Re: Life likely on Mars
- From: Ian Parker <ianparker2@xxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 26 May 2008 06:29:12 -0700 (PDT)
On 26 May, 10:47, Willie.Moo...@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
My thoughts tonight
http://phoenix.lpl.arizona.edu/
Before this week we were uncertain about life in the universe. After
this week, we will know of a certainty, that life exists outside
Earth. That's my bet.
No we won't. Microbes are capable of surviving a journey to Mars and
that meteroites have ejected material from Earth some of which have
found their way to Mars. We will never know for sure whether Mars
represented a separate origin, or whether there is/was terrestrial
life which has evolved. Pheonix is imcapable of telling which is
which. With life on Europa we would be more certain of an idependent
origin.
As a consequence, this will be the biggest week in the history of
humanity - though we won't know that generally until much much later.
The certainty of other life will subtly shift so many aspects of our
culture and the way we think about the universe. It will also mark a
shift in our conciousness from Earth centered to Cosmic centered
thinking.
When Captain Cook took the Endeavour and completed the first
circumnavigation of the the world in 1771 the idea that the world was
limitless ended. With that the idea that there was a frontier
accessible beyond the horizon also ended. We began organizing our
international affairs around the disposition of limited resources.
The modern military age had begun.
The greatest discovery biologically was made by Wallace, who
discovered the Wallace line. The Wallace line shows up continental
drift. I am raising this to emphasize that we need to be sure of the
pedigree of any life.
BTW - It was the Wallace who discovered Evolution independently of
Darwin and who sent his manuscript to Darwin who was then prompted
into publishing.
Yes, indeed.
This week's discovery is the beginning of the end of that age. This
was predicted at the beginning of the space age, but has been slow to
develop following the cancellation of Project Apollo and the general
abandonment of manned solar system exploration.
Beyond the large sea change in human conciousness there will be
continuing debates following this weeks discovery. The big debate
will be where did life come from? Did it evolve independently on
Earth and Mars? Did it arrive with the water from the Kuiper belt
objects? We won't know the answer to that question without being
able to look at the DNA of living systems - and that will take a human
presence on Mars, or rather a human level presence on Mars (AI driven
bio-lab)
The Earth's oceans formed about 3.8 billion years ago. Where did the
water come from? Deep space probes have photographed nearly all
moons and planets with solid surfaces. One thing we know for
certain, analyzing every surface from Mercury, to the Moon, to Mars,
to the Moons of the outer planets - that about 3.8 bilion years ago
there was a massive solar system wide cratering event. Where did the
debris come from? The Kuiper belt! We have already mapped in just
a few short years over 120,000 objects. These objects are made of
exotic ices. Nitrogen, and water. The very things that are
abundand on the surface of the Earth. Nitrogen and water are
present on Mars. Nitrogen and water are present on Earth. Nitrogen
and water are present on Venus. Mercury is too hot and small to
retain much nitrogen and water - as is the moon - but likely when
landers set down on some of the oldest craters - they'll find - as on
the moon - nitrogen rich compound and hydrides dating back 3.8 billion
years ago.
Life also formed on Earth 3.8 bilion years ago - just after water
arrived the theory goes. Some think the old idea of panspermia is
still got some life in it so to speak! Why couldn't the life have
arrived WITH the water? The discovery of life on Mars will reopen
this old debate.
NO, we have top ask always where that life came from. Occams razor
tells us that with a Universe of finite lifetime (13.7e9 years) we
should look to the evolution of life ON EARTH.
Can't be. Life can only really travel at up to 50km/s (even this is
We won't know the answer until we send a bio lab to the Kuiper belt
with the ability to drill deeply into the core of these bodies.
Then the question will be, is ALL life across the cosmos related?
wildly optimistic) life cannot therefore be related in any sense
beyond 700 kiloparsecs. Completely impossible.
We already know that amino acids the building blocks of life formPhoenix is a great project, I think you are overselling it a little.
freely in interstellar clouds
http://www.springerlink.com/content/m036064v04358h46/
and that the Kuiper Belt is debris left over from the Sun's formation
from an interstellar cloud.
Moreover life is not the same as intelligent life. A consenus view is
that life in the Universe is fairly common, but that intelligent life
is rare. We have already had discussions on the Fermi Paradox.
- Ian Parker
.
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