Being a warrior is about more than just owning a bow and arrow.

“It’s pretty atypical to maintain variation over such a long time.”

Like seahorses, pipefish males have a brood pouch for the eggs and give birth to the young.

The dwarf planet and its massive moon are often considered a binary system.

Until recently, scientists believed that Homo floresiensis, a species of dwarf humans that lived on the island of Flores, was driven to extinction by modern humans. But new research suggests a different cause for the collapse. Around 50,000 years ago, the Indonesian island of Flores was home to a unique species of tiny humans, Homo floresiensis , often referred to as “hobbit humans.” Researchers initially believed that these tiny hominids were driven to extinction by modern humans, but recent research points to other causes, IFLScience reports. A new study, which has not yet been peer-reviewed, points to climate change as a likely cause of their demise. The researchers say that decreased rainfall significantly affected the dwarf elephants known as stegodons, which Homo floresiensis relied heavily on for its diet. These small elephants shared the island with the hobbits until climate change caused their water sources to dry up, causing a catastrophic collapse for both species. Until recently, scientists believed that Homo floresiensis, a species of dwarf humans that lived on the island of Flores, had become extinct due to the activities of modern humans. The researchers note that archaeological evidence of Homo floresiensis disappears about 4,000 years before Homo sapiens arrived on Flores , about 46,000 years ago. To investigate the reasons for their disappearance, the team analysed geological samples near Liang Bua, a key hobbit site, focusing on levels of magnesium, calcium and oxygen isotopes. This allowed them to piece together a history of climate change in the region. Their findings show that about 76,000 years ago, rainfall on Flores was much higher and more stable. Over the next 20,000 years, rainfall decreased significantly and seasonal variability increased. By 50,000 years ago, rainfall during the summer monsoon rains had dropped to 430 millimetres per year, leaving Stegodon with limited access to water during the dry seasons. The researchers suggest two possible scenarios. In one, the elephants remained near Liang Bua, vulnerable to lack of water and persecution by Homo floresiensis , who lived around the waterholes. Or the elephants may have migrated to wetter coastal regions, where unfamiliar environments would likely have threatened their survival. If the hobbits had followed their prey, they would have encountered new dangers and perhaps even modern humans who traveled along the coast on their way to Oceania. Although there is no reliable evidence of interaction between Homo sapiens and Homo floresiensis , the researchers do not rule out the possibility of their brief contact. This study demonstrates the fragility of ecosystems and the profound impact of climate change on ancient species. The post Extinction of the Hobbits: What Happened to Flores’ Ancient Humans? appeared first on Anomalien.com.

A couple of weeks ago, Dr. Sam Parnia released a new mini-documentary about Near Death Experiences (NDEs), which he now coined a new term for: REDs, for ‘Recalled Experiences of Death.’ His argument is that, physiologically, these people weren’t merely near death, but actually died and were resuscitated thanks to modern medical technology. Indeed, defining death as a state one can never return from is operationally contingent; it is arbitrary and ignores the physiology—the science—of the process. So I am comfortable with the term RED. But I diverge. The point of this essay is a common feature of REDs and ‘Out of Body Experiences’ (OBEs) that have always stricken me as exceedingly odd: the claim by experiencers that they could perceive the colloquially physical world around them—from a mildly elevated, bird’s-eye perspective—during the period of, e.g., cardiac arrest, as if they still had working eyes and ears. This seems to violate logic, as evolution required hundreds of millions of years of painstaking adaption to come up with retinas and eardrums. And that these are needed to perceive the world is unquestionable: right now, if you close your eyes and ears, you will see and hear nearly nothing. So how can a patient under cardiac arrest, lying on a hospital bed with eyes closed, see and hear what is going on in the corridors outside their room? If one can see and hear perfectly well without working eyes and ears, why do we need them at all? Why can’t I close my eyes right now and see what’s happening around the corner of my street? Nonetheless, I am not one of those people who find it easy to disregard (anecdotal) evidence just because it doesn’t fit with their understanding of the world. As a friend reminded me of just a couple of days ago, alluding to a particular scene from the Netflix series Chernobyl, theory must fit the facts, not the other way around. And there are just too many mutually-consistent reports to dismiss. My commitment to truth is such that I just can’t pretend otherwise, which puts me at an impasse, for I am equally unable to think of nature as something so capricious as to change the rules