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NASA's Mars Science Laboratory |OT| 2,000 Pounds of Science!

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Grym

Member
so they found organics. They are just not ready to state definitively that they are native to Mars (yet).

is that what I just heard?
 

SpecX

Member
why wouldn't it be?
mars.jpg

mars-page2.jpg

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/big-idea/07/mars

If I could live 1000 years, this would be amazing to witness.
 

Grym

Member
No definitive evidence i suppose.

Yeah, I think the last guy said they can't rule out that what they found was external to Mars. It could have come from an external sources or something and they needed to run more samples over time to be sure, etc. etc. Not sure, I don't speak science fluently.
 

Protein

Banned
I'm still sticking with this


Mariolee wrote:

I anticipating something more along the lines of this.

'NASA scientists found fucking aliens living on motherfucking Mars. New reports from the Mars Curiosity showed that there was John Carter shit happening everywhere. You got aliens shooting aliens, aliens fucking aliens, aliens up the hoosgow. We're very excited about what this means.'
 

fallout

Member
Aliens could show up tomorrow and the vast majority of people would not care, unless it affected their day-to-day lives.
 

Evolved1

make sure the pudding isn't too soggy but that just ruins everything
Aliens could show up tomorrow and the vast majority of people would not care, unless it affected their day-to-day lives.

I think other intelligent life being discovered would basically kill off most of the big religions... of course the aliens would probably wipe us off the face of the planet.

Not sure if that still gets filed in the win column or not. Hey, at least no more religion.
 

akira28

Member
Which one?

Well, The Ineffable, for starters. Then the Creator Father. Then the Monad and his 12 Aeons.(potentially the same dude) Then the Lord Jesus Christ, followed by YHVH the Demiurge, and the angel Lucifer. Finally, the Great Attractor, just to cover any overlap.
 

fallout

Member
I'd love for it not to be true, but most of humanity just wouldn't care. There'd be a lot of hoopla to start, but assuming they weren't blowing us up, everyone would go back to their day jobs.

I think other intelligent life being discovered would basically kill off most of the big religions... of course the aliens would probably wipe us off the face of the planet.
I think most religions would be affected, but it's not like it's going to rock someone's deep-seeded beliefs. I'm hopeful that exposure to an alien culture might get people to think a bit more about it, but I don't think it'll ever really go away.
 
I think other intelligent life being discovered would basically kill off most of the big religions... of course the aliens would probably wipe us off the face of the planet.

Not sure if that still gets filed in the win column or not. Hey, at least no more religion.

If aliens is the coup required for science to prevail over religion, then we're fucked.
 

Woorloog

Banned
I hope they find a way to do it faster than 1000 years.

Biggest problem with terraforming Mars is figuring out how to create a strong magnetic field.
How perfect do you want to do it? How controlled? What are goals?
Most likely the project is far faster than 1000 years, especially since as tech advances, the project can be accelerated. And if it is a runaway thing, as it could well be... well, it will accelerate itself. EDIT also, depending how radical methods you want to use... Burn a few comets in Mars' atmosphere and you can thicken the thing fast, though getting enough oxygen to it and reducing CO2 is going to be slow.

And primary issue definetly ain't creating a magnetic field, for it is practically impossible. Unless you somehow reignite the core-dynamo of Mars, don't even think about it.
Thickening the atmosphere is the best you can do and hope advanced medical tech can take care rest of the problems.

That article makes it seem pointless.

Maybe the article does make it seem pointless but it ain't: Don't keep all your eggs in one basket. Terraforming Mars or another planet is ESSENTIAL to continued survival of human species. If we don't venture to space and other planets, we'll die if something bad happens to Earth (or get stuck there forever). And we need to venture to other solar systems as well, if we stick to our system, we'll die for sure, eventually.
In short term it is pointless, but then pretty much anything happening in short term is pointless, despite people thinking in merely short term and thinking it important.
 

Darknight

Member
Aint both Earth and Mars gonna get destroyed at one point by the sun? Im not sure colonizing Mars is the best thing for humanity once we get the opportunity that is. I mean it could be for testing purposes but humans will need to move away from the Sun in the distant future, correct?
 

Ether_Snake

安安安安安安安安安安安安安安安
Even if they found life, or remains of life, they would then say "We can't confirm that it didn't come from a meteorite that left the Earth after an impact of another meteorite on Earth!".
 

Prez

Member
Aint both Earth and Mars gonna get destroyed at one point by the sun? Im not sure colonizing Mars is the best thing for humanity once we get the opportunity that is. I mean it could be for testing purposes but humans will need to move away from the Sun in the distant future, correct?

I think after Earth becomes inhabitable Mars will be habitable for millions of years. That seems worth it.
 
Aint both Earth and Mars gonna get destroyed at one point by the sun? Im not sure colonizing Mars is the best thing for humanity once we get the opportunity that is. I mean it could be for testing purposes but humans will need to move away from the Sun in the distant future, correct?
Do you know the time frame for either event? We can terraform mars and chill for billions of years as we figure out how to do interstellar travel.
 

