Making Tracks on Mars

An anonymous reader writes "In a remarkable series of orbital pictures, the Mars Global Surveyor's cameras have imaged the tracks of the Spirit rover on the surface. Individual debris pieces including the backshell and lander are visible with remarkable clarity using an innovative roll of the satellite."

Comments

An Initiative roll? Already made the saving throw

[EQ]

[insert D&D reference here]

I wonder what the Satellite has for initiative roll bonuses?

Crap.

[Skye16]

Can't we go to just ONE other planet without scattering our garbage about willy-nilly?!?!

Re:Crap.

[smoking2000]

Ofcourse not!

We are humans, therefor we litter ;-)

Re:Crap.

[Lt Cmdr Tuvok]

Your phraseology is poor. The Earthern Moon is, by definition, not a planet. This applies equally to other moons that orbit other planets.

Humans have the strangest thought glitches at times ...

Re:Crap.

[lucabrasi999]

The Earthern Moon is, by definition, not a planet

True. But the article does not discuss the Moon. It talks about Mars Rover.

Re:Crap.

[Lt Cmdr Tuvok]

Ah ... indeed. Quite true. Pardon me, I am not feeling well.

I think I will have a brief lie down.

Re:Crap.

[Moby Cock]

NASA ought to launch a Roomba to Mars to take care of all the mess. Its small, robust and autonomous. A perfect solution!

Re:Crap.

[Anonymous Coward]

What's worse: remember when they were going to put a pizza hut logo on the side of the shuttle (or did they already do that)? I thought the title of this /. article was "Marketing Tracks on Mars" You know, having the highest bidder pay NASA to write/draw their corporate logo in the sand of this far away (even if it is the closest) planet. So not just the physical kind of garabage, but the intellectual kind too.

Re:Crap.

[shaitand]

"The Earthern Moon is, by definition, not a planet."

That has what connection to his crack about the litter we left on the PLANET Mars?

Re:Crap.

[b-baggins]

Because, of course, we all know that nature itself is perfectly neat and tidy.

Re:Crap.

[Dun Malg]

Can't we go to just ONE other planet without scattering our garbage about willy-nilly?!?!

Why should we? What possible reason is there to keep every damn thing in the universe in pristine, untouched condition? Besides, it's not like we're going to Mars and throwing a McDonald's bag out the window, scattering burger wrappers and half-eaten McNuggets all over the Martian surface. These are spacecraft components that, first chance we get, will probably be brought back to Earth and examined.

Re:Crap.

[HackHackBoom]

To quote Hugo Weaving jr:

We're a virus remember?

Re:Crap.

[nizo]

I look forward to the day the first human comes along and picks up all this stuff to put in the new "Mars Museum". I just hope it happens in my lifetime.

Re:Crap.

[maxpublic]

Fifty years from now, if we're *really* lucky, there'll be hundreds of human beings on Mars producing garbage left and right. I certainly hope so.

Max

Re:Crap.

[955301]

Why not? Nature left the entire planet covered in dirt. Why can't we leave a few stamped impressions of tire tracks.

Don't make it sound like the planet was a pristine horticulture mecca. It's dirt. It can't get any dirtier.

Re:Crap.

[SEWilco]

Can't we go to just ONE other planet without scattering our garbage about willy-nilly?!?!

Okay, okay.
I'll go pick it up.

Re:Crap.

[Cili]

It's sad that your optimistic post was modded funny...

Re:Crap.

[nizo]

Yeah I was thinking the same thing.

What else...

[Anonymous Coward]

Now all they need to do is locate the massive impact crater left by Beagle 2.

Re:What else...

[WormholeFiend]

I don't think it would be more massive than the one left on Earth by the Genesis probe...

Re:What else...

[adeyadey]

They cant do that, at least easily - the roll-while-imaging method only works if you know the area you want to look at exactly - it would take way to long to search the possible area for beagle impact. Maybe they should have timed beagle eta better so that MGS could image impact..

They're not tracks...

[Anonymous Coward]

...they're alien canals!

Snoopy, where are you?

[argStyopa]

Any chance that they can use this process to search for Beagle?

You know the Surveyor guys are like "oh, sure, NOW you can look around and tell us what's interesting to investigate!"

Re:Snoopy, where are you?

[Tablizer]

Any chance that they can use this process to search for Beagle?

As described in other posts, they need to know the specific area in order to use this technique. They don't have specific enough info about Beagle's whereabouts.

This is old news

[sat1308]

I worked on the Mars Exploration Rovers (Spirit) this February at JPL and we had images like the posted one available almost as soon as the rover landed, of course you couldn't see the tracks back then...I don't have a link handy to any of the pictures from then I remember that we had a wall-sized poster where scientists used to guess where the rover would land. Some days later, once the rover landed, there was another poster with various points of interest (lander, parachute etc.) marked on it. So we have had images (also from the Mars Global Surveyor) like these for a long time only they weren't available to the public. If anything, these images bear testimony to the quality of the camera on-board MGS.

Re:This is old news

[sprouty76]

So it's old news to people who worked on the project - however, I think it's safe to say that doesn't include the vast majority of people reading this.

Re:This is old news

[zogger]

Why are the "new and improved" images of sedonia so dismal then? They are crappier than the original ones from 30 something years ago.

Re:This is old news

[powerlinekid]

Thats like saying "I work at Microsoft and have been playing with Longhorn for 2 years so its not new" when its first released to the public. To the public this is new.

Re:This is old news

[Ariane 6]

If anything, these images bear testimony to the quality of the camera on-board MGS.

Indeed, the folks I worked with over the summer mentioned several times that they were quite impressed with the resolution that Malin seems able to squeeze out of his camera.

Let's hear it for going into business for yourself!

Re:This is old news

[Tablizer]

I did see some of the images you described several months ago (without the tracks also). However, the tracks add a certain finality about it. Without the tracks, all you see are blurry spots where the craft and shells are allegedly supposed to be. When you see tracks between those spots, it is much more "satisfying" photo evidence.

(However, Spirit left that crater months ago, so that image probably was available months ago, unless perhaps it was not processed until recently.)

Re:This is old news

[Anonymous Coward]

The infamous Kevin Jeffries, who wrote that line of Java that crippled the front wheel!

Re:This is old news

[vrmlguy]

So, has anyone given any thought to driving the rover over to the big divot left by the heat shield? Judging from the images, if the rover had turned left at Bonneville instead of right, it'd be almost on top of it already.

It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[Sheetrock]

Mars always seemed just out of reach when I first took interest in astrology. The planet most like our own in the solar system, it's the logical next step for our move off this planet as we begin to explore and colonize space and it's quite encouraging to see that this is a possibility -- although hopefully more success will be had with landing manned spacecraft on its surface.

I suppose another thing I've always hoped to see was signs of life in the universe. Although we've discovered a number of potentially lifebearing worlds, I find it quite interesting that none actually seem to bear life. One starts to wonder if alternative scientifically accepted theories, such as intelligent design, might be at play in the larger picture when we fail to discover one other world with the same characteristics as our own bearing life.

Indeed, it seems almost as if the universe might be made for us alone (a sobering thought if ever there was one.) Things like irreducible complexity in bacterial flagelli or the inability to intentionally design life from scratch while claiming that a roll of the dice made all this seems absurd. Perhaps it's time to present alternative theories to our budding scientists to permit the forward-thinking ones to discard the baggage of examining the past so that progress on space travel can be most efficiently made.

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[Scrab]

Did you mean astrology (The moon is in the fifth house of Venus, and Mars is ascending) or astronomy (Is that comet headed this way?). From the sounds of it, you meant astronomy...

It's not a personal bugbear of mine, but apparently some astronomers get very annoyed by this sort of thing.....

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[Mentorix]

You are talking about Astronomy ofcourse

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[argStyopa]

First, it's astronomy, not astrology. One is a science with reproducible experiments and predictable results; the other is a pagan near-religion whose results are entirely vague, and impossibly subjective.

Second, you're talking about a statistical sample of 2 planets (out of what, thousands of billions?). (And I daresay we've hardly explored #2 - heck, there are great chunks of EARTH we haven't explored.) To wash your hands of it saying 'well, haven't found life yet, we must be alone' is a bit presumptuous.

Second "Things like irreducible complexity in bacterial flagelli or the inability to intentionally design life from scratch while claiming that a roll of the dice made all this seems absurd." NOBODY (except Creationists commonly hiding behind the title of 'intelligent design theory' and busily building strawman arguments) has ever suggested that life is the result of the 'roll of the dice'.

We KNOW that in the presence of radiation, complex hydrocarbon chains such as those found around the universe will form amino acids (found both in liquid water on earth, and in insterstellar dust clouds http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/0328/p11s01-stss.htm l).

We KNOW that these acids can spontaneously form proteins and quinones, among lots of other stuff, which in turn form proteins and (it's surmised) possibly the precursors to RNA.

