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Cassini Shatters Titan Theories

Posted by timothy on from the ok-now-give-me-my-money-back dept.

Dozix007 writes "The Herald reports: Cassini pierced the haze around Titan, Saturn's biggest moon, revealing details that have shattered theories about its composition. It has atmosphere and soil similar to primordial Earth and may contain the building blocks of life. Scientists believed bright patches on its surface seen earlier were pure water ice. But the first infrared images taken by Cassini revealed water ice as dark patches because it is mixed with material that may be organic, raining on to the surface."

7 of 461 comments (clear)

  1. Ethical questions by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I think this brings up huge ethical questions. If we are right, and there are the building blocks of life down there, do we have any right to interfere with that process? Undoubtably we are going to do something while "studying" this that causes the process to go all wrong (or not happen at all) like a satellite hitting the surface and contaminating the moon, causing these building blocks to not form (flash backs of the last episode of ST:TNG).

    1. Re:Ethical questions by mikejz84 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Not really. Titan is stuck in way out in the cold of space. Everyone believes that Titan is WAY to cold for life to ever exist. This however changes in about 5 billion years when the sun goes red giant and Titan might possibly enter a period of a few 100 million years where it gets earth-like tempatures. The question of course is if titan will survive for another 5 billion years.

    2. Re:Ethical questions by AKAImBatman · · Score: 5, Interesting

      It isn't quite that easy. To date, we haven't seen a single form of life (save for microbes) that can survive that deep into the Solar System. Even Mars is downright balmy in comparison to Titan, but there is little sign that life does exist there or ever will.

      The core of the problem is that life needs one thing above all else to survive: Energy. The star we call our Sun pumps terrawatts upon terrawatts of power into the Earth each day. Plants and some forms of microbes are able to take this energy and convert it into fuel stores. These fuel stores are then used to power all other life on the planet.

      The problem with Titan is that it's probably lacking the energy necessary to sustain life. While the soil may be rich in "organic compounds" (i.e. the elements and minerals necessary for life as we know it) those compounds are of zero use if there isn't a sustainable energy source. And the Sun can't be that energy source since barely a few kilowatts of its energy reach Titan. That's not to say that Titan doesn't have some other energy source at its interior, but it is somewhat unlikely. In the end, it may be that Titan would make an excellent place from which to acquire raw materials as man expands into space. Difficult to find materials such as Nitrogen could be hurled from high up in the Sun's gravity well, to lower points such as Mars.

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    3. Re:Ethical questions by mindstrm · · Score: 5, Interesting

      The same place it is in the arctic, where the surface temperature is 60 degrees below the freezing point of water. Under the ice.

  2. 2001 by dirtmerchant · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Does anyone else find it interesting that in the original draft of 2001: A Space Odyssey, the craft is bound for one of the moons of Saturn as opposed to Europa as was portrayed in the movie. Now after some preliminary exploring Europa we find that Europa's a dud and the easy-bake life mix is in fact on Titan.

  3. Europa vs Titan by Delta+Vel · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Can someone explain why NASA was so concerned about contaminating Europa that they smashed a spacecraft into Jupiter that could otherwise have lasted a lot longer, but where Titan is concerned no one seems to think about contamination?

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  4. Put a NASA Donation box on the Tax Forms by Vandil+X · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I've been saying for years that the IRS needs to replace the "Contribution to the Presidential Campaign Fund" box on tax forms with a "Write in your desired donation to NASA" box.

    If this were made possible I'm sure thousands of people would gladly donate money every year.

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