NASA: Life Could Have Existed On Mars

[63dot]

Originally Posted by MagnusVonMagnum

I don't know about lying, but what many scientists (not to be confused with science itself) do is judge/conclude/condemn entire subjects and theories without any proof except their own opposing theories. This, to me, shows extreme bias and emotionalism that pure science is not supposed to have. Sadly, most human beings are incapable of pure scientific work. They always want to draw conclusions on a given subject and then use those conclusions to bash any other ideas out there with words like bogus, poppycock, fiction, fancy, etc. etc.

...

Excellent points.

I have seen so much in science that displays this extreme bias. I guess it's not different than politics or religion.

I like to keep an open mind when it comes to science and a lot of what I see as common sense (Newtonian physics) just doesn't hold up when seen in a very small scale or with very fast speeds. Einstein is enough of a mind altering thing to make me realize all that came before may not have been as true as many once thought it was. I can't really comment on alternates to Big Bang or string theory, but I am sure that some new ideas get shot down before they are properly analyzed.

In religion I hold many orthodox Christian beliefs but I know many other concepts (all male priesthood, concept of eternal hell, and accepted canon of scriptures) came after Jesus and the disciples. In politics I know that my liberal beliefs don't always mesh with what is the accepted norm of "liberals". Being pro-gun rights or pro-life just doesn't make me popular with many other green party people even though my main beliefs are for people over corporations and individual human rights over what some may hold to be most important for society as a whole. I would say that I fall within most of the green party views but the few "conservative" viewpoints make many a true believer think my wayward view or two is poppycock.

I think for anything like science, religion, or politics, a person does not give their own viewpoint a fair shake unless they challenge their own beliefs point by point rather than accepting an entire platform deemed by others to be correct.

[MagnusVonMagnum]

Originally Posted by eric/

To be fair, the ancient astronaut theory is criticized because:

A: History channel has that show and the arguments they make are absolutely ridiculous

Much of it IS ridiculous or at least pure conjecture. On the other hand, I find many of the sites they cover are mysterious and at least some evidence makes you wonder. I don't find the idea behind it ridiculous at all, though. IF we were a genetic modification, it would explain a lot of the things in religion and quite a few strange things as well (Mohenjo Daro combined with Indian mythology, etc., flight worthy shaped jewelry, etc. Coincidence? Maybe. Maybe not.) Atlantis legends had to be based on something, even if it were just an ancient group of more advanced humans that blew themselves back to the stone ages, so to speak. Most things other than stone crumble over tens of thousands of years. Trying to prove it is difficult, yes and that show appears to be more about sensationalism than anything else. But what bothers me is the reaction of so-called scientists to ANY parts of the theory. They try hard to say, "We can't disprove God" and yet they just laugh at the very idea that aliens might have visited the Earth at some point even though it makes sense in terms of genetically being possible and explaining creation myths beyond just laughing at them.

Personally, I don't have the answers. But unlike some, I don't stop looking just because Charles Darwin says I'm essentially a divergent ape. What happened before the Big Bang? Science has no idea and doesn't even try to guess for the most part (unless they have a cyclical version that could be infinite in nature, despite more recent evidence that we are almost definitely NOT going to have a big "crunch" and so it goes right out the window.)

B: That guy's hair is crazy.

A lot of women I know seem to think he's hot (fake tan and all), so he might just start a new bed head hair trend.

[eric/]

I think it's interesting too, and I have never dismissed it.

And girls think he's hot? Wow.

[63dot]

Originally Posted by eric/

I think it's interesting too, and I have never dismissed it.

And girls think he's hot? Wow.

What show are we talking about? History channel, right? Carl Sagan had an interesting doo back in the day.

[eric/]

Ancient Aliens @ History Channel

[63dot]

Originally Posted by eric/

Ancient Aliens @ History Channel

Thanks, I will check it out. I love shows on the implausible. I am nowhere close to believing in aliens but I do respect that there are many people who believe it. Life on Mars in a small state, bacteria, is probably more than likely if there was water there, but it's a huge jump to say we were visited unless there's proof.

[eric/]

Originally Posted by 63dot

Thanks, I will check it out. I love shows on the implausible. I am nowhere close to believing in aliens but I do respect that there are many people who believe it. Life on Mars in a small state, bacteria, is probably more than likely if there was water there, but it's a huge jump to say we were visited unless there's proof.

