Meridiani Is A Seabed (APOD 05 Jun 2006)

[harry]

Hello Aichip

It sounds far fetched,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,well you could look at the rocks on the moon and check them out with earth. Have they done this.


But! the moon has a consistent orbit. If it came off earth i do not think that orbit would be the same.

[orin stepanek]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giant_impact_hypothesis

That's a pretty impressive concept Aichip. Seems logical. This Theia Wouldn't necessary have to be in the same orbit as the Earth for this to happen, would it?
Orin

[BMAONE23]

Harry,
I saw a program on the science channel that talked about what aichip stated. The Moon formed at a distance of about 17000 miles from the Earth. At that time the tidal forces were horrific as the Moon pulled against the Earth. Thankfully though the Moon is in a gradually increasing orbit and its effect lessens over time or we might have no life here as it caused 1000' tides. It stated that the moons orbit will continue to change at an increase of 1.5" per year until it reaches a point roughly double what it is today and then will probably settle into a comfortable orbit about 750,000 k away.

[Dr. Skeptic]

You argue like a two dollar lawyer.

I never met a two dollar lawyer.

I said:

The assumption is based on terrestrial chemistry. We know nothing of the sort of chemistry of these organisms. All we have is their remains and no samples in hand for analysis. Even on Earth there are extremophile organisms that live in conditions thare are considered toxic to "normal" life.

You replied:

You are the one proposing Earth-like life forms.

No, I am not. I am looking at images of sea shells and rolled trilobites. The images say nothing of their chemistry. You are making assumptions based on what you know about terrestrial organisms. So let's dispense with the salt argument first. Sodium chloride does exist on Mars, and NASA has said so clearly. So have their research scientists at Arizona State:

According ASU's Carleton Moore further analysis of a piece of the Nakla meteorite showed that "the highest concentrations of negative ions were chloride, sulfate, fluoride, and a little dissolved silica, and, in positive ions, sodium, magnesium and calcium. The elements in highest abundance were sodium and chloride -- like the salt water on Earth.

From Dr. J. J. Hurtak, in his words:

The "brewing evidence" shows a strong case for an evaporation sequence of conditions that moved from high levels of sulfur to sodium chloride (NaCl) (water-soluble solid) to bromide, as well as salt-rich brine material, all indicative of strong water activity where byproducts precipitated out of brine.

In a NASA briefing on March 3rd, 2004, Steven Squyres had this to say:

"You have to have a lot of water involved to get these results....Mars was habitable for a long period of time," said Steve Squyres, principal scientist for the rovers at NASA.

Straight from the horse's mouth.

I said:

For the water level to have been 1 meter at Meridiani, the water depth would have been 4 kilometers elsewhere. Simple topographic maps will show this. No plate tectonics equals an inevitable result, namely that the elevations are the same now as then. Therefore, the planet must have been roughly half covered in water. MOLA data is very clear about that.

You said:

The surface H2O was in shallow pools capillary fed from sub-surface H2O. The sedimentary layering found to date is uniform in thickness and hasn't exceeded .5 cm suggesting small, shallow pools with short layering cycles.

Dr. James Head, a planetary scientist at Brown University seems to think otherwise. He says:

Altogether, Head and his colleagues say, the amount of water contained in the ancient Martian ocean would have been enough to cover the entire planet to a depth of more than 300 feet, if it were spread out uniformly over the whole planet. (The surface area of Mars is approximately equal to the dry- land surface of Earth). This ocean, Head estimates, would have been about one-third the size of the Atlantic.

Now, about the flat areas in Meridiani, covered in mud polygons. Another scientist, David Smith of Mars Global Surveyor, has this to say:
" Most startling of all is the new data showing the remarkable smoothness of this region of Mars - perhaps buried under millions of years worth of sediments deposited by this ancient sea."

"We don't know of anywhere smoother," said David Smith, one of Global Surveyor's principal scientists. "There's nothing on Earth, nothing on Venus that smooth, on that kind of scale. It's like the Bonneville Flats," a perfectly flat, dried lake bed in the Nevada desert, but much more extensive. "You can go for probably 1,000 miles with only variations [in height] of 5 to 10 meters," or 15 to 30 feet, he said (not counting the continual downward slope of this whole expanse).

