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The Indirect Case For Life On Mars

Posted by timothy on from the nearly-almost-somewhat-approximate dept.

Deinhard writes "Space.com is reporting that '[a] pair of NASA scientists told a group of space officials at a private meeting here Sunday that they have found strong evidence that life may exist today on Mars, hidden away in caves and sustained by pockets of water.' It is all based on methane signatures and not direct observation. Now plans for using the Genesis Device on Mars are out ... unless this is just a particle of preanimate matter caught in the matrix."

27 of 334 comments (clear)

  1. PROOF!!! by Arctic+Dragon · · Score: 5, Funny

    Here is the scientist's proof:

    http://xmlx.ca/images/37/o_martian.jpg

  2. obligatory by bersl2 · · Score: 4, Funny

    KHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNN!!!

  3. Hiding in caves by gaber1187 · · Score: 2, Funny

    And they are just over the horizon with their Atomic Pistols!

    1. Re:Hiding in caves by CrixelGarten · · Score: 5, Funny

      So that's where the Taliban is! We've been looking in the wrong place the whole time... ....

  4. In other news.... by slapout · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...Santa may be real because he leaves me presents...

    --
    Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
  5. Re:I wish them... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    Your mom must be so proud that you can speak Klingon.

  6. Re:Genesis device?! by EnronHaliburton2004 · · Score: 2, Funny

    There ain't no genesis device in real life is there?

    Well, you exist, right? So there is at least once...

    I just feel sorry for the microbes which inhabited this planet before the device went off...

    The show's not off apparently ...

    --
    94% of Repubs and 21% of Dems voted to renew the Patriot Act
  7. meanwhile... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Microsoft releases the new Microsoft Genesis:

    1. Terraforms any planet within 2 minutes.
    2. Can only be used on Micrsoft Authorized, Genuine Planets and Asteroids (MAGPAs)
    3. Any matter may be used, however the Matter Standard may be extended in the future.

    Microsoft has critiziced GNU Terraform system, calling it 'anarchist'. Richard Stallman has responded, reminding about how Microsoft once lamented about how 'if people knew how planets were terraformed when the Earth became inhabitable, people would be in dystopian alien governments today.'

    Meanwhile in an unrelated incident, a person has sued MMOINC for not letting him use a used copy of Marsland MMO.

    The WiMax Foundation has come out saying that WiMax could blanket 99% of Mars. Microsoft has responded to GNU Terraform by making Microsoft Genesis free-of-charge.

  8. Life on Slashdot by Tackhead · · Score: 4, Funny
    > hidden away in caves and sustained by pockets of water.' It is all based on methane signatures and not direct observation.

    Creature that secrete methane gas and spend their lives hidden in caves, never coming out for observation.

    Well, of course, th-HEY! This isn't the "EULA Confusion w/ Used Copies of WoW?" thread!

  9. Re:Nonbiological methane production by Chuckstar · · Score: 5, Funny

    One of my college roommates also produced a lot of methane. Based on his ability to consume large amounts of alcohol, I'm pretty sure he was inorganic.

  10. Well... by GillBates0 · · Score: 4, Funny
    "They are desperate to find out what could be producing the methane," one attendee told Space News. "Their answer is drill, drill, drill."

    ...it is primarily produced by symbiotic bacteria and yeasts living in the gastrointestinal tract of mammals.

    The proper way to avoid flatulence (colloq: farting) is through a controlled diet, avoiding beans, cabbage etc. Drilling is apt to get them nowhere.

    --
    An Indian-American Hindu committed to non-violent thought/speech/action alarmed by the global explosion of radical Islam
  11. Let's hear it from an expert! by frozenray · · Score: 5, Funny

    Mars is essentially in the same orbit... Mars is somewhat the same distance from the Sun, which is very important. We have seen pictures where there are canals, we believe, and water. If there is water, that means there is oxygen. If oxygen, that means we can breathe.


    Dan Quayle, 8/11/89

    I rest my case.
    --
    "There are already a million monkeys on a million typewriters, and Usenet is NOTHING like Shakespeare." - Blair Houghton
    1. Re:Let's hear it from an expert! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      Ah Dan - those were the days. He even makes Dubya look like a Rhodes Scholar by comparison.

    2. Re:Let's hear it from an expert! by RatBastard · · Score: 4, Funny

      You must be a youngin'. Dan Quayle was one of the dumbest men to walk the face of the earth. I think George Sr. picked Danforth for two reasons:
      1: so no one would dare assaninate him.
      2: to get us used to a moron in the Whitehouse.

      --
      Boobies never hurt anyone. - Sherry Glaser.
  12. We are not bound by the "Prime Directive" by AHumbleOpinion · · Score: 4, Funny

    ... Now plans for using the Genesis Device on Mars are out ...

    Since the "Prime Directive" is centuries in our future we are free to f' over anything we find there as we terraform.

  13. Yup, life is there... by the_skywise · · Score: 4, Funny

    And we probably sent it there on the Viking Probes!

    (or it's from the remains of a long dead civilization that had a war with the fifth planet of the solar system. The fifth planet was turned to rubble and the aftermath of the war destroyed Mars. So the survivors fled to Earth and feasted on dinosaur meat until they hunted them to extinction...)

  14. Re:Nonbiological methane production by KiltedKnight · · Score: 5, Funny
    There's also the buried black obelisk...

    --
    OCO is Loco
  15. Finally ... by GnoMoreGnuPuns · · Score: 2, Funny

    we can answer David Bowie's question.

  16. More importantly by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Weren't large subterranean gas deposits on Mars of inorganic origin the plot of Total Recall???

    I recommend we send Governor Schwarzenegger to investigate.

  17. Re:Nonbiological methane production by exp(pi*sqrt(163)) · · Score: 4, Funny

    Nah! There are countless obelisks here but nobody claims there's intelligent life in Ireland. No...wait...I phrased that wrong...

    --
    Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
  18. hmmm by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    last I heard, Methane was frequently produced on Uranus.

  19. Re:case for Genesis Device test site by Dunbal · · Score: 2, Funny

    I don't think that the preponderance of evidence suggests that any present life on Mars has any chance at all of evolving into an intelligent species.

    As compared to say, Earth, you mean? There's not much evidence of intelligent life here either... :)

    --
    Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
  20. Re:Nonbiological methane production by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    Well, by golly, call me a romantic, but I would like to think that there is actually something on Mars happily farting its way through life. Oh, what a wonderful world it would be.

  21. To the girl with the mousy by BeerCat · · Score: 2, Funny

    Well, Mr Bowie, we nearly like your new song, but I'm not too sure about that second line. Now I'm only a record executive, and no nothing of rhyme and rhythm, but I think that it would scan better with an extra word tagged on the end.

    How about the word "hair" ?

    --
    "She's furniture with a pulse"
  22. Re:To the, uh.. Martian Cave!, .... Rover! by glebfrank · · Score: 2, Funny

    Considering that the rovers operate on solar power... I don't know about this idea :)

  23. Re:Ancient Life by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    I think passing English Ralph would be pretty freakin' difficult, unless he's really really small.

  24. Easy Fix by spineboy · · Score: 3, Funny
    When it's power supply gets low, it can just use it's arm to shine the flashlight onto the solar cells, thereby recharging it's batteries.

    Somehow I seem to remember a Simpsons qoute about thermodynamics that's applicable to this situation. NASA should investigate this.

    --
    ..........FULL STOP.