Ammonia Could Indicate Life On Mars

Young Master writes "Just seen this story on good old Auntie Beeb, apparently traces of ammonia have been found in the Martian atmosphere. Ammonia doesn't last long on Mars, so it must be constantly replenished - it could be active volcanoes (none yet found), or it could indicate life..." Along with the detection of methane, Mars is starting to look a lot less dead than had been supposed.

Comments

Underground lava seems more likely.

[garcia]

So far the PFS has observed a depletion of carbon dioxide and an enrichment of water vapour over some of the large extinct volcanoes on Mars.
Ammonia is not a stable molecule in the Martian atmosphere. If it was not replenished in some way, it would only last a few hours before it vanished.

An underground lava theory seems much more plausible than microbes hoarding nitrogen. Underground lava beneath the extinct volcanoes could be releasing the ammonia into the atomosphere and thus explains how it is replenishing so quickly. Without other specific evidence of microbial life I really think we should just not get our hopes up, at least not yet.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Ignignot]

Or maybe the microbes are like some of those anaerobic heat loving kinds they find in volcanic fissures here on Earth. Maybe the only place where life can survive is the volcanoes?

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Thud457]

I just like to say "alien pee".

/thank you

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Progman3K]

Good hypothesis,

But do we have any proof of -current- volcanism on mars?

Granted Olympus Mons is the remains of the biggest volcano EVER, but it's extinct, and there is barely any seismic activity on Mars...

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[cephyn]

I think this explanation, based on evidence, is equally as likely as the non-bio explanation, the lava tube one. However, Mars is thought to be relatively geologically dead, so an active lava tube this close to the surface (close enough to vent ammonia) would seem unlikely to have avoided detection by now. So a deeper, more sedentary lava bulge, warming the rock and allowing anaerobic microbes to survive of the heat seems to me to be an equally likely proposition. EITHER discovery would be fantastic.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[cephyn]

there's no proof, but we dont have the seismic monitors in place on the ground that could detect magma chamber shifts and the like. We've only been able to look for BIG changes. Little ones might go unnoticed. Mars is a big mystery still, there's just not enough direct observation being made to say anything for sure.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[BlaKnail]

I'm not so sure that magma pockets are a more likely source of ammonia.
I thought many astronomers felt that Mars' core had cooled, since it did not have a dynamo driven magnetic field.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[BasilBrush]

No one would have believed, in the early years of the twenty first century, that human affairs were being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man's and yet as mortal as his own; that as men busied themselves about their affairs they were scrutinized and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinize the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Progman3K]

OK, but if there is volcanic outgassing, we'd be seeing other trace gasses along with ammonia, I expect. Are those present too?

I'm not absolutely sure about the chemical composition; but should there be increased dust that can be identified as coming from the interior, along with other elements like sulphur? I know sulphur may also be present in the case of life, but there must be some compounds which exclude one or the other possibilities.

If ammonia is alone, then it would confirm the life hypothesis, I expect.

On a side note, if there IS life over there, it may be the biggest news and the greatest gift to mankind ever: It might serve to finally get nations and peoples to realize that provincialization is stupid, and we're all in this together.

Good lord, I've never prayed God and asked him to grant me a wish, but in this case, I do.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Perl-Pusher]

Open up a can sometime in a very sterile room and look at the soda under a microscope, you might be very surprised.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[cephyn]

Is earth vulcanism a good model for mars? I don't know. Different rock composition might make for radically different magma gasses. Are volcanos on Io similar to terran? I don't know...but I bet they're rather different. And of course, vulcanism on Triton is RADICALLY different than terran....so who knows what gasses a Martian volcano would release.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[torpor]

... what if we get to Mars, find microbes, look into the microscope, and they all look like this!

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Progman3K]

Quite right, but I think the issue here is -
IS there ANY volcanism on Mars?

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[freshwillie]

Yeah, Marvin the Martian has to go someplace.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[cephyn]

In some other threads that's come up...and we just don't really know. There's no rivers of lava or exploding Tambora event caldera producing eruptions, but are there underground magma rivers? Chambers? Bulges? Just don't have the equipment in place to measure such sensitive seismic data.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Anonymous Coward]

I had the same exact thought! Now those scientists must look for another compound to prove it beyond any reasonable doubt: Methane.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[youlogee]

Perhaps Mr Spock could shed some light on Martian vulcanism...

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Artifakt]

On earth, volcanic dust is mostly kicked up by one type of actual eruption and by ground shockwave effects. Ash is also a two stage process, with ash emitted directly in some eruptions and indirectly by burning off nearby forests and such.
A martian volcano can't burn off local forests, but should be like an earthly one in kicking up dust from shockwaves, and like an earthly one, this should happen both during actual eruptions and outgassing. What we don't really know all that well yet is how long such dust will remain suspended in the thin Martian atmosphere to be detected, but we can safely predict something about that from observing the world wide dust storms Mars gets, even if we don't know if that dust was originally from a volcano or not. Unfortunately, dust particle sizes on earth mostly seem to follow the same curve whether they come from localized ground shock or scouring off of exposed rock faces by high winds. Barring being able to analyze the mineral content of the dust and trace it to specific surface terrain features, dust will be a pretty inconclusive indicator. Your first suggestion, other gases, looks more possible, both to test and to get something like strong evidence out of.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[goodhell]

You don't even have to go as far as the bacteria living near the volcanic fissures. Just go to your local wastewater municpal plant.

Some of them use anaerobic digesters to treat their sludge. One of the by-products is methane, which they can then use to help power the plant.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[goodhell]

Sorry, I was thinking about methane. But there are also nitifying bacteria in some anaerobic lagoons. These bacteria are common in soils here. Maybe there's a carbon source below the surface on Mars that is providing these little anaerobic bacteria with something to munch on.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Progman3K]

"Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)"
Volcanism Vol"can*ism, n.
Volcanic power or action; volcanicity.

"Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)"
Vulcanism Vul"can*ism, n.
Volcanism.

I hope that clears things up.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Anonymous Coward]

Come on ! Who modded this off-topic? It's a quote from War of the Worlds! You know, about martians?

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[supmylO]

I was just thinking, do they do a good job of sterilizing these probes they are sending there? We could be introducing certain bacterias (not sure about them surviving) to the planet. Just wondering..

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Alranor]

Are there actually people on Slashdot with enough postings to have mod points who haven't read War of the Worlds?

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[sp0rk173]

I doubt it, bacteria that exists plentifully on earth have been on earth for quite a while and are pretty well adapted to the way things are on earth. In order for bateria to be introduced on mars a population would have to:

A) Survive on a surface with little to no food (the probe)
B) Survive exiting earth's atmosphere
C) Survive in the vacuume of space, existing only on whatever particles are in it's immediate suroundings on the probe
D) Survive on mars, basically living off the same food source (the probe) until it either found a food source on mars, or, after sever hundred generations (ball park estimate), it evolved into a new species that could survive on mars.

While it is entirely possible for this to happen (bacteria are freakin machines when it comes to evolution), I think it would be highly unlikely.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Tongo]

Dumb ass mods. Thank you for your post anyways, it put a smile on my face.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[mattdm]

Probably. But how is this comment an on-topic reply to its parent? (As opposed to the story in general.)

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Rei]

There's still that pesky issue of "what *active* volcanoes are there on mars"? By all standards we've observed so far, it's a geologically dead planet. We've seen no active plate boundaries, no visible earthquakes or vulcanism, and - perhaps even more concerning - the planet has no sizable magnetic field.

I don't buy the life explanation either, though. Whenever there is chemistry going on in a planet that we don't yet understand, there's this natural tendancy to yell "it must be life!". There are many reactions which can produce ammonia gas. For example, there's the decomposition of ammonium salts by alkaline hydroxides or lime, the decomposition of magnesium hydroxide with water, etc. I'm not sure if any of these processes are applicable anywhere on mars, but "life" is not the only way to make ammonia.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Anonymous Coward]

You are a humorless ass.

I hope that clears things up.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Anonymous Coward]

*raises eyebrow*
Humor is not logical, doctor.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[tsm_sf]

The article mentioned, though, that ammonium breaks down rapidly in the atmosphere. The only KNOWN explanations for the (apparently replenishing) amount detected are volcanic activity or the presence of life.

Thus spake the BBC =p

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Rei]

You completely missed what I wrote. I discussed how ammonia could be replenished. It would take large deposits of nitrogen-bearing minerals, probably subsurface, but there are a number of ways that nitrogen-bearing minerals can end up producing ammonia, and not all involve life or large amounts of heat.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Short Circuit]

So, if you consider the apparent age of the rest of the planet (no magnetic field, little atmosphere, etc.), why is it likely these deposits haven't been depleted?

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[dnahelix]

"Whenever there is chemistry going on in a planet that we don't yet understand, there's this natural tendancy to yell "it must be life!". "

Tendancy? We've only seen chemistry on other planets (& moons) a handful of times, and I don't remember anyony yelling 'it must be life!' This is one of the grossest over-generalizations I've read all day.

I don't know where the ammonia is coming from on Mars. If there even is any; from the article: "Ammonia may have been found in Mars' atmosphere" But to just not buy an explanation, because you think it is just too implausible or because it turned out not to be false in another instance is just stupid.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Anonymous Coward]

1913? Is that release still supported?

For more current info, Google gives http://members.tripod.com/idic/ as it's first result. Clearly Trekies won the Vulcanism trademark fight.

Yeah, I know my argument's weak in this case, but a lot has changed since 1913.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Anonymous Coward]

This dictionary seems up to date.
http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=vo lcanism

Imagine how much MORE things are going to change when Zefram Cochrane meets the vulcans while testing his warp drive!

We'll be adding whole new chapters!

Seriously, when alien contact finally does happen, it'll impact everything.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[BasilBrush]

Let me explain. The parent poster has a soda pop in the basement, and after several months he opens it, and is surprised to see it fizzing with carbon dioxide. He avoids the obvious explaination that the factory injected the soda pop with CO2 and explains the effect by imagining tiny trolls living in the cans. Tiny trolls also known as yeast, or indeed "the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water."

Wait, that's not it. The explaination is this: We detect ammonia on Mars so we obviously jump to the conclusion that it's "the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water", whilst completely missing the ammonia factory constructed by "intelligences greater than man's" to generate fuel to propel pods to planet earth!

No that's not it either. I was just testing the the combined intelligence of Slashdot mods to see if they would spot a HG Wells quote hidden in the middle of otherwise unrelated material.

Actually it was a warning that as we busy ourselves about our affairs on slashdot and and looking through microscopes at soda pop, we are being watched by martians. But don't worry, if you manage to find an old enough home made soda pop in your basement and open it in the martians face, it'll defeat him everytime.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Rei]

The entire history of modern human perception of Mars - not just chemistry - has been to see life into it where it wasn't. First, there were the "canals". Even in scientific circles, there was commonly a view that there were "at least" species like lichens and mosses on mars. There was the viking biology experiment. There was the mars meteorite. There was the methane. There's the ammonia. I'm sure I'm missing some, too. Each time, there's this immediate "It's life!" reaction that people instinctively do, before being shown that there are many other more "Occam's Razor compatable" explanations.

BTW, speaking of the viking biology experiment, lets not forget that it showed processes that we sometimes view as life occurring in the sterilized sample, aka, abiotically.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Rei]

You find trace amounts of ammonia, from a body 6.42e23kg in mass, to be odd? Do you have any clue of the size of that number? Heck, here's yet another possibility: we know that mars used to be warmer and more hospitable in the past, and since cooled. If ammonia was in the atmosphere then (for whatever reasons), it quite easily could have been trapped in polar and subsurface dry ice/water ice, and has been slowly escaping.

Just yet another possibility.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Anonymous Coward]

if there IS life over there, it may be the biggest news and the greatest gift to mankind ever: It might serve to finally get nations and peoples to realize that provincialization is stupid, and we're all in this together.

One might have said the same about Copernicus's discovery of the Earth's orbit around the sun. But human nature doesn't change according to the progress of science (well, mind-altering chemicals might be a counterexample), and humans fight over land (and resources, mates, personal affronts, etc). The discovery of life on another planet will bring brief euphoria and romantic exclamations of future hope, but once the notion has become commonly accepted we'll be right back to our old tricks. Only this time with bigger stakes to fight over: a whole new planet to divide.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Rei]

Oh, one that just came to mind that I forgot to mention: the seasonal brightening/darking of mars was initially assumed to be due to plants.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Phrogman]

No actually its a quote from the introduction of HG Well's "War of the Worlds" - at least the album version produced in the 70's/80's (I remember someone like Richard Burton reading it aloud at the start of the Album) - probably taken directly from the beginning of the book but I am working and don't have time to check. So blame the author of the original words, not the poster who quoted something without attributing it because he thought it would get a laugh :P

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[BasilBrush]

Erm....

I AM the poster who submitted both the original quote, and the post you are replying to. It's the first paragraph of the book, and yes, it was voiced by Richard Burton in Jeff Wayne's album.

I like sticking in the occasional well known quote without attribution or quotation marks. People who know the quote enjoy it, and it's fun to see the reactions from those who don't realise. :-)

You're working too hard. The PHB isn't looking. Stick your earphones in and sing-along-a-Jeff. I'm not trying to tell you what to do, oh no, oh no, not me. But if mankind is to survive, the people left alive are going to have to start this world a new. And it's going to have to start with me and you!

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Anonymous Coward]

On a side note, if there IS life over there, it may be the biggest news and the greatest gift to mankind ever: It might serve to finally get nations and peoples to realize that provincialization is stupid, and we're all in this together.

Huh?!? I'm all for the world peace and happiness as the next guy (ok, well, he's a dork; I'm genuinely for it!), but how on Mars would such a (granted, magnificent) discovery do ANYTHING to get over-nationalist bickering greedy intolerant selfish people to feel more togetherness? And more than that, to change anything?

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget the face!

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[dnahelix]

I repeat; to dismiss a theory because it was proved false in another case, or worse, because you think it's just too far 'out there' to be true, is just BAD SCIENCE.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[dnahelix]

Example:

Observation: Mars is getting lighter and darker.
Theory: Mars is getting lighter and darker because of plant growth.
Conclusion: False, we now see there are no plants on Mars.


Observation: Mars (possibly) has Ammonia.
Theory: Microbial underground life is producing it.
Conclusion: This can't be true because Rei thinks it's impossible
and because we were mistaken when we thought there were plants???? WRONG!!

The conclusion will take some very long and hard science and will not be decided by opinion.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Gilgaron]

A) Easy for bacteria that can encyst
B) Harder, even if you can encyst, but howabout inside the probe?
C) Still encysted
D) This is the hard part. Finding a food source that will work is necessary because you can't evolve to eat martian food if you've nothing to eat in the meantime.

It is fairly unlikely that the proper conditions would arise to get the cysts to germinate, but I bet we've brought a few over there.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[barakn]

The decomposition of magnesium hydroxide with water produces ammonia? Amazing. This must be one of those rare chemical reactions that induces a nuclear reaction: turning oxygen into nitrogen.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[shaitand]

'"Occam's Razor compatable" explanations.'

I'll abstain on the current issue but please stop this Occam's Razor nonsense.

It's a horrible thing to spread around, it's a completely invalid method that results in the "shaving" of solutions which may or may not be the correct ones in favor of ones which are no more likely to be correct.

The idea that a simpler answer is more correct merely because it's simpler is false. I could give you hundreds of examples where the simplest answer is NOT the correct one. In fact I could give you MORE examples where the simple answer was incorrect than the other way around.