Granted, we're not clear on that last, teeny step. But give scientists some benefit of the doubt - they've resolved the simplest forms of life down to the point where serious research projects are going on now to create life at a molecular level; to the credit of the researchers in the field, there seems to be a hesitation going on while some of the ethical and moral issues are discussed before proceeding.

I don't dispute with you your essential point - it IS pretty amazing when you think about it. I find the system of the universe a glorious and joyful ballet of energy, matter, and life. I don't know why people feel compelled to assume that God isn't competent enough to build it from the beginning to do what He wanted, and that He would have to stick his hand in and 'make' stuff happen.

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[Toresica]

Give it time.

Most (if not all, I'm not an astrophysicist) of the planets we've discovered in other solar systems are Jupiter-like - enormous and gaseous. (They've also mostly been almost as close to their suns as Mercury is to ours).

Jupiter-like planets may be easier to detect, but they're not very hospitable to life. Give it time, we'll find something.

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[sonamchauhan]

..."serious research projects are going on now to create life at a molecular level; to the credit of the researchers in the field, there seems to be a hesitation going on while some of the ethical and moral issues are discussed before proceeding."

People have been discussing Asimov's three laws of robotics for decades. But we're no closer to robots with synthetic intelligence than we were in the glory days of AI research. (i.e. we're not close at all).

There is no evidence these projects that you say are "going on now to create life at a molecular level" are likely to succeed. Of course, I am excluding efforts that (effectively) cut-and-paste complex (and incompletely understood) biological structures ripped from _already_ living cells in order to form new ones -- that's not _creating_ life. Rather, it's similar in principle to, say, hybridizing roses -- something humans have been doing for 1000s of years.

See this for reasons why the 1950s Miller experiment was not an accurate replica of supposed primordial conditions:
Oxygen, deliberately removed from Miller's apparatus, destroys amino acids.Oxygen, deliberately removed from Miller's apparatus, destroys amino acids. But geological evidence indicates oxygen was always present on earth.1--7 . Your chain of logic has multiple missing links.

You agree that the universe is wonderful - good. You must have considered the apparently unique earth we have: it's wonderfully balanced Carbon Nitrogen Oxygen cycles, the temperature and the position of earth w.r.t. to the sun, the qualities of water, and the wonder that is the water cycle, the wonderful balance of plant and animal life, the mysteries of an apparent Cambrian explosion in the fossil record? Good. Consider how the continents were one supercontinent to begin with (as the Bible describes in Genesis) or how the Bible, rather off-handedly, describes the earth as a sphere (Book of Job). And then there are the smaller details: look up and consider how the sun, and the the moon have the same relative size, how all humanly-recorded history begins 5000 years ago, how despite searching, no tree has more than 5800 yearly tree rings (and there is no reason they can't - these old trees were cut down, still living, in this century).

Finally consider how many millions of humans _know_ (and can testify) to a supernatural and loving God, who communicates with them: A God who does not love differently based on their position... or their intellect.

And He yearns for you too - its your choice.

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[Anonymous Coward]

You agree that the universe is wonderful - good. You must have considered the apparently unique earth we have: it's wonderfully balanced Carbon Nitrogen Oxygen cycles, the temperature and the position of earth w.r.t. to the sun, the qualities of water, and the wonder that is the water cycle, the wonderful balance of plant and animal life, the mysteries of an apparent Cambrian explosion in the fossil record?

So what happened? God just got the other 40 billion planets wrong? Or is it possible that you are only here to make such stupid statements because this planet happened to be that way? Instead of inventing a divine being, why can't you accept that perhaps it was just a happy accident? How do we even know there aren't thousands of other planets exactly like Earth in the Universe? We don't know because we lack the scientific tools necessary to discover the answer.


And then there are the smaller details: look up and consider how the sun, and the the moon have the same relative size, how all humanly-recorded history begins 5000 years ago, how despite searching, no tree has more than 5800 yearly tree rings (and there is no reason they can't - these old trees were cut down, still living, in this century).


If the sun and moon did not have the same relative size in the sky, it would mean one was too big or the other too small or that one or the other wasn't in a stable orbit. In any case it would have resulted in different tides and weather patterns unlikely to support life. That doesn't prove the existence of god, only that there are certain conditions necessary to support life.

The fact that there might have been a mini ice age or other major event 5800 years ago might explain that. Why must people such as yourself jump to divine explanations for what may very well be simple natural occurences?


Finally consider how many millions of humans _know_ (and can testify) to a supernatural and loving God, who communicates with them:

Right, millions of people, all of whom believe in (basically) the same God who just happens to tell them to go attack their sworn enemies in his name despite the fact that they believe in him too. Your god is pretty sadistic if you ask me. Second, these people don't _know_ that god exists. They believe, they "know" or they feel that he exists. To _know_ is to have proof and if they had proof, I would not be sitting here thinking you were a complete and total idiot.

-not a religious loon

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[Anonymous Coward]

When, exactly, did Dr. Spock start speaking like Yoda?

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[Anonymous Coward]

First, it's astronomy, ... blah blah

Second, you're talking about a statistical sample of 2 planets ... blah blah

Second "Things like irreducible complexity in bacterial flagelli ... blah blah

Shouldn't it be First, Second, Third - or did you work on the Beagle project ?

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[virg_mattes]

Do the AnswersInGenesis people know that you're trying to defend their point of view? Maybe you should just link to the site and leave it at that. Yours has to be one of the worst arguments for your point I've seen in a long time, and that's saying something. Let's take a few swings, shall we?

> People have been discussing Asimov's three laws of robotics for decades. But we're no closer to robots with synthetic intelligence than we were in the glory days of AI research. (i.e. we're not close at all).

And you know this exactly how? In 1899, the vast majority of the world's brightest minds were openly saying that there was very little left to learn in the realm of physics, since Newtonian mechanics had been quite thoroughly explored by that point. It only took six years to turn that on its ear, and nobody (not even Einstein) knew it was coming. How you propose to know what technological or innovative breakthroughs will or won't occur in AI is beyond my understanding. As simple (to us) a device as the steam engine took more than 300 years to develop, and societies as far back as the Romans had the materials to make it happen, just not the innovation.

> There is no evidence these projects that you say are "going on now to create life at a molecular level" are likely to succeed.

Nice spin, but to reverse it, there's also no evidence that they're likely to fail, either. See above. Isn't acting clairvoyant a violation of Christian ethics?

> See this for reasons why the 1950s Miller experiment was not an accurate replica of supposed primordial conditions...

Since that particular experiment doesn't have much to do with current efforts (because, y'know, it was not an accurate replica of supposed primordial conditions) this point is irrelevant. If they simply wanted to replicate the old experiment, then they'd have done so.

> You must have considered the apparently unique earth we have: it's wonderfully balanced Carbon Nitrogen Oxygen cycles, the temperature and the position of earth w.r.t. to the sun, the qualities of water, and the wonder that is the water cycle,the wonderful balance of plant and animal life...

I'm familiar with this argument, but it's not valid because it's two-sided. You argue that the Earth is perfectly designed for humans, and I argue that humans developed specifically to survive Earth conditions, and these things support both points, so they support neither point.

> ...the mysteries of an apparent Cambrian explosion in the fossil record?

I agree that there's no good explanation for this as yet. Again, though, it doesn't disprove any reasonable theory, it puts bumps in the road for the theories. Whether we will learn what caused it will remain for time to tell, but I see no reason to accept the young-Earth theory on the strength of this alone, and so far it's the only thing you mentioned that I can't answer directly.

> Consider how the continents were one supercontinent to begin with (as the Bible describes in Genesis) or how the Bible, rather off-handedly, describes the earth as a sphere (Book of Job).

In a book the size and scope of the Bible, you will find plenty of references to stuff that turns out to be true. However, you must counter mentions in the Bible of stuff that turned out false as well, if you care to use it as a scientific reference. You might start by Googling for "geocentrism".

> And then there are the smaller details: look up and consider how the sun, and the the moon have the same relative size...

What? What relevance could this possibly have? If you think this is anywhere approaching a good piece of evidence in defense of the existence of God, you're going to be very easy to dismiss. Besides, they're not all that close, unless 20 percent different is "close enough".

> how all humanly-recorded history begins 5000 years ago...

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do you consider belief in God to be equivalent to belief in creatinism? I believe in God. I also believe that creationism is a load of crap that a worthless Sunday school teacher came up with. You can't have faith that God can plant the seed of a Universe that will grow and develop for billions of years? You must think that God is pretty weak that he has to hack his own creation.

Wonderful revelation you have about the Earth being unique. Don't you think every planet is unique in millions of different ways?

