Mars's Two Faced Riddle Solved

Mars's Two Faced Riddle Solved

news.bbc.co.uk

The puzzle of why the northern and southern hemispheres of Mars look so different may now have been solved.

Mars' crust is thicker in the southern hemisphere, and magnetic anomalies are found in the south but not the north.

New studies in Nature magazine suggest that a massive space rock smashing into the planet could have created an abrupt disparity between the two halves.

(visit the link for the full news article)

The new research suggests Mars bears the largest impact scar known anywhere in the Solar System

This is a pretty interesting article. Says the asteroid that struck it could have been the size of Earth's moon.

news.bbc.co.uk
(visit the link for the full news article)

What I am interested in is the technique they used to determine the thickness of Mars's crust. Anyone know what it is/was?

This is the second explanation I've heard using the "asteroid crashing" theory to explain an anomoly. The first was how our moon came to be. Now I'm no scientist but, when smashing occurs there is usually destruction that precludes any other explanation. Using it as a theory for the moon creation and the mars crust issues is far reaching imo. Why don't they (science community)just admit they don't know instead of theorizing nonsense.


Here is more nonsense from the "Source"

"It happened probably right at the end of the formation of the four terrestrial planets - Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars," said Craig Agnor, a co-author on the Francis Nimmo study.

He told BBC News: "We think the planets formed out of a disc of rocks. As the rocks collide, you get bigger rocks and so on. Eventually, you end up with four planets and a lot of rocks - of various sizes.

Come on people I ask you.....
How do you get bigger rocks from a collision and secondly how do get near perfect sphere shapes from collisions. These people are laughable.



[edit on 27/6/2008 by FreeRadicull]

Originally posted by spec_ops_wannabe
What I am interested in is the technique they used to determine the thickness of Mars's crust. Anyone know what it is/was?

It's likely similar in theory to how an ultrasound works. I'm pretty sure they would have equipped the probes with something of that nature.

reply to post by FreeRadicull


You would have a point if space wasn't a vacuum . They form like that the same way that fire in space burns spherical .
Also collision does not HAVE to mean that they were flying at speeds that would do huge amounts of damage .
Every collision could leave debris that debris would for a short time orbit the mass slowly being pulled in and building up . The larger the mass gets the stronger the gravity then being able to pull in larger objects. when this debris finally smashes into the mass it would be just short of pulverized thus creating a "rocky" planet.

I'm no physicist but a little common sence could have told you why/how they came to this conclusion . Of course i didnt read the article yet either . So i'll do that now.

reply to post by d11_m_na_c05

So I guess there's not to much floating out in space that is irregularily shaped, like say a Comet or Astroid. Also since you brought up the vacuum in space, where did our atmosphere, perfect for our life, come from. Was it caused by more "collisions", what about our Sun, more collisions and how about the angle of the earth which is just right for life, let me guess another collision. And how about life here on earth, what are the odds of every living creature evolving a male and female fully matured because babies wouldn't survive, all at the same time, more collisions I venture etc. etc....
Also what spherical fire are you speaking of in the vacuum of space? I have alot more "common sense" questions for the scientic community to answer.

This is a pretty interesting article. Says the asteroid that struck it could have been the size of Earth's moon.

No, it says:

These conditions indicate a space rock about one-half to two-thirds the size of Earth's Moon, striking the Red Planet at an angle of 30 to 60 degrees. This would have produced an elliptical crater.

Originally posted by spec_ops_wannabe
What I am interested in is the technique they used to determine the thickness of Mars's crust. Anyone know what it is/was?

As they say that the scientistis used data from Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and Mars Global Surveyor, they probably used MRO's Gravity Field Investigation Package and MGS' Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter (MOLA) and Magnetometer/Electron Reflectometer (MAG/ER).

reply to post by ArMaP


Good catch there.

Still a good size chunk of rock, by in any case.

But there's a lot of work needed to be done to prove this. A theory is just a scientific way of formulating a good guess.

Originally posted by FreeRadicull
Now I'm no scientist but, when smashing occurs there is usually destruction that precludes any other explanation.

Not always, in fact, total destruction is very difficult to achieve.

Go to the Earth Impact Effects Program and play with some values, you will see that an object the size of Mars hitting Earth at 24 km/s would not destroy the Earth, although more than 6% of the Earth would melt with the impact.

Why don't they (science community)just admit they don't know instead of theorizing nonsense.

They admit it, that is why they use words like "probably", "we think", etc., and that is why it is called a theory and not a fact, these are not the type of people who post videos in YouTube.

These people are laughable.

Only to people that do not understand a thing of what is being said.

Trying to find reasons for anything is always a guessing game, but real scientists try to find data that proves or disproves their theories, anyone who has done real work in any field knows that sometimes we learn more when we go in the wrong direction for some time, creating a far fetched theory may make people think in a different way, and that may lead to a better understanding of what is being studied.