Although useful at times, Occam's Razor overall does more harm than good and would be best forgotten.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Rei]

Hold on a minute here. I was responding to someone who challenged the premise that people tend to blame things on mars that we don't understand on life. I demonstrated it. If you wish to discuss likely alternatives and why ammonia is not a likely hypothesis, I'd be glad to discuss that with you, and I have been discussing it in other threads. However, "because people were wrong about plants" was not my reason why it likely was not life; that was mentioned for a tangential topic.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Tablizer]

What "click here to get plugin"? I am not wow'ed

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Rei]

Never did I state that the simplest answer IS correct. However, the simplest answer is *most likely* correct. And the simplest answer is not life. Have you forgotten everything the Viking probes discovered, for example?

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Rei]

Grrr, that's what I get for typing too quickly. Ammonium salts + alkaline hydroxides, or water + magnesium nitride. Thanks for catching the error. :)

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Chuck1318]

D) This is why they are looking so hard with the Mars rovers for evidence of water in the past. If Mars had been wetter billions of years ago, then life, whether native or imported, would have had a much better chance of flourishing then. And it could have evolved over time to hardier forms that could survive on or in Mars now.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Anonymous Coward]

This is slashdot. If your comment can't stand own its own, or in the context of the blurb of an article, expect to be misunderstood.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[shaitand]

And I'm stating the simplest answer isn't more likely to be correct except in a mathmatical sense. The razor is a falsity and shouldn't be spread.

What I'm saying has absolutely nothing do with life or the lack thereof on mars. I just mean in general and anyone who mentions the razor gets this rant from me. With that said, carry on ;)

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[DerWulf]

maybe not. We have so many preconceptions and expectations already formed and envisioned by the many many good sci-fi litrature and movies there are. It could be disappointing when John Galaxy barely makes it here with tech that is not all that spectacular, looks that are just gross, intelligence that might forever remain unfathomable for us, with not much to say ( if we understand at all) because there is hardly any common ground and a culture that could be so contrary to ours that his presence might even be offending to the most open minded people. So yeah, people would get excited at first, but the alien could be so, well, alien that his existance is insubtantial to us. I don't know. I am not expecting much, makes it easier to please me ;)

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[Saint Aardvark]

Ha! Did you know about this?

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[hesiod]

> I don't buy the life explanation either, though. Whenever there is chemistry going on in a planet that we don't yet understand, there's this natural tendancy to yell "it must be life!".

You say that as though it's happened thousands of times before. How many different planetary chemistries have we witnessed that we don't understand?

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[sp0rk173]

Thats basically what i'm saying - And not all bacteria have the ability to create a neat little protein cuticle around their cell walls. So, fist the bacteria that was pre-existing on the probe would have to have the ability to encyst. We probably have brought a few over...but the evolutionary leap from life on earth or life on mars is...well...fucking huge. That would cull off a HUGE majority, if not all. But really...you only need one sucessful bacteria to colonize.

Another thought that the conspiracy theory side of me digs - what if NASA has been developing a microbe that would have the ability to live on mars (selectively "breeding" microbes is done all the time, especially in bioremediation), and then plan on sending them up in latter probes to begin terraforming? All they would have to account for would be the basic nutrient requirements, mainly H, C, N, P, and K; then have them be photo-energetic (not necesarily photosynthetic...there's not much carbon dioxide over there as I understand), somehow using oxygen as their terminal electron acceptor...It would be difficult...but i'm not so sure it's undoable. Those sly bastards. All it would take would be one wayward biologist.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[sp0rk173]

And then there's always the theory that we actually first existed on mars, then around 6,000 years ago had to migrate because of some crazy intense cataclysmic event and wanted to start completely fresh, and so we founded this awesome city - Atlantis. But everyone was being jerks, so there was a big war. Different factions went their spearate ways and started their own oral traditions, though two of the factions kept to the old traditions...with a little bit of interpretation. They were headed by Egy Patian and Maz Teknolopiant. They still built great observatories, hoping that one day they could return back to Mars. They also kept crops of Martian homeland plants, known mainly today as Salvia Divinorum, Cannibus, a couple special types of mushrooms, and some other things. They found these special plants had amazing abilities to transport them to other dimensions, without actually harming them (or seemingly so) physically. Cause...i dunno about you, but it freakin hurts to try and enter another dimension by walking through a wall. It's just not possible. I'ved tried, trust me.

Anyway, long story short, the other factions didn't like all of this old-school martian mumbo jumbo, so they engrained into their oral tradition the concept of dominance and conquest, basically rasied both of the old-school factions to the ground (thats a weird turn of phrase, "raise to the ground!" ...language is so WEIRD!), and thats how we got here today. Oh, and this was all totally conscious until just after the printing press was invented, when religious leaders from around the globe came together to discuss the threat from the old ways (which promoted individuality and freedom from the material world) to their power. They decided that for the next two hundred years, printing presses would be subsidized for approved uses, and incredibly expensive otherwise, citing that while the rich might try and revive the old ways, they would be easily chastized by the church leaders as being greedy, promoting crazy far-out ideas to get more money from the unsuspecting commoners. And so, all knowledge of the old ways dissapeared until Archaeology came about, when scientists began discovering alien-seeming civilizations in south america and along the nile...

Man, i need to stop listening to Art Bell.

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.

[dnahelix]

The original article is about The Theory that Ammonia on Mars Is Caused by Living Organisms

But, as you've pointed out, you "don't buy" that theory. You haven't given any scientific reasons why you "don't buy" that theory. You've talked about other theories as to the (possible) presence of ammonia, and you've talked about other observations that people thought were life and have been (marginally, in some cases) proven wrong. But, you haven't given any logical reason as to why you "don't buy" the theory that life could produce ammonia on Mars.

Cool!

[Walrus99]

Cool! We better do a good search for life before we start terraforming. Uncle Martin must have come from somewhere.

Re:Cool!

[Ari_Haviv]

why...he's my favorite uncle!

Re:Cool!

[Anonymous Coward]

And he's My Favorite Martian.

Too bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's send them some bleach, that'll take care of that problem

Ain't that something?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ammonia, eh? Either Mars has life or just really clean windows....

Re:Ain't that something?

[j1m 5n0w]

I for one welcome our martian ammonia-spewing window-cleaning microbial overlords.

Re:Ain't that something?

[Vasan]

Probably clean windows, since the telephone cleaners landed on Earth.

Re:Ain't that something?

[Tongo]

At least our ancestors kicked off because of all the dirty telephone handsets.....bastards.

Ammonia and methane?

[Jonboy X]

Great! Not only do we know that there are aliens in Mars, but that they pee and fart just like us!

Re:Ammonia and methane?

[Hogwash McFly]

Yep, but from the opposite holes.

Re:Ammonia and methane?

[NanoGator]

"Great! Not only do we know that there are aliens in Mars, but that they pee and fart just like us!"

What were you expecting, to say "He did it!" in a high pitched voice and a thumb on your forehead?

Re:Ammonia and methane?

[micromoog]

Speaking of, does that gold-plated record Voyager is carrying out into the great unknown contain any fart jokes? Those are pretty universal.

Re:Ammonia and methane?

[Cro Magnon]

And their poo-hole is located right above their head.

Oh no! They've already got politicians up there!

Re:Ammonia and methane?

[Anonymous Coward]

How powerful is their poo-hole's eject-mechanism? What if loads of these guys were watching something in a stadium?

Re:Ammonia and methane?

[grandbonheur]

Well I wouldn't like to be stuck behind one in a cinema...

Re:Ammonia and methane?

[Tablizer]

And their poo-hole is located right above their head.

Please God(s), don't let this man become a Star Trek writer.

again?

[Anonymous Coward]

is it just me, or is this story months old?

How do we know?

[millahtime]

How do we know ammonia doesn't last long on mars? Did we take some there and see how long it lasts?

Re:How do we know?

[haluness]

Lack of atmosphere would probably lead to rapid degradation of ammonia. I'm sure there are other geological/atmospheric mechanisms that would lead to ammonia degradation

Re:How do we know?

[kippy]

the lack of a magnetosphere and a thin atmosphere would allow more solar radiation to hit the surface. That breaks the hydrogen off of those molecules. Their presense means that they must have been made more recently than the length of time it takes to break them up.

Re:How do we know?

[Basehart]

Ok, you guys can get back to removing coffee cups from cd trays now - NASA has everything under control on Mars thank you very much.

Re:How do we know?

[tgrigsby]

Now hang on. That's actually a good question. How do we know that ammonia, in a given environment, doesn't have a "half-life" of sorts. Or, for example, any given ammonia molecule surrounded by a given amount of a given collection of gases at a given pressure subject to a given gravity and thus at a calculable density and thickness providing a determinable protection from UV rays will survive radiative damage for X amount of time.

Do we have any idea, assuming for a moment that there was once a tremendous amount of ammonia in the atmosphere of Mars, what the expected life expectancy would be for the traces we now find? And the byproducts would be easy to find? What does ammonia break down to? Anyone?

Re:How do we know?

[micromoog]

By that logic, we're not really sure if the sun is hot, are we?

Re:How do we know?

[calypso15]

How do we know ammonia doesn't last long on mars? Did we take some there and see how long it lasts?

That's one of the reasons we have scientists... to simulate situations which they can't get hands-on access to. Or, are you going to demand that they put a flashlight in a blackhole, just to be sure that light can't escape?

Of course

[SquadBoy]

the Wong's have all those herds. Of course they have methane and ammonia. Duh.

Re:Of course

[NanoGator]

Pretty lame Futurama reference there. Shoulda gone with a college, beer, and urine reference instead. Coulda cooked up a +3, Funny.

Re:Of course

[64Bit]

You mean like this? "Of course there's ammonia on Mars with all the frat parties at Mars University someone's bound to pee on ground after drinking all that beer and Slurm"

[FuturamaFactoid=Random] Amy Wong is in the sorority Kappa Kappa Wong [/FuturamaFactoid]

Re:Of course

[SquadBoy]

You only know that cause it was on last night. gawd I'm pathetic. :)

Re:Of course

[64Bit]

Yes it was on Adult Swim last night but you do know that the show was cancelled right?? I mean that's not the first time that episode aired. Then again that is where I got that factoid, so... I'll just shut up now ;)

[FuturamaFactoid=Random]Bender's serial number is 2716057[/FuturamaFactoid]

Re:Of course

[SquadBoy]

Yes I do know that. For some reason they started over with episode 1 on Tuesday night. So now that we are so OT that we can't even see the damned topic. I have to ask. Left or Right?

Re:Of course

[64Bit]

Oh yeah I know I'm glad because I didn't see the episodes when they first aired. Such a great series why did Fox have to cancel. Well in closing, in the words of Bender, "Oh yeah?? Bite my shiny, metal ass!" Oh and I think the topics up to tell you the truth but what do I know.

[FuturamaFactoid=Random]Futurama is on weekdays at 11:30 EST on Adult Swim[/FuturamaFactoid]

Re:Of course

[orkysoft]

I didn't see the episodes when they first aired. [...] why did Fox have to cancel[?]

You answered your own question already.

Re:Of course

[orkysoft]

Nonono, it's because of the Ass of Mars, exactly on the opposite side of the planet from the Face of Mars.

Re:Of course

[Anonymous Coward]

For some reason they started over with episode 1 on Tuesday night.

For some reason? They showed "The Devil's Hands are Idle Playthings" on Monday night, is why. They wrapped around.

Bite my shiney metal -- noooooooo!!

Methane and ammonia: What we know about ...

[burgburgburg]

Martians:

Gassy neat freaks.

Re:Methane and ammonia: What we know about ...

[TheLetterPsy]

I believe that the odor associated with flatulence is mostly associated with sulfur-containing compounds rather than methane. IIRC, methane by itself is odorless.

Re:Methane and ammonia: What we know about ...

[eclectus]

I believe that the odor associated with flatulence is mostly associated with sulfur-containing compounds rather than methane. IIRC, methane by itself is odorless.

Like they say down here in the south, you're a purty fart smeller.

Re:Methane and ammonia: What we know about ...

[_anomaly_]

...and what does the fact that methane is odorless have to do with the parent post?

He/she just said that they'd be "gassy neat freaks"... nothing about "smelly, gassy neat freaks".

ammonia and methane, eh?

[surreal-maitland]

"folks, we've discovered life on mars, and boy, is it stinky!"

Re:ammonia and methane, eh?

[Anonymous Coward]

PASADENA CONTROL: It's looking good. It's going good. We're getting
great pictures here at Nasa Control, Pasadena. The landing-craft touched down on
Mars 28 Kilometers from the aim-point. We're looking at a remarkable landscape,
littered with different kinds of rocks - red, purple.... How 'bout that, Bermuda?

BERMUDA CONTROL: Fantastic! Look at the dune-field.

PASADENA CONTROL: Hey, wait. I'm getting a no-go signal. Now I'm losing one of
the craft. Hey, Bermuda, you getting it?

BERMUDA CONTROL: No, I lost contact. There's a lot of dust blowing up there.

PASADENA CONTROL: Now I've lost the second craft. We got problems.

BERMUDA CONTROL: All contact lost, Pasadena. Maybe the antenna's...

PASADENA CONTROL: What's that flare? See it? A green flare, coming from Mars,
kind of a green mist behind it. It's getting closer. You see it, Bermuda? Come in,
Bermuda! Houston, come in! What's going on?

Tracking station 43, Canberra, come in Canberra! Tracking station 63, can
you hear me, Madrid? Can anybody hear me? Come in, come in...

Psshhh screw that!

[sp0rk173]

I'm getting my hopes up, baby!!! Yeah!!!!!! Life on Mars!! WOOOOO!! PARRRTTYYY!!!

Its not that exciting

[Timesprout]

It was just the Martians giving Beagle a good clean up before they show it of to the Saturnians (they are really proud of their collection of landers on Mars).

Re:Its not that exciting

[bcattwoo]

they are really proud of their collection of landers on Mars

Yet those bastards won't wipe off the rover solar panels for us.

Re:Its not that exciting

[kpansky]

Good pun, becuase the Europeans are feeling pretty saturnine after their spectacularly unspectacular lander successes.

Also, could make a joke about France & Germany and having no balls stemming from the derivation of the word saturnine but shall refrain for decorum's sake.

Re:Its not that exciting

[Slack3r78]

Germany? You mean the country that has *twice* tried to take over the entire world in the past 100 years? Yeah, no balls on them at all. :-P

Re:Its not that exciting

[kpansky]

At the end of WWI they were merely testicularly wounded (and darn mad about it), but by the end of WWII they were full fledged geldings :-)

Don't mind that..

[ParticleMan911]

It's probably just left over from the filming of Total Recall.

Cool !!

[Anonymous Coward]

Now lets harvest it and turn it into cleaning products.

Re:Cool !!

[Marc Desrochers]

$83000 for a bottle of Windex.

Not very encouraging news...

[CompWerks]

It smells like a bathroom.

But...

[7Ghent]

Does it indicate the insidious presence of Mr. Clean??

Who knows what evil lurks in the shiny surfaces...

Re:But...

[Exatron]

Well, it's not Martians. They sell whole surface of planet for one lousy bead.

Re:But...

[Anonymous Coward]

Who knows what evil lurks in the shiny surfaces...

Who knows? Marvin knows.

now if venus...

[Hooya]

has some traces of perfume and lipstick it would settle beyond any doubt that men are indeed from mars and women are from venus.

Re:now if venus...

[psavo]

I'd remind that any technical device sent there by man has very short estimation of uptime there..

Re:now if venus...

[drinkypoo]

I don't follow your logic. In order to say that men are from mars, wouldn't you have to find some degreaser or diesel fumes or something?

Re:now if venus...

[Anonymous Coward]

they found ammonia... stuff that you excrete.

So according to his logic, mars smells like a bathroom, while vinus would smell like perfmumes.

Ammonia?

[kpansky]

On the continuing hunt for life on Mars, the leading (and quite suspect) NASA scientist had this to say: "They used ammonia.... that means that none of this is any good! Even if we do get suspects we got nothing on them! FUCK!"