Why do you point to Bible support for things we already know from scientific methods such as "Consider how the continents were one supercontinent to begin with (as the Bible describes in Genesis) or how the Bible, rather off-handedly, describes the earth as a sphere (Book of Job)." What do these facts mean? Nothing. You just throw them in because you think it gives the Bible credibility as a fact book. Well, I already think it has credibility. But it doesn't support creationism.

Why did human recorded history start 5000 years ago? Humans had to learn how to write at some point. You can't record history before you learn how. It has to start sometime. Why do trees have no more than 5800 yearly rings? Uh, because we keep cutting them down maybe?

I used to wonder why some religions don't get along with others. I think I understand why. Because it is dumbasses like yourself that make Christians like myself look like dumbasses.

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[Yunzil]

nd then there are the smaller details: look up and consider how the sun, and the the moon have the same relative size

Um. So? Millions of years ago they didn't have the same size, as the moon was closer to the Earth. Millions of years from now they won't be the same size, as the moon is steadily moving further away.

no tree has more than 5800 yearly tree rings (and there is no reason they can't - these old trees were cut down, still living, in this century).

You can extend it back a lot further if you look for more than one tree. You find a live tree going back, say, 4000 years. The you find an old stump whose later rings match up with the earlier rings of your tree. Then maybe you find a petrified log whose later rings match up with the early rings on the stump. We have tree ring data going back 10,000 years. Here's an example of a study going back 7400 years.

Also, we have ice cores and varves with annual layers going back tens of thousands of years.

And please don't disappoint me by quoting some rubbish from the ICR or answersingenesis.

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[Yunzil]

Things like irreducible complexity in bacterial flagelli

Please demonstrate conclusively that bacterial flagelli are irreducibly complex and must have been created. Show your work and there might be a Nobel Prize for you.

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[sonamchauhan]

"You can't have faith that God can plant the seed of a Universe that will grow and develop for billions of years? "
Since you're asking about faith... God can do that, but he didn't. The basis of your faith - the Bible - tells more about this.

"Wonderful revelation you have about the Earth being unique. Don't you think every planet is unique in millions of different ways?"
Yes.

"Why do you point to Bible support for things we already know from scientific methods such as "Consider how the continents were one supercontinent to begin with (as the Bible describes in Genesis) or how the Bible, rather off-handedly, describes the earth as a sphere (Book of Job)."
"What do these facts mean? Nothing."
No. Since the Bible was written before any man had a geographic world map handy, these facts do mean a fair bit.

"You just throw them in because you think it gives the Bible credibility as a fact book."
Yes.

Well, I already think it has credibility. But it doesn't support creationism.
Well, you obviously are fighting logic pretty hard then.

Why did human recorded history start 5000 years ago? Humans had to learn how to write at some point.
Is it a coincidence recorded human history starts from about when the Bible says the previous world was destroyed by a near-extinction event (the worldwide deluge)? That other ancient cultures, from the Americas to India, record a similar ancient worldwide deluge?

Why do trees have no more than 5800 yearly rings? Uh, because we keep cutting them down maybe?
No. This is a worldwide phenomenon. Also, I believe its not 5800, but fewer than 5500 rings

I used to wonder why some religions don't get along with others. I think I understand why. Because it is dumbasses like yourself that make Christians like myself look like dumbasses.
I cannot help you with that friend.

Here's some more evidence for you to consider

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[sonamchauhan]

> > Do the AnswersInGenesis people know that you're trying to defend their point of view?
Indeed, how dare I? In fact, let me show you a worse outrage!: where I quote 3 peer-reviewed secular journals..

> >But we're no closer to robots with synthetic intelligence
> >than we were in the glory days of AI research. (i.e. we're
> >not close at all).
>
> And you know this exactly how?
I studied AI while working toward an MS in Computer science a few years ago.

> There is no evidence these projects that you say are
> "going on now to create life at a molecular level" are
> likely to succeed. ...
> Isn't acting clairvoyant a violation of Christian ethics?
Correct: if the "medium" (to put it crudely) is not God's spirit.

> > How you propose to know what technological or innovative
> > breakthroughs will or won't occur in AI is beyond my understanding.
Advances in "AI" (a badly named field) are very interesting to me - I hope to see them continue to occur for some time. I said synthetic intelligence (as in "pass the Turing test" intelligence) is unlikely. That belief is based on the current state of AI research and my understanding of the Bible.

> ...no trees have been found with more than 5800 rings because no
> tree has ever lived that long.
I agree. Now why haven't they lived that long? Nothing is stopping them living further - no global ice age, no built in logic bomb -- if (my_age == 5000) {wither(); die();}, no corporations pillaging timber...

> I'd thank you to point me to evidence that a tree with 5800
> rings has even been found, since I couldn't find a single
> mention of one even approaching that age ever found live.
How about one - a 4844-ring pine cut down (!) just a few decades ago.

> Notwithstanding that, though, this is proof of nothing but your
> willingness to go very far out on a limb to try to support your point.

Its sad to see you angry without just cause. :( Here are my reasons for the apparently arbitrary 5800 ring count: the Bible says that the existing world was destroyed in a deluge that occured about 5000 years ago. Now most trees add one tree ring a year. In extremely rare cases, trees have been known to grow more than a single ring a year. Hence, I chose the 5800 ring count (to sufficiently account for ring aberrations). Now, I probably should not have stated 5800 -- 5100-5200 rings should be sufficient. :)

Here is another one: a 4700 ring bristlecone pine -- still-living.

And here is is a thread where this was discussed... threadbare.

> >You must have considered the apparently unique earth we have:
> I'm familiar with this argument, but it's not valid because it's two-sided. ...
> I argue that humans developed specifically to survive Earth conditions

Please back that up with suitable observations of an evolutionary process adding information to the genome.

And also consider (again)...
> > ...the mysteries of an apparent Cambrian explosion in the fossil record?

> > Consider how the continents were one supercontinent to begin with
> >(as the Bible describes in Genesis) or how the Bible,
> >rather off-handedly, describes the earth as a sphere (Book of Job).

> In a book the size and scope of the Bible, you will find plenty
> of references to stuff that turns out to be true.
It is important since men didn't have geography atlases handy back then.

> However, you must counter mentions in the Bible of stuff
> that

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[virg_mattes]

> I studied AI while working toward an MS in Computer science a few years ago.

My pointing out the thinking of physicists in 1899 was to demonstrate that even those who have studied a field extensively can't usually predict watershed changes in the field any better than layfolks, so it's a bad exercise to say "we're no closer to..." about it. Studying AI makes you better informed about the current state of AI, but it doesn't help you predict the future.

> Advances in "AI" (a badly named field) are very interesting to me - I hope to see them continue to occur for some time. I said synthetic intelligence (as in "pass the Turing test" intelligence) is unlikely. That belief is based on the current state of AI research and my understanding of the Bible.

See above, and remember that your understanding of the Bible doesn't speak very well toward what we'll discover in the field of AI.

> Its sad to see you angry without just cause. :( Here are my reasons for the apparently arbitrary 5800 ring count: the Bible says that the existing world was destroyed in a deluge that occured about 5000 years ago. Now most trees add one tree ring a year. In extremely rare cases, trees have been known to grow more than a single ring a year. Hence, I chose the 5800 ring count (to sufficiently account for ring aberrations). Now, I probably should not have stated 5800 -- 5100-5200 rings should be sufficient. :)

I almost don't want to get into this, because it's such a bothersome dance, but I must ask you one thing. If all the trees on Earth were destroyed by a deluge, where'd the new trees come from? Most importantly, though, why do you say that there's nothing stopping them from living longer? Random chance virtually guarantees that any living object will die due to accident or disease give enough time. Sure, there's no one specific thing that guarantees that a tree will die in 5000 years but the amount of luck an immobile living object would need to fail to have anything lethal occur to it in that span of time would be significant. The fact that the number of trees that measure past 4000 years can be counted in single digits indicates that a tree some significant amount older than them would be even more rare, to the likely point of non-existence. Again I present, you've given no reasonable argument that the age of the Earth can be determined by the age of trees in any case.

> Please back that up with suitable observations of an evolutionary process adding information to the genome.

This is my just cause for being angry, by the way. It's a broken argument, and you present it broken on purpose. The failure is this. I can't present the mechanism for how it works. You can't present any evidence that it's not possible. However, because I can't prove it does work, you take that as proof that it doesn't work, and that's broken.

To counter, I can simply present gravity. It's easy to see that gravity works. Two massive bodies attract each other in very predictable ways. Ready for the twist? Nobody on Earth can tell you why. That's right, nobody. There are plenty of theories, but not a single one of them can be conclusively proven. The fact that nobody understands why gravity works does not mean that it doesn't. I can't conclusively prove that ceramic yard gnomes are not the mechanism for gravitation, so I can't directly refute a theory that states that yard gnomes cause gravity. However, I can present a theory (like graviton particles or dark matter or whatever) that's more likely based on the evidence.

