THOTH A Catastrophics Newsletter VOL VI, No 5 Aug 30, 2002 EDITOR: Amy Acheson PUBLISHER: Michael Armstrong LIST MANAGER: Brian Stewart CONTENTS BACK TO BASICS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Mel Acheson MICROBES IN GEOLOGY: part 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . Earl Staelin WATER ON MARS? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Wal Thornhill >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>-----<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< BACK TO BASICS By Mel Acheson Newton, Einstein, Darwin and the other early explorers of science discovered the "New World" of fundamental laws of reality, and the scientists who have come after them are mere colonists. Continuing this line of thought, John Horgan writes in THE END OF SCIENCE that the latecomers have only two choices: to apply those fundamental discoveries in the construction of derivative theories or "to pursue science in a speculative, post-empirical mode that I call ironic science.... [Ironic science] offers points of view, opinions, which are, at best, interesting, which provoke further comment. But it doesn't converge on the truth. It cannot achieve empirically verifiable surprises that force scientists to make substantial revisions in their basic description of reality." Horgan classifies most modern theories as ironic science: superstring theory and the inflationary big bang and punctuated equilibrium. This interesting opinion provokes me to make a couple of further comments. A "basic description of reality" is not the same thing as "fundamental laws". Fundamental laws are generalities. Reality is concrete. A description of reality asserts, among other things, which fundamental law applies in which real situation. Between the laws and reality lies the description, in which scientists select which laws to apply. The accepted description of reality in astronomy asserts that only the law of gravity applies in space. The law can be Newton's or it can be Einstein's, but it cannot be Darwin's law of evolution. A description of astronomical reality based on Darwin's law probably wouldn't make any sense, but the point is that one law is selected and another is not. Even the particle physicists who lately have invaded astronomy select only certain fundamental laws on which to construct their basic description of atomic reality. This business of selection is so simple as to be not worth mentioning. But not mentioning it leads to not paying attention to it, which leads to skipping over it in the occasional circumstance when it may be important. My next comment, of course, is that it's important now. Horgan and the scientists he interviewed for his book have overlooked a deeper irony. While the theories of ironic science have been unable to "achieve empirically verifiable surprises", experimental and observational science has produced a flood of them. Nearly every discovery of the space age, from the Van Allen radiation belts around the Earth to the high velocity winds around Neptune, has been announced as a surprise. And the surprises have been surprising precisely because they haven't verified the prevailing "basic description of reality." One might think a reasonable plan in this circumstance would be to take a second look at the fundamental laws selected for one's description. One doesn't have to resort to anything as ridiculous as considering Darwin's law: For instance, the laws of electromagnetism have been lying around for over a century, mostly ignored (because "you can't get charge separation in space") except by a few electrical engineers. The problem is that scientists are like the horse led to water: Neither the failure of ironic science to achieve empirical surprises nor the failure of achieved empirical surprises to verify the accepted description can force scientists to drink basic revisions if they don't want to. Selection is the result of wanting to choose, and if you want to defend a theory you can always find expedient excuses. Almost nothing outside the solar system and a lot of things inside it don't obey either Einstein's or Newton's law of gravity: E.g., the stars in the arms of spiral galaxies revolve at about the same velocity instead of slowing down with distance as gravity predicts. To make these observations fit the gravitational description of reality, astronomers have chosen to hedge the fundamental law with a thicket of ironic "opinions" and "points of view" that are not empirical: There might be appropriately configured halos of unseen "dark" matter outside the galaxies that produce the observed velocities. This avoids the necessity of questioning fundamentals. But it turns the basic description of reality into an imaginative fantasy that is explanatory but neither verifiable nor falsifiable. Modern theories, with