New Scientist: Venus' Atmosphere Implies Life

WolfWithoutAClause writes "This New Scientist article says that the atmosphere of Venus has features that may only be explaineable by the existence of life in its upper atmosphere. In particular it has cartain chemicals which are extremely difficult to make inorganically. At the altitude where life is suspected the temperature is about 70C and about 1 atmosphere. There are gases there which are not naturally found together. The article suggests something is actively producing them, quite possibly, life."

Comments

Life?

[Anonymous Coward]

There are more than a few explanations for that, I hate New Scientist, they jump to conclusions too often in an effort to drum up interest in their articles.

Re:Life?

[naph]

it does seem like every month they're reporting on something new that's gonna change the world... but never does. but ya never know. :D

Re:Life?

[squaretorus]

Actually, the articles themselves seldom go so far as the articles ABOUT the articles (i.e. this story).

New Scientist do a pretty good PR job every week to get some story into the press / radio to generate some interest. Usually the story itself will be relatively light, and centred on a new piece of research which raises a possibility - it is the tabloid reporting of these that state 'Mer are all dicks, and there IS life of Venus' or some such (I'll never get that sub-ed job).

Re:Life?

[Anonymous Coward]

For a while I foolishly believed that the
New Scientist was a reputable magazine...
but my fiancee (who is a real scientist, does stuff with dna & microbes & proteins that I'll never understand - I'll stick to my C++ and my Java ;^)
eh..ah yes...she laughed. Long and loud.
She compared it to the "Womans Weekly of the science world" (i.e. trash)

Turns out that most scientists that read the New Scientist only read it for one reason: The job-advertisements in the back!

Re:Life?

[ch-chuck]

Sounds like the 'psychic' strategy - predict enough weird stuff and odds are that one will eventually come true, make you famous, while the bogus ones are quickly forgotten by the beleivers / suckers. That's called the Jean Dixon effect.

Re:Life?

[matrix29]

There are more than a few explanations for that, I hate New Scientist, they jump to conclusions too often in an effort to drum up interest in their articles.

Or just to play head games with people for laughs. Eggs are good for you today and now they're bad for you again and now they're good for you again. Confusing isn't it?

And of course The ONION's take on this whimsy science... From FussyMonkey.COM (a wonderful archive of "The ONION RADIO NEWS")
http://www.fussymonkey.com/orn/

Snickering
Researchers Say Dog Urine Lowers The Risk Of Heart Disease

Re:Life?

[matrix29]

<I>Actually, the articles themselves seldom go so far as the articles ABOUT the articles (i.e. this story).</I>

Which reminds me of...

<A
href="http://www.sciencebase.com/SciObs_archive. html">http://www.sciencebase.com/SciObs_archive.ht ml</A>

The old ones...
Question: How many Internet mailing list subscribers does it take to change a light bulb?
Answer: 1374.
1 to change the light bulb and to post to the mailing list that the light bulb has been changed, 14 to share similar experiences of changing light bulbs and how the light bulb could have been changed differently, 7 to caution about the dangers of changing light bulbs, 27 to point out spelling errors in posts about changing light bulbs, 53 to flame the spell checkers, 41 to correct spelling in the spelling flames, 156 to write to the list administrator complaining about the light bulb discussion and its inappropriateness to this mailing list, 109 to post that this list is not about light bulbs and to please take this e-mail exchange to another list, 203 to demand that cross posting to other lists about changing light bulbs be stopped, 111 to defend the posting to this list saying that we all use light bulbs and therefore the posts _are_ relevant to this mailing list, 309 to debate which method of changing light bulbs is superior, where to buy the best light bulbs, what brand of light bulbs work best for this technique, and what brands are not so good, 27 to post web addresses where one can see examples of different light bulbs, 14 to post that the web addresses were posted incorrectly, and to post corrected ones, 33 to concatenate all posts to date, then quote them including all headers and footers, and then add 'Me Too!', 12 to post to the list that they are unsubscribing because they cannot handle the light bulb controversy, 19 to quote the 'Me Toos' to say, 'Me Three!', 4 to suggest that posters request the light bulb FAQ, 48 to propose new <change.lite.bulb> newsgroup, 47 to say there is already an <alt.light.bulb> newsgroup, 143 to ask if anyone ever did change the light bulb. Friday, May 31. Back in June!

Okay, I had to Karma Whore just for the sake of it (sad when we define the nature of the reposter).

Re:Life?

[2names]

Whatever life there is, I bet it's female...

Re:Life?

[Darby]

As pointed out by my wife, you forgot:

37 to ask what the hell you want with a lightbulb when a match works perfectly well.

Life on Venus?

[Anonymous Coward]

Gotta be female. After all, Men are from Mars, etc.

Re:Life on Venus?

[Anonymous Coward]

I must disagree, It has to be men - did you not read the part about ' actively producing ' gases?

I may not know too much, but..

[SlashDotIDOne]

Besides the typical "oooogle first post bork bork", I do have some sort of serious question to ask: Why are we focusing so much on mars instead of venus? Venus seems to be very earthlike in some ways, and if we could only find a way to cool it down some... :) Not to mention just plain having a better name and no nasty stigma of war.. Oh yeah, and speaking of space, why has /. been up and down the last 20 minutes?!

Re:I may not know too much, but..

[Interfacer]

the reason that we focus on mars is that at least on mars we could land a craft without it melting before it touches the ground.

the temperature on venus is several 100 degrees C, not to mention the storms that rage at speeds near the speed sound, and the fact that the atmosphere would probably corrode the helmet off an astronaut in 30 minutes.

Re:I may not know too much, but..

[SlashDotIDOne]

Hmph. Well don't I feel right well stupid. Thanks for the info though, that's pretty insane and interesting. Hmmm, perhaps we could change a few entries in holy scripture, make venus the new holyland, and send all the extremists and fundamentalists THERE?

Re:I may not know too much, but..

[Interfacer]

Now THAT is an interesting idea...

Re:I may not know too much, but..

[fredrik70]

not to forget is the rather high atmospheric pressure, about 90 times higher than on earth, nice...

Re:I may not know too much, but..

[asscroft]

"Hmmm, perhaps we could change a few entries in holy scripture, make venus the new holyland, and send all the extremists and fundamentalists THERE? " We tried, but the Church of Scientology threatened us with lawsuits for revealing their 400th level secret - "Venuthresiausx The Holyland known as Venus"

Re:I may not know too much, but..

[b-baggins]

The planet would be kind of lonely with you here all by yourself.

Re:I may not know too much, but..

[JebusIsLord]

40 atmospheres of greenhouse enducing carbon dioxide, owch!
In order to cool it down we would have to either a) convert the C02 to a thick layer of elemental carbon (ie charcoal) and about 30 atmospheres of pure oxygen, or b) blow it off the planet entirely. bacteria could do a) for us but then a single spark and the whole planet goes up in flames and things are back to normal. b) is downright impossible without diverting thousands of massive asteroids into the planet in order to blow its atmosphere away.
conclusion: mars is easier :)

Re:I may not know too much, but..

[melonman]

Wouldn't getting rid of 'natural' greenhouse gases on Venus be just as environmentally destructive as producing them on Earth? Can't we stick to messing up one planet at a time?

Life in the Atmosphere of Venus

[herwin]

New Scientist is not a peer-reviewed journal and often publishes speculative articles. This report is interesting, but I'd like to see the scientific article. There are alternative explanations, I'm sure, and I'm interested in seeing whether they've been adequately ruled out. In any case, how would you test this theory?

Re:Life in the Atmosphere of Venus

[Hittite Creosote]

The article should appear in an ESA special publication (ESA SP-518). If the author submits it, it might appear in the new peer-reviewed journal International Journal of Astrobiology

To test the theory, obviously you'd need a sample of the atmosphere. Although New Scientist mentions ESA's Venus Express mission, it doesn't say whether the mission would have the necessary equipment to check for life.

Re:Life in the Atmosphere of Venus

[anonymous loser]

In any case, how would you test this theory?

Easy!

http://www.omnimag.com/archives/continuum/venus.ht ml

He foresees human occupied cities, suspended in Venusian clouds. "It's room temperature up there," he points out. "All we'll need is a suit to fend off acid clouds, oxygen tanks, and something cold to drink."

Let me grab my goggles and a slurpie, and I'll be right over!

Now that's sci-fi appeal!

[Anthony Boyd]

From the article:

He suggests the bugs could be using ultraviolet light from the Sun as an energy source. If they are absorbing UV, that would explain the presence of mysterious dark patches on ultraviolet images of the planet.

I think this would be amazing. Whenever there has been a possibility of life before, it has always been microscopic bacteria frozen in rock or ice. Nearly undetectable, and certainly nothing that would visually incite people. But this? Huge swarms that discolor the atmosphere under ultraviolet light? If true, I'd bet that these images become more popular than Cindy Margolis.

Re: Now that's sci-fi appeal!

[Black Parrot]

> But this? Huge swarms that discolor the atmosphere under ultraviolet light? If true, I'd bet that these images become more popular than Cindy Margolis.

Only among them what get their Viagra and LSD mixed up.

Damn!

[Hmpf!]

All this time we have been wasting our time looking for little green men on mars.
Wonder how many movies about vixens from Venus we 'll get if this turns out to be true.

Developing ideas

[DeadeyeFlint]

From the Article:

Meanwhile the Swedish Space Agency is looking for international partners to develop their idea for a mission to return a sample of the atmosphere from Venus around 2010.

So how'd you do it?