Yeah if you take it with a grain of salt (and you should), there are some interesting ideas.

[Huntn]

Originally Posted by eric/

I think this is even bigger news



<--- understatement

Wow! Fossils on a meteor. Unleash imagination! (not sarcastic, seriously, WoW!)

[snberk103]

My enthusiasm for alien visits waned a long time ago. I don't know what the current thinking is, but one of the big "proofs" were the figures from the plains of Nazca... those giant figures in Peru that you can only see from the air ... and that were "supposedly" used by the aliens as navigation aids. It was pointed out to me that anyone able to navigate to the moon, let alone interstellar space, would be using something a shade more sophisticated than drawings in the sand.

There was also the blocks of stone too big to move by hand. My father put a simple lever in my hand, and had lift his car. I was about 13 at the time, and the car was big. He told me to imagine what 100 big men with big levers could lift.

A couple more examples like that, and I realized that best and biggest mystery was still why early people, for their own reasons, were doing these amazing things. And what people a 1000 years from now will be saying about us.

Sorry to be a kill joy....

But here is a mystery.... if you look at the pattern of the labyrinth (not the maze, but a circuitous path you walk - perhaps in meditation) that same basic pattern (sequence of rights to lefts) is found from ancient Minoan to the First Nations in the US south west to early 20th century turf patterns in Wales and beyond. Assume it wasn't aliens... and think about how humans managed to keep this pattern across the continents. Now that is weird.

[MagnusVonMagnum]

Originally Posted by snberk103

My enthusiasm for alien visits waned a long time ago. I don't know what the current thinking is, but one of the big "proofs" were the figures from the plains of Nazca... those giant figures in Peru that you can only see from the air ... and that were "supposedly" used by the aliens as navigation aids.

First of all, it's all speculation what they were used for (if anything). The only thing they can really discern is that you can't really view them correctly except from the air. The fact they've found "jewelry" in the region that is 100% flight worthy aerodynamic (proven with scale models given a model airplane engine) tells me that alien or not (I happen to think it's entirely possible we've had a more advanced HUMAN civilization at some point in the past and perhaps they blew themselves up and/or some other disaster sent them back to the stone ages; imagine if we had a bad enough plague and most of the people running the power grids and other tech systems all died alone with say 75% of the population. Do you think the REST of us would be able to make it all work again, specialized sciences and all or would we all be too busy fighting to stay alive and end up technically inept within a few decades?)

In any case, the Ancient Astronaut idea is that the people of the Nazca region were trying to get the attention of the "gods" (aliens/technically advanced whatever beings) with the drawings knowing that they come from the sky they could see them there. It's not a "navigation aid" but primitive humans trying to attract the gods again to come back, the idea being they visited here, perhaps interacted or taught the humans some things and then left on for their next destination and these people wanted them to return again. I don't find the idea implausible at all as long as you find it possible that these more advanced beings could have visited. The rest is just basic logical deduction. Why else would you build HUGE drawings that could only be viewed from the sky? Exactly who else was supposed to see it?

It was pointed out to me that anyone able to navigate to the moon, let alone interstellar space, would be using something a shade more sophisticated than drawings in the sand.

The problem is this person that pointed this out had the wrong idea as to who was using them and for what purpose.

There was also the blocks of stone too big to move by hand. My father put a simple lever in my hand, and had lift his car. I was about 13 at the time, and the car was big. He told me to imagine what 100 big men with big levers could lift.

Yeah, well, there's a BIG difference between moving a two ton car a few inches off the ground and trying to move a two HUNDRED ton block 60 miles over uneven mountains with not even a tree line to make rollers with them (i.e. look up Puma Punku and the near laser cut precision an inset within inset designed "lego-like" blocks found there that we would have trouble producing today with our best equipment on that scale, let alone primitives mining it 90 miles away over uneven ground above the tree line carrying it up there one at a time and chiseling away perfect 90-degree angles with a level of precision that matches the best we could possibly do today. There is simply NO WAY ON EARTH those stones were made by primitives. Whether it was aliens or more advanced earthlings, the very idea the natives did it is downright ludicrous.

Places like Macchu Picchu have stones so closely put together (without mortar) they must have been melted to achieve that level of precision. Again, how did primitive man do that on the side of a mountain without a blast furnace to cook the rocks to the melting point? It makes no sense. Yet so-called "scientists" just dismiss it as primitives with rock shaped chisels when it's not possible to make them with chisels no matter how badly you want to do so.

