NASA Scientist Claims to Have Found Evidence of Extraterrestrial Life

[Josh123914]

I'd be more impressed if something like this didn't occur every few months...

Ninja'd

Still, it's nice to know I was alive when the Human race answered one of the 4 great questions.

ok, excuse my ignorance but what are the other 3 great queastions?

Captcha words: Chaos Emeralds(looks like something enjoys Sonic games)

 

[Realitycrash]

Okey, once again; When they are intelligent enough to have a conversation with, let us know. In the mean time, NASA, stop hyping bacteria as "extra terrestrial life".

 

[Thedutchjelle]

Just like that 'arsenic bacteria" ? That was highly critized because it's quite possibly caused by an error of the lab personell.

This is probably the same deal - perhaps the asteroid/rock was contaminated when they dragged it out of wherever it fell.

I'm no scientist but can they clone alien dna, jurrasic park style? That would be awesome, havin a little alien bacteria! Please, anyone with any sciemtific knowledge answer?

Impossible. If it is alien, it is _extremely_ unlikely that it's DNA has the same chemical composition as terrestial DNA. I'm not sure that matters though - I doubt that any genetic material will stay intact during such a journey through space + reentry of the atmosphere.

It is important to point out that if you look at ANYTHING under a scanning electron microscope, you can see features that look lifelike.

Garbage.

Spoiler: Random image found on the internet after searching 'SEM images plastic. HOLY CRAP ITS ALIEN WORMS

WORMS oh actually just plastic

Edit:

Ok, I've gone through the article a bit. I'm not a cosmologist, but I do publish scientific articles in journals for a living. And "peer reviewed" does not mean "good." The first red flag is that this paper is available for free from the journal. The top multidisciplinary journal on earth is Science. Check it out at http://www.sciencemag.org. Neat huh? Try to read an article.

Ohhhh, you can't, unless you are in a library or at a university, or otherwise have some kind of subscription or are a AAAS member. Sometimes they'll hand the articles out to just anyone, but usually not. Theres rules for all that. This is an open publication journal. The idea sounds attractive on paper; lets have journals designed to get pioneering papers to the public faster! This isn't meant to get information to the public, this is meant to make a splash in the news media. This paper will go on the pile with all the other mineralized fossil bacteria from mars papers and everyone

The last time "life" was found that did get into Science. Turns out it was just funny wiggly things in SEM images. Oh look! These are funny wiggly things in SEM images. With chemicals on them! I forgot to properly clean some silicon wafers a few months back, and when I analyzed the surfaces by EDS I found all sorts of nitrogen, carbon, oxygen. Its called "shit that gets all over everything because you are on the planet earth, and probably anywhere else in the universe"

Where this manuscript starts grinding my gears is the random figures and images are thrown in there. Throw in enough figures and anything looks legit. The pictures of comets and meteroites and moons and what not? Utterly useless, and would not be included in a proper scientific manuscript.

I like this post

 

[Realitycrash]

I'd be more impressed if something like this didn't occur every few months...

Ninja'd

Still, it's nice to know I was alive when the Human race answered one of the 4 great questions.

ok, excuse my ignorance but what are the other 3 great queastions?

4. Is time travel possible?

3. Are we alone in the universe?

2. Is there life after death?

1. What is the meaning of life/The Universe/Everything?

Why? is a bit unclear. so I edited it.

..And we already have an answer for that.

 

[Anti Nudist Cupcake]

I don't get the people who "hope" this is real, what hope or joy do you get from the knowledge that there are lifeforms elsewhere? What does it matter?

The idea, as best I can express it, is that a general factual acknowledgement by the public at large of our adjusted place in the universe (not alone, potentially IMMINENT threats and opportunities out there in the vast expanses between the planets and stars) could lead to a substantial increase in science funding the world over: something that is sorely needed.

So a bunch of gamers really really really care about the funds scientists are getting?



Okay......

Unless your'e talking about funding for, say, how to destroy or divert a meteor on a collision course with earth, that is funding I can understand people would want scientists to receive.

But I doubt that a bunch of gamers really care about that and are more excited about this because "ooooooh! Aliens!"

