite, and he of course did not do any of the other tests he agreed to perform in his conversation with Hoagland. This led him to conclude:

"Its similarity to the top left image strongly suggests that the Enterprise image is an altered version of the ASU image."

He then goes on to claim that because the Laney image changes from band to band in the unratioed grayscale, that this somehow leads him to conclude that it is a "distorted" version of the "official" ASU release:

"That the Enterprise Mission's image is a distorted version of the ASU image can best be seen by looking across spectral bands. In ASU's image (Fig. 3a) image structure is stable across bands while Enterprise's image (Fig. 3b) has a considerable amount of geometrical distortion. Notice, for example, how edges shift and the shape of objects changes as we move from one band to the next. In multispectral imagery the brightness of different materials changes band to band but image structure always remains constant (Fig. 3c). "

What is truly disturbing is that Carlotto's "test" here is proving exactly the opposite of what he is claiming. Real multispectral data (and certainly thermal IR data) does change from band to band. What he is illustrating is exactly what "true" multispectral data should look like. He's not seeing distortion, but rather the expected shift in "return" to the camera from slight variations in the thermal signatures of actual features on the Cydonia plain. The other phenomena he seems to be describing, the "shift" in certain edges of some of the large features, is simply due to the fact that the various bands are not all taken at exactly the same time. There are significant shifts in the spacecraft's position as different filtered CCDs in the THEMIS camera record (in a rapid-fire sequence) the actual imaging data for all the bands. This makes it a near impossibility to simply overlay the various bands when doing a composite. Of course, had he simply read the camera specs, he would have known this, and physically corrected (as Laney has successfully) for the minute geometric shifts.

That Carlotto made no effort to correct the alignment problem is not only a testament to his lack of thoroughness in this case, but an outright indictment of his methods and possibly even his motivations. Keith Laney, at our request, produced an image similar to the section that Carlotto had done, only with the various bands properly aligned geometrically.

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It took him all of five minutes.

All Carlotto would have to do, if he truly wanted to decide the question of which dataset is "degraded" and which is "pristine," would be to run the two images side by side through a quality enhancement tool, like ENVI 3.5 from Research Systems Inc. Had he done so -- as he promised Hoagland he would -- he would have clearly seen that he got it completely backwards.

What makes this truly egregious is that Carlotto certainly knows everything we have described above, that a simple visual inspection of a single grayscale IR band is not a valid comparison of these incredibly information-rich datasets. He has evidently decided that it is better to try and cover his own mistakes by making up a "pretty picture" which only proves his talents as an artist, not as a scientist. What seems to have happened is that Carlotto is unwilling to publicly Face the fact that his initial declaration "that the Laney image is the degraded one" is flat out wrong. Given the opportunity to admit his mistake, he has instead decided to cover his tracks with this absurd comparison. We are truly sorry that Mark has chosen to take a politically defensive stand, instead of the scientifically courageous one.

The absurdity of this position is underscored by an e-mail Laney received from Research Systems Inc. While refusing to get into the middle of the "which image is real" controversy, the communication made several points totally inconsistent with Carlotto’s "analysis." Said Keith’s RSI ENVI representative:
 

"Hi Keith,

"So take that for what it is worth, and keep having fun playing with ENVI!"
 

First: how could someone crudely "degrading" the official Cydonia data create "quite a stir in the astronomy community?" Given the scientists that RSI routinely deals with, and their level of multi-spectral expertise, any simple "degredation" of the official ASU THEMIS website image into the one Laney has been working with (with RSI looking on), would most certainly have been caught … if it was as simple as Carlotto is now claiming.

Second: if Keith’s image was a "hoax," why would the RSI representative go on record saying that the images produced from it "look awesome?" Wouldn’t the better part of valor be to simply refrain from ALL comment ... until the lineage of the "real" image was determined?