And no simple "lever" is going to move a 50 ton rock on top of other giant stones at Stone Henge either not matter how many of those simple levers you get (in fact, trying to move them all at once makes it that much more unlikely they could coordinate their efforts precisely, let alone lift them dozens of feet into the air to put them into place. There are so many examples of giant stones that are just too big to place precisely today, let alone in ancient times (even with cranes!). A simple lever doesn't explain the 800 ton foundation stone found at the Temple of Jupiter ( http://www.world-mysteries.com/mpl_5.htm ). Just look at that photo and some of the 1000+ ton stones they did put in place at Baalbeck. That thing isn't going to move with a simple set of levers.

And I've seen plenty of theories about HOW something could be done, but very few examples to prove it and that's because no one want to try to build something like a pyramid using primitive labor methods. They'd waste their entire lives trying to figure out how to do it with such primitive tools, let alone build the Great Pyramid in half a lifetime.

A couple more examples like that, and I realized that best and biggest mystery was still why early people, for their own reasons, were doing these amazing things. And what people a 1000 years from now will be saying about us.

I don't know about 1000 years, but I can tell you that if we blew ourselves back to the stone ages tomorrow, certainly 12,000 years from now there wouldn't be much left of our civilization to find. All the skyscrapers, etc. would have fallen down and rotted in to piles of rubble. All the electrical goods, etc. would have disintegrated and the only things left would be STONE (and maybe styrofoam ) and things like gold jewelry. Yet when those future people get to the moon, they might just find some undisturbed evidence of our civilization. Would they reveal it or hide it? They'd probably conclude they were the center of the Universe for awhile too....

This planet has been here for BILLIONS of years. It is the height of human arrogance to assume we were the first intelligence species to ever evolve on this planet. Hell, the continents have rearranged themselves over that time and we think we would have found evidence? Sadly, though, we have found evidence of a previous advanced (or visiting) civilization. We ignore it. It was just humans who didn't even have the wheel that built those structures in Egypt. Nevermind the near 100% symmetrical precision of the statues in Luxor that simply COULD NOT have been done without automated manufacturing tools (a negative made of one half the face superimposed and reversed over the right half the face lines up EXACTLY the same; a level of precision IMPOSSIBLE with a mere "chisel"). It was just a bunch of guys with the desire to make giant statues and huge piles of blocks for some odd reason. There are rotary tool marks on many of the obelisks and statues. No, they COULDN'T have had a tool like that back then so IGNORE the marks and pretend they could chisel all that stuff with primitive rocks.

We've got people today that would DESTROY the pyramids even (and thus any record of them having ever been made if our own civilization some day fell) if they had the simple means to do so because they are a "pagan distraction" and so it's not hard for me to imagine a similar sect of people in ancient times wherein they would have destroyed that civilization back to the stone ages then too because no matter how advanced their or our technology becomes, you always have groups of people that think their particular "religious" beliefs are more important than respecting others' rights to exist or disagree with their beliefs. Their "god" demands they convert everyone to their particular or primitive stone-age beliefs (technology is evil, of course) or wipe them all out. This apparently impotent god never does anything himself so they are left with the dirty work, imagining what he wants from old books or their own imaginations that vary like storms across the earth's surface. Yes, I'm afraid we are a primitive planet indeed and yet we make assumptions about space travel being impossible over distances measured because we can't do it. Hell, we can't even figure out gravity properly and have to invent things like "dark energy" to explain why our mathematical models don't mesh between quantum physics and classical, etc. But no, we must be alone. The Catholic Church said so once upon a time!

Sadly.... All of this has happened before and it will (probably) all happen again.

[Huntn]

Originally Posted by snberk103

It was pointed out to me that anyone able to navigate to the moon, let alone interstellar space, would be using something a shade more sophisticated than drawings in the sand.

How true, but maybe the little people were trying to attract the aliens/gods. Still could be aliens...

[APlotdevice]

Originally Posted by Huntn

How true, but maybe the little people were trying to attract the aliens/gods. Still could be aliens...

Gods are more likely.

