Space/Science — HabitableZone

Space/Science » in reply to Then Hoyle's rain of viruses must be an even bigger joke

re: The Big difference
BD — (archived)

Hoyle and Wickramasignhe postulated the theory RL. Do you know what a theory is? They never said they had definite proof of their theory, but that they had some evidence for it and are looking for proof. Isn't that what science is for?

I say that until we know for sure, extreme caution should be taken using in-situ observations before we return samples from Mars.

As far as comets go, if Hoyle and Wickramasignhe are correct saying that some microbes exist in them, then there is not much we can do here on Earth about it. No one knows how life began...or how it occurs nor how long it can be preserved in large ice structures. 250 million year old bacteria have been found still viable in terrestrial salt crytals.

With regard to Martian meteorites, the few samples we have show little evidence for any life, but they are ancient igneous samples, not samples of sedimentary deposits from Mars. It is possible that in Earth's past, mass extictions could have resulted from Martian microbes deposited from large surviving chunks of debris. The fact that Earth microbes could have landed on Mars and then evolved to Martian conditions over millions of years would give them a greater chance of being pathogenic. Even NASA's Planetary protection Officer John Rummel knows that...

BD

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