Come on! Finding life on this rock is as sure as the sun will rise tomorrow. I rode the prop down till the Pheonix actually landed and did not fall through the atmosphere in a ball of fire. But now it's on the ground and will be digging in just a couple days. We know there is or was water and or ice on the planet. Over the past say 500 million years even Mars has had climate change sufficient enough to assume at one time or another conditions were prime to start and support at least the most basic life forms.
This prop will pay off at 100
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The lander doesn't have the tools to detect life. It will only pay long if something walks up to the camera and poses.
As has been said many times before, the Phoenix lander is limited in its range, plus its tools are designed to detect substances that could have supported life as we know it. It would have to be totally retooled to detect actual life, past or present.
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Phoenix will dig deep enough into the soil to analyze the soil environment potentially protected from UV looking for organic signatures and potential habitability.
That is the last sentence from this mission page for the phoenix:
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/phoenix/mission/objectives.html
Looking for organic signatures is going to be considered looking for signs of life.
ejcassel
To find verifiable signs of life (past or present) on the surface of Mars by January 1, 2009.
This it is capable of doing. Right?
Check this out y'all...
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/080605-am-mars-probe.html
It may not be able to find life because of bacteria that are on it FROM EARTH. If it does find life, how do we know that it's not just a piggyback germ? What if it does find life? How will it pay? I think that I just found a giant hole in the payout statement.
Ok now i would love to here on the news that there is proof of life on Mars. But I just don't believe the pheonix has the right tools to find life. And even if it does have the right tools I doubt it will find anything by the end of this year. But I must say that,that supposed *white stuff* they found on Mars is pretty mysterious.
if there was life there once, its gone now because of the radiation that hits mars every 2 hours, and because of the atmosphere that you can barely breathe in!its full of carbon dioxide. now a way to find if theres life is to monitor the amount of carbon dioxide for 10 years and see if there is even a SLIGHT change, for that will mean that plants or animals are breathing the Carbon dioxide and exhaling oxygen!
the prop statement says " on the surface", so does that mean it wont pay out if it finds something digging underground?
there's got to be some sort of at least sign of life on mars. Whether it's fossilized remains or actual cells within the permafrost.
The Phoenix Lander is only capable of spotting "organic signatures" as was pointed out earlier in this thread. If proof comes some day in the form of fossils or whatever, the Phoenix won't find them.
Therefore, although there is a chance that Phoenix will find organic signatures, the odds are this stock will end SHORT.
ejcassel
http://www.ppxchat.com
Milkweed, wouldn't the bacteria from earth explode from a drastic pressure change. Water was found so what that doesn't mean there is life on that rock with little to no atmosphere. If they do find something, what are we going to do try and colonize the area. Just curious, how many of you guys are Christians (just curious).