[eric/]

Originally Posted by APlotdevice

Gods are more likely.

same thing

[APlotdevice]

Originally Posted by eric/

same thing

Not really. Gods are primative humans' attempt to explain and anthropomorphize the world around them. Aliens are beings from another world. The latter is also more likely to actually exist, though unlikely to have ever visited Earth.

[ucfgrad93]

Originally Posted by APlotdevice

Not really. Gods are primative humans' attempt to explain and anthropomorphize the world around them. Aliens are beings from another world. The latter is also more likely to actually exist, though unlikely to have ever visited Earth.

Source?

[APlotdevice]

Originally Posted by ucfgrad93

Source?

Source: The absolutely immense scale of the universe and the abundance of organic molecules throughout it.

[snberk103]

Originally Posted by MagnusVonMagnum

First of all, it's all speculation what they were used for (if anything). The only thing they can really discern is that you can't really view them correctly except from the air.

Of course it's speculation... These figures are reintroduced as proof of something every decade or two. Back then, it was navigation aids. I'm sure it's something else now. Still easily explained by more terrestrial means once the breathless narration is removed. Doesn't make it any less amazing, though. And speculation fits right in with MR since this whole site is founded on speculating about what the aliens in Cupertino are going to do next...

However, note (as just one example) the Gardens at Versailles - started in the 1600s - also can't be fully appreciated except from the air and covering 800 hectares. The amazing thing about the figures (and gardens) is that they had the confidence to build them without being to able to check for accuracy.

Originally Posted by MagnusVonMagnum

The fact they've found "jewelry" in the region that is 100% flight worthy aerodynamic

Can you be more specific? I'd love to look into this. Though... I will note that many things in nature are naturally aerodynamic, and any human-made artifact that are faithful to nature will also be.

Originally Posted by MagnusVonMagnum

...(I happen to think it's entirely possible we've had a more advanced HUMAN civilization at some point in the past and perhaps they blew themselves up and/or some other disaster sent them back to the stone ages; imagine if we had a bad enough plague and most of the people running the power grids and other tech systems all died alone with say 75% of the population....

No, but if they were human they'd leave some archeological evidence. And if they were current with or predated the dinosaurs then they wouldn't be human, I suppose.

Originally Posted by MagnusVonMagnum

...the Ancient Astronaut idea is that the people of the Nazca region were trying to get the attention of the "gods" (aliens/technically advanced whatever beings) with the drawings knowing that they come from the sky they could see them there. ....Exactly who else was supposed to see it?

Different decades, different ideas. But to answer your question... trying to get the attention of the gods does not mean that we were visited by aliens. Other cultures burnt lambs as a sacrifice to get the attention of their gods/god. Different strokes for different folks. The amazing thing is that, for very terrestrial reasons, they were able to build such amazing figures at all.

Originally Posted by MagnusVonMagnum

...
Yeah, well, there's a BIG difference between moving a two ton car a few inches off the ground and trying to move a two HUNDRED ton block 60 miles over uneven mountains with not even a tree line to make rollers with them....

Just a matter of scale. Through enough people at a rock and it will move. Post-communist-pre-industrial China dug massive canals in very short time spans by simply several thousands of 'workers' with thousands of shovels into hole in the ground. Rocks or canals... it is still bl**dy amazing to think what humans are capable of when you harness them into giant projects.

Originally Posted by MagnusVonMagnum

...perfect 90-degree angles with a level of precision that matches the best we could possibly do today.
There is simply NO WAY ON EARTH those stones were made by primitives. Whether it was aliens or more advanced earthlings, the very idea the natives did it is downright ludicrous.

I know a couple of stonemasons... the precision is very easy to obtain.. with enough time. You can work stone with ... stone. Harder stones are tools. Or you can "sandpaper" the blocks with sand and another surface. Put a hundred skilled stonemasons together and massive blocks can be precisely honed. It is still amazing - don't get me wrong.... it is amazing that unskilled human finger can feel irregularities that are amazingly tiny. Think about how thin a piece of tissue paper is. Now put a sheet on the table and run your finger across the edge. Can you feel that 'thinness'? Are those stones any more precise than that? The accomplishment is that that culture had the resources and patience to create those blocks. It doesn't mean that there wasn't outside "advanced" help. But it isn't necessary.

Originally Posted by MagnusVonMagnum

Places like Macchu Picchu have stones so closely put together (without mortar) they must have been melted to achieve that level of precision.....