appropriate adjustments, can explain everything and anything, just as psychoanalysis, with childhood trauma, the dark matter of the mind, can explain any behavior. However, the point of science is not merely to explain but to find out which explanation is actually the case. For that, you need more than one explanation from which to choose. This object might be a black hole; that object might be dark matter. Having disallowed competition from fundamentally different theories, there's no way to tell if those objects might be something else. Verification alone is inadequate: You need to search for alternatives and to test them to gain reliability. (See "The Epistemology of Error" by Douglas Allchin.) Planting more hedges of ad hoc hypotheses around the fundamental law of gravity may appeal to ironic scientists. But other scientists, mostly outside astronomy, are more inclined toward empirical results. The new field of plasma cosmology has admitted Maxwell's laws of electromagnetism to the description of astronomical reality. The properties of electrical discharges applied to the phenomena of space by such pioneers as Birkeland, Langmuir, and Alfven explain the new discoveries without ironic fantasies. The revised description expects the observations that are surprising to the standard gravity-only version. And this electrical description is directly verifiable in plasma labs. Dark matter and ten-dimensional superstrings are not. The reality we think we see is constantly being revised by what we actually see of a partially known reality. (See, e.g., "The Sensory Order" by F.A. Hayek.) Usually the revisions are superficial. But there have been times in the history of thought when the revisions have reached to the basics. Plasma cosmology hasn't discovered a new fundamental law. It merely replaces one law (gravity) with another (electromagnetism). But the effect on the basic description of astronomical reality is as great as if a new law had been discovered: We think we see an entirely new reality. This shouldn't be a surprise. The space age has brought substantial revisions in instrumentation, allowing us to sense the entire electromagnetic spectrum from radio wavelengths to gamma wavelengths. For the first time in human history, we are not restricted to an anthropocentric sensory viewpoint. The space age has also brought substantial revisions in location, allowing us to sense the cosmos from positions off the Earth's surface. For the first time in human history, we are not restricted to a geocentric positional viewpoint. We should expect these revisions in basic viewpoint to be accompanied by a revision in the basic description of the reality viewed. The ultimate irony would be that, in the face of our liberation from an anthropocentric and geocentric viewpoint, we would be unable or unwilling to liberate ourselves from a traditional way of thinking about reality. Mel Acheson thoth at whidbey.com ************************************************************ MICROBES IN GEOLOGY By Earl Staelin THE AMAZING ROLE OF MICROBES IN GEOLOGY: ARE BIOLOGICAL TRANSMUTATIONS INVOLVED? Copyright, July, 2002 EXCERPTS: The past twenty years has witnessed a revolution in geology-the discovery that microorganisms or microbes play a major role in many geological processes in the crust of the earth. The evidence goes back over 200 years ... [forcing] Geologists to take a new look at old problems in which microbes appear to play a prominent part. [Among these are] the formation of limestone, petrified wood and bone; the formation of elements such as hydrogen, carbon, oxygen, magnesium, calcium, silica, aluminum, phosphorus, chlorine, and sulphur; the formation of heavy metals such as iron, manganese, silver, and gold, the origin of geodes, and the formation of natural gas and other hydrocarbons. In recognition of these discoveries university departments are popping up with new names such as geomicrobiology. Some of these startling findings challenge our understanding of certain laws of physics and thermodynamics as applied to biology, because it appears that the nuclei of elements may be altered and recombined so as to produce other elements. Henry Ehrlich, author of the textbook GEOMICROBIOLOGY said "we're still at the very beginning of understanding how microbes shaped the planet." (NY Times, 10/15/96). Stephen Jay Gould has written with approval and considerable awe over such evidence in his book Full House, and cites evidence that microbes in the earth's crust and ocean live up to several miles deep in the earth's crust, in temperatures up to 650 F, and under pressures up to 265 atmospheres (Full House, p. 189). Microbes may even outweigh all other living matter including trees. As William J. Broad, science writer for the New York Times wrote: "In hundreds and perhaps