It is our position that, despite their official position "not to get involved," the RSI comments to Laney quietly affirm the obvious: that the Laney THEMIS image was a stunning leak of the Real THEMIS Cydonia data, capabilities, and information potential … which expert professionals in the field far outside of NASA are now vigorously debating ("quite a stir in the astronomy community ….") behind closed doors.

In effect, Carlotto has simply parroted the position of Dr. Phillip Christensen of ASU by declaring that the Laney data is "degraded," when all parties involved (as the RSI e-mail underscores) certainly know that the official version is far inferior to the Laney data. By refusing to put that data to the true scientific test, whatever the reason, Carlotto and SPSR are reduced to being nothing but mouthpieces for the NASA party line. As we said before we released this data, people are going to have to take sides … and SPSR and Carlotto evidently have:

They are squarely in the NASA disinformation camp.

However, the attempt to bring Carlotto back into the fold was not all wasted. A reader, Wil Faust, made a truly inspired suggestion to us. Why not compare, he said, Carlotto's own seminal work -- his fractal analysis of the Cydonia region from the Viking data -- to our own IR results?

So we did ….

From "The Martian Enigma's -- A Closer Look" by Dr. Mark Carlotto (left)
And from Keith Laney's "real" version of THEMIS IR data.
Laney image enhanced by contrast stretch only.

It turns out that when you use Carlotto's own methodology, and take a single band of the IR image strip from Keith's "real" version of the data and compare it against Carlotto's own fractal analysis of Viking frames 35A72 and 70A13, you get quite striking results (above). Not only are the THEMIS blocks -- which Carlotto now flatly claims are "enhancement" or "filtering" artifacts -- clearly visible on his own work from 12 years ago, but they match up very precisely with the blocks on the Laney image, literarily one for one!

It is now incumbent upon Dr. Carlotto, who is so sure that the Laney image isn't valid (or is at least "degraded," he's parsed his words pretty carefully) to demonstrate just how "filtering artifacts" can not only line up with features in Odyssey’s THEMIS and visible light images (as we have previously shown) -- but also with direct non-fractal "hits" in his own dataset!

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Overlay of THEMIS color ratio bands and Carlotto's Fractal image of Cydonia from
"The Martian Enigma's -- A Closer Look" by Dr. Mark Carlotto
Overlay by Keith Laney

Significantly, these non-fractal patterns -- to show up in the visible images at all -- also have to be caused by geometric structures buried just beneath the ground.

And, their extraordinary match with the THEMIS IR "buried city" data is another, separate confirmation of the increasingly peculiar MOLA results cited above: that in fact, the laser reflections from these buried structures have to be coming from a relatively shallow depth … despite the readings themselves, which say they are echoing up from several thousand feet down! The resolution of this major discrepancy is undoubtedly trying to tell us something additionally critical about Cydonia ….

Clearly, Dr. Carlotto's methods -- which have led him to dismiss all of these converging anomalies as just "degraded data" -- have led him off the edge of the paper here.

It is one thing to make honest errors in a piece of scientific work. It is quite another to compound those errors and "miss the entire forest" … by hiding behind an incompetent "peer review" and obvious political propaganda, without even checking your own previously published, seminal work!

We have no desire to pillory Carlotto any further here. His own demonstrable lack of true scientific curiosity has more than accomplished that. We simply challenge him to produce and publish the composites, color ratios and decorrelation stretch results from the appropriate multi-spectral analysis he promised Richard Hoagland he would do on the "leaked" THEMIS image … more than a month ago. We'd also be interested if he would explain at that time Keith Laney's numerical side by side noise analysis (below, left) -- which shows that the supposedly "degraded" Laney image is much cleaner than the "official" version (below, right), which Carlotto still somehow insists is "better."

And, finally, we suggest he initially submit his analysis to us this time -- the one independent research institution actually doing successful Mars multi-spectral imaging (by RSI’s own admission) -- for "peer review" … before he goes to press.

Until he does this, sadly, we can no longer endorse his methods, his competence, or even his intellectual honesty on any issue pertaining to this continuing extraterrestrial artifacts investigation.