NASA Announces Water Found On Mars

s.bots writes "Straight from the horse's mouth, NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander has identified water in a soil sample. Hopefully this exciting news will boost interest in the space program and further exploration of the Martian surface." Clearly, this has long been suspected, but now Martian water's been (in the words of William Boynton, lead scientist for the Thermal and Evolved-Gas Analyzer) "touched and tasted."

Comments

Mars...

[Poromenos1]

I still can't believe we sent a small robot and let it run around on *Mars*. It seems so unfathomably far away that I find it hard to even imagine...

Next stop: Bacteria.

"So what?"

[damburger]

...is what most people will think. Whilst this is of earth-shattering (well, mars-shattering) importance to a lot a scientists it isn't going to motivate Joe Public to commit any more tax money to the exploration of space, because they don't benefit from it themselves. This isn't a condition of human nature, this is a conscious choice by a significant portion of the population to never grow out of adolescent self obsession. People are told its good to be totally egotistical, and here is a product that will help you do that.

So no, it won't boost interest in space exploration; everyone who will raise an eyebrow to this news is already interested in space. People who didn't care before now won't care now.

Re:"So what?"

[Turiacus]

I'm sick of these constant attacks on "Joe Sixpack". When was the last time you were consulted on NASA's budget ? Ordinary folks have no control over this.

And what did you personally do to encourage congress to spend more of space exploration ? Probably nothing. (whining on slashdot doesn't count).

I also disagree with the idea that nobody cares. I care, and I bet a lot of people here care too. I remember the record number of visitors pathfinder's website had at the time. You are certainly not alone in finding a robot driving around Mars more exciting than a bunch of guys bicycling in orbit. But I guess having a superiority complex is fun.

Amazing! Unprecidented!...I wonder what's on MTV ?

[TheLazySci-FiAuthor]

This will be remembered in the textbooks as one of the biggest discoveries in human history - and yet it will of course be presently overlooked by uninterested masses.

Will humanity ever get past our predilections with ourselves?

I can't fathom the significance of this event fully, and yet the public applause so well deserved is again, starkly absent.

oh well - I think it's great at least, maybe I shouldn't care so much what the masses think or care about.

Re:Are we surprised?

[19Buck]

Seriously are we really that surprised we found water on Mars? Considering most of our galaxy is made up of the same compounds here on Earth, I wouldn't doubt if we found water on nearly all our planets, in one form or another.

from our perspective here on earth we might seem to have an overabundance of water, but on a universal scale it's a fairly rare compound. After all, water can only exist in a limited number of states under a limited number of conditions.

Re:Measurements on a human level

[SlashDev]

Wasted tax dollars? I'm sure tax dollars are wasted on many idiotic programs than the geological survey of Mars. Space exploration is so important to understanding how the universe was formed, which in turn makes us understand how the earth was formed, which in turn makes us predict many events.

Re:Amazing! Unprecidented!...I wonder what's on MT

[Dynedain]

This will be remembered in the textbooks as one of the biggest discoveries in human history

No it won't, because water is a fairly common molecular arrangement. Electricty, atomic power, Earth being round, these are things that qualify as the biggest discoveries. In 10 years this particular incident of the rover will be forgotten, and in 100 years, the rover itself will be a historical footnote. How much do textbooks cover the Apollo program other than #11 and #13?

Less than 100 years ago, people believed that Mars had canals full of water. Then with better optics people realized that no, those trenches, causing an extreme belief swing the other way - that Mars must be bone dry, any water having long since evaporated. Of course that ignores the polar ice caps which spectrography can easily identify.

We've finally come into direct contact with H20 on Mars' surface rather than simply remote identification. While a milestone, it's a pretty damn tiny one. It will not be remembered in textbooks. Look how results of the Venus expeditions of the 70s are now glossed over.

Re:Water? Big Deal!

[Penguinisto]

True, but that's one gawdawful pipeline you gotta build to get at it, dontcha think?

(...and I don't even want to know how what's gonna happen once the Sierra Club crowd finds out...)

(yes, I'm being facetious).

/P

Re:Are we surprised?

[meringuoid]

from our perspective here on earth we might seem to have an overabundance of water, but on a universal scale it's a fairly rare compound.

On the contrary: I'd guess that water is the most common compound in the Universe.

The most abundant substance in the by far in the visible Universe is hydrogen. The second most abundant is helium. The third most abundant element in the Universe is oxygen, but in the presence of elemental hydrogen oxygen is unstable and reacts exothermically to produce water. Probably most of the oxygen not locked up inside stars is in water molecules.

Liquid water is rare, I'll grant. But the Universe is absolutely riddled with water vapour and with ice.