5 ms·

Look.. Life on Mars! Oh wait, no. Look! Life on Mars! Ah, never mind. Ad infinitum

InclinedPlane 13y ago
Science isn't just some magical box that you press a button on and get definitive answers out of, it's a process. Sometimes it's frustrating to watch that process narrow in on answers, but that's the nature of discovery. So far as I know there's only ever been one serious claim for life on Mars (the Alan Hills Mars meteorite claim from the 90s). What has been happening recently has been more and more evidence about the conditions of ancient Mars, especially in relation to the long-term presence of water. We've known for a long time that Mars has had liquid water on it in the past, what we haven't known is how much and for how long and under what conditions. We've known more recently that Mars still contains a substantial amount of sub-surface water ice over much of its area. And we've learned more recently that Mars appears to have had sufficient water to form long-lived lakes and rivers, long enough to allow the formation of both rounded river rocks and pebbles as well as conglomerate rocks made up of those but also hydrate minerals that can only form in conditions of near neutral pH and low salinity. These are big discoveries, even though from a certain perspective they may seem like yet another "water on Mars!" story. These discoveries are painting a picture of ancient Mars that was not just occasionally wet or perhaps a hellscape Mars covered with brackish or boiling lakes but an almost familiar Mars with lakes and rivers that would be nearly drinkable for humans and that lasted millions of years at least. Certainly conditions that lots of Earth-bound life would find it quite easy to live in. And that provides the tantalizing hope that perhaps some form of life arose on Mars and survived for a time and perhaps lives still in some sheltered underground areas. It's not evidence or proof of life, it's the hint of a possibility. But again, that's the way science works. You narrow down possibilities and provide hints for further investigations.
- ygmelnikova 13y ago
  'may', 'tantalizing hope', 'perhaps'... What about 'maybe not', 'doubtful', 'perhaps not'... is that any less scientific? Imagine applying for a $1B grant to study the possibility of a designer? What would be more dramatic, discovering there was a creator, or finding some bacteria on mars? Not that the discovery of life on Mars or any other place for that matter would alter truth in the slightest.
  - Strilanc 13y ago
    - How is a one billion dollar grant going to make progress on discovering if there was a creator? - How much evidence do we expect to get for a billion dollars? A decibel? A hundred decibels? - Would sufficient evidence either way come about anyways, through other human endeavors?
    - ygmelnikova 13y ago
      Now apply that same logic to the pursuit of life on other worlds.
      - Strilanc 13y ago
        - I don't have the expertise to list off the progress, but a lot of questions about water seem to have been answered. We're ahead of where we started, which is more than I'd expect from a billion dollars spent on searching for a designer (well, to be fair, I'd expect it to help progress in biology; but we could just focus the money on that and do better). - Assuming we started at 1:1 odds for long-term presence of water, and moved to 100:1 odds, that's twenty decibels on that particular question (and there are others). Again, way higher than I'd expect on designer research. - Probably not. I'm not sure I why you said to apply the same logic to the pursuit of life on other worlds. We're clearly discovering things. Plenty of people say the value of discovering those things is low, but I didn't mention value-of-information.
- ygmelnikova 13y ago
  Even if life is found on Mars, the human race has lost it's right to celebrate. Every 3.6 seconds some child dies of starvation here on Earth. How many children can you feed with $400,000,000+? http://goo.gl/s46ol http://goo.gl/s46ol
  - RKoutnik 13y ago
    Bah. Such terrible logic. Truth is, we can do both. You're also mis-quoting your own source. http://www.smbc-comics.com/comics/20120716.gif http://www.smbc-comics.com/comics/20120716.gif
    - ygmelnikova 13y ago
      Explain that to the mothers of the 5,000 children that have died of starvation in their mother's arms in the last 5 hours since this was posted. Maybe if you down vote this post enough, the problem will go away?
      - guylhem 13y ago
        It's not about the problem going away or not. Saving a life also increases cost, especially if the life you are saving is non productive (ie require food) Fact is, there will always be people dying on earth. It's sad. But why bother? Sending the human race to another planet, then maybe another galaxy, are long term projects, and it makes sense to care about that however. If it only required the sacrifice of 5,000 children, that would be a very cheap price to pay. It will certainly cost (as in opportunity costs - how the money could be used in different ways) many more lives. Yet you know what? It's a great deal. If we lose our only current planet, all of humanity goes down, including any possible future "children" one may imagine. How many people do you expect will have existed in 10,000 years from now (humanity is much older than that!), given our current population? (let's say no grow)? Round that to 5 billion per 100 year with an greatly overestimated lifespan of 100 years to ease our calculations. We have a lowball estimate of (10,000/100)*5b = 5 000 billion It would be quite a bargain to sacrifice a total of 5 billion to ensure a living of the 5 000 billion future humans that will exist... hell, even a 100 billion!! So yes, children are dying, it's sad, and your use of "saying that to the mothers" is a call to use sentimentalisms to obscure the facts. Yet the facts remain : having more than one habitable planet is a necessity to protect the continuous possibility of a thriving human race, in case of major disasters (at mass-extinction level).
- pjungwir 13y ago
  Thank you for this comment. Do you know what the relationship is between water and atmosphere? That is, what do these rivers imply for the ancient Martian atmosphere? Is there no relationship? Does anyone know?
  - shardling 13y ago
    I believe they indicate for sure that the atmospheric pressure on Mars used to be greater. Below a certain pressure, liquid water simply can't exist, and the existing atmosphere is below that point.

