Life on Mars???

[Falcman0o7]

Originally Posted by 2011G6E

Kind of...not enough gravity (only a third of Earths) to retain a thick atmosphere so it bled away into space.

I remember my kids watching the old "Captain Planet" TV cartoon show and hearing him give Venus as an example of what Earth was going to end up like.
Disregarding the fact that Venus is 40 million kilometers closer to the sun than the Earth...think of the difference on Earth between summer and winter, and that's only because of a small orbital change closer or further away...so it's no surprise that Venus is a hellish oven even though it's almost a twin of Earth in size.

Mars is much smaller so doesn't have the mass to retain a thick atmosphere.
Yet. If we get off our backsides and plan on a large scale, terraforming could be undertaken, but it's a long term project involving seeding the planet with engineered lichens and mosses to create oxygen and thicken things up a bit.

Like the movie RED PLANET

[marty351]

Earth is the bowl of porridge that's just right. Mars, not enough gravity to obtain atmospheric pressure to be breathable. Terra forming could be possible, but limited to gaseous mixtures. Venus on the other hand, the most inhospitable place know to mankind. Forget that.
I would just love to have a time machine and jump foward 100, 1000, 10000 years to see where we're at.
Hopefully not fighting each other over pointless crap.

[jpblue1000]

Originally Posted by 2011G6E

and we're just bumbling around now advancing slowly and steadily. Where are the big thinking projects? Where are the plans that the public jumps behind feet first like they did with the moon landings and earlier space exploration?

Perhaps there are plenty of big thinking projects, plans people are jumping behind feet first, maybe you just disagree with them? or and are blinded to them through personal bias.
The world is changing, many on here complain about it, many say its for the bad, "wasn't like this when I was a kid nor part of my big plan", buts its happening, for many, in their opinions, there are developments and projects that rival the moon landings and the greatest human stories.

JP

[zoesgift]

has anyone noticed the pictures of the surface of mars showing supposed changing amounts of water on its surface being shown in all these news stories are close to or over 4 years old.....gets the alien theorists putting forward all these theories of what nasa and similar type agencies actually really know. where is fox and scully when you need them!?

[Trump]

Originally Posted by 2011G6E

I remember back in the seventies we looked forward to a 21st century full of unlimited expansion and plentiful atomic power, but somewhere along the way cowards got put in charge of things...and we're just bumbling around now advancing slowly and steadily. Where are the big thinking projects? Where are the plans that the public jumps behind feet first like they did with the moon landings and earlier space exploration?
A couple of setbacks and they chicken out...backed by navel-gazing green idiots who think we should be ashamed of being able to flicjk a switch and have easy access to energy.

You really wonder if that bright future is ever going to happen if we keep limited thinking like that...

It wasn't cowardice that caused the technological stagnation instead of the world envisaged by many in the late 60's and 70's. Immense wealth and power are vested in the status quo and maintaining it. Had technological progress akin to that during the post-war period up until Apollo kept on going through the latter half of the 20th century, we would have had sizeable colonies on Mars by now, decentralised energy generation in every household running on scraps, viable alternatives to plastics, non polluting highly efficient transportation (private and public) and many more other innovations.

We don't because such technologies free humanity from the shackles of servitude.

As for the announcement today, it just reminds me of how much I miss the NASA of old.

[superyob]

Originally Posted by jpblue1000

Perhaps there are plenty of big thinking projects, plans people are jumping behind feet first, maybe you just disagree with them? or and are blinded to them through personal bias.
The world is changing, many on here complain about it, many say its for the bad, "wasn't like this when I was a kid nor part of my big plan", buts its happening, for many, in their opinions, there are developments and projects that rival the moon landings and the greatest human stories.

JP

Could you name some JP? Do you think the super collider in Switzerland is one of those projects?

[Trump]

Originally Posted by superyob

Could you name some JP? Do you think the super collider in Switzerland is one of those projects?

The SSC (Superconducting Super Collider) that was scrapped in the 1990's was designed with proton energies five times greater than the LHC.

