Sea of ice discovered on Mars

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http://www.salon.com/news/wire/2005/02/22/mars/index.html

― donut debonair (donut), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 06:50 (twenty years ago)

"See? I told you it wasn't milk"

― Autumn Almanac (Autumn Almanac), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 06:58 (twenty years ago)

man i hate salon but seriously this is awesome.

― hstencil (hstencil), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 07:00 (twenty years ago)

god i'd forgotten about salon.

― Jarlr'mai (jarlrmai), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 09:33 (twenty years ago)

"Your search - martians seaside - did not match any documents."

― mark s (mark s), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 11:22 (twenty years ago)

Martians at the seaside...

http://images-eu.amazon.com/images/P/B0000277CR.02.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

― lock robster (robster), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 11:33 (twenty years ago)

bloody Martians, getting up at 6am to get their beachtowerls on the sunbeds first

― Sven Bastard (blueski), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 11:55 (twenty years ago)

sven that's some beachtowel!! it has legs AND a death ray!

― mark s (mark s), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 12:45 (twenty years ago)

why is water assumed to be the basis of all life? is there some sort of science says life can't be sustained w.out water?

― cozen (Cozen), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 12:48 (twenty years ago)

situationist science!!

"sous les cobblestones le plage" etc

― mark s (mark s), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 12:53 (twenty years ago)

Beach is feminine, mark. The source of the world!!

― Tracer Hand (tracerhand), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 18:57 (twenty years ago)

my french is weak tracer (hence use of the word "cobblestones" as valid french for cobblestones)

― mark s (mark s), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 19:01 (twenty years ago)

The link isn't working for me oh noes!

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 19:02 (twenty years ago)

why is water assumed to be the basis of all life? is there some sort of science says life can't be sustained w.out water?

-- cozen (skiplevel...), February 23rd, 2005.

yeah dude, didnt those scientists see "M. Night Shyamalan's Signs?"

― t0dd swiss, Wednesday, 23 February 2005 19:04 (twenty years ago)

I think the implication is that water can't exist without life, you jerks.

― Huk-L, Wednesday, 23 February 2005 19:05 (twenty years ago)

http://www.eonline.com/Features/Features/Schwarzenegger/Links/Images/links.main.jpg

Now get your ass to Mahs

― fcussen (Burger), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 19:07 (twenty years ago)

is there some sort of science says life can't be sustained w.out water?

Yes. All of chemistry and biology.

― MindInRewind (Barry Bruner), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 19:40 (twenty years ago)

Just another example of terracentric hoodwinkery (the rockism os science).

― Huk-L, Wednesday, 23 February 2005 19:41 (twenty years ago)

I don't think that's true, Barry - for a start, because it assumes that there aren't significantly other forms of life than those on earth, but also haven't they found live bacteria deep under the earth in rocks where there is no liquid water?

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 20:19 (twenty years ago)

haven't they found live bacteria deep under the earth in rocks where there is no liquid water?

Oh, I wouldn't exactly call that living.

― Huk-L, Wednesday, 23 February 2005 20:22 (twenty years ago)

Almost all biochemical processes occur in aqueous environments, which was the basis behind my comment. As you noted, Martin, we can't rule out the possibility of deviations from this "Standard Model for Life" (I am being somewhat tongue-in-cheek by invoking that phrase).

I haven't heard of these deep-earth bacteria ... sounds interesting.

― MindInRewind (Barry Bruner), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 20:28 (twenty years ago)

The assumption isn't so much that all forms of life require water, it's that water is required for life to begin on a planet; those bacteria presumably adapted away their need for water. Not everyone agrees with this, but not everyone agrees with anything.

Doesn't matter, though. The significance with regards to Martian water is the other way around: it's not the fact that we find so little life without water that matters, but that we've otherwise found no water without life.

xpost with Barry

― Tep (ktepi), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 20:31 (twenty years ago)

well, in that we haven't found life or water previously on other planets. That's not really evidence that water => life.

I am very dubious about our standard model. It seems to amount to saying 'this is the way things here are, therefore it is the only way things can be' with nothing substantial to back that up.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 20:37 (twenty years ago)

That's not really evidence that water => life.

But water's presence greatly increases the likelihood of life as we are able to recognize it.

― Huk-L, Wednesday, 23 February 2005 20:39 (twenty years ago)

and indeed hit it

(cf every other old-skool star trek ever) (kirk never did a non-carbon-based lifeform ppl)

― mark s (mark s), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 20:41 (twenty years ago)

What Huck said. It's not a matter of "this is the only way things can be," but "this is the way which produces results we can recognize." You can speculate all day about theoretical exceptions, but they don't do you any good until you find them.

― Tep (ktepi), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 20:46 (twenty years ago)

geez, you guys are all missing the point (well, ONE of the main points). If there's water on Mars - and it looks pretty clear that there is - *people* can survive there. With the presence of water, man can develop fuel, breathable oxygen, etc., all the basic compounds necessary to sustain human life. What's more, it means that the potential for terraforming (ie, converting Mars to a more earth-like environment) is now beyond the realm of being only "theoretically" possible. We are going to Mars for sure now.

― Shakey Mo Collier, Wednesday, 23 February 2005 21:00 (twenty years ago)

bah it doesn't count unless *i* get to go there (and have hott sex w.a martian)

― mark s (mark s), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 21:02 (twenty years ago)

Native ice might reduce the cost of maintaining a Martian colony, but I'm not sure it significantly reduces the vast cost of starting one, so I don't know if that's really something people are excited about. Finding out there's a big stack of free pants in Australia so I'll have something to wear doesn't mean I can suddenly afford to move there.

― Tep (ktepi), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 21:03 (twenty years ago)

no no no - it means when a crew of people land there, they will have resources to draw on to create breathable oxygen and create fuel and thus generate energy. Any successful expedition to a foreign environment has to draw on the resources of that environment to survive - we can't just *send* everything we need to Mars with a crew, the weight alone would cripple the mission. The crew has to be able to draw resources out of Mars in order to sustain themselves, and H20 is *the* big requirement. It's necessary for fuel, it's necessary for air, it's necessary for food, its necessary as a containment fluid, etc. Am I the only person here who's read up on this?!?

― Shakey Mo Collier, Wednesday, 23 February 2005 21:09 (twenty years ago)

Shakey, I though the absence of genuine scientific knowledge and ability among all but 2 or 3 of we ilXors had already been clearly established on the quantum physics threads.

― thee music mole, Wednesday, 23 February 2005 21:11 (twenty years ago)

It's the big requirement once we're there, yeah, but that still doesn't mean we can afford to go there. Substitute "a well-paying job" for "free pants" for a closer analogy. I don't think we're remotely close to a Martian colony being feasible, even if we found a Wal-Mart and a McDonald's there.

― Tep (ktepi), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 21:14 (twenty years ago)

Mark my words - the first people to go there will be convicted felons and prison guards. It will be the new Australia.

― thee music mole, Wednesday, 23 February 2005 21:18 (twenty years ago)

Except a little colder.

― MindInRewind (Barry Bruner), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 21:28 (twenty years ago)

Any kangaroos?

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 21:31 (twenty years ago)

(I do like the news in general, that's very spiff.)

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 21:32 (twenty years ago)

TS: remote-controlled robots to explore sea of ice on mars vs remote-controlled submarines to explore undersea realm on europa?

― Sébastien Chikara (Sébastien Chikara), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 21:53 (twenty years ago)

"Mark my words - the first people to go there will be convicted felons and prison guards. It will be the new Australia.

don't forget religious fanatics! They're always great colonizers.

― Shakey Mo Collier, Wednesday, 23 February 2005 22:06 (twenty years ago)

I'm sure the Radio 4 news report about this story said that the concentration of methane in the Martian atmosphere was greater in the area of the 'sea'. The methane was already been taken as an example of *some* kind of activity, either biological or geological; the implication was that the methane in combination with the 'sea' was strong evidence for Martian life.

― caitlin (caitlin), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 22:10 (twenty years ago)

is the james lovelock "stable atmosphere" theory good or bad science* (ie that a planet sustaining "life as we know it" will have an atmosphere that is an unstable mixture of gases)?

it sounded v.plausible when i read it like 20 years ago or whatever

*(or "good science, just wrong", which is my favourite kind) (cf the luminiferous aether)

― mark s (mark s), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 22:17 (twenty years ago)

ihttp://www.curiousnotions.com/mars/mars_plants.jpg

― latebloomer: HE WHOM DUELS THE DRAFGON IN ENDLESS DANCE (latebloomer), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 22:20 (twenty years ago)

The Banyan trees of Mars: Sir Arthur C. Clarke's minority view.

"I'm now convinced that Mars is inhabited by a race of demented landscape gardeners," Sir Arthur C. Clarke announced recently.

The author of 2001: A Space Odyssey was only half-joking. He claims that an image produced by the Mars Global Surveyor satellite shows "large areas of vegetation . . . like banyan trees." Most experts dismiss the idea. But Popular Science loves a free thinker, especially one as talented and charming as Sir Arthur. We questioned him in Sri Lanka via e-mail.

> Nicole Foulke

Popular Science What makes you so confident there is life on Mars?

Arthur C. Clarke The image is so striking that there is no need to say anything about it -- it's obviously vegetation to any unbiased eye.

PS What about animal life?

AC If there is vegetation, it seems probable there are other life-forms as well.

PS Few experts agree with you.

AC Remember how a certain Astronomer Royal said that space flight was 'utter bilge'?

[Indeed, Richard van der Reit Wooley said so in 1956 -- Ed.] But they are right to be cautious -- we still don't have 100 percent proof. I think it's in the high nineties!

PS Why are you so passionate about this?

AC Because nothing could be more important than the discovery of other life-forms. It's getting lonely down here.

― latebloomer: HE WHOM DUELS THE DRAFGON IN ENDLESS DANCE (latebloomer), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 22:23 (twenty years ago)

bah it doesn't count unless *i* get to go there (and have hott sex w.a martian)

Are you so sure that Martians are all that in bed? (As opposed, say, to Venusians?)

― j.lu (j.lu), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 23:07 (twenty years ago)

i am sure they are better than me! so it's win-win! (well, except for them)

― mark s (mark s), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 23:10 (twenty years ago)

http://www.xmission.com/~emailbox/barry/martian.jpg

― eman (eman), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 23:37 (twenty years ago)

http://www.fancyephemera.com/jpeg/spacebabe1.jpg

Or maybe just...

http://www.omegagrafix.com/Geo/venusian.jpg

― nickn (nickn), Wednesday, 23 February 2005 23:50 (twenty years ago)

http://community.middlebury.edu/~mobrien/covers/marsattacks/mars01.gif

― latebloomer: HE WHOM DUELS THE DRAFGON IN ENDLESS DANCE (latebloomer), Thursday, 24 February 2005 05:19 (twenty years ago)

ihttp://www.slightlywarped.com/movies/L/images/littleshopofhorrors2.jpg

― Jimmy Mod Has Returned With Spices And Silks (ModJ), Thursday, 24 February 2005 05:21 (twenty years ago)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Mark my words - the first people to go there will be convicted felons and prison guards. It will be the new Australia.
-- thee music mole (mole...), February 23rd, 2005.

http://community.middlebury.edu/~mobrien/covers/marsattacks/mars66.gif

― latebloomer: HE WHOM DUELS THE DRAFGON IN ENDLESS DANCE (latebloomer), Thursday, 24 February 2005 05:24 (twenty years ago)

Babylon 5 lied to me!

― Trayce (trayce), Thursday, 24 February 2005 05:32 (twenty years ago)

Mark my words, if there's methane, there's cows.

― Huk-L, Thursday, 24 February 2005 15:54 (twenty years ago)

http://malone.blogs.com/genius/images/lifeonmars2.jpg

― rs, Thursday, 24 February 2005 15:59 (twenty years ago)

We should start dumping our garbage on mars.

― David Allen (David Allen), Thursday, 24 February 2005 16:15 (twenty years ago)

Fuckin' A.

― Huk-L, Thursday, 24 February 2005 16:18 (twenty years ago)

Methane is a nice though and all but it is found regularly in the outer planets; for example Saturn should actually be colder than it is because of its distance from the sun and all, but it constantly rains methane on the planet, which warms up the atmosphere.

Of course, who knows, maybe this means Saturn is inhabited too. One of the things I've learned from my Astronomy classes is that detecting life on other planets is extremely hard. For example, looking at Earth from the moon, one would have an extremely difficult time getting pictures of people walking around.

― Adam Bruneau (oliver8bit), Thursday, 24 February 2005 17:58 (twenty years ago)

Yeah, everybody drives nowadays.

― Huk-L, Thursday, 24 February 2005 18:00 (twenty years ago)

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