Water was stable on the surface of Mars for ages, as shown in this release:
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=18417

The University of Arizona research team (same one that works for NASA) seems to think that salty oceans were present:
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewnews.html?id=169

Now, what about the glaciers in the equatorial areas? There is a whole frozen sea there.
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=18050
In the more popular parlance, it is here:
http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn7039

Mars Express seems to have found water reservoirs underground.
http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Results_fro ... WFE_0.html
And, the polar caps are mostly water - 98% is the estimate.
http://ltpwww.gsfc.nasa.gov/tharsis/hend_mola.html
But don't take their word for it, how about another NASA team?
http://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/new ... water.html

I said:

The planet has had water in liquid form all along. This is the only contention that people really have a problem with. NASA has the worst press release system in the world, and people seem to miss these snippets of information. Look also to the work of Derek Sears and Gil Levin. Both have proven that liquid water can exist on the surface today. But again, this is routinely ignored or dismissed.

You said:

Total bunk. H2O will evaporate from solid state directly to a gaseous state in the pressure ranges of the Martian atmosphere, the same way CO2 does at Earth's atmospheric pressure - chem 101.

Here you are proven wrong. You were taught from a chart of numbers that somebody put together without doing the actual experiments. But you are saying I should just take your word for it, when clearly you have not done the experiments, while Sears and Levin and others have? Perhaps you should read this:
http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2005/pdf/1496.pdf
http://www.marstoday.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=18269
http://dailyheadlines.uark.edu/5717.htm
You can see that at 7mb atmospheric pressure and the present surface temperatures on Mars, water evaporates at a rate of about 1mm per hour. Put some salt in it and place it in the soil, and it can remain for weeks. it will not evaporate or freeze, it will remain as briny mud. It perfectly explains the airbag prints from the landers and the fact that the rover tracks are crisp, unlike prints in dry sand. The soil is muddy just below a layer of dust on the surface.

I said:

...nobody actually knows whether there has been a shield or not. it is purely an opinion at this point.

You said:

Wrong again.

I have not yet been 'wrong". Show me proof that there was a shield. You are a skeptic, you should welcome the chance to prove your statement. Having proof at hand makes an argument far more effective, and good references are a plus. But let's look at what you had to say in detail.

Mars contains far less Fe than the Earth (look up planet densities).

I agree with that statement.

A magnasphere protects an atmosphere from bombardment from the Sun's heliosphere. Mars has an inadequate Fe core to produce a suitable magnasphere to protect complex organic molecules from destruction.

I will assume you mean a magnetosphere. As it is, we know that some organisms can survive raw vacuum and sunlight for weeks to years. The surface of Mars is far more protected than the environment of raw space. Many organisms produce natural sunblockers and the presence of salts also provides protection from ultraviolet radiation. Some organisms here on Earth can survive, even thrive in, the cores of nuclear reactors. I am absolutely certain that the radiation environment inside a reactor core is thousands of times more dangerous than the surface of Mars. This does not seem to be a problem to radiodurans, the organism I mention here.

And, again, salt water is a great shield to life. Consider why life did not come onto the land in ages past on the Earth. The ozone layer was not yet in place, or effective enough, and life stayed in the oceans until it had worked out the proper survival strategies and the ozone layer became effective. Life existed in the seas for ages before it did on the land. Mars had a very thin atmosphere, and I estimate that the oceans would have served as a surrogate atmosphere, allowing gas exchange and shielding for those organisms.

There is no point in continuing from here.

You may be right. The fact is, Mars had oceans, there is sodium chloride present, water still exists there today in liquid form, and I have found hundreds of marine fossils.

Show me the published papers directly from the landers data that show the compounds you claim are present from the locations where your "fossils" are located. I have with a negative result.

[aichip]

I think it was not neccesary to quote the entire response and paste a single line at the end - but so be it. Let's look at the compounds in question and whether they are present on Mars. First, we need to understand the whole controversy.

I will start by presenting the original paper for Viking to explain what was being searched for.

http://mars.spherix.com/spie2/Reprint75.htm

They measured the relative humidity and landed. This area where maximum relative humidity was know to be present was near the north polar cap. Now, Malin space Science Systems's version of the Viking hardware:

http://www.msss.com/http/ps/life/life.html

They proposed that reactive hydrogen peroxides would be present and would sterilize the soil.

