Question of the Day, December 3, 2010

The Escapist Staff

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Question of the Day, December 3, 2010



Yesterday, NASA announced that it had discovered a revolutionary new arsenic-based life-form in a lake in California. It may not be E.T., but it could change the search for life outside our blue planet. Is it cool, or is it boring?

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Celtic_Kerr

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May 21, 2010
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I just can't seem to push it beyond the scope of interesting... If I knew what could COME of it, it might interest me more
 

Sjakie

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Feb 17, 2010
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I always find it cool when 'standard' human assumptions/science gets knocked off balance.
Keep a more open mind!

And yes, i was also hoping for alien life!
 

Dorian

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It is as amazing as anything on Earth could be discovered.

What we've been shown is that life is not you need these four things in just the right quantities otherwise fuck you.

This has potentially increased the number of possible life-supporting planets by a million fold, and a likewise increase in the possibility of finding sentient life.

And mind you, this discovery has been on our own planet. This just shows that instead of pie-in-the-sky goals of going to Mars right now, we ought to be exploring our oceans and lakes more. Who knows? There might be a primitive city of cuttlefish somewhere out in the Pacific, or penguin-like fish in the Arctic.

We simply don't know. This discovery proves it thousands of miles by far that we still don't know everything Earth, let alone extraterrestial locations.
 

ssgt splatter

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Oct 8, 2008
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Wait, I'm a little slow today. The big announcment was that they found some kind of arsenic based bacteria on earth in California?
Granted most, if not all life on earth is supposed to be carbon based that just seems underwhelming. If they discovered the bacteria in a sample of lunar or martian dirt from one of the probe/lunar landing missions then I'd be far more impressed.
 

Lizardon

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Mar 22, 2010
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Incredible. This shows that just because a planet doesn't have an environment similiar to earth, life could still potential exist. And now we will have to redefine what we classify as life.

And I love how the media blew the whole up, misinterpreting NASA's statement as an announcement of the discovery of aliens.
 

DPunch4

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Portal Maniac said:
It is as amazing as anything on Earth could be discovered.

What we've been shown is that life is not you need these four things in just the right quantities otherwise fuck you.

This has potentially increased the number of possible life-supporting planets by a million fold, and a likewise increase in the possibility of finding sentient life.

And mind you, this discovery has been on our own planet. This just shows that instead of pie-in-the-sky goals of going to Mars right now, we ought to be exploring our oceans and lakes more. Who knows? There might be a primitive city of cuttlefish somewhere out in the Pacific, or penguin-like fish in the Arctic.

We simply don't know. This discovery proves it thousands of miles by far that we still don't know everything Earth, let alone extraterrestial locations.
I was wondering why no one else realized that! Its amazing, people are stupid if they think otherwise.
 

_Janny_

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That is pretty darn wicked. I thought that they'd reveal something on another planet, but what do you know, our own little planet is still filled with surprises. Awesome!
 

Echo136

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Why is it we are so bent on trying to find intelligent life out in the cosmos. Wouldnt we be happy finding any life at all?
 

Canadamus Prime

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Jun 17, 2009
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So they discovered a new life form on this planet? I don't see how that is exactly world shattering news.
 

manythings

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It's NEW life, life we didn't even think could possibly exist. Even the idea of it was crazy talk before this. This is like Tesla talking about wireless internet when the most basic computational devices were being made. If you honestly can't get how huge this is you have zero imagination.

Echo136 said:
Why is it we are so bent on trying to find intelligent life out in the cosmos. Wouldnt we be happy finding any life at all?
Most people aren't happy about anything if it isn't exactly what they want it to be. Look at all the work on cancer most people still think there is A cure for cancer and don't get that there isn't JUST cancer. Normal people aren't made for science, that's why you don't let them into a lab environment, they'll just start demanding jet packs.

Also, on the topic of aliens, Stephen Hawking is probably right about us not drawing attention to ourselves. Aliens will most likely be assholes just like us.
 

manythings

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canadamus_prime said:
So they discovered a new life form on this planet? I don't see how that is exactly world shattering news.
It's life that most scientist's never believed could exist, we're talking about finding a herd of Unicorns.
 

MMMowman

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Mar 9, 2009
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It's room temp. Why is it not cool I'll prove it. What is the name of the organism found? I'll give you a sec... anyone? Exactly. If you can't even remember the name who's to say you'll remember it three months time.
 

Zhukov

The Laughing Arsehole
Dec 29, 2009
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Well... I was kinda hoping for Asari.

But, eh, it'll do for now. At least the biologists will have something to talk about.