Re:Developing ideas

[richie2000]

So how'd you do it?

1. Put a vehicle in orbit.
2. Insert a probe into the atmosphere (either from the orbiter or as a separate vehicle). This probe could use one or more of several techniques (parachute, winged design (no retro-thrusters at this stage as this may contaminate the samples)) to perform a fairly slow and controlled descent.
3. The probe fills a small canister with gas (possibly several compartments from different altitudes) and propels it back up into orbit before the pressure and gravity gets too high
4. Dock the canister with the orbiter and send it back to earth.

Difficult? Damn right. Impossible? Nope. Just keep those pesky imperial units away from the project and you should be set. The probe could continue to send back data to the orbiter as it goes down, but it's probably too much to ask for a soft landing.

Re:Developing ideas

[hatchet]

Gravity and pressure and not really a huge problem. (gravity is same as earths) and pressure on surface is 60 earth atmospheres. (equivalent of pressure in water 600m deep)

Russian probe already landed on venus and the only real problem was heat. Camera lenses melted. I think we will have samples of venus' atmosphere in 10-15years on earth.

Re:Developing ideas

[richie2000]

AFAIK, it was primarily the pressure that did the Venera probes in, not the heat. And in one case, the plastic (probably not a thermoplastic, but still) lens cap got in the way of the soil sampler so the data sent back was an analysis of something the Soviets had put there in the first place. :-)

But the heat just gives us even more reasons to not (at least not as a first step) land first and try to launch back up. It's much easier to propel the canister(s) from a decent altitude than if you wait until you're in deep. Gravity, pressure and heat all combine to make it unnecessary difficult (and expensive, since all propellants and other resources has to be brought along for the ride) to do launches from the surface.

Or, just get the orbiter there and launch disposable probes into the atmosphere that can analyze the gases as they tumble down through the soup and relay back the results via the orbiter. This could be done as a cheaper and faster precursor to the "bring 'em back alive" mission, to help develop the technology, methodology and focus of the mission.

Re:Developing ideas

[david.given]

But the heat just gives us even more reasons to not (at least not as a first step) land first and try to launch back up. It's much easier to propel the canister(s) from a decent altitude than if you wait until you're in deep. Gravity, pressure and heat all combine to make it unnecessary difficult (and expensive, since all propellants and other resources has to be brought along for the ride) to do launches from the surface.

Damn straight. Venus has the same gravity as Earth, remember? Which means that getting stuff out of its gravity well is an incredible hassle. If you need an Ariane or a Proton to get an object off Earth, you're going to need another Ariane or Proton to get it off Venus again once you've landed it there. And the super-dense atmosphere is going to cause even more problems.

No, launching from Venus is a problem that can happily wait until nuclear rockets or antigravity are feasible.

Besides, if there is life on Venus, I'd much rather study it in situ than bring some back here. While it almost certainly wouldn't survive in an Earth environment, that 'almost' worries me a bit...

Re:Developing ideas

[Fyz]

Big deal. Denmark has a space agency too, but that doesn't mean they're flying rockets into space. These agencies are lucky if they get two sattelites into orbit(in Arianes or STS) a decade.

Re:Developing ideas

[Hittite Creosote]

You need an Ariane or Proton to get a large payload off the surface of the Earth. They would be talking about a small payload from the upper atmosphere, where it will be both cooler and a lot less dense (70 degrees C, one atmosphere). Basically, they're not landing, they're just skimming the atmosphere.

Re:Developing ideas

[wahay]

Just keep those pesky imperial units away from the project

You probably meant to keep these imperial units away from the probe device. But perhaps it would be just as well to keep these imperial units away too.

Re:Developing ideas

[Havokmon]

Just keep those pesky imperial units away from the project and you should be set. The probe could continue to send back data to the orbiter as it goes down, but it's probably too much to ask for a soft landing.

Even with a hard landing, make sure it has a self-destruct so the Rebels can't examine it.

"A Wookie? What's a Wookie doing on..."

Re:Developing ideas

[richie2000]

No worries, we'll just unleash Uncle "Wesley" Willy on them. ;-)

Re:Developing ideas

[Gerry Gleason]

But you have to bring the sample back if you want to actually gather some microbes and bring them back for deeper studies. If they really are microbes, we would want to know what they use for genetic information, and if it is DNA, then we want to sequence it to see where it comes from.

I wonder if you could have a probe dip into the atmosphere, maybe without even slowing (much) from the Earth to Venus trip, and still have enough momentum to get back out. Ok, so it is a bit hard to collect samples at mach 2+ (probably plus a lot), and even if you could they might be destroyed in the process.

You definitely don't want to land, then launch. All this activity is in the upper atmosphere anyway.

Re:Developing ideas

[Izmunuti]

Venus is basically the same size as Earth so a sample-return would be more difficult than on Mars. Think how big a rocket we need to get into orbit from Earth's surface. Speed is what is required to make orbit, not just altitude, so even starting at 50 km, one would need an enormous amount of fuel.

For an atmospheric sample, it might make sense for the probe to not enter orbit or slow down enough for a parachute. Perhaps it could approach Venus at high speed, penetrating the atmosphere only enough to get a sample and then skimming off of it, back into space.

Re:Developing ideas

[tiedyejeremy]

"Besides, if there is life on Venus, I'd much rather study it in situ than bring some back here. While it almost certainly wouldn't survive in an Earth environment, that 'almost' worries me a bit... Almost -- Does that remind you of byrus or Ripley?

Re:Developing ideas

[DrXym]

Super dense acidic, 400 degrees centigrade atmosphere. Gravity would be the least of your problems.

Re:Developing ideas

[richie2000]

Think how big a rocket we need to get into orbit from Earth's surface.

That's if we want to get into orbit personally. A few ccs of gas is another matter entirely. The re-exit container won't need a heat shield for re-entry, no system for a landing or even maneuvering (the orbiter could do that) and much of the other stuff we need to get out of our gravity well (and back again) might not be needed.

The skimming idea is dependant on if the interesting layers are accessible that way. It's currently believed to be a layer at 50kms altitude at one atm pressure - so unless we can find the same stuff a lot higher up (with correspondingly lower pressures) I don't see that happening. As a fact-finding mission before going in and grabbing the little guys, sure.

Re:Developing ideas

[superdan2k]

Sounds like a typical over-engineered NASA fiasco with too many steps. Why not just build a small lifting-body system (reducing the need for tons of heavy heat tiles as entering the atmosphere will cause much less friction) that will dive into the atmosphere, scoop at various altitudes, then launch itself back out and into an earth-return orbit? One vehicle for lower launch weight, no complex in-orbit automatic rendezvous. Have the thing stop in Earth orbit where it can be retrieved by the Shuttle. Voila.

Re:Developing ideas

[richie2000]

Sounds like a typical over-engineered NASA fiasco with too many steps.

Does that mean I could pass myself off as a rocket scientist? :-)

Why not just build a small lifting-body system

Because that might actually work. :-) You'd still need some heat-shielding, though. I didn't think of launch weight (earth) as a factor since this whole shebang can be assembled in earth orbit (ISS, anyone?) and the re-exit canister wouldn't need any shielding, but having one single vehicle going in and back out would. The shuttle is basically a really obese lifting body in drag and it needs lots of heat shielding - but a lighter, aerodynamicaler (yes, I just made that word up, so there!) body would probably need less. Then again, the much denser atmosphere might create a problem with that assumption...

Re:Developing ideas

[Cujo]

Insert a probe into the atmosphere (either from the orbiter or as a separate vehicle). This probe could use one or more of several techniques (parachute, winged design (no retro-thrusters at this stage as this may contaminate the samples)) to perform a fairly slow and controlled descent.

I don't see that a slow descent is necessary or even possible. Any way you do it, your velocity with respect to the atmosphere is on the order of kilometers per second.

The easy way to do it is to enter Venus orbit in a high elliptical orbit with periapsis close to the atmosphere. First, make a few close passes with optical, UV instruments and a mass spectrometer to try and get some idea of where to lower. Natural rotation of the line of apsides will allow you to look at different latitides.

When you're ready to go in, a small delta-V will bump either a probe or the whole spacecraft down into the atmosphere, where you take your samples - either using some kind of gas capture technique, or Aerogel like the Stardust mission. You could also run your mass spectrometer at the same time. You'd need a heat shield, of course.

If you have to have low velocity capture, best thing is to brake in the atmosphere, pop up to the top with a balloon, then do in-situ analysis. Returning anything you captured low-velocity would take too much velocity capability.

Re:Developing ideas

[richie2000]

Returning anything you captured low-velocity would take too much velocity capability.

I agree, but the premise was to return a sample of the atmosphere (to earth, presumably - or, to the ISS where one could argue for better containment - IT CAME FROM VENUS - THE MOVIE!). I didn't argue against that, just thought of a way to do it (or rather, one way of doing it). I also agree with the idea to survey first, but I'm not sure if this should be done with the same craft as collecting the samples since there are considerable differences in the mission and orbit profiles.

That's why I suggested an orbiting surveyor, relay and return vehicle (this can be almost arbitrarily large if assembled in earth orbit), one (at least) descent probe (heat shield, mass spectrometer, a Gentoo CD to prove our intelligence, whatever) and the return canister for the gas going back up to the orbiter. If nothing else, you can get much more instrumentation onboard the orbiter than anything we can hope to keep alive in the atmosphere.

I think maybe I was influenced by the Apollo missions - one command module staying in orbit, one lunar lander assembly going down and one craft to get back up from the moon. It made sense back then and it seems to me it still does.