Note that these reactive compounds would be destroying the aluminum parts of the landers, but we see no sign of this. Note also that these proposed reactive peroxide compounds would also destroy any magnetic iron oxides, but there are magnetic iron oxides present on the trap magnets. Therefore, they have not been destroyed by these proposed peroxides.

The conclusion is simple - since the rovers are not corroded, and the iron oxides are indeed magnetic, then there cannot be any significant amount of peroxides present in the soil. No peroxides means no inorganic explanation for the results, and that means that biology is not ruled out.

The GCMS, as it happens, was never capable of identifying organic compounds as such. It can detect compounds that contain carbon, but it cannot distinguish between organic and inorganic. That is a fact. However, they chose to use its results (which can't tell the difference) over three other experiments that gave positive results for organic activity or compounds. This is selective seeing.

One more very important consideration should be noted. In all cases, there is no proof provided by the "dead, dry Mars" people. They always resort to "the consensus opinion" to explain the results, NEVER the measured and factual data.

In other words, for all the money and effort invested, they always come to "the consensus opinion". This is not good enough. It is hand waving.

Let's look at the harware and its goals.
http://csep10.phys.utk.edu/astr161/lect ... iking.html

These are the Viking instruments meant to look for evidence of life on Mars:

Gas Metabolism: look for changes in the atmosphere induced by metabolism in the Martian soil.

Labeled Release: Look for release of radioactive carbon dioxide by metabolism from organic material labeled by radioactive carbon.

Pyrolytic Release: Search for radioactive compounds in soil by heating soil exposed to radioactive carbon dioxide.

Mass Spectrometer: Search directly in Martian soil for organic compounds known to be essential to Earth life. (This instrument is otherwise known as the GCMS)

The first three gave positive results, the fourth did not - but it was the flawed instrument, unable to detect organic compounds (GCMS). In other words, they chose their own personal bias over the readings of the scientific instrumentation.

http://www.spacedaily.com/news/mars-life-00g.html

Here are the words that outline the whole controversy:

The tests showed that the pre-flight Viking GCMS test model could not detect organic molecules in Antarctic soil sample that contained life. Yet this would be the instrument used to render the final verdict against any positive evidence of life on Mars that might have been found by the Viking biology instruments.

In other words, NASA chose to use the GCMS results even though actual tests showed it to be flawed and incapable of detecting organics in real world tests. Let's see what else was said:

Strangely enough, one of the other Viking biology instruments known as the Pyrolytic Release experiment found traces of organic matter forming inside its test chamber. This occurred in seven out of nine PR tests.

Another instrument, known to word properly, did in fact find organics in nearly all its Martian soil samples tested. It did work on Earth, where the GCMS did not. It is silly to assume that the roles would be reversed, simply because they were on Mars later.

Titled "The Missing Organic Molecules On Mars" (published in the PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES, Vol. 97, p 2425, March 18, 2000), Benner et al., concluded that the Viking GCMS was insensitive to certain organic molecules including those left behind by any microbial life that might have been on Mars.

Again, confirming that this GCMS was a flawed instrument and blind to the very compounds that they needed to detect.

Now fast forward to MER.

Let us look at the presence of carbonates are present on Mars.
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2001/ast04feb_1.htm

"We know there are carbonates (on Mars), because we see them as weathering products in a variety of Martian meteorites," said Everett Gibson, an astrobiologist at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas.

Testing Martian meteorites shows that they contain carbonate minerals. These are direct samples of Mars itself, and they contain carbonates.

Tiny patches of carbonate like those found in the "Mars rock" would not be detected by the thermal emission spectrometer currently in orbit around Mars, Gibson continued. Even THEMIS's 100-meter resolution isn't likely to reveal such diminutive deposits.

In other words, the instruments are blind to small deposits like they have already found from the meteorites. But not all instruments are blind to carbonates, because the Mini-TES can see them.

Here is what NASA considers proof of carbonate minerals on Mars, based on spectra.
http://www.psrd.hawaii.edu/Oct03/carbonatesMars.html

Note that they say that 2% to 5% of the dust blowing over the planet's surface is carbonate. So we have spectral data saying there are carbonates, and they have actual meteorite samples that prove that there are carbonates. That is solid enough for me, as the two data from two remotely different sources confirm the presence of the material. But it gets even better:

http://physicsweb.org/articles/news/7/8/12/1

Although the researchers do not believe the wet scenarios for ancient Mars, they still did in fact find carbonates. Keep in mind that dust blown over the surface can cover any deposits, so they would not be detectable for most instrumentation.

