They didn't patent the software, the encryption method, or the concept.
What they have patented is the perceptual encoding schema; the data this research institute gathered was which frequencies, amplitudes, and combinations of the two are important, with all the others either discared since they aren't perceptably audible, are represented by other data, or cannot be heard outright. Anyone can make up this data, and many fast encoders out there do that for 'good enough' quality, but they have noticible artifacts and errors in encoding. Fraunhoffer's data is exactly a statistical model and sample of audible frequencies and dominant frequencies.
I don't know how to make an analogy; Perhaps with a loose analogy. The data Fraunhoffer holds is like a survey of a quarter of the people in the US. If you want to use their info, you can pay for it. If you don't want to pay for it, you can go out and get this info yourself, which is prohibatively expensive, or you can guess what the information is, with much larger margins of error and such. In the same way then if you buy the codec from Fraunhoffer, you can get the smallest best quality files, or you can go out and collect the data yourself, or you can guess based of your own hearing and reasonable assumptions what data is important and what isn't.
If that analogy didn't work, think of Fraunhoffer as cataloguing all the stars visible with a telescope, and sorting the data by size, color, distance, etc. Either you can buy this data to create your star maps, you can guess(ick), or you can go get it yourself. Fraunhoffer has some useful info, and as such have every right to sell it, I think.
Even a JPEG at highest quality encoding has visual artifacts visible to an eye trained to see such things, and if the source image is of poor quality, the artifacts themselves may get worse.
So what? MP3 quality is about 'good enough', not best. A Toyota Camry is good enough, where a Corvette or Ferrari or Volvo or Mercedes is best. Not everyone can afford those high end cars, and likewise, I'm not sure we could afford in memory, hard disk space, and CPU cycles a much better standard than MP3
Not saying its technically difficult, because it isn't, but it's laborious and time consuming and expensive as hell, which is why Fraunhoffer has a patent on the perceptual encoding used in the best MP3 encoders. It isn't the encoding itself, which is stupidly easy for MP3, but the special discard functions that cost money.
If I'm not mistaken, here's how MP3 encoding works. This is the simple, easy, free part: Take a wave source; break it up into samples. Take a sample, use discrete cosine/sine transforms, and break it into a bunch of frequencies and coefficients. The compression part is the expensive part; select components that are inaudible, masked, or undetectable and discard or discount their value. Which frequencies do you want to throw out? That's what Fraunhoffer has patented. You could pick and choose until it sounds right, but that is essentially what Fraunhoffer did. The problem is that you need to experiment with many different kind of instruments, music, data types, and against very many people to ensure broadest possible reach, and not just optimization against a few people who may have odd hearing response.
Once the proprietary part is done, you have a bunch of coefficients for cos and sin terms, which are further compressed using Huffman bitrate encoding, which is fine, though not the best. This is free too, as the algorithm is pretty well known. Morse code happens to work on a similar principle; frequent characters get the shorter combinations of dits and dahs, while the rare characters get the longer combinations.
What, brave enough to make an insult under cover of anonymity?
Its a legitamate trade off between quality, size, and performance. Not wanting to waste bandwidth on flames, but it's like labeling those who enjoy JPEG pictures blind, or who enjoy fast food without taste or culture. If you happen to be driving a no-compromise car, with a no-compromise engine, and no-compromise performance, its easy to label all other cars as weak, ineffectual, and pointless, except that they hit different price, performance, convenience points. I would like to hear what you use to listen and share music with if not mp3 or some other similar compressed standard.
My problem with Office? I'm not a point and click person... I'm not a homekey VI user either, but I tend to use keyboard commands and shortcuts very often, and the problem is probably due to the fact that I grew up with WP5.1 for dos, and haven't been able to unlearn it.
Another problem is that Office tries to do so much thinking for you, it's hard to figure out how to unthink. In WP, even in v8 with Corel Suite, it's a little more detailed/complicated, but it's clear and consistent how to do columns, and switch between columns, and how to modify the text height of each column, and column width, border width, if there should be a line between columns, and how to change the wrap settings in a column. That has always been one of my biggest complaints with office and Word; I actually don't know how to make an uneven 3 column document with differing widths.
I'm not stupid either, the argument of point and click is worthless because the complexity is above point and click. Word and Office is fine if all you need is point and click, but if I want to do a brochure, pamphlet, or flyer, I'm stuck with using PageMaker, which is overkill, until I went and bought WP Suite. There is a better product, and I'm surprised that no one uses it.