Re:Developing ideas

[Kintanon]

Acid. An entire Atmosphere made of Acid.
You have to build enough shielding that the entire system (or even just some important exposed bit or piece) doesn't get devoured by Acid.

Kintanon

Re:Developing ideas

[Kintanon]

The necessary sample depth may preclude 'skimming' for samples. What happens if you need to move 50% of the way down into the atmosphere to get your sample? You then have to be carrying enough power to boost yourself back out, otherwise byebye probe....

Kintanon

Re:Developing ideas

[eric peterson]

That's if we want to get into orbit personally. A few ccs of gas is another matter entirely.

Not so. Most of the rocket is used just to get itself into orbit; the payload is fairly insignificant compared to the mass of the engines and propellant. Whatever it is, you still have to get it through the atmosphere and up to escape velocity, and it isn't going to be moving any faster than the rocket's final stage. While there is a difference between heavy- and light-lift boosters, they're both still great big, massive, things.

And it isn't just a "few ccs of gas" - it's a metal container of some kind to put them in, probably with telemetry, radios, computers, etc.; i.e. a payload, which would out-mass the gaseous contents by many orders of magnitude.

That's one big reason why a hyperspace plane is so very difficult to build - unlike a staged rocket, it doesn't shed mass on the way up.

Re:Developing ideas

[Jack9]

Also, be advised that the median temperature of venus is greater than that of the SURFACE OF MERCURY facing the sun (it has a relatively sluggish rotation leading to insane surface temperatures) - making rocket fuel and most earthmade components rather...useless, when you get to the goopy surface of venus. Nothing from earth is going to land and take off again in the near future.

Re:Developing ideas

[Cujo]

In the current environment, it would have to be cheap to get funded. Arbitrarily large is arbirarily expensive.

Of course, if the microbes aren't fairly high up in the atmosphere, then my idea doesn't work. It seems to me that in-situ analysis with some sort of balloon is the only hope. However, this would be complex and costly. It's non-trivial to sample the upper atmosphere of our own planet.

Re:Developing ideas

[richie2000]

Arbitrarily large is arbitrarily expensive.

Not necessarily, you don't have to miniaturize so much and can use several low-tech, low-cost instruments developed by many participating countries and agencies. Also, it's easier to lay out the interior of the craft if you're not cramped for space (har, har), saving time and money.

Of course, if the microbes aren't fairly high up in the atmosphere, then my idea doesn't work.

Well, the article said ~one atm and since Venus has roughly the same gravity as Earth, that would mean a lot of gas between that layer and space (unless the microbes are present more or less all the way out, which seems unlikely). Or, if the distance between one atm pressure and space for some reason is much less on Venus than on Earth.

But I hope we'll see what the real rocket scientists come up with. :-)

Re:Developing ideas

[msebast]

will be both cooler and a lot less dense (70 degrees C, one atmosphere).

This doesn't make any sense.
70 degrees C is HOTTER then typical earth surface temperature.
One atmosphere is the same density (I think you mean pressure) as sea level on earth.

Since the gravity is about the same as earth and the air pressure (and consequently the amount of atmosphere between this level and space) is the same as earth, the launch conditions are THE SAME as earth, except that at this level in the Venusian atmosphere there is no surface to support a launch platform.

I'll be very impressed if anyone actually returns a sample from this deep in the Venusian atmosphere.

Re:Developing ideas

[Hittite Creosote]

Once again I demonstrate that there is no point hitting preview unless I actually check what I write makes sense on its own. What I meant to say is that 70 degrees and one atmoshphere is a hell of a lot less than the Venusian surface. Plus, all they are doing is sending a small sample of the atmosphere up into orbit. It's definitely doable.

Cool.

[rde]

A couple of thoughts occurred...

1. Isn't the adjective pertaining to Venus 'venereal'?
2. If true, life must truly be ubiquitous. In the solar system alone, we've got Earth, Mars, Europa, Titan and now Venus. Of course, there's only evidence so far of life on one, but the very fact that scientists are even considering it is a testament to life's tenacity.
3. Can someone who knows more than I tell us all how easy it'd be for UV light to penetrate to the required depth? I wouldn't have thought it possible.

Re:Cool.

[cyrek]

1. Isn't the adjective pertaining to Venus 'venereal'?

Yes, but to avoid the obvious innuendo people tend to derive an alternative based on 'Martian'. i.e. 'Venusian' or 'Venutian'.

But not 'Venison'.:)

2. If true, life must truly be ubiquitous. In the solar system alone, we've got Earth, Mars, Europa, Titan and now Venus. Of course, there's only evidence so far of life on one, but the very fact that scientists are even considering it is a testament to life's tenacity.

The evidence so far from those other places is purely hypothetical and circumstantial. But you're right - it is comforting to think that self-replicating patterns, structures and chemicals exist beyond our world. The big question is - Are those patterns found elsewhere complex enough to form sentient beings. Or am I being sentimental?

3. Can someone who knows more than I tell us all how easy it'd be for UV light to penetrate to the required depth? I wouldn't have thought it possible.

I seem to remember reading somewhere that it would be possible to see your surroundings if you were somehow able to survive a visit to Venus' surface - the light being a dark dull red glow. If ordinary light can get through then UV will definitely make it to the surface - On a cloudy day here on Earth, 80% of the UV radiation can make it through the clouds. People don't get suntans on those days simply because they spend more time indoors.

Re:Cool.

[jesterzog]

I seem to remember reading somewhere that it would be possible to see your surroundings if you were somehow able to survive a visit to Venus' surface - the light being a dark dull red glow.

Well for what it's worth, Venera 9 and Venera 10 managed to return images with lighting that was reportedly similar to an overcast summer day on Earth. (At least the Venera 10 photo was.) I'm not sure if that means visual light or not.

Too bad the view wouldn't stop human tourists from being crushed to death, combusted into nothing and suffocated, all simultaneously. :)

Re:Cool.

[mcfiddish]

1. Isn't the adjective pertaining to Venus 'venereal'?

Yes, but to avoid the obvious innuendo people tend to derive an alternative based on 'Martian'. i.e. 'Venusian' or 'Venutian'.

You can use "Cytherean" as well.

Re:Cool.

[susano_otter]

there's only evidence so far of life on one, but the very fact that scientists are even considering it is a testament to life's tenacity.

A testament to wishful thinking, maybe, but no real proof of life's tenacity at all.

Not, mind you, that I have any objections to theories of extraterrestrial life, just that this particular factoid doesn't really support your hypothesis.

Re:Cool.

[rde]

Not, mind you, that I have any objections to theories of extraterrestrial life, just that this particular factoid doesn't really support your hypothesis.

Damn me for trying to fit too much information into a pithy wee sentence. You're right, of course. What I should have said what that we're increasingly coming across environments on Earth where life is thriving; hot springs, nuclear cooling rods... basically, there are more and more environments out there where life can be supported; be it via geothermal energy on Europa, clouds on Venus, subterranean rock on Mars (what's the word that should be there instead of 'subterranean'?)... the list goes ever on.

Of course, this says nothing about the genesis of life; that could still be a one in a godzillion chance. But once it's established, everything we know (from our limited vantage point) tells us that it's hard to get rid of.

Hmm.....

[neksys]

Remember that astronomers once said Mars was covered with a complex network of irrigation ditches, which implied the presence of life. Take this with a grain of salt - we know so little about our own solar system that we must treat all discoveries as hypotheses - nothing more, nothing less.

Re:Hmm.....

[shd99004]

Yes, but just because they were wrong about A doesn't mean they are wrong about B.

Re:Hmm.....

[JCholewa]

> Remember that astronomers once said Mars was
> covered with a complex network of irrigation
> ditches, which implied the presence of life.

Are you sure about this? I wasn't around at the time, but I recall that the confusion was brought on by badly translating journalists. Basically, a scientist in Italy said something like "Canali su Marte" (I'm using google ... pheer my mad inaccurate Italian skillz0rz :p ), which means "Channels on Mars". Journalists thought he said "There are [artificial] canals on Mars!".

He didn't. The scientist didn't make a mistake. The unscientists listening to him made the mistake.

Granted, it's possible that *other* scientists held the misconception. I know nothing of this either way.

-JC
http://www.jc-news.com/

Re:Hmm.....

[Tablizer]

which means "Channels on Mars". Journalists thought he said "There are [artificial] canals on Mars!". He didn't. The scientist didn't make a mistake. The unscientists listening to him made the mistake.

But there were "respectable" astronomers who claimed to see very *strait* markings all over Mars.

Some speculate that what was really being seen was blood vessels in their own eye. I bet such an astronomer would feel like a real numnut if alive today.

Humm...

[hatchet]

Maybe numerous earth probes infected venus' atmosphere with life.

Re:Humm...

[sllim]

Your comment is actually fantastically smart. If they found probes and they resemble earth organisms at any level then we will be forced to consider that some Earth probe put them there.

And if they don't resemble organisms we must still think about the possibilty. UV radiation does cause genetic mutation.

If we conclude, or even give credence to the idea that this might be stuff we put there we must not peg that idea with too much negativity. This would lend serious credit to the (until now) sci-fi idea of terraforming.

I won't even pretend to have the knowledge to make an intelligent comment on this stuff. Smarter people then me may be able to poke holes in my ideas.

I was just impressed with how much thought your comment put into my head. I think you were being sarcastic, but I think you have a real point.

Re:Humm...