 

[Jamous]

Not everyone is convinced, of course. Dr. David Marais, an astrobiologist at NASA's AMES Research Center, says that similar claims have been made before and proven wrong - and that a discovery of this magnitude will need solid evidence rather than conjecture. "It's an extraordinary claim, and thus I'll need extraordinary evidence," Marais said. Until the claims could be independently verified, said Marais, this was merely a "potential signature of life." Which is still pretty huge, if you ask me. But then again, I'm not a scientist.

Is it really such an extraordinary claim that life could exist on other places than earth? Or does she mean this particular example? Because, while I can agree with her if she means this particular example, looking at the size of the universe that we know at the moment, it really is more likely that there is other life -somewhere-. I think Steven Hawking hypothesized that, there should be several billion planets with the capability of life, like the Earth throughout the universe, and at least some of those should have actual life on. Which is fucking AWESOME.

 

[Stevepinto3]

Ok, I've gone through the article a bit. I'm not a cosmologist, but I do publish scientific articles in journals for a living. And "peer reviewed" does not mean "good." The first red flag is that this paper is available for free from the journal. The top multidisciplinary journal on earth is Science. Check it out at http://www.sciencemag.org. Neat huh? Try to read an article.

Ohhhh, you can't, unless you are in a library or at a university, or otherwise have some kind of subscription or are a AAAS member. Sometimes they'll hand the articles out to just anyone, but usually not. Theres rules for all that. This is an open publication journal. The idea sounds attractive on paper; lets have journals designed to get pioneering papers to the public faster! This isn't meant to get information to the public, this is meant to make a splash in the news media. This paper will go on the pile with all the other mineralized fossil bacteria from mars papers and everyone

The last time "life" was found that did get into Science. Turns out it was just funny wiggly things in SEM images. Oh look! These are funny wiggly things in SEM images. With chemicals on them! I forgot to properly clean some silicon wafers a few months back, and when I analyzed the surfaces by EDS I found all sorts of nitrogen, carbon, oxygen. Its called "shit that gets all over everything because you are on the planet earth, and probably anywhere else in the universe"

Where this manuscript starts grinding my gears is the random figures and images are thrown in there. Throw in enough figures and anything looks legit. The pictures of comets and meteroites and moons and what not? Utterly useless, and would not be included in a proper scientific manuscript.

Agreed. Real scientific journals don't throw that stuff in there, and this "journal" just kind of added them in totally meaningless ways. They don't contribute to it besides saying "Hey look, that kinda resembles something you remember from Bio 110, right?".

Further, check out the advertisements on the top and bottom of the page. Real Journals do not advertise books that you can purchase on Amazon. The books aren't even for fully developed fields of study. Abiogenesis is essentially a hypothesis that's still being developed due to how hard it is to actually find any research or evidence on the origins of life. And as for "Life on Earth Came from Other Planets", this is again an unsupported claim, one even less tenable than abiogenesis.

Now, I would love for this article to be true. Really, I would. It would be a fascinating discovery. But this kind of stuff happens ALL THE TIME. Someone thinks they have made some amazing break through or discovery, only to realize a week later that they're just hyping up some vague research. One example was only a few months ago, when the media started announcing NASA has discovered some kind of new life in arsenic pools or whatnot in California. The claim was that arsenic was part of this bacteria's DNA, which would have been pretty remarkable. But two days later, WOOPS! Turns out that no one reporting it actually read the paper, and no where did they confirm that the bacteria had arsenic-DNA, simply that it managed to survive in environments with arsenic. The DNA bit was just pure speculation. This is when hype ruins science.

Another famous case? Look up "Cold Fusion" on Wikipedia. Seriously, this stuff happens every now and then. If the media thinks it's some kind of "Earth-shaking-discovery" odds are it's crap. Oh, and they announced this on Fox. I think most gamers are aware of their journalistic standards. Just sayin'.

 

[Joshimodo]

I for one welcome our new microscopic overlords.

 

[ImprovizoR]

Fossils of alien bacteria? Does this sound like a horror scenario involving body snatching bacterias to anyone?

 

[v3n0mat3]

I was kinda hoping for something bigger than a bacteria. And by the looks of most of my fellow posters, so were they. Oh, well. At least bacteria is something.

 

[Bloodstain]

If this is real: Yay science!

If not: Aww. Yay science anyway.

I for one welcome our new microscopic overlords.

Thanks for making me laugh.