In other news there have been popular calls for these renegade life forms to set up colonies "on every major planet."

Re:Ammonia?

[yohan1701]

LOL.! Sign me up!

Re:Ammonia?

[cidViscous]

good call on the saints, if only i had some mod .'s right now. . .

Re:Ammonia?

[dknight]

Excellent Boondock Saints reference.

Makes me proud to be Irish ;)

Re:Ammonia?

[Anonymous Coward]

makes me proud to be a vigilante :D

life indicates life

[mattkime]

really the only indicator of life on mars that is going to convince me is....life on mars.

i've been disillusioned by all the rumors since the face hasn't lead to any big breakthrough.

http://www.matrixofcreation.co.uk/mars/face-on-m ar s.gif

Re:life indicates life

[ChuckleBug]

really the only indicator of life on mars that is going to convince me is....life on mars.

Nor should you be. Scientists aren't convinced there's life. This is just a possible clue.

Re:life indicates life

[Anonymous Coward]

I guarantee that if Bush's program goes through to send astronauts to Mars, then they will find life on mars. Unless they arrive dead.

Re:life indicates life

[DoraLives]

i've been disillusioned by all the rumors since the face hasn't lead to any big breakthrough.

Face hell, I'm still pissed off over that whole canal fiasco!

Re:life indicates life

[Anonymous Coward]

It isn't even a face...only when looked at from certain angles and with certain light.

I wish people who believe in the conspiracy of the face would take a logical, statistical approach. In high school finite mathematics we learned all about probability and such.

It is only reasonable to expect something we recognize would appear on such a large surface area. I bet there are areas on earth shaped like a man's dingdong but nobody says "OMGWTFBBQ CONSPIRACY!".

Take some math classes and learn all about probability and so forth people... it will make much more sense.

Re:life indicates life

[Anonymous Coward]

Agree 100%

Look at the so-called face from another view:
http://www.cerrone.nl/mars/images/face2.jpg

Really looks like a face now, huh?

Re:life indicates life

[ballwall]

Every six months there's something new, later found to be caused by something else.

In January: "Brown rock may be evidence of life on mars"
February: "Turns out brown rock was just a brown rock"

Next August: "Mars existing may mean life on Mars"
Sept: "Oops, Mars not created by life on Mars"

Re:life indicates life

[blancolioni]

I bet there are areas on earth shaped like a man's dingdong

Funny you should mention that. Euro coins have an map of the EU embossed on them.

There's a reason we wish Norway would join already.

Re:life indicates life

[Coupons]

North America has Lake Michigan

Life was inevitable

[apikoros]

I am not at all suprised at this. I always regarded life on Mars as being inevitable for the following reasons:

1. There is no place on this planet that we have not found bacterial life,
2. we know that meteorites can travel between the two planets as we have found rocks of Martian origin in Antarctica.
3. if all rocks of earth origin contain bacteria and rocks from Mars can reach earth I would *expect* that life had travelled from earth to Mars via the same mechanism in reverse.

That the meteorites found in Antarctica contained fossil bacteria only makes the case stronger.

Re:Life was inevitable

[cephyn]

Well, actually #3 isn't a safe assumption. The gravity wells of the two planets are very different, it is MUCH harder for an earth rock to land on mars. That said, the probability is not zero. It's just much less likely than finding Martian rocks here.

Re:Life was inevitable

[painandgreed]

Not only that, but there is the theory of panspermia. Basically, spores and microbes are constantly entering the upper atmosphere and from there entering space and have been at a slow but contant rate for millions if not billions of years. if protected in a body of dust or resistant to ultraviolet light such as many spores are it's possible for them to remain viable after a trip through space. As they head out in random directions from Earth, it stands to reson that eventually some of them would have been captured by Mar's gravity and entered their atmosphere and made it back to the surface where they could begin to prosper. Some people put forth that life could have originally been birthed on Mars and made it to Earth is such a manner.

Re:Life was inevitable

[missing000]

if all rocks of earth origin contain bacteria and rocks from Mars can reach earth I would *expect* that life had travelled from earth to Mars via the same mechanism in reverse.

I don't understand this logic. Mars is at a larger orbital plane than Earth. Wouldn't the logical assumption be that some object jettisoned from Mars could intersect Earth's orbit? The other direction seems a bit far-fetched.

Re:Life was inevitable

[apikoros]

True, the escape velocity of this planet is higher than that of Mars but that only means that it would take a bigger meteorite strike to kick a chunk toward Mars. We have evidence of plenty of strikes big enough to have done so, however.... Chicxulub springs immediately to mind.

Once at escape velocity, the odds of any given rock hitting Mars are low but given 4 billion years (the oldest fossil evidence for life) a lot can happen.

Re:Life was inevitable

[ShieldWolf]

A few deflating points:

1. There are places on earth where there is no bacterial life: try the upper atmosphere and farthest reaches of antarctica at the moment (both places as cold as Mars).

2. A human being has trouble surviving a re-entry inside a spaceship covered with heat-resistant tiles, do you really think a bacterium sitting on a rock that is heated up to a few thousand degrees has a chance in hell of surviving the trip?

3. Not all rocks of Earth origin contain bacteria, again those in the middle of antartica do not.

4. The rocks found in antartica DID NOT have fossilized bacteria. What they did have were crytalized structures that scientists figured could plausibly have been created by life. As for the famous picture: those structures are MUCH smaller than bacteria and scientists were careful not to say they were fossils.

The approach you should take is common-sense:

If I can kill all the bacteria in water by simply boiling it for a few minutes at ~100 celcius, do you honestly think it could survive on a rock that has is flung off the earth at escape velocity through the atmosphere, across the freezing vacuum of space and then plumetting through the martian atmosphere and then crashing to the ground?

Re:Life was inevitable

[cephyn]

Right! But also, things blown off mars would tend to fall inward towards the sun...just as things blown off earth would. So to really get moving into an orbit that would intersect the martian one, AND then hit Mars....wooo.

But 4 billion years IS a long time. I'd be surprised if we ever found an earth rock on mars, but maybe, just maybe...

Re:Life was inevitable

[Jesrad]

Not only do rocks travel between Mars and the Earth, but some are even thought to have traveled there and back !

There's approximately half a ton of material from Mars that falls on the Earth every year. Even though it takes more momentum to leave the Earth and more chance to fall back on Mars than the opposite, that's way too much to neglect.

Re:Life was inevitable

[Anonymous Coward]

3 is a pretty safe assumption, as long as you consider the probes as rocks. As far as I know they didn't remove all the microbes and spores from them, so they should apply.

Re:Life was inevitable

[cephyn]

Mariner and Viking went through sterilization procedures. The Russian probes...well, no documentation and no real way of knowing if they did or not. So you may have a point. 8)

Re:Life was inevitable

[maxchaote]

There is no place on this planet that we have not found bacterial life,

Not so, according to this.

Re:Life was inevitable

[cephyn]

1) There has been life found in the upper atmosphere and in the farthest reaches of antarctica.

2) some microbes live IN rocks, some very deep, so the outer layers of rock could protect an atmospheric entry. Especially since rock-loving microbes aren't bothered by extreme temperatures, the center of the rock could still be cool enough not to cook them.

3)Not all rocks, but way more than you'd expect.

4)No argument.

Yes, I believe it could since microbes were discovered on the moon landers after they'd been sitting on the moon for a few years. Also, earth rocks blown off that later re-enter and land have microbes that could survive. There's no event in your scenario that some microbes couldn't survive.

Re:Life was inevitable

[Bob Cat - NYMPHS]

If I can kill all the bacteria in water by simply boiling it for a few minutes at ~100 celcius

That won't kill all the spores, which is why autoclaves operate at higher temperatures for much longer periods. And Oceanic vent-dwelling bacteria would find it posively chilly.

Re:Life was inevitable

[ShieldWolf]

Oceanic vent-dwelling bateria require massive pressure to survive at those temperatures.

Re:Life was inevitable

[elpapacito]

Eh I like common sense :) Too bad if anybody uses common sense too much you end up with botulin in your common-sense-level sterilized jars.

Oh and the meteor is indeed heated to thousand degrees during entry phase, but not necessarily uniformly heated. Think about the Space Shuttle..if it was uniformly heated at the temperature of the heat shield you'd have a bunch of unhappy vaporized astronauts ; fortunately that doesn't happen (unless you have an hole in the wing).

So yeah it is in theory possible for some lifeform to enter the planet by hitchhiking some meteor. I'll declare a War on Illegal Aliens asap.

Re:Life was inevitable

[Chuck1318]

things blown off mars would tend to fall inward towards the sun. . .

I don't know about that. It's not like orbits are a set of shelves where you knock something off and it falls down. A piece of rock on Mars starts off with Mars' orbital velocity. If it gets ejected in some random direction it is as likely to increase its orbital velocity (larger orbit) as to decrease it. In fact, since meteorite strikes tend to be on the leading side of the planet (the bug-on-the-windshield effect), this may favor increased orbital velocity of the ejected material.

Re:Life was inevitable

[apikoros]

I am sorry to say I disagree with your deflating points, Jeff.

First, bacterial can be and are found in the stratosphere, in the far reaches of Antarctica, and deep in oil well shafts. There are species that not only survise 100 degrees C, they must have temperatures over that to survive . In deep sea vent communities, bacteria live at 200+C! They are truly ubiquitous.

Second, humans are far more delicate than bacteria, much less bacterial spores. I do think that a bacterial spore in the center of even a moderately (1-2 meter) sized chunk of rock could survive entry into the Earth's gravity well. As a result surviving an entry on Mars would be a doddle.

And, third, you would be suprised ar just how ubiquitous bacteria are. YES! In the middle of rocks! Not very rock, true, but pretty much every one within a kilometer of the surface.

And on the orbital mechanics, well... once you reach escape velocity, you are "leaving the building"! The sun is certainly one possibility, but one Mars-bound rock in a million years (that's 4,000 rocks in 4 billion years) is plenty for my hypothesis to work out.

Re:Life was inevitable

[ShieldWolf]

Counterpoints:

Life in the UPPER atmosphere is still an open question, though research continues.

It is safe to say that the VAST majority of rock on this planet does not have bacteria, think of structures such as the Canadian shield etc. which PREDATE life.

I think your lander point is totally false -when did they examine landers that had been there for YEARS? Astronauts have never returned to any lunar landing sights so how would they know? In any event the landers were protected from the heat of take-off inside the launch vehicle and they never went through reentry.

Re:Life was inevitable

[Teancum]

How absolutely sure are you that bacterial life is not in the upper atmosphere?

I've heard of bacterial capture as high as 50,000 feet. Do you mean higher than that? Like the 100 km altitude that Space Ship One went to?

And the same about Antarctica. How absolutely sure are you that you can't find some sort of bacterial remains or transport of some kind that can litterally be found in the middle of Antarctica? That is even ignoring the Antarctic research stations where I'm sure you can find bacteria in abundance. I've seen bacterial growth on alpine glaciers high on mountain tops, that live in conditions that are very similar to Antarctica. Antarctica is a big place, and to totally rule out anything living there is just too absolute.

Also, if you think boiling something for a few minutes in water at 100 C is going to kill bacteria, you really don't understand food science at all. What that normally does when you cook is kill bacteria and other organisms that are harmful to people. An autoclave does a much better job, but that is not normally something you would stick a chicken sandwich into.

One reason why it is suspected that bacteria could survive in space is because of Apollo-12, where the Surveyor probe, launched several years earlier, was "accidentally" contaminated before it was launched. Parts of this space probe were returned back to Earth in sealed bags, and it was detected that several bacterial cells survived not only the spaceflight to the moon, but "lived" on the moon for several years before coming back to the laboratories on the Earth. Nobody is claiming that they thrived and multiplied into huge numbers on the Moon, but they were able to survive and when put into a much more hospitable environment (like a petri dish full of agar in an Earth-based lab) they did thrive and begin to reproduce again.

Also, micrometeorites that are the size of a pin-head or even somewhat larger have been known to survive reentry without burning up from re-entry. It is not that difficult to bring things to the Earth that could survive, and certainly something the size of a bacterium could enter the Earth's atmosphere without heating up to several thousands of degrees C.

The only reason reentry is so difficult for spaceflight is because it is a cheap and easy way to reduce speed without having to fire rockets to reduce velocity for a safe landing. This has no relationship to small grains of sand that are orbiting the sun. Even a large rock will only get heated so much coming into the Earth's atmosphere, simply because the entry won't last that long. A very hard landing, but relatively quick transit time through the atmosphere. How many G's of force do you think a bacteria could take? I bet it is quite a bit more than a person could take, by about 1000x.

Re:Life was inevitable

[cephyn]

Lander point is NOT false.

http://science.nasa.gov/newhome/headlines/ast01s ep 98_1.htm

Excerpt:
The Surveyor probes were the first U.S. spacecraft to land safely on the Moon. In November, 1969, the Surveyor 3 spacecraft's microorganisms were recovered from inside its camera that was brought back to Earth under sterile conditions by the Apollo 12 crew.

The 50-100 organisms survived launch, space vacuum, 3 years of radiation exposure, deep-freeze at an average temperature of only 20 degrees above absolute zero, and no nutrient, water or energy source. (The United States landed 5 Surveyors on the Moon; Surveyor 3 was the only one of the Surveyors visited by any of the six Apollo landings.

Re:Life was inevitable

[foistboinder]

if all rocks of earth origin contain bacteria and rocks from Mars can reach earth I would *expect* that life had travelled from earth to Mars via the same mechanism in reverse.

Possible, but if there was an exchange of biological material, it is more like to be bacteria from Mars making it to earth (do to the relative depth's of their gravity wells).

Re:Life was inevitable

[another_henry]

I think your lander point is totally false -when did they examine landers that had been there for YEARS? Astronauts have never returned to any lunar landing sights so how would they know? In any event the landers were protected from the heat of take-off inside the launch vehicle and they never went through reentry.

Apollo 12 landed within walking distance of the Surveyor 3 probe, which had touched down 2.5 years earlier. this page has more details - although you are right about the bacteria not having to survive reentry.

Re:Life was inevitable

[ShieldWolf]

The nitpicking grows tiresome, but that is not a LANDER it is a PROBE. The term lander refers to the ship that the astronauts used to land on the moon. ;)

You are correct that this is evidence against my point though.

Re:Life was inevitable

[teromajusa]

Life has evolved into every nitch on this planet, but that doesn't mean that a random chunk of bacteria is going to survive anywhere you put it. Whatever survives the impact which sends it into space, the trip through space, and the impact on mars, then has the difficult job of surviving in an environment likely to be totally unlike where it came from. With time it might evolve into something could survive there but its not likely to get the chance.

Re:Life was inevitable

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, for christ's sake. Did the thing land? Can you both not be right?

If you want an end to nitpicking, QUIT PICKING NITS.

Re:Life was inevitable

[Anonymous Coward]

That won't kill all the spores, which is why autoclaves operate at higher temperatures for much longer periods.

Too add to this comment, there are proteins that an autoclave can't destroy, for example, certain RNAses. This suggests that given the basic biochemical machinery we know on earth, other proteins could evolve to survive at temperature extremes. And, that's ignoring the infinitely larger set of possibilities based on non-Earth derived biochemistry.

Re:Life was inevitable

[cephyn]

my apologies. I meant "lander" not, Lunar Lander. Still, something that "landed" on the moon had microbes. ;) No offense meant, and none taken.

Re:Life was inevitable

[BTWR]

The Russian probes...well, no documentation and no real way of knowing if they did or not.

Well, no Russian (Soviet) lander ever survived.

Re:Life was inevitable

[Anonymous Coward]

do you really think a bacterium sitting on a rock that is heated up to a few thousand degrees has a chance in hell of surviving the trip?

