The Kaluts in the Lut desert, Iran. By yurybirukov/stock.adobe.com.
New information continues to emerge in the remarkable story of how the American pilot shot down in Iran was rescued on Easter. In the press conference announcing the operation’s success, President Trump alluded to a top-secret device that the CIA used to help locate the missing airman. In the days since, reports have begun to leak that the technology in question is called the “Ghost Murmur” and, depending on who you talk to, is either a quantum leap in our ability to detect electromagnetic signals like a human heartbeat or a gross exaggeration based more in science fiction than in real science.
So, what does the device do, and where does it fall along that spectrum?
When the New York Post broke the story earlier this week, they described the Ghost Murmur as a device that uses “long-range quantum magnetometry to find the electromagnetic signal of a human heartbeat and pairs the data with artificial intelligence software to isolate the signature from background noise.”
To be honest, I understand very little of what I just typed. The important part, though, is that sources claim the military was able to use the device, in concert with the airman’s locator beacon, to pinpoint his location.
As one source described, “It’s like hearing a voice in a stadium, except the stadium is a thousand square miles of desert. In the right conditions, if your heart is beating, we will find you.”
A form of the technology has been around for a while, though, and is frequently used in hospitals to monitor heart arrhythmia through sensors placed directly on the chest. Expanding the capacity to do something similar from a distance of even a few feet, though, usually drops the signal strength to roughly a thousandth of what it was. At a kilometer away, it would fall to about one trillionth of the normal strength.
All of that to say, many in the scientific community are dubious of the reports. Are they right?
Why secret technology shouldn’t be a surprise
When news of the Ghost Murmur first broke, initial reporting relied primarily on anonymous sources and hearsay. It was interesting, but perhaps little more than that. However, President Trump reportedly called the New York Post and confirmed the device’s existence on Wednesday, describing it as “very important” to rescuing the downed pilot.
He went on to say, “Nobody even knows what it is. Nobody ever heard of it before. Everybody’s surprised. We have many other things that nobody has heard about. We have equipment the likes of which nobody has ever even thought about.”
Now, President Trump is no stranger to prioritizing the message over the truth, particularly when a bit of exaggeration suits his desired end. As such, experts in the field remain hesitant to fully accept the official reports on the device’s capacities.
Still, the Ghost Murmur would not be the first example of previously unknown tech that our military has deployed in recent months. In the attack on former Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro, the US reportedly used what President Trump referred to as “The Discombobulator.” And while the name may sound like something out of a low-budget science fiction film, the sonic weapon disabled enemy weaponry while incapacitating soldiers on the ground and causing them to vomit blood.
While a degree of skepticism is warranted here as well when responding to the initial accounts, on-the-ground reports support the basic outline of what occurred and lend credence to the idea that US forces could possess other technologies that are difficult to believe at first glance. Lockheed Martin, which developed the Ghost Murmur, disclosed last year that it was working on similar technology.
So, while the device would represent a massive leap beyond what was previously thought possible, the basic concepts are there. It’s just a matter of, as Chris Duncan described, “how well they filter out all the noise.”
And that’s hardly a problem limited to the realms of science and war.
The key to cutting through the noise
Most of us understand all too well how difficult it can be to filter out the noise in our lives today. Between the way media connects us to the world, and the simple fact that most forms of entertainment carry a noise of their own, finding the space to focus can seem impossible.
But I’m going to go out on a limb and say that awareness of the problem is not what’s keeping most of us from addressing it. After all, even when we put away our screens, get out in nature, or take whatever other steps are often recommended to combat the distractions, it can still be difficult to clear the clutter in our minds. And that’s the problem with most of the ways we try to address the overwhelming amount of information we face daily.
You see, it’s not enough to simply eliminate the distractions if we don’t have a clear idea of what’s meant to take their place.
Like the Ghost Murmur, the key to filtering out the noise in our lives is the ability to lock in on the one frequency that’s most important. To whatever extent that technology works as described, the key is going in with a specific understanding of what you’re looking for.
In the same way, dedicating time to prayer, reading your Bible, going to church, or any other spiritual activity meant to draw us closer to the Lord will have little impact unless we go into them with our hearts and minds focused on God. Admittedly, that’s easier to do some days than others, and there’s grace for the times when we fall short. But we have to try.
So, as we conclude for today, take a moment to pray and ask the Holy Spirit to help you know what it looks like to focus on him. Ask him to protect your heart and mind from the kind of empty practices and checked boxes that can so easily replace God as the frequency we’re searching for. And ask him to show up so powerfully that he stands apart from everything else competing for your attention.
The more often you are intentional about truly making God the focus of the time ostensibly spent with him, the easier it gets to discern his presence in the midst of the noise in your life.
And now is the perfect time to start.
Quote of the day:
“So often we try to develop Christian character and conduct without taking the time to develop God-centered devotion. We try to please God without taking the time to walk with Him and develop a relationship with Him. This is impossible to do.” —Jerry Bridges
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