thousands of cases, scientists are discovering that microbes dwelling up to miles deep in the planetary crust are responsible for creating and arranging the rocks, seas, gases, metals and minerals that make up the Earth's surface." (William J. Broad, "Microbes likely had vital role in shaping Earth's outer crust", New York Times, Oct. 15, 1996.) According to William A. Fyfe, an environmental geochemist at the University of Western Ontario, 20 years ago there were about 40 or 50 compounds that were known to be made or amassed by microbes, sometimes as excreta or body parts, just as humans concentrate calcium to make teeth and bones. "Today the number is hundreds" he said. "Every time we look harder, we find more." (Broad, NY Times, ibid.) Thomas Gold, eminent scientist at Cornell University, originator in 1948 with Hoyle and Bondi of the steady state universe theory (which may be making a comeback), and the theory that pulsars are neutron stars, has written a recent book that gives significant support to the role of microorganisms in geological processes. (Gold, The Deep Hot Biosphere (1999) p. 131). He says: "Indeed the problem is so great that answers are promoted piecemeal-some chemical reactions are proposed for the solution and deposition of one metal, and a different set is proposed for another. Piecemeal answers are especially questionable when there is a group of metals involved, and a different path is proposed for each of them., yet they are often packed closely together." (p. 132) The scientific evidence shows that microbes play a major role in a wide variety of geological and paleontological formations, and mineral and hydrocarbon deposits, and that they often perform these transformations rapidly, that is, within a few years, or even in weeks or days. Let's begin by looking at some of the well documented roles of microbes in geology. Limestone gets its name because of the high percentage of calcium or lime in it. Ehrlich's textbook contains a detailed discussion and excellent microscopic photos of numerous bacteria, fungi, and lichens inhabiting and altering limestone. (3rd Ed., pp. 200-204). It appears that microbes also may play a major role in the creation of limestone, which I will discuss later. PRESERVATION OF FOSSILS. British and French scientists propose that microbes are responsible for the preservation of ancient soft tissues, by turning them into rock. (Wilby, P.R., Briggs, D.E.G., Riou, B., "Mineralization of soft-bodied invertebrates in a Jurassic metalliferous deposit," Geology, September, 1996, v. 24, no. 9, pp. 847-850). When the bacteria form apatite, the fossil is preserved at the subcellular, microscopic level. (Apatite is the chief mineral, a form of calcium phosphate, from which our bones are composed) "(W)here soft tissues are preserved in pyrite [iron sulfide] and other minerals, only their outline usually survives. A progressive sequence of fossilization caused by microbes appears as follows: apatite [calcium phosphate] calcite [calcium carbonate] ± gypsum [calcium sulfate] pyrite [iron sulfide] ± chalcopyrite [copper iron sulfide] galena [lead sulfide]. Laboratory experiments show that the mineralization of soft tissues in apatite occurs within two to four weeks after death". (p. 849) (Parenthetical matter [] added). Transformation of apatite to other minerals also occurred at an early stage. (loc. cit.). Petrified Wood. In 1975 Richard F. Leo published his Ph.D. thesis at Harvard entitled Silification of Wood. He found that silification of wood may occur rather rapidly, such as a wood specimen taken by Leo from a spring in Yellowstone Park, Wyoming which the author said could not have been in the spring more than 13 years, since the spring came into being 13 years before as a result of an earthquake. The author speculates about the mechanism of silification or petrification, and reaches no firm conclusions. He did not seriously consider the role of microbes, perhaps because it was not until several years later that knowledge of the role of microbes in geological processes became more widespread. However, he says that the presence of water is necessary for the process. Of course water would also be necessary for microbes. Leo assumes that silica comes into the tree from outside, however, such as from sand deposits in which the tree rests. Later experiments using bacteria or yeasts such as the residue of beer to cause petrification of wood have reported petrification within three years. These experiments used wood soaked in beer-making residue and embedded in sand. The moisture must be sufficient for the microbes but not so great as to cause the wood to rot. Leo points out that "beer, due to the malt husk, is essentially a saturated solution of silica," citing Iler, 1955 (p. 74). Of course fossilized trees would not have