[superyob]

Originally Posted by Loud_Noises

The SSC (Superconducting Super Collider) that was scrapped in the 1990's was designed with proton energies five times greater than the LHC.

What's LHC Loud_Noises?

[Trump]

The Large Hadron Collider in Europe.

[superyob]

Originally Posted by Loud_Noises

The Large Hadron Collider in Europe.

Do you know its ultimate purpose?

[castellan]

Man will never even survive on the Moon, in fact no one has even been back their from the so called first landing and some say that the fact is, no one ever landed at all, but it's just a way of spending tax payers money for what ever pollys want to do, maybe like all the child molesting supporting crap they have done as well as any degenerate load crap like Political Correctness or funding Communism to prop all the good for nothing grubs up.

Who the hell would want to live on another planet, let alone go their and if there was another living being out in the universe, I don't want to know them, bloody hell we have enough problems dealing with people amongst the world as it is.

[superyob]

Originally Posted by castellan

Man will never even survive on the Moon, in fact no one has even been back their from the so called first landing and some say that the fact is, no one ever landed at all, but it's just a way of spending tax payers money for what ever pollys want to do, maybe like all the child molesting supporting crap they have done as well as any degenerate load crap like Political Correctness or funding Communism to prop all the good for nothing grubs up.

Who the hell would want to live on another planet, let alone go their and if there was another living being out in the universe, I don't want to know them, bloody hell we have enough problems dealing with people amongst the world as it is.

Castellan, I can normally decipher your posts but this one has lost me...

[Trump]

Originally Posted by superyob

Do you know its ultimate purpose?

One of the core tasks of LHC-spec particle accelerators is to try recreate the sorts of energies present in the immediate aftermath of the Big Bang.

[DoreSlamR]

NASA's budget last year was half a percent of the US governments total budget.

0.5%

What they do with such a small amount of money is amazing, and you can thank the likes of NASA for the thousands of things we now take for granted.

[Trump]

Taking inflation into account, NASA's budget has actually gone backwards over the years. They used to be at the forefront of many a research project, now they are but a PR firm that shoots a rocket into space every once in a while.

Canning the much-maligned Zumwalt-class destroyers could double their budget in an instant and restore them to being the premier aerospace research organisation.

Oh and superyob, a decent article on wikipedia about the LHC:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Large_Hadron_Collider

[jpblue1000]

Originally Posted by superyob

Could you name some JP? Do you think the super collider in Switzerland is one of those projects?

I wont here as this thread is about mars, yes the LHC is amazing, research knowledge and unlocking new avenues for research and development. Not as macho as strapping a rocket to your butt and heading for the moon but arguable more important and more epic.
I like science, design and problem solving and see many of the great big pictures in these spheres.
Social, moral, economic, artistic and environmental progress all great stories, rarely carried out by heroic white men walking with swaggers, more likely a unassuming somebody in a white lab coat.

JP

[marty351]

Castellan, where do you think the many saturn 5 rockets went? It wasn't a simple day trip. So much evidence of their missions.

Man can survive on the moon. Until technology progresses to that point, its not practical. Lack of funding and available resources prevents this from happening. Sadly.

[superyob]

Originally Posted by 2011G6E

Kind of...not enough gravity (only a third of Earths) to retain a thick atmosphere so it bled away into space.

I remember my kids watching the old "Captain Planet" TV cartoon show and hearing him give Venus as an example of what Earth was going to end up like.
Disregarding the fact that Venus is 40 million kilometers closer to the sun than the Earth...think of the difference on Earth between summer and winter, and that's only because of a small orbital change closer or further away...so it's no surprise that Venus is a hellish oven even though it's almost a twin of Earth in size.

Mars is much smaller so doesn't have the mass to retain a thick atmosphere.
Yet. If we get off our backsides and plan on a large scale, terraforming could be undertaken, but it's a long term project involving seeding the planet with engineered lichens and mosses to create oxygen and thicken things up a bit.

So it did have a thicker atmosphere at some stage?

[castellan]

Originally Posted by superyob

Castellan, I can normally decipher your posts but this one has lost me...