To get back to the point, the most likely mechanism in science for the development of the species is currently evolution driven by natural selection. And before you get started, any theory based on the Bible isn't science, it's theology. "Because God said so" doesn't work in science, so feel free to argue that it's how things happened, but don't present it as evidence that ev

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[sonamchauhan]

-- I must ask you one thing. If all the trees on Earth were destroyed by a deluge, where'd the new trees come from?

from seeds carried in the waters.

-- Most importantly, though, why do you say that there's nothing stopping them from living longer?

Because the 2 oldest were still living in the 20th century.

-- Again I present, you've given no reasonable argument that the age of the Earth can be determined by the age of trees in any case.

No, but I have an explanation why the trees observed are no older. You don't have any explanation.

> Please back that up with suitable observations of an evolutionary process adding information to the genome.
-- This is my just cause for being angry, by the way. It's a broken argument, and you present it broken on purpose.

Still no just cause. My "Please back that up..." statement was made the post after.

-- The failure is this. I can't present the mechanism for how it works.

OK...

-- You can't present any evidence that it's not possible.

There is no process observed that counters the law of entropy sufficiently to account for the complexity of life.

-- However, because I can't prove it does work, you take that as proof that it doesn't work, and that's broken.

No, also see point just above.

-- To counter, I can simply present gravity. It's easy to see that gravity works. Two massive bodies attract each other in very predictable ways.

Good, so there are observations scientists have made to validate the law of gravity.

-- Ready for the twist? Nobody on Earth can tell you why.

I didn't ask why.

-- The fact that nobody understands why gravity works does not mean that it doesn't.

Yes, but we can observe gravity in action and hence validate it.

Can we observe evolution in action? No.
Note, we can see natural selection in action. Not evolution.

-- but don't present it as evidence that evolutionary theory is wrong.

I trust my God, and you don't. Fair enough.

-- To counter that argument, I need only ask for your proof that "Allah said so" or "the spirits of my forefathers said so" is somehow less valid than your argument.

If you check their history and their predictions and you will see them as less valid.

> It is important since men didn't have geography atlases handy back then.
-- What you're saying is that guesses that turned out right (round earth) are more scientifically important than guesses that turned out wrong (geocentrism). Why is that? I posit that if the Bible was divinely inspired there should be no "wrong guesses" in it.
Yes there should be no wrong guesses in it. Also see geocentrisms link in my last post.

> First let me clear this fallacy up:
>> Besides, they're not all that close, unless 20 percent different is "close enough".
> You're wrong. They are. Google it.
-- Sorry, I was operating under the assumption that the apparent visual size to someone on Earth without viewing instruments was our measure.

Yes, it is. The discs precisely cover each other in a total solar eclipse.

> Well, I did say it's a minor point but you do realize that the odds of having both the same size are _pretty_ unlikely, right?The sameness in their relative size makes for a wonderful show during total eclipses.

-- You're joking me now. The odds that the Moon and a U.S. quarter held at arm's length would be the same are also rather unlikely, but you've got a long reach to convince me that the fact that the Sun and Moon fit over one another during eclipses has any relevance to discussions about God.

Bad strawman. But lets leave that for now.

> The Bible says God made the moon for signs, for a light, and a clock (the basis of the lunar calendar used by the ancients).

-- And the relative size of the Sun to the Moon affects that function in what way? Like I said, if every coincidence this tenous is taken as proof

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[sonamchauhan]

Further to my post, about the intersection of humans and dinosaurs...

As this site says:
the standard long-age scenario of our evolution-riddled culture says that such encounters between pterosaurs and man have never happened, because all flying reptiles, along with the dinosaurs, allegedly became extinct some 65 million years before man came on the scene.

But what we know is:
The Sioux Indians have long told the story of the huge "thunderbird". They gave it this nickname because this flying reptile was hit by lightning and fell from the sky during a thunderstorm.

They searched for this creature and when they found it they described it as having wings almost 20 foot across. It had a long sharp bill and a large bony knob-like protrusion on the back of its head.

There are no birds that fit this description. The similarity between the "thunderbird" and the pteranodon is striking. Flying dinosaurs like the pteranodon have been found fossilized with a wingspan of 23 feet!

Pteranodon also have a large bony crest jotting off of the backs of their heads. Just as the Indians described. ...
The Indians have made many paintings and carvings of this dinosaur with accuracy that can only come from seeing the creature first hand.

And you can see this in a picture from a Canadian Indian tribe:
"Kwaguilth Thunderbird", by Jim Johnny

.

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[virg_mattes]

> -- What you "know" of God does nothing to invalidate what I believe.
> It does. But you wouldn't know that.

I was going to go on with the retort, but this comment pretty much closes the door, and makes it pointless to continue the dance. Have fun with your faith.

Virg

Re:It's pretty amazing when you think about it.

[sonamchauhan]

> -- What you "know" of God does nothing to invalidate what I believe.
> It does. But you wouldn't know that.

"I was going to go on with the retort, but this comment pretty much closes the door, and makes it pointless to continue the dance. Have fun with your faith."

I am sorry: let me take back my "But you wouldn't know that"

I used to share your viewpoint.

You can know God for yourself by deciding to search for him, armed just with the smallest smidgen of faith, and a fair mind.

With regards,
Sonam

What does this say about Earth imaging?

[dpilot]

On the one hand, Mars does have a much thinner atmosphere, and I have no idea how low the Mars Global Surveyer orbit is.
On the other hand, *anything* we ship to Mars is a design compromise in terms of weight and size. So I'm sure the camera is sophisticated, but isn't this one of those times when size matters, especially on the objective lens?

I've found my house on Terraserver, and I couldn't see features as small as this picture gives us. Makes me wonder what spy satellites can do, what commercial imaging satellites can do, and what DHS wants to let us have.

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[Anonymous Coward]

On the gripping hand, have you seen images from spaceimaging.com? I understand that their tech is pretty close to state of the art; I'd imagine that spy sat technology is only a little better

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[dreamchaser]

Keep imagining...state of the art spy sattelites can supposedly read license plates and even the rank insignia's on a soldier's uniform.

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[jstave]

Makes me wonder what spy satellites can do, what commercial imaging satellites can do, and what DHS wants to let us have.

The government spy satelites can actually image individual crinkles on our tin-foil hats.

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[Anonymous Coward]

The Mars rovers are not that small: 2.3 meters (7.5 feet) wide by 1.6 meter (5.2 feet) long.

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[Binestar]

The government spy satelites can actually image individual crinkles on our tin-foil hats.

That is exactly why I wear Tin Foil Sombrero's, and I make a new one each morning before work.

Guaranteed to stop those mind control waves along with making you close to impossible to be followed by face recognition spy sattilites.

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[dpilot]

No, I haven't. YET.

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[dpilot]

It's not so much the tinfoil hat. It's that I'd like to see this stuff, too.

I heard one proposal that if they're going to put surveillance cameras all over covering public places, they should put the monitors in a public place, too.

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[Cobalt Jacket]

The best commercial resolution right now is 1 meter. NRO is supposedly far better than that. Not only that, but it's real-time. Not like Patriot Games, but still a lot more responsive. Unlike commerical operators, the NRO has the benefit of relay satellites.

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[MtViewGuy]

Actually, I've heard that the imaging satellites that were launched after Ikonos are not capable of resolving down to 80 cm resolution since they have better optics than the Ikonos cameras.

Given the fact that the current Keyhole satellites use essentially a modified version of same technology used on the Hubble Space Telescope, my guess is that our current spy satellites can resolve down to about 4-5 cm (around 2 inches) resolution from a 300 km orbit. At that resolution, you could make out the larger markings on vehicles pretty easily.

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[Ariane 6]

On the one hand, Mars does have a much thinner atmosphere

It still needs to be corrected for, however; I spent the summer testing techniques to do so with data from Mars Odyssey. Especially in regions of high relief (Valles Marineris, Olympus Mons, etc.) the amount of dust in the air can significantly affect the image.

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[drinkypoo]

They're commonly held to be able to read (on a clear day) the headlines of a newspaper laid on its back, with some image processing. Not very useful but a good indication of quality.

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[photonic]

The CIA will have better pictures than those available on Terraserver but there are limits to the resolution. Due to the fact that light has a finite wavelength, there are certain limits in resolution you can get depending on the size of your telescope. This phenomenon is known as the diffraction limit. A very rough calculation would say that Resolution=wavelength*Distance/Telescope_diameter. This gives 5 cm with a 2 meter telescope from 200 km at visible wavelengths. So take of your tinfoil hats

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[garbs]

And of course as shown in Under Siege 2, monitoring hotties on a beach from orbit.

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[d34thm0nk3y]

The government spy satelites can actually image individual crinkles on our tin-foil hats....when you are inside!!!

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[Anonymous Coward]

it's not the government, it's Major League Baseball Spying!!

