Flowing water on Mars - it used to exist!

Speculation is over, Curiosity has found evidence that flowing water on Mars used to exist.

NASA's Mars rover Curiosity has discovered what appears to be an ancient streambed, suggesting that water once flowed in large volumes — perhaps hip-deep in places — across the Martian surface.

Source here from www.space.com.

We're possibly on the very beginning of a new way to see our neighbouring planets. This is just amazing news!

It was already known. mars was just like the earth today.

reply to post by UFOs20


Well, not quite. But it did have bodies of water if you look at the history of it's orbit on it's axis where every 5 million years or so, it's tilted on its axis so that the ice caps are indeed melted and rather tropical for it's position in the solar system.

Not like today. As in, we have no idea if there were even micro organisms in this water. My bet there was. Possibly early forms of plant life, but nothing that had the ability to hunt.

Hoping to be proven wrong!

It almost feels as if most of the opinions about this are based on faulty understanding of Mars history (assuming people saying there is no water there, means there has never been water) and using this faulty understanding to take this news and go "AHHA! I knew it. They lied to us!" which makes me want to bang my head into a meat grinder.

Not this thread in particular, but I've seen it already...

Mars history? How do you know mars history? Nothing that could hunt? Thats just as wildly speculative as that there are humans there, and as crazy to say as obama went there.

Theres pictures of ice on mars. They say it gets up to 80 degrees. That means there is water. At the pressure they claim is on mars,which is basically a vacuum, wouldnt water sublimate? They said it was dry ice. Dry ice has to be minus 109 at our atmospheric presssure....probably colder in a vacuum? Whats the rated temperature range of those solar panels? Hmm? Also interesting to notice is the first lander was nuclear powered...like they expected solar panels to not work. All later landers until curiosity used solar panels. Curipsity has a freakin laser that can zap rocks 9 feet away? solar aint gonna power that lol

How do we know there arent oceans? Someone could easily make earth seem lifeless. Ah, that planets blue because the rocks are blue....

Originally posted by winofiend
It almost feels as if most of the opinions about this are based on faulty understanding of Mars history (assuming people saying there is no water there, means there has never been water) and using this faulty understanding to take this news and go "AHHA! I knew it. They lied to us!" which makes me want to bang my head into a meat grinder.

Not exactly. Rather talking of "flowing water" as opposed to ice caps that sublimate into water vapor.

It's just about the means that we have to have a look at it way over there, rather than all the different means that we have to look at it right here and now on earth. We do know that some deserts were once green paradises (or so to say), but are now dry rocky and sandy plains with no life on it. In the middle of the Sahara or in the Gobi desert, except for temperature and atmospheric pressure, you could think that you're on Mars.

If man could set foot there, we would probably find much more than what most expect now. Or not, but we'd have to be there to know for sure.

part of me hopes we find some kind of life on mars, but the other part hopes its completely void of life so we can crack on with colonizing and teraforming.

Originally posted by DaveNorris
part of me hopes we find some kind of life on mars, but the other part hopes its completely void of life so we can crack on with colonizing and teraforming.

We could have both. I suspect mars is earthlike..but a desert. Seems like itd be blue if it had oceans, right? If thats the case, it could support life, but probably not a civilization. From what ive seen of martian anomalies, i suspect a major civilization never existed, but that intelligent life was there for a while. Its not like weve seen skyscrapers or anything. So, in that case the life would all be extremely adapted for keeping in water....animals would try to eat the plants for water, plants would try to hoard it all and grow weapons. So basically itd be like arizona.

So wed just have to bring a lot of water. maybe we could steal it from a comet.

reply to post by DaveNorris

Terraforming?

We wouldn't know where to start.

Have you seen the frightful chains of unintended consequences that result from something as modest as a landscape-gardening project, right here on Earth? The idea that we can alter the ecologies of entire planets to our taste is a leftover from the science fiction of the 1950s and 1960s, when the military-industrial complex was in its heyday and technological hubris was rampant.

I am surprised people are not more excited about this. Sure, we have been speculating for a LONG time,but now it is confirmed. I, for one, have always believed water once (or still is) flowed on Mars. Now that it is solidified, I have more questions as to why it all went away.

Me = Stoked at this news!

Originally posted by TheSparrowSings
I am surprised people are not more excited about this. Sure, we have been speculating for a LONG time,but now it is confirmed.

Standing water was previously confirmed by the presence of gypsum, clay, and hematite -- all which only form in a watery environment.

Curiosity's landing site (Gale Crater) was specifically chosen because previous orbital analysis of the area indicated the presence of clay deposits -- which, as I said, need a watery environment to form. So the idea that Gale Crater once had large amounts of water (possibly was once a deep lake) was already confirmed prior to the arrival of Curiosity.

It will be interesting when Curiosity gets to the sides of Mount Sharp, because it is believed it could possibly find exposed layers of strata that were laid down as sediment within this lake that perhaps once filled Gale Crater.

I feel like all this news about Mars isn't really new. Haven't we learned about this in school already? lol

Originally posted by phroziac

Originally posted by DaveNorris
part of me hopes we find some kind of life on mars, but the other part hopes its completely void of life so we can crack on with colonizing and teraforming.

We could have both. I suspect mars is earthlike..but a desert. Seems like itd be blue if it had oceans, right? If thats the case, it could support life, but probably not a civilization. From what ive seen of martian anomalies, i suspect a major civilization never existed, but that intelligent life was there for a while. Its not like weve seen skyscrapers or anything. So, in that case the life would all be extremely adapted for keeping in water....animals would try to eat the plants for water, plants would try to hoard it all and grow weapons. So basically itd be like arizona.

So wed just have to bring a lot of water. maybe we could steal it from a comet.

You really need to do some research on Mars. It is not Earh like. You can't bring water OR an atmosphere to Mars as both would disappear. Feel free to research why.

Originally posted by TheSparrowSings
I am surprised people are not more excited about this. Sure, we have been speculating for a LONG time,but now it is confirmed. I, for one, have always believed water once (or still is) flowed on Mars. Now that it is solidified, I have more questions as to why it all went away.

Me = Stoked at this news!

Mars is a dead planet that is why. It does not have an active core. That means no magnetic shielding like Earth has, so the atmosphere has been stripped away.

Originally posted by OccamsRazor04

Mars is a dead planet that is why. It does not have an active core. That means no magnetic shielding like Earth has, so the atmosphere has been stripped away.

All the evidence of ancient volcanic activity show it once had an active core. Any theories as to why it died?

Originally posted by OccamsRazor04

Originally posted by phroziac

Originally posted by DaveNorris
part of me hopes we find some kind of life on mars, but the other part hopes its completely void of life so we can crack on with colonizing and teraforming.

We could have both. I suspect mars is earthlike..but a desert. Seems like itd be blue if it had oceans, right? If thats the case, it could support life, but probably not a civilization. From what ive seen of martian anomalies, i suspect a major civilization never existed, but that intelligent life was there for a while. Its not like weve seen skyscrapers or anything. So, in that case the life would all be extremely adapted for keeping in water....animals would try to eat the plants for water, plants would try to hoard it all and grow weapons. So basically itd be like arizona.

So wed just have to bring a lot of water. maybe we could steal it from a comet.

You really need to do some research on Mars. It is not Earh like. You can't bring water OR an atmosphere to Mars as both would disappear. Feel free to research why.

Thanks for not reading what i said. i posted a conspiracy theory on a conspiracy site. Duh!