What point would their be in living on the moon or anywhere other, it's just rubbish. they have not even been back to the moon from the first so called landing, have they.

What would be the point of coming across another life form ? all this garbage has been drummed into peoples head by con artist.

The whole thing is just so much of a wast of money.

Look at all the funding for just total rubbish the governments do, like all the support for Political Correct rubbish and there is a lot of support for just filth and stupidity that they toss a hell of a lot of money at.

All this stuff we see could all be just total BS about other planets and if one listens to that clown Steven Hawking, what he says is not a fact at all, with a lot of his rubbish.
I could be right that it's all one big con job, just saying.
How much other BS do we hear nowadays.

[jpblue1000]

Most of it in drunken or apparently drunk rants.on the internet.
Hope imagination and expanding horizons is worth a lot more money than we already spend.
Lets colonise the moon and send our internet loonies (see what I did there)
JP

[CoupeKing]

Originally Posted by castellan

What point would their be in living on the moon or anywhere other, it's just rubbish. they have not even been back to the moon from the first so called landing, have they.

What would be the point of coming across another life form ? all this garbage has been drummed into peoples head by con artist.

The whole thing is just so much of a wast of money.

Look at all the funding for just total rubbish the governments do, like all the support for Political Correct rubbish and there is a lot of support for just filth and stupidity that they toss a hell of a lot of money at.

All this stuff we see could all be just total BS about other planets and if one listens to that clown Steven Hawking, what he says is not a fact at all, with a lot of his rubbish.
I could be right that it's all one big con job, just saying.
How much other BS do we hear nowadays.

You lost me at the part where you described the moon landings as so-called and that Stephen Hawking is a clown.

[chamb0]

Originally Posted by 2011G6E

But that doesn't matter...the human race doesn't advance by sitting in our houses and feeling sorry for ourselves as some people would prefer we do...we have to go further and expand and strive to discover everything there is to discover.

Really...?
Spiritual well being doesn't get you to the stars...cold hard facts are how the world works...how the universe works. Spiritual stuff is all inside your head...it doesn't exist beyond what you think exists, and has literally no place in the world of science and human advancement.

I remember back in the seventies we looked forward to a 21st century full of unlimited expansion and plentiful atomic power, but somewhere along the way cowards got put in charge of things...and we're just bumbling around now advancing slowly and steadily. Where are the big thinking projects? Where are the plans that the public jumps behind feet first like they did with the moon landings and earlier space exploration?
A couple of setbacks and they chicken out...backed by navel-gazing green idiots who think we should be ashamed of being able to flicjk a switch and have easy access to energy.

You really wonder if that bright future is ever going to happen if we keep limited thinking like that...

It is the awe inspired in us by the cosmos, our sense of wonderment and curiosity at mystery, a sense of greatness beyond our ourselves and broad philosophical purpose which drives our exploration. Determining the "cold hard facts" and laws of nature provide us the mechanism. We are not cold machines, our thinking, philosophy and connection to others is what defines us as human and has allowed us our successes.

Carl Sagan, in his book exploring the scientific and the spiritual The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark wrote:

The notion that science and spirituality are somehow mutually exclusive does a disservice to both.

In its encounter with Nature, science invariably elicits a sense of reverence and awe. The very act of understanding is a celebration of joining, merging, even if on a very modest scale, with the magnificence of the Cosmos. And the cumulative worldwide build-up of knowledge over time converts science into something only a little short of a trans-national, trans-generational meta-mind.

This echoes the consistent sentiments and passionate language of accomplished thinkers and scientists right across the spectrum:

* Einstein: "The finest emotion of which we are capable is the mystic emotion. Herein lies the germ of all art and all true science. Anyone to whom this feeling is alien, who is no longer capable of wonderment and lives in a state of fear is a dead man. To know that what is impenetrable for us really exists and manifests itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty, whose gross forms alone are intelligible to our poor faculties - this knowledge, this feeling ... that is the core of the true religious sentiment."

