Nasa expects to find alien life in 5 years

I came across this article Are we alone? Nasa expects the answer soon

It says that Nasa is expecting to find earth like planets that could contain alien life. Ofcourse we on ATS already knew that. But what I find strange is that later when they find such a planet they are going to build a telscope which is going to look if there is carbon dioxide. And I think the chance is so small thet they will find it that its a waste of moneyand time. Because the aliens could be more advanced than us or they could be less advanced than us. But to be precisally equally advanced that chance is very small. So they are delaying it.

I think in our lifetime we shouldn't except to find proof of advanced alien lifeform. Sadly we also don't need to except disclosure.

That is an interesting find, and one which fits into my personal perspective on disclosure. I think it is pretty obvious to those paying attention that NASA is complicit in a gradual, controlled release of information about alien life.

For whatever reason, they are moving... glacially.... slow....

I remember when they sent the second set of rovers up to Mars and I thought, "oh great, they're finally going to search for microbial life in the soil." and you know what? NASA purposefully OMITTED the kinds of instruments that could easily check soil for signs of life. "That's for a future mission".

What kind of brain-dead scientists send up a 100 million dollar probe to mars and then neglect to put simple sensors on it that can answer the question definitively, "Is there life on Mars?"

Now we have this Kepler satellite, looking for planets. It finishes its survey later in 2010, when I'm sure NASA will say "Oh yeah, we found 9000+ earth-like planets in the galactic neighborhood. Then a few years after that, confirmation of an atmosphere, then a few years after that, maybe a signal from SETI.

It is all a controlled release of information. The people involved in the cover-up already know definitively if there was ever life on mars (chances are, yes). Official science won't tell us about it until there is a political reason to do so.

THE GOOD NEWS: press releases like this suggest NASA is eventually going to be part of disclosure.

THE BAD NEWS: it is taking so darned long.

i read this in the sun news paper today, seems discosure is being seeped out slowly but surely,

Is it possible that a disclosure right now would mean imprisonment for many people who are way deep in the cover up? Is it possible that the many government employees are releasing information slowly because they feel its wrong to keep this from the public and at the same time they dont want to cross their leaders? Hell I was an infantry soldier in the Army and I did not carry out half the orders that was given to me...

NASA already Know!

Why wait other five years?

reply to post by UFOexisist
That is a downright lazy piece of writing by the author of your link. He refers to 'four or five years' without referencing anyone else saying it. As far as anyone can tell from the article, the only guy guessing 4 or five years is him.

"The fundamental question is: Are we alone? For the first time, there's an optimism that sometime in our lifetimes we're going to get to the bottom of that," said Simon "Pete" Worden, an astronomer who heads NASA's Ames Research Center. "If I were a betting man, which I am, I would bet we're not alone - there is a lot of life."

'In our lifetime' is the phrase he uses. Anyway...criticism over. It's good to see these important people of NASA sharing the optimism so many of us on ATS feel. I'm hoping the next ESA/NASA mission to Mars will reveal that the methane is biological in origin. It's a small hope, but I'm jaded and cynical.

Following that it would be cool for Kepler or any observatory to go all out front-page hysterical with...OMFG!!!! Definitive evidence found of intelligent life!!! ZOMG!!

I'm not ready for meeting aliens unless they are 100% friendly and 100% not devious....and bring light sabres in many sizes and colors. I want a pocket light sabre for peeling fruit

reply to post by UFOexisist


Heres the thing though: There is no reason to suggest that the intelligent species on any given planet will conform to the ideas of the science community . The only way to know for certain what is on a given planet is to look with optical devices, not gas examining lazers and stuff like that !

[snip] NASA, we already know you guys discoverd aliens already, dont try to covered up your tracks



Removed profanity

Please read Vulgarity and The Automatic ATS Censors


[edit on 9/1/10 by masqua]

Originally posted by UFOexisist
I came across this article Are we alone? Nasa expects the answer soon

It says that Nasa is expecting to find earth like planets that could contain alien life.

