IN 1908-1909, both Huxley and Wallace had very correctly inferred much about Mars' true nature, inferences rigourously derived from a very limited set of observed facts.

But Huxley and Wallace's logical deductions attracted almost no public notice, and that situation continues even to present times - it is quite difficult to find narratives of their work. Given the mass of available literature, it is clear that the Mars Nuts of 1908-1909 needed on a very fundamental emotional level an Earth-like Mars, a planet where their repressed sexual and dominance (romantic) fantasies could play out.

We can view the same phenomena today.

In the case here, one can note the intensity of this set of Mars Nuts constant challenge to simple assertion of fact, due from the most part to their inability to understand anything which interfere's with their fantasies -

The plain facts in this case are that the responsible Japanese, French and Italian officials all procured the IKI robotic vision system. Donna Shirely, in charge of engineering Pathfinder, also inquired about its use for Sojourner, but it was simply too late in the engineering process to adapt it to the limited radiation hardened processor available.

Now what the Mars Nuts' claims here amount to is that Donna Shirely did not know what she was doing, was completely ignorant of the problem of controlling a rover on Mars, and of the available technologies for dealing with this problem. All of these claims are manifestly and patently absurd on the face of them.

As for the MER craft, their robotic vision systems are of limited ability, and this will severely restrict the rovers' operational ranges - thus limiting the return on a $800 million dollar investment. Close study of the history of the systems reveals that they are largely the result of engineering exercises undertaken to develop US capabilities in this field.

Unfortunately, based on what I know of the algorithms which do work, and which have been purchased by responsible officials because they do work, none of the current US development paths are close to converging on the only viable solution, one which already exists - and these last facts have been demonstrated in the real world through widely observed field tests.

The restrictions of the current US systems are well known, and not amenable to solution. It's called barking up the wrong tree.

Of course, since all of these facts interfere with the Mars Nuts fantasies, it is a complete waste of anyone's time to present them to them here - They are siimply incapable of accepting any facts, unless they have repressed sexual and dominance fantasies attached to them.

ep