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News Briefs 05-09-2011

We might all be happier with a tumbleweed-size space.

Thanks, Greg!

Quote of the Day:

I believe that the moment is near when by a procedure of active paranoiac thought, it will be possible to systematize confusion and contribute to the total discrediting of the world of reality.

Salvador Dalí

  1. Hiding in the asteroid belt
    Re: These are the remains of an ancient river on Mars

    This is where I often get caught up in the subject of exploring Mars because… by golly, it seems NASA/JPL has a penchant for selecting some of the most boring terrain and unlikely locations for life – past or present – as they can possibly find.

    The layman’s logic asks why go digging in a crater when the impact undoubtedly killed off every scrap of life present and removed whatever geology that was present… leaving nothing but a big, desolate hole.

    But then… there are good cases of craters here on this planet that (eventually) became lakes and rendered very unique features to the landscape.

    I don’t agree with Gale Crater as being the choicest spot for the MSL but… there’s no reasoning behind these last few missions to Mars anyway.

    After Viking, it appears that we’ve made a point NOT to look for life – past or present – at all costs. The rovers and Phoenix looked for water and evidence of water and evidence of the evidence of water. Now the MSL is going to examine… what? The possibility that there was a possibility for something that could be mistakenly interpreted as a place where life once existed umpteen billion years ago, but probably not?

    I hate to say it but, I think NASA/JPL got cold feet after the Viking missions returned data that has still not been completely settled. They found there is a line that, once crossed, can’t be backtracked without humiliation and/or regurgitation.

    They won’t make that mistake again, no sir-ee! No more life-finding missions!

    Asteroids are a lot safer that way.

  2. Looking for heat in all the wrong places
    Re: Paper disputing basic science of climate change is ‘fundamentally flawed.’ Journal editor resigns, apologizes.

    What is more than just fundamentally flawed is how this subject of global warming has become politicized. Al Gore’s rant about doubters being no better than racists is one of the most recent examples of how this subject has spun out of control and is now in a position to forcibly impose itself on the world, like it or not.

    There seems little doubt that our biosphere is undergoing changes. What is in an incredible amount of doubt is the exact cause of those changes. That the subject has now become a playtoy for the political, spins it (or spits it?) out from the halls of science to the halls of the political elite.

    The subject of trust in any answer, is now no longer possible without a predisposition to the political structure behind it.

    What this means is that the truth of the matter is no longer as important as winning the argument.

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