of the game on a whim. I just can’t accept that eyes and ears are utterly unnecessary to perceive this world during a RED or OBE, but absolutely necessary during ordinary waking states. Moreover, nature just isn’t so redundant as to struggle for hundreds of millions of years to evolve retinas and eardrums we can allegedly do perfectly well without. The present essay is the result of my struggle to make sense of this conundrum. At this stage, however, what follows is still very highly speculative and should be taken with a whole bag of salt. I am not at all committed to the conjectures I discuss below, but simply play with them as an intellectual exercise. In the future, I may further expand on these thoughts in a more rigorous manner, if my argument can be more substantiated. Alternatively, I may abandon the idea altogether. Either way, right now what follows is just a very loose exercise of theoretical imagination, nothing more. Finally, notice also that the Phantom World Hypothesis is supposed to cover only the parts of a RED or OBE that seem to relate directly to the ordinary, so-called physical world; not the parts about transcendence and other realities. Assumptions I am not a RED/OBE researcher or scholar. My interest in these states is professional but ancillary. Therefore, I must start with some basic assumptions, knowing full well that these may ultimately prove to be wrong or misleading. My assumptions are these: (a) experiencers of REDs/OBEs are being sincere and reasonably accurate when they report the ability to perceive the ordinary, colloquially physical world during the period in which they do not have functioning sensory organs; (b) Nature indeed isn’t redundant or whimsical, so despite their sincere reports, experiencers in fact aren’t truly perceiving the colloquially physical world around them. Background I will base my hypothesis on the tenets of my own Analytic Idealism. According to it, all nature consists of experiential—i.e., mental—states. Some of these states are within our individual minds, such as our own perceptions, thoughts and emotions. We identify with these internal states or at least feel that we own them. Other mental states in nature are external to our individual minds and, therefore, constitute the external environment we inhabit. I shall say that these external mental states belong to a ‘mind-at-large’ beyond our individual minds. That there can be mental states out there, outside your individual mind, is nothing new: my thoughts are mental, and yet external to your mind. Analytic Idealism simply leverages this trivial fact to argue that the entire world beyond the boundaries of our own minds is constituted of external mental states as well, not just the inner lives of other people. When external mental states in mind-at-large impinge on our individual minds, they modulate our internal mental states. This is what we call perception: what we see, hear, taste, smell, and touch are our inner representations of external states. As such, under Analytic Idealism there is indeed an external world beyond us; a world that does not depend on us to exist or do whatever it is that it does. When we interact with this world—such that the world impinges on us—its states are represented by our individual minds as the colloquially physical world around us. As such, what we perceive is merely an image, an appearance of states in mind-at-large. Still under Analytic Idealism, what separates our internal mental states from the external mental states of mind-at-large is a dissociative boundary. Just like the multiple, disjoint personalities—called ‘alters’—of a patient of Dissociative Identity Disorder (previously known as ‘Multiple Personality Disorder’), each living being is a dissociative alter of the field of mentation that constitutes nature. A biological organism is what one such an alter looks like when represented on the screen of perception. Biology, life, is the perceptual appearance of a dissociative alter in the universal mind we call nature. As such, death—the end of life—is, in fact, merely the end of the dissociation, of the alter, not the end of consciousness. The dying process is that by which the previously private mental states of the alter—one’s personal memories, insights, etc., originally insulated from their cognitive surroundings by a dissociative boundary—become progressively re-associated with the mental states of mind-at-large. It stands to reason, thus, that this should be experienced as an expansion of consciousness, not its end, which is precisely what experiencers of REDs/OBEs report. The Phantom World Hypothesis Among the previously private mental states of an alter undergoing re-association—i.e., a person dying, being re-integrated into his or her cognitive surroundings—are episodic memories. These contain a lifetime of perceptions: a cognitive map of one’s home, neighbourhood, city, country, places visited or seen on TV shows and YouTube videos, and so on. We don’t just perceive the world, we also remember these perceptions. As these perceptual memories accumulate over time, they form an increasingly broad, high-resolution, internal map of our environment, constituted of the qualities of perception: the colours, shapes, contours, and geometrical relationships