Assuming the rock is heated up to approximately the temperature of Hell, then yes, the bacterium has roughly 1.0 chance-in-hell probability units.

Re:Life was inevitable

[AJWM]

I think your lander point is totally false -when did they examine landers that had been there for YEARS?

Apollo 12, 1969. Landed a few hundred yards from Surveyor III, which had landed 3 years earlier. Conrad and Bean walked over to it, clipped off some parts (including a digger arm and the TV camera) and returned them to Earth. It was part of the mission plan.

Bacteria were found within the camera housing.

(As for reentry, while the outer surface of meteorites is charred and melted, the transition through the atmosphere is fast enough that the center stays cool. Rock is a lousy heat conductor.)

(Oh, and the Canadian shield is a fairly small percentage of the exposed rock surface of this planet -- most of which is sedimentary.)

Re:Life was inevitable

[vincecate]

2. A human being has trouble surviving a re-entry inside a spaceship covered with heat-resistant tiles, do you really think a bacterium sitting on a rock that is heated up to a few thousand degrees has a chance in hell of surviving the trip?

Many meteors ablate like an Apollo heatshield as they enter the atmosphere. The heat is used up turning the surface into a gas and little heat is conducted inside the meteor. Meteors start out very cold, so meteorites are often very cold to the touch when found right after impact.

Yes, I really think they could survive the trip.

Re:Life was inevitable

[hesiod]

> There are species that not only survise 100 degrees C, they must have temperatures over that to survive

This is not meant to take away from your meaning, because I agree that it's possible, but the probability is minute.

Yes, there are bacteria that need those conditions, some that just can handle it. The thing, however, is are there bacteria that can handle BOTH extremes. If you need a bacteria that can handle reentry heat & pressures, they must also be able to handle extreme cold & (virtually) no pressure in space. I would think that jumping from 100 psi to 0 psi, volcanic heat to cold space, would be a hell of a change.
To survive in high pressure, I would think the bacteria would need to build up its own pressure inside itself to keep from crushing. Going to space within a day would, IMO cause it to explode (ignoring bacteria living in the core of a very large rock).

Re:Life was inevitable

[hesiod]

> An autoclave does a much better job, but that is not normally something you would stick a chicken sandwich into.

EXCELLENT! I'm off to invent the chickenclave!

Re:Life was inevitable

[hesiod]

> Whatever survives the impact which sends it into space, the trip through space, and the impact on mars, then has the difficult job of surviving

If it was able to live through two impacts, zero pressure, & no heat, I doubt the conditions on Mars are going to trouble it too much, unless there is some specific chemical there that the bacteria simply cannot be around & live.

It has a magnetosphere

[millahtime]

Mars has a magnetosphere

Take a tour

Re:It has a magnetosphere

[cephyn]

From your link:

The magnetic field of Mars is 1/800 as strong as Earth's and was first recorded in 1997 by the Mars Surveyor probe.

That's barely a magnetosphere. It is there, but it's not exactly substantial...

Re:It has a magnetosphere

[scaaven]

The magnetic field of a planet has a direct correlation with the amount of fluid activity (lava) from within. Mars is a small planet, so it cooled off relatively quickly from its accretion period. We can see this similarly with our moon. With little to no convection, the magnetic field will be very low, which is what we observe on Mars. BUT, since we do observe a tiny magnetic field, it suggests that the Martian core might not be completely frozen. Given that Mars has the largest volcano in the solar system, it could indicate a great weakness in the crust where gasses from the core could escape easily. And because they are detecting these chemicals around volcanoes, it doesn't seem likely that life is responsible

Re:It has a magnetosphere

[hesiod]

> Given that Mars has the largest volcano in the solar system

Please excuse my ignorance, but is it an active volcano? I thought there weren't any found, but of course, that probably came from other ignorant Slashers.

I suppose it makes sense

[rsilvergun]

I mean, if there's life, they're gonna need something to clean their windows.

Re:I suppose it makes sense

[flmngbrd]

they don't want to have streaks. when they evolve they wouldn't want to be flying into windows.

Re:I suppose it makes sense

[BlaKnail]

If there was intelligent life, they'd use linux. Wouldn't have to worry about cleaning it as much.

Re:I suppose it makes sense

[flmngbrd]

i like to wake up in the morning and look out the linux. when its hot i just open a linux so i don't need to use an air conditioner.

Re:I suppose it makes sense

[amliebsch]

I mean, if there's life, they're gonna need something to clean their windows.

Microsoft's reach extends beyond the bounds of planet Earth? There goes hopes for intelligent life...

A recurring theme

[Sean80]

I myself wouldn't be in the least surprised if they found life on Mars.

Again and again, life has proven itself to be a real beyutch to kill. Bottom of the sea near lava vents. Antarctic wastelands which are the driest places on earth. I believe I once read about viruses which had survived in space for years as well.

I think the notion of panspermia (if I have the terminology correct) - that life first arrived on Earth after having been blown off the surface of Mars by an impacting meteor - is one of the most interesting theories out there.

Re:A recurring theme

[dancingmad]

Just to chime in, viruses aren't really considered "life." They require real cells to reproduce and I've read that they are probably not a kind of pre-life, but more likely a simplification of early living things.

Re:A recurring theme

[flmngbrd]

i believe that life was planted here by aliens wanting to do an experiment. they come back from time to time to observe us. that would explain all the ufo sightings and abductions throughout time. we're just a big petri dish

Re:A recurring theme

[pclminion]

Just to chime in, viruses aren't really considered "life." They require real cells to reproduce

Hence, wouldn't their presence indicate the presence of living cells, if not now, then at least at some time in the past? It seems that finding viruses would be tantamount to finding living cells, don't you think?

Re:A recurring theme

[stratjakt]

This mouse here says they had the earth created to compute the question to the answer for life, the universe and everything.

Re:A recurring theme

[dj42]

"Again and again, life has proven itself to be a real beyutch to kill. Bottom of the sea near lava vents. Antarctic wastelands which are the driest places on earth."

The Martian surface is compartively very harsh.

It should also be pointed out that the myriad species and diverse enviornments on Earth, combined with the co-evolution between dinstinct but intertwined life forms, seems to be a success factor in the continued survival of life.

Re:A recurring theme

[MarkusH]

Nah, Viruses are unlife. I mean, have you ever seen one under a microscope? Or at least a picture of one? They are these strange, skeletal monsters that possess other living organisms, eat their brains and turn them into zombified machines.

I'm sure that when amoeba tell horror stories to each other, it all involves viruses taking over amoeba-kind.

Re:A recurring theme

[efflux]

viruses aren't really considered "life."

Well, the jury is still, technically, out on this one. To indicate otherwise is disingenuous.

Re:A recurring theme

[Anonymous Coward]

i believe that life was planted here by aliens...they come back from time to time to observe us.

s/observe/harvest

It doesn't make sense to go to so much effort unless there was a worthwhile crop at the end of it.

Re:A recurring theme

[flmngbrd]

thats why people are so dumb. compared to these aliens we're cattle and probably delicious

Re:A recurring theme

[sexylicious]

We taste like chicken? =)

I've heard that humans actaully taste more like pork. But I've never eaten anyone...

Re:A recurring theme

[gphinch]

I believe I once read about viruses which had survived in space for years as well.

I read that too, The Andromeda Strain I believe. Decent book, horrible movie.

Re:A recurring theme

[hesiod]

> It doesn't make sense to go to so much effort unless there was a worthwhile crop at the end of it.

Perhaps they are more interested in learning than in possessing & harvesting. They harvest knowledge.

in Japan

[Anonymous Coward]

Apparently traces of ammonia have been found in the Martian atmosphere ... in Japan

Not a flamebait, but...

[rfernand79]

I don't intend to go on a flamebait, but this kind of news seem to support Bush's "Go to Mars" space program. Yes, there are some of us who think it's great to explore Mars, but not at the expense of other resources. I keep hearing this comments on how government research funding has been redirected towards Mars... this is the flaw. I believe no resources should have been redirected, but instead, new resources created for a new project. Anyway, something to ponder...

Re:Not a flamebait, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

"New resources" created? You mean like a "Mars Tax" added to the federal income tax or something?

Unless new taxes are inacted to go to mars, then all Mars mission resources will have to be "redireced" from other places (Or no mission at all).

Re:Not a flamebait, but...

[micromoog]

We still have plenty to learn from Mars . . . the true waste of resources is the idea to return to the freaking moon.

Re:Not a flamebait, but...

[kyknos.org]

These news are from ESA, Europaen space agency and European craft. If it is there to support "Go to Mars" space program, then we are talking about European Aurora programme. Or hopefully international mission.

Re:Not a flamebait, but...

[drinkypoo]

Well, here's some "Flamebait" (aka anything a half-cocked moderator disagrees with) for you: Bush doesn't have a Go to Mars space program. He has a pretend to go to mars campaign program.

I agree that new resources should be created for a new project, but Bush has been too busy trying to ban gay marriage (the senate shot the latest attempt down, thank goodness.)

Re:Not a flamebait, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

Not really. We could probably learn the same
things about Mars sending unmanned research
tools as we could by sending humans there.
However, I suspect we could learn a great
deal of use from figuring out how to get
humans to Mars and back. The economic value
of a manned space program has in the past
over the long term outweighed the immense
immediate costs, and the same is likely to
be true for going to Mars.

Re:Not a flamebait, but...

[0x0d0a]

I am an European. And I will die for Europe if necessary.

Ballsy to say that during the Bush Administration.

Re:Not a flamebait, but...

[Eivind]

Actually, all resources any project consume comes from somewhere. In pretty much all cases you could drop the project, and use those resources (even if those resources are mostly man-hours) for some other purpose.

Doing *anything* has an opportunity-cost equal to the next best thing you could be doing.

Now, perhaps you mean that government spending on fundamental research should be increased overall, rather than just reprioritised, that I'd agree with, but that's not what you said.

Enough Already

[dcollins]

How many of these "Arcane Clue Could Posibly Indicate Life on Mars" stories are we going to publish? One a month? C'mon, give it a rest. I'll believe there's life on mars when we see something crawling around, and not a second before that. This merry-go-round has been going on since the late 1800's and the "Canals on Mars Could Possibly Indicate Life" movement.

Re:Enough Already

[cephyn]

When you fork out the cash to send out a definitive human expedition to mars that will comprehensively scour the planet for life, looking for your super-proof, then we'll stop. Otherwise, "arcane clues" are all we have to go on. Science works that way. I mean really, you can't see x-rays, just some arcane clues that they are there...but boy, are they there!

Re:Enough Already

[Anonymous Coward]

True, but the difference between extrapolating the existence of an X-ray and extrapolating the existence of life are many orders of magnitude apart.

Remember, X-rays were first observed (or detected, if you prefer), then named; life has yet to be detected on Mars.

But good job on getting a +2, Interesting for a half-baked statement!

Re:Enough Already

[cephyn]

Orders of magnitude apart to be sure, but its a slippery slope -- when does evidence become too arcane? where's the line? We make do with what we got, until we can get better information.

Please...

[budhaboy]

Allow ME be the first to welcome our future gas-filled overlords...

How did life get on Mars?

[anomaly]

This may solve the question about the origin of life on earth, but does nothing about the origin of life in general.

Re:How did life get on Mars?

[Anonymous Coward]

So? It's better than nothing.

Re:How did life get on Mars?

[shrewmy]

Well a long long time ago, a meteor impacted Pluto and broke a piece off which was containing Plutonian life, and it landed on Mars, which was then colonized.

Re:How did life get on Mars?

[Anonymous Coward]

Life got onto Mars from than planet in between Mars and Jupiter.

What do you mean, there's no pla-- I feel a terrible disturbance in The Force.

I Sure Hope There's Life On Mars...

[bfg9000]

... sales are slowing down here on Earth, I could use some fresh meat.

Bill Gates,
CEO, Microsoft Interplanetary

Re:I Sure Hope There's Life On Mars...

[bfg9000]

How's about you bundle an iPod and a copy of Finding Nemo with that? Call me.

Steve Jobs
Apple Universal Innovators, Inc.

Maybe it's the planet

[Anonymous Coward]

farting at us. I mean if it sees what we're doing on our home planet, it's not going to want us crapping it up any more than it already is.

We're ready to hear the truth

[kraksmokr]

The world might be ready to accept that there is life on Mars (say, bacterial life). After all, we found meteorites from Mars that contained fossilized bacteria. After all we don't even know if life originated on Mars, and then spread to Earth. But the fact that life can spread between planets on ROCKS is going to take some of the shock value out of it and people will realize that instead of saying something like "I don't think God created life on MARS!"

Re:We're ready to hear the truth

[dekeji]

After all, we found meteorites from Mars that contained fossilized bacteria.

I think the scientific community is pretty divided pretty significantly on that.

Re:We're ready to hear the truth

[Anonymous Coward]

"I don't think God created life on MARS!"

Hell, I don't even think God created life on Earth! I'll never buy that Martian shit!

Re:We're ready to hear the truth

[jridley]

It is not at ALL certain that the structures we found were fossillized bacteria. In fact, the majority opinion is that they are places where crystals formed, and have since been leeched out. This kind of structure is common on earth, and has been found by the MER rovers all over the place.

Re:We're ready to hear the truth

[molarmass192]

Bite you tongue pal, you're gonna piss off all the creationists with your "life on Mars" heresy. Everyone knows that God created man, and ... umm ... put those bacteria into those rocks ... uhh ... to ... test our faith. Yeah that's the ticket, it's a test! Heathen! You need a good leeching to drain those evil spirits from ya!

OT: Clouds as bacterial colonies?

[lawpoop]

I was doing some reading on astrbiology and I noted that someone was theorizing that the changing cloud structure on venus might be an indication of life activity. I don't know weather he meant the coulds were the life itself, or a byproduct thereof.

Anywho, seeing as how we have little clue how earthly clouds develop, some are theorizing that certain bacteria are necessary for cloud formation. What if the whole cloud is a bacterial colony? Clouds have an organic shape, and certain patterns seem similar to bacterial growth patterbs.

Here's my question: If clouds are not bacterial colonies, what non-organic chemical processes produce shapes and structures similar to clouds?

Re:OT: Clouds as bacterial colonies?

[planckscale]

Um, how about anything that creates vapor? A cloud of hydrogen sulfide? If you're uncertain, jump into one and take a deep breath.

Re:OT: Clouds as bacterial colonies?

[Teancum]

I have no doubt that you can find some sort of carbon-based cellular life in any environment that has at least some form of water, from the bottom of an ocean trench to the pressurized interior of gysers (sometimes over 300 C), and yes, even in clouds.

What I don't accept is that clouds themselves are a product of bacterial colonies other than as a by-product from releaseing water vapor from inside their cellular structures. Water clouds would form even if the Earth were sterile of life.

You can also find organic shapes from lava flows, like from Mauna Kea in Hawaii. Lava can even form pillowing structures and rounded shapes, and that is just a simple non-organic chemical process, just like you have suggested. Look at some pictures of Io (the moon of Jupiter) to see some other "organic" structures that are clearly from chemical processes. While living things may be on Mars, I seriously doubt any living thing could survive the extreamly hostile conditions on Io, both from extreame heat/cold conditions, the "atmospheric" conditions there, the fact that it sits in the middle of Jupiter's Van Allen Belt (radiation like you wouldn't believe) and other life threating issues. Europa has just enough "heat" getting pumped into it that it can melt water, which is why Europa is considered an even higher candidate right now for Extra-terrestial life in our solar system.

I think some clouds are occasionally found on Mars (getting this back on topic), and that by itself is certainly not proof of life on Mars. Ammonia, methane, and free oxygen are all much larger signs of life because all of these compounds (yes, O2 is a compound) are easily lost to space or consumed very quickly through chemical processes for it to have been sitting there for the past 4 1/2 billion years that is estimated our Solar System has for its age since it left the primordial stellar nursery. All of these compounds are found in abundance in the atmosphere on the Earth, in part because living things are also found in abundance. If you don't think ammonia is that common, you havn't walked past a manure pile lately.

