Prompt Cast
The Philadelphia Experiment: Debunking a World War II Urban Legend
TLDR The Philadelphia Experiment, a supposed Navy experiment involving teleportation and invisibility of a ship, was actually a made-up story by Carlos M. Aende. The conspiracy theory gained traction but is not believable due to lack of evidence and logical inconsistencies.
Timestamped Summary
00:00
The podcast episode is about the Philadelphia Experiment, a World War II naval experiment that is considered an urban legend.
04:47
The Philadelphia Experiment was a Navy experiment in which a ship called the USS Eldridge was made to disappear and reappear, causing harm to the sailors on board, and it is rumored that Albert Einstein was involved.
09:45
The Philadelphia Experiment, which involved teleportation and invisibility of a Navy ship, never actually happened and was made up by a man named Carlos M. Aende.
15:06
In 1956, Carlos M. Aende sent a series of letters to author Morris Jessup claiming to have witnessed an experiment in Philadelphia in 1943 where a ship disappeared and created a green glow, but when Jessup asked for evidence, Aende had none.
20:06
After receiving a heavily annotated copy of his book from three people, including Carl Allen, two Navy researchers took it upon themselves to find Morris Jessup, which has kept the Philadelphia Experiment conspiracy theory alive.
25:00
The USS Eldridge was not in Philadelphia on the day of the supposed Philadelphia Experiment, but was actually in Brooklyn, according to a researcher named Jacques F. Velais.
30:29
Edward Dugin, a former Navy electrician, claims that the Philadelphia Experiment was actually the degaussing of ships to make them non-magnetic to German U-boats and torpedoes, and that the USS Eldridge simply traveled to Norfolk and back using a military canal.
35:25
The Philadelphia Experiment is easily explainable as a regular ship sailing in and out of Norfolk, but over time it became a mysterious and exaggerated story, likely due to drunken sailors and the game of telephone, with some claiming the ship would become invisible when they actually meant it would be invisible to mines.
40:28
The green glow seen during the Philadelphia Experiment could have been caused by an electrical storm or experiments with a higher power generator on the USS Timmerman, combined with degaussing during World War II, and the USS Eldridge was actually in Brooklyn, not Philadelphia, during the alleged experiment.
45:19
The Philadelphia Experiment conspiracy theory gained traction due to a book published in 1979 and was further popularized by a movie, but there are several reasons why it is not believable, such as the fact that if the military had successfully transported a battleship, we would know about teleportation by now.
50:06
The hosts give advice to a new podcaster, suggesting that they invest in good microphones, release episodes on a reliable schedule, and aim for a conversational style rather than reading from a script.
Categories:
Society & Culture
