March 02, 2004
Evidence of Water

Rover finds strong evidence of Mars water.

It's an interesting discovery, to be sure, but it's no surprise that there was (and may still be) liquid water on Mars. What would be good to find out now is whether the processes involved lasted long enough and took place over enough of the surface to have concentrated useful materials in profitably extractable amounts.

I mean, it's gonna cost a fortune if we have to ship out all the materials to build and outfit our strip malls, even if the Starbucks can get its water locally...

Posted by T.L. James on March 2, 2004 07:40 PM

Comments

A spoilsport named "Mr. Toad" posted at NewMars comments suggesting that the water findings are greatly hyped. An excerpt:

>> "In my opinion, the mineralogy (revealed in NASA press releases to date), argues against a fluvial, lacustrine, or oceanic origin for the environments currently under study by Rover instruments."

He argues further that water is present in all magma and therefore (apparently) the Opportunity findings do not prove that an ocean, lake or sea ever existed at that location. Anyone here have the ability to review and comment?

Bare link follows since it says HTML gets filtered out:

http://www.newmars.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard/ikonboard.cgi?s=68bc99427cf5c7587aba68b4d449de12;act=ST;f=25;t=26



Posted by: Bill White at March 3, 2004 12:04 AM

It's not for me to say -- I'm an engineer, not a geologist. I gather from what they said at the press conference that the types of sulfur minerals, their distribution, and certain physical features of the rocks examined so far suggest long-term submersion.



Posted by: T.L. James at March 3, 2004 07:30 AM

The thread cited above has had several interesting posts added, at least IMHO.

IMHO, it couldn't get any better than = IF = in the days and weeks to come tantalizing evidence of conditions suitable for fossils are found and the geology suggests that conditions favorable for life and fossils ended many millions of years ago.

Then sample return can proceed with minimal fear of forward/back contamination.

Then = IF = sample return reveals actual fossils that have been dead for 50 million years or more then. . .

humans to that site, right?

Being a liberal arts major, all I can do is cross my fingers! :-)



Posted by: Bill White at March 3, 2004 02:50 PM