Re:OT: Clouds as bacterial colonies?

[cjameshuff]

> What I don't accept is that clouds themselves are a product of bacterial colonies other than as a by-product from releaseing water vapor from inside their cellular structures. Water clouds would form even if the Earth were sterile of life.

Well, spores and other microbes could act as condensation seeds. Have a hard time getting bacteria in one droplet to produce more droplets though...just about the best you could hope for would be bacteria getting rained down, dried out, and then kicked back up as dust. Cloud-borne life would probably be transferred by air currents and droplet collisions, and would be unlikely to have a strong effect on cloud formation. Well, absorption of light by the bacteria could heat the cloud up, dispersing it or making it less likely to rain out, but they would be quite noticeable then.

Cellular automata often produce cloud-like shapes, which really isn't surprising when you think about it. And some aspects of cloud formation could be simulated with CA...they have some similarities. The cloud is a group of tiny droplets condensed out of the air, the vaprous water is the "food", the droplets are the "cells". However, fluid dynamics makes a better cloud simulation...you get similar effects in many fluid systems, without any chemistry (organic or otherwise) involved. Clouds are simply caused by fluid dynamics and temperature/phase changes.

Clouds are complex systems that show some aspects of life, but none of a living organism. However, they could make a good home for microbial life.

Re:OT: Clouds as bacterial colonies?

[Rick.C]

Here's my question: If clouds are not bacterial colonies, what non-organic chemical processes produce shapes and structures similar to clouds?

A: Lava lamps.

Re:OT: Clouds as bacterial colonies?

[lawpoop]

As I understand it, the water vapor is already in the air, but we don't understand how it specifically condenses into a cloud. My question is if a bacteria population causes this as they reproduce. Not that a cloud is a itself an organism, but the result of bacteria creating a hospitable environment for themselves.

Re:OT: Clouds as bacterial colonies?

[Anonymous Coward]

Who doesn't understand how clouds form? Water vapor gets cold. Water vapor condenses around condensation nuclei, which can be any sort of particulate matter -- dust, ash, salt. Pollen or bacteria might work as well, but are not required.

Re:OT: Clouds as bacterial colonies?

[lawpoop]

Well, isn't the hallmark of understanding re-creation? I understand that all couldseeding experiments have failed ('chemtrail' conspiracy theories notwithstanding), which leads me to believe that we don't really get how water condenses into clouds. If we did, shouldn't we be able to seed clouds?

Re:OT: Clouds as bacterial colonies?

[Anonymous Coward]

We can seed clouds.

Not that nucleation is the only important factor.

Re:OT: Clouds as bacterial colonies?

[Teancum]

The problems with cloud seeding are huge, and yes, I will admit that we don't totally understand the dynamics of what makes rain. We do have a pretty good idea, and some very good theories, so when you propose something fantastic and from left field away from the current theories, you must have some incredible evidence as well. Raw speculation simply won't cut it, and we are talking raw basic science here. This is how scientific theories form.

There are incredible amounts of energy that are released in storms, and in particular clouds have to be heavily saturated and ready as well in order to rain. Cloud seeding is attempting to bypass the normal weather mechanisms and cause a cloud to rain when normally it wouldn't.

For example, some people suggested (even here on /.) that perhaps we should use nukes to stop hurricanes. I really am not kidding either, and these were serious proposals that even made it to congress (like they know science as well). The weather forecasting community litterally started to laugh until they realized how serious the proposal was. The point is that the entire nuclear arsenal of the USA, simultaneously detonated, could only at most divert a Hurricane by a few miles. It couldn't possibly stop it because by itself has more power than all of those nukes combined. That is totally ignoring the radiation effects of such an action.

Do you really think that one small plane with a few drops of iodine or other mineral would really make that much difference? You might make a huge difference if you "seed" a few miles before it normally would, or increase the amount of rainfall by about 1%. The questions then would be: How can you tell if it made a difference? Is it really worth the money when you can obtain more water elsewhere? Is this preventing rainfall in areas that really need this water? What other climtological effects does rain seeding do?

There are some very competent scientists working on weather forecasting and study of the physics of weather. Except for the Global Warming issues, there really isn't that much that is controversial regarding what they do, and they don't really get paid that much either, unless they are working for a major market television station. Put away your tin hat and read what real scientist are saying about this topic. If you study this in detail and can prove organic production of clouds, including going up in a Cessna. It wouldn't be hard, and you can even keep the airspeed rather low. Even a sail plane would work if you wanted to make sure that engine noise and exaust would keep bacteria away. If you capture relatively large numbers of organic lifeforms in clouds, and can prove that the clouds themselves form nurseries for these organic lifeforms, I might be considerably more impressed.

Lifeforms in the clouds of Venus or Jupiter would be the next place to look if you can even identify lifeforms that spend most of their lifetimes in clouds themselves. You might even get a NASA grant if you can show even preliminary results for something like this.

Bias?

[bluprint]

Mars is starting to look a lot less dead than had been supposed.

Or mars is starting to look like it has a lot more volcanoes (or similar activity) than previously reported. But why assume some crazy thing like that when we can just assume there is life on Mars?

Re:Bias?

[Anonymous Coward]

You must be new here...

Re:Bias?

[theblacksun]

Um, how about because we have evidence that suggests little to no current volcanic activity on Mars (it's related to the magnetic field)? That "bias" is knowledge.

Re:Bias?

[forii]

One thing to remember is that we have evidence of Mars having volcanic activity, but we have no evidence of Mars supporting life. It makes no sense to uncritically accept an unprecedented explanation. There are several interesting things that could be explained by life, but there is no reason why that has to be the ONLY explanation.

Re:Bias?

[theblacksun]

No shit sherlock. That's the quote that started this subthread said "looks" rather than "is". I didn't say Mars has life, I said given the current data it is not a fringe possibility anymore.

Don't forget the big glowy thing

[MarkusQ]

Getting out of the Earth's gravity well is only the first problem. Climbing higher in the Sun's (Mars is, after all, farther out) is the second, and the falling into Mars's smaller well is the third. All three of these favour rocks coming our way over rocks going theirs, though non of them strongly enough to say it couldn't happen.

-- MarkusQ

Not a nice place to visit....

[BigBadBus]

First we have farts (methane) on Mars, and now we have cat's piss (ammonia)!

Re:Not a nice place to visit....

[Anonymous Coward]

So you're saying Mars is inhabited by farting cats?

Only if

[Prince Vegeta SSJ4]

it uses Ammonia-D, otherwise it will have alot of streaks!

Very interesting...

[polyp2000]

The prospect of active volcanoes is a surefire indicator that there are sources of heat. That means there could well be regions on mars with liquid water. Warmth + Water are definitely a good start when it comes to the possibility of life. Of course if there are no active volcanoes then whatever is creating and sustaining supplies of ammonia and methane is also very interesting. Either way whether ammonia is coming from volcanos or from a possible source of life both scenarios are good in terms of finding it.

Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Jagasian]

If NASA starts finding life on other planets, many Christian fundamentalists will most likely try to put an end to our space program, just as they have tried and conintue to try to put an end to the teaching of theories of evolution, stem cell research, cloning research, etc.

Remember Galileo Galilei. It can happen again!

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[flmngbrd]

christian fundamentalists can't really do anything other than pray that you be smote.
its the extremists you have to worry about. haven't you heard of extreme bible thumping?

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[synaptic]

I'm not a Christian but I know a lot of them.

I think it's far more likely that Christians will say "see, God is omnipotent and created life there too".

You've got a couple different types: the ones that believe the bible is the end all, be all, written word of the almighty God himself; and the ones who believe the bible is something of a history book, with some metaphorical science sprinkled in genesis and whatnot.

Your second group is likely to believe that the so-called God, in creating the heavens and earth, is responsible for our entire universe and any other life that may exist. The first group will tell you the Earth is 6,000 years old, dinosaurs never existed, and the rest of the universe has no life and is otherwise unimportant.

It's the first group that fights against the theory of evolution, but I think both groups (and me) are concerned about the ethical implications of stem cell and cloning research. I've heard that we no longer have to murder babies to harvest the stem cells -- something about taking it from umbilical cords. That's a good first step.

It's better to be extra careful when fiddling with the very keys to our existance. Does this mean this research shouldn't continue? No. But I'll be pretty pissed (until I'm dead), if some airhead in a lab makes a mistake and wipes out mankind.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[pjkundert]

Christians generally don't have a problem with life on mars, or anywhere else for that matter. Belief in the work of the Christ, and theories about exactly how and when things came into being are pretty independent of eachother.

Please don't confuse the term "Luddite Maniac" with "Christian".

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[synaptic]

At any rate, my point was that Christians won't kill NASA when they find life on other planets.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[cephyn]

And there's history of Christian thinkers wondering about life on other worlds going back to the Middle Ages. Fascinating stuff that isn't studied much.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Strange_Attractor]

haven't you heard of extreme bible thumping?
Isn't Xtreme Bible Thumping (XBT) where pairs of bible-thumpers work together to get the thumping done more quickly? They subsist on Mountain Dew and Snickers bars? I think there's an O'Reilly book or two on it...

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[demaria]

There is also nothing in the Bible that says life in itself is unique to this world. The only thing it says is that man has dominance over the other creatures of the Earth. That doesn't give us an unlimited license to abuse or torture lower lifeforms, but I think it justifies our selective killing and domestication as needed for food, safety, work or companionship (by way of Christian/Jewish dogma. Other religions may disagree with this, but I'm sticking with the Christian belief system at hand).

I think if we found advanced intelligent life on other planets, that would lead to a bunch of interesting religious questions. Do they have dominance over us, or do we have dominance over the non-intelligent life on their planet? Would we be permitted to interfere with said planet's development? Do they have souls? Finding non-intelligent life, like bacteria or simple organisms, would be much less controversial. After all, if God has the power to create life on Earth, he certainly has the power to do so elsewhere.

I believe the Pope was quoted as saying if there was life on other planets, those lifeforms would also be the children of God. I don't know if Pope John Paul II made any formal declarations whether it'd be in conflict with Bible teachings, or if life on other planets was possible/impossible by religious dogma, but I have a feeling he'd side on the possible side. Didn't he recently say creationism and evolution aren't in complete conflict (despite what a small group of highly vocal people claim)?

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[RobinH]

I've heard that we no longer have to murder babies to harvest the stem cells -- something about taking it from umbilical cords. That's a good first step.

You also need to realize that it was scientists who came up with this procedure, not religious nuts. What have religions done for us other than caused death? Not to say scientists are off the hook on that one (given the rapid advances in military technology), but I'd say science is about even on the moral scale. Religion has a major deficit.

Life expectancy is up around 80 years. Quality of life is also much better. Productivity is through the roof. Our understanding of the universe has increased substantially. Science did that, while religions were trying to hold us back.

Has religion succeeded in saving our souls? Give me proof that it has saved even one. Scratch that... start by proving that a soul exists.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Anonymous Coward]

You make it sound like the first and second groups have the same amount of power and influence. To point out the obvious, the first group (the Bible is literal fact group) happens to run all three branches of the US government, including both houses of the elected branch. The other group mostly just hangs around assuming rational thinking will infiltrate the former group. This blind faith (and I use this word very intentionally) in the inherent power of rationalism is what prevents rational Christians from doing anything to soften the impact of their irrational counterparts.

Which, I might add, is why Christians have got a bad name in some places. When you've got fanatics on the loose running your country, the meek shall inherit the shaft. In other words, by not being part of the solution, rational Christians are, quite correctly, assumed to be part of the problem.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Duhavid]

I would tend toward disagreement.

Anyone that (IMHO) believes in what the bible teaches AND is corrupt enough to gain elected office in this day and age has got to know what is coming to him / her / it self. And it isnt good.

Course, after saying all that, we do have Jimmy Carter to contend with. He doesnt seem to fit my theory very well. The exception that proves the rule?

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[flmngbrd]

every year they have the x-pray. its the ultimate in extreme praying. the final event is usually a battle royale between every religion to see which will reign supreme for the year.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Anonymous Coward]

Technically, the Bible only records the fall of man on this planet. Jesus only had to die for the salvation of humans on this planet. We have no knowledge of the spiritual condition of life on other planets, so we cannot assume that they are in a "fallen" state, and there is certainly no need to proseletyze them, since they are not descendants of Adam, hence not under the curse.

However, if humans have been abducted and taken to live on other planets, that is a different situation altogether. *smirk*

If there is sentient life elsewhere in the universe with spiritual and physical components of their being (lets assume the Biblical perspective of humans, and of God, for the sake of the hypothesis). Then if the God of the Bible is consistent (as Christians believe He is) then He would also provide the righteous and just treatment of those beings, as well, within the frame of reference of their existence, and without the intervention of humans when/if we meet them.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[equex]

You must buy either all or none of the christian package. you cannot pick out the spots you like about jesus and call yourself a christian. either you belive everything from genesis to the revelation or you belive nothing of it.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[jcuervo]

Oh, God.

Flashback to the Simpsons:

Homer: Oh, great. Mormons.
Kodos/Kang: Actually, we're Quantum Presbyterians.

Y'know, I can just picture "first contact".

Martians: We come in peace.
Earthlings: That's just super. Have you heard about our lord and saviour Jesus Christ?

Use your imagination for the rest...

Maritans: The being you knew as Jesus Christ was actually Knarrrle of the fourth Martian expeditionary force...
Earthlings: LIES! PREPARE FOR WAR, BLASPHEMOUS LITTLE GREEN DUDES!

[ Thus begins a 40,000 year war]

Wow, I've got way too much time on my hands.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[BgJonson79]

That's complete and utter crap. Good God, at the Catholic high school I attended, the frickin' priest during Freshman theology said the Bible was not to be taken literally.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Anonymous Coward]

Life expectancy is up around 80 years. Quality of life is also much better. Productivity is through the roof. Our understanding of the universe has increased substantially. Science did that, while religions were trying to hold us back.

Many many many scientists throughout history have been scientists. Do the names of Copernicus, Keppler, Descartes, Newton, Galileo, Boyle, Faraday, Mendel, Planck or Einstein sound familiar? Your predefined sets of Christians vs Scientists are certainly not exclusive. Often, Christians have pursued science as a means of discovering God's creation. In fact, the deeper scientists dig, the more complex and ordered creation is revealed to be.

Perhaps you should read The Case for a Creator by Lee Strobel. This is an excellent book, that interviews many prominent scientists, and finds that the more you follow the scientific evidence, the more you see a design in creation.

What have religions done for us other than caused death?... Religion has a major deficit.

Throughout history, Christians have formed groups such as Catholic Social Services, the Salvation Army, World Vision, YMCA and Habitat for Humanity. Christians minister and serve in third world countries, distributing food and medicine. We collect and distribute food, and offer shelters for the homeless here in the US. Groups such as the Boy Scouts were formed as Christian groups.

Tomorrow night, I am staying at our church overnight with homeless families as part of IHN (Interfaith Hospitaility Network). Every six weeks or so, the families stay at our church and we bring them food, play with the kids and talk with the parents. Church members regularly bring in clothes and toys for the families to have, and donate furniture when families finally secure their own housing.

Christianity has NEVER been about holding someone back, unless you include moral depravity and sin. Caring about one another and treating them as equals IS the Christian way. But throughout history, we have still fallen short of the example given to us by Christ. Who better than us to acknowledge that we have fallen short of God's expectations. But, we do keep trying.

Thus, I find your comment that we "religious nuts" have never contributed to society, only holding it back... to be quite a bigoted statement.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[neurojab]

>What have religions done for us other than caused death?