that define what we colloquially call the physical world. Even when you are lying in bed at night, with your eyes closed, you can access these perceptual memories to visualise your room, your street, the route to work that you will be taking in the morning, etc. As such, a copy—more or less precise, more or less accurate, more or less comprehensive—of the world as perceived exists in us at all times. When we die, this copy of the world as perceived and remembered becomes re-integrated with the external mental states of mind-at-large. And since people are dying every minute, mind-at-large becomes increasingly enriched with individual perceptual maps, which are representations of its own states. These perceptual maps—each corresponding to the perceptual memories of a re-integrated alter—become cognitively associated with one another, like different pieces of a giant jigsaw puzzle coming together. It is reasonable to infer this because we know that this is how mind works: through spontaneous cognitive associations based on similarities and correspondences. Mind-at-large cannot help but spontaneously put the pieces of the puzzle together. Nature’s mind is thus constantly assembling a cognitive map of itself—a jigsaw puzzle representing its own states, whose pieces are constituted of qualities of perception—based on the episodic memories it inherits from re-integrated alters. Where there are gaps, extrapolations spontaneously arise, just as we extrapolate our own perceptions to infer that, say, a wall partly obscured by a tree in fact continues behind the tree; or that a road continues beyond the visible horizon; etc. These extrapolations reflect well-known and intrinsic properties of mentation: you spontaneously extrapolate a square from the figure below, even though there is no square in it at all; you do it because this is what mind naturally does. Technically called interpolations, the extrapolations complete the jigsaw puzzle where pieces are still missing. The result may be an inaccurate but rather complete cognitive map, a Phantom World constituted of perceptual qualities originally generated by living people and other organisms. I call the resulting map a Phantom World because mind-at-large isn’t actually perceiving the world; it isn’t actually representing its own states on a screen of its own perception. Instead, it is merely inheriting the perceptual states of myriad former alters and spontaneously assembling them together through cognitive similarity and correspondence. The resulting pseudo-perceptual world is thus an approximation containing inaccuracies and imprecisions (the interpolations). Nonetheless, it should still feel as though it were a (colloquially physical) world perceived, since it is made of qualities of perception like the colours and sounds you and I see and hear. During a RED or OBE, I contend that the dissociative boundary that defines the individual mind of a person becomes weakened, porous, permeable, allowing for partial but direct access to external states in mind-at-large, without the intermediation of a screen of perception. And since these external states contain the Phantom World, the experiencer gains temporary access to that pseudo-perceived world. I suggest, therefore, that the experiencer is not actually perceiving the real world, but the Phantom World instead. For this, the experiencer indeed does not require working eyes or ears, for he or she is accessing the compound result of myriad episodic memories—the assembled jigsaw puzzle—of people who did have working eyes and ears. Analogously, when you are lying on your bed at night, with your eyes closed, visualising your route to work the next morning, you too can visualise it by recalling episodic memories and without using your eyes. Perspectival transposition A number of possible criticisms of this hypothesis must be popping in your mind right now. I will try to anticipate and address them in this and the next sections. The first issue is the perspective experiencers report: a bird’s-eye view of things, as if they were floating above other people, the furniture, the cars on the streets, etc. This perspective does not correspond to the episodic memories of any human being, dead or alive, since we don’t ordinarily float around like air balloons. How can this be accounted for under the Phantom World Hypothesis? Even in ordinary waking states, our minds routinely adjust our perceptual experience so to conform to an expected context or perspective. In other words, we don’t just perceive the world as it is, we manipulate our perceptual states so they fit with the context we cognitively expect. This is so even when you know what is going on. In the picture below, for instance, the squares marked A and B have exactly the same colour. Yet, because the context forces you to expect them to have opposite colours, that’s what you see. And you will continue to see it even after you convince yourself that the squares do indeed have the same colour. The drawing below contains a variety of perspectival illusions. Even after we realise that what we think we are seeing is impossible, we continue to see it nonetheless. This is an intrinsic property of mind: it tries to fit what it perceives to its expectations and models of what is going on. There