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Ingredients of Life Found Around Sun-Like Star

smooth wombat writes "NASAs Spitzer Space Telescope has detected the basic organic building blocks of life in a ring orbiting in the 'habitable zone', that area where Earth orbits the Sun and where water exists on the borderline between gas and liquid, in a nearby stellar nursery. When acetylene and hydrogen cyanide combine with water they form adenine, one of the four bases of DNA. The detection supports the widely held theory that many of the molecular building blocks of life were present in the solar system even before planets formed, thus assisting the initial formation of complex organic molecules and the start of life itself." Though it was a little shakier than this observation, we've discussed the possibility of life elsewhere in the galaxy before.

20 of 366 comments (clear)

  1. Ingredients of Life Found Around Sun-Like Star by gowen · · Score: 5, Funny

    What, you mean concrete evidence of an Intelligent Designer?

    Love,
    Kansas Board of Education

    --
    Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
    1. Re:Ingredients of Life Found Around Sun-Like Star by ahsile · · Score: 5, Funny

      I do believe there is evidence of "His Noodly Appendages" visible from Earth.

    2. Re:Ingredients of Life Found Around Sun-Like Star by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      NASAs Spitzer Space Telescope has detected the basic organic building blocks of life in a ring orbiting in the 'habitable zone'

      Nope. In fact, they've found the ringworld.

      Yeah yeah, its unstable -- but only when those goddamn insane puppeteers are nearby.

    3. Re:Ingredients of Life Found Around Sun-Like Star by InfiniteWisdom · · Score: 4, Funny

      The correct spelling is Kansas Board of "Education"

    4. Re:Ingredients of Life Found Around Sun-Like Star by kin_korn_karn · · Score: 3, Funny

      Kansas Bord of Edyookashun

    5. Re:Ingredients of Life Found Around Sun-Like Star by jdbartlett · · Score: 2, Funny

      Other spelling variations found in KBE literature: - "Kansas" "Board" of "Education" - Kansas Board of Education. Honest. - Kansas, Bored with Education - Kansas Mod of Education - Kansas Board of Holy Education - The Lord's Board

    6. Re:Ingredients of Life Found Around Sun-Like Star by Golias · · Score: 4, Funny

      The debate between ID and anti-ID zealots doesn't really interest me all that much, but every time the "flying spaghetti monster" argument gets invoked, I get really hungry for pasta.

      Is that just me?

      --

      Information wants to be anthropomorphized.

    7. Re:Ingredients of Life Found Around Sun-Like Star by kin_korn_karn · · Score: 2, Funny

      Support the Kansas Public Schools!
      Our Motto: Ignorance is Relative

    8. Re:Ingredients of Life Found Around Sun-Like Star by PriceIke · · Score: 4, Funny

      Ramen!

      --
      It's not a lie. It's the truth with lossy compression.
  2. Intelligent Design by setirw · · Score: 5, Funny

    Definitive proof that the building blocks of life were purposefully placed here by a space alien :-)

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    This message printed on 100% post-consumer recycled electrons.
  3. In other news by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Ingredients for bleu cheese found in my bathroom... but that doesn't mean it is bleu cheese or that I'd want to eat it even if it were.

  4. Dupe?! by lawpoop · · Score: 3, Funny

    "Though it was a little shakier than this observation, we've discussed the possibility of life elsewhere in the galaxy before."

    Oh, so you've bourght us another dupe, huh? Well, thanks, Slashdot mods, thanks! FOR NOTHING!

    --
    Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
    -- Pablo Picasso
  5. Wait - so Moby had it right? by Dark+Paladin · · Score: 1, Funny

    We are all made of stars?

    1. Re:Wait - so Moby had it right? by Golias · · Score: 2, Funny

      I sang it in the shower this morning, does that make it my song now?

      --

      Information wants to be anthropomorphized.

  6. I think I'm desperate for entertainment... by mister_llah · · Score: 2, Funny

    I find myself strangely hoping that someone gives you some insightful karma for this...

    --
    MoM++ - A Classic Expanded - [Master of Magic 1.5]
    http://mompp.sourceforge.net/
  7. Re:After further consideration... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    Well basically the darwin force lets call it god assembles the molecules so that very unlikely events become possible. Then after much prayer the darwin force manages to protect the material while it freefalls down a few hundred miles and is unhurt.

    praise be the darwin force god....down with the other gods.

  8. ingredients for life by revery · · Score: 4, Funny

    To inhabitants of the T'nsha'grlsk galaxy this is hardly surprising. Scattered across their saucier-pan-shaped galaxy are planets containing the ingredients for Fetucinni Alfredo, Pork Tenderloin, Chicken Cacciatore, and in what will most likely result in a lawsuit should humans develop interstellar space travel, the McRib.

    When asked about the ingredients for Life, Ss's'krpwjdnq waved his third-dimension-bound tentacles wildly and secreted an information packed protein strand. While there is no English equivalent for his communique, a rough translation would be "Given the chance to eat a human, I would."

  9. So? Quaker Oats has know for years ... by joelsanda · · Score: 3, Funny

    The ingredients of Life.

    Sure as hell don't have to go that far out to get it - local supermarket has it!

    --
    The Luddites were ahead of their time.
  10. Re:It's all in Xenu! by Cpt_Kirks · · Score: 3, Funny

    My! What DO they teach you young Scientologists these days?

    Where to send the checks?

  11. Re:DNA in space? by Rick.C · · Score: 3, Funny
    There is no such thing as "ludacrously improbable"

    IIRC, that was one of the speed settings on the Heart of Gold's throttle lever.

    --
    You were 80% angel, 10% demon. The rest was hard to explain. - Over The Rhine
    "Math in a song is good."-Linford