The really odd thing is that all major religions preach peace over war, yet somehow people still get it in their heads that their god wills them to kill people. Take any war: if you look at the root cause, why these people are really mad at each other, it's always some form of economic wealth.

I wouldn't say that religion has caused death. Rather it has given people who already want to kill each other, for economic reasons, a reprieve. If a deity wants a person to kill someone, how could the killer possibly suffer consequences? Combine a population with that mentality with a leader that wants a piece of land, and you've got a dangerous combination. Religion isn't bad per se, but it is a dangerous power to wield.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Anonymous Coward]

If some of these other planets are in a fallen state, does that mean that Jesus has to do the whole son of ma..alien role all over again or maybe that is a job that gets farmed out to the newbs. Maybe his new brother Orgblat has to take his turn. However, prior experience may be a plus for that job.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Rostin]

The advances you so hastily ascribe to "science" stand on the shoulders of Christendom. Contrary to your backwards and indeed bigotted view of "religion," the positive influence of Christianity on ideas like individual rights and the scientific method (many/most of the original scientists WERE "religious nuts" who started doing science because of the conviction that the God who made everything is rational and so the laws of nature are also rational and discoverable) is hard to miss.

"Science" has rarely met with any significant resistence from "religion" in the Western world (please do some research before you trot out stories about Galileo - something besides Russel's account or accounts derived from his), and science has done far less for us than you might think.

Science has not, for example, made people generally more happy. It's just replaced the old miseries with new ones.

At least Marx could call religion the "opiate of the masses."

Typically the people who have gone most astray and done the most harm were, like you, anti-religious. The 20th century was the bloodiest in the history of the world (some would say bloodier than all other centuries combined) mostly because of men like Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot, who murdered many tens of millions of people. The worst criminals apparently motivated by religion (who are most of the time motivated by greed or megalomania, in reality) pale by comparison, and stand out because their acts contrast so strongly with the reality of what they claim to represent.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Anonymous Coward]

If that was true, wouldn't Christians be putting up major opposition to SETI projects, sending Chuck Berry records out into space, movies with aliens, etc.???

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[ceejayoz]

Why not?

Jesus picked the bits of Jewish theology he liked, and still called himself a Jew.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[RobinH]

Tomorrow night, I am staying at our church overnight with homeless families as part of IHN (Interfaith Hospitaility Network). Every six weeks or so, the families stay at our church and we bring them food, play with the kids and talk with the parents. Church members regularly bring in clothes and toys for the families to have, and donate furniture when families finally secure their own housing.

How's that working for ya? Has the tiny violin army fixed the homeless problem? I think I'll put more "faith" in improved construction methods and a better understanding of economics any day.

It's too bad that anyone who wants your help, also has to submit to being converted to your religion.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you're missing the inherent logical fallacy of believing what the Bible literally says.

The problem is that the Bible is self-contradictory. It just is. Rational Christians work around this by believing that the Bible is a collection of stories, histories, parables, and lessons that have been handed down through oral tradition and have gone through multiple translations, so you're supposed to focus on the underlying meaning and not sweat the details.

Irrational Christians resolve this problem by inventing their own interpretations of the Bible, sometimes wildly convoluted and self-contradictory in their own right, which stray a long way from the underlying message of the Bible but attempt to reconcile the details.

So an irrational Christian can have a belief system which they call Christianity which allows (for example) the torture, murder, and rape of imprisoned civilians, and they don't think there's anything wrong with it. If you think you're fighting a war for God against the forces of Satan, you can fly planes into buildings or strap electrodes to an innocent peasant, and you can think you'll be rewarded in the end.

Sad but true. I'm not even a Christian and I nearly cry when I think of the things people stick Christ's name on. If he were still alive the shame would kill him.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Eamon C]

Christianity falls flat when we meet other intelligent beings. Why? Because Jesus died for *our* sins (and the "original sin" for which we can thank Adam and Eve).

So we meet these intelligent aliens, and you know *some* nutjobs are gonna try to convert them. On what grounds? "Jesus died for our sins, but if you don't believe him you'll go to hell anyway"?

What if these aliens are smarter and stronger and better than us in every way? That's gonna throw a monkeywrench in the whole "made in God's image" thing, isn't it? I can already see the televangelists claiming that they're minions of Satan.

God, I hope we never meet intelligent aliens.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[neurojab]

>"Science" has rarely met with any significant resistence from "religion" in the Western world.

I agree with much of your post, but that's a very silly statement. What about stem cell research? What about the John Scopes Monkey trial, which some (in the south) still insist isn't over? The Big Bang (somehow opposed to creation)?

It's really not hard to find examples of religion opposing science, especially when you talk about religious groups that take the bible literally.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Just Some Guy]

You've got a couple different types: the ones that believe the bible is the end all, be all, written word of the almighty God himself; and the ones who believe the bible is something of a history book, with some metaphorical science sprinkled in genesis and whatnot.

I think you've over-simplified significantly, although I agree with your overall message. I was raised in a Southern Baptist church and still practice that faith, which includes believing that the Bible is the literal word of God.

Having said that, I don't believe that the Bible contains all truth. For example, it leaves out molecular genetics, quantum physics, and general relativity, although I know that those exist. I also believe in Creation, although I think it took several billion years rather than 7 days (the Bible uses statements like "a day is as a thousand years" all the time, and if you use "thousand" as a placeholder for "any number so big that people from 2,500 years ago couldn't comprehend it", then I don't see why "7 days" can't mean "mind bogglingly long period of time").

Belief in the Bible as the direct words of God is no indicator that someone doesn't also believe in and value the scientific method. The latter tells me how I got here. The former tells me why.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Just Some Guy]

You must buy either all or none of the christian package.

That's fine. I believe that the Bible is the word of God. Having read quite a bit of it, I don't recall seeing:

"Yay, be it known that the manner of Creation was Spontaneous Generation. The manner of Creation was not that of Darwinian Evolution, neither that of Random Genetic Mutation."

Show me where Jesus said that the world was created in seven 24-hour periods and I'll reconsider. However, I'm fairly certain that you won't find it.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Anonymous Coward]

> Many many many scientists throughout history have been scientists.

No kidding?

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Santarelli]

I believe the comment was not aimed at Christians in general, but specifically at Christian Fundamentalists who espouse a belief in the literal meaning of the Bible. Besides, with so many different belief systems and sects claiming themselves as "Christian," how can anybody say what Christians "generally" believe? What Would Jesus Do? Probably weep.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[somekindofuniguy]

Christianity does not collapse as soon as any intelligent being besides humanity is discovered. Note God Himself, Angels and Demons are all intelligent beings. Also note the vaugue (and interestingly, unique) reference to four "living beings" in Revelation (also note that this is translated very differently between versions of the Bible). What follows from this? Jesus died for the sin of man - other intelligent life need not apply. There is no salvation for (undeniably intelligent) demons.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[somekindofuniguy]

Sola Scriptura is far from universally accepted, and you won't find Jesus preaching it either. My "Christian package" includes a variety of influences... the Bible is just a very important one.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Hellsbells]

There's an interesting article in Wired (from a while ago), titled "The Pope's Astrophysicist", which touches on extra-terrestial life, and the Pope's belief in evolution.

Link

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[meringuoid]

On the third day he rose again... he ascended into heaven...

... and is now incarnate on the planet Traal, anxiously wondering how he's going to pull off a resurrection given that the favoured form of execution there happens to be 'feeding the offender to the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast'.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, no. Very few of the homeless families we take in are Christians. And we do not "convert them" try to convert them. In fact, as part of our church's involvement, we're not allowed to. Now if they ask why we're serving, that's something different. But overall what we do is called compassion.

And no, we haven't "fixed the problem". Jesus says the "poor will always be with us". But that doesn't mean that we stop trying to help. Quite the contrary. I know that I am making a difference.

If I was the cynic that you seem to be, I could turn around and ask you, "so has the problem gone away by throwing more money at social problems?" (The answer BTW is no... otherwise I wouldn't be needed tonight.)

I still have a problem in that I can't understand why you are so hostile to Christians. I mention why I happen to try to help others, and you put me down. Go back and reread your comment and see what I mean.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Anonymous Coward]

Christians only object to babies being murdered and harvested for their cells (yes, it does sound like something out of a sick horror movie!).

Most of the successes in the stem cell arena are actually in the area of ADULT stem cell research. In reality it seems as if the pro-choice (really pro-death to infants) are merely looking for something to justify their position.

Also, the Big Bang is more in line with Christian ideas than the ideas previous to that. Most of Greek society and earlier believed that the universe around them had always existed. It was only the "religious nuts" who believed that the universe had a beginning.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Anonymous Coward]

I fail to see why you should attack me personally, instead of debate with me logically... unless you see the truth of my statements.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Raven_Stark]

As a Freethinker, I'll guess Christians will generally believe whatever best spreads Christianity. If they go along with science they look less like knuckle dragging Luddites which would be attractive to some. If they contradict science they can pull the "us versus the evil world" thing and more strongly bind the cult together. They'll find scriptures to support whatever view just as they found them to support slavery, mass murder of Jews, and Communism. Those ways of thinking didn't profit them so now they are rather pro-black freedom, unconditionally love Jews, and are often Republican. Religion is no more about truth than a virus is about killing people, it's life whether it be meme or carbon based. No evil genius will direct it, it is the miracle of evolution.

Just so there is no confusion, I hate Christianity but love the Christian.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[jb_02_98]

I almost agree completely with your post. I like how you mentioned that the bible doesn't contain everything. I would assume then that you would agree with me when I say that there could very easily be more scripture that we haven't yet recieved. I believe God is a god of order and that he wouldn't let us stay confused. That would mean that we should be expecting/ looking for more scripture to clarify. What's your opinion on this?

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[jb_02_98]

Anyone that studies the Bible would know that it isn't self contradicting. I don't mean to argue with you, but you should realize that the bible has been translated and in the translation, many things have been unfortunatly lost (or changed). So as many things appear to be contradicting, if you look at how they may have been in original context, it isn't confusing at all. But, just to make sure, God has given us even other ways of knowing the truth (a 100 percent dependance on the bible for knowledge isn't how to know the truth of all things.) God is smarter though and still gets the truth through to some and the others usually reject it, but that's how life goes.

I agree with you though, it is sad what some people do in tha name of God or the name of Jesus Christ. Something that I have found out though has been that they don't really believe in what they do. They do it because they have found an excuse that they can pull from. It would be better to say that when people believe that they have a valid excuse they can... (put whatever action here.)

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Just Some Guy]

I believe God is a god of order and that he wouldn't let us stay confused. That would mean that we should be expecting/ looking for more scripture to clarify. What's your opinion on this?

I don't have one, except that perhaps that's what modern science is - the revelation of the mechanics of the universe that God created.

Re:Christian fundamentalists will end NASA

[Ed_Moyse]

WHICH religious nuts? At any one moment in time you can probably find a "religious nut" who believe whatever you might wish for. And as for your assertation that it was only the religious nuts who believed that the universe had a beginning ... bullshit. Neither you nor I know what the 'common man' thought, but I bet that an idea as intuitive and obvious as the notion that the universe had a beginning, had made a fair few rational people wonder as well.

Mars is a big place...

[exp(pi*sqrt(163))]

...with an area of over 1014 m2. And this is a small amount of ammonia. There could be any number of vents where ammonia is being released from volcanic activity underground without an active volcano being discovered. Given that we've only looked at a tiny part of the Martian surface it's a little premature to be calling 'life'.

Re:Mars is a big place...

[1984]

1014 m2?

You mean 32 metres on a side? I reckon it's bigger than a kids' playground, isn't it?

Re:Mars is a big place...

[exp(pi*sqrt(163))]

Stupid slashdot doesn't understand the ^markup.

How doe meteorites travel?

[carn1fex]

Could someone explain how meteorites travel from one planets surface to another? Are they ejected during large meteor impacts? That must be some impact to send a boulder 100 miles or whatever beyond orbit. And if large impacts are the reason, wouldnt the holocaust of the impact kill any life on the boulder?

The answer...cats

[mysterious_mark]

A dry sandy place with only ammonia and methane, sounds like a giant cat box, but where are the martian kitties? M

Life vs. the Volcano

[doconnor]

Of the few planet like bodies we've observed we know of two with active volcanoes (Earth and Io) and one with life. However, we haven't really looked hard for life and there are several places where we are planning to look, including Mars and Europa.

While it would be far more exciting to find life then lava, I'm not sure the data backs the assumption that volcanoes are far more common then life.

We know there are only 2 planets/moons with volcanoes, making them a little rare. We know there is 1 planets/moons with life and serveral unknown. Our very palimerary evidence suggests volcanoes are twice as common as life.

We have evidence that life appeared on Earth as soon (by geological time scales) as it was possible to sustain it. There is debate on whether the life experiments on Viking come out positive or negative. Now we have methane and ammonia in the atmosphere.

Perhaps it is our arrogance that insists that we are so special, life of other planets is unlikely.

Re:Life vs. the Volcano

[JessLeah]

Palimerary evidence? What is that?

Oh, you mean preliminary.

Why is it that it's suddenly perfectly acceptable to be unable to write English, and pedants like me who care about correctness get downmodded? Is it really that cool to be ignorant?

Re:Life vs. the Volcano

[Anonymous Coward]

What about Venus? Without checking, I was pretty sure Venus had a very active volcanic surface.

Re:Life vs. the Volcano

[Anonymous Coward]

Why is it that it's suddenly perfectly acceptable to be unable to write English, and pedants like me who care about correctness get downmodded? Is it really that cool to be ignorant?

No, its just that uncool to correct spelling and grammar when the vast majority simply overlook it. Most users are more concerned with content rather than structure here, being that Slashdot is a BLOG, not an English class. Of the two comments, yours and the parents, it is obvious that his added to the conversation, and yours simply detracts from it.

PLEASE someone mod this spelling/grammar nazi down (then me too).

Re:Life vs. the Volcano

[transient]

Normally I think being a grammar nazi is stupid, but in this case the error was bad enough that the sentence didn't make sense. Yeah, it's annoying when someone writes "loose" instead of "lose," or when they're confused about their theres. But palimerary? This is beyond poor spelling. I honestly wasn't certain about what the word was supposed to be.

Re:Life vs. the Volcano

[Rostin]

Perhaps it is our arrogance that insists that we are so special, life of other planets is unlikely.

Possibly. It's also true that consideration of the possibility of extra-terrestrial life has taken on a religious character.

The truth is, we don't know where life came from, and that bugs some people on a level deeper than just scientific curiosity. If life is so common as to show up twice in the same solar system, many will feel about it the same sentiment expressed by (I think) Huxley when he said that Darwin made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist.

Re:Life vs. the Volcano

[Anonymous Coward]

That would be at least three to one volcanoes/life since the dead volcanoes on Mars would count.

The fact that the planet in question HAS had vulcanism in the past could bias such as the more probable explanation.

Re:Life vs. the Volcano

[doconnor]

There are no known active volconoes on Venus. Like Mars there are many extinct volcanoes, however I was talking about active volcanoes and active life.

The question of past life and past volcanoes is separate.

Re:Life vs. the Volcano

[caswelmo]

You know what, it kind of annoys me when people misspell things. But I'm not exactly Mr. Perfect Grammar. I always try and look back over my posts to see if I misspelled anything (or if it just doesn't make sense). However, as this sentence suggests, I usually don't have a clue where to put commas.

Regardless, this site isn't about spelling correctly or using correct grammar. It's about exchanging ideas & opinions on technology. The only thing proper English gains you is a little more credibility. I knew what the poster was getting at with the faulty spelling of "preliminary", and I'm guessing that everyone else did as well.

So chill out folks.