been immersed in beer. There is another potential source of petrified silica in the wood itself, which I will discuss later, and which might better explain why the subcellular structure of the wood or of fossils is often preserved than the assumption that the silica migrated from outside the wood. GOLD AND SILVER. The Serra Pelada is a famous gold field in the Amazon jungle, where prospectors have extracted more than 100 tons of gold since it was discovered in the early 1980's. Scientists concluded that the rich lode was produced by swarms of microbes that "concentrated" the gold from soils, rivers, and rocks (Broad, supra). Southam and associates made some excellent microscopic photos of gold octahedral crystals produced by microbes. In one study ionic gold was transformed in several steps by bacteria into crystalline octahedral gold containing 85% gold. In the latter two stages the gold increased from 75% to 85%, while sulfur declined from 9% to 1%, and phosphorus decreased from 14% to 10%. (Gordon Southam and Terrance J. Beveridge, "The occurrence of sulfur and phosphorus within bacterially derived crystalline and pseudocrystalline octahedral gold formed in vitro," (Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta, Vol. 60, No. 22, pp. 4369-4376, 1966). The roughly 13% increase in gold within a short period of time, accompanied by comparable decreases in S and P is an interesting finding that may reflect a complex transmutation into gold, possibly involving sulfur and phosphorus. When the experiment was extended to four weeks at room temperature, or when the temperature was raised from room temperature to 60 C or 90 C, the octahedral gold was increased. The ionic gold used at the start of the experiment killed the bacteria within seconds, and the bacteria had to be replenished. Octahedral gold is an important constituent of placer gold, which forms nuggets. The octahedral gold contains spheres representing the bacteria. The authors state: "The gold has increased in size one thousandfold and now dominates the bacterial cells they were once inside." (p. 4528) (Southam and Beveridge, "The in vitro formation of placer gold by bacteria", Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta, Vol. 58, No. 20, pp. 4527-4530, 1994). (Southam is a biologist at Northern Arizona University, and Beveridge is a microbiologist at University of Guelph, Ontario, Canada. Thomas Gold points out that gold in mineral deposits is concentrated "a million or even a hundred million times greater than in the source of composite from which it came". (Ibid., p. 131). He says: "Indeed the problem is so great that answers are promoted piecemeal-some chemical reactions are proposed for the solution and deposition of one metal, and a different set is proposed for another. Piecemeal answers are especially questionable when there is a group of metals involved, and a different path is proposed for each of them., yet they are often packed closely together." (p. 132) It appears that silver may also be produced by microbes. I took a photo of a rock at the Colorado School of Mines museum. The silver deposit in the rock is shaped like deposits produced by lichens or other microbes. That would be consistent with Ehrlich's and Southam's findings regarding gold deposits and microbes. Probably the high pressures (up to 265 atmospheres) and temperatures (up to 650 F) deep within the earth provide added energy that helps cause such reactions, as Gold believes, although he says that the cost to do studies at such pressures and temperatures is rather prohibitive. These pressures also allow water to be liquid at temperatures far exceeding the boiling point, and far exceeding 451 degrees F, which is the temperature at which a match will cause a piece of paper to catch on fire. Such a liquid or flow state appears to be essential for life, whereas temperatures and pressures may vary widely. Gold also says: "It is generally believed that microbes can build concentrated deposits of a wide variety of minerals" (ibid., p. 138, citing Barry S.C. Leadbeater and Robert Riding, eds. Biomineralization in Lower Plants and Animals.", Clarendon, Oxford, England, p. 4; also Lynn Margulis and Dorion Sagan, What is Life? Simon and Schuster, N.Y., 1995. Here are a few more examples of the hundreds of other mineral deposits that the evidence indicates were formed by microbes: Magnetite; phosphates; carbonates; sulfates; metal sulfides (pyrite, galena [lead sulfide]); quartz; clay; graphite; etc., copper ores, iron ore, vanadium, nickel, etc. Natural gas, hydrocarbons, and petroleum. Anna M. Martini and co- workers at the University of Michigan and Martin Schoell of Chevron studied deposits of methane in the Antrim shale along the northern margin of the Michigan basin at depths of less than 600 meters and found