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I’m Convinced We Found Evidence of Life on Mars in the 1970s

blogs.scientificamerican.com

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Re: I’m Convinced We Found Evidence of Life on Mars in the 1970s

#21

Post by api »

smohare wrote: post #14
newdayrising wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's the opposite. There are scientists who are obsessed with finding extraterrestrial life because of their philosophical views regarding man's place in the universe. The fact that our universe seems primed for life has bothered so many gung ho atheistic scientists that they've conjured all sorts of semi-pseudoscientific multiverse theories (Sean Carroll). That's one part of it. The second part it's reducing…

Methodological naturalism as applied to the scientific Certainly has no dependence on atheism. Who categorizes science as an intrinsically atheistic endeavor other than religious apologists?

The perception that all scientists are atheists comes from a small number of loud dogmatists. This is exactly like the perception that all Christians are literalist fundamentalists or hold right wing political beliefs.

Re: I’m Convinced We Found Evidence of Life on Mars in the 1970s

#22

Post by modzu »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #15
psaux wrote: post #7

I often wonder why these are always auxiliary conversations. Ever since I was young, like most kids (I have 4), I also had this deep yearning for knowledge on life external to earth. Wonder why this never has gone mainstream.

Let's assume for a moment that we did find something resembling simple organic life on Mars and confirmed that earth isn't the only life bearing planet. What functionally changes for our existential understanding of the universe? I'd argue little to nothing. We'd learn a bit more about organic life, but no fundamental philosophical or existential questions would be resolved. Life has been confirmed to be able to thri…

what? so would we have a common ancestor with this organic life (like all life on earth shares)? id think that has philosophical and existential implications

Re: I’m Convinced We Found Evidence of Life on Mars in the 1970s

#23

Post by soup10 »

chkaloon wrote: post #16

I wonder if there is an incentive to NOT find life there because of what that discovery might do to slow industrialization and colonization plans. Do we need to conserve that life? Do we need to set up preserves that are off limits to development? Opens a big can of worms (or bacteria) that I imagine some would rather see kept closed

realistically mars is way more interesting if its more than a boring rock

Re: I’m Convinced We Found Evidence of Life on Mars in the 1970s

#24

Post by dleslie »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #15
psaux wrote: post #7

I often wonder why these are always auxiliary conversations. Ever since I was young, like most kids (I have 4), I also had this deep yearning for knowledge on life external to earth. Wonder why this never has gone mainstream.

Let's assume for a moment that we did find something resembling simple organic life on Mars and confirmed that earth isn't the only life bearing planet. What functionally changes for our existential understanding of the universe? I'd argue little to nothing. We'd learn a bit more about organic life, but no fundamental philosophical or existential questions would be resolved. Life has been confirmed to be able to thri…

> What functionally changes for our existential understanding of the universe?

The anthropic principal becomes less compelling; to say nothing of the religious implications.

Re: I’m Convinced We Found Evidence of Life on Mars in the 1970s

#25

Post by defterGoose »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #15
psaux wrote: post #7

I often wonder why these are always auxiliary conversations. Ever since I was young, like most kids (I have 4), I also had this deep yearning for knowledge on life external to earth. Wonder why this never has gone mainstream.

Let's assume for a moment that we did find something resembling simple organic life on Mars and confirmed that earth isn't the only life bearing planet. What functionally changes for our existential understanding of the universe? I'd argue little to nothing. We'd learn a bit more about organic life, but no fundamental philosophical or existential questions would be resolved. Life has been confirmed to be able to thri…

I'd argue that the jump from 0 to 1 of "knowledge of life on other planets" would be huge. Currently, we have an almost pseudo-religious understanding of what place life holds in the universe, but that's based on the fact that when we've looked up at the cosmos for all of history, it seemed impossibly devoid of anything familiar. The discovery of life on another planet (even if that life somehow originated on Earth), turns the proposition of finding intelligent life elsewhere from at best a 50/50 question of belief into a near certainty. And that is huge.

Re: I’m Convinced We Found Evidence of Life on Mars in the 1970s

#26

Post by NeedMoreTea »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #15
psaux wrote: post #7

I often wonder why these are always auxiliary conversations. Ever since I was young, like most kids (I have 4), I also had this deep yearning for knowledge on life external to earth. Wonder why this never has gone mainstream.

