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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

#51

Post by trianglem »

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 read your whole post and all I can come up with is that if we found life of any sort on another planet it would completely change my internal narrative and I guarantee I'm not the only one. This would in a subtle or unsubtle way gradually influence literally most of the decisions we make on earth.

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

#52

Post by dleslie »

jacquesm wrote: post #29
dleslie wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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.…

I did not intend to state the implications are the end of religion; simply that many faithful will alter their faith, in no small manner.

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

#53

Post by dleslie »

pfdietz wrote: post #27
dleslie wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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.

Perhaps, or perhaps it's different enough that it most likely developed independently.

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

#54

Post by CardenB »

joshmarlow wrote: post #35
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…

If the life evolved independently of life on earth (ie, no panspermia or anything like that), then it would have philosophical/existential implications because of the Great Filter Hypothesis - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Filter . Edit for a TL;DR - The basic idea is that, if we don't see evidence of intelligent life in the universe, it must be because star traveling species must be rare. If we find life evolv…

Not necessarily. It just suggests the bottleneck for life lies at whatever point is after mars. Nothing would suggest that complex life gets progressively more difficult to evolve.

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

#55

Post by AndrewKemendo »

evil-olive wrote: post #43
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…

> no fundamental philosophical or existential questions would be resolved If you don't consider "does life exist on other planets?" to be a fundamental, existential question, can you share an example of what you do think is such a fundamental question? Finding life on Mars wouldn't necessarily resolve any fundamental questions, but it would open up a whole new realm of questions. Is it similar to life on Earth? How s…

Sure:

Is the concept of objective meaning valid in any possible universe?

Is it possible for the universe to be a fully observed deterministic system?

Is there a universal objective function motivating what we consider reality?

Is it possible to determine with certainty the origins of what we can conceptualize as reality?

Is it possible to forecast with mathematical certainty events in future time steps.

Basically just off the top of my head my questions boil down to: Can laplaces demon actually exist, is there a resolution to the munchausen trilemma and is godels incompleteness theorem disprovable.

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

#56

Post by lovemenot »

NeedMoreTea wrote: post #26
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…

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. Hope…

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

Unlikely. There's been no animal hosts on Mars, in which such a micro-organism might have evolved to threaten humans on Earth.

Not to say we shouldn't be careful for other reasons though. The bigger risk is the sudden extinction of entirely different branches of life, by more highly-evolved Earth-originating species.

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

#57

Post by jacquesm »

dleslie wrote: post #52
jacquesm wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.…

I did not intend to state the implications are the end of religion; simply that many faithful will alter their faith, in no small manner.

I highly doubt that. If the genetics, the silicon revolution, access to space imagery, quality education, the internet and science in general did not alter faith in a drastic way I don't think 'life on Mars' is going to do anything either unless it comes in the form of little green creatures.

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

#59

Post by pfdietz »

dleslie wrote: post #53
pfdietz wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Perhaps, or perhaps it's different enough that it most likely developed independently.

In which case, why haven't we seen it already on Earth? Life will have been transferred back and forth between Earth and Mars for billions of years.

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

#60

Post by viburnum »

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.

I know that Musk knows he’s lying. I feel so sorry for his fans.
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