Each of the two rovers contains a Mini-TES. Dr. Phil Christensen is the man responsible for this instrument. He has confirmed the presence of carbonates on Mars using this instrument. Although he has not located a specific outcropping of carbonate minerals yet, he has located the signature in the soil all over.

So yes, there are carbonates on Mars, and the pyrolytic release experiments showed that 7 out of 9 soil samples tested showed positive for organic matter.

Further analysis of the Labeled Release Experiment showed a circadian rhythm in the release of the gas in the experiment chamber - exactly of the period that you would expect from living organisms that have their biological clocks set to Mars days.

Now, let's look at the details of the sodium chloride findings.

http://www.uwo.ca/earth/people/king/res ... aters1.pdf

The charts on page 51 are particularly interesting. They show the relative concentrations of various salts in percentages and where the Martian soils from Pathfinder, Viking, and MER fall. All show sodium and chlorides in their salts. Looks like table salt to me.

http://www.astrobio.net/news/article859.html

Look at the APXS data and you will see the chlorine signature on the curve. Chloride and bromide salts are present, and this is the signature of the chlorides. The interesting thing is that as the water receded and the solutions dried out, the crystallization separated the salts into different families, based on their solubility.

In other words, the sodium chloride settled out of solution at a different time from the sulfate salts species. So the result is that it is in fact present, but separated by where the water level was and what the brine concentration was as the oceans dried up. The lack of huge chunks of halite is not an issue. The sodium chloride is there, just crystallized in deposits they have not driven over. This is expected, since it would have dropped out of the brine solution at an earlier time than the sulfates, apparently.

So using the Mini-TES on the rovers, carbonates have been identified. And, using the APXS (also on the rovers), they found sodium chloride as well as other sodium and chlorine compounds. The most interesting thing for me, however, is that even though this was a "find the water" mission, they have absolutely no device on either rover that can find water. Not even a simple pair of platinum wires that can touch the ground and see whether it is damp! This is just plain silly.

And what about that peroxide hypothesis that has been thrown about for ages? Let's see, thirty years now, by my reckoning, since Viking. If this is a main theory against the presence of life, why is there no instrument on either rover (or pathfinder) capable of identifying, unambiguously, the presence of peroxides? This is just plain criminal. With a stroke they could have proven or disproven their claims. They chose not to include these absolutely essential devices on the rovers.

Now, how about liquid water? NASA admits that Mars was wet in the past, but they deny it for the present. Yet they do it using weasel words. Here is how they pull it off:

http://www.astrobio.net/news/modules.ph ... le&sid=842

In the article they say:

It may find evidence of liquid water on Mars. Well, not exactly liquid water. Liquid brine, actually.

In other words, they think that brine is not liquid water. Or at least that is what they are saying. Yet brine is liquid water with salt in it. So they are saying that if you find brine on Mars, you have not found liquid water. This is absolutely incorrect.

I would hardly say that Salt Lake in Utah was not liquid water, just because it is brine, nor would I deny that the Dead Sea was liquid water. But this is exactly what they are doing in their inscrutable way.

This is exactly why the results are so confusing to most people and to the press - they never say outright in plain English what they mean. They always waffle and qualify until nobody is really sure what it is that they are saying. Well, here is the plain English.

NASA found that Mars had large bodies of salty water in the past. That sounds like seas to me. They found that much of the surface of the planet never falls below 6.1 millibars of pressure, the exalted triple point of water - and that as a consequence, there is a range of temperatures where liquid water can indeed exist on Mars. That is exactly what Gil Levin and Derek Sears have beein saying, backed up by experiments in vacuum chambers. They found carbonates and table salt, and they have decided that brine is not liquid water.

No wonder that people are confused.

[harry]

Hello Aichip


You have gone the extra distance,,,,,,,,,,,the extra mile,,,,,,,,,covered as many bases and remained humble.

You are a real SIR!!

This forum would not be the same without you.

I'm really learning from you.



Smile and live another day.

[Dr. Skeptic]

I will start by presenting the original paper for Viking to explain what was being searched for. I will start by presenting the original paper for Viking to explain what was being searched for.

I am fully aware of what, how, why and the results of the Viking Landers.

What does the Viking Lander have to do with the chemical makeup of your fossil sites?

The soil samples are void of C, Na ...