Let's assume for a moment that we did find something resembling simple organic life on Mars and confirmed that earth isn't the only life bearing planet. What functionally changes for our existential understanding of the universe? I'd argue little to nothing. We'd learn a bit more about organic life, but no fundamental philosophical or existential questions would be resolved. Life has been confirmed to be able to thri…

Presuming SpaceX pull off their plans, there will be trips to and from Mars. We'd better be pretty sure what microbes we're being exposed to or bringing back to Earth before we do.

Or we might get a repeat of when the Spanish brought disease to the Inca and Maya.

The mere knowledge of life is viable off-Earth is huge. If we find it on our nearest neighbour, the chances of encountering it elsewhere rise markedly. Hopefully it would trigger a search elsewhere in the solar system, like Europa.

Re: I’m Convinced We Found Evidence of Life on Mars in the 1970s

#27

Post by pfdietz »

dleslie wrote: post #24
AndrewKemendo wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's assume for a moment that we did find something resembling simple organic life on Mars and confirmed that earth isn't the only life bearing planet. What functionally changes for our existential understanding of the universe? I'd argue little to nothing. We'd learn a bit more about organic life, but no fundamental philosophical or existential questions would be resolved. Life has been confirmed to be able to thri…

> What functionally changes for our existential understanding of the universe? The anthropic principal becomes less compelling; to say nothing of the religious implications.

No, because the origin of life on Mars would probably be the same event as on Earth, with life having been transferred by impact ejecta. It would not allow us to conclude that origin of life was common.

Re: I’m Convinced We Found Evidence of Life on Mars in the 1970s

#28

Post by dwoozle »

hirundo wrote: post #11

"Our aspirational goal is to send our first cargo mission to Mars in 2022. The objectives for the first mission will be to confirm water resources, identify hazards, and put in place initial power, mining, and life support infrastructure. A second mission, with both cargo and crew, is targeted for 2024" -- spacex.com/mars Maybe NASA should book space for a biologist on that flight. A botanist would do.

Do you really need a botanist on board? I would think you need space travel / survival / engineering hands on deck who then gather samples and bring them back. A botanist isn’t going to be able to do much on Mars that she can’t do on Earth.

Re: I’m Convinced We Found Evidence of Life on Mars in the 1970s

#29

Post by jacquesm »

dleslie wrote: post #24
AndrewKemendo wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's assume for a moment that we did find something resembling simple organic life on Mars and confirmed that earth isn't the only life bearing planet. What functionally changes for our existential understanding of the universe? I'd argue little to nothing. We'd learn a bit more about organic life, but no fundamental philosophical or existential questions would be resolved. Life has been confirmed to be able to thri…

> What functionally changes for our existential understanding of the universe? The anthropic principal becomes less compelling; to say nothing of the religious implications.

Religion will have absolutely no problem to adapt to new information and incorporate it as though it had always been there. This has happened time and again in the past to the point where the religions of old would have been in direct contradiction with even the most basic scientific knowledge if they didn't adapt. The funny thing is that the so-called holy books are full of stuff that no sane human would believe in. That doesn't stop a lot of people from doing just that when those books are creatively re-interpreted by intermediaries.

Religion will last for a very long time into the future, forget about major lasting change on that front other than some rearguard action to ensure survival.

Re: I’m Convinced We Found Evidence of Life on Mars in the 1970s

#30

Post by sosborn »

justinator wrote: post #18
api wrote: post #4

I get the feeling that contrary to rhetoric the search for life on Mars or anywhere else is almost an anti-priority. Not much designed to look for life has been sent since Viking in spite of direct observation of water ice, brine, and other features suggesting ideal landing sites for such experiments. If perclorates were the cause of the Viking positive as many suggest, why not send a new experiment designed to rule…

I mean, you're probably right. If there was life found on Mars, there would be precedence to protect it - I could see this even stopping ANY manned missions (fear of contamination). If the planet is dead, we as a civilization get the privilege to do whatever we want with it. Also a dead planet means the idea of the Monotheistic God kind of remains. Ignorance is bliss.

> Also a dead planet means the idea of the Monotheistic God kind of remains.

I don't follow why life on another planet would have any bearing on the idea of a Monotheistic God.

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