[cp99]

If we did find earth like bacteria, it wouldn't nesscessaryly mean that probes put them there. Perhaps a impact on earth blasted a rock (containing earth bacteria) into space, where eventually they reached Venus. Kind of a Mars bacteria in reverse.

Re:Humm...

[adrianhensler]

Yes. We put it there.

Here is the scenario as I see it.

1. Earth sends 'probes' (hee hee - he said 'probes') to Venus.
2. Earth accidentally 'seeds' Venus with our 'probes'.
3. New Scientist reports infected atmosphere on Venus. Possible bugs.
4. Earth sends more 'probes' to Venus to bring back sample.
5. Accidental release of sample into Earth's atmosphere......
6. ?
7. Profit.
8. Earth decimated by 'venereal'' bugs, or VD.

There you have it. We are the origin of our destruction.

Re:Humm...

[hatchet]

Actually i am dead serious... Note that we already infected moon with earth bacteria. It's very sirious concern for all future space programs. Project to jupiter's moon Titan was held back for few years because of that.

However.. there is also quite huge chance that earth life came from space and didn't evolve on earth at all.

Re:Humm...

[Jugalator]

Well, if the life survived at the pretty extreme conditions (acidic, etc) at Venus. I mean, they woiuldn't *come* from that environment, so I find it hard to believe that they'd function in the way to *survive* in that environment. Then it's easier for me to believe that the life there is native to Venus. Although *neither* of these life theories feel easy to accept.

But who knows? There are bacteria surviving in the depths of volcanos on earth.

Re:Humm...

[bored]

Possiblely, but unlikely to be the source of the hydrogen sulphide or carbonyl sulphide that this article is talking about. I say that because the information about the chemical composition of the atmosphere was gathered by the very probes which might have infected it. Hence its unlikely that the probes infected the atmosphere and the infection changed the whole composition instantly. I think it more likely that contamination on the sensors screwed with the results.

Re:Humm...

[Tablizer]

Possiblely, but unlikely to be the source of the hydrogen sulphide or carbonyl sulphide that this article is talking about. I say that because the information about the chemical composition of the atmosphere was gathered by the very probes which might have infected it. Hence its unlikely that the probes infected the atmosphere and the infection changed the whole composition instantly. I think it more likely that contamination on the sensors screwed with the results.

But the probes had incremental detection apperatuses. The first entering probes were the Soviet probes around 1967 IIRC. I don't know what they detected WRT atmosphere composition, but they were primative by today's standards. The Soviets sent quite a few probes there over time because they had more success at Venus than they had at Mars.

Mars is famous for eating probes. On Venus you can use the thick atmosphere to slow the probe down to landing levels with tiny parachutes, while Mars requires complicated precision timing to land, and sudden wind gusts can put a can of worms into the equations. Venus is more like going into a gradual ocean.

The first image from the surface of another planet (excluding moon) was a Soviet Venus probe around 1975 IIRC, a year before the Viking probes landed on Mars.

Re:Humm...

[junkgrep]

No, there is not a "quite huge chance" of that. There isn't a way we could calculate how huge or small the chances of that would be: we don't know the parameters we're even talking about, much less their probability.

Re:Humm...

[c.emmertfoster]

There are bacteria surviving in the depths of volcanos on earth.

True, but we didn't send those guys to Venus, or the Moon, or Mars. The microbes that allegedly "hitched a ride" were garden-variety, room-temperature wimps!

It seems to me that the chances of anything surviving the trip are too slim to waste time speculating over.

Re:Humm...

[c.emmertfoster]

Perhaps my grasp of common sense is skewed, but your post implies that the Moon is "infected" with bacteria we sent there. Evidence of such an event would surely be remarkable news.

And your link appears to be broken.

Re:Humm...

[bored]

The first entering probes were the Soviet probes around 1967 IIRC. I don't know what they detected WRT atmosphere composition, but they were primative by today's standards

I don't know exactly which probes were doing what. The article said they used data from both the Russian and US probes. Even if the data didn't come from the original probes ~30 years is still quite a short amount of time to be making significant changes to the atmosphere of a planet.

Re:Humm...

[daeley]

Extra bonus coolness points for making a veiled reference to the origin of the word "venereal". You, sir/madam, are a god/goddess. :)

Re:Humm...

[Tablizer]

30 years is still quite a short amount of time to be making significant changes to the atmosphere of a planet.

Humans did :-)

exaggerated article title

[Anonymous Coward]

The New Scientist article title is "Acidic clouds of Venus *could* harbour life." To summarize, the New Scientist article basically says that Venus could have life, but nobody really knows for sure. But the slashdot article title is "New Scientist: Venus' Atmosphere Implies Life." Give me a break. I suspect Slashdot exaggerated the content of the posted article just to get page hits. Also, New Scientist is not one of the more reputable science news sites on the net (even though /. likes to link to their articles).

Slashdot really sucks nowadays. There are better alternatives. I'm quitting /. now. You should, too. Check out

The Quit Slashdot Movement for some better quality "new for nerds" sites.

Sceience.

[SimpleSphere]

In other news, further research has found that the atmospheric gasses on Venus are actually made up of insect farts... farts, and burps. Oddly enough however it is believe that the smell produced would actually be a pleasant one to humans.

Is it worth getting excited about?

[Zakabog]

Shopkeeper: "... I must warn you they've found life on venus."

Homer: "That's bad."

Shopkeeper: "But it was only some bugs!"

Homer: "That's good!"

Shopkeeper: "The news was reported on New Scientist."

Homer: "That's bad."

Shopkeeper: "But they don't require you to register!"

Homer: "That's good!"

Shopkeeper: "They log your IP address and keep logs of all the pages you go to."

[Silence; Homer looks puzzled]

Shopkeeper: "That's bad."

Homer: "Can I go now?"

science

[Scaebor]

I can say with a fair amount of (entirely baseless) confidence that the chemical anomalies observed on venus are simply the result of processes seperate from life and these claims will one day be put on the same shelf as ether and the four elements along with all the other anomalies inexplicable by current-day science that were explained fully in later years with the discovery of new concepts and theories. (now that was a long sentence)

Re:science

[elakazal]

I've got to agree with you here. The simple fact that there are certain chemicals floating about which would very complicated and unlikely to be produced inorganically by no means implies that the presence of life is likely. Remember, by most calculations, life itself is one damn unlikely and complicated chemical reaction (at least at the initial stages...we seem to muddle along quite well at this point). So what's more unlikely...the weird chemical maneuverings required to make this stuff inorganically, or the weird chemical maneuverings required to create the life to create it organically?

Yo ho let's go

[spankfish]

Let's terraform the bastards before they evolve into ten foot tall insection beasts with razor sharp teeth, glistening with demonic slobber.

Terraform Venus Now!

Re:Yo ho let's go

[dpilot]

Are you arguing in favor of a preemptive biosphere change?

That could set a bad precedent. You never know when the Martians might decide the Earth is too wet for their liking.

Re:Yo ho let's go

[Tablizer]

The problem with terraforming Venus is that it has a day about 240 Earth-days long. It would not be pleasent to be in the dark for 240 days, even if a way was found to keep warm. Then again, in northern Alaska they get used to something almost like that.

Hmmmm. Maybe the poles may be a compromize.

Venus is almost the same size as Earth, so it is a bummer that it is so hot and slow-rotating.

Kind of an odd cooincidence that Venus is almost the same size as Earth, and Mars has almost the same rotation period.

I wonder if we could not use the asteroid-Jupiter-gravity-drag trick to speed up Venus and/or move it to a further orbit? But if it gets too close to Earth, then it's gravity may upset our orbit.

The ideal place would be the exact opposite side of the Earth from the Sun. However, getting it there (via asteroid technique) would require getting it too close to Earth before it can be inserted into that ideal position.

Maybe if we gave it a tilted and/or elliptical orbit, then it would not pass by Earth often enuf to cause disturbances.

Venus is a nice-sized rock. It would be a shame to let it go to waste. Mars is just too puny. It's surface gravity is something like 1/3 of Earth, and that cannot hold a thick enough atmosphere, let alone perhaps give colonizers gravity-related health problems.

Maybe if we could crash Venus into Mars....

oh great.

[sawilson]

New York Times August 10th, 2010

KILLER VENUS MICROBE BROUGHT BACK BY SWEDEN
"EATS EVERYTHING"

You must have an account to read full text of
story. :)

Re:Makes me think of that Bananarama song...

[Jafafa Hots]

Sorry to correct you, but you are a bit off.

They landed several Venera landers, two of which took B&W photos and two of which took color ones...

They did fail relatively quickly, but not in only seconds. And they failed due to the crushing atmospheric pressure, not acidity.

yeah yeah

[__aahlyu4518]

"In particular it has cartain chemicals which are extremely difficult to make inorganically."In our perspective that is.. and... it says extremely difficult, and not impossible... put 20 IFs together and you have life.... yeah right... Come up with FACTS...

History

[jesterzog]

In the solar system alone, we've got Earth, Mars, Europa, Titan and now Venus. Of course, there's only evidence so far of life on one, but the very fact that scientists are even considering it is a testament to life's tenacity.

Personally I'm not that enthuiastic yet. Scientists were considering life on Mars, the Moon and life on Venus and life outside of Earth generally 100 years ago, too. Respected scientists throughout history were involved in a lot of these theories, which unfortunately were often hyped out of proportionby media and others. It doesn't mean that the basis for the considerations were correct or meaningful or led to anything except for hype.

