Originally posted by RJHindsIt's a pretty sad state of affairs with your brain when all you can do is post and repost and repost the same dumb SNL skit as some kind of response. You really should check to see if your refill of anti-dementia pills came through.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mF9Yn5mgrjY
The Instructor
Originally posted by sonhouseI suppose you must know all about anti-dementia pills at your age, old man. Too bad they don't have a humor pill so you could get a laugh from the skit.
It's a pretty sad state of affairs with your brain when all you can do is post and repost and repost the same dumb SNL skit as some kind of response. You really should check to see if your refill of anti-dementia pills came through.
The Instructor
Originally posted by sonhouseThere is also evidence that this may be where the water is.
Since we have literally only scratched the surface of Mars we may yet find active life, most likely bacterial, underground. I guess it will take humans with big rigs to dig deep enough, maybe a kilometer deep or so.
There is also the theory that life originated on Mars first and was brought to Earth by meteorites.
Actually I mean right under the surface, way less than a kilometer down.
But I would think that life would "follow the water", so to speak.
Originally posted by SuzianneYes, it surely would. The recent findings of Curiosity shows the soil of Mars to be 2% water, quite a lot! Bodes well for future colonists and you cans see a whole industry forming when they do get colonies there, dredging machines chewing up the ground and extracting industrial amounts of water.
There is also evidence that this may be where the water is.
Actually I mean right under the surface, way less than a kilometer down.
But I would think that life would "follow the water", so to speak.
There wouldn't be much of a problem polluting the environment with such a project, eh.
Solar energy heating up the soil to about 400 degrees F, extracting the water, dumping the processed soil back into the ground after processing for usable minerals and such.
My guess is they will have machines like the massive fishing boats of Alaska, 400 foot long monsters that are in fact floating fish factories.
On Mars, they would have solar cells in trailers a mile long providing megawatts to power machinery to extract water and process the tailings for iron, aluminum, silicon and so forth.
I think Mars gets about half the energy of Earth so about 60 watts per square foot, so a machine, say 100 feet wide and one mile long full of solar cells on top would produce maybe 10 megawatts during daylight hours so that would make for a lot of processing!
Originally posted by sonhouseCompletely ridiculous.
Yes, it surely would. The recent findings of Curiosity shows the soil of Mars to be 2% water, quite a lot! Bodes well for future colonists and you cans see a whole industry forming when they do get colonies there, dredging machines chewing up the ground and extracting industrial amounts of water.
There wouldn't be much of a problem polluting the environ ...[text shortened]... uld produce maybe 10 megawatts during daylight hours so that would make for a lot of processing!
The Instructor
Originally posted by sonhouseWell, yes, such would be the dream of initial tech on Mars, self-sustaining colonies.
Yes, it surely would. The recent findings of Curiosity shows the soil of Mars to be 2% water, quite a lot! Bodes well for future colonists and you cans see a whole industry forming when they do get colonies there, dredging machines chewing up the ground and extracting industrial amounts of water.
There wouldn't be much of a problem polluting the environ ...[text shortened]... uld produce maybe 10 megawatts during daylight hours so that would make for a lot of processing!
But if life IS on Mars, just under the surface, where the water is, then "dredging" the soil on Mars for water could indeed destroy this life. Then we'd never know if it was really there to begin with, thus not a lot of research.
So surely, all this colonization would have to come after any initial research into "is there life on Mars or not".
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Originally posted by SuzianneI just read a piece on that very subject, titled, Are we too protective of Mars?
Well, yes, such would be the dream of initial tech on Mars, self-sustaining colonies.
But if life IS on Mars, just under the surface, where the water is, then "dredging" the soil on Mars for water could indeed destroy this life. Then we'd never know if it was really there to begin with, thus not a lot of research.
So surely, all this colonization would have to come after any initial research into "is there life on Mars or not".
We may just go in and damn the consequences, build our cities and so forth ignoring the indigenous life there.
There may be political will to limit such damage after we get there but at least the first few years will be devoted to being close to the surface, certainly underground but not very deep, 20-30 feet maybe, just deep enough to avoid the worse punishment from the sun. It would certainly raise a political ruckus if we found Marian life forms say, 10 feet underground.
It would be later we would be going to kilometer depths looking for resources. THAT would be when we would most probably run into Martian life forms whatever it may be, we may not even recognize it for life since we only have the sample of life from Earth.
My guess is we WILL recognize it and will find Martian life, even if only bacteria at this point, will be based on DNA like ours which would say something about a common origin of life there and here.
I am dying to find out about life on mars and whether it is related to Earthy life and then going further out to the moons of Jupiter and Saturn and seeing if we find life there, whether that life too is related to Earth life. That would be astounding to find a relationship between life here on Earth, on Mars AND on the moons of the outer planets.
Originally posted by sonhouseWith all your speculating, you seem to be interested more in science fiction than real science.
I just read a piece on that very subject, titled, Are we too protective of Mars?
We may just go in and damn the consequences, build our cities and so forth ignoring the indigenous life there.
There may be political will to limit such damage after we get there but at least the first few years will be devoted to being close to the surface, certainly un ...[text shortened]... o find a relationship between life here on Earth, on Mars AND on the moons of the outer planets.
The Instructor