Maybe it's buggy and crashes; I haven't seen that yet. It does take more memory, but on the order of 1200k vs 9700k, and it is even faster than word. Maybe I'm just clueless for wanting to do things my way rather than MS way...
Is it that horrible a product? I just bought it for Windows, since it was on discount and I wanted to try it, and it seems perfectly acceptable, useable, heck, I even like it! Why is it everyone gravitates around Office?
Unified-Linux Office Server Edition:web enhanced with integrated networking
That would be a hilarious name for a M$ Linux Offise product. Microsoft Office: Linux Distribution MO:LD
I'm not sure myself if it's a good or bad thing if M$ Office gets ported to Linux. If they're in it to make money, that's fine-its an understandable goal, and easy enough to work with. If they want to undermine Linux with bad software that causes the OS to become unstable and crash, or if they want to control Linux's growth by 'requiring' compatibility to run Office, I'm not so sure I would place any faith in the product.
I'm surprised no one has responded to this statement yet...
It bespeaks of the huge power and force that/. has and can wield in our society...
While people are free to disagree on what is important or not, it is very powerful that/. was able to boost Jon Katz to some sort of respectability, and to push sales.
Sure, hate Katz for what he did, but it means in a concerted effort, we could pick and choose any random work, any random title, any random author, and guarantee them in the top 25 best sellers. Its a sign of the power of/. and of geeks and nerds everywhere!
Gee, it must have been expensive to set up an entertainment center good enough to forgo a visit to a theatre to see Star Wars I. I guess it would be more convenient than waiting for a couple hours in line, maybe.
I'm not sure which will get bigger, VCD or DVD. My bet is on DVD, because the quality I've seen suggests that DVD, or at least properly done DVD, is better quality than VCD.
You're not really missing much if you don't understand the appeal; it just doesn't appeal to you. I myself realized how bored I was when I saw the original trilogy in the theatre. Not that I'm not a Star Wars nut, its just lost some of the appeal it had when I was younger. I look forward to the new series because Lucas is a good storyteller and has some neat special effects and CG on his plate, but I'm not a fanatic of the movies so much as a fanatic of the philosophies, the universe, and the ideas embedded in the movies.
Just as many people shoot down a space station as they do Mars, so whichever comes first gets the most technical prizes.
You're right about spending much time in space, but that requires a space station, and the only difference at that point is aim and control. Once you fire something off in the right direction, it will keep going in space, so there is little functional difference between a space station orbiting the Earth or something flying to Mars... Landing and getting off Mars is different, but a small module designed for such a purpose who probably accomplish that.
Don't get me wrong gang - I actually like Sci-Fi. The problem to me is that too many people arn't very critical in their thinking and as a result of that, they end up taking it far too seriously.
It's probably related to the US's abysmal science education in school. Most people have no clue what science or scientific thought really is, I'm sure.
Do we lose anything for believing there exists life outside our planet and solar system? If we don't all we lose our hope, and that's just a shame, so for all extents and purposes, we want to act as if the next mission, the next study, the next survey will discover intelligence of life, no?
I'm surprised no one has mentioned any of the real value of scientific exploration...
Imagine the medical, technological, computing, materials science, and engineering innovations inherent in a trip to Mars!
Diet, medicine, and exercise need to compensate for the zero G environment. This also happens to translate directly into the Earth's environment, with bone loss and bone density issues of the elderly and those suffering from osteoperosis. Likewise information about our daily cycles(what without the normal day-night cycle for extended time), and about our relationship to gravity, in the zero G environs.
Technology: Too much to talk about! Imagine the compounds we would discover to facilitate travel! Radiation shielding, new super strong, super light, super hard, super everything ceramics, plastics, metals, and fibers! Energy and solar efficiences, new solar panel technologies, new high efficiency batteries, or fuel sorces, or power plants! Or superconductors? Or new polymers?
How about computing? Simulation demands, new processes to deal with the high radiation environments of space? These can also be applied to new microprocessors perhaps.
Not a very coherent reply, but I think you get some idea... Besides just the coolness factor.
There is fairly good evidence that it is a Mars rock.
Isotope distributions match fairly closely to Mars Atmospheric makeup of gas trapped within glass bubbles also match Mars; note that Venus has a hydrochloric acid and sulfuric acid atmosphere..
