New Mars Forums

Interesting article, Cindy!

    In the world of SETI, there have been various suggestions as to how we might recognise alien civilisations. The most obvious is to pick up radio signals.
    Other suggestions included looking for evidence of 'stellar engineering'.
    As you probably know already, an ad hoc classification system was invented to grade civilisations:-
    Type I - Control of an entire planet and all its energy and
                resources (presumably no more nation states.)
    Type II - Control of an entire star system including the
                 star.
    Type III - Control of an entire galaxy!

    Maybe one day we'll see a celestial phenomenon which is unmistakably artificial.

    Maybe we just did!!   

[P.S. On the above scale, I believe our present civilisation is a Type 0.      ]

I'm glad it amused you, Josh!   

    As it happens, I have no knowledge at all of Mr. O'Rourke's politics or any of his work. I just saw the quote and it tickled my sense of humour.

Ein andere 'Tausendjahriges Reich', ja?!!!
    Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Fuhrer!!
    Heil, Mr. President!!

    Beware of thousand-year political predictions. History vindicates those who say that even a week is a long time in politics!
                                       :;):

All very valid points, Cindy.
    I think you've covered most of the anti-gun arguments and I agree wholeheartedly that it's a tragedy when going to school starts to resemble a shakedown in a 'speakeasy'.
    Ideally, nobody should have a gun.
    Ideally, all governments should be trustworthy.
    Ideally, there should be peace and love ... and Mars colonies!   

    But I can't help feeling nervous when we're all being systematically disarmed by governments of all complexions in countries all over the world.
    Authorities don't seem to be saying we should control the accessibility of guns in private homes, so as to avoid children getting hold of them. They simply step in and take guns away from everybody. I wonder why?

    Talk about a rock and a hard place! Nobody wants lunatics and children running around with weapons but then the last thing we want is a rogue government against which we have no defence of last resort.
    I think, on balance, insidious totalitarianism worries me more than guns in the community. Most of my American friends here seem to be constantly afraid that the former is on the rise in their own country, yet many of them appear oblivious to the consequences of being disarmed. I guess it's because the violence is 'here-and-now' while the threat of fascism is a 'someday maybe'.

    Whatever your viewpoint, I suggest you think very carefully before allowing politicians too much power to 'protect us from ourselves'.
                                            ???

Good to have your input here, Rex.

    I especially liked these pearls of wisdom:-

".. the Pacific Ocean has been shown to contain water .."

"We haven't found how to keep gravity from making it [water] run down hill yet."
                                       :laugh:

    I do so enjoy a touch of humour - it cheered me up considerably!

    If you, Rex, or anyone else out there can solve the riddle of the Ganges olivine, I'm all ears.
                                         

PHEW !!!
                     

Thanks for the reply, Dickbill!
    Dealing first with the interesting extract in your last post, I feel, as you do, that it casts little light on the existence of olivine on, or near, the floor of Ganges Chasma.
    Rather, it seems to form part of the large body of research work carried out since Viking in order to find an explanation for the Gas Exchange and Labeled Release experimental data. Much of that research may be valid; Mars may indeed be totally sterile. As I've stated quite often, though, my view is that Mars almost certainly harbours life, at the very least in underground ecological niches. I base this assertion on the frequent exchange of crustal material which has occurred between Earth and Mars over geological time, which must certainly have resulted in the transfer of viable organisms in both directions. Even if every square centimetre of the surface of Mars today is subject to harsh oxidising and sterilising conditions, and I don't necessarily accept this as fact, there is little doubt in my mind that the deeper rock strata are host to a thriving community of organisms, most likely based on the same 20 amino acids as terrestrial organisms and using DNA as its blueprint.
    The only question we'll be left with, if all this is true, is which planet life actually originated on - Earth or Mars - and we may never find the answer to that one.

    Your idea that the olivine currently protruding from the bedrock deep in Ganges is the remnant of a much larger mineral body washed away by catastrophic flooding, doesn't help.     Christensen states that the olivine is proof that the bedrock itself must also have been dry otherwise the olivine would have decomposed from contact with groundwater.
    Catastrophic flooding in the region would certainly have resulted in water seeping down into the sub-surface and probably remaining there long after the superficial water had evaporated. It seems to me that if the area has been subject to large-scale flooding on many occasions, the lower levels of Ganges would have been very wet for long periods - much too long, in fact, for any olivine to survive.

    It appears that this olivine's existence, at such a topographically low point on Mars, is a show-stopper for any notion of an Oceanus Borealis in Mars' past. Even a cursory glance at a contour map of the area shows clearly that, if Chryse and Acidalia were once part of an ocean, Ganges Chasma must necessarily have been inundated too!
    Conversely, if Ganges has never seen water, then neither have the northern Martian lowlands ever seen an ocean.
    The logic seems inescapable!   

    Anyone who can help me escape this inescapable logic is most welcome to show me how!

    Every time I think about it, I keep coming back to the olivine itself. There simply has to have been a mistake! Everything else points to a formerly wet Mars and current evidence points to an ocean of water trapped as ice just below the surface today. Olivine just can't exist at such a low point on such a watery planet!!     

    This is really weird.   ???

Israeli people are carrying a lot of baggage from centuries of persecution - persecution against which they were effectively impotent. The most recent episode in this tragic saga was played out in Europe, the hub of modern civilisation, and its memory weighs heavily on the hearts and minds of jews everywhere.
    But things are very different now. The jews have a homeland and they have a nuclear-armed military. They're never going back to being the world's punching bag, no matter what! For these reasons, I think Clark is essentially correct. Israel will be defended against arab forces with whatever means are available ... including, if need be, the unleashing of atomic destruction against arab countries. And, as he says, the world is far too small a place these days for such a disaster to pass unnoticed by the rest of the world. The consequences could be severe.