are countless other compelling examples of our minds imposing a perspective onto the contents of perception that is not there at all. The video below is just one more example, where we impose very specific movement where there is none. And even knowing this, and being convinced of it, does not reduce—let alone eliminate—the seeming perception. Staring at this optical illusion where the boxes are not moving – my brain can't comprehend! pic.twitter.com/9TcgbQfxVL — CreativeCorner (@Creativefun2024) February 6, 2024 My contention is thus the following: during a RED/OBE, the experiencer expects to perceive the world from his or her own unique and contingent point of view, not the objective perspective of other people, dead or alive. To reconcile his or her access to the Phantom World with this expectation, the experiencer transposes his or her experiential vantage point accordingly, thereby generating the bird’s-eye view. This is possible because the Phantom World is already a cognitive model—an interpolation—anyway, so any perspective can be ‘computed’ from it through a form of grounded, calibrated imagination. Ongoing experiences Another issue with the Phantom World Hypothesis is that experiencers often report, veridically, what is going on in the world during the RED/OBE: what people are saying, doing, etc., while the experiencer is in, e.g., cardiac arrest. This means that their pseudo-perceptions cannot be grounded only in the episodic memories of the deceased, but also in the ongoing experiences of living people, as they unfold. Under Analytic Idealism, the mental inner lives of two different people are ordinarily separated from one another by two dissociative boundaries, each defining the limits of each person’s individual mind. During the RED/OBE, however, we’ve hypothesised that the dissociative boundary of the experiencer becomes weaker, porous, permeable. As such, it is reasonable to conjecture that access to another person’s on-going experiences becomes easier than under ordinary circumstances. This is especially so if those other people are emotionally connected with the experiencer, which could spontaneously shift their own state of consciousness in a manner that weakens their own dissociative boundary as well. If this direct mind-to-mind access does take place, it is in principle reasonable to conjecture that the experiencer will import it into the Phantom World—to keep everything consistent and unified—and again spontaneously apply a perspective transposition, as discussed in the previous section, so to portray such access as if it were taking place from an external vantage point. After all, the experiencer doesn’t expect himself/herself to be another person. Instead, things will be experienced as if he/she were seeing or hearing another person. The experiencer will then report having seeing or heard other people say or do this or that, while, in fact, the experiencer has directly accessed their inner mental states. Dr. Sam Parnia Implications and validation To check whether the Phantom World Hypothesis is consistent with the (anecdotal) RED/OBE data, we must derive its implications and check them against what experiencers report. So let us do this, one implication at a time. If some of what is reported corresponds to direct access to the inner mentation of living people—subsequently transposed to an external perspective—then experiencers should, at least occasionally, report accessing endogenous mental states of others as well. In other words, in addition to knowing what people said or did, experiencers should, at least occasionally, claim that they knew what people were thinking or feeling. And indeed, this is precisely what is often reported. In the recent mini-documentary by Dr. Sam Parnia, linked above, an experiencer claimed to have become aware of what his doctor was thinking—a claim confirmed by the doctor—while the experiencer himself was in cardiac arrest. If the experiencer can access someone’s thoughts, than she or he surely can access what one is seeing, hearing, or otherwise perceiving. This corroborates the hypothesis that experiencers aren’t actually perceiving the real world without functioning eyes or ears, but pseudo-perceiving the world by proxy, through the inner mental states of both the deceased and the living. Another implication of the Phantom World Hypothesis is that, since the Phantom World is a cognitive construct, a model containing interpolations and extrapolations, at least occasionally experiencers should report things that don’t actually match with the real world. These inaccuracies are probably filtered out in the popular literature, since they can easily be (mis)interpreted as refuting the validity of the RED/OBE. Yet, under the Phantom World Hypothesis, occasional inaccuracies and oddities are precisely what one would expect. These inaccuracies—provided that they are localised within a broader context that is itself veridical—in fact corroborate the validity of the RED/OBE. Finally, the most important implication of the Phantom World Hypothesis is this: the experiencer should not be able to know any fact that has never been experienced by any organism still alive or already dead. Because the hypothesis entails that experiencers only pseudo-perceive the world—that is, perceive