* Richard Dawkins: In his book the Magic of Reality- How We Know What's Really True," he writes: "I hope you agree that the truth has a magic of its own"

* Ken Miller in his book Finding Darwin's God - a scientist's search for common ground between God and evolution,

* Astrophysicist Neil DeGrasse Tyson: "my atoms came from those stars; there's a a level of connectivity" and "Emotive forces are what drive the greatest artistic and inventive expressions of our species."

* Ancient astronomer Ptolemy's awe at the cosmos: "when I trace at my pleasure the windings to and fro of the heavenly bodies, I no longer touch earth with my feet. I stand in the presence of Zeus himself."

Your own language in your post show that like most you also share this sense of curiosity and purpose beyond the straight mechanics: "strive," "big thinking," "jumping in feet first", a grand vision of what you would like the future to be like.

People love listening to those who have the rare gift of blending science and storytelling because the cold hard facts alone don't always speak to our humanness.

Originally Posted by 2011G6E

Disregarding the fact that Venus is 40 million kilometers closer to the sun than the Earth...think of the difference on Earth between summer and winter, and that's only because of a small orbital change closer or further away...so it's no surprise that Venus is a hellish oven even though it's almost a twin of Earth in size.

Are you sure about that??

[GasoLane]

Originally Posted by castellan

All this stuff we see could all be just total BS about other planets and if one listens to that clown Steven Hawking, what he says is not a fact at all, with a lot of his rubbish.

And Einstein was just a Government clerk with a bad hair day, right ?

[Madaya]

Back to the Life on Mars subject
For now, it is best that we search for possible life using robots and remote sensing. This avoids (or drastically reduces) the possibility of contaminating the Red Planet with Earthly bugs. Much of the equipment that has landed on Mars has undergone a thorough sterilization process for that very reason.
To find any lifeform, not of the Earth, would greatly enhance our understanding of what life is, how it formed and where it could arise and survive.
There is only one lifeform found on the Earth present day, though some believe other forms of life may have existed in the planet's early days, but died out.
I think the best shot for Mars maybe finding signs of extinct life, or the chemistry that is essential for life as we know it. And liquid water is numero uno. Its a start.

[Iggle Piggle]

deleted

[superyob]

Some great points of view from differing perspectives expressed here. chamb0, that spiritual/science dichotomy is spot on...

[superyob]

Originally Posted by Madaya

Back to the Life on Mars subject
For now, it is best that we search for possible life using robots and remote sensing. This avoids (or drastically reduces) the possibility of contaminating the Red Planet with Earthly bugs. Much of the equipment that has landed on Mars has undergone a thorough sterilization process for that very reason.
To find any lifeform, not of the Earth, would greatly enhance our understanding of what life is, how it formed and where it could arise and survive.
There is only one lifeform found on the Earth present day, though some believe other forms of life may have existed in the planet's early days, but died out.
I think the best shot for Mars maybe finding signs of extinct life, or the chemistry that is essential for life as we know it. And liquid water is numero uno. Its a start.

Something that could survive without the pre-requisite elements needed for life now?

[Madaya]

Originally Posted by superyob

Something that could survive without the pre-requisite elements needed for life now?

Precisely my point Super. I'm only saying that for now, we are pretty much full bottle on what life as we know it requires, so the water is the first port of call.
Other, exotic life forms must surely have some form of respiration. It must absorb something, it should excrete something. It should grow and or multiply. If it dies, it should leave fossils, or evidence that it has somehow changed its environment.

[Trump]

The best method for exploring the planets isn't by remotely controlled robotic craft. The best method is by having feet on the ground as much as possible. This doesn't wash with the bean counters so we send probes out.

Space exploration is the key to not only humanity thriving and growing, but just surviving. Even if we were to reduce our footprint on Earth to the point where the net impact of our existence on the planet was zero, we would still need to leave this rock one day. The resources we have are finite (and dwindling fast by some reports) and as such, we will need to look beyond the horizon for them.

I watched too much Star Trek as a kid

[GasoLane]

I think Eric Idle summed it up in the Galaxy song ( from Monty Python's The Meaning of Life)

And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere up in space 'Cause there's bugger all down here on Earth