I heard somewhere (great source, that!) that there are people who think the Necronomicon was a real book. Somebody apparently put a fake ad for a copy into a bibliographic journal and was swamped with offers.

I think hermetology and hermetiscism and such have already been taken long ago for alchemical pseudosciences, after Hermes Trismegistus, some sort of mythical Greek alchemist and “god of secret wisdom” like Imhotep in Ancient Egypt. I think though that both are based on Hermes (the god after which Mercury was named in Greek) and Thoth (the god of wisdom and scribes in ancient Egypt). Indeed the 42 Books of Thoth seem to be ones of the most sought after items by magick believers today.

For some reason the priests of ancient Egypt never preserved any of these purported books, and while 5000 year old writings of their religious beliefs have been unearthed, there’s no written evidence about these 42 books until the late 19th century when ancient Egypt became a fashionable thing to write about.

When I’ve seen the photos with the light from the “right” direction, I can understand the craters, and in this case Mercury more, the illusion of pancakes is really annoying. Of course most images are published with north at top, at least I think that’s the case? Also the illusion of the phone handset is less prominent when you see it with the topography right. It’s a depression and a central peak that might have formed from a low angle impact.

I don’t think the amount of double craters so far seen in pictures is a coincidence. Of course, I’m just an amateur, what do I know about planetary geology. There’s a term for martian geology, Areology. What’s the term for Mercurean geology? Hermology?

But if the sun is off the bottom of the frame, your brain interprets the highlight at the top to be a bump, a reflection from the sun off the top of the frame, and the shadow at the bottom to be a shadow off of what your brain is now interpreting as a hill.

P.S.: We *must* rename Neptune to Poseidon to get the P back at the end of our planetary list! Not kidding.

Yes, all your bases are belong to us.

- Jack

Someone is going to count craters and estimate that the copyright notice has been there 20 million years longer than American copyright terms.

The RIAA and MPAA will then lobby the government for an emergency 20 million year copyright term extention.

Aaaarrrghhh! You beat me to it!

OK, how about Mercury has a pierced septum and a nose ring?

- Jack

-M.