by proxy, through the inner mental states of others—whatever no one has ever perceived or otherwise known cannot be accessed by the experiencer. As such, when Dr. Sam Parnia devised his famous experiment to test the veracity of REDs—wherein he placed electronic displays on top of tall cupboards, facing up and displaying random numbers automatically chosen by a computer, to see if the ‘free-floating soul’ would be able to read the numbers—he ensured that no experiencer would succeed. After all, the experiment was designed to be double-blind: the experimenters themselves didn’t know what numbers were displayed. Therefore, no one, dead or alive, knew what the numbers were. It was impossible for the experiencers to access such information, since their access is always by proxy and not direct. The experiencers don’t have eyes to perceive the displays; they can only see what others see or have seen. Again, this implication of the Phantom World Hypothesis seems to match with the data, as Parnia’s experiment is known to have ‘failed.’ Conclusions The Phantom World Hypothesis should not be taken as a rigorous scholarly theory, for it is no such thing; at least at the present time. As it stands, the hypothesis is merely educated speculation and conjecture, with very little theoretical underpinning or empirical basis. But the little it does have is, well, a little intriguing. I am not an experimentalist in the field of REDs/OBEs. I cannot, therefore, take it on myself to design and carry out experiments to validate or falsify my own hypothesis. But those who are in the position to do so could perhaps allow themselves to be informally informed by the Phantom World Hypothesis in their experimental designs. Doing so would prevent the understandable but possibly equivocated jump to concluding that Parnia’s experiment debunks the veridical aspect of REDs, for its very double-blind design could have precluded any veridical report. New experiments are needed that are informed by the Phantom World Hypothesis. The post The Phantom World Hypothesis of NDEs/OBEs appeared first on Anomalien.com.

MRC President and Founder Brent Bozell commended Meta following a stunning announcement on free speech by the company’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg.  Four years after the major social media platforms censored the then-President of the United States Donald Trump, Zuckerberg promised that Meta would “get rid of fact-checkers” at Facebook and Instagram. He also said that the platforms would majorly curtail the frequency and types of automated content moderation (censorship). And Zuckerberg also noted that the Meta platforms will allow more personalization regarding what users see in feeds, including again allowing political content to be seen. Bozell thanked Zuckerberg for taking this step after years of censorship and election interference on his platforms and called on other major platforms such as Google and TikTok to do the same. “I commend Mark Zuckerberg for doing the right thing and enacting real, meaningful reforms to move Facebook closer to a platform for free speech. I know Mark has long believed that his company should strengthen freedom and democracy around the world. Today, he has taken a giant step toward helping to grow freedom everywhere,” Bozell said in a Jan. 7 post on X.  Bozell also commended Zuckerberg for acknowledging that Meta had made mistakes, noting that MRC Free Speech America has recorded 1,725 cases of censorship from Facebook, Instagram and Threads in its exclusive CensorTrack database.  Bozell went on to note that the Media Research Center and its allies in The Free Speech Alliance have fought for years to bring down the censorship regime at Meta. “Our years-long battle for free speech on the internet has finally borne fruit. I also want to thank my allies in the Free Speech Alliance and all the patriotic Americans who have stood with us for bringing about this great victory for free speech.” The Free Speech Alliance has been steadily pushing for online free speech since 2018 when it got its first victory in the right direction. As described on the alliance’s website: "In April 2018, the Media Research Center released a groundbreaking report exposing efforts to censor conservatives and silence conservative speech from major online platforms. Our report was so impactful that US Representatives on the House Judiciary Committee cited it four separate times during a July 17, 2018 congressional hearing." As Bozell noted, these efforts have now come to fruition. Zuckerberg not only acknowledged mistakes and promised to “get rid of fact-checkers” but also to annihilate “restrictions on topics like immigration and gender.” The Meta CEO even promised to move his “Trust and Safety” and “content moderation” teams from California and said that Meta’s “U.S.-based content review” team will work in Texas, away from authoritarian leftists like Governor Gavin Newsom (D-CA).   Conservatives are under attack! Contact your representatives and demand that Big Tech be held to account to mirror the First Amendment while providing transparency, clarity on hate speech and equal footing for conservatives. If you have been censored, contact us using CensorTrack’s contact form, and help us hold Big Tech accountable.

