NASA Gets A Good Look At Mars Soil And A True Puzzle

Chicago Tribune/Yahoo ^ | 1-7-2004 | Jeremy Manier

[Free ThinkerNY]

"We must not allow filthy Earthlings to contaminate our home planet!"

[mewzilla]

Just ran across this link for a site called spacedaily.com.

Look at this pic:

Sure looks like there could've been water on Mars.

[joesnuffy]

Tax dollars at work...coulda taken those pics in Nevada or better yet from a Nintendo game cube..saved us a lot of money

[Political Junkie Too]

Do Not Taunt Happy Fun Ball!

-PJ

[Brett66]

dingleberries....?

dingle/norwood?

[XRdsRev]

New Jersey, 2nd Richest state (per capita) in the nation.

North Carolina not even on the radar screen.

[hummingbird]

a mysteriously sticky form of soil

Any Clinton sightings lately...either one?

[templar]

We may have found a covered layer of liquid slightly below the dust.

Tar. Like in the La Brea Tar Pits.

[Phsstpok]

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. --Clarke's law

Any sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology. --Murphy's reformulation of Clarke's law (I heard it was Niven who came up with this version)

Any sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from a rigged demonstration. --programmer's restatement of Murphy's reformulation of Clarke

taken from Rick Cook's Wizardry books - quotes available at http://neil.franklin.ch/Jokes_and_Fun/Wizardry_Compiled_Quotes.html

[SamAdams76]

Everybody is making fun of Mars. This is serious!

We have machinery on another planet. Machinery that is beaming images back to Earth. Machinery that travelled millions of miles to get there. This should be a major story. But instead, we are treated to the latest hijinks of Brittany Spears and Pete Rose.

Imagine if, in 1969, when we were landing on that moon, that the news media ignored it in favor of talking about Soupy Sales and Yoko Ono.

[hummingbird]

Watch for NY Times Headline: Mars Probe Commandeered by Cheney's Halliburton to Search for Tar Sands on Red Planet

Add the "women and children hurt worst" and we have a match.

[Husker24]

A very very very fine powder can act just like a liquid, thats what im guessing is happening here.

[RightWhale]

Really? What about Soupy Sales and Yoko Ono? Hadn't heard that.

[hummingbird]

If there was life on Mars it could be oil.

"Mmmmmmmmm......oil....." (Homer Simpson voice off)

[Phsstpok]

actually looks like dune buggy tracks to me.

[hummingbird]

With all the money we pump into this progam the least they could do was make up a new slogan. "Shock and Awe" is so 2003 anyway.

LOL...no kidding! I don't think we got our money's worth on this one!

[Main Street]

[Phsstpok]

Could they have landed in New Jersey?

No, but they could have landed on a poor, defenseless, Martian waiting to greet them. He didn't always look like that.

Actually, it does look disturbingly like roadkill. I can even imagine tire tracks across it.

I had this thought for a cartoon of the first pictures from the lander would show a 3rd ID soldier in full battle rig and the controllers sitting their going "I told you to carry the 2 when calculating the course!"

[e_engineer]

a really fine dust might stick via static electricity.

Opposite charges attract each other, but once they touch, the charges neutralize. If there is still a net charge after they touch, the particles then repel one another. (Like charges repel).

[blam]

"A very very very fine powder can act just like a liquid, thats what im guessing is happening here."

I heard them describe it as being like talcum powder. I have often wondered why there are sharp edged rocks on Mars after reading about 200 mph dust storms there.