Mars is more CO and CO2, I think.
Jupiter is also hydrogens and ammonias, with some water.
Gosh I wish I could find your email and have a constructive conversation rather than some pointless rant where you aren't even guaranteed to see or read it...
The problem with science, research, and results is we don't know that we will ever get anything useful. Period. Research by its very nature is experimental and untried, with a high probability of failure. However, without it, we would still be using wooden tools and stone implements, and probably even less.
You're arguments as such are true, but they are also not the real benefits of space exploration and research.
Space exploration demands, screams for, requires new materials. However, if we don't build things like space stations, new materials don't get researched, and these materials never get used here on earth. Like titanium golf clubs, or aluminum coke cans, or millions of other products of our past space programs. Fullerines, super-conductors, super-ceramics, super polymers, and many other wacky things get worked on while designing a space station, for insulation, strength, durability, stress, radiation protection, etc. All of the above also have uses here on Earth, and are far from useless.
There is also biological information ready to be harvested from an extended space trip, such as info about human physiology, health, and maintanence. Ecosystems and recycling of wastes and other things also need to be figured out as well. Who knows but the next great advance, such as an anti-hangover pill, or a anti-alergy medication, or a preservative that keeps food fresh for weeks, or whatever, can't be found because of the space program?
Personally the space program has value in of itself, for the exploration, the barriers, the newness, the excitement. But I guess for you, and other's like you, I have to dish out explanations of convenience, worth, and viability.
Heck, what better use do we have for some of our money than space?
As cool as a pencil in space is, I've heard plenty of good arguments that pencil shavings, graphite, and eraser dust would be pretty bad contaminants in zero G.
Of course, a wax pencil would probably be that much better than either.
I'm not sure I believe the quote of a million bucks for the Space Pen, though I'm sure it cost quite a bit...
Ian McDiarmid looks and sounds good as the Emperor. 12 years done him in too badly. Well, he was wearing his trademark cloak though...
Did anyone else catch the scene right after young Queen talks to some sort of inter-federation council about the invasion? Did that not sound like the original Obi-Wan, Alec Guiness? Maybe wishful thinking on my part.
Wonder why the ceramonial makeup the Queen wears; is it just makeup? Or does she really look like that?
Ambivalence; I'm sorta glad they didn't spoil the new music for us, unless of course all the new music just happens to sound like the old music =)
What is it, 2 months from now, roughly? 68 days or something?
Not horribly so. Escape velocity on earth is like 11,000kph or something like that. If there were just an asteroid sitting on earth's path, the earth's velocity while orbiting around the sun is much greater than 11,000kph, so the asteroid itself will be able to reach escape velocities, and any chunks of dirt it dishes out will be able to leave with escape velocities.
On Mars, since it is smaller and less massive, has much lower escape velocities. It's very easy to imagine chunks getting knocked out into orbit; some believe Mar's moons are just this type of remnant, either pieces of Mars, pieces of asteroids caught by Mars, or pieces of asteroids that bounced off Mars. In a similar vein, some believe the moon is a result of an extraordinary impact with earth and a large fast asteroid.
While getting it into space is easy enough, getting to earth is the hard part. While not easy to imagine, much more coincindental things have occurred, like the earth getting hit by an asteroid. In fact, the probabilities are the same, since anything that leaves Mars is an asteroid, and the probabilities may be higher because Mars is closer than all the asteroid belts.
Nothing needed to live through reentry if they were fossilized remains inside the rock. Likewise, they probably didn't survive escape from Mars either, except that they were protected as fossilized remains in the rock.
Slashdot Mirror
They didn't patent the software, the encryption method, or the concept.
What they have patented is the perceptual encoding schema; the data this research institute gathered was which frequencies, amplitudes, and combinations of the two are important, with all the others either discared since they aren't perceptably audible, are represented by other data, or cannot be heard outright. Anyone can make up this data, and many fast encoders out there do that for 'good enough' quality, but they have noticible artifacts and errors in encoding. Fraunhoffer's data is exactly a statistical model and sample of audible frequencies and dominant frequencies.
I don't know how to make an analogy; Perhaps with a loose analogy. The data Fraunhoffer holds is like a survey of a quarter of the people in the US. If you want to use their info, you can pay for it. If you don't want to pay for it, you can go out and get this info yourself, which is prohibatively expensive, or you can guess what the information is, with much larger margins of error and such. In the same way then if you buy the codec from Fraunhoffer, you can get the smallest best quality files, or you can go out and collect the data yourself, or you can guess based of your own hearing and reasonable assumptions what data is important and what isn't.