 

[klasbo]

-snip-

The last time "life" was found that did get into Science. Turns out it was just funny wiggly things in SEM images. Oh look! These are funny wiggly things in SEM images. With chemicals on them! I forgot to properly clean some silicon wafers a few months back, and when I analyzed the surfaces by EDS I found all sorts of nitrogen, carbon, oxygen. Its called "shit that gets all over everything because you are on the planet earth, and probably anywhere else in the universe"

-snip-

Now, I would love for this article to be true. Really, I would. It would be a fascinating discovery. But this kind of stuff happens ALL THE TIME. Someone thinks they have made some amazing break through or discovery, only to realize a week later that they're just hyping up some vague research. One example was only a few months ago, when the media started announcing NASA has discovered some kind of new life in arsenic pools or whatnot in California. The claim was that arsenic was part of this bacteria's DNA, which would have been pretty remarkable. But two days later, WOOPS! Turns out that no one reporting it actually read the paper, and no where did they confirm that the bacteria had arsenic-DNA, simply that it managed to survive in environments with arsenic. The DNA bit was just pure speculation. This is when hype ruins science.

Agree with you both: this is the work of a hype machine. He went with it to Fox News for crying out loud.

I skimmed the paper, and as far as I understood the core argument was this (correct me if I skimmed too fast, but it was skimming after all): There is "too little" nitrogen in the (claimed) bacteria for them to have decayed "naturally" in a period of <150 years (the age of the meteorites studied). Even trilobites have more nitrogen (per mass) in them than these bacteria. Also, the bacteria seem to be "embedded" in the rock matrix, suggesting that they were there when the meteorite landed. His excessively extrapolated conclusion is aliens. Yea. Because we don't have rock-eating bacteria on earth, and nitrogen isn't kinda reactive.

Also, I feel I need to mention this as well: in my opinion, The Journal of Cosmology has published articles in the past that can charitably be called "shaky" (like this anti-Big Bang paper [http://journalofcosmology.com/Cosmology4.html]). One of their editors, Chandra Wickramasinghe, has made some pretty outrageous claims [http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2010/10/27/is-nasa-hiding-life-on-mars-i-seriously-doubt-it/] about NASA and life in space (links to some of his other odd claims can be found at that page as well). However, this does not necessarily mean that Hoover?s work is any more suspect than any other scientific claim! But it does mean I will cast an especially-skeptical eye on claims made in papers published by them. Others agree [http://koppernigk.net/2011/03/05/what-about-claims-of-extraterrestrial-life-in-the-journal-of-cosmology/] as well.

Source [http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2011/03/05/has-life-been-found-in-a-meteorite/]
Also, the Journal of Cosmology is going out of business [http://daviddobbs.posterous.com/journal-of-cosmology-going-out-with-big-bang]. Don't draw any hasty conclusions, their business model is rather strange from the start.

PS: thiosk: your choice of career and taste in comics both make me happy.

 

[BENZOOKA]

It would've been cool if it were something, exactly like ALF

 

[JDKJ]

Does this mean that Pfizer's going to develop and market anti-alienbiotics?

 

[Bloodstain]

I don't get the people who "hope" this is real, what hope or joy do you get from the knowledge that there are lifeforms elsewhere? What does it matter?

The idea, as best I can express it, is that a general factual acknowledgement by the public at large of our adjusted place in the universe (not alone, potentially IMMINENT threats and opportunities out there in the vast expanses between the planets and stars) could lead to a substantial increase in science funding the world over: something that is sorely needed.

So a bunch of gamers really really really care about the funds scientists are getting?



Okay......

Unless your'e talking about funding for, say, how to destroy or divert a meteor on a collision course with earth, that is funding I can understand people would want scientists to receive.

But I doubt that a bunch of gamers really care about that and are more excited about this because "ooooooh! Aliens!"

Some people (including me) are fairly interested in the world we live in. I don't think playing video games has anything to do with that, so it doesn't matter if it's "a bunch of gamers".
Besides, what is wrong with "ooooooh! Aliens!"?

 

[Sarah Kerrigan]

Well it ain't no Predators, but this is pretty big news. I hope this is real. I truly do.

[sub]Though I do want Predators...[/sub]

 

[FungiGamer]

Look at the source

FOX NEWS

I rest my case, move along everyone nothing to see here