evidence: Conspiracy theorists on social media have been busy at work peddling their latest conclusion: The magnificent auroras seen over swaths of four different continents over the weekend were caused by a University of Alaska program that studies the ionosphere. Which, of course, is pure nonsense. [...] Conspiracy theorists online are suggesting that the auroras were actually caused by the High-frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HAARP), an experiment for studying the ionosphere. As it just so happens, the University of Alaska announced on May 2 that HAARP testing would take place from May 8 to May 10, a fact that theorists interpret as meaning the experiment caused the auroras. [...] HAARP uses a suite of instruments to understand the ionosphere, but conspiracy theorists are most interested in its Ionospheric Research Instrument, which according to the University of Alaska at Fairbanks, "can be used to temporarily excite a limited area of the ionosphere for scientific study." That’s right—scientists actually can create little auroras as they study the ionosphere. But that’s where similarities cease; HAARP isn’t powerful enough to create auroras like those that occur naturally. Honestly, if humans could manufacture light shows as spectacular as those seen this weekend (by everyone but me, if I am to trust social media), someone probably would’ve monetized it by now.