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[AJWM]

along with making you close to impossible to be followed by face recognition spy sattilites.

Well, face recogition, yeah. But since you're the only one out there wearing a tin foil sombrero, ...

(What, you didn't know about the hat recognition satellites?)

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[AJWM]

state of the art spy sattelites can supposedly read license plates

Which is pretty amazing, considering how hard it is to read license plates from overhead even if you're just standing on a bridge or overpass.

Re:What does this say about Earth imaging?

[Binestar]

(What, you didn't know about the hat recognition satellites?)

Of course I know about the hat recognition satillites, thats why I make a new one each morning!

Not a bad idea at all.

[burnttoy]

The only problem is that the area in which it may have "landed" is fairly large. With the NASA rovers they knew exactly where to look.

Re:Not a bad idea at all.

[Tablizer]

The only problem is that the area in which [Beagle] may have "landed" is fairly large. With the NASA rovers they knew exactly where to look.

IIRC NASA rovers had a small external camera that shot images of the ground a few minutes before landing. These were used in conjunction with orbital shots and later surface shots to pinpoint the final landings. The near-landing shots were not sent back immediately, but stored in flash memory and sent back after landing. Thus, if the rovers crash landed, those images probably would have no way to make their way back in order to find the crash site.

Without the near-landing images, it may have been much more difficult, perhaps impossible, to find the landing areas in orbiter images. Wait, I take that back. The orbiters could and did use the landers' radio signals to help pin-point them. But if they crashed, that would not be available either.

Re:Not a bad idea at all.

[mlyle]

NASA was able to get a really good initial fix on the positions of the rovers using doppler measurements of the tones the spacecraft emitted on descent.

For example, from the journal of Michael Watkins, manager of the navigation team:

But we're also still working, and for Opportunity, the Navigation Team wants to get our first solution for the position of Opportunity as quickly as possible to help assess the condition of the rover.

Ten minutes after landing we get it - it's about 10 km further downtrack (to the East on Mars) from the last targeted point (which was about 10 km from the original target), due entirely to low atmospheric density on Mars. This is similar to Spirit, and well within specifications, and it looks from our maps to be an awesome landing site for the scientists. But we'll have to wait and see the first pictures...

This picture shows you the relative accuracy of the navigation. The big blue estimate ellipse is based on doppler data from the approach to Mars. The black ellipse is based on doppler data from the rover's status tones prior to chute deployment. And the white dot is the estimated position based on doppler from surface communications.

Re:Not a bad idea at all.

[3vi1]

"NASA was able to get a really good initial fix on the positions of the rovers using doppler measurements of the tones the spacecraft emitted on descent."

What did Beagle emit? One of those "AAaaiiiieeeeee..." screams from Johnny Quest?

What about the Moon?

[trash eighty]

have they ever tried doing this to look for the remains of the Apollo missions and other luna missions?

Re:What about the Moon?

[Patrik_AKA_RedX]

they can't. Satelites can't look inside movie studios.

Re:What about the Moon?

[isa-kuruption]

Here
Here
And Here
And something else here

Re:What about the Moon?

[dtolman]

First we would need something in orbit around the moon with a camera - which we should in a few years...

Re:What about the Moon?

[pipingguy]

Maybe they can use nuclear batteries to power the flash so they can photograph the dark side.

Re:What about the Moon?

[Cytotoxic]

have they ever tried doing this to look for the remains of the Apollo missions and other luna missions?

Actually, you can look for some of the space junk yourself. They left a reflector next to the lander that will reflect any light directly back to it's source. Just take a laser and point it at the right area of the moon and use a reasonably sized telescope to measure the light bouncing back. You can actually measure the distance to the moon using this tool and prove to yourself that at least that one peice of junk is up there. This was a fun experiment that we did in science camp when I was a kid.
(Ok, did I just label myself as a complete geek on one of the busiest sites on the internet?
....dang....)

Erosion?

[Dan East]

Any estimate on how long it will take the tracks to erode until they are no longer visible, given the average winds in that area? Unlike the tracks on the moon, these shouldn't last too long (relatively speaking).

Dan East

Hey you kids!

[spidergoat2]

Quit messing up my lawn!!!

Unearthly

[NoInfo]

Yes, it's soooo interesting to look at our own devices on other planets.

Maybe it's just me, but when I'm on an exotic vacation, I don't go out and start taking pictures of my car.

Re:Unearthly

[MBaldelli]

Maybe it's just me, but when I'm on an exotic vacation, I don't go out and start taking pictures of my car.

I'm sitting here asking me, how much money is being funneled into this program from my taxes, that is paying for this sophomoric frat boy picture taking myself.

Re:Unearthly

[saider]

Yeah, but you didn't design and build your car from scratch to get to your "exotic location". I'd be taking pictures of my car if it landed on another planet.

Re:Unearthly

[Jtheletter]

Maybe it's just me, but when I'm on an exotic vacation, I don't go out and start taking pictures of my car.

If I took my Enzo Ferrarri to the utah salt flats and had a choice of pictures of salt, or pictures of my car tearing it up on the flats, I'd have to go with pictures of the car.

Re:Unearthly

[qray]

Maybe not, but I'd bet you might take pictures of yourself on an exotic vacation. This is THE explorer as well as the vehicle. I'm just waiting for the environmentalists to ban all off roading on Mars.

Re:Unearthly

[drinkypoo]

If I took my car to another country, you can bet your sweet ass that I'd be taking pictures of it there. Then again, I have a car that's worth taking pictures of - well it would be if I had finished painting it. Maybe this semester :P

Re:Unearthly

[aggiefalcon01]

This sounds like a photoshop challenge on Fark. "Hey, show us your car, on Mars! More points for an SUV climbing out of a crater!!!"

Re:An Initiative roll?

[spectrokid]

Over the past year and a half, the camera and spacecraft teams for Mars Global Surveyor have worked together to develop a technique that allows us to roll the entire spacecraft so that the camera can be scanned in a way that sees details at three times higher resolution than we normally get," said Dr. Ken Edgett, staff scientist for Malin Space Science Systems, San Diego, Calif., which built and operates the Mars Orbiter Camera. The technique adjusts the rotation rate of the spacecraft to match the ground speed under the camera.

It is a line camera, X resolution is set by number of pixels, Y resolution by mars rotation speed and number of scans per second. If the satelite rolls opposite to mars rotation, it is as if mars rotates more slowly, therefore higher Y resolution. Price to pay is you end up rotating out of view, so smaller pictures, but more detailed ones.

Re:An Initiative roll? Already made the saving thr

[edwilli]

Keep in mind that it's got a +12000 lens of seeing.

JPEGs!

[The Grassy Knoll]

>imaged the tracks of the Spirit rover on the surface

Oh, yeah. Link to JPEGs why don't you? ;-)

Previously on slashdot...

Messages

[Anonymous Coward]

You'd think that the NASA geeks could have managed to sneakily plot the rover's course so we get a message like "Osama was here" writ large in the Martian dust... What a wasted opportunity.

Re:I'm not so sure.

[mikael]

Reminds me of a sketch I saw on French TV, which was taking the mickey out of journalists who were make live reports on Iraq from their own homes back in England. They show this barrage of green lights constantly starting to flying upwards, then as the camera pans out, you see the camera was doing a zoom-in on the water in the bowl, as the chain was being pulled.

On Beagle 2

[tod_miller]

My first thoughts about this were about re-calculating and re-imaging possible crash zones.

What would happen if hubble could image on mars? I suspect the optics are not designed to image something like mars, and wouldn't be effective?

Otherwise surely we would have close to 1m resolution of mars?

Am I missing something? Or is hubble too busy?

are visible in this image from the Mars Orbiter Camera on NASA's Mars Global Surveyor orbiter. North is up in this image I think the images released are not the full resolution, or if they are then they at least with less compression (unless they transmit them compressed - which would be an insane idea) it should be clearer.

I would guess that they transmit all data back in raw, with lots of error checking.

Re:On Beagle 2

[BJH]

According to the link provided by the other guy who answered you, Hubble's resolution in the photos it took of Mars was good enough to resolve features 12 miles in size.
The photos from MGS had a resolution of 0.5 meters per pixel.

Obviously being closer is better than having a bigger mirror.

Re:On Beagle 2

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, NOT transmitting them compressed seems a bit more insane to me. Given that there are numerous lossless compression algorithms that integrate error checking available. Add to that some link-layer error checking, and you have a pretty robust data channel. Granted, they're probably not compressed much, or only capable of compression to a single format(Probably dedicated ASICs, or a low power embedded chip doing some simple compression.)

Remember, compression != lost quality.

