Category: L

Famous French chemist who made many notable discoveries in chemistry, biology and medicine. In 1848, Pasteur separated tartaric acid into two forms, both having the same chemical formula; however, one form rotated a polarized light beam to the right (dextro-rotatory) and the other to the left (levo-rotatory). Pasteur’s discovery of molecular dyssymmetry opened up the…

Historical reports of extraterrestrial life on the Moon. The concept of life on the Moon has a long history. The first person to suggest that the moon was, like Earth, inhabited was Greek philosopher Anaxagoras (c. 500-c. 428 B.C.E.). Second-century writers Plutarch and Lucian of Samosata both wrote about the Moon as an inhabited world.…

Scottish lawyer, judge, and pioneer anthropologist who explored the origins of language and society. His book, entitled Of the Origin and Progress of Language (6 vol. 1773-92) is typical of Enlightenment thinking in 18th-century Scotland, containing a large body of curious ideas, as well as sober anthropological learning, on the manners and customs of primitive…

Marxist approach to agricultural science. Trofim D. Lysenko (1898-1976) attempted to reform Soviet agricultural practices during the 1930s and 1940s by utilizing a version of Jean-Baptiste Lamarck’s theories. Lamarck’s version of evolution rested on the idea that life starts out simple and then becomes more complex as environmental forces act on it. In the late…

One of the most abiding superstitions throughout history, that some numbers are lucky and others are unlucky. In our society, 3 and 7 are commonly held to be especially lucky; why this should be so is uncertain. Perhaps 3 is from the Holy Trinity, or it may have an earlier origin, such as the three-legged…

A place of pilgrimage for millions of devout Christians each year, where visions of the Virgin Mary were seen by a local girl in the mid-19th century. Lourdes, of Roman origin, is situated in southern France, at the foot of the Pyrenees. On the right bank of the River Gave, which flows through Lourdes, stands…

Ten tribes of the northern Hebrew nation of Israel taken captive by the Assyrians in the eighth century B.C.E. They never returned to Israel. The fate of the Lost Tribes became a matter of much theological debate, especially after the discovery of the Americas in the 15th century. Some clerics advanced the opinion that Native…

Originally called The Bureau for Investigating the Loch Ness Phenomena Ltd., a bureau that was established to serve a dual function: to receive reports of observations and investigations and to promote actively research concerning the loch and its famous inhabitant (or inhabitants) the loch ness monster. The bureau was established in 1962 at Achnahannet on…

The most widely publicized and most widely believed survivor of the dinosaurs. The first recorded sighting of this animal, possibly a living plesiosaur, was by Saint Columba in 565 C.E. There were a very few further sightings reported until 1933. “Nessie” has since become an international celebrity, being photographed and reported in newspapers and on…

Giant serpents reported to exist in Scandinavia. In 1885, Swedish scientist/folklorist Gunnar Olof Hylten-Cavallius published some 50 accounts of sightings of the lindorm, which he described as being 3 to 6 meters (10 to 20 feet) in length. These reports gave verification to the earlier discussion of lindorms in The Natural History of Norway by…