P.S. Let's remember that we're not all native English speakers, either. And I know all of you liberals out there want to give everybody a fair shot at feeling good about themselves. ;^P

Re:Life vs. the Volcano

[JessLeah]

As I've said in the past, the most egregious errors in English writing come from native English speakers-- notably Americans.

Re:Life vs. the Volcano

[plaa]

We know there is 1 planets/moons with life and serveral unknown. Our very palimerary evidence suggests volcanoes are twice as common as life.

You can't use the Earth as a data point for existance of life alone, because Earth has no option of being dead: if the Earth was dead, we would not be here wondering about it.

Re:Life vs. the Volcano

[K3lvin]

I think this is because English (and all germanic languages) is not spelled as it is written (unlike for example Fenno-Ugric languages) so native English speakers learn their language by hearing it, when non-native English speakers learn it word-by-word. That's why American/Brittish people make more stupid mistakes than non-native English speakers.

Re:Life vs. the Volcano

[Peaceful_Patriot]

Well said.

Re:Life vs. the Volcano

[pklinken]

Of the few planet like bodies we've observed we know of two with active volcanoes (Earth and Io) and one with life. However, we haven't really looked hard for life and there are several places where we are planning to look, including Mars and Europa.

Hello! I'm from Europe!
There's life here bloody americans!

Re:Life vs. the Volcano

[Anonymous Coward]

Not to be a pedant, but the languages are Finno-Ugric, not Fenno-Ugric.

Also, English is a poor example of a Germanic language. While Danish is admittedly also not phonetically spelled, German has very predictable pronunciation, once you know a few rules. Icelandic, too, is pretty predictable, although admittedly the number of rules you need to learn are um... more numerous.

English doesn't have any rules by which you can accurately predict pronunciation, but that's due to its rather diverse linguistic heritage, and the fact that it essentially is VERY far removed from its Germanic roots, having been so extremely influenced by French in the early second millenium.

Re:Life vs. the Volcano

[Anonymous Coward]

British is spelled with one "t" moron. :)

Re:Life vs. the Volcano

[Anonymous Coward]

Why did you pick that one word? That post is full of errors. Maybe you aren't as good as you think you are at discovering mistakes?

• planet like bodies = planet-like bodies
• find life then lava = find life than lava
• more common then life = more common than life
• there is 1 planets/moons with life = there is 1 planet/moon with life
• and serveral unknown = and several unknown
• palimerary evidence = preliminary evidence
• geological time scales = geological timescales
• life of other planets = life on other planets

And those are just the obvious ones. I'm sure I could come up with 10 more picky mistakes (ie, "as it was possible to sustain it." should be "as it was possible to sustain."). The house has burned to the ground, and you think you're smart for pointing out that the front door isn't there anymore. That's pretty funny.

Re:Life vs. the Volcano

[eam]

> this site isn't about spelling correctly or using
> correct grammar

Right! It's about arguing with people who correct spelling and grammar... ...What? Technology? Since when?

There will never be proof of anything.

[Zapdos]

We know we have already contaminated Mars. This could just be evidence that the clean room environments we built the Mars crasher ^M^M^M^M^M^M^M polar explorers in, were not clean.

For the conspiricist:
Was there a sinister (living) payload in the polar explorers? There is a lot of funding to be gained.

Re:There will never be proof of anything.

[Anonymous Coward]

Why'd this get modded "funny" instead of bloody "insightful"?

Re:Underground lava seems more likely.,, or...

[mikael]

... somebody cleaned the sensor array with "Windex" prior to mission launch.

Gassy

[bnewendorp]

Mars: I fart in your general direction!

Oink

[onyx pi]

Ammonia on Mars could be indicative of pigs.
Those flesh colored swines would blend in perfectly with the surroundings.

I can see the headlines already:
"World hunger eliminated, by sending starving people sent to Mars. Haliburton stock reaches $1000 a share"

They come

[Anonymous Coward]

"The chances of aliens coming from Mars
Where a million to one
But still...
they come!!"

Ammonia, Windows

[HermanZA]

and viruses, sort of goes together doesn't it?

byproducts

[MenTaLguY]

(subscripts/superscripts omitted because of dumb slashdot HTML limitations)

If all the hydrogen atoms were knocked loose and took their electrons with them, you'd get:

2NH3 => N2 + 3H2

So, hydrogen and nitrogen.

Maybe more likely though you'll just lose a hydrogen ion and end up with an NH2- ion, which could recombine with other compounds in the atmosphere to form various amines (which themselves would be subject to breakdown in UV).

Generally whatever happens you're likely to be left with molecular nitrogen and some other stuff eventually.

Re:byproducts

[Anonymous Coward]

They did lie us telling "OH2(water)" instead of "NH2- ion".

They'd changed N by O.

Confussion is not possible!!!

Re:byproducts

[MenTaLguY]

H2O would be the fate of two of those "liberated" hydrogen atoms if they met some oxygen in other compounds. That'd fall under "other stuff".

At least we're not still blameing the cows!

[ElDuderino44137]

Hey There,

I remember back in the day ...

We were told that someone looking for intelligent life may search for bovine gas!
That is, cow toot.

They would go on to say,
this composes a significant portion of the spectrum coming from this planet.

Magnificent!

We blame the cows for our flatulence.

And then in similar egocentric fashion ...
we assume that intelligent life will seek us out based on this thing...
we avoid to the point ...
that we need to blame it on the cows :)

Cheers,
--The Dude

Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

Young Master writes "Just seen this story on good old Auntie Beeb, apparently traces of ammonia have been found in the Martian atmosphere. Ammonia doesn't last long on Mars, so it must be constantly replenished - it could be active volcanoes (none yet found), or it could indicate life..." also none yet found

Nice job Mods

[Excelsior]

What I've learned from this thread is that to be modded up you need to have extensive credible knoweledge of geology and chemistry, or you need to post any excerpt from South Park's Terrance & Phillip.

Re:Nice job Mods

[gekkotron]

After that, it has to be said:

I, for one, welcome our new Martian unclefucker overlords.

"just seen"? Hellllllloooo yokel.

[gosand]

No better way to point out that you are a redneck than to say you "just seen" something. Hilarious, in a tragic sort of way.

Active Volcano?

[john_smith_45678]

From what I've heard (and obviously nobody else here), Mars doens't have a molten core. How could it have volcanoes?

Re:Active Volcano?

[dunsel]

From the article:

But future missions could include sensors to analyse the ammonia to determine if it has a biological or volcanic origin. Lava deposited on to the surface, or released underground, could produce the gas.

But, so far, no active volcanic hotspots have been detected on the planet by the many spacecraft currently in orbit.

So, as we can see, there are MANY things that could put amonia on Mars, but none of them happen on Mars. We haven't found active volcanoes, comet impacts, or anything of the type.

What we haven't been able to detect, and thus rule out, is life in the form of bacteria. So it is the most likely cause in my book.

Re:Active Volcano?

[kryptKnight]

Earth doesn't have a molten either because their are hundreds of billions of tons of pressure on it making the core to dense to flow, lava however comes from the mantle. Sounds like someone learned their geology from The Core.

Re:Active Volcano?

[john_smith_45678]

Really. What are your references?

Maybe they clean windows with Linux

[mangu]

Like this.

But is it intelligent?

[TheEmpyrean]

I'm still trying to find intelligent life on Earth

Yeah sure they have life on Mars

[Bloodlent]

in... uh... Japan!

Meteors and Comets

[b-baggins]

--
"There are no known ways for ammonia to be present in the Martian atmosphere that do not involve life," a US Space Agency (Nasa) scientist told BBC News Online.
--

That's just bunk. Ammonia is a very common compound in the outer solar system. Ammonia can get formed like crazy without life being present; it's a very simple chemical to create abiotically.

A decent sized comet impact could deposit enough ammonia in the soil to account for the amounts being detected just from simple outgassing.

Judging from the smell...

[qtone42]

...of my technical advisor's litterbox, that life could consist or stealthy, rust-colorerd felines.

--QTone, not French

It was me...

[Anonymous Coward]

I farted (methane).. it was kinda messy, so I tried to clean it up (ammonia)

Mars is alive?

[dunsel]

"There are no known ways for ammonia to be present in the Martian atmosphere that do not involve life"

But then the article continues on to say that it could be due to volcanic activity.

Since when did volcanoes count as life?

Re:Mars is alive?

[Ill_Omen]

The article also says that they know of no active volcanoes. Therefore, there are no currently "known" ways of producing ammonia. Of course, they haven't discovered Life yet either.

Alient ammonia and methane equals ...

[Anonymous Coward]

I just like to say "alien pee".

Don't forget the methane. So now we have alien pee and alien farts!

lot of iron oxide there...

[zogger]

..which means there used to be a lot of oxygen there. There are still remnants of water, some evidence anyway. At one time it was nicer there, with a better atmosphere.

I think there's still microbial life there, and higher forms used to exist. Just a feeling, no other decent evidence.

Re:"just seen"? Hellllllloooo yokel.

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree one of my huge pet peeves.

off-topic troll-feeding

[dR.fuZZo]

I've heard that we no longer have to murder babies to harvest the stem cells...

Oh, please! Nobdy murders babies to harvest stem cells. Harvesting stem cells is an added bonus to murdering babies! It's like, hey, I got that baby murdered (awesome!) and then I get free stem cells to boot (woo-woo!) It's win-win!

Re:off-topic troll-feeding

[Anonymous Coward]

LOL

And it matters there is life because....

[hudsong]

Why does it actually matter if life is found on another planet in this solar system other than earth? Does that mean mars will ever be habitable to humans? Will there ever be enough resources or enough technology to be able to send people anywhere but to the moon and back? Sure, I can see the interest it triggers, especially in the groups that invested billions in sending probes over there to have a look but I still don't see the point. Just a short time ago a new whale was discovered! Many new mammals are discovered every year! Thousands of acres of land, along with all the new animals and plants living there, are being destroyed while the rocket scientists at NASA sit in their chairs and ponder about amonia being found on a desolate planet, far away. The thing people need to focus on is the conservation of out OWN planet, our ONLY planet, not scientific research on another planet. Why try to explore space when we have no idea what is in our own oceans? I am sure lots of people will be infuriated at this statement but it is the truth and no matter how hard you deny it, we will eventually all have to accept it, or die.

Re:And it matters there is life because....

[payndz]

Because spaceships are cooler than submarines, obviously!

Still, at least you're pro-exploration on Earth rather than a 'how can we spend all this money when there are children starving?' type. There's more than enough money and resources and food to go around - it's just unevenly distributed. If people and nations stopped being assholes to each other, who knows what we could have accomplished by now, on Earth *and* in space?

Re:And it matters there is life because....

[Anonymous Coward]

You must realize that it is entirely possible that discoveries about Mars or other planets could theoretically change our understanding of our own planet. In fact this is often a major motivation for alot of these scientists. So really they are doing what you want, maybe just not in the direct way that you hope. But there are plenty of other people to help with that.

Re:And it matters there is life because....

[Anonymous Coward]

And will the assholes stop? I think we will have to live with them a little while longer -- err -- some centuries? Forever?

Why wait? Why put sticks in the wheels of good people, who want space travel to be a fact, in hope of paradise on earth? It isn't gonna happen any time soon. Travelling in space has more good in it than trying to stop aggressors. Trying to stop aggressors creates more aggressors, as usually it's only a bunch of aggressors that wants to stop them.... (sigh) Going to space might actually work for peace!

Space travel could unify humans on earth more, like globalization has done up til now. I think we're on a good path here - space travel fits in the global picture and makes us more connected.

And don't forget, when could humans only do one thing! There are huge resources of money going around - a few billions put in space won't matter a thing on world starvation, poverty or any other situation. We each have two hands, and there's 6 billion people on this planet. Calculate.

Re:And it matters there is life because....

[Anonymous Coward]

Will there ever be enough resources or enough technology to be able to send people anywhere but to the moon and back?

Are you retarded? Have you never looked in a history book? Were you educated in a luddite cult?

100 years ago we had just learned to fly through our own atmosphere. 50 years later, we landed a man on the moon. But yeah, that's where technology ends. There is no more technology. Can't get any more advanced than that. We'll never figure out anything new or make any more breakthroughs. We shouldn't even bother to try anything more than we already know.

Re:And it matters there is life because....

[g0bshiTe]

Why wait? Why put sticks in the wheels of good people, who want space travel to be a fact, in hope of paradise on earth? It isn't gonna happen any time soon. Travelling in space has more good in it than trying to stop aggressors. Trying to stop aggressors creates more aggressors, as usually it's only a bunch of aggressors that wants to stop them.... (sigh) Going to space might actually work for peace! Space travel could unify humans on earth more, like globalization has done up til now. I think we're on a good path here - space travel fits in the global picture and makes us more connected.

Parent this poster has a point, why stop them why wait. Let them search for life and resources away from Earth, perhaps then you would find the balance you were talking about when the zealots are gulping their own piss from "water reclamation machines" breathing scrubbed oxygen, and not having to shave from the mega doses of cosmic radiation.

Don't get me wrong I'm all for exploration of any type inner and outerspace. It's how we learn, and evovle.

I'm also a realist and I don't think we will see people living their entire lives off world in our lifetime.

Though with cloning I could be wrong. This is truely the area we should focus.
Is it cheaper to use natural resources to build a ship to withstand radiation, not to mention put it in space or build it there, or would a genetically engineered human resistant to radiation and bred for space travel/life be more feasable?

Marinate on that awhile!

Re:And it matters there is life because....

[hudsong]

Sorry, I'm only a 15 year old with my own opinions and hypothoses.

ammonia on mars??

[Anonymous Coward]

Or is someone just cooking "Meth". Trying to take Iowa's claim to fame of having the highest number of meth labs.

Re:"just seen"? Hellllllloooo yokel.

[Anonymous Coward]

Not using correct punctuation when nitpicking? Priceless.

The source

[c0d3h4x0r]

...it could be active volcanoes (none yet found), or it could indicate life...

...or it could be Mr. Clean's evil hideout!

As usual, Steve Martin has the answer.

[Syncdata]

According to the index, on page 22.

I highly recommend anyone looking for 45 minutes of hilarity to pick up this book.

Terran microbes?

[Anonymous Coward]

more plausible than microbes hoarding nitrogen.

Perhaps this isn't so implausible... perhaps us Terrans didn't do such a hot job getting every last piece of equipment 100% sanitized. Possibly, a resilient microrganism had been transplanted with a previous probe/rover, taken root in the environment, and started replicating.

Alternatively, might there be a chance that the rover is "smelling" its own exhaust? Rubbers could be disintegrating, metals might be catalyzing atmosphere... who knows... it might be remnants of the gasses used to inflate the airbags that deployed on the past rovers? As it was explained to me, the engineers of the previous rovers used systems similar to automotive airbags, which use tablets that, when sufficient electricity is introduced, would rapidly generate nitrogen-based gasses, like nitrous oxide and ammonia.

pedant

[Anonymous Coward]

It is certainly much cooler to get your point across than to assign grades for spelling and punctuation and call posters on the carpet. Until slashdot gets a spell checker on a plain text box, you are fighting a losing battle.

pedant
\Ped"ant\, n. [F. p['e]dant, It. pedante, fr. Gr. ? to instruct, from pai^s boy. See Pedagogue.]
1. A schoolmaster; a pedagogue. [Obs.] --Dryden.

2. One who puts on an air of learning; one who makes a vain display of learning; a pretender to superior knowledge. --Addison.

You can save your verbal caning for the public school boys and post something interesting on topic. Look down your nose at those who cannot spell or use punctuation if you want. BUT QUIT SHOUTING AT THE REST OF US ABOUT IT.

I bet you are a real treat in meetings...

bacteria

[slashdotjunker]

Bacteria sems to be a common thread here. Specifically whether they can live on Mars or not. For those who want to find more information on bacteria living under extremely adverse conditions, they are referred to in scientific literature as extremophiles

I disagree.

