Remember this before and after picture in the news recently from NASA’s Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity?
Well, it appears there’s a conspiracy theory under every rock, more fodder for Lewandowsky and Cook I suppose.
Science doesn’t advance by lawsuits, though some people think it does.
I’ll point out the obvious: that “biological organism” hasn’t moved since.
The explanation from NASA’s mission leader Steve Squires (al la Occams’ Razor):
“We think the most likely hypothesis is that it was dislodged by the rover wheels from a location that may currently be obscured by the solar arrays,” he said via email.
Squyres described the rock as “white around the outside, in the middle there’s low spot that is dark red. It looks like a jelly donut,” and said it’s like nothing they’ve ever seen before on Mars.
And Squires has a photo to back up the claim:
Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2014-01-ideas-jelly-donut-mars.html#jCp
Anyone who’s ever driven a vehicle down a gravel road knows that rocks get dislodged by the tires and may move a foot or two.
The lawsuit seemed almost too ridiculous to be real, so I checked to see if the plaintiff was real. Yep, he has his own Wiki page.
Rhawn Joseph is a neuropsychologist who worked at the Veterans’ Affairs Palo Alto Health Care System in California.
He is involved with the Journal of Cosmology, and he advances eccentric views on the origin of life on Earth.[1]
Joseph is the author of Astrobiology: The Origins of Life and the Death of Darwinism, published in 2001. In the book he writes that “Contrary to Darwinism … the evidence now clearly indicates, that the evolution of life had been genetically predetermined and precoded…”
…
Joseph has been described by some evolutionary biologists as a crank for embracing unorthodox mechanisms of evolution. In one instance, the blogger P.Z. Myers ridiculed a claim by Joseph that a rock found on Mars is a living organism similar to a type of fungus existing on Earth.
In the lawsuit there is this language:
“Petitioner immediately recognized that bowl-shaped structure, hereafter referred to as Sol 3540, resembling a mushroom-like fungus, a composite organism consisting of colonies of lichen and cyanobacteria, and which on Earth is known as Apothecium.”
“When examined by Petitioner the same structure in miniature was clearly visible upon magnification and appears to have just germinated from spores.”
Strangely, and for the first time ever, I find myself in agreement with P.Z. Meyers.
h/t to reader Ed Zuiderwijk
Source: http://www.scribd.com/doc/202863315/NASA-Lawsuit
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If Mann is ridiculous, what is Prince Charles? Really ridiculous? I guess so, just as portrayed on the BBC original ‘House of Cards’. A devastating portrait of this bewildered prince.
Prince Charles slams climate-change deniers
Science Video
Buy AP Photo Reprints
LONDON (AP) — Prince Charles has called people who deny human-made climate change a “headless chicken brigade” who are ignoring overwhelming scientific evidence.
The heir to the British throne, a dedicated environmentalist, accused “powerful groups of deniers” of mounting “a barrage of sheer intimidation” against opponents.
He made the comments at a Buckingham Palace awards ceremony on Thursday.
Charles said it was “baffling … that in our modern world we have such blind trust in science and technology that we all accept what science tells us about everything – until, that is, it comes to climate science.”
He praised finalists for the Prince of Wales Young Sustainability Entrepreneur Prize for having “the far-sightedness and confidence in what they know is happening to ignore the headless chicken brigade and do something practical to help.”
© 2014 The Associat
Brian R said on January 31, 2014 at 12:03 pm:
Hey now, watch the language. No need to go to such a dark place. Nothing worth finding there.
Remember Nietzsche (alternate translation), And when you probe long into an abyss…
It’s obvious that Rhawn Joseph has never played Tiddlywinks:
Apothecium – this is not an organism but the ascocarp or fruiting body of some fungi. Since ascocarps come in different shapes, they have each been given a name – apothecium is the one with a disk or bowl shape.
Lichens are a complex of a fungus and a bacterium (note bacterial taxonomy is shifting a lot, but generally what those of an older persuasion knew as blue green algae, now more commonly cyanobacteria), so the biology is somewhat suspect.
Davidg says:
January 31, 2014 at 12:08 pm
Prince Charles slams climate-change deniers
Another reason why Oz will become a republic.
Look at the photo again; who would have thought there were pavers on Mars?
Physics Major says “Holy Moly, look carefully at the before picture. There appears to be a face…”.