Gorgon

Member
So it was announced that organic substances containing "water and sulfur and chlorine" were found on Mars by Curiosity. They now trying to analyze the origin (curiousity itself or debris or actually indigenous to Mars).

Huffpo "Reporting"
Organics on Mars Curiosity Rover

Nope, that report is wrong. They have no confirmation of organics.


Do you know the time frame for either event? We can terraform mars and chill for billions of years as we figure out how to do interstellar travel.

In about 1 billion years Earth will be too hot for habitability. Mars will soon follow. But 1 By years is a loooooooooooooonnnnnnnnnnnnnnggg time.
 
Do you know the time frame for either event? We can terraform mars and chill for billions of years as we figure out how to do interstellar travel.

A couple of billion years anyway (alot of estimates seem to be between 3-4.5 Ga, but it still seems pretty coarse)... I don't think we, as a species, need to worry about it. We might feel sentimental about our creator though, the earth.
 

Gorgon

Member
A couple of billion years anyway (alot of estimates seem to be between 3-4.5 Ga, but it still seems pretty coarse)... I don't think we, as a species, need to worry about it. We might feel sentimental about our creator though, the earth.

5 by is for the sun to go red giant. It will go too hot for sustaing life (specially macroorganisms) way before that at about 1-1.5 by from now.
 

GaimeGuy

Volunteer Deputy Campaign Director, Obama for America '16
Do you know the time frame for either event? We can terraform mars and chill for billions of years as we figure out how to do interstellar travel.

billions?

The earth is absolutely fucked in 3-5 billion years when the sun becomes a red giant. It will be swallowed up by the Sun as it expands to 200x its current radius (and loses about 38% of its mass).

However, we're screwed much earlier than that.

In about 1 billion years, the solar energy released by the sun will cause Earth's oceans to evaporate, and all of the hydrogen from the water will be lost permanently to space. There will be very little water on the planet from that point on to the sun's red giant phase, though trace amounts may be detected as late as 2.5-3 billion years from now. Life won't be able to exist at scales larger than the microorganism level, though. It'll be too hot.

Earth will be similar to Venus for about a billion years, until the atmosphere gets lost to space and leaves earth as a dead planet with a surface of molten rock.

Basically, the sun is bombarding every planet with solar energy, and the atmospheres and surface hydrogen from each planet are gradually leaking out into space. It's not sustainable. The only way for survival is to ultimately leave the solar system.

Humans are very young: We've only existed for about 200,000 years. But the clock is ticking.
 
billions?

The earth is absolutely fucked in 3-5 billion years when the sun becomes a red giant. It will be swallowed up by the Sun as it expands to 200x its current radius (and loses about 38% of its mass).

However, we're screwed much earlier than that.

In about 1 billion years, the solar energy released by the sun will cause Earth's oceans to evaporate, and all of the hydrogen from the water will be lost permanently to space. There will be very little water on the planet from that point on to the sun's red giant phase, though trace amounts may be detected as late as 2.5-3 billion years from now. Life won't be able to exist at scales larger than the microorganism level, though. It'll be too hot.

Earth will be similar to Venus for about a billion years, until the atmosphere gets lost to space and leaves earth as a dead planet with a surface of molten rock.

Basically, the sun is bombarding every planet with solar energy, and the atmospheres and surface hydrogen from each planet are gradually leaking out into space. It's not sustainable. The only way for survival is to ultimately leave the solar system.

Humans are very young: We've only existed for about 200,000 years. But the clock is ticking.

Oh ok, a billion. Sorry. I guess we better get to packing.

Regardless, it's silly to write off intra-solar colonization because of a billion year time horizon, as if there will not be any other compelling reasons to start getting some people off of Earth.
 

DrForester

Kills Photobucket
NEW ROVER IN 2020: Link

BOOOOOYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

The planned portfolio includes the Curiosity and Opportunity rovers; two NASA spacecraft and contributions to one European spacecraft currently orbiting Mars; the 2013 launch of the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN) orbiter to study the Martian upper atmosphere; the Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport (InSight) mission, which will take the first look into the deep interior of Mars; and participation in ESA's 2016 and 2018 ExoMars missions, including providing "Electra" telecommunication radios to ESA's 2016 mission and a critical element of the premier astrobiology instrument on the 2018 ExoMars rover.

I've gotten to see this in person being built in Colorado.

Psh, in 2020 I should be standing on Mars snapping photos with my cell.

Sa3zz.jpg
 
NASA's Mars rover Curiosity has pulled out another item from its toolkit for the first time, using a brush to sweep Martian rocks clean of the planet’s ubiquitous red dust, the space agency announced Monday.

Curiosity’s first use of the Dust Removal Tool at the tip of its robotic arm marks another milestone for the rover, which has spent about five months on the Red Planet.


More here: http://www.space.com/19167-curiosity-rover-dusts-mars-rock.html

 
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