evidence that significant volumes of bacterial gas were generated, supplementing previous findings that methane of bacterial origin is "ubiquitous in marine and fresh water sediments," though mainly at depths of several kilometres in basins that had high sedimentation rates. Anna M. Martini, et al., "Microbial generation of economic accumulations of methane within a shallow organic-rich shale," (Nature, Vol. 383, 155-158, Sept. 12, 1996). The gases from the Antrim shale vary from pure methane to approximately 5% hydrocarbons with two or more carbon atoms. The authors conclude: "Non-conventional gas resources, such as coal beds and organic rich shales have largely been attributed to thermogenic (i.e. non-microbial) processes, yet they may contain far more microbial gas than previously believed" (ibid., p. 157). (that is, microbes produce a lot of methane and some longer chain hydrocarbons) RADIOACTIVITY. Scientists have found bacteria that can withstand lethal levels of radioactivity. One example is a bacterium that can support ten million roentgens (x-ray units of measure) for eight hours, or 20,000 times the mortal dose for humans of 500 roentgens. This bacterium, of the Pseudomonas type, was discovered in 1958 in Los Alamos in the water of a nuclear reactor. "It liked the medium so much that it reproduced every twenty minutes." (Kervran, Swan House Pub., p. 111). In a reactor in Lucas Heights, Australia, there were two million bacteria per cubic cm. However, only 1,000 of these bacteria were left when the heavy water came out of the reactor. Micrococcus radiodurans resists 3,000 times the mortal dose for mammals (ibid., p. 113). A research study showed that radioactive mercury 203 diminished much more rapidly than expected due to the action of bacteria. Radioactive mercury 203 has a half life of 46 days. However, Magos and co-workers showed that after a period of 16 hours of normal degradation there was thereafter a much more rapid disappearance of mercury 203 which was very great at 48 hours. The researchers reasoned that microbes might have caused the excess diminution because the great increase only occurred after an "incubation" period of about 16 hours. (Kervran, Beekman Pub., pp. 78-79; L. Magos, Tuffrey and T.W. Clarkson, "Volatilization of Mercury by Bacteria," Brit. J. Ind. Med., Oct. 1964, pp. 294-98). Kervran notes that including toluene or penicillin in the medium prevents any excess diminution of mercury, and that the term "volatilization" that was assumed by the researchers to explain the diminution is unlikely given that mercury boils at 360 degrees C and its vapor pressure is very low at even at 40 to 50 degrees C, whereas the experiments were conducted at 20 degrees C (68 F). Also, certain bacteria were very active in the media (Kervran, Beekman Pub. pp. 78-81; Swan House Pub., 111-113). The fact that bacteria can withstand enormous temperatures, pressures, and levels of radioactivity makes it more probable that bacteria may be found in comparable conditions on other planets, meteorites, comets, and moons, thus supporting the conclusions of some scientists that microbes were found on rocks from Mars, the Allende meteorite that fell in Mexico in 1967, and rocks from the moon, as Thomas Gold asserts. Actually, the eminent Fred Hoyle long ago advanced the position that microbes live in such conditions and may be transported to other bodies by comets, etc. A microscopic photo was taken of apparent bacteria in the Allende meteorite in Mexico. Earl Staelin To be continued ************************************************************ WATER ON MARS? By Wal Thornhill Planetary scientists are busy looking for evidence of water on Mars in support of plans to send robotic and, eventually, manned missions to the red planet. Water is a key ingredient in the search for signs of extraterrestrial life. Some scientists speculate that life may have once existed on Mars because a few massive channels there suggest floods of copious liquid surface water in the planet's dim past. Also, the possibility of life is suggested by the presence of carbon dioxide as a major constituent of the thin atmosphere. The scientific community has shifted its earlier view of Mars dramatically. Instead of stories about the cold desert planet, the popular press now prints headlines such as: "Flood Carves Instant Grand Canyon." The situation is ripe for seeing only what is already believed. This bias shows in the language when channels are identified unequivocally as fluvial (carved by flowing water) and of late Noachian age (between 3.5 and 3.7 billion years old), the very name invoking images of a universal flood. The thesis presented on this website tells a completely different history of Mars, based upon the electrical nature of the solar system and recent chaotic orbital