It’s a bird in the “before” – if you switch between superimposed widows (so before and after alternate directly over one another) you will see what looks very much like a bird – eyes, beak, chest, front legs and tail and in “after” it seems to have been superimposed (flattened?) by some form of bowl with projecting handle.
Are the Martians having fun with us here – OMG, Horsell Common (where they first landed last century) is only about 10 miles up the road from here ….!
Chris4692 says:
January 31, 2014 at 9:42 am
I’ll point out the obvious: that “biological organism” hasn’t moved since.
They killed it!
————————————–
They killed Kenny.
You bastards!
Curious: The square jelly donut does share a few features with the ‘dislodged’ area shown in Squires’ photo. However it appears that it is from a foot or stabilizer used during various tasks that caused the dislodged area not a rotating wheel, somewhat akin to those on Indy cars to replace separate jacks in the pit. In fact, there appears to be just such a jack/foot nearby (‘up’ and to the left in the pic).
Obviously this means the soil is what we in the south call expansive clay, and quite organic…..I believe the same gumbo was found when we planted the flag there back in the 60s.
Looks to me as though his evidence is “rock solid”.
philjourdan says:
January 31, 2014 at 1:30 pm “Dave Barry is still the best! LOL”
It’s like it was written yesterday. (: The article is from 2004.
But we should all try to be nice. That could be somebody’s mother.
@Zeke – It was indeed as if it was written yesterday. I was reminding myself to search for his entire article! Thanks for the information.
Greenpeace, the World Wildlife Fund, the Guardian, the BBC and Tim Yeo are already busy looking at how they can incorporate the moving rock into the next IPCC report as more evidence of climate change.
Come on guys it is obviously a chocolate raspberry donut with many legs can’t you see them!
NASA just wants them for themselves…yummy!
The Viking Mars landers back in the 70’s got a positive result to one of their life detecting experiments. That result was subsequently changed to “negative” and years later “indefinite”.
It is a pet peeve of mine, that every other mission NASA has sent to Mars specifically does not look for life. Instead they have skirted around the edge of this search, only looking for evidence of water or past water. Why spend millions of dollars, traveling millions of miles, and not use the latest technology to conduct experiments to directly look for bacterial life that might still clinging to existence on that barren world?
Paul Westhaver in his above comment has finally given me an answer I understand. The conspiracy, is not NASA covering up life on Mars. NASA is covering up the almost certain lack of life on the Red Planet. The tantalizing prospect of life keeps saps like me interested in funding their million dollar science projects…. with a large share of those dollars going to fund political global warming ‘research’…
Of course the Martian atmosphere is 96% co2, so one should assume that Mars is much to hot to sustain life.
philjourdan says:
January 31, 2014 at 1:30 pm
@Zeke – Dave Barry is still the best! LOL
_________________
Dave’s not here, man.
From Marnof on January 31, 2014 at 7:40 am:
“I am a cocktail sausage”? It doesn’t look like anything like a little wiener.
Or have I been misinformed by a classic episode of the excellent X-Files? Shocking, I know.
What would Mulder say about the moving Mars rock? Did the real aliens stop by to hack the rover’s data streams so it doesn’t transmit anything incriminating, and missed one little detail while covering their tracks?
I think we will find that this was the only life form on Mars, until the Rover ran it over.
@DougbyMany
I am in a climate alarming projecting mood.
If the atmosphere on Mars is 96% CO2, what would happen if we doubled it to create almost twice as much atmosphere and 98% CO2? It might go from being ‘too hot to sustain life’ to ‘just enough CO2 and warmth to sustain life’. Increasing the CO2 level increases the ability of the atmosphere to radiate heat. There might even be more forcing involved that in this explanation.
I’ve known a few in the neuro industry in my time. No exception, I think they are all nutters.
How did that Obamaphone ever get there?
@ur momisugly Joe Bastardi: I always catch your Saturday forecast on Weatherbell, good stuff. So far as the Mann suit, there will some day be an end and results to the suit, ( I am a big fan of Mark Steyn) but the only winners will be the lawyers.
“Strangely, and for the first time ever, I find myself in agreement with P.Z. Meyers.”
I’ll second that one.
This shows that there is a civilization on Mars equal to our own — of people very much like ourselves. Obviously that is a Pet Rock
Eugene WR Gallun
PETA is already on this.
Eugene WR Gallun