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Free Associating On The Surface Of Mars

Posted by timothy on from the stream-of-less-consciousness dept.

jdaily writes "Apparently, while NASA scientists are busy analyzing the more than 10 gigabits of data returned by the rovers thus far, earnest space enthusiasts are dissecting the images and reporting discoveries of fossils, letters of the alphabet, and a white bunny. The 'Net really needs a kook hall of fame."

7 of 55 comments (clear)

  1. Hall of fame by noselasd · · Score: 4, Informative

    Seems there already is a crank hall of fame. Thisone didn't reach that site yet though.

    1. Re:Hall of fame by sporktoast · · Score: 4, Informative

      Back in the day, Donna Kossy was always the first person to turn to for this sort of thing. She's still around, if you are looking for this sort of stuff in dead tree format.

      If you look around, you can find a couple of good sites around that carry the torch.

      --
      In a related story, the IRS has recently ruled that the cost of Windows upgrades can NOT be deducted as a gambling loss.
  2. Actually, the fossil picture is pretty interesting by mosel-saar-ruwer · · Score: 5, Informative

    Check it out:
    http://www.enterprisemission.com/images/Spirit/Fos sil.jpg
    Granted, it's probably just a tire track, or something, but, last I checked, they hadn't outlawed armchair quarterbacking...

  3. Definitely not that... by mynameis+(mother+... · · Score: 3, Informative
    Eeeks, you've all slid down the same slippery slope :)
    Granted, it's probably just a tire track, or something

    If you notice the raw image names given, they begin with:

    1M131201699EFF

    1M131212854EFF 1------------- Opportunity
    -M------------ Microscopic Imager
    --iiiiiiiii--- Time taken, unsigned integer seconds since ?MEpoch?...
    -----------EFF Full-Frame 'EDR' (not linearized)
    #man meredr

    So those two images are both 'microscopic.'
    Tire tracks? Did Opportunity goof off and play with some MicroMachines(tm) for 3 hours? ;)

    There are lots of unusual objects, particularly in micro images. Being genious enough to know I'm an idiot; I go 'hmm can't wait until someone explains the process that makes that biological looking shape.'

  4. Re:spirit/opportunity by Tree131 · · Score: 2, Informative

    You have to remmember that the surface of mars is at a nice -81 F (-63 C) and there is no oxygen
    , so an internal combustion or any other "burning" propellant to produce motion is out of the question. You're stuck with either bringing your own energy, or having to rely on solar cells to power your vehicle.

    Not everything that works so well on Earth will work on other planets. I'd recommend reading a part of this article (search for "thermal expansion" and read that paragraph).

  5. Re:spirit/opportunity by Tree131 · · Score: 1, Informative

    I was trying to link to "this" above at http://www.mentallandscape.com/V_Venera11.htm, but it didn't work...

  6. plonk.com by DynaSoar · · Score: 2, Informative

    "The 'Net really needs a kook hall of fame."

    The site for display and archive of awards for kooks on usenet is at plonk.com. The associated newsgroup is alt.usenet.kooks (warning: excessive signal to noise ratio, even for usenet). The award relevant to the article, the finding of artifacts on Mars, would be the Victor Von Frankenstein Weird Science Award. The drawback here is the requirement that the kookishness be on usenet, a holdover from when that was pretty much the entire public part of the net (before WWW). Anything that appeared strictly on web sites wouldn't qualify.

    --
    "I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B