I just watched an interesting show the other day that was explaining how mars has lost it's magnetic field. Because of this it's earth like atmosphere blew away from solar winds over thousnds of years.

Originally posted by FreeRadicull
reply to post by d11_m_na_c05

 

So I guess there's not to much floating out in space that is irregularily shaped, like say a Comet or Astroid. Also since you brought up the vacuum in space, where did our atmosphere, perfect for our life, come from. Was it caused by more "collisions", what about our Sun, more collisions and how about the angle of the earth which is just right for life, let me guess another collision. And how about life here on earth, what are the odds of every living creature evolving a male and female fully matured because babies wouldn't survive, all at the same time, more collisions I venture etc. etc....
Also what spherical fire are you speaking of in the vacuum of space? I have alot more "common sense" questions for the scientic community to answer.

Yeah that, or 'explosions' like the big-bang nonsense. Yes, an explosion created intelligent life as we know it...

reply to post by FreeRadicull

So I guess there's not to much floating out in space that is irregularily shaped, like say a Comet or Astroid.

On the contrary, there are many bodies that are too small to be geologically active, thereby preventing them from recycling their contents and forming a sphere over time. These same bodies also do not carry enough mass for the effects of gravity to compress their contents into that of a sphere.

Also since you brought up the vacuum in space, where did our atmosphere, perfect for our life, come from.

As succinctly explained in most fifth grade science classes, the combination of impacts from space depositing interesting elements and compounds, and the gradual release/accretion of gases from the earth's constituent elements themselves resulted in the atmosphere that we currently enjoy.

Was it caused by more "collisions", what about our Sun, more collisions and how about the angle of the earth which is just right for life, let me guess another collision.

Are you asking how the sun formed? Not sure if I'm understanding the question correctly. As for the angle of the earth, do you mean relative to the solar plane?

And how about life here on earth, what are the odds of every living creature evolving a male and female fully matured because babies wouldn't survive, all at the same time, more collisions I venture etc. etc...

You've got it backwards, and slightly confused, I think. Life is not the outcome of a process, it is the process. During the (long) process of evolution, the "mutants" with DNA sequencing or composition slightly different than their parents tend to be numerous. The likelihood of severe mutations surviving, and thereby propagating, is low. The amount of nature's failures is titanic when compared to the brief moment in evolutionary time that we're witnessing right now, which has literally taken billions of years to arrive at. For each viable species, billions of deaths occurred. Life didn't just spring up with male and female genitalia to flap at itself and start happily reproducing. =)

Also what spherical fire are you speaking of in the vacuum of space?

Check out Project SOFBALL. Interesting stuff. The premise here is that without gravity feeding columns of oxygen down into the fire, and the fire itself not "knowing" which way to spread (up, when in a gravity-present situation) in a zero-g environment, it will take the form of a sphere.

science.nasa.gov...

reply to post by pernox


Thanks pernox i think you covered most of it . And like it said in not so many words . (Its my understanding) that this is how these things occurred..

Most of these things are directly observable and or reproducable on a smaller level . But were still not at the [point where we can create planets :/ And untill then . Most everything on a planetary scale is gonna stay theoretical .
If we (humans) survive over the next few billion years . We will surely amass enough info over that time to call it fact .

BTW. In a few billion years our moon will collide with earth . (Granted we don't find huge underground deposits of gasses we can release to help encourage an atmosphere . )

[PIC UNRELATED]

"Pale Blue Dot" - Earth from 4 billion miles away snapped by Voyager in '91 [NASA/JPL space.com]

[edit on 29-6-2008 by d11_m_na_c05]

[edit on 29-6-2008 by d11_m_na_c05]

reply to post by Mad_Hatter


I agree with that. I also, believe that the same rock/comet that slammed into Mars ripped away its atmosphere.

With the majority of the atmosphere gone, any and all liquid water would evaporate into space.

It would nicely explain what, may have happened to any intelligent life on Mars.

Listen, i am no geologist. I am a call center manager...i make sure there are people there to answer your calls when they aren't sent to india or the phillipines. Hell, i haven't even slept in a Holiday Inn Express in over 6 months. But this seems so obvious as to almost hurt.

there is a HUGE scar on the southern hemisphere. Directly across is a HUGE bulge (mons olympus). And there are rocks littering the landscape planet wide. and mars has two potato shaped moons in degrading orbits.

the only question now is, what caused it? A moon/asteroid? A "thunderbolt" a la Wallace Thornhill? A comet? Or could it be a ???

But the evidence is right there, in all its false color image glory. I kind of thought that was what everyone already thought.

So, does the UK have a robot on Mars? I am wondering the BBC got this information about the poles from?