There's definitely a lot of anecdotal evidence so far supporting the idea that life might exist in other places, and it's interesting. I'm going to wait for life somewhere else to actually be proven before I get too excited, though.

Re:I just hope they would...

[blinx_]

Oh no.. religious fundies will soon after claim that it has been in their bible all along, you just have to read it in this new specific way and that it just proves that their God movies in mysterious ways or whatnot.

But how extremely cool it would be to be alive during the time when extra terrestial live was proven to exist, now thats something to tell your children :)

If it's life, Jim, then it's not as we know it.

[Observer]

See subject.

The speculation is on the basis of finding two chemicals which don't typically persist for long in each others presence, Hydrogen Sulphide and Sulphur Dioxide. BBC news has a summary.

--
"Now my own suspicion is that the universe is not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can suppose."- JBS Haldane.

Let's all take a trip to self-delusion-land

[c.emmertfoster]

To quote the article, "To look for possible signs of life, Schulze-Makuch and his colleague Louis Irwin looked at existing data..."

Of course if they were looking for signs of life, they would find some anomalous results that they could present as "amazing."

And from the /. headline I thought they had something tangible. Oh well.

Re:Let's all take a trip to self-delusion-land

[Proquar]

If biologist can make such statements as: "7 atoms reproducing in a beaker - that's my definion of life"... then there is a good chance they consider that there is life on Venus.

But, er... don't think that will cut it on any theological argument - or any non-delusional discussion, or any where else important... maybe slashdot?

Re:Makes me think of that Bananarama song...

[The Original Yama]

Thanks for the correction. It's been many years since I saw that documentary, so I wasn't sure if I was recalling it correctly. Being a little kid at the time doesn't help the recollection much either :)

Re:TELL YOUR LORD THAT I GAVE HIM GONORRHEA

[Anonymous Coward]

Boy, you are going top burn in the lake of fire with all them other sodomites. I'll pray for your soul, so's maybe you'll let Jesus into your heart one day and be saved. But hurry, there ain't a lot a time left. You gotta let Him into your heart while you're still alive, before the End. The world will end at 14:35 hours, PDT August 14th 2003. Don't waste your time.

Not necessarily

[joss]

It could be that life formation is extraordinarily unlikely and occurred on a single planet in our system [eg mars]. Once firmly established on that planet a glancing blow from a largish asteroid could release dust containing the basic compounds [DNA, or perhaps simpler stepping stone molecules] from the planets gravitational pull.

This is all conjecture anyway. We have no proof that life exists on these other planets. New Scientist these days is a tremendously speculative publication.

For a good discussion about life's probability's, read Not By Chance by Dr. Lee Spetner.

Re:Not necessarily

[junkgrep]

---For a good discussion about life's probability's, read Not By Chance by Dr. Lee Spetner.---

Spetner's discussion of the issue is about as good as someone who claims that helium filled ballon cannot rise, because given random movement, it's very unlikely that it would go straight upwards. You can't simply calculate odds of something as if every process were random. Discussing the potential origins of life is fundamentally about _mechanism_, not mere probability.

Altitude ?

[theefer]

At the altitude where life is suspected the temperature is about 70C and about 1 atmosphere.

I did not know that ET could fly without a bicycle ?

Re:Altitude ?

[PhuCknuT]

Clouds fly, clouds are made of water, microbes live in water.

Any questions?

Let's find out

[StrawberryFrog]

Yes, we should treat them as hypotheses deserving of vigourous investigation. That's how you learn. Well, it's how I debug.

Re:Bear in mind that...

[evilviper]

That explains all the e-mail I get from routers on Mars.

Re:New business-model?

[paploo]

Haven't I heard this joke a couple times before?

We must strike now if the Earth has a chance!

[Vidmaster_Steve]

TO SURVIVE!

The evidence that life has fostered on the Earth's Sister Planet is a dire and grim proposition for the future of the human race. If we don't strike now, these phosphate-producing bacteria may, in billions of years evolve to a spacefaring race with religious viewpoints opposing The One True Way.

We must strike now, to wipe out these bacteria before it is too late! I beg of you, Mister President. Launch the nukes. It's the only chance that we have to eradicate these monsters before they can oppose Earth and America and Christianity! LAUNCH THE MISSILES! NOW!

God I'm drunk (on love, Pokey?) Yes Little Girl, drunk on love. And whisky. But mainly whisky.

A good place to market the latest l33t CPU's?

[Jugalator]

I mean, it always feel impressive to say "our CPU runs at a tenth of the room temperature", doesn't it? :-)

Re:A good place to market the latest l33t CPU's?

[racerx509]

"our CPU runs at a tenth of the room temperature"

I think you mean our CPU runs at 10^7 of room temperature.

Re:I just hope they would...

[Haeleth]

There's nothing in the Bible that either suggests or denies the presence of life other than on Earth. Assuming you treat the creation stories in Genesis as myths or allegories, that is. Which most _intelligent_ Christians (and Jews) do.

I don't think there's even any point in attacking fundamentalists - they're so blinkered that God could show up in person and TELL them that they'd got it wrong, without it changing a thing.

So I agree: leave the deluded to their delusions. Let's get on with the interesting debates right now.

Re:Makes me think of that Bananarama song...

[pigreco314]

And we all know that diamonds are the Venus girls best friends...

Re:I just hope they would...

[sql*kitten]

That'd finally put a full stop to all those religious morons that are so full of "we're the centre of the universe". Just by showing that there's _a_ life form outside earth would remove a huge barrier from all those debates and we could concentrate on more interesting topics.

No it wouldn't. Faith is by definition a belief that exists without any supporting evidence, or contrary to evidence.

Illudium 239 Explosive Space Modulator

[Surak_Prime]

Marvin probably could have told us about this a while back if WE weren't obscuring his view!

Where's Dan Dare when you need him?

[Nighttime]

Life on Venus? Could a Mekon-led Treen invasion of Earth be imminent?

God is here

[Steeltoe]

"...God could show up in person..."

That's us!

Actually, I find it more interesting to think about the universe, existance, to be life itself. After all, a body is nothing solid. Within a year, nearly all our cells are replenished. The food we eat, the water we drink and the air we breathe become our body when it enters. On the other hand, without the touch of God, natural laws, whatever you want to call it, life is null and void.

Since a body, any existing object, is nothing by itself (all matter is 99,99999...% empty), life must therefore be existance itself, a glorious play of patterns and experiences.

You can't even say stone is devoid of life. By watching earth's crust for millenias, stone and sand become just as lively and complex as any other organism.

What is life anyways? All the labels we stick to it, are nothing without our logical way of thinking. When our thinking defines reality, our thinking becomes reality! Thus if we're stuck with logic alone, that limits our reality.

*hehehe*

[CyberDruid]

Damn funny!

We have Found Lando Calrissian's Hideout

[egommer]

We may have found Lando's Cloud City. We must inform the Emperor. The Imeprial have already been dispatched. The rebel resistance will be crushed.

Regards,

D.V.

Re:We have Found Lando Calrissian's Hideout

[Anonvmous Coward]

As if anybody visiting this site would know how to find a life. Heh.

Re:We have Found Lando Calrissian's Hideout

[Anonvmous Coward]

"As if anybody visiting this site would know how to find a life. Heh. "

It would appear as though my silly comment rubbed a moderator the wrong way.

Well, he can have an apology: I'm sorry that my comment touched a sore spot with you. I hope you find that life you're looking for one day. Heh.

So, the bacterias wouldn't use Linux or what?

[Laglorden]

Just /. them out of existence!

Re:Life?, did we bring it ourselves?

[Anonymous Coward]

The Venera 13 & 14 landers arrived on the surface of Venus on March 1st and 5th, 1982, respectively. This is more then 20 yrs ago. Is it possible that small lifeforms from earth hitchhiked along and found the conditions favorable to reproduce? Would 20 years be enough to get enough bacteria to color the clouds of a planet?
The Apollo 12 mission brought back some parts of the unmanned Surveyor 3 probe, which had been on the surface of the moon for 31 months. The Surveyor 3 had not been sterilized prior to its launch, and the researchers found a few small colonies of bacteria (Streptococcus mitis) inside some parts of the probe which had survived the 31 month exposure to the lunar environment.
Of course, the bacteria could have also been accidentally introduced during the trip home or during the research....

psssshhh

[Marc2k]

That joke is *SO* 4 minutes ago.

Re:I just hope they would...

[cainem]

to many people atheism is just as much a religion as say islam, judaism, paganism, materialism, and pretty much most -isms.

We call these people dumb.

President Bush Gave Speech this Morning

[espionage_7]

President Bush Gave Speech this Morning about the possibility of life on venus. In his speech he mentioned that they are harobring terrorist and weapons of mass destruction and that we must act now before they strike first. He spoke of a regime change as well.

A simple experiment...

[shimmin]

Well, there is a simple experiment that could be packed onto the next Venus atmospheric entry probe, that would probably be as cheap and as unambiguous a test for life as you can do without a sample retrieval. I don't know why they didn't put it aboard the Vikings.

Collect a sample. Run it through a chromatography column. Put a polarimeter on the end. If there's anything chiral, you have life. If everything is completely racemic, you almost certainly don't.

Re:Self-contradiction in action

[Daetrin]

It's not a self-contradiction, clearly all life is unnatural. This would imply that all live on Earth should be destroyed to return it to it's early pristine, lifeless state :)

Re:I just hope they would...

[DaDigz]

Not hardly...