Is it you have another conspiracy theory why NASA is withholding or releasing misinformation information - are the protecting something?

If NASA found evidence of life, isn't it logical they would announce it to increase their funding?

Who would have strong enough influence over the science team to prevent the information from going public?

If they did, why would pictures of these "fossils" be released?

Why is it the most complex Martian "fossils" are found in igneous rock debris fields?

[aichip]

Harry: thank you. I truly enjoy presenting information and if it helps others, so much the better. Every fact we accumulate leaves us more able to understand the universe we live in.

Dr. Skeptic wrote:

What does the Viking Lander have to do with the chemical makeup of your fossil sites?
The soil samples are void of C, Na ...

The Viking landers provided the first on-site data about soil composition and the compounds present. That is what they had to contribute to the information.
I have in fact posted links confirming the presence of both carbon and sodium, yet you are simply saying "not so!" Let me post the information in pictures for all to see right here.

The link I had listed in the article above, I now post here. It shows how they proved carbonates exist on the surface of Mars:
http://www.psrd.hawaii.edu/Oct03/carbonatesMars.html

Extracted from that link is this image showing the spectra for both Mars and carbonate samples in the lab:


Well, that looks like the Mars curve at the top of the image is identical to the curve below made from carbonates. I see that as proof that the spectral data directly from Mars shows carbonates.

Do we get it from more than one source? Of course we do. That is how we get confirmation.
http://physicsweb.org/articles/news/7/8/12/1

The title of the article is "Carbonates found on Mars", which is pretty direct. In fact, it cannot be any more direct. Carbonates, as I perhaps mistakenly thought you know, contain carbon. This means that there is carbon in the Martian soil. That is also pretty clear.

From the article in Physicsweb.org:

Small amounts of carbonate minerals have been discovered on the surface of Mars for the first time.

Yes indeed, this says that there are carbonates on Mars, and that by necessity means carbon. Carbon is the root for from which "carbonate" is derived, because carbonates contain carbon atoms.

Joshua Bandfield and colleagues at Arizona State University discovered that particles on the surface of Mars reflect and absorb infrared radiation in a way that exactly matches that of magnesium-rich carbonates found on Earth (J Bandfield et al. 2003 Science 301 1084).

That shows a reputable university, a researcher and his colleagues collaborating on the research, and the method they used to perform the identification. It also lists the published paper that resulted from their work. Denying that this is a real result obtained from observation and experiment begs the question, "why don't you believe this?"

Finally, let us see the NASA press release that clearly and unambiguously says that there is carbon in the soil on Mars. It was found in the form of carbonate compounds and here is the press release:
http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/newsroom ... 0109a.html

Notice that this comes directly from NASA and is not reworded, influenced, or rewritten in any way by some outside source - it is in their own words.

Traces of carbonate minerals showed up in the rover's first survey of the site with its infrared sensing instrument, called the miniature thermal emission spectrometer or Mini-TES. Carbonates form in the presence of water, but it's too early to tell whether the amounts detected come from interaction with water vapor in Mars' atmosphere or are evidence of a watery local environment in the past, scientists emphasized.

So NASA says there are carbonate minerals in the soil right there. What does the chief scientist in charge of the mini-TES say?

"We came looking for carbonates. We have them. We're going to chase them," said Dr. Phil Christensen of Arizona State University, Tempe, leader of the Mini-TES team.

So there you have it. Would you consider that proof of carbon being present in the soil on Mars? If not, why not? I consider it the last word on the subject. Score one for carbon atoms everywhere.

Now for the sodium, again.

This link contains a PDF file documenting the salts in various locations on Earth and Mars.
http://www.uwo.ca/earth/people/king/res ... aters1.pdf

I have extracted the chart from page 51 of the report. Notice the right hand graph that is triangular? The upper point has sodium and potassium listed (that is the Na-K marking). Now you can see that if a data point is not all the way to the right line, there must be some combination of potassium and sodium in the soil.


Okay, let's look at the refereed paper by Steven Squyres et al., and see what the APXS data shows us. I have provided the URL here for the PDF file:
http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2005/pdf/1997.pdf

I have also extracted the table showing the elemental composition here:


I have circled the sodium data in green and it turns out that there are from 6 to 8 times the counts for sodium that there are for chlorine. That looks like sodium data to me, and the chart is almot identical to what I get using the EDAX machine on a sample of material I need to analyze. I see a sodium peak. That means sodium is present and there is nothing to argue about.

