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Vox - Why scientists really want to know if there was ever life on Mars
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a425couple
Jul 3, 2022, 4:43:13 PM7/3/22
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https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2022/6/29/23171032/mars-nasa-perserverance-search-for-life-luca
Why scientists really, really want to know if there was ever life on Mars
If there was life on Mars billions of years ago — even just microbial
life — it could change our understanding of how life begins.
By Brian Resnick@B_resnickbrian@vox.com Jun 29, 2022, 1:00pm EDT
NASA’s Perseverance rover took this photo of the Martian surface in
January. The robot is searching for signs of past life on the planet.
NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU
Today, Mars is a wasteland. It’s a dusty desert, rough and pockmarked
with craters. There’s no apparent life on its surface. But over the past
decades, scientists have found evidence of a lost Mars, one that looked
a lot more like Earth than like a hellhole.
“You can see evidence of what Mars was like 4 billion years ago,” says
NASA astrobiologist Lindsay Hays. Etched into its rocky surface, “you
see things like the remnants of a huge river delta,” she says. You see
evidence of past lakes. That gets the imagination going. “There may have
been clouds in the atmosphere,” Hays says. “The surface would have been
absolutely beautiful.” Past missions to Mars — including with robotic
rovers, landers, and orbiters — have added on-the-ground evidence that
this watery past is very likely.
And that’s the most exciting thing for an astrobiologist like Hays:
Where there was water, there could have been life. “One of the universal
features that we see of life is that it needs water,” she says. There’s
life that survives without light, life that survives without oxygen.
Nothing that we know of lives without water. If there was water on the
surface of ancient Mars, “well, then maybe there was life that was
living in that water,” she says.
A recent episode of Unexplainable — Vox’s podcast that explores big
mysteries, unanswered questions, and all the things we learn by diving
into the unknown — is about the search for a key piece of evidence that
would confirm if there was life on ancient Mars.
Perseverance, NASA’s latest rover that landed on the Red Planet in 2021,
is currently exploring an ancient dried-up river delta. The hope is that
some form of microbial life that lived — and died — billions of years
ago is preserved in its sediments. (It’s less likely that anything is
currently alive on Mars.) The rover is on the hunt for rock samples that
may eventually be returned to Earth for precise study; they would become
the first Mars rocks returned to Earth by a scientific mission (we have
some samples of Mars rocks that arrived on Earth via meteorite).
CHINA-HONG KONG-XI JINPING-25TH ANNIVERSARY-MEETING-INAUGURAL CEREMONY (CN)
But ... what if we find it? What if evidence of past life on Mars is
confirmed?
Finding life on Mars could help us understand how common life is in the
universe
“The reason that I am interested in the search for life has to do with
this concept of how interrelated life is on Earth,” Hays explains.
Any two human beings are related by a common ancestor if you look far
enough back in their family trees. But the same is true of all life.
There’s a common evolutionary ancestor relating a human to a chimpanzee,
a chimpanzee to a frog, a frog to an insect, an insect to a spore of
fungus. All life on Earth is related, via the last universal common
ancestor (or LUCA), a hypothesized microbe that lived billions of years ago.
To Hays, that relationship raises an epic question.
“So, knowing that all life on this planet seems to be all related to
each other, what would life on a different planet be like?” she asks.
It’s possible, though not guaranteed, if Perseverance finds evidence of
past life on Mars that scientists could determine if it likely shares a
common ancestor with life on Earth. (“All life on Earth shares certain
similarities,” she says, “using DNA/RNA for ‘information’ storage and
most of the same amino acids in their proteins. If we found life on Mars
that shared those similarities,” then maybe it’s related to life on Earth.
If life on Earth and Mars has a common ancestor, then that means
possibly life started on one of the planets and then was somehow
transported to the other (likely by meteorite). It’s possible that life
didn’t start on Earth but instead on Mars, or perhaps even somewhere
else in space.
Listen to Unexplainable
Unexplainable is a weekly science podcast about everything we don’t
know. For stories about great scientific mysteries, follow us wherever
you listen to podcasts.
But if the Martian life seems very different from the life on Earth,
then it could mean that “life is so fundamental a process of the
universe that you can have two different life-generating events in the
same solar system,” Hays says. That means life might be even more common
in the universe than we currently suspect.
Hays does caution that answers to these epic questions may still elude
us, even with the best of all possible rock samples. Scientific evidence
is often ambiguous, and there is sure to be debate about any sweeping
conclusion.
But the fact remains: Mars is a hugely important place in our solar
system to investigate these questions.
And there could be, right now, a simple rock lying on the Martian
surface, with epic evidence inscribed in it. Maybe, just maybe, our
robot rover will find that rock, collect it, and show us how special
life really is.
Further reading
7 solar system mysteries scientists haven’t solved yet — Why is our moon
so weird? What killed Venus? Big cosmic questions lurk in our celestial
backyard.
NASA’s Perseverance mission, explained
Apollo astronauts left their poop on the moon. We gotta go back for that
shit.
