So, where did the water on Mars come from?

The Toronto Star ^ | 3/7/04 | Terence Dickinson

[redheadtoo]

in a word, GOD.

Jack Smith, the late humor writer for the Los Angles Times once wrote a book called God and Mr. Gomez. Smith met Mr. Gomez when he leased land from him in Baja California to build a vacation home. The title of the book stemmed from Smith's questioning of Gomez about the source of their water supply. Smith kept asking Gomez where the water came from and the clueless Mr. Gomez would answer, "Senor, the water comes from God."

By the way, Smith later observed trucks pumping water into the local reservoir. The water came from God but he must have hired humans to transport it.

[ngc6656]

Any possibility God had anything to do with this?

I don't recall reading anywhere that God proposed comets as the source of planetary water, but because it is a marvelous idea it is within the realm of possibility.

[SunkenCiv]

[LexBaird]

What causes free hydrogen and free oxygen to combine to make water in the first place?

Ancient civilizations generating electricity on Mars. They used the Earth as a dumping ground for the toxic Dihydroxide waste.

[AppyPappy]

What causes free hydrogen and free oxygen to combine to make water in the first place?

The draconian environmental policies of the Bush Administration.

No wait.....Is water a good thing?

[William Terrell]

Ask a science question; get a politics answer. Welcome to FreeRepublic, all.

[wideminded]

A Google search turns up that Dr. Louis Frank proposed in the 1990s that Earth's atmosphere is continuously receiving water vapor as many small comets evaporate there.

IIRC he had a telescope that scanned the sky in UV. He noticed black dots that appeared against the background and then disappeared. He interpreted these as large "snowballs" that were continuously entering the upper atmosphere and melting. (Water absorbs UV). The problem was that the dots he was seeing were never larger than 1 pixel. Critics claimed he was just seeing noise from his detector. Frank planned to build a build a better system, but I never heard what happened after this.

[houeto]

Lake Steadman

Geometry

Latitude 24.65°

Longitude 207.10°

[LIConFem]

Poland Spring?

[LexBaird]

Ask a science question; get a politics answer. Welcome to FreeRepublic, all.

Hey, it was worth every cent I charged for it.

[P-Marlowe]

In my bizzare mind the big question is not where the water on Mars came from, but where it went.

My own pet theory is that most of it is here.

[Fred Hayek]

"And the problem with sufficient atmosphere is that Mars is not large enough to have enough gravity to hold a respectable atmosphere in place. Which, to me, points to the idea that Mars was once larger than it is now."

I submit another possibility. Mars' core was once liquid, which would mean that Mars at once had a magnetic field. Such a magnetic field would keep the solar wind from abrading away the atmosphere. Look at sketches of Earth's magnetic field in relation to the solar wind, and such sketches show a bow shock wave. The charged particles of the solar wind are deflected by the magnetic field. Now granted the solar wind is not very dense, but going on the order of a million miles per hour it does things like throw space probe trajectories off a bit (measureable) and over time (geologic scales mind you) can have some significant impact.
When the iron core of Mars solidified, the field was lost, no bow schock to shield the atmosphere.

[P8riot]

Lots of hydrogen - lots of oxygen - lots of energy....sounds like a recipe for lots of water.

Damn! Now I need to go to the bathroom.

[xzins]

I didn't know there was water on Mars.

[SunkenCiv]

just updating.

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[SunkenCiv]

9/11 Truther, zotted:

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