Without mincing words, I have now presented, twice, the facts about the matter. Both sodium and carbon are present in the soil of Mars. Any further debate on the matter should be directed to the authors of those papers and articles, because they arrived at those conclusions, not me.

Now, why did I include Viking soil data? Because, as it says in the report from the Max Planck institute:

There are two geological regions, the Gusev plains and the Columbia Hills. The plains contain soils that are very similar to previous landing sites on Mars.

That implies that soil contents are similar in those sites, and later we see that this is the case. Viking data is germaine to the issue because of the similarity of composition of the soils in the various sites.

It is of the greatest importance the information such as this be verified by researchers, or to show that what is presented is at least consistent and does not violate any known laws of physics. Theory is fine but experiment is much, much better. Having data from Viking match data from Pathfinder and MER is strong evidence that they are on the right track.

Is it you have another conspiracy theory why NASA is withholding or releasing misinformation information - are the protecting something?

I have nothing of the sort, and I cannot know what they are thinking or why. But when you see some of the things they have done in recent years, it really makes you wonder. They had the chance to resolve the peroxides issue and the liquid water issue but chose not to. Does that seem reasonable on a "find the water" mission? It does not.

If NASA found evidence of life, isn't it logical they would announce it to increase their funding?

Again, I have no idea what they are trying to do or why. It would surely seem logical, and Dr. Charles Elachi, the director of JPL, is most assuredly aware of my work. On same days, 25% or more of the hits on my site are from various NASA or JPL offices, and they constantly read my new postings.

But this is no longer about finding alien life. NASA of years ago was an outstanding organization, but those fellows are either dead or retired. These new people are simply sitting at their desks, by all indications. Interesting how in the last two years, people have referred said that NASA must stand for "No Adult Supervision Apparent" or "No Actual Science Allowed". Look at the scandalous George Deutsch incident at the start of this year.

Suppression or censoring of scientific data destroys the heart of science itself and has no place in reality. Knowing that they stoop to this should raise many red flags, but it seems to be business as usual to most people. Pity.

Who would have strong enough influence over the science team to prevent the information from going public?

The Department of Defense does. You will probably be rather enlightened by the fact that both NASA and JPL have their employees sign a rather interesting non-disclosure agreement that in essence says they cannot say anything to anyone that is not released through official channels.

By commingling classified and non-classified data, all information is then classified, and any employee stands to go to federal prison if they speak out. They can lose their academic credentials, face federal prosecution, and stand to lose any future funding for research projects. Pretty stiff penalties, I would say.

Here is the DOD-254 form for the California Institute of Technology, the parent organization of JPL:
http://xenotechresearch.com/NAS7-03001.pdf

Why does JPL need critical nuclear weapons design information to study the planets? Why does JPL need NATO information or foreign government information? Look at the classifications in this document that they use, and just ask yourself why.

When I was working on nuclear weapons, I had specific reasons for having CNWDI access, dealing directly with defense. I really don't see Mars as a nuclear threat, do you?

But this is getting far off track. All that is important is to recognize that the DOD has the ability and leverage to keep researchers quiet, and they hold stiff penalties over their heads. Would you speak out knowing that you would be ridiculed, face prison, loss of tenure and employment, and any future funding? Might as well bag groceries after that.

If they did, why would pictures of these "fossils" be released?

Most people will not recognize them, and chances are, many were not recognized by NASA or JPL either. They were unable to identify petrified wood during the test runs of the rover hardware here on Earth, and they even balked at a trilobite placed in the field of vision of the imager, and talked themselves into not seeing it. It had to be just a rock, therefore, it was.

Why is it the most complex Martian "fossils" are found in igneous rock debris fields?

Looks like fossilized coral heads to me. You can even see what appears to be growth layers on some. So, if these are igneous rocks, where is the volcano they came from? Just something to think about.

Out of curiosity, what do you think this is?



Any thoughts on a pentagonal, hollow, thin-walled object?

[BMAONE23]

As far as the moon being in a constant orbit? It would depend on what is meant by constant. The Apollo astronauts placed a reflector on the moon back in the early 70's prior to the last trip there. NASA can and has been bouncing Laser light off of it and discovered that the Moon is grqadually moving away from us at the steady rate of 1.5 inches/3.75 cm per year. So the orbit is constant at 29.4 days (for now) but the mean distance is gradually increasing.