behavior. It may seem outrageous to propose a completely different Mars about 10,000 years ago, instead of 3,500 million years ago in the conventional story. However, the dating techniques used by geologists rely on a belief in fictional and endlessly adjustable planetary evolution stories a different story for each planet. These stories have proven to be totally non-predictive. Good science requires accounting for as much of the relevant evidence as possible. Instead of working forward from a set of beliefs about the past, we should first assemble all the data we can, including that from the stories told by ancient people about the behavior of objects they saw in the sky. A forensic method can glean useful information from these archaic stories, rituals, and art that can help distinguish between alternative explanations for present conditions. The results of this forensic research by a very few adventurous scholars are unequivocal, unexpected and disturbing. If we could see it, our prehistoric sky would stupefy us with its unfamiliarity. Mars and Venus moved close to the Earth and met in apparent combat wielding thunderbolts. The spectacular patterns of interplanetary lightning were commemorated globally in petroglyphs, monumental works and cultural traditions. Our prehistoric ancestors remembered the Earth's encounters with a furious Mars, "the god of war," as the archetypal "doomsday." That memory survives to this day in our cultures and religions, its true meaning almost universally unrecognized. We do not want to know that our beautiful Earth can be unsafe. We accept palaeontologists' stories about global extinction events provided they happened in the dim and distant past. Modern doomsayers, as if tuned into the ancient fears, try to arouse us by stories of imminent impacts. But those stories are based on the geologists' misunderstanding of impacts. Global devastation requires an encounter between planets, not puny asteroid impacts. The evidence for planetary electrical encounters is sufficiently detailed and extensive to fill several forthcoming books. Being a small body, Mars suffered terribly in its planetary electrical exchanges. It lost most of its atmosphere in the process and gained a little in return. So present day measures of water and carbon dioxide on Mars do not represent billions of years of evolution. Indeed, the dominant constituents of its atmosphere, carbon dioxide and nitrogen, could have been predicted from the global accounts of the entanglement of Mars with the distended atmosphere of Venus. Also, it has been known since the first space probes descended into the infernal atmosphere of Venus that the measurements of isotopic ratios in its atmospheric gases contradict the standard evolutionary model of planet formation. The reason is that interplanetary discharges are powerful enough to cause nuclear transformations. In particular, they are copious generators of neutrons. So the anomalously high levels of the heavy isotopes of carbon (13C), nitrogen (15N) and hydrogen 2H, in the Martian atmosphere may be understood simply as due to neutron capture in the gases stretching between Mars and Venus during one of their celebrated battles. So, what are we to make of the orthodox dating of the channels on Mars to almost 4 billion years ago? Relative dating of surface features relies upon comparisons of crater counts on the surfaces of Mars and other bodies. Radioactive clocks are then used to pin down the age of surface rocks. We have for that purpose rock samples from the Moon and a small number of meteorites identified as originating from Mars. But if the initial states of the rocks are unknown and the clocks can be upset by energetic electrical discharges, geologists are left with little else to date the surface features of Mars other than to count craters. And that is a method based on two crucial and erroneous assumptions: The first assumption is that the solar system has run like clockwork for 5 billion years. That has allowed a fictitious early history to be written about planets being hit by leftovers from their afterbirth. The impacts had to be late enough that the planets could record them on a solid surface, so it is called the "late heavy bombardment." Crater statistics led to a need for another episode, called the "post late heavy bombardment." This "history" is a complex fiction because (1) the "accretion by impact" model of planet development has not been shown to work; (2) the source of objects responsible for the cratering record observed on solar system bodies remains an unsolved problem. (The "Oort cloud" of comets is postulated as one source of ammunition for pockmarking planets. However, the number of comets seen does not support the existence of such hypothetical "builder's rubble" of the solar system. Nor does the