Comments on: Life in the Solar System

By: Thomas Palm

Thomas Palm — Wed, 28 Sep 2005 13:09:57 +0000

Regarding the early Earth atmosphere and the Miller-Urey experiment there was an interesting perspective in Science a few months ago:
“Rethinking Earth’s Early Atmosphere”, Christopher F. Chyba, 962-963 , 13 May 2005.
It seems there may have been more hydrogen in the early atmosphere than believed which would make synthesis of amino acids easier.

By: Torbjorn Larsson

Torbjorn Larsson — Tue, 27 Sep 2005 18:06:55 +0000

“One naturally cannot afford both”

How is that natural, and is not both planned (but not funded) today?

Missions could also be much cheaper with cooperation and without status projects as ISS, so I would prefer cutting that pork instead of strangling investments towards perhaps lower ROI or certainly public interest.

By: Paul Orwin

Paul Orwin — Tue, 27 Sep 2005 03:16:20 +0000

Two quick points;
Astrobiologists at JPL have been doing lots of work demonstrating that bacterial spores in particular can survive the transition from earth’s surface to orbit and back. I haven’t looked at the S. mitis study cited above. It’s not the bug I would have expected, but that is neither here nor there. As far as life on Mars or other planets in the Solar System, all of us are completely unqualified to say (and I definitely mean no insult there!), although it is great fun to speculate. I’ll say this; there are essentially no environments on or in this planet (outside the mantle) that do not contain living microorganisms-from the driest desert to the deepest oceanic trench to miles below the earth’s surface (deep crust bacteria are very interesting, and a significant challenge). I’d be very skeptical of any logical argument that leads to the conclusion that there is no life outside Earth. That said, finding it might be very tricky. That’s probably more than two quick points…

By: Moshe Rozali

Moshe Rozali — Mon, 26 Sep 2005 21:43:44 +0000

One naturally cannot afford both, otherwise the discussion would really be boring, but I agree it is a little stale…

By: Torbjorn Larsson

Torbjorn Larsson — Mon, 26 Sep 2005 21:22:53 +0000

Tim, I suspect you mean the Surveyor 3 pieces recovered by Apollo 12 after 31 months. Streptococcus mitis was recovered, perhaps from the probe and not afterwards contamination, and 1 sample out of 33 lived in culture. ( http://www.lpi.usra.edu/expmoon/Apollo12/A12_Experiments_III.html , http://science.nasa.gov/newhome/headlines/ast01sep98_1.htm ). I believe Surveyor missions were done before sterilization was an interest (in some cases).

Moshe, the discussion probes or manned missions is old and boring. A generalisation of Steinns argument on space missions is valid here. And there is positive reinforcement between both types in the public interest so doing both is probably best ROE if one can afford it.

By: Moshe Rozali

Moshe Rozali — Mon, 26 Sep 2005 20:10:11 +0000

Seems to me that even for the purpose of finding life on Mars, a manned mission is the least efficient way to go. It is really science vs. advertizing, not one kind of science vs. another.

By: Sean

Sean — Mon, 26 Sep 2005 19:52:46 +0000

True, I agree that it’s important not to denigrate other fields, and didn’t mean to do that. I was presuming that everyone can see the obvious interest in finding life on Mars, and using that to demonstrate the importance of looking for supersymmetry.

I’ll never be a politician. Surprising they even let me have a blog.

By: Adam

Adam — Mon, 26 Sep 2005 18:40:57 +0000

That depends on whether or not there is a relatively fixed amount of ’science funding money’ to go around, surely?

By: Steinn Sigurdsson

Steinn Sigurdsson — Mon, 26 Sep 2005 18:30:52 +0000

Rule number one of science policy: you’re not going to get funding by putting down other fields.
If it is more important to test supersymmetry than search for life on Mars, than neither will be done…

Prioritizing within fields is good and proper, and helps get funding; trying to claim cross-field priority is counterproductive.

By: Tim M

Tim M — Mon, 26 Sep 2005 17:35:11 +0000

I heard that a U.S. moon probe was intentionally not sterilized before sending it. Then, when the astronauts landed, they collected a sample that still had bacteria from over a year before. I don’t have any documentation, but the source is a professional astronomer.