[harry]

Hello All

Like two sides of a coin. The coin cannot be one without the two sides. So also without Dr Skeptic we would be limited in our discussions and be left with a one sided coin.

Did I just coin a phrase.

Aichip has laid the points of investication, now we need evidence to prove the point.

------------------------------------------------------------------
Hello BMAONE23,,,,,,smile,,,,,should have said a stable orbit.

[Dr. Skeptic]

Any thoughts on a pentagonal, hollow, thin-walled object?

If it's not a (as in one) previously gas fill volcanic rock that split on crystalline cleavage lines, its probably a peanut shell left by Elvis after the Feds exiled him to Mars once he found out who kill Kennedy. Or maybe I know and can't say because NASA is holding my family hostage.

[BMAONE23]

aichip,
I saw your article on Coast to Coast website. Another shell for sure. Great eyework!

http://www.coasttocoastam.com

[aichip]

Thanks, I will be on the show Sunday night (13th). Robert Bigelow will be on Saturday, according to what Art said. This will be my seventh appearance with Art Bell.

This show will be about nanotechnology, in particular the possibilities for abuse. My last show was about the coming virtual world.

[BMAONE23]

Looking Foreward to it

[harry]

Hello Aichip

Whats this, you are a TV star?

A sir

What else?

Good on you.

[aichip]

I have done a few television spots and programs, notably for the Discovery Channel (such as Science Mysteries). Mostly these days I do radio programs like Coast to Coast, The Space Show with Dr. David Livingston, etc.

For the most part, I do my work and research space and robotics. I have a small business where we are working on compact solar power generators for use on the ground and in space, which can be scaled to very large sizes for orbital power generation. We are also working on nanosatellite launch systems to bring small experimental packages within reach of the college student or small business user.

[aichip]

This was a good show, and Robert Bigelow was the guest for the first hour. You can see his private space craft in orbit at this link:

http://www.bigelowaerospace.com

I had the next three hours and talked mostly about nanotechnology. I think that overall the show was pretty good. I will probably do another in a couple of months.

Here is a link to the show, for those who are interested:

http://www.coasttocoastam.com/shows/2006/08/13.html

As soon as I have new images from Gusev with more fossils, I will post links to those. This has been a fun thread.

[harry]

Hello Aichip

Reading your links.

You have done well.

Nothing stopping you.

[BMAONE23]

Aichip

Have you seen this info yet???

http://www.metaresearch.org/solar%20sys ... efault.htm

Some is questionable but some is interesting

[harry]

Hello BMAONE23

I have looked at the link

It opens the door to many issues.

Thank you for the link and thank you for thinking about Steve Irwin.

=====================================

Hey!!! where is aichip

[BMAONE23]

Here is a new great image of the mars face http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Mars_Expres ... URE_0.html . It shows how very Unfacelike the mountain is if viewed as oriented with respect to the viking images. If you re-orient it though rotate it to the left by 100 deg, it still resembles a face with the old nose ridge becoming a brow ridge ant the tall peak becoming a nose.

https://ssl.rapidshare.de/cgi-bin/collectorszone.cgi

[harry]

Hello BMAone23

Thank you for the image.

The question is:

How did it form in such an isolated spot?

[aichip]

When we look at how subsurface ice melts or sublimates, we see that it retreats at the edges where it is exposed. Perhaps the "monuments" are nothing more than the retreating edges of an ice sheet or glacier field left from when the last oceans and lakes froze.

This explanation would also cover the long water streaks in the craters and ridges that we see in so many of the images today (which are euphemistically called "dust slides" by many). Dust does not get darker or lighter just because it moved, but water would darken the soil as it sprays out, and lighten again as it evaporates.

So the "monuments" could easily be nothing more than slumping overburden that covers a vanishing ice deposit. This explains the pyramid structures perfectly. As the ice recedes, the soil slumps down at the angle of repose, making flat, straight sides. If a few pieces of the ice were four or five sided, they would make hills that look like pyramids.

[harry]

Hello Aichip

I have missed your comments mate.

[aichip]

Hi, Harry. I've been very busy with projects and sorry not to have much time for the forum here. We are making some innovative solar generators and also working on a nanosatellite launcher, so time is in short supply these days.

More discoveries, soon to be posted about Mars. I have to admit the forum is fun.