Re:On Beagle 2

[rhkaloge]

The resolution of Hubble is remarkable bad when you talk about imaging nearby stuff. When you are looking at galaxies, a resoluion of 1 m ain't what you need. We once thought of turning Hubble on a satallite that was malfunctioning, and the calculations showed the satellite would be a big blur to Hubble. No, we hadn't even thought about the practical problems of repointing Hubble, etc, it was just a though (about as feasible as getting the next shuttle flight to "swing by").

Re:On Beagle 2

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah. So 20 minutes later Earth finds out there were errors in the transmission.

Re:On Beagle 2

[mopomi]

The images you are seeing are JPEGs! They're not science data, they're press release data. The images are transmitted back with lossless or lossy compression, depending on the needs/resources. Lossless is obviously necessary when one wants to view the finest details, but is not always necessary, especially when you do a cost:benefit analysis. . .

Re:On Beagle 2

[tod_miller]

Forgive my poor sentence structure, it happens when you reword a sentence in your head but keep typing regardless.

I said, the originals must be: larger, less compressed (if compressed at all!)

The version shown was far too compressed.

Haar Haar Haar :-) [sorry old wavelet joke!]

Re:figures -- we humand are pigs

[datadriven]

I remember a late seventies TV show about sending a mission to the moon to clean up all the stuff on the moon. I think it was called "Salvage 1"

Re:Crap - Calvin & Hobbes

[davidmcw]

This reminds of a Calvin & Hobbes cartoon, I think it was in the Weirdos from Another Planet! collection. They use their, very flexible, carboard box to travel to another planet (I'm pretty sure it Mars) and Hobbes makes a comment about them leaving garbage lying about

Great, now the tree-huggers will...

[potus98]

...start attacking NASA for terrorizing the natural environment of Mars. NASA will be blamed for wrecking fragile former wetlands and destroying possible cures for AIDs and cancer. All so a bunch of adreneline-pumped off-roaders can go joy-riding with some fancy-schmancy camera truck.

Oh wait, haven't they heard: Us evil humans ARE A PART OF nature.

Re:Great, now the tree-huggers will...

[Anonymous Coward]

NASA will be safe from the tree huggers as long as the rovers are not SUVs. The minute NASA sends a Hummer, look out!

Beagle2

[jdtanner]

So, could they do this to spot the remnants of Beagle2?

John

Re:Beagle2

[eutychus_awakes]

Probably not. They knew exactly where to look to see the rover, and they also were able to take many pictures of the same area at different sun angles (shadow lengths) to get one with enough contrast to show the tracks. Because the width of the rover's tracks is just at the pixel resolution of the orbiting camera, a little luck/persistence was required to get those shots, I imagine.

I, too would like to know where the Beagle2 lies. It is about as small as one pixel from an orbiting camera, so they'll need to find some other evidence (ejecta from an impact crater, etc.) to find it. It's very likely Beagle is the crack of a rock, for example.

Re:Beagle2

[Mr2cents]

To quote this article to give an idea of the amounts data we get:
"The Mars Orbiter Camera's narrow-angle camera has now examined nearly 4.5 percent of Mars' surface, including extensive imaging of candidate and selected landing sites for surface missions."

4.5 percent! At high resolution, a reasonably small area can rapidly contain lots of pixels, for example if we were to image a 20kmx20km area *known* to hold the lander, that would mean 400 million pixels at 1m/pixel, or 1.6 billion at 0.5m/pixel. Oh, and you want multiple sun-angles, too. And you can only send about 20 megabytes/day, if I'm correct. Such an endevour could easily take a year, and for what?

And in any case, if anyone should be looking for Beatle2 it should be Mars Express. Not that I wouldn't appreciate it, but as a European I don't see the use of asking NASA to find a failed probe for us. Just let it rest in peace, and build a next one, one that reports back during landing.

Terraforming or ecosynthesising mars

[tod_miller]

A little article with two boffins talking abour terraforming mars.

They harp on about oxygen levels. I started to wonder - what gas other than nitrogen would be good to compose the other 80% (assuming we reach earth density - could we have a 1/5 less atomosphere than was 99% 02?

So I think (although mars contains nitrogen - composition) the matter is how to make nitrogen and oxygen and enough co2.

Nitrogen in the air is vital for plant life also, so I think a valid nitrogen cycle, water cycle and healthy o2/co2 ratios would need to be established.

Would they find thier own levels, or will it be *bloody* hard to establish a balanced eco system?

Any other thoughts on mars ecosynthesis?

Re:Terraforming or ecosynthesising mars

[mikrorechner]

I started to wonder - what gas other than nitrogen would be good to compose the other 80% (assuming we reach earth density - could we have a 1/5 less atomosphere than was 99% 02?

I don't think anything that has evolved on earth could survive in such an atmosphere for very long. And having things from earth there is the point of terraforming, right?

Also, if you had played The Little Terraformer's Virtual Lab (aka Sim Earth) long enough, you would know that if the oxygen ratio is higher than 25%, trees start to burn spontaneous. And then everybody dies, unless you have a fish civilization, or whales, or crustacean, or...

Ahem, I got a little carried away there. Sorry.

Re:Terraforming or ecosynthesising mars

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem with breathing is something called "partial pressure". Partial pressure is the pressure exerted by an individual gas in the atmosphere. You have to have a bare minimum oxygen partial pressure of around 2.4in Hg in order to push enough oxygen through the lining of your lungs and into the bloodstream. That's the pressure at about 2 miles up. 6" Hg is about normal partial pressure at sea level.

Here's the first hit off of Google for partial pressure:
http://wine1.sb.fsu.edu/chm1045/notes/Gases/Mixtur es/Gases06.htm

You also have to have enough air pressure to keep water from boiling at room or body temperature, whichever is higher. Say, about 3" Hg, which is about 10% of normal. That's not much margin of error. Plus, an extremely dry atmosphere will suck the water right out of you.

You also need a small amount of CO2 to help regulate breathing. Too little and you tend to hyperventilate.

Nitrogen for plants. Actually, most plants don't use free nitrogen in the atmosphere, but fixed nitrogen (nitrates) in soil. The plants that fix the nitrogen do need the gas.

And then you have to have some protection from solar radiation.

I did this seat-of-the-pants, probably got some of it wrong, but the numbers should be somewhere in the ballpark. Anyway, the simple answer is that it's not that simple.

Re:Terraforming or ecosynthesising mars

[applemasker]

Without a stable magnetic field to deflect the solar wind, any attempt to increase the atmospheric density on Mars is never going to work. It would be like trying to inflate a balloon with a hole in it. Deatils here.

Re:Terraforming or ecosynthesising mars

[fucksl4shd0t]

I was actually thinking about shipping oil and gasoline out there. :) Use bottled oxygen and use IC engines for transportation. That's a sure way to fill up the atmosphere with CO2. Then in selected areas, inject nitrogen into the atmosphere and just grow plants. Do that for awhile and eventually you have an entire planet capable of supporting human life!

(might take awhile, though)

Re:Terraforming or ecosynthesising mars

[radtea]

Unfortunately for this hypothesis, Venus has no magnetosphere, experiences much stronger solar wind than Mars, and has no shortage of atmosphere.

So Mars' lack of atmosphere is likely due to a combination of factors, with the lack of magentosphere being perhaps necessary but hardly sufficient. The question for terraformers is whether or not it is possible to create and sustain an environment like the one we have on Earth via biological means.

It is worth noting that in the absence of life, Earth would be a lot less habitable than it is. That is, life on Earth has created conditions that are suitable for life on Earth. Or more correctly, life on Earth has found relatively open evolutionary niches due to the actions of other life on Earth. The most obvious thing like this is oxygen, which would weather out of the atmosphere in a few million years were it not a waste product thrown away by plants.

--Tom

Re:Terraforming or ecosynthesising mars

[pipingguy]

Instead of looking to off-earth as a possible (waaay into the) future home for us meatbags, why not consider moving underground?

Probably a stupid question.

Re:This is nothing new

[Dan East]

Mars does have an atmosphere, and wind erosion is quite active.

You have heard that all theses recent missions to Mars used parachutes during the landing process, right?

Dan East

Re:This is nothing new

[dykofone]

Planets that dont have an atmosphere such as Mars and the Moon

Point 1) Mars has an atmosphere.
Point 2) The moon isn't a planet.

Other than that you're completely right.

Hubble HAS imaged Mars

[chalker]

Hubble has already imaged Mars. The resolution is nowhere close to these new images from MGS. They are images of the entire planet. Check them out here: http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/newsdesk/archive/ releases/1999/27/

Re:figures -- we humand are pigs

[MBaldelli]

I think it was called "Salvage 1"

OMG. Andy Griffith's forray into sci-fi. And here I thought that I had blissfully forgetten it. Thank you very much for reminding me about it.

Life on Mars

[just_gecko]

According to this (long) article, there's "evidence that there were habitable environments" on Mars, and recent research results "also suggest a possible search strategy for evidence that there might once have been life".

The question is...