Tuesday’s Washington Post revealed their angst for a second Trump term. Whatever can the media do now? All the media's horses failed to knock Trumpty Dumpty off the wall. Does anyone remember media angst over how to cover Biden? No. The headline on this Jeremy Barr roundup was: How should the news industry cover Trump? Ten top journalists weigh in. Well, ten top liberal journalists weigh in, and the most predictable was Don Lemon of CNN, channeling every predictable Jeff Zucker line about Cruel Trump ruling the media: The media must also cover less of what Trump says and more of what he does. Too often journalists let Trump’s latest cruel or bigoted comment rule the news cycle. Too rarely do they dedicate the front page to the radical actions of the man.  [What?] There will be few guardrails in this second term. As Trump vows to carry out [a large wave of deportations], I pray an insult spat at a press conference doesn’t distract reporters from the work of showing the American people what it looks like to rip Black and Brown families apart. At least Katie Couric suggested the legacy media is “in a bubble, and it’s time to pop it.” Whose fault is that? She offered the old saw of more shoe-leather reporting across the country, including transgender teens and women denied abortion “access,” and then there's Trump fans: I’d also try to find a few Americans who were big Trump supporters and chronicle their lives to see if they improve. But pointing out lies and examining the fallout from certain policies will be more important than ever, even if criticism of President Trump will be called biased or “fake news” by many of his supporters. Former New York Times editor Jill Abramson advised, “Assign at least one reporter to monitor and listen to right-wing media, the same influencers and podcasts where MAGA world and Trump get their (often dubious) information and ‘news.’” No one did that last time? Abramson added: “Report exhaustively on the tech billionaires and crypto kings, and dig for stories that show how the White House rewards them. [Elon] Musk is a beat, at least for now.” The weirdest line came from New Yorker editor David Remnick:  “I think, to some degree, we should be self-critical, but we should stop apologizing for everything we do.” Who on Earth thinks the media are apologizing for everything? Are they apologizing for anything? Finally, it’s quite funny to turn to Lyin’ Brian Williams for journalism advice, but he turned the focus back on Biden: It was crushing to watch so many working journalists attempt to generate the words to accurately describe a visibly struggling and diminished president, seemingly unable to complete a sentence or a thought in his disastrous and final debate. Say it with me: It is perhaps the ultimate irony that the electoral collapse of the Democratic Party in 2024 was triggered in large part by the man who ran to save the country and democracy — the same man who then tried to stay too long at the fair. They're all upset that the "democracy savers" lost an election. If you're asking Brian Williams for journalism advice, it's like asking Biden for advice on when to quit. 