If that analogy didn't work, think of Fraunhoffer as cataloguing all the stars visible with a telescope, and sorting the data by size, color, distance, etc. Either you can buy this data to create your star maps, you can guess(ick), or you can go get it yourself. Fraunhoffer has some useful info, and as such have every right to sell it, I think.
AS
Well duh!
Even a JPEG at highest quality encoding has visual artifacts visible to an eye trained to see such things, and if the source image is of poor quality, the artifacts themselves may get worse.
So what? MP3 quality is about 'good enough', not best. A Toyota Camry is good enough, where a Corvette or Ferrari or Volvo or Mercedes is best. Not everyone can afford those high end cars, and likewise, I'm not sure we could afford in memory, hard disk space, and CPU cycles a much better standard than MP3
AS
Not saying its technically difficult, because it isn't, but it's laborious and time consuming and expensive as hell, which is why Fraunhoffer has a patent on the perceptual encoding used in the best MP3 encoders. It isn't the encoding itself, which is stupidly easy for MP3, but the special discard functions that cost money.
If I'm not mistaken, here's how MP3 encoding works. This is the simple, easy, free part:
Take a wave source; break it up into samples. Take a sample, use discrete cosine/sine transforms, and break it into a bunch of frequencies and coefficients. The compression part is the expensive part; select components that are inaudible, masked, or undetectable and discard or discount their value. Which frequencies do you want to throw out? That's what Fraunhoffer has patented. You could pick and choose until it sounds right, but that is essentially what Fraunhoffer did. The problem is that you need to experiment with many different kind of instruments, music, data types, and against very many people to ensure broadest possible reach, and not just optimization against a few people who may have odd hearing response.
Once the proprietary part is done, you have a bunch of coefficients for cos and sin terms, which are further compressed using Huffman bitrate encoding, which is fine, though not the best. This is free too, as the algorithm is pretty well known. Morse code happens to work on a similar principle; frequent characters get the shorter combinations of dits and dahs, while the rare characters get the longer combinations.
Decoding is left as an exercise for the reader =)
AS
What, brave enough to make an insult under cover of anonymity?
Its a legitamate trade off between quality, size, and performance. Not wanting to waste bandwidth on flames, but it's like labeling those who enjoy JPEG pictures blind, or who enjoy fast food without taste or culture. If you happen to be driving a no-compromise car, with a no-compromise engine, and no-compromise performance, its easy to label all other cars as weak, ineffectual, and pointless, except that they hit different price, performance, convenience points. I would like to hear what you use to listen and share music with if not mp3 or some other similar compressed standard.
AS
People who like portability in their music; a 3mb mp3 vs a 30mb wav, despite the loss in quality. It's akin to your asking...
What's up with that fixation on JPEG? Who gives a damn anyway?
Any answer you can give for one, you can give for the other, and I'm sure you'll think JPEG is useless too.
AS
WinAMP is better still, and well worth the 10 dollar registration. I like the options, speed, and reliability of WinAMP...
I'm too busy to take and add to FreeAMP to suit my tastes, so I stick to WinAMP...
AS
If you use an MP3 player, which is it?
WinAMP registered;
WinAMP unregistered;
Old WinAMP free;
Sonique
FreeAMP
X11AMP
etc...
Or something like that.
AS
Yeah buddy, just wait until we meet in a dark alley. We'll see who's laughing then, ne?
AS
I would prefer some dark meat too. Variety and all that, right?
Imagine the freaky chicken with 4 legs that walks around like a dog?
AS
My problem with Office?
I'm not a point and click person...
I'm not a homekey VI user either, but I tend to use keyboard commands and shortcuts very often, and the problem is probably due to the fact that I grew up with WP5.1 for dos, and haven't been able to unlearn it.
Another problem is that Office tries to do so much thinking for you, it's hard to figure out how to unthink. In WP, even in v8 with Corel Suite, it's a little more detailed/complicated, but it's clear and consistent how to do columns, and switch between columns, and how to modify the text height of each column, and column width, border width, if there should be a line between columns, and how to change the wrap settings in a column. That has always been one of my biggest complaints with office and Word; I actually don't know how to make an uneven 3 column document with differing widths.
