4 ms·

Why does we go through so much trouble to not let mars etc get polluted by life from earth, why don't we just send a bug chunk of hardcore life forms like this

Why does we go through so much trouble to not let mars etc get polluted by life from earth, why don't we just send a bug chunk of hardcore life forms like this fungi and others on the red planet etc and go back later to see how they are fairing? What are we trying to find or learn that life from earth will permanently remove the chance of?

ufo 3y ago
For starters it becomes harder to find martian life. The earth life could kill the martian life before we get a chance to find it. Also, if the experiments detect signs of life, we won't be able to know if it's from martian life or from the earth life we brought along.
eganist 3y ago
> What are we trying to find or learn that life from earth will permanently remove the chance of? Species prove to be invasive all the time on earth when exposed to new ecosystems or environments, and usually that's at the expense of many potential discoveries about the life forms that are replaced. Seeding the universe with life from our planet may make sense as a survival strategy, but there's no ceiling to the knowledge we can glean from life thats different from our own. In short: we don't know what we don't know, and the gains from such knowledge could be endless.
- smusamashah 3y ago
  So one of the things we are trying to learn is if there are other type of life forms than what we know from earth. What if do find something, there are no big size living things there but if did find some microbial Mars/X native life form, will we just let that be? Won't we still try to put ourselves there anyway? that's what we do on current planet being top of the food chain.
  - throwup238 3y ago
    Yeah the whole safety dance is a bit of a farce. Everyone is willing to play along with the ethical considerations now because there's currently zero value to the Moon and Mars but if we had the technology and industrial capacity to start sending thousands of colonists, those rules would probably be discarded with much haste.
    - pests 3y ago
      Sounds like AI alignment
  - WalterBright 3y ago
    > will we just let that be? Why should we? Microbes are not sentient.
  - 14u2c 3y ago
    This is not about about some microbe conservation effort. The whole idea is to preserve the conditions in which life can be discovered, and if it is, studied. Think about how much harder it would be to detect Mars life if organic molecules from Earth are present in quantity, let alone the interaction that could occur.
- irrational 3y ago
  At what point do we determine there is no more to be learned so terraforming efforts can start?
  - EasyMark 3y ago
    we can't even terraform our own planet in a controlled, positive manner. It's gonna be a long time for mars.
- WalterBright 3y ago
  Perhaps we are the only life in the universe. It would be a pity to have the earth destroyed and that is all gone, because we were so terrified of spreading life around. > the gains from such knowledge could be endless. Could be - but the gains from spreading Terran life around will be endless. Besides, Mars is a lifeless hulk.
- deadbabe 3y ago
  If life in the universe is actually really rare, isn’t it irresponsible for us to not be seeding life anywhere we can put it? If we put microbes on several planets and moons in the solar system those worlds could have complex and even intelligent lifeforms in millions of years.
janosdebugs 3y ago
We only have one petri dish planet close by. No control, and the experiment takes a very long time.
shagie 3y ago
The part of NASA that is charged with this mission - https://sma.nasa.gov/sma-disciplines/planetary-protection https://sma.nasa.gov/sma-disciplines/planetary-protection From there, https://journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/aem.33.2.379-384.1977 https://journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/aem.33.2.379-384.1977 is "Microbiological profiles of the Viking spacecraft" Note things like: > Approximately 1,300 colonies were picked from culture plates, identified, lypholipized, and stored for future reference. About 75% of all isolates were microorganisms considered indigenous to humans; the remaining isolates were associated with soil and dust in the environment. So that if we do encounter that particular strain on Mars, we'll know its from Earth. --- One that's on the interesting side and has more than just an available abstract: Europa Clipper planetary protection probabilistic risk assessment summary https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0032063320303524?via%3Dihub https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00320...
WalterBright 3y ago
We should be dumping a bag of extremophiles into the atmosphere of every body we can.
dyno12345 3y ago
nitpick: fungi don't produce their own food; they need something to eat. what you need to get an ecosystem going is photosynthetic or chemotrophic organisms that produce their own food.
thret 3y ago
I don't know either. We could limit exposure to a tiny patch on the planet's surface and still have ample opportunity to look for signs of life on the rest of it.
EasyMark 3y ago
I think that we want to exhaust any possibility that there was/is life in some form on mars without merging our biosphere with it just yet. I think to most of humanity that would be an extreme epiphany that you don't need a higher power or that humans are anything special outside of our own little mudball. Seems like a reasonable take for now. I'm sure if we actually do establish permanent colonies there it won't be a choice, although avoiding taking extremophiles that might easily adapt there is something we'll avoid for a while.