    Perhaps as long as America is seen to be there, holding Israel's hand, antagonistic arab countries will be circumspect about risking another attempt at the invasion and annihilation of the Israeli state. Without U.S. support, some of the regional hotheads might just think they have a shot at the brass ring and be tempted to try for it.

    I was brought up in an English/Irish household. The arguments about the shortcomings of the British and their empire - in particular their treatment of the Irish people - were neverending and, of course, fruitless. The situation in Northern Ireland, which exploded into senseless violence and appeared on our TV screen every night through much of my teen years, was the subject of some pretty heated debates.
    What I learned was the futility of retaliation but also its inevitability. A protestant father sees his son murdered for no reason (other than his non-catholic status). Mindless with grief and bent on revenge, the father helps plant a bomb in a catholic bar. The relatives of those killed or maimed in the explosion, though up to that point peaceful and law abiding, now see protestants as less than human. Guess what happens next?

    It's exactly the same in Israel/Palestine. Each side believes absolutely in the justice of their own cause and in the heartless inhumanity of the opposition. If you listen to an aggrieved Israeli for ten minutes, you can see her point of view and start to imagine the Palestinians as animals. Ten minutes with an aggrieved Palestinian, and you can't imagine why the butchering Israelis should be allowed to live!! They're both right and both wrong all at the same time! It's a nightmare.
    The only way it's ever going to stop is if one side decides to turn the other cheek and pursue peace even while still under attack from the enemy, because there will always be some reason to stop the peace talks and resume the ceaseless cycle of retaliation. At some point, someone somewhere has to swallow the pain and say: "No! I will not retaliate!", and stick to that decision in the face of all provocation.
    I regret to say my model of human nature tells me that can't happen - for the same reason that socialism doesn't work and crime is always with us. The average human is stupid, childish, and self-centred and, what's worse, lacking in self-discipline. (If you don't believe me, tune in to Jerry Springer once in a while ... I don't!!     )

    As for the original question (apologies Cindy! ), I don't think it can be disentangled from religion. I don't know enough about American demographics to be sure of this, but my impression is that the U.S. has a substantial jewish population. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
    Another of my impressions is that, by and large, jewish people place great importance on education and are often very talented. Again this is anecdotal in nature since I have no statistics, but if it were true it would help explain some of the historical animosity toward jews - jealousy is a powerful driver of malice.
    If my impressions are accurate, such a population, in a meritocracy like America, should quickly rise to positions of responsibility and wealth and become quite influential. If so, would this not at least partially account for U.S. leanings toward protecting Israel?

    Having said that, I've heard that almost all the arab countries surrounding Israel still have an unspoken policy that she must be destroyed completely. Given the opportunity, these nations would carry out that policy without hesitation and without mercy. Not that they would be interested in helping the Palestinians, by the way! As I understand it, the Palestinians would be jumping out of the frying pan into the fire if they were thrown back on the tender mercies of their brother arabs.
    If all this is true, the Middle East is indeed a Pandora's box of evils. Even two thousand years ago, as the Roman province of Judea, it was a hotbed of religious turbulence which caused the empire more than its fair share of problems.
    I wonder whether 'Judea' will prove equally troublesome for today's 'Roman Empire'?    ???

Welcome mc !
    Your idea has actually been put forward in another thread here at New Mars (I can't think where just now) but that doesn't mean to say it shouldn't be brought up again. People come up with new ideas all the time and it's no bad thing to revisit interesting concepts once in a while.   

    There's probably a minimum number of people required to form a viable initial colony. There are varying opinions as to what that number should be but I think most people would regard one couple as being too small a number.
    If, as in your plan, there is no need to consider bringing the crew home again, even a modest Mars Direct style of mission might be upgraded to carry, say, 8 people. Whether even this number would be sufficient is debatable but I suspect it would attract more support than the notion of sending just two.
    In any event, I don't think you'd have too much trouble rounding up a crew for a one-way trip. Many people would be happy to try a brand new life on a brand new planet, regardless of the potential hardships and dangers!
                                     

For what it's worth, and in agreement with Clark, I defend Cindy's right to oppose the viewpoint of journalists who publicly express the hope that The Mars Society will fail in its stated objectives. (Not that Cindy needs any defending, mind you! )
    The Guardian is a noted left-wing publication which, of necessity, must pass up no opportunity to ridicule America. I think the writer did his job well. It was really quite funny, at least to me. And he was subtle enough to include camouflaging insults against the Canadians and others in his anti-American efforts, too.

    Given that most people recognise The Guardian for what it is, and don't take it very seriously, I think the commentaries of its journalists are probably harmless enough.
    But, nevertheless, if individuals feel the need to respond, then more power to them!   

    Incidentally, I am firmly in the camp of the Non-American MS members who are pro-terraforming.

Hi Rex!
    Your comment is well taken ... and really quite disconcerting, since it seems to go right to the nub of the misgivings I have about 'big science' in the world today: You can't get funding unless you toe the party line. Departure from the popular paradigm is tantamount to professional suicide. It doesn't matter what your eyes tell you and it doesn't matter whether the facts back you up, anything you say or do had better fit in with the 'standard model' or ridicule and professional leprosy will be your lot!
    It's small wonder very few people have the testicular fortitude to call a duck a duck!!
   
    If there's one thing I hate more than the baseless claims of the lunatic fringe, it's the hypocrisy of the impenetrable edifice of a scientific community that's forgotten what a fresh idea looks like!   

    Excuse me ... I think I need a drink!   :angry:

Why, ma'am, you overwhelm me.
    Your intelligence is rivalled only by your gracious generosity of spirit! (... and possibly your culinary skills!! )
    Thank you for your kind words.