I'm not stupid either, the argument of point and click is worthless because the complexity is above point and click. Word and Office is fine if all you need is point and click, but if I want to do a brochure, pamphlet, or flyer, I'm stuck with using PageMaker, which is overkill, until I went and bought WP Suite. There is a better product, and I'm surprised that no one uses it.
Maybe it's buggy and crashes; I haven't seen that yet. It does take more memory, but on the order of 1200k vs 9700k, and it is even faster than word. Maybe I'm just clueless for wanting to do things my way rather than MS way...
AS
Is it that horrible a product? I just bought it for Windows, since it was on discount and I wanted to try it, and it seems perfectly acceptable, useable, heck, I even like it! Why is it everyone gravitates around Office?
Just curious
AS
You could just fly down to the US for a nice friendly summer visit, see a few movies, grab a few souvenirs, and make all your friends jealous...
Then again, it is just a movie.
But it is Star Wars.
Could you just take a trip to Britain or something to catch it? When does it appear there?
AS
Unified-Linux Office Server Edition:web enhanced with integrated networking
That would be a hilarious name for a M$ Linux Offise product.
Microsoft Office: Linux Distribution
MO:LD
I'm not sure myself if it's a good or bad thing if M$ Office gets ported to Linux. If they're in it to make money, that's fine-its an understandable goal, and easy enough to work with. If they want to undermine Linux with bad software that causes the OS to become unstable and crash, or if they want to control Linux's growth by 'requiring' compatibility to run Office, I'm not so sure I would place any faith in the product.
We'll see if the rumor pans out.
AS
I'm surprised no one has responded to this statement yet...
/. has and can wield in our society...
/. was able to boost Jon Katz to some sort of respectability, and to push sales.
/. and of geeks and nerds everywhere!
It bespeaks of the huge power and force that
While people are free to disagree on what is important or not, it is very powerful that
Sure, hate Katz for what he did, but it means in a concerted effort, we could pick and choose any random work, any random title, any random author, and guarantee them in the top 25 best sellers. Its a sign of the power of
AS
Gee, it must have been expensive to set up an entertainment center good enough to forgo a visit to a theatre to see Star Wars I. I guess it would be more convenient than waiting for a couple hours in line, maybe.
I'm not sure which will get bigger, VCD or DVD. My bet is on DVD, because the quality I've seen suggests that DVD, or at least properly done DVD, is better quality than VCD.
AS
You're not really missing much if you don't understand the appeal; it just doesn't appeal to you. I myself realized how bored I was when I saw the original trilogy in the theatre. Not that I'm not a Star Wars nut, its just lost some of the appeal it had when I was younger. I look forward to the new series because Lucas is a good storyteller and has some neat special effects and CG on his plate, but I'm not a fanatic of the movies so much as a fanatic of the philosophies, the universe, and the ideas embedded in the movies.
AS
Just as many people shoot down a space station as they do Mars, so whichever comes first gets the most technical prizes.
You're right about spending much time in space, but that requires a space station, and the only difference at that point is aim and control. Once you fire something off in the right direction, it will keep going in space, so there is little functional difference between a space station orbiting the Earth or something flying to Mars... Landing and getting off Mars is different, but a small module designed for such a purpose who probably accomplish that.
AS
Don't get me wrong gang - I actually like Sci-Fi. The problem to me is that too many people arn't very critical in their thinking and as a result of that, they end up taking it far too seriously.
It's probably related to the US's abysmal science education in school. Most people have no clue what science or scientific thought really is, I'm sure.
Do we lose anything for believing there exists life outside our planet and solar system? If we don't all we lose our hope, and that's just a shame, so for all extents and purposes, we want to act as if the next mission, the next study, the next survey will discover intelligence of life, no?
AS
I'm surprised no one has mentioned any of the real value of scientific exploration...
Imagine the medical, technological, computing, materials science, and engineering innovations inherent in a trip to Mars!
Diet, medicine, and exercise need to compensate for the zero G environment. This also happens to translate directly into the Earth's environment, with bone loss and bone density issues of the elderly and those suffering from osteoperosis. Likewise information about our daily cycles(what without the normal day-night cycle for extended time), and about our relationship to gravity, in the zero G environs.
