Word: venusized
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Astronomers are full of facts about far-distant stars, but they know almost nothing about Venus, the earth's nearest (26 million miles) planetary neighbor. Its size, density and period of rotation are all uncertain, and no one has glimpsed its surface, which is always covered with clouds as opaque as marshmallows. In the latest Astrophysical Journal, Astronomer Gerard P. Kuiper of Yerkes Observatory tells how he learned at least a few facts about cloud-wrapped Venus...
...telescope of McDonald Observatory near Fort Davis, Texas, Dr. Kuiper took 260 pictures with a filter that excluded all but violet light. Most of them showed six vague light-and-dark bands around the cloudy planet. Dr. Kuiper believes that the bands are connected with the climate zones of Venus, and that therefore they must be parallel to the Venusian equator. The earth has climate zones too, e.g., the cloudy band (the rainy doldrums) around the equator and the clear-aired bands (the dry "horse latitudes") on either side...
...Kuiper is sure that Venus' bands are due to rising or falling currents in its carbon-dioxide atmosphere. His theory is that where the currents are moving upward (as they do in the earth's doldrums), the fine yellow dust that forms the clouds of Venus is carried high. Where the currents move downward, the dust deck is lower, and above it lies a greater thickness of carbon dioxide. The CO2 reflects violet light better than the dust does, and this makes the down-current zones photograph brighter than the others. In light of longer wave length...
...Adamski, a self-described Southern California "philosopher, student, teacher, saucer researcher" and former short-order cook who claimed (in last year's Flying Saucers Have Landed) that he stood beside a saucer on the California desert in November 1952 and talked (telepathically) with a tanned, short visitor from Venus...
...political question. He wanted to know, says Allingham ("Needless to say I could not understand his words, but his gestures were clear enough"), whether the Earth people would start another war. Allingham says he was only able to shrug hopefully in reply. After indicating that he had visited both Venus and the Moon says Allingham, the Martian also asked if Earthmen would soon reach the Moon. When Allingham nodded, the Martian's broad brow clouded up. "And who can blame them?" asks the author. "We have not yet proved ourselves fit to rule our own planet, let alone visit...