Will you support Vox’s explanatory journalism?
Millions turn to Vox to understand what’s happening in the news. Our
mission has never been more vital than it is in this moment: to empower
through understanding. Financial contributions from our readers are a
critical part of supporting our resource-intensive work and help us keep
our journalism free for all. Please consider making a contribution to
Vox today.
Yes, I'll give
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https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2022/6/29/23171032/mars-nasa-perserverance-search-for-life-luca
Why scientists really, really want to know if there was ever life on Mars
If there was life on Mars billions of years ago — even just microbial
life — it could change our understanding of how life begins.
By Brian Resnick@B_resnickbrian@vox.com Jun 29, 2022, 1:00pm EDT
NASA’s Perseverance rover took this photo of the Martian surface in
January. The robot is searching for signs of past life on the planet.
NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU
Today, Mars is a wasteland. It’s a dusty desert, rough and pockmarked
with craters. There’s no apparent life on its surface. But over the past
decades, scientists have found evidence of a lost Mars, one that looked
a lot more like Earth than like a hellhole.
“You can see evidence of what Mars was like 4 billion years ago,” says
NASA astrobiologist Lindsay Hays. Etched into its rocky surface, “you
see things like the remnants of a huge river delta,” she says. You see
evidence of past lakes. That gets the imagination going. “There may have
been clouds in the atmosphere,” Hays says. “The surface would have been
absolutely beautiful.” Past missions to Mars — including with robotic
rovers, landers, and orbiters — have added on-the-ground evidence that
this watery past is very likely.
And that’s the most exciting thing for an astrobiologist like Hays:
Where there was water, there could have been life. “One of the universal
features that we see of life is that it needs water,” she says. There’s
life that survives without light, life that survives without oxygen.
Nothing that we know of lives without water. If there was water on the
surface of ancient Mars, “well, then maybe there was life that was
living in that water,” she says.
A recent episode of Unexplainable — Vox’s podcast that explores big
mysteries, unanswered questions, and all the things we learn by diving
into the unknown — is about the search for a key piece of evidence that
would confirm if there was life on ancient Mars.
Perseverance, NASA’s latest rover that landed on the Red Planet in 2021,
is currently exploring an ancient dried-up river delta. The hope is that
some form of microbial life that lived — and died — billions of years
ago is preserved in its sediments. (It’s less likely that anything is
currently alive on Mars.) The rover is on the hunt for rock samples that
may eventually be returned to Earth for precise study; they would become
the first Mars rocks returned to Earth by a scientific mission (we have
some samples of Mars rocks that arrived on Earth via meteorite).
CHINA-HONG KONG-XI JINPING-25TH ANNIVERSARY-MEETING-INAUGURAL CEREMONY (CN)
But ... what if we find it? What if evidence of past life on Mars is
confirmed?
Finding life on Mars could help us understand how common life is in the
universe
“The reason that I am interested in the search for life has to do with
this concept of how interrelated life is on Earth,” Hays explains.
Any two human beings are related by a common ancestor if you look far
enough back in their family trees. But the same is true of all life.
There’s a common evolutionary ancestor relating a human to a chimpanzee,
a chimpanzee to a frog, a frog to an insect, an insect to a spore of
fungus. All life on Earth is related, via the last universal common
ancestor (or LUCA), a hypothesized microbe that lived billions of years ago.
To Hays, that relationship raises an epic question.
“So, knowing that all life on this planet seems to be all related to
each other, what would life on a different planet be like?” she asks.
It’s possible, though not guaranteed, if Perseverance finds evidence of
past life on Mars that scientists could determine if it likely shares a
common ancestor with life on Earth. (“All life on Earth shares certain
similarities,” she says, “using DNA/RNA for ‘information’ storage and
most of the same amino acids in their proteins. If we found life on Mars
that shared those similarities,” then maybe it’s related to life on Earth.
If life on Earth and Mars has a common ancestor, then that means
possibly life started on one of the planets and then was somehow
transported to the other (likely by meteorite). It’s possible that life
didn’t start on Earth but instead on Mars, or perhaps even somewhere
else in space.
Listen to Unexplainable
Unexplainable is a weekly science podcast about everything we don’t
know. For stories about great scientific mysteries, follow us wherever
you listen to podcasts.
But if the Martian life seems very different from the life on Earth,
then it could mean that “life is so fundamental a process of the
universe that you can have two different life-generating events in the
same solar system,” Hays says. That means life might be even more common
in the universe than we currently suspect.
Hays does caution that answers to these epic questions may still elude
us, even with the best of all possible rock samples. Scientific evidence
is often ambiguous, and there is sure to be debate about any sweeping
conclusion.
But the fact remains: Mars is a hugely important place in our solar
system to investigate these questions.
And there could be, right now, a simple rock lying on the Martian
surface, with epic evidence inscribed in it. Maybe, just maybe, our
robot rover will find that rock, collect it, and show us how special
life really is.