theory make any sense.); and (3) random impacts do not explain either the detailed pattern of cratering nor the heavily cratered southern hemisphere and much smoother northern hemisphere of Mars. The second assumption is that planetary craters are caused by the impacts of comets and asteroids. This assumption is clung to in the face of contradictory evidence. Researchers have admitted that it has not been possible to reproduce the features of most planetary craters with either impacts or explosions. So it is simply assumed that the craters are a result of impacts, and their features are used in an attempt to understand impact cratering! That is circular thinking, not science. So what can be said of water on Mars in its earlier history? In the real story of Mars, the god of war, its pre-battle surface environment was likely to have been much more benign and Earth- like than it is today. On that basis I predict there was liquid water on the surface of Mars within the time of modern homo sapiens and that there is a good chance of finding fossils of complex life forms on Mars. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Keeping this in mind, let us look critically at this report from the Smithsonian researchers: June 20, 2002 Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum Large Former Lake, Catastrophic Flood Identified on Mars Geologists at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum have discovered a large former lake in the highlands of Mars that would cover an area the size of Texas and New Mexico combined, and which overflowed to carve one of that planet's largest valleys. The findings will appear in the June 21 issue of the journal Science. The flood channel, Ma'adim Vallis, is more than 550 miles long and up to 6,900 feet deep, making it larger than Earth's Grand Canyon. "Imagine more than five times the volume of water in the Great Lakes being released in a single flood, and you'll have a sense of the scale of this event," said Ross Irwin, a geologist in the museum's Center for Earth and Planetary Studies (CEPS) and the paper's lead author. Mars is now a cold desert planet but its many dry valleys could indicate that water once flowed on its surface. Recent results from the Mars Odyssey spacecraft have found evidence of water trapped in the near surface of the polar regions. "The size of this lake -- 1,400 miles long -- suggests Mars was warmer and wetter than previously thought," said Robert Craddock, a CEPS geologist and co-author of the paper. Former lakes are considered the most likely places to preserve the record of any past Martian life. Calm water would allow sediments to be deposited slowly, preventing small organisms from being destroyed. The source of water to carve the flood channel had long been a mystery to scientists, who had known very little about Mars' topography prior to the Mars Global Surveyor mission, which has been orbiting Mars since 1997. Detailed elevation data from the Mars Global Surveyor shows the large valley originated nearly full-size at a ridge, much like the spillway of a dam. Late in the lake's history, rising water levels overflowed the lake basin rim, releasing the huge flood as the river cut into this former dividing ridge. What remained was "some of the best geological evidence for a lake found to date on Mars, including clear indications of the former shoreline," Irwin says. Two other smaller lake basins were identified in the region by paper co-author Alan Howard, a geologist at the University of Virginia. All three lakes shared the same water level prior to the flood, indicating the possibility of an ancient water table and suggesting the locations of other dry lake basins on Mars. Such information could be important in determining where to land robotic probes in coming years. CEPS is the scientific research unit within the Collections and Research Department of the National Air and Space Museum. CEPS performs original research and outreach activities on topics covering planetary science, terrestrial geophysics, and the remote sensing of environmental change. END OF REPORT ---------------------------------------------------------------- Comment: The geologists have not "discovered" a lake on Mars in the real sense of the word. They have discovered a cutoff level of valley networks, based on topographical maps derived from the Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter (MOLA) data. There appears to be an "abrupt transition from bedrock to less resistant sedimentary materials" at the 1100-metre contour. So this "shoreline" need only be reflecting the different response of the surface material to whatever erosive force shaped the area. The major problem faced by geologists trying to explain huge valleys on dry and freezing Mars is to find a prodigious source of liquid