Science isn't just some magical box that you press a button on and get definitive answers out of, it's a process. Sometimes it's frustrating to watch that process narrow in on answers, but that's the nature of discovery. So far as I know there's only ever been one serious claim for life on Mars (the Alan Hills Mars meteorite claim from the 90s). What has been happening recently has been more and more evidence about the conditions of ancient Mars, especially in relation to the long-term presence of water. We've known for a long time that Mars has had liquid water on it in the past, what we haven't known is how much and for how long and under what conditions. We've known more recently that Mars still contains a substantial amount of sub-surface water ice over much of its area. And we've learned more recently that Mars appears to have had sufficient water to form long-lived lakes and rivers, long enough to allow the formation of both rounded river rocks and pebbles as well as conglomerate rocks made up of those but also hydrate minerals that can only form in conditions of near neutral pH and low salinity. These are big discoveries, even though from a certain perspective they may seem like yet another "water on Mars!" story. These discoveries are painting a picture of ancient Mars that was not just occasionally wet or perhaps a hellscape Mars covered with brackish or boiling lakes but an almost familiar Mars with lakes and rivers that would be nearly drinkable for humans and that lasted millions of years at least. Certainly conditions that lots of Earth-bound life would find it quite easy to live in. And that provides the tantalizing hope that perhaps some form of life arose on Mars and survived for a time and perhaps lives still in some sheltered underground areas. It's not evidence or proof of life, it's the hint of a possibility. But again, that's the way science works. You narrow down possibilities and provide hints for further investigations.

ygmelnikova 13y ago
'may', 'tantalizing hope', 'perhaps'... What about 'maybe not', 'doubtful', 'perhaps not'... is that any less scientific? Imagine applying for a $1B grant to study the possibility of a designer? What would be more dramatic, discovering there was a creator, or finding some bacteria on mars? Not that the discovery of life on Mars or any other place for that matter would alter truth in the slightest.
- Strilanc 13y ago
  - How is a one billion dollar grant going to make progress on discovering if there was a creator? - How much evidence do we expect to get for a billion dollars? A decibel? A hundred decibels? - Would sufficient evidence either way come about anyways, through other human endeavors?
  - ygmelnikova 13y ago
    Now apply that same logic to the pursuit of life on other worlds.
    - Strilanc 13y ago
      - I don't have the expertise to list off the progress, but a lot of questions about water seem to have been answered. We're ahead of where we started, which is more than I'd expect from a billion dollars spent on searching for a designer (well, to be fair, I'd expect it to help progress in biology; but we could just focus the money on that and do better). - Assuming we started at 1:1 odds for long-term presence of water, and moved to 100:1 odds, that's twenty decibels on that particular question (and there are others). Again, way higher than I'd expect on designer research. - Probably not. I'm not sure I why you said to apply the same logic to the pursuit of life on other worlds. We're clearly discovering things. Plenty of people say the value of discovering those things is low, but I didn't mention value-of-information.
ygmelnikova 13y ago
Even if life is found on Mars, the human race has lost it's right to celebrate. Every 3.6 seconds some child dies of starvation here on Earth. How many children can you feed with $400,000,000+? http://goo.gl/s46ol http://goo.gl/s46ol
- RKoutnik 13y ago
  Bah. Such terrible logic. Truth is, we can do both. You're also mis-quoting your own source. http://www.smbc-comics.com/comics/20120716.gif http://www.smbc-comics.com/comics/20120716.gif
  - ygmelnikova 13y ago
    Explain that to the mothers of the 5,000 children that have died of starvation in their mother's arms in the last 5 hours since this was posted. Maybe if you down vote this post enough, the problem will go away?
    - guylhem 13y ago
      It's not about the problem going away or not. Saving a life also increases cost, especially if the life you are saving is non productive (ie require food) Fact is, there will always be people dying on earth. It's sad. But why bother? Sending the human race to another planet, then maybe another galaxy, are long term projects, and it makes sense to care about that however. If it only required the sacrifice of 5,000 children, that would be a very cheap price to pay. It will certainly cost (as in opportunity costs - how the money could be used in different ways) many more lives. Yet you know what? It's a great deal. If we lose our only current planet, all of humanity goes down, including any possible future "children" one may imagine. How many people do you expect will have existed in 10,000 years from now (humanity is much older than that!), given our current population? (let's say no grow)? Round that to 5 billion per 100 year with an greatly overestimated lifespan of 100 years to ease our calculations. We have a lowball estimate of (10,000/100)*5b = 5 000 billion It would be quite a bargain to sacrifice a total of 5 billion to ensure a living of the 5 000 billion future humans that will exist... hell, even a 100 billion!! So yes, children are dying, it's sad, and your use of "saying that to the mothers" is a call to use sentimentalisms to obscure the facts. Yet the facts remain : having more than one habitable planet is a necessity to protect the continuous possibility of a thriving human race, in case of major disasters (at mass-extinction level).
pjungwir 13y ago
Thank you for this comment. Do you know what the relationship is between water and atmosphere? That is, what do these rivers imply for the ancient Martian atmosphere? Is there no relationship? Does anyone know?
- shardling 13y ago
  I believe they indicate for sure that the atmospheric pressure on Mars used to be greater. Below a certain pressure, liquid water simply can't exist, and the existing atmosphere is below that point.