[stealth.c]

Going to the moon first would probably make Mars a whole lot more feasible. Launching something from lunar orbit would be a hell of a lot cheaper than launching it from the ground on Earth.

If we can get to the moon, we can more easily get at passing asteroids, which means trillions of dollars in minerals, metals and ore. Build it on the moon, then throw it at Mars at a fraction of the fuel cost.

Now that we're sufficiently off the topic of life on Mars, I shall conclude my post.

oops

[DreadSpoon]

That's just great. Near future:

"We have found life on mars!!!"

Several years later:

"Actually, what we found was Earth life that migrated..."

Which doesn't really have half the wonder. The big question isn't, "Has life gone from Earth to elsewhere?" It's, "Have the conditions to start life occurred elsewhere?"

"Oops, damn; all we found was Earth life that migrated."

Re:oops

[feathertop]

why finding life migrated from earth not wonderful? Life is life, no matter it originated in earth or mars, or moon. BTW: how do you know that the life you find on mars is not migrated from some other planet to earth then to mars?

Re:"just seen"? Hellllllloooo yokel.

[Anonymous Coward]

If you are going to make fun of someone, you could at least use complete sentences.

Re:"just seen"? Hellllllloooo yokel.

[gosand]

If you are going to make fun of someone, you could at least use complete sentences.

Why?

Nasa - ESA

[rilister]

""There are no known ways for ammonia to be present in the Martian atmosphere that do not involve life," a US Space Agency (Nasa) scientist told BBC News Online."

I'm all for co-operation in the world of space exploration, but what is a NASA scientist doing giving the lead quotes on a discovery by a European (ESA) probe?

"Professor Vittorio Formisano, principal investgator for the instrument, is expected to release details of new findings from the PFS at an international conference being held next week in Paris."

Did Nasa just hi-jack ESA's press conference? Or was this lazt journalism from the BBC?

Of course!

[ZipR]

Even space aliens need clean windows and deodorized trash cans!

Re: there is not water, only Amoniaco... NH3

[Anonymous Coward]

They did detect many hydrogen molecules, and they did say yes, there is water.
But, i did say them: there is not water stupid!!!, only Amoniaco NH3!!!

I'd said Amoniaco before, few months ago, here in slashdot :P

open4free ©

Ammonia that replenishes

[g0bshiTe]

Ammonia doesn't last long on Mars, so it must be constantly replenished - it could be active volcanoes (none yet found), or it could indicate life..." Along with the detection of methane, Mars is starting to look a lot less dead than had been supposed.

Sounds to me more like a toilet.

And As A Paradox: Life Is Also Pervasive

[EXTomar]

This paradox has been noted before. As Sean80 notes, life is often far more robust than people realize and will flourish places most would think are completely sterile. Mars is no different...in fact I wouldn't be surprised to find Earth bugs (figurative term, not the hard shelled animals) on still alive on the stuff we've thrown there.

This also creates a small paradox. If life is so robust and there is life on Mars it should be flourishing. By all intents and purposes Mars hasn't changed in a long time. A super stable environment is perfect for life to exploit no matter how hostile we view it. If its home for a martian life form it should love the place adapting itself in a place we would consider unlivable. If life takes a foot hold it will expand and capitalize as much as far as the environment will allow.

I'm not saying that we should be able to kick over a rock and find a martian bug hiding there but I'm saying that if there was life on Mars you should be able to inspect a wide field of the planet and easily find evidence of life. You can look at many small parts of Earth and claim "wow there is no life here" but if you zoom out take several thousands of cubic miles of space you can easily find the presence of life. In the middle of the Pacific ocean there might be nothing living from the sea surface to the mud ocean floor but the fact that the water is holding desolved unstable gases such as O2 is a big indictor that life is out there elsewhere. An actual life form might be hard to find but evidence of life should be all over.

So lets say there is a lifeform that is hearty enough to surive and flourish on Mars. It should flourish in places all sorts of spots on Mars and other lifeforms will rise around it to capitlize on them or some other side effect of them. So where is the evidence they've been there? If there are really ammonia producing martian microbes then they should be producing buckets of the stuff every day and over millions of years should be easy to detect. Is there another process destroying the ammonia that is dumped into the air? Either we have some sort of radical departure from what know is life living on Mars for millions of years...or Mars is really sterile.

Re:are there amount of oxygen's composites?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ammoniaco = NH3
Methane = CH4

Question: is there any molecule with Oxygen (O2)?
Answer: Not.

Question: and, is there water H2O?
Answer: Not, but they, the scientifics and/or the max. authorities lied us saying there are water and life.

open4free ©

When will people give up? Mars is lifeless!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's see.... First we spent decades searching for some form of advanced civilization in mars. Then once mankind took to space and saw that the fabled canals of mars were just the result of natural processes, we spent many more years fantasizing about the fauna and flora that might thrive in mars. By the time Viking landed and we saw that mars actually is a desolate planet, hopes were that might be some kind primitive life hidden under the sand. Nowadays, our aim has lowered itself further still and we're just content to look for primitive microbes. When will people give up and realize there is no life in mars? This doesn't mean that there isn't a lot of science to be done - mars is still an infinitely interesting world even if it is completely lifeless. But I fear this fool's quest for life in Mars is detracting from valuable science that ought to be carried out instead.

*Survival Of The Fittest*

[Arren]

"Do they have dominance over us, or do we have dominance over the non-intelligent life on their planet?"

How a puerile Darwinian hypothetical qualifies as an 'interesting religious question' is beyond me.

Certainly the only 'conflict' between creationism and evolution-derived science is the fear-driven irrationality of a goodly portion of believers in the former.

However, parent post's obsession with some contrived 'dominance' paradigm is a tellingly hierarchial Judeo-Christian oversimplification.

One that also informed the Christian Darwin's own extensions of the implications derived from the data he collected.

...I think [Man's 'dominance'] justifies our selective killing and domestication as needed for food, safety, work or companionship...

That's convenient. However Mankind's intrinsic subsistence on consuming other life is not a unique trait in Earth's ecosystem..... not only natural predators', but also various symbiotic lifeforms' (not to mention any other examples') existence is predicated on their 'dominance' over their subsistence source (i.e., prey).

Definition of "Christian"

[Anonymous Coward]

This one suited the conclave of bishops that, among other things, selected the books of the Bible.

The Nicene Creed

We believe in one God,
the Father, the Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all that is, seen and unseen.

We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ,
the only Son of God,
eternally begotten of the Father,
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made,
of one Being with the Father.
Through him all things were made.
For us and for our salvation
he came down from heaven:
by the power of the Holy Spirit
he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary,
and was made man.
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate;
he suffered death and was buried.
On the third day he rose again
in accordance with the Scriptures;
he ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead,
and his kingdom will have no end.

We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life,
who proceeds from the Father and the Son.
With the Father and the Son he is worshiped and glorified.
He has spoken through the Prophets.
We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church.
We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.
We look for the resurrection of the dead,
and the life of the world to come. Amen.

Interestingly enough, there's nothing at all in there about the literal truth of the entire Bible.

Some people prefer the short form, which also says nothing about Biblical literalism:

The Apostles' Creed

I believe in God, the Father Almighty,
the Creator of heaven and earth,
and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord:

Who was conceived of the Holy Spirit,
born of the Virgin Mary,
suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died, and was buried.

He descended into hell.

The third day He arose again from the dead.

He ascended into heaven
and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty,
whence He shall come to judge the living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy *catholic church,
the communion of saints,
the forgiveness of sins,
the resurrection of the body,
and life everlasting.

Source?

[gidds]

If there is life on Mars, as so many people seem so desperate to prove despite the almost overwhelming lack of evidence, then what's the betting it arrived from Earth on one of our previous probes?

If people put as much effort as they use persuading themselves of extraterrestrial life into making sure we're not contaminating the rest of the solar system, it might be a good deal safer...

Ammonia on Mars...

[Anonymous Coward]

Means there is Ammonia on Mars, face it there is nothing out there. No Zarqan Warrors, no green haired women with 6 breasts who say "show me some more of this Earth thing called kissing".

Its just us an a whole lot of barren rocks and planets.

Keep looking if you must but stop telling the world about the tenious fucking theorys. The rest of us lost intrest a long time ago.

Re: "It's life!"

[grandbonheur]

We humans always project our own traits (ie, life) onto the unknown. It's a hell of a hobble on the frontier sciences.

Re: scandinavia indicates dong

[grandbonheur]

Holy God, that's funny. The dramatic way it looms over all of Europe, so menacingly... dangly...

Why is it most likely life?

[Teahouse]

I have read a bunch of "debunking" below trying to jutify how this is probably NOT a sign of life on Mars, when in fact it is probably the most significant sign yet (moreso than even methane). With the atmospheric and radiation conditions on Mars, Ammonia would only last 2-3 hours in the atmosphere. There is no stableizing factor there. That means that whatever source is producing this ammonia has to be capable of replenishing the entire level being read every 2-3 hours. That is a significant amount!

Some have suggested that this is not significant because ammonia is found in other areas of the solar system. This is true, but in all of those cases, ammonia is being produced and maintained n areas where it is either cryogenically COLD, or where the atmosphere or magnetic field provides some form of radiation shielding. In other words, the conditions on Mars means either life, or volcanos. No third option is possible since it is too warm, and too vulnerable to radiation.

It is most likely not a Martian volcano because most of the seismic, magnetic, and erosive signs seem to point to Mars no longer being capable of volcanic activity. There have been ZERO signs of any volcanic activity by the 5+ orbiting probes that currently are mapping the surface in myriad ways. Besides, the level of ammonia they are finding would require that a volcano of considerable size would have to be completely missed for it to produce this ammonia level.

Life on the other hand, would fit perfectly into this scenario, and if tested by Occam's razor, it is definitely the most likely conclusion. Sub-surface bacteria spread lightly around the equatorial zone could easily produce the levels and consistency these observations have shown.

In a nutshell, this is a very exciting observation that should not be dismissed so easily. Unless the insturments are wrong, or an unlikely volcanic source is found, today is the day we can say that we saw the first real sign that there is life on Mars.

Seems less dead? Its NEVER seemed dead!

[frobnoid]

There was some evidence that Viking found
life on Mars back in the 1970s.

Mars is dying

[arose]

It is official; NASA confirms: Mars is dying. One more crippling spaceship hit the already beleaguered ammonia generating community on Mars when Bureau International des Poids et Mesures confirmed that miles aren't kilometres yet again.

unless...

[Hooya]

the technical device happens to be the bra. then you're really rooting for the device to come "down".

Life on mars...maybe Venus too

[LXAC08]

If you think about it, Venus has a toxic cloud that surrounds it and prevents us from doing any research whatsoever, but wouldn't that theoretically be what would happen if we had a nuclear war, and the toxic clouds engulfed the whole planet? Not only would that mean there's life, but humanoid life.

Ammonia is Simple

[Santarelli]

Ammonia in underground pockets, seeping out; Ammonia by microbial conversion; Matter traveling to and fro in our solar system; Perhaps meteorites or comets (which constantly crash into Mars) could carry ammonia; If we found evidence of one source, would that make the others impossible? Finding ammonia seeping into the Martian atmosphere from one source wouldn't necessarily preclude the others. What if the answer is all of the above?

tell me...

[clayasaurus]

just why is Mr. Clean is so evil?

Re:tell me...

[c0d3h4x0r]

Haven't you seen the commercials? He he leaps off the label, shows off his shiny bald head, and then *BAM* housewives everywhere are falling for him. He's always got his buff arms folded with a look on his face like, "Dude, I just did some guy's wife!"

No proof is troof

[Santarelli]

It's true, there is no proof, only disproof (?) I wonder if it has a creamy nougat, smooth caramel, loaded with almonds, covered in chocolate--oh wait, that's the Snickers Almond Planet. Don't buy the propaganda--lease it instead!

Leaving out the obvious

[Santarelli]

So, there are probes and sensors currently crawling around Mars measuring and transmitting data to NASA. Is there life on Mars? Yes, and we spent billions of dollars so far to put it there.

Next Time......

[Icegryphon]

Life Could Indicate Life On Mars?

Re:The Problem With The Article....

[bfg9000]

Well, *I* thought it was funny. BTW, thanks for giving me my first hat trick. I guess I should've posted a "fart and piss" joke like EVERYBODY ELSE.

The THIRD theory

[barakn]

Methane and ammonia are supplied by comet impacts. These gases are then frozen into the polar caps or into even lower latitude subsurface ice in bubbles or as hydrates. They are slowly released whenever Mars warms up. This is not the first time I've mentioned this theory.

Why life is dependent on ammonia...

[bobl]

Here is an alternative explanation of the connection between extraterrestrial life and ammonia.

Low Hanging fruit.

[billjank]

I, for one, welcome our Martian Overlords.

Occam's Razor

[British Pedant]

Occam's Razor is fine, it just tends to get misapplied. It doesn't suggest that the simpler solution is likelier to be correct. Rather, where there are competing explanations with no means of distinguishing between them, you may as well use the simplest one -- not because it's any likelier to be true, but because it's easier to work with and, in the absence of any distinguishing factor, it makes no difference which explanation you use.

The common phrasing of the razor, "Do not multiply entities needlessly", itself implies this by the word 'needlessly.' You are fully entitled to multiply entities if you need to, as you often will.

If evidence allows you to distinguish between explanations -- as with your suggested examples of where the simpler solution is false -- then Occam's Razor would not require you to keep an explanation that is demonstratably false. After all, if an explanation is wrong, then it is not a valid answer at all.

Occam's Razor only applies where there is no other way of determing which explanation to adopt. Where there are better ways, such as experiments, we use those.

Re:Occam's Razor

[shaitand]

"If evidence allows you to distinguish between explanations -- as with your suggested examples of where the simpler solution is false -- then Occam's Razor would not require you to keep an explanation that is demonstratably false. After all, if an explanation is wrong, then it is not a valid answer at all."

But if we pondered the problem and did not have evidence of the solution 20yrs ago, we maybe used Occams Razor to shave off the correct solution 20yrs ago and not recognize the evidence we find today as the proof of it.

What I was meaning to express, is that despite wives tales, the simpler solution is rarely the correct one in practice. At best I'd give it half, which means when we DON'T already have evidence, using Occams Razor we will throw away the correct answer (assuming one of our theories is correct) at least 50% of the time.

Occam's Razor is itself an example of the simplest solution, which is most definately NOT the correct one.

Re:Occam's Razor

[British Pedant]

Well, if we have an expectation of getting more evidence, we really shouldn't be disposing of any potential solutions. We may tend to work with one, but the rest should still be documented in case the evidence points the other way.

Occam's Razor doesn't get used to judge between competing, sensible theories much. It's really more of an injunction against invoking invisible magic pixies to push photons around when theory can work quite happily with pixie-free photons; scenarious like that.

Up until we find evidence of invisible photon-pushing magic pixies, of course. Nature keeps rejecting my breakthrough paper, the ignorant fools.

Re:Occam's Razor

[Chuck1318]

The choice is not between two choices, one simpler and one more complex. Without a preference for a simpler explanation, there could be an endless number of explanations. A special cause could be postulated for every data point. The correct explanation would be lost among a zillion other explanations, from hitherto unknown forces to wood sprites. If you say common sense would tell you not to add endless special causes, hey, you've just applied Occam's Razor.

whole solar system infected from one planet

[peter303]

No matter where life started, meteorite impacts and sloughing off the atmosphere will frequently inject biomaterial into space. These will drift to the other planets moon. Doezens of meteors from Mars and the Moon have been discovered in Antarctica, where it is realtively easy to find the stuff on top of the ice. Imagine how much more has hit elsewhere on earth.