[mikrorechner]

...did those things spot any buggalos yet?

Re:Best Hack of all times...

[Anonymous Coward]

hahaha you're so funny and original. I bet you get all the ladies. Fag. Stop with the fucking "Bush jokes" (if that's what you could call them) in unrelated threads.

There is life on Mars!

[Chemisor]

Now we know how those "canals" got there :)

Re:Best Hack of all times...

[Jimpqfly]

Dear "Anonymous Coward", I *think* I can write anything I want, without forcing anyone to agree with me. Thanks anyway to the one who voted a +1 score for me... at first.

Just wait for Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.

[MtViewGuy]

If you think the images from Mars Global Surveyor look awesome, the images from the upcoming Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter should be nothing short of AWESOME.

Given that MRO will likely use a modified version of the same camera system used on the Ikonos imaging satellite (Ikonos can resolve down to 100 cm resolution from a 300 km orbit through Earth's thick atmosphere), the combination of the lower orbit and the very thin atmosphere on Mars means there are estimates that the MRO cameras could resolve objects as small as 150 millimeters across in the visual light spectrum! At that resolution, MRO could finally put to bed the controversy about the anomalous features on the Cydonia plain of Mars that some people claim are not natural features of that plain.

Re:Just wait for Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.

[mopomi]

HiRISE on MRO will be able to resolve about 30 cm/pixel, not 150 mm, with a swath width of > 6 km for the greyscale images. It is not a remake of the Ikonos, though it is similar. A slice through the CCD array (I don't remember the number of CCDs in the array off the top of my head--must be 20) of the camera is something like (lameness/HTML filter screws this up--ignore the dots):

........BBBB
PPPPPPPPRRRRPPPPPPPP
........GGGG

Where the middle layer three CCDs deep are the "Blue", "Red", and "Green" (approx.) CCDs, while the others are the panchromatic (really the same as the "Red" in the color portion of the array). Each of the CCDs is something like 1024 pixels across, with a 6 pixel overlap on each side.

Check out:

http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu http://marsoweb.nas.nasa.gov/hirise

Re:Just wait for Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.

[MtViewGuy]

That's about 300 mm/pixel, or just a hair under one feet in resolution, based on the estimates from the HiRISE team. But given Mars' very thin atmosphere and the fact Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter could orbit Mars from lower orbit compared to what Ikonos does now orbiting the Earth, we could in theory see resolutions far better than 300 mm/pixel once MRO has optimized its orbit over Mars.

Re:Just wait for Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.

[mopomi]

The estimates given are for observing at Mars--these guys know what they're doing, and they know how to plan for Mars.

The only way to get better resolution is to pull tricks like MGS does or to get closer to the surface. Either one will be done sparingly because of wear and tear on the spacecraft:

Getting very much closer than the planned 300 km altitude will begin to put the spacecraft into the planet's exosphere, AND the plan is for a sun-synchronous orbit where the craft is between 320 (32cm/px) and 255(25.5cm/px) km above the surface;

Trim maneuvers like rolling the spacecraft to increase the time the camera observes a given spot--thereby increasing signal to noise and effective resolution will cost propellant, and thus can only be done a finite number of times.

You are correct, the "resolution" of the cameras on spacecraft observing the planets they orbit depends very much on how close they are to a planet, and on how clear the atmosphere is in the observing wavelengths, but the plan for HiRISE is for a 30 cm/pixel (+- a few cm) resolution, which has already taken into account the orbit height and the atmosphere (for the most part) of Mars. In fact, if anything, the resolution is only likely to get worse, not better due to unplanned things like clouds in the way. . .

Damn!

[Civil_Disobedient]

the combination of the lower orbit and the very thin atmosphere on Mars means there are estimates that the MRO cameras could resolve objects as small as 150 millimeters across in the visual light spectrum

I think I just shat myself.

Re:Damn!

[shawn(at)fsu]

Stand up and bend over, I'll tell you if you did or not.

White Rabbit

[__aajqwr7439]

But can you see the carcass of the little bunny that NASA cruelly murdered?

Re:White Rabbit

[ModernGeek]

I always wondered, what would happen if a human was in a pressurised capsule that simulated gravity, etc, and was just told to leave that capsule once they reason mars, and to walk on the surface bare? Would they suffocate, die from heat/cold, or would the pressure just kill them? All of the above? If so, which one first? Too bad we let things like morals and common sense keep us from doing these things, because I think it would be sweet to make a little city on mars.

They need to stop this monkey business!

[BobPaul]

If they keep driving all over the surface of Mars, how will they ever tell the difference between their tracks and those made by the little green men?

We'll never prove the existance of life on Mars at this rate!

Beagle 2, Viking's, Polar Lander, Mars landers..?

[Zerbey]

Couldn't they use the same techniques to find the other landers that have either crashed or soft landed successfully and died (Viking, one of the Russian Mars probes).

I would be interested to see if the Viking landers are still visible, or if they're now covered in martian dust? Maybe it'll be a better job for the MRO when it gets there.

No no no

[apankrat]

Any chance that they can use this process to search for Beagle?

Any chance that they can use this process to search for Apollo Lunar Lander ? If you know what I mean ..

Mars face's best friend

[Tablizer]

Enhancement can bring out all kinds of interesting new details.

I may be wrong

[Hooptie]

bit I don't think you will find an Apollo Lunar Lander on Mars.

Re:I may be wrong

[Anonymous Coward]

AHA! so it IS a hoax!!

Re:I may be wrong

[Black Copter Control]

but I don't think you will find an Apollo Lunar Lander on Mars.

Well, if we did, it would be proof positive that they never went to the Moon!!

Re:Beagle 2, Viking's, Polar Lander, Mars landers.

[Tablizer]

I would be interested to see if the Viking landers are still visible

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/mgs_mpf_viki ng_040107.html

Re:I'm not so sure.

[Tablizer]

...make live reports on Iraq from their own homes back in England. They show this barrage of green lights constantly starting to flying upwards, then as the camera pans out, you see the camera was doing a zoom-in on the water in the bowl, as the chain was being pulled.

Most poop is not green and does not fly up. Then again, maybe this is a special effects technique that I really do not want to know the details of.

Looks like someone drew the lines in

[bteeter]

Looking at the raw images, I don't see even the slightest trace of the items they point out. Seems to me someone just penciled in the tracks and other stuff on the marked up image.

Take care,

Brian
--
Linux Web Hosting

Time of image

[Mr2cents]

The image shows shows spirit on the crater rim, that's something like sol 90 iirc (spirit is now at sol 260). So why did it take so long to get the image? Were they stored on-board for months? Were they processed for months? This is not a flame, I'm genuinly curous :).

Anyway, I hope that Mars Express will give it a try, too.

Hey what an Idea!

[Madcapjack]

I think we've stumbled upon a way to finance bigger and better future missions to Mars! For a sizeable contribution, our rovers will draw in a company's logo on Mars.

Re:Hey what an Idea!

[Anonymous Coward]

I always thought an "Allah Fucks Goats" sign on the moon would be good for a laugh. I would _love_ to see the Imams take on that!

This Just In...

[MonkeyGone2Heaven]

JPL Assistant Program Manager Buzz Finkel was put on administrative leave today after NASA's Mars Global Surveyor discovered he had programmed the Spirit rover to write the words 'HI MOM' on the surface of Mars. Details at 11...

Dust Storms

[AHumbleOpinion]

I think the atypical winds will be far more relevant. In other words it will take until the next dust storm hits. Are these random? Seasonal?

Honest honey, I was taking a picture of the car

[AHumbleOpinion]

Maybe it's just me, but when I'm on an exotic vacation, I don't go out and start taking pictures of my car.

Picture one us Americans on vacation in Europe. We park next to a topless beach and take a picture of our rental car. "Honest honey, I was taking a picture of the car".

Yeah, ok, well, I'm a programmer not a commedian. ;-)

Been reading old Heinlein short stories lately?

[AHumbleOpinion]

Been reading old Heinlein short stories lately? Or was it a novella? :-)

Nope, keep those hats on.

[955301]

Because the limits on resolution can be compensated for with image processing. For example, take a large number of photographs of the same thing, then use the differences to interpolate the real image.

Re:Nope, keep those hats on.

[photonic]

No, there are certain hard limits imposed by physics that you can't break with some fancy image processing. Sure, you might reduce some of the noise, and you might gain a factor of 2, but that's it. Why do you think they build 10 meter diameter telescopes (100 meter in the works: OWL) if they could achieve the same with a 1 meter diameter and some processing.

Re:Nope, keep those hats on.

[mopomi]

1) What is the "real image"?
2) With super resolution techniques, you only gain, at best, something like a factor of r~sqrt(n) in resolution, where n is the number of pictures you take. However, the computational time required goes as e^r, and you have a lot of issues with actually understanding the movement between images such that you could end up in a local minimum, far from the ideal solution. . .

