APOD: A Crumbling Layered Butte on Mars (2016 Oct 05)

[ta152h0]

earthuakes on that dead planet ?

[Chris Peterson]

earthuakes on that dead planet ?

What makes a planet "dead"?

Mars almost certainly had tectonic activity in the past, and it's far from certain that it is completely ended. And there are other things which can generate quakes, like thermal variation and impacts. Until there's a seismometer on Mars, nobody will know for sure. But most people believe that there are quakes there, even now.

(There was a mission scheduled to launch this year that would put a seismometer on the martian surface. That instrument failed before launch and the entire mission was postponed until 2018.)

[Mr Spif]

Weird side question ... Who is Dr Kremer and why does he get to label the picture with his name?

Does he own it? (that is usually the implication of a watermark)...

[neufer]

Weird side question ... Who is Dr Kremer and why does he get to label the picture with his name?

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LANDLORD: And you must be Professor Von Nostrand?
.
KRAMER: Yes, yes I am.
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LANDLORD: I've read your book, Professor, and I was quite intrigued by it.
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KRAMER: Uh, yes. Well, it's, uh, very intriguing.
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LANDLORD: Tell me, is it your contention that Shakespeare was an imposter?
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KRAMER: My contention?
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LANDLORD: Yes, your contention.
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KRAMER: Yes, that's my contention.
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ELAINE: I heard him contend that.

[Cygnus X-1]

This is the most amazing pic ever back from Mars!!!

Layers! Amazing!!!!!

[neufer]

This is the most amazing pic ever back from Mars!!!

Layers! Amazing!!!!!

GEORGE COSTANZA: This thing is like an onion. The more layers you peel, the more it stinks.

[Kaarlo]

Chris,
Please don't (on purpose?) forget/omit the BIF evidence: the very first life was oxygen-generating (and consequently CO2-consuming).
Here's a new term applicable to the first life ("proto-life") on any young planet, Earth and Mars included: Photogenic. How's that?

[Chris Peterson]

Chris,
Please don't (on purpose?) forget/omit the BIF evidence: the very first life was oxygen-generating (and consequently CO2-consuming).
Here's a new term applicable to the firs life ("proto-life") on any young planet, Earth and Mars included: Photogenic. How's that?

All the evidence suggests is that the earliest life which has left obvious traces was oxygen generating. Most people who study abiogenesis consider that the first life on Earth was most likely some type of very simple chemoautotroph (which may or may not have produced oxygen, depending on the reactions involved). It may have formed early enough that little or no trace of it remains in the geological record.

[Kaarlo]

Chris,
The geological record of Proto-Earth is (literally) frozen in meteorites, asteroids and comets.
There's plenty of potential evidence available for open mind.
Find BIF (on Mars, asteroid..) and you have located Photogenic Life!

[geckzilla]

Kaarlo, please stop posting speculation and opinion as if they are already-proven facts or so obvious that they couldn't possibly be wrong. Treat your own ideas with the same skepticism that you treat others. Consider this an official warning.

[heehaw]

Can you imagine a human colony on the surface of this planet? Growing crops, to feed themselves ... somehow? With no water to speak of? Their energy sources being ... what? Not solar power, from a very very distant sun.

No water on Mars? Au contraire... There's plenty to be found, but it's locked up as ice in the Polar caps and subsurface permafrost. Exposed to the thin Martian atmosphere, water ice quickly sublimates as vapor and never has the chance to exist as a liquid. However Human technology could find ways to extract and store water.

Those multilayered formations are testament a wetter, warmer past of Mars' history billions of Earth years ago. Did Life have a chance to form back then? I think probably not, but who's to know?

All that is needed is a Biosphere (with an air lock) set into the ground and given an earthlike Atmospheric pressure and temperature. Once both are approaching that similar to Earth, the Permafrost would thaw and the water would be released in a liquid form

Sorry, that isn't going to even come close to doing it: "How much water does the average person use at home per day? [USGS] Estimates vary, but each person uses about 80-100 gallons of water per day" Maybe deep drilling on Mars will produce gushers. Maybe!

[geckzilla]

I think the droughts on Mars would put the Sahara to shame. Sure, go to Mars if you don't mind being freeze dried.

[neufer]

I think the droughts on Mars would put the Sahara to shame.

Sure, go to Mars if you don't mind being freeze dried.

• Or to the northern margin of Mercury's Caloris basin:

[img3=""To freeze a being solid, then hang him on a wall like some trophy?"
―Han Solo, expressing disdain for the Galactic Alliance's carbon-freezing methods"]http://cdnph.upi.com/sv/b/i/UPI-3241379 ... ercury.jpg[/img3]

<<If there are two things you should remember, it's not to cross a Hutt, and that Mercury's surface can throw up all kinds of surprises. In this image, a portion of the terrain surrounding the northern margin of the Caloris basin hosts an elevated block in the shape of a certain carbonite-encased smuggler who can make the Kessel Run in less than twelve parsecs. This block may be part of the original surface that pre-dates the formation of Caloris, which was shaped by material ejected during the basin-forming event.>>

[b][color=#0000FF][size=150]PIA17496: He Will Not Be Permanently Damaged[/size][/color][/b]

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"Oh, they've encased him in carbonite. He should be quite well protected. If he survived the freezing process, that is." ―C-3PO

<<Carbon-freezing was the process of freezing stored tibanna gas in carbonite to preserve it while it was being transported over long distances. In the freezing process, the gas was pumped into a freezing chamber where it was mixed with molten carbonite into a solid block. The gas was released later at its destination or at the processing center. Carbon-freezing could induce hibernation sickness after being released, as was the case with Han Solo. The Alderaanian Medical Association established that inhaling carbon-freezing smoke was a health risk.

Darth Vader ordered the modification of a freezing chamber on Bespin's Cloud City so that he could freeze Luke Skywalker—eliminating any chance of escape—to transport him to the Emperor. As a test, the process was tried on Han Solo, who survived the freezing process through the use of a special device and was eventually freed from his trap.

During the Galactic Civil War, a large number of Sith Troopers and possibly a Sith Master, frozen in carbonite, were discovered by the Nightsister Silri with the help of a Sith holocron stolen from Jabba the Hutt by Tyber Zann. Additionally, bodies were sometimes preserved in carbonite, as in the case of the Senatorial Tombs on Coruscant.>>

[Chris Peterson]

Chris,
The geological record of Proto-Earth is (literally) frozen in meteorites, asteroids and comets.

No. The formation history of the Solar System is frozen in meteorites, asteroids, and comets. Making inferences about the Earth's own history at any given time from that is a tricky business. For instance, comets almost certainly formed in a very different part of the Solar System, and from a very different ingredient mix, than the terrestrial planets. What comets tell us about terrestrial planet formation is very indirect. Asteroids, and the meteorites they produce, also formed somewhat differently and have undergone metamorphic processes.

All of this evidence allows us to formulate and test different hypotheses about how the Solar System formed. But it's a mistake to argue any case too strongly. You seem to think I'm forcefully disagreeing with the conclusions you draw. Mostly I'm arguing that you're demonstrating poor scientific thinking in how certain you seem to be that they are right.