SIGNALS FROM MARS

Greymouth Evening Star, 8 March 1922, Page 3

SIGNALS FROM MARS

— Al ARGON I CORRECTS ERROR. Senator Alarcuni has so often been ciediled wilii saying fantastic things about having heard wireless messages from Alars, and with having actually undertaken an expedition io sea. io listen lor such messages, that, il is refreshing Io learn. I Hat lie lias not been so loolish as to say or do anything of the sort. In an address in Birmingham a few weeks ago, lie said that tnere had been sensational reports- that he had received wireless signals that lie thought might have come from Alars. lie attribiiled thes? reports to a misunderstanding of some' remarks he had make. He bad stated at various times that undoubtedly effects resembling signals of great wave lengths were occasionally registered by wireless receivers—effects coining apparently from somewhere in space—and these observations bad been confirmed by many wireless observers. When, therefore, In 1 was called upon to aflirni absolutely that the signals in question did not come from Alars, he refuse.t. How could ho know? How could anyone know? The signals camo Lorn out side the earth. Apparently they might be caused by magnetic disturbances in the sun; they might come from Alars or from Aenus even. “As a- matter of fact,’’ he added, “these effects have not been nearly so noticeable of late ; and I sincerely hope that the gentlemen of the press will not interpret this last i-'-mark of mine to mean that I assert that the Alartians, in despair at receiving no reply to their signals, have given up the aitempt, probably thinking that our state of civilisation is so low that they had better wait sjeveral thousand more years before rejieafing the attempt.”