1 cell resolution

[heroine]

So if us can resolve 1.5m, that means the European orbiter can resolve single cells. When are we going to see the European orbiter use roll/pitch compensation to image single cells?

heat shield impact site opportunity.

[Stephen Samuel]

After looking at one of the images It would appear that the rover is tantalizingly close to the impact site of it's heat shield. (OK: It's about another 4 months drive across the Bonniville crater).

I'm thinking that the heatshield impact should have dug a pretty nice divot out of the ground, which might make a pretty good opportunity for examining deep layers of soil on the edge of a large impact crater.

Possible to find all sorts if interesting things in there... almost as good as the crater itself. (presuming that the rover can get out on the other side, that is.)

From the "coal to Newcastle" department...

[sean.peters]

I was actually thinking about shipping oil and gasoline out there. :) Use bottled oxygen and use IC engines for transportation. That's a sure way to fill up the atmosphere with CO2.

Are we still talking about Mars here? Because Mars' atmosphere is already 95% CO2.

Sean

Re:I'm not so sure.

[mikael]

It wasn't the poop - the bathroom light was off, the camera nightsight was set on, and they were reflecting torchlight off a certain liquid they were pouring into the bowl. The reflection of the light off the little drops was forming a tracer style pattern.

Re:This is nothing new

[rpj1288]

Actually, with regard to point #2, the earth and moon are a double planet system, because the moon orbits the sun, not the earth, as evidenced by the fact that it always falls towards the sun. More here: http://www.copernicus.org/EGS/egsga/nice00/program me/abstracts/aac6816.pdf

Closer then you think

[BashDot]

Right here...

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/mgs/sci/msss27Sept04/R150 2643merA_1mA.gif

Dunno why they called it the Bonneville crater though...

(Note to mods: lame attempt at humor)

Re:This is nothing new

[dykofone]

Well no shit, learn something everday...

That PDF you pointed too didn't really give the best explanation, but a little searching and I found it described as the moon not orbiting around the earh, but instead the moon and the earth both rotating around their combined center mass. Therefore, neither is considered a "satellite" of the other. Meanwhile, they both orbit the sun.

Of course, most of the info out there was rather sketchy, mainly saying "they're a double planet system cause the moon is so big." You got me thinkin though..

Re:Crap - Calvin & Hobbes

[aggiefalcon01]

Well, their wagon, but close enough. And as the story goes, they find a martian they think is scared of them. Calvin asks why it would be, and Hobbes guesses that humanity's bad reputation (due to its environmental sins) may have preceeded them. So, they leave, hoping to make some change on Earth.

Re:An Initiative roll?

[Anonymous Coward]

What has any of your post got to do with D&D? The only reason that I can think of that you replied to the GP was to get your post closer to the top. Such blatant camera horning should not be rewarded. Moderators, mod this post down, -1 off-topic.

Re: Your sig

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't worry, you're not paranoid. We really are out to get you. ($3.75 hosting [75-hosting.com])

The company claims that they have no limits, no throttling, etc., for $3.75, but if you dig a little bit, you will find that they will charge you extra or close your account if your traffic exceeds 256Mb. (Note that that is 256Mb total, not 256Mb/month.)
Pretty unethical, if you ask me.

Re:An Initiative roll? Already made the saving thr

[jdray]

Not to mention a ring of telepathy and armor of protection vs. environment.

Loving the Stretch

[virg_mattes]

Here we go again. You'll have to pardon my irritation, but you're still hyperextending, and you're far from being the first, and it gets tiresome to go over this again and again. But, once more we go...

You point out that the Souix tribe's description of a thunderbird that matches a description of a pteronadon is proof that humans and dinosaurs lived concurrently. To that I say it proves that one tribe saw one dinosaur, even if it truly was a dinosaur, which I'm willing to allow for. Heck, there are those that think that the Loch Ness monster (again, if it exists) it likely to be a saurian animal. But again, this is a hyperextension. One dinosaur isn't proof of concurrence by any stretch. There were many, many dinosaurs all over the planet. There are many, many people all over the planet. There's no more than a tiny handful of descriptions of first-hand accounts of encounters. If humans and dinosaurs shared the planet, and the planet was only about 5000 years old, there'd be a lot more than that. There are no descriptions of dinosaurs in Egyptian culture. None in Sumerian culture. None in Inca culture. Do you really expect that one account, even if it's completely accurate, is enough to prove the widespread commingling that you so stubbornly posit? Would you accept that from any scientist?

Virg

Re:Loving the Stretch

[sonamchauhan]

> "You'll have to pardon my irritation, "
OK

> "I say it proves that one tribe saw one dinosaur,
> even if it truly was a dinosaur,..."

The posting about the thunderbird was ancillary - I decided to try to validate the creationist reports and found the thunderbird picture as described.

> "There are no descriptions of dinosaurs in Egyptian culture.
> None in Sumerian culture. None in Inca culture."
You put effort into posting your viewpoint - thank you for that. But I have put in effort too -- please do read my posts completely.

My earlier post linked to this article: ANCIENT DINOSAUR DEPICTIONS ON STONE

It reports evidence of ancient dinosaur depictions from these cultures:
France
Red Indian
Babylonian
Sumatran
Asia Minor (Turkey)
Mesopotamian
Egyptian
Ethiopian
Roman
Mayan
Australian
African ... (I gave up counting at this point)

And then there are the accounts in the Bible.

With regards,
Sonam

Well, Fine, Then.

[virg_mattes]

As I said in my last post, I wasn't going to go forward with the discussion, and in all honesty I doubt I will. The problem with our "discussion" (in quotes for reasons below) is that our premises simply rest too far apart to come to anything remotely resembling agreement. I read the referenced article about dinosaur depictions in ancient cultures, and I found the as I worked my way through it I reached an enlightenment. That enlightenment is that both sides of this argument are too stubborn about it.

On my side, there are people who will say that dinosaurs and people can't have lived together, and so any evidence at all must be faked or incorrect.

On your side, there are people who say that dinosaurs and people have to have lived together, so any evidence is irrefutable.

Both sides can be wrong here.

On my side, there may very well have been dinosaurs (or creatures akin to them) that lived in human times, and therefore some of the evidence might be real. The thunderbird example is a good example of that possibility.

On your side, folks use the Piltdown Man as proof that people will lie and fake stuff to back up their side of the story, and yet can't seem to allow that some ancient Greek guy could dig up a fossil head and then make up a story that he killed the beast himself, just to further his own glory.

This is why I've tired of bickering about it. I've conceded several points but I won't concede them all, and your religion simply does not allow you to yield any part of the point, because a big part of your religion is the prohibition against compromise. Arguing with intractability is pointless, so we're done. We'll just have to disagree.

I thought you at least deserved an explanation as to why I put down the ball and left.

Virg

Re:Well, Fine, Then.

[sonamchauhan]

I beg for your attention once more:

I just read this Link to Sydney Morning Herald story (free registration required):

Family trees share roots in 1415BC

Everyone alive today is descended from one person who lived about 3500 years ago, probably in Asia, a study has found. ...

The results are published in the journal Nature.

This article supports what the Bible says about all descending from Noah in Asia (the ark settled in Armenia) after a global flood about 4200 years ago. This is similar to the conclusion I pointed to in these three scientific papers

I agree with some things you say:
On your side, there are people who say that dinosaurs and people have to have lived together, so any evidence is irrefutable.

Correct. I disagree strongly with such views. Each piece of evidence _must_ stand or fall on its _own_ merits. ...allow that some ancient Greek guy could dig up a fossil head and then make up a story that he killed the beast himself, just to further his own glory.
It is possible. But it is really probable for so many different cultures to _all_ do careful archeological excavations of delicate and (possibly fragmented incomplete) fossils, correlate differnt parts, and then record so _many_ fradulent accounts and render so much accurate artwork? Some of these depict features difficult to assess without modern technology and methods.

Some depict animals that even we came to know about only recently:
"No hoaxer could have known of the Iguanodon's existence, much less made a model, for it wasn't until 1978 or 1979 that skeletons of adult Iguanodons were found with nests and babies."

Other indications point to their observations in the flesh:
"Cartilage forming the shape of a frill or ears may be stylized or accurate (since there is no way to know from the skeletons we have today)."

"Moreover, the dinosaurs are modeled in very agile, active poses, fitting well with the latest scientific evidence and lending credence to the artists having actually observed these creatures."

I've conceded several points but I won't concede them all, and your religion simply does not allow you to yield any part of the point, because a big part of your religion is the prohibition against compromise.

We are not negotiating a "compromise truth".
Yes, we _must_ remain humble about what we do not know (which is quite a lot). But for what we do know, we must be willing to change according to the truth, because this is better for all involved. This applies equally to me, and includes all my religious beliefs too. Is this not fair?

With regards,
Sonam