From Merriam-Webster

Atheism:
the doctrine that there is no deity

Doctrine:
a principle or position or the body of principles in a branch of knowledge or system of belief (DOGMA)

Dogma:
a doctrine or body of doctrines concerning faith or morals formally stated and authoritatively proclaimed by a church

Dumb:
1 : lacking the power of speech
2 : temporarily unable to speak (as from shock or astonishment)
3 : not expressed in uttered words
4 : SILENT; also : TACITURN
5 : lacking some usual attribute or accompaniment; especially : having no means of self-propulsion
6 a : markedly lacking in intelligence : STUPID b : showing a lack of intelligence c : having little or no meaning -- sometimes used in the phrase dumb luck
7 : not having the capability to process data -- compare INTELLIGENT

Looked in a mirror lately?

Re:I just hope they would...

[EllisDees]

Let's break it down:

a - prefix meaning lack of.
theism - belief in a god or gods.

atheism - lack of belief in a god or gods.

Atheists do not necessarily claim that there are no gods, only that they have no belief in them.

Decayed Orbit

[Global-Lightning]

This can be achieved without having to actively propel the probe back up to orbit. Change the eccentricity of the orbit to go into the atmosphere, but not enough to cause it to crash into the planet. After it makes it's pass through the atmosphere, change the eccentricity back into near-circular and prepare to return to earth. This would take some skill, as atmospheric effects would affect the velocity and direction of the probe, and corrections would have to be made when the probe emerges.

This was a very real concern during re-entry of the manned space missions. If the angle of re-entry was to steep, then the spacecraft would come in too fast and burn up. If the angle was too shallow, then the danger was the spacecraft would "bounce" off the atmosphere and get into an unpredictable orbit around the earth. In this case, we could use the bounce to our advantage.

Re:Decayed Orbit

[richie2000]

Change the eccentricity of the orbit to go into the atmosphere, but not enough to cause it to crash into the planet.

- Ensign, take us into eccentric orbit. Make it so. :-)

I thought about that, but I wasn't sure if you could get far enough into the atmosphere to collect relevant samples - since these possible microbes seem to live in a specific layer. Also, the density of the venusian atmosphere would make this a very tricky proposition. That said, I think this approach can very well be used in one of the preparatory missions, to gather more data before the real deal.

Re:Life on Earth

[EllisDees]

>it could be a native form (at 70C?? I doubt it)

Why? We have identified thermophiles that can survive in temperatures over 100C here on earth.

Interesting to consider...

[CommieLib]

Assuming that it is life, it seems unlikely that:

• Life evolved in the clouds,
• Life evolved on Venus's current surface environment.

This would seem to indicate that conditions were more conducive to life in the past. I wonder if it was the life that led to the current surface conditions...

Re:Self-contradiction in action

[Steve Franklin]

There does seem to be a scientific predisposition toward treating life as anomalous rather than widespread and perfectly normal, all of which goes back to the theological underpinnings of European thought, i.e., God created life on Earth, which is the center of the universe, and therefore life anywhere else in the cosmos is heresy. Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake for violating this dictum. The confusion has its origins in assuming that because a certain set of chemicals have not been observed by our severely geographically limited species to occur in places where life is not present, that therefore these chemicals imply the presence of life on Venus. They could just as easily indicate that our observations have been distorted by viewing these processes almost exclusively through the filter of a rather lively (life-bearing) planet.

Again, life is seen as unusual, in that its products are assumed to be different from those produced by inorganic processes rather than the results of parallel organic and inorganic processes. Keep in mind that Venus is basically a huge pressure cooker. One might also be reminded that the primary difference claimed by the alchemists between their art and that of the chemists was the practice of slow cooking.

Venus Photo Links

[jafiwam]

In case you are too lazy to check Google.

http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/image/planetary/venus /v enera13.jpg

http://seds.lpl.arizona.edu/nineplanets/pics/v13 .j pg

http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/image/planetary/venus /v enera14.jpg

http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/image/planetary/venus /v enera9-10.jpg

Watch for spaces in the URLs.

Re:Venus Photo Links

[Darby]

Watch for spaces in the URLs.

Rather than add this stupid disclaimer, why not just make them links so this doesn't happen?

Sulfur compounds and "proof of life"

[hyacinthus]

I found an interesting article which, among other things, discusses the presence of hydrogen sulfide and sulfur dioxide in volcanic gases. The article is on the website of the U. S. Geological Survey and can be found here. A highlight:

An interesting chemical relationship exists between the sulfur dioxide and the hydrogen sulfide released by the volcano. These two gases react quickly (within minutes) with each other to produce sulfur particles and water vapor. Both of the products of this reaction are odorless and are less toxic than either H2S or SO2. Most of the hydrogen sulfide released in eruptive areas on Kilauea is consumed and is converted to sulfur particles by this process, because there is much more sulfur dioxide than hydrogen sulfide coming out of the volcano. This is why you seldom smell hydrogen sulfide at the summit caldera or along the eruptive east rift. The volcano has its own hydrogen sulfide abatement system! Geothermal areas, by contrast, have no large quantities of SO2 available for reaction, so any H2S released is removed by reaction with oxygen in the air to form sulfur dioxide, a process that takes a day or more.

But another sentence in the article implies that nevertheless the two gases can be found together. And certainly neither of them are produced by biological activity in this case.

As for carbonyl sulfide (also "carbon oxysulfide", or COS - essentially carbon dioxide with sulfur substituting for one of the oxygens), I don't know much about how it can be synthesized. I suspect that it is a product of careful hydrolysis of thiophosgene (CSCl2 - itself not an easy thing to make), but this would hardly be occurring naturally. I know that the gas is unstable, susceptible to hydrolysis into carbon dioxide and hydrogen sulfide. This article discusses its presence in our own atmosphere; the bulk of it comes from natural sources.

Incidentally, why do these articles on Slashdot of genuine scientific interest attract more stupid posts than usual? Everyone's trying to crack lame sci-fi jokes, and few are addressing the matter seriously.

God-Damn! (Re:God is here)

[the bluebrain]

What are you on? I want some.

[...] all matter is 99,99999...% empty [...]

Yes - that's why the simile "a hole in a hole within a hole" is sometimes used to describe matter. That doesn't, however, change our perception (well, mine ... not sure about yourself :) that a brick wall is hard.

[...] stone and sand become just as lively and complex as any other organism [...]

Lively and complex: yes. Exhibiting something which might be recognised as "intent" or "will" or "emotion" or what-have-you by us wormbabies: no.

[...] if we're stuck with logic alone, that limits our reality [...]

Yeeees. What alternatives have you to offer? Anything you can communicate? Anything structured? "Things are things", "Time is time" et cetera ad absurdum (which wouldn't take a whole lot of time), I agree. But unless somebody decides to come back down from the smokey mount and give us logicians a hand, I for one will stick with attempting to build a better satellite or whatever.

Human perception is indeed fantastically narrow - but recognising the fact that this is so does not change the fact.

</superfluous reply to what I have come to the conclusion is a happyTroll[TM]>

Re:God-Damn! (Re:God is here)

[Steeltoe]

I'm intoxicated by life ;-)

Why, the intent of stone is of course to reach the centre of the earth!

It's plainly obvious for those who use their eyes to observe!! ;*)

Re:Self-contradiction in action

[Anonymous Coward]

Hello? I am searching for the clue that this thread lost?

The reason the gases are "un-natural" is because they react with each other!

Just like finding a fresh, half-eaten bagel at your desk, you know someone or something was there. You know it was recent, otherwise you would already have finished off the bagel, (or else it would have gone to waste, or green, you understand..)

If the fresh bagels keep appearing, you know that *something* is making them. Otherwise, all the bagels would soon be stale.

That is why the presence of things that react together quickly shows that something is re-supplying the process, which means life. Unless you know something we don't?

It was the other way around

[red_gnom]

Maybe numerous Earth probes infected Venus' atmosphere with life.

It was the other way around; the Earth was contaminated with life from other planets.
Everybody knows, that women are from Venus.
Dr. John Gray proved that long time ago: Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus

Re:Bear in mind that...

[tiedyejeremy]

do you mean "viruses?"

So don't come back..bring the mountain to Mohammed

[goyena]

If you can't bring the sample to the lab, just bring the lab to the sample...what's wrong with a Venus lander similar to the Martian one (ok, the environment is much harsher) that will collect a sample, pick it apart and send all data back via radio before the Venusian "air" eats the lander. Radio waves are lighter than payload after all. One would probably still have to speculate if radio waves could penetrate.

Conspiracy theories and all notwithstanding, I get the creeps when I think about what would happen if there really WAS bacteria there and the government (any gov't) got there hands on it. You could probably FORGET heat disinfection for this particular strain...

Hm. The word "strain" make me think of a certain novel/film...

Re:Bear in mind that...

[Dalcius]

I think this might be a more precise answer:

User Friendly, July 29, 2000

Ben Bove

[SquadBoy]

is *so* loving life today. :)

http://www.curtharmon.com/bova/tour/venus/defaul t. htm

Implies life?

[shess]

1) Detect a new compound in inhospitable place.

2) ???

3) Life!

Beautiful logic!

[gloohufr]

Highlight of the report:

This gas is so difficult to produce inorganically that it is sometimes considered an unambiguous indicator of biological activity.

But sometimes *not* an unambiguous indicator? Could that make it...let's see... *always* an *ambiguous* indicator?