Further reading
7 solar system mysteries scientists haven’t solved yet — Why is our moon
so weird? What killed Venus? Big cosmic questions lurk in our celestial
backyard.
NASA’s Perseverance mission, explained
Apollo astronauts left their poop on the moon. We gotta go back for that
shit.
Will you support Vox’s explanatory journalism?
Millions turn to Vox to understand what’s happening in the news. Our
mission has never been more vital than it is in this moment: to empower
through understanding. Financial contributions from our readers are a
critical part of supporting our resource-intensive work and help us keep
our journalism free for all. Please consider making a contribution to
Vox today.
Yes, I'll give
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A man with his face painted red, white, and blue wearing a fur hat with
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R Kym Horsell
Jul 3, 2022, 6:03:00 PM7/3/22
to
In alt.astronomy a425couple <a425c...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> from
> https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2022/6/29/23171032/mars-nasa-perserverance-search-for-life-luca
>
> Why scientists really, really want to know if there was ever life on Mars
> If there was life on Mars billions of years ago - even just microbial
> from
> https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2022/6/29/23171032/mars-nasa-perserverance-search-for-life-luca
>
> Why scientists really, really want to know if there was ever life on Mars
> life - it could change our understanding of how life begins.
...
Note the doublethink.
Life on earth was here billions of years ago and despite planet-killing
asteroid strikes and other major disasters is still around.
But life on Mars is all safely dead and in the past.
If history has taught us anything it's that a slew of phds are gunna
be based on overturning the relevant "everyone knows that X".
--
Months like: Avg E-Mars dist Av #UFO sgt. Power law
(AU) (NUFORC)
2003.62 0.385998 636.3 555.434
2020.79 0.437594 618.291 545.601
2020.88 0.530053 609.324 530.912
2014.29 0.608519 481.058 520.579
2020.54 0.690655 429.941 511.278*
2020.96 0.770661 575.772 503.361
2018.88 0.844598 422.054 496.838*
2008.12 0.903603 370.14 492.084*
2020.46 0.95391 472.705 488.303
2021.04 1.0628 497.988 480.846
2018.96 1.17668 497.558 473.927
2018.21 1.27404 555.163 468.593*
2021.12 1.36315 414.442 464.105
2014.71 1.45549 447.137 459.794
2020.21 1.55687 480.729 455.407
2021.21 1.62066 467.944 452.811
2019.12 1.68755 357.909 450.211*
2017.04 1.74136 334 448.203**
2020.12 1.79477 436.775 446.279
2007.29 1.84762 537.504 444.439*
2021.29 1.90453 486.426 442.524
1989.29 1.9588 450.712 440.757
2015.04 2.02089 442.901 438.803
2021.38 2.11625 432.673 435.932
2015.12 2.17672 408.848 434.187
2013.71 2.23069 428.214 432.675
2021.46 2.32364 383.788 430.168
2015.71 2.40661 402.214 428.024
2021.54 2.48216 524.126 426.145*
2019.71 2.64152 556.852 422.386*
MODEL:
y = 485.034 * x^-0.142377
T-test: P(beta<0) = 0.996146
Rank test: Spearman corr = -0.355284
critical value = 0.306 2-sided at 5%; reject H0:not_connected
r2 = 0.227
a425couple
Jul 4, 2022, 11:04:18 AM7/4/22
to
On 7/3/2022 3:02 PM, R Kym Horsell wrote:
> In alt.astronomy a425couple <a425c...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>> from
>> https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2022/6/29/23171032/mars-nasa-perserverance-search-for-life-luca
>>
>> Why scientists really, really want to know if there was ever life on Mars
>> If there was life on Mars billions of years ago - even just microbial
>> life - it could change our understanding of how life begins.
>>
>> By Brian Resnick@B_resnickbrian@vox.com Jun 29, 2022, 1:00pm EDT
> ...
>
> Note the doublethink.
> Life on earth was here billions of years ago and despite planet-killing
> asteroid strikes and other major disasters is still around.
>
> But life on Mars is all safely dead and in the past.
>
> If history has taught us anything it's that a slew of phds are gunna
> be based on overturning the relevant "everyone knows that X".
>
Huh??
> In alt.astronomy a425couple <a425c...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>> from
>> https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2022/6/29/23171032/mars-nasa-perserverance-search-for-life-luca
>>
>> Why scientists really, really want to know if there was ever life on Mars
>> If there was life on Mars billions of years ago - even just microbial
>> life - it could change our understanding of how life begins.
>>
>> By Brian Resnick@B_resnickbrian@vox.com Jun 29, 2022, 1:00pm EDT
> ...
>
> Note the doublethink.
> Life on earth was here billions of years ago and despite planet-killing
> asteroid strikes and other major disasters is still around.
>
> But life on Mars is all safely dead and in the past.
>
> If history has taught us anything it's that a slew of phds are gunna
> be based on overturning the relevant "everyone knows that X".
>
"If history has taught us anything it's that"
well paid and fully employed.
Hopefully they also add to human knowledge and
understanding of who we are, where we are, and
how we got here.
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