water. With few signs of feeder streams or catchment areas, the various proposals have all required an underground source of water with unexplained episodes of heating. This paper is the first detailed proposal for a large surface reservoir of liquid water, and it requires a completely different atmospheric and temperature regime on Mars from that found today. For that reason, geologists push the event back into some imagined past epoch, called the "Noachian" era, ignoring the fact that the channels look new. It is surely premature to declare that a former lake has been discovered on the basis of a "shoreline" and the identification of a single channel, Ma'adim Vallis, as an overflow channel that was carved by a catastrophic flood from that putative lake. An overflow of such magnitude over sedimentary material would usually be expected to produce a braided stream of many channels. This is particularly so given the cratered terrain, where crater ramparts should divert the flood. Instead of that, Ma'adim Vallis is noteworthy for the way it breaches crater walls as if they never existed. Even more damaging for the water erosion story is the fact that the channel bed itself does not show the forms expected of flowing water! Shown here in greater detail is Ma'adim Vallis, the channel picked out in blue in the earlier picture. It is about 900 km long and varies in width from about 8 km to some 25 km near the mouth. Note that the flood is said to have originated at the bottom of the picture, where the lake is supposed to have breached an ancient crater rim. The expectation would be that the channel would be largest there but that is not the case. In fact it widens and deepens "downstream." The morphology of Ma'adim Vallis is precisely that of a sinuous rille. See also 'Mars and the Grand Canyon.' at Ma'adim Vallis was formed by surface lightning, streaking across Mars toward Gusev Crater. Gusev crater is the 150 km diameter crater at the top of the valley. This channel is supposed to be incredibly old -- 3,500 million years! Yet it looks as if it was carved yesterday. If the craters are formed in the same flurry of electrical discharge activity across this hemisphere of Mars then the large crater seen straddling the channel may have been formed shortly before the rille was carved through it by the surface discharge. Full article with photos of Martian rilles and laboratory experiments can be found at: Cathode arcs focus on local sharp high points. Having formed a crater, the tendency is then for the arc to jump to the rim of the new crater. By this means, continuous channels, composed of overlapping circular craters, may be cut into a surface. The edges of such a channel have a characteristic "cookie cutter" or scalloped appearance. This effect can be seen in the Ma'adim Vallis tributaries at lower center and top center in the picture. A small crater centered on the rim of a large crater is seen at a glance in images of any cratered planetary surface. It is an observation that impacts cannot explain. The two dissected craters at the entrance point of Ma'adim Vallis to Gusev crater show this hierarchical effect in relation to the Gusev crater. So, what is the story of the formation of Ma'adim Vallis? An arc cutting Gusev crater will sap electrons from the surrounding terrain by creating a strong radial electric field that begins to rip electrons from the solid surface. When breakdown begins, a lightning bolt tears across the surface, blasting soil and rock to either side of its sinuous path. A large proportion of the excavated material is impelled electrostatically to follow the main discharge toward space. Pieces not pulled into space would fall back in a more or less random scattering all over Mars. That explains why there is little evidence of deposition inside Gusev Crater from a channel that is larger than the Grand Canyon. It is also the reason why every Mars lander has returned a vista of rubble that extends to the horizon. Mars has many giant channels like Ma'adim Vallis. One of the mysteries of these channels is the prevalence of transverse ridges, or so-called "sand dunes." On a planet with practically no atmosphere that description seems far-fetched. Here we show an excellent example from the floor of the 700 km long Nirgal Vallis. On another Martial rille, Nirgal Vallis, the inner channel is the path followed by the lightning discharge and is somewhat more sinuous than the excavated channel. The floor of the main channel is crisscrossed with lines conventionally interpreted as "dunes". These "dunes" turn the bend to follow the inner channel. Wind would not be expected to do that. The "exploding wire" experiment is deemed to be the closest thing to real lightning achievable in the laboratory. A thin wire is suspended and a powerful electric discharge sent