Technology: Too much to talk about! Imagine the compounds we would discover to facilitate travel! Radiation shielding, new super strong, super light, super hard, super everything ceramics, plastics, metals, and fibers! Energy and solar efficiences, new solar panel technologies, new high efficiency batteries, or fuel sorces, or power plants! Or superconductors? Or new polymers?
How about computing? Simulation demands, new processes to deal with the high radiation environments of space? These can also be applied to new microprocessors perhaps.
Not a very coherent reply, but I think you get some idea... Besides just the coolness factor.
AS
There is fairly good evidence that it is a Mars rock.
Isotope distributions match fairly closely to Mars
Atmospheric makeup of gas trapped within glass bubbles also match Mars; note that Venus has a hydrochloric acid and sulfuric acid atmosphere..
Mars is more CO and CO2, I think.
Jupiter is also hydrogens and ammonias, with some water.
AS
Gosh I wish I could find your email and have a constructive conversation rather than some pointless rant where you aren't even guaranteed to see or read it...
The problem with science, research, and results is we don't know that we will ever get anything useful. Period. Research by its very nature is experimental and untried, with a high probability of failure. However, without it, we would still be using wooden tools and stone implements, and probably even less.
You're arguments as such are true, but they are also not the real benefits of space exploration and research.
Space exploration demands, screams for, requires new materials. However, if we don't build things like space stations, new materials don't get researched, and these materials never get used here on earth. Like titanium golf clubs, or aluminum coke cans, or millions of other products of our past space programs. Fullerines, super-conductors, super-ceramics, super polymers, and many other wacky things get worked on while designing a space station, for insulation, strength, durability, stress, radiation protection, etc. All of the above also have uses here on Earth, and are far from useless.
There is also biological information ready to be harvested from an extended space trip, such as info about human physiology, health, and maintanence. Ecosystems and recycling of wastes and other things also need to be figured out as well. Who knows but the next great advance, such as an anti-hangover pill, or a anti-alergy medication, or a preservative that keeps food fresh for weeks, or whatever, can't be found because of the space program?
Personally the space program has value in of itself, for the exploration, the barriers, the newness, the excitement. But I guess for you, and other's like you, I have to dish out explanations of convenience, worth, and viability.
Heck, what better use do we have for some of our money than space?
AS
As cool as a pencil in space is, I've heard plenty of good arguments that pencil shavings, graphite, and eraser dust would be pretty bad contaminants in zero G.
Of course, a wax pencil would probably be that much better than either.
I'm not sure I believe the quote of a million bucks for the Space Pen, though I'm sure it cost quite a bit...
AS
Ian McDiarmid looks and sounds good as the Emperor. 12 years done him in too badly. Well, he was wearing his trademark cloak though...
Did anyone else catch the scene right after young Queen talks to some sort of inter-federation council about the invasion? Did that not sound like the original Obi-Wan, Alec Guiness? Maybe wishful thinking on my part.
Wonder why the ceramonial makeup the Queen wears; is it just makeup? Or does she really look like that?
Ambivalence; I'm sorta glad they didn't spoil the new music for us, unless of course all the new music just happens to sound like the old music =)
What is it, 2 months from now, roughly? 68 days or something?
AS
Not horribly so.
Escape velocity on earth is like 11,000kph or something like that. If there were just an asteroid sitting on earth's path, the earth's velocity while orbiting around the sun is much greater than 11,000kph, so the asteroid itself will be able to reach escape velocities, and any chunks of dirt it dishes out will be able to leave with escape velocities.
On Mars, since it is smaller and less massive, has much lower escape velocities. It's very easy to imagine chunks getting knocked out into orbit; some believe Mar's moons are just this type of remnant, either pieces of Mars, pieces of asteroids caught by Mars, or pieces of asteroids that bounced off Mars. In a similar vein, some believe the moon is a result of an extraordinary impact with earth and a large fast asteroid.
While getting it into space is easy enough, getting to earth is the hard part. While not easy to imagine, much more coincindental things have occurred, like the earth getting hit by an asteroid. In fact, the probabilities are the same, since anything that leaves Mars is an asteroid, and the probabilities may be higher because Mars is closer than all the asteroid belts.
Nothing needed to live through reentry if they were fossilized remains inside the rock. Likewise, they probably didn't survive escape from Mars either, except that they were protected as fossilized remains in the rock.
AS
That is the whole reason and push for a mars exploration movement from Nasa, right?
To find out more about life, Mars, etc.
AS