**keep your eyes on my buh buh-buh-buh bump**

Re:Self-contradiction in action

[Steve Franklin]

God, do I really have to read the silly article? ;-)

"That is why the presence of things that react together quickly shows that something is re-supplying the process, which means life. Unless you know something we don't?"

That's not exactly what it says:

"Solar radiation and lightning should produce large quantities of carbon monoxide in the planet's atmosphere, but instead it is scarce, as if something is removing it. They also found hydrogen sulphide and sulphur dioxide. These two gases react with each other, and so are never normally found together unless something is producing them."

The operant word is "should." They are postulating life on the basis of the absence of something they think "should" be there, or rather, even less convincingly, on the basis of their inability to detect something they think "should" be there.

As for the presence of gases that "normally" react together, one is tempted to ask, how are we defining normal? There is nothing particularly "normal" about Venus except to the extent that I have already suggested, that anything not subject to human intervention can be thought of as "natural." Venus is certainly not "normal" when compared to the Earth, and any suppositions regarding what SHOULD be happening there are premature at best.

The contradiction referred to in the subject line results from the supposition that the presence of life is somehow unnatural. I would remind you that what is normally thought of as a dichotomy, inorganic-organic, is actually part of a continuum: inorganic, organic, cybernetic,...,n. One could just as easily postulate the presence of any one of these terms in the vicinity of Venus if it is assumed that some chemical process or lack thereof indicates an unnatural (read not inorganic) condition. Despite the reference in the article to a "theory," this is in fact just a hypothesis. Any other hypothesis would have equal standing until subjected to some kind of experimentation. Appealing to William of Occam, one might more productively suggest that there is some chemical process going on in the atmosphere of Venus that we do not completely understand. Perhaps resulting from the presence of a chemical poison (the opposite of a catalyst) that we have not yet detected.

Ben Bove wrote a book about something similar.

[Inoshiro]

http://www.benbova.net/venus_benbova.htm

Go and read about life on Venus in the book, it's a very good story :)

Saturn Ruhk

[ckessel]

Robert L. Forward (sadly, died this week) wrote a book called Saturn Ruhk with a similar basic concept. Life evolved and exists in the upper atmosphere of Saturn. All of Forward's books have great plausible lifeforms and fascinating technology. He was a long time researcher with a PHD in physics.

If you'd actually READ the article...

[J'raxis]

But Schulze-Makuch points out that there is chemical evidence that Venus was once cooler and had oceans. "Life could have started there and retreated to stable niches once the runaway greenhouse effect began," he says.

Re:If you'd actually READ the article...

[CommieLib]

You're missing the point. What I'm saying is that maybe the life evolved, and did not successfully establish an equilibrium with the environment, and caused the runaway greenhouse effect.

Actually, I guess the current state would be the equilibrium.

Re:Contamination from Earth

[jc42]

Several astronomers have written articles about the contamination (or colonization) of the rest of the planets by Earthly bacteria. They've known for some decades that bacterial spores are found throughout the Earth's atmosphere, including at very high altitudes. The Earth has a "dust tail" produced by the solar wind that very slowly strips off the outer atmosphere and blows it outward. This tail is something that interferes with some kinds of astronomy, so they must take it into account.

The dust tail includes gases and fine dust particles, including things the size of bacterial spores. We've also known for decades that many such spores can survive indefinitely in space.

The conclusion is obvious. Bacterial spores from Earth have been contaminating the outer solar system, probably for several billion years. Some of them will get picked up by meteoroids and comets and carried back to the inner solar system, so Mercury and Venus have also been colonized by these bacteria.

Probably not many survive. But it's likely that some do. And, of course, their descendants will have re-colonized the Earth.

The solar system is a pretty messy place, when you look at it on a microscopic scale.

One article I read back in the 70's did a rough calculation on a larger scale. The Earth circles the galaxy in about 250,000 years. We've made more than a dozen orbits since bacterial life arose here, spraying spores most of that time. The author calculated that by now the entire galaxy has been contaminated several times over by Earthly spores. Of course, we don't know how many could survive interstellar space for the required millions of years.

But it's fun to think about.

Re:Contamination from Earth

[Tablizer]

One article I read back in the 70's did a rough calculation on a larger scale. The Earth circles the galaxy in about 250,000 years. We've made more than a dozen orbits since bacterial life arose here, spraying spores most of that time. The author calculated that by now the entire galaxy has been contaminated several times over by Earthly spores. Of course, we don't know how many could survive interstellar space for the required millions of years.

Or perhaps the reverse: that galactic dust/comets have seeded the Earth with microbes rather than life being "native" to Earth.

IOW, life here may be something like 10 billion years old instead of 5.

Some alien in Orion may even hold a patent on all of us who came from it :-)

Zakabog

[RumGunner]

You rock!

Speculative Name Contest...

[GeneralEmergency]

.
They must float about clinging to the clouds.

I think they should be called Baloonicles!

.

My pills, where are they?

.

Re:Life on Earth

[EllisDees]

The post that I responded to was talking about 'native forms' of life on venus, not transplanted ones.

Besides, many of those bacteria are extremely hardy. They can withstand both hard vacuum and cosmic rays and still remain viable. We sent some up on a satellite a few years ago and bacteria were able to survive fine with just a little soil for protection.

I have to ask this

[Cro Magnon]

Is there life on Uranus?

Re:I just hope they would...

[Kintanon]

Even a literalist biblical interpretation of the creation section of genesis does not preclude the existence of life on other planets. "God Created the heavens and the earth..." and then he goes on to tell us about the part that matters to us, the earth. Depends on whether you believe that everything that exists must be mentioned specifically in the bible, which is absurd, since no one ever mentions platypuses in the bible, or even or dozens of other animals. So there is no biblical reason for any religious nutball to believe there is or is not life on other planets.

Kintanon

Re:I just hope they would...

[Kintanon]

Umm, how does that work? Is it the specific belief that there are no gods, or is it no opinion either way? A lack of opinion would make you an Agnostic. A firm belief that there are no gods would make you equally as faith based as any other religion as there is no proof one way or the other that there are gods of any kind.

Kintanon

Re:Contamination from Earth

[jc42]

> Or perhaps the reverse: that galactic dust/comets have seeded the Earth with microbes ...

Yup; that's the "panspermia" hypothesis that some astronomers (and some biologists) have discussed. In essence, all the places where life arose are busy contaminating the rest of the universe with spores.

Now to collect some evidence ...

Re:Makes me think of that Bananarama song...

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought they had problems due to the heat. On 2 mission the lens cap melted

The lens cap melted?

For me, this phrase immediately summoned the image of forty russian scientists all huddle around a monitor, eagerly anticipating the first look of Venus's landscape, when one says "It's black! What in Lenin's name is going on?"

And then one of them gets a horrified look on his face, smacks his forehead, and says "ACK! I forgot to take the lens cap off before we launched it!"

This ain't new

[SCSI-Wan]

This same observation was mentioned on Paul Harvey News and Comment at least two years ago (I actually think it was longer than that).

Venus' Atmosphere Implies 4.7GHz Pentiums

[vaxer]

Gee, this sounds familiar.

Temperature of 70C... check.
Earth-normal air pressure... check.

My God! Venus' atmosphere is just like the inside of a tricked-out 4.7GHz tower with neon and Nixie tubes.

NASA can save their money looking for life in an atmosphere like that. I've been to LAN parties -- you're not going to find a life anywhere near a box like that.

Re:Bear in mind that... (OT)

[Boronx]

I like how he thinks in in bad, accented English.

Re:Contamination from Earth

[junkgrep]

Wait a minute: for the microbes to seed the galaxy, how fast would they have had to be moving, and in which direction? They'd still have whatever momentum our solar system hadc(there isn't a lot of friction in space), and they'd only go outwards as fast as the solar wind could push them. Even with several shots of 250,000 years, I'm not sure they could get far enough to reach other solar systems with planets, much less the galaxy.

Re:Contamination from Earth

[dlkinney]

Of course, Venus is CLOSER to the sun than Earth so a "dust tail" extending towards the outer planets would not be a strong hypothesis of the source for bacteria on Venus.

why venus second to mars?

[solferino]

this article brought up the question which i often ask myself - why is there so much attention paid to mars and so little to venus?

surely venus is a much better long-term proposition for colonisation than mars? yes i know about it's crushing and extremely hot atmosphere, but this is something that can potentially be adapted to or ameliorated - perhaps even comprehensively changed by some atmosphere engineering

what can not be changed about a planet is it's gravity - this is obviously a fundamental characteristic of a planet inextricably linked to it's mass - and mars' low gravity seems to me to be an intractable problem for colonists - ie maybe they could adapt to living there but they would never be able to return to earth

finally, from a poetic viewpoint it would be nice if the human race made it's first step out into the solar system towards the planet of love and not the planet of war

i welcome comments

Re:why venus second to mars?

[solferino]

thanks for yr reply

initially, of course, we would be interested in establishing bases on a planet with terraforming coming much later

so leaving aside the question of terraforming it still seems to me that venus is a better choice for establishing bases on the planet, simply again due to the fact of it's earthlike gravity

i can forsee the heat and pressure problems being dealt with - and i think it would not be necessary initially to establish bases on the surface of venus (with it's attendant volcanic dangers) but in some kind of bases in the atmosphere - perhaps something similar to buckminster fuller's "cloud 9" structures if you are familiar with them

as the new scientist article highlights, the heat and pressure in the atmosphere lessen with altitude above the surface - and so there might be some optimum altitude low enough to still provide decent gravity, but with a lesser heat and pressure environment to deal with

extreme craft capable of withstanding the heat and pressure could then descend to the surface to mine required materials

it may be obvious from this post that i have little knowledge of what i am talking about - in which case i beg your pardon - i will do a bit of a search for the book you mentioned - i simply wrote my first comment because as i said the idea of going first to mars is always so obviously assumed as the only course of action and it surprises me that venus is left out of the running

Re:why venus second to mars?

