Posted on 11/20/2012 7:03:34 PM PST by Free ThinkerNY
Scientists working on NASA's six-wheeled rover on Mars have a problem. But it's a good problem.
They have some exciting new results from one of the rover's instruments. On the one hand, they'd like to tell everybody what they found, but on the other, they have to wait because they want to make sure their results are not just some fluke or error in their instrument.
It's a bind scientists frequently find themselves in, because by their nature, scientists like to share their results. At the same time, they're cautious because no one likes to make a big announcement and then have to say "never mind."
The exciting results are coming from an instrument in the rover called SAM. "We're getting data from SAM as we sit here and speak, and the data looks really interesting," John Grotzinger, the principal investigator for the rover mission, says during my visit last week to his office at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. That's where data from SAM first arrive on Earth. "The science team is busily chewing away on it as it comes down," says Grotzinger.
SAM is a kind of miniature chemistry lab. Put a sample of Martian soil or rock or even air inside SAM, and it will tell you what the sample is made of.
Grotzinger says they recently put a soil sample in SAM, and the analysis shows something earthshaking. "This data is gonna be one for the history books. It's looking really good," he says.
Grotzinger can see the pained look on my face as I wait, hoping he'll tell me what the heck he's found, but he's not providing any more information.
(Excerpt) Read more at npr.org ...
Gee I never thought of that. I hope the Mar’s rover washes its hands before coming back to Earth. Sorry, couldn’t resist.
Not mine, maybe yours?
They found a monolith with perfect 1-4-9 dimensions.
Snickers
I have seen some Christians here on FR who apparently think the rest of the visible universe is devoid of life and was created for no other purpose than to provide pretty twinkling night lights for the Garden of Eden.
Wow. wouldn’t want to be around when Mars did a crunchy with the Earth. wonder what the kinetic energy release would be for something like that.
Google “Theia planet” sometime. All the calculations have already been done.
Thanks.
It’s the next page of the Mayan calendar.
“Ok let me get this straight. There are no men here. There’s an unlimited supply of Bud Light. And we can never leave?”
“Correct.”
“I can live with that.”
You wrote:
“You don’t think the existence of life on another planet is a significant discovery?”
Honestly, no. I just wouldn’t find that all that big a deal. That might shock you, but I’m serious. What would it change here in everyday life? Nothing really.
“I think if it’s true it will be one of the most important discoveries in history.”
Actually it’s real importance would be determined by what it effectively changes here on earth in everyday life. And if it changes little or nothing, then it ultimately isn’t that important.
“Some will greet it with excitement and some with dread.”
Maybe. But what will it actually EFFECT? And is that even the announcement NASA will make?
They found where Disney buried the negatives for John Carter.
""Honestly, no. I just wouldn’t find that all that big a deal.""
Yeah, no doubt it would hardly make a blip on your local news.....yuk,yuk..
Good thinken vlad....
L Ron Hubbard scratched into a rock?
I know the news would make a huge deal about it. It just wouldn’t actually EFFECT anything practicle of every day use on THIS PLANET for the foreseeable future. Sorry, I grew up in the age of science fiction turned to fact. The discivery of life on another planet wouldn’t impress me much because I’ve been told for my entire life that ot would happen eventually.
I would be much more impressed by a cure for the common cold (or cancer) or the Democratic Party becoming Pro-Life or producing a balanced federal budget - but let’s not stray from science fiction into pure fantasy.
lol...
They found Ted Kennedy’s car keys.
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