Astronomers say they are on the verge of finding planets like Earth orbiting other stars, a key step in determining if we are alone in the universe.

I know a little of this technology and it still seems like quite a challenge to find Earth-like planets. Use our solar system as an example, the Sun is roughly a little over 100x the diameter of Earth, over 10,000 times the surface area and over a million times the volume. I think the apparent area is what matters, so that puts us in the ballpark of the 10,000 factor. So someone else trying to detect our earth passing in front of our sun will see a slight dimming of the sun by maybe a factor of 1 in 10,000? Isn't this really, really hard to do?

And if say Mars once had life and could be considered an Earth-like planet, it's even smaller and therefore harder to detect.

Anyway there's a big gap between detecting an Earth-like planet and confirming that planet has life, so we have the means to detect the former but the latter could be a challenge.

Regarding the conspiracy theorists who think NASA has already discovered life, are you referring to this? nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov...

Evidence of Ancient Martian Life in Meteorite ALH84001?

If you're referring to something else I'd appreciate details, or possibly you are fantasizing that they know something they don't.

It would be nice if they would confirm life on Mars, but I don't think the life detecting experiments are as simple as one poster inferred.

We also might find life on one of Jupiter's moons such as Europa, where the heat generated from Jupiter's gravity might warm up the moon enough for liquid water to exist there.

Maybe the senior NASA official is right and we will detect an Earth-like planet within 5 years, but I doubt we will know if that planet has life or not when it's discovered, that would take longer to determine I think.

We also have to consider the possibility that life elsewhere may not be like life as we know it, so it could be hard to recognize, and may occur on planets other than Earth-like planets, but it seems like a good idea to search for life as we know it first, since we really don't know exactly what to look for otherwise.

reply to post by Arbitrageur


Disregard the last post.



[edit on 9-1-2010 by Lacenaire]

reply to post by TrueBrit

Heres the thing though: There is no reason to suggest that the intelligent species on any given planet will conform to the ideas of the science community . The only way to know for certain what is on a given planet is to look with optical devices, not gas examining lazers and stuff like that !

Not necessarily so if you think about it. It's more about what definition of 'intelligent life' we use. It would be hard to detect marine lifeforms (e.g. dolphins) using astronomy or optical devices. They have no discernible effect on a planetary atmosphere or surface.

If the 'intelligent life' criteria was focused on 'intelligent life' that was instrumental on it's environment...spectrum analysis would be the way to go. It's inevitable that in the near future (a lifetime) we'll be able to analyze the composition of planetary atmospheres in search of familiar signatures of 'artificial' pollution.

The effect of proto-lifeforms on the atmosphere is evident in our fossil record. As the prokaryotes and eukaryotes began to thrive in the oceans, the atmosphere changed and became more oxygenated. The composition of the Earth's atmosphere from then would provide a rough benchmark to look for. Add to that our current atmosphere with its elements that indicate industrialization and we have a broad spectrum to search within.

From detecting a planet in the 'Goldilocks zone' with an atmosphere, it's inevitable that we would then use spectrum analysis to look for signs of industrialization.

Let's face it, the nearest possible planets are so distant that we are unlikely to be able to see anything using 'naked eye' telescopes...no matter what advances are made in technology. Analyzing atmosphere for familiar signatures is the only game in town so far.

Sure...it's possible that life will take many forms and some may be unfamiliar to our own evolution. 'It's life Jim, but not as we know it!' The thing is, we can only look for what we can recognize.

I am willing to bet that NASA are preparing to find life a lot closer to home with the launch of Curiosity rover in 2011 .
science.nasa.gov...

reply to post by Arbitrageur


Its just the usual crew on here that can not only say YES life is out there but some on here are in contact,know all the local races by star sytem how their crafts travel the name of the races what they look like you get the picture THEY never have any real proof of any of this but lets humour them

Nasa has already found Alien life imo and have covered it up for years and years.