[akh]

I'd add to to that

6: Sulphuric acid rain
7: A planet that catastrophicly resurfaces itself on unknown but geologicly short timescales.

There's a reason that we only have one photo from the surface of Venus: the Soviet lander only survived long enough to take one picture (and the craft was heavily hardened against the environment)

Re:Contamination from Earth

[jc42]

> Not 250,000 Years, it's 250,000,000 Years ...

Yeah; you're right. But what's a few zeroes among friends? The significant part of the astronomical calculation was the dozen or more orbits we've made since bacterial life arose on this rock.

As I recall, the current estimate is more like 260 million years, but of course it depends a lot on what large masses we pass near during the orbit. And they don't have that good an estimate of the detailed mass concentration where we're headed even over the next 10 million years.

Stick around and find out, I say.

Re:Contamination from Earth

[jc42]

> ... for the microbes to seed the galaxy, how fast would they have had to be moving, and in which direction?

It's been a few decades since I read that article, but as I recall, the author went into quite a lot of detail about the force of the solar wind and the velocities that it imparts to the Earth's dust tail.

The effect isn't trivial. The solar wind varies over a wide range, but the speed of particles as they pass the Earth are comparable to the Earth's orbital speed. Most of the time, the solar wind is above escape velocity. The Earth's dust tail rapidly accelerates to solar-wind velocity. This was the crux of his calculations.

The direction is easy: The dust tail starts off pointing away from the sun. The Earth is in a nearly circular orbit, so the dust tail is a spreading spiral. So the junk is heading out in all directions (though it's mostly close to the plane of the ecliptic).

At the time in the Earth's orbit when it's leading the sun (in our galactic orbit), the dust tail is blowing ahead at more than escape velocity, so that part will spread outward ahead of us at speeds comparable to our speed around the galaxy,
plus solar escape velocity. This is higher than galactical orbital speed in our neighborhood.

In 4 billion years, some of those dust particles will have left the galaxy entirely. Most, however, will end up in assorted galactic orbits, until something bigger stops them.

At the time in the Earth's orbit when it's following the sun, the dust tail will be escaping the solar system with a galactic speed below local orbital velocity. That part of the tail will tend to drop toward galactic center. Its speed will be low, so it might not have got there yet. Some will be soaked up by passing nebulae.

At other times in the Earth's orbit, the dust tail will leave the solar system with intermediate galactic speeds. On average, the speed will be comparable to the solar system's speed, but in different directions. In 4 billion years, the particles will have easily crossed the entire galaxy, unless something stops them.

Remember that in a billion years, the solar system circles the galaxy roughly 4 times. The Earth's dust tail spews out in all directions in the plane of the ecliptic. It has a speed comparable to our galactic orbital velocity, but in different directions. Dust particles and spores will also orbit the galaxy roughly 4 times per billion years, but in assorted directions.

Find a friendly local astronomer or a few good books and do your own calculations. Then start thinking up your own SF plots. But remember that it can take a long time for a bacterial spore to evolve into a Klingon, even on a hospitable planet.

The main unanswered question is how long bacterial spores can really survive in interstellar space. If they're only viable for a million years or so, they could only reach a few nearby stars. The basis of this topic is that bacterial spores do seem to be inert and unchanging, and potentially viable indefinitely.

Venusian atmosphere much different than surface

[dolphin558]

The conditions in the Venusian atmosphere are much more favorable to life as we know it than the surface. Contrary to popular belief the article was speaking of the upper atmosphere, not the surface.

Here's one!

[leonbrooks]

Bit of a headscratcher for you: http://www.kronia.com/library/journals/venair.txt

Re:Contamination from Earth

[junkgrep]

---Remember that in a billion years--- Wait: didn't you say we go around once every 250,000 years? That woud be a lot more than 4 times around.

Re:I just hope they would...

[junkgrep]

---Umm, how does that work?---

It's not that hard, but confusing to people that are used to positive definitions only. To say that I am an atheist is akin to saying that I am not a racecar driver.

---Is it the specific belief that there are no gods, or is it no opinion either way?---

You've got it wrong. "There is a god" is a belief. "I don't believe in god" is a description of a person (and an atheist). "No belief" is not the same thing as "I believe no."

---A lack of opinion would make you an Agnostic.---

Some agnostics believe in god: on faith. Agnostic means "without knowledge" i.e.: I don't have any knowledge of god. Atheism/theism concerns _belief_, not knowledge. Agnosticism is not a midpoint between having a belief or not having it. A person who says that they are agnostic can always still be asked "yes yes, but do you believe IN a god?" If yes, then they are a theist. If no, then they are an atheist.

--- firm belief that there are no gods would make you equally as faith based as any other religion as there is no proof one way or the other that there are gods of any kind.---

I agree. However, not all atheists believe THAT there are no gods. Most just do not believe IN any gods, usually because they don't have any reason to believe (like me). Are there gods? Who knows: but I don't BELIEVE in them anymore than I BELIEVE in the existence of life on Venus.

This story has only just been posted

[fexk]

and these life forms may not exist, but already you just know someone somewere has begun worshiping them :(

Gentlemen, there is bad news...

[Peter Harris]

What, deliberately kill another planet's biosphere to pre-empt a dangerous civilisation developing there?

Then when a ship of the law drops into Earth orbit, I think I'll want to be tried separately.

Note to moderators: don't bother, I know...

Re:I just hope they would...

[Kintanon]

Maybe it's just a function of the specific Atheists I've spoken with in the past, but they have all stated there beliefs in the format of "I believe there is no God", as opposed to "I do not believe there is a God". Would being an Atheist more accurately be defined as not Worshipping any God? Regardless of your belief in their existence? So that perhaps one could say, "Yes, I believe in the existence of Allah, but I do not worship him." And be an Atheist or am I missing the point?

Kintanon

Mea culpa...I am dumb

[cainem]

You know what? You're right. How that escaped (-1, Flamebait) I will never know. What I'm objecting to is the (often heard, though not in the comment I replied to) assertion that not believing in a god is a belief in itself, which it isn't. Atheism, as a positive belief that there is no god, is of course as much a matter of faith as the belief in a god.

Is that what they mean by a dictionary attack?

Re:Mea culpa...I am dumb

[SillySlashdotName]

Atheism (A= no, Theo=god) is the belief that there is no God.

Agnostic (A=no, Gnosis=knowledge) is a recognition that the existence - or lack thereof - of God has not been proven. It is not a belief - other than a belief that the matter has not been proven!

Re:I just hope they would...

[junkgrep]

It can be a confusing issue, because "belief" can have more than one meaning: and one of them is "trust in" or "have (personal) faith in." Consider the Greek gods: many people believed in most of the them, but only worshiped a subset of them.

However, in modern usage, "theist" and "atheist" refer to the existence question only. Someone who believes in Allah, but doesn't like Allah, would still be a theist for the purposes of philosophical discussion.
To understand why this is so you have to think about the needs of a philosophical discussion: to establish what _objective_ truths can be considered givens between _subjective_ parties. That I don't like Allah isn't particular relevant to any philosophical discussion of objective facts. However, whether or not I believe Allah objectively exists IS very important: if I don't, then a participant in the discussion cannot simply assume the truth of Allah's existence: I can't gratn that premise unless its proven. That's why the terms 'theist" and "atheist" are actually useful: they tell us what a given person's ultimate position is on whether or not they think the proposition "god exists" can be taken as being true, without additional proof.

Re:I just hope they would...

[junkgrep]

---Maybe it's just a function of the specific Atheists I've spoken with in the past, but they have all stated there beliefs in the format of "I believe there is no God", as opposed to "I do not believe there is a God".---

Perhaps. "I don't believe in gods." is easily confused with "I believe no gods," even by atheists themselves. To make matters worse, people who believe there are no gods are ALSO atheists (because if you believe there are no gods, you also fall under the superset of "I don't believe in god").

The best way to think about it is this: when you call someone a theist, you don't necessarily have to know their REASONS for believing in god. They could be rational reasons, faith reasons, habit, whatever. All you have to know is that they do in fact believe in god (and not even WHICH god, at this point!). On the atheist side, a belief that there is definately no god is one possible REASON why one might be an atheist (not believe IN gods): it is a sufficient, but not necessary, condition. Other reasons might be: no reasons TO believe, never even heard the claim (god exists) and so never even considered the possibility of belief, or don't even think the claim (god exists) is linguistically meaningful (which is known as non-cognitivism).

Life on Venus

[oyeresu]

The Soviets sent that virus in their probe to teraform Venus because there's oil there too. The viruses, I believe, took the USSR flag as well.

Last Post!

[alpg]

A novice asked the master: "I perceive that one computer company is
much larger than all others. It towers above its competition like a giant
among dwarfs. Any one of its divisions could comprise an entire business.
Why is this so?"
The master replied, "Why do you ask such foolish questions? That
company is large because it is so large. If it only made hardware, nobody
would buy it. If it only maintained systems, people would treat it like a
servant. But because it combines all of these things, people think it one
of the gods! By not seeking to strive, it conquers without effort."
-- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming"

- this post brought to you by the Automated Last Post Generator...