Friday, January 16, 2009

Life on Mars?

Is there life on Mars? David Bowie asked this in his song by that name in 1973, but the question is much older than that. Well, nowadays, nobody expect to find green men - or green dogs - on the Red Planet, but there may be other forms of life there. NASA has detected large quantities of methane gas on Mars. This may be the result of geological activity, but it may also be the result of activity by some sort of primitive life. It will be interesting to get to know more.

Personally, I would not mind Mars being without life. A lifeless Mars would be open for colonization by dogs and humans without any risk of medical problems when facing Martian life or ethical problems on disturbing these native organisms. On the other hand, if there is life on Mars stopping dogs and humans from living there, there are many other places in the Solar System to colonize. During the second half of the 20th century, Shiba Inus left our native Japan to successfully conquer the Earth. It may be time to conquer more than that at least in a century or two.

1 comment:

Kuro said...

I think space is fascinating and I do think and hope there's some kind of life out there. The possibility of us being alone in the universe is very small.