The fight over Taiwan may be all talk right now, but Mark Levin of “LevinTV” is well aware that the small island off the coast of China is an inevitable flashpoint due to its location. And in a recent segment on DW News, it was explained why the United States and China “can’t quit Taiwan.” “In some ways, Taiwan’s strategic importance is about three choke points around the island to the West. There’s the Taiwan strait,” the narrator explained. “It’s a key trade route for both Beijing and Taiwan and also for everybody else.” The world’s biggest container ships pass through the strait. And to the north is the Miyako strait, which runs through Taiwan and several Japanese islands. To the south is the Bashi strait. These straits are China’s “key strategic gateways to the Pacific Ocean.” Meanwhile, the United States has military bases sprinkled near the border of China — and surrounding Taiwan. “Now, the next question is what can we do about this.” Levin says. “With each passing year, less and less.” “We’re building up our military presence there; we’re also strengthening our alliances there. But we’re not building it up to a point that they’re going to be able to rebuff China. China’s going to surround them. They’re going to choke them off economically. This is my prediction as the first of their strategy,” Levin explains. “Surround them, choke them off, and then warn the United States or anybody else, ‘You fly planes over there, you drop them anything, we’ll shoot you out of the sky.’ I mean, they’re right next to China, you can see.” “They will bombard it. They will attack it. They’re planning and planning and planning on this. Now, the Taiwanese are tough people. They have a strong little military — but nothing compared to what’s being built to attack them,” he continues, noting that now that Donald Trump has been elected, the plan could change. “Obviously, they didn’t act while Biden was president because I don’t think they’re in a position to do so. Why? Because their economy sucks right now,” he explains. “But it’ll be back. And so what happens if they do attack Taiwan when Donald Trump is president?” “I think they’ll suffer economically. In other ways too,” he adds. Want more from Mark Levin?To enjoy more of "the Great One" — Mark Levin as you've never seen him before — subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

As his days in office draw to a close, President Joe Biden has released nearly a dozen Yemenis from the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba as part of a larger goal of closing the facility permanently.On Monday, the Department of Defense announced that 11 prisoners would be transferred to Oman: Uthman Abd al-Rahim Muhammad Uthman, Moath Hamza Ahmed al-Alwi, Khalid Ahmed Qassim, Suhayl Abdul Anam al Sharabi, Hani Saleh Rashid Abdullah, Tawfiq Nasir Awad Al-Bihani, Omar Mohammed Ali al-Rammah, Sanad Ali Yislam Al Kazimi, Hassan Muhammad Ali Bib Attash, Sharqawi Abdu Ali Al Hajj, and Abd Al-Salam Al-Hilah.Both al-Alwi and al Sharabi worked as bodyguards for the late Osama bin Laden, former leader of the terrorist group Al-Qaeda and organizer of the 9/11 attacks. Al-Alwi, who was also allegedly a member of Al-Qaeda, served on bin Laden's security detail in Afghanistan. A 2016 intelligence file noted that he had been "pardoned" for a number of infractions at Gitmo since his capture and suggested that he may still have an "extremist mindset" based on some of his statements while in prison, the New York Post reported.In addition to working as bin Laden's bodyguard, al Sharabi, another suspected member of Al-Qaeda, was also allegedly involved in "an aborted 9/11-style hijacking plot in Southwest Asia," according to his 2020 intelligence file.None of the 11 transferred detainees has ever been charged with a crime, though American courts have never firmly settled whether enemy combatants ... should be treated as accused criminals.All 11 Gitmo prisoners are Yemeni nationals who were captured shortly after 9/11. They will all be transferred to Oman as part of a pledge from Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin in September 2023."The United States appreciates the willingness of the Government of Oman and other partners to support ongoing U.S. efforts focused on responsibly reducing the detainee population and ultimately closing the Guantanamo Bay facility," the DOD press release said.None of the 11 transferred detainees has ever been charged with a crime, though American courts have never firmly settled whether enemy combatants captured on a battlefield should be treated as accused criminals, conferred with full due process rights and subject to the justice system.Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, considered the mastermind behind the 9/11 attacks, is an exception. After more than 20 years at Gitmo, Mohammed is expected to avoid the death penalty by pleading guilty to plotting the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Fox News reported.Co-conspirators Walid bin Attash and Mustafa al-Hawsawi, who have also been held at Guantanamo Bay since 2003, were also offered plea deals.With the 11 detainees gone, Gitmo now has just 15 remaining prisoners, a tiny fraction of the number of prisoners held there at the peak of the War on Terror. In 2003, the facility housed 680 prisoners.H/T: The Post MillennialLike Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!