Woodworkers do this all the time with wood. You mate two pieces of straight wood together and run a saw right down the seam. You'd swear you were looking at a single piece of wood. You can do the same with two stones. It also doesn't hurt that in an earthquake zone those seams will be ground together, flattening any leftover highspots.

Originally Posted by MagnusVonMagnum

And no simple "lever" is going to move a 50 ton rock on top of other giant stones at Stone Henge either not matter how many of those simple levers you get ....

I use the principles required in my garden all the time. The scale is different of course. But I move, by myself, boulders of up to 100 lbs using nothing more than levers, pits, & ramps. I can usually solve the sequencing problem and move the sucker in an afternoon. If you have an experience foreman - who has done this several times before - and hundred or so strong workers, moving a 50 ton rock up a ramp and into place is not so difficult. Moving an 800 ton rock simply takes more time and more workers. Doesn't make the feat less amazing... maybe it makes it more amazing. What is so important that someone said I want that boulder over there (tens of miles away) shaped like this and then put on top of some more boulders shaped like that. And then that person could then actually make that happen. I live in a region where our local peoples routinely (until recently) built their longhouses by putting massive multi-ton, 100+foot trees horizontally on top of massive posts - each tens of feet high. If you suggested to them that they had the help of an external agency they would be insulted. This is an important and hard-won skill that they are proud of. Oh, and they also still raise hundred foot totem poles by hand.

Originally Posted by MagnusVonMagnum

...It was just humans who didn't even have the wheel that built those structures in Egypt. Nevermind the near 100% symmetrical precision of the statues in Luxor that simply COULD NOT have been done without automated manufacturing tools (a negative made of one half the face superimposed and reversed over the right half the face lines up EXACTLY the same; a level of precision IMPOSSIBLE with a mere "chisel").

Easy with strings or measuring sticks. Build a perfect square frame (which is easy to do with basic geometry. Measure one side with a string, transfer string to the other side. Chisel away until the string is measures the same distance. Repeat endless as required. And that is the amazing thing. Someone did that thousands of times to achieve that level of precision. Is that not amazing enough?

Why can't we give the people those ages the credit they probably earned themselves. In my part of the country the first peoples had an established trading network across the Rockies a thousand or two years before the settlers built a road across the same mountains. These people hunted whales... big whales... out of a canoe using nothing more than stone and wood tools. The Inuit developed highly complex kayaks using wood and skins - even though the nearest wood grows hundreds of miles away. And without glue. The wood joints on a traditional kayak defy anything that we had invented ourselves. If you suggest to an inuit elder that aliens had had a hand in the development of this technology... they'd be insulted.

Originally Posted by Huntn

How true, but maybe the little people were trying to attract the aliens/gods. Still could be aliens...

Probably were...

Originally Posted by APlotdevice

Not really. Gods are primative humans' attempt to explain and anthropomorphize the world around them. Aliens are beings from another world. The latter is also more likely to actually exist, though unlikely to have ever visited Earth.

Or, perhaps I'm wrong and aliens were seen as gods.

[eric/]

Originally Posted by APlotdevice

Source: The absolutely immense scale of the universe and the abundance of organic molecules throughout it.

Well that's not a source. But my point was that if aliens did visit us, they would likely be so advanced that they would appear as gods. How would we know the difference?

[APlotdevice]

Originally Posted by eric/

Well that's not a source. But my point was that if aliens did visit us, they would likely be so advanced that they would appear as gods. How would we know the difference?

I think it would be more accurate to say how would they know? And the answer is they wouldn't. But still it presumes that aliens visited; The difference from our perspective is that aliens would have had to physically exist, whereas gods would only have to exist in the minds of those who believe in them.

[eric/]

Originally Posted by APlotdevice

I think it would be more accurate to say how would they know? And the answer is they wouldn't. But still it presumes that aliens visited; The difference from our perspective is that aliens would have had to physically exist, whereas gods would only have to exist in the minds of those who believe in them.

Which means they don't exist

[APlotdevice]

Originally Posted by eric/

Which means they don't exist

Well yeah, but the people who made those drawings didn't know that. Religion is funny that way.

[DisMyMac]

They don't want crackpots proven right about anything. It will ruin their credibility and destroy the media machine that protects "human rights" (aka the oil racket). There is also the problem of abductions that simply can't be solved, it seems.