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Russian Scientist Claims Signs of Life Spotted On Venus
flergum writes "Leonid Ksanfomaliti, an astronomer based at the Space Research Institute of Russia's Academy of Sciences, analyzed photographs taken by a Russian landing probe during 1982 and claims to have found signs of life. Ksanfomaliti says the Russian photographs depict objects resembling a 'disk,' a 'black flap' and a 'scorpion.'"
"Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" -The Sagan Standard
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Or easily explained by the distortion of a lens by heat in desert conditions - this one a scathing 1k F.
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No pictures were included, so how can we form our own, uneducated, opinions???
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Leonid Ksanfomaliti, ...claims to have found signs of life...objects resembling ... a scorpion
I haven't heard the Scorpions since the 80s. They were pretty good in their niche. Is this a reunion tour?
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
See this site for the best processed pictures from the Venera missions. Absolutely fascinating stuff those Russians did then.
http://www.mentallandscape.com/V_DigitalImages.htm
Ydco co
*clicks on article* ...Hmm, ok, no pictures here.
*googles it* http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2090556/Life-Venus-Russian-scientist-claims-seen-scorpion-probe-photographs.html?ito=feeds-newsxml.
Yea... I'm no astrocryptozoologist, but that doesn't look like life to me.
but on earth. We do pattern matching, even when there is none, we see shapes of gods in cluods, of the future in tea leaves, even faces in the moon and mars. This could have been totally random shapes. But of course, if it was life, specially one that are totally different from what we are used to see, could be a step forward for us, still too much people see earth as the center of the universe.
The author designed some of the instruments on Venera, in fact. I can find several articles by him in the aformentioned journal but nothing that suggests "aliens".
http://www.springerlink.com/content/0038-0946/?k=Ksanfomaliti
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
"looked like a disk, a black flap, and a scorpion"
Is that like one of those drafting exercises where an object looks like a black flap from the front, a scorpion from the side, and a disk from above?
No pictures were included, so how can we form our own, uneducated, opinions???
This article from Ria Novosti has one picture with attributions to the scientist and journal. I'm not sure what you're looking at but I am guessing that the object outside of the pod is not a device of theirs -- which leads to a lot of speculation and conjecture. I guess I don't know enough about their sensors/cameras that they were using in 1982 to say whether or not this was some sort of aberration or malfunction of the camera due to extreme temperatures. But that's about the best uneducated opinion I can offer you.
My work here is dung.
What in god's name does a "black flap" look like?
I don't understand why there are not any pictures with this story.
Usually, kinda black and flappy. :-P
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
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Sent as ripples into the electromagnetic field. No single photon has been harmed in the process.
Which is exactly what a greenhouse effect is, moron.
The sun is responsible for the heating. The dense atmosphere is responsible for keeping the heat in. Like, y'know, a greenhouse.
Or did you think that the atmosphere was dense enough to undergo nuclear fusion and release heat, or something?
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
The picture is published at "Is this life on Venus? Russian scientist claims to have seen 'scorpion' in probe photographs"; I don't think it look like a scorpion though, more like the bio-luminous worm like thingies in the movie "Pitch Black" to me. The photos are way to grainey to get anywhere past the "if you squint your eyes and tilt your head" stage. The book "There's Somebody Else on the Moon" had way better photos.
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The greenhouse effect IS responsible for the high temperatures. This is why the temperature stays pretty much the same even on the dark side of the planet. Solar radiation comes in but radiates away very slowly. This is demonstrated by the night side temperatures, which are pretty much the same as the day side temperatures. This is also verified by the stratospheric temperature difference from the surface (the stratosphere is very cold, since little heat is escaping from the troposphere).
Density plays a part because it further reduces the rate of heat escaping. However, it is the CO2 gas that is key. An atmosphere of 95% Nitrogen, for example, would not be nearly as scorching and given the slow rotational rate, the night side of the planet would be bone chilling cold. Our own atmosphere is mostly nitrogen and oxygen, and without the various greenhouse gases (water vapor, CO2, methane, etc.) our planet would be a block of ice.
~X~
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