ufo 3y ago

For starters it becomes harder to find martian life. The earth life could kill the martian life before we get a chance to find it. Also, if the experiments detect signs of life, we won't be able to know if it's from martian life or from the earth life we brought along.

eganist 3y ago

> What are we trying to find or learn that life from earth will permanently remove the chance of? Species prove to be invasive all the time on earth when exposed to new ecosystems or environments, and usually that's at the expense of many potential discoveries about the life forms that are replaced. Seeding the universe with life from our planet may make sense as a survival strategy, but there's no ceiling to the knowledge we can glean from life thats different from our own. In short: we don't know what we don't know, and the gains from such knowledge could be endless.

smusamashah 3y ago
So one of the things we are trying to learn is if there are other type of life forms than what we know from earth. What if do find something, there are no big size living things there but if did find some microbial Mars/X native life form, will we just let that be? Won't we still try to put ourselves there anyway? that's what we do on current planet being top of the food chain.
- throwup238 3y ago
  Yeah the whole safety dance is a bit of a farce. Everyone is willing to play along with the ethical considerations now because there's currently zero value to the Moon and Mars but if we had the technology and industrial capacity to start sending thousands of colonists, those rules would probably be discarded with much haste.
  - pests 3y ago
    Sounds like AI alignment
- WalterBright 3y ago
  > will we just let that be? Why should we? Microbes are not sentient.
- 14u2c 3y ago
  This is not about about some microbe conservation effort. The whole idea is to preserve the conditions in which life can be discovered, and if it is, studied. Think about how much harder it would be to detect Mars life if organic molecules from Earth are present in quantity, let alone the interaction that could occur.
irrational 3y ago
At what point do we determine there is no more to be learned so terraforming efforts can start?
- EasyMark 3y ago
  we can't even terraform our own planet in a controlled, positive manner. It's gonna be a long time for mars.
WalterBright 3y ago
Perhaps we are the only life in the universe. It would be a pity to have the earth destroyed and that is all gone, because we were so terrified of spreading life around. > the gains from such knowledge could be endless. Could be - but the gains from spreading Terran life around will be endless. Besides, Mars is a lifeless hulk.
deadbabe 3y ago
If life in the universe is actually really rare, isn’t it irresponsible for us to not be seeding life anywhere we can put it? If we put microbes on several planets and moons in the solar system those worlds could have complex and even intelligent lifeforms in millions of years.

janosdebugs 3y ago

We only have one petri dish planet close by. No control, and the experiment takes a very long time.

shagie 3y ago

The part of NASA that is charged with this mission - https://sma.nasa.gov/sma-disciplines/planetary-protection https://sma.nasa.gov/sma-disciplines/planetary-protection From there, https://journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/aem.33.2.379-384.1977 https://journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/aem.33.2.379-384.1977 is "Microbiological profiles of the Viking spacecraft" Note things like: > Approximately 1,300 colonies were picked from culture plates, identified, lypholipized, and stored for future reference. About 75% of all isolates were microorganisms considered indigenous to humans; the remaining isolates were associated with soil and dust in the environment. So that if we do encounter that particular strain on Mars, we'll know its from Earth. --- One that's on the interesting side and has more than just an available abstract: Europa Clipper planetary protection probabilistic risk assessment summary https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0032063320303524?via%3Dihub https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00320...

WalterBright 3y ago

We should be dumping a bag of extremophiles into the atmosphere of every body we can.

dyno12345 3y ago

nitpick: fungi don't produce their own food; they need something to eat. what you need to get an ecosystem going is photosynthetic or chemotrophic organisms that produce their own food.

thret 3y ago

I don't know either. We could limit exposure to a tiny patch on the planet's surface and still have ample opportunity to look for signs of life on the rest of it.

EasyMark 3y ago

I think that we want to exhaust any possibility that there was/is life in some form on mars without merging our biosphere with it just yet. I think to most of humanity that would be an extreme epiphany that you don't need a higher power or that humans are anything special outside of our own little mudball. Seems like a reasonable take for now. I'm sure if we actually do establish permanent colonies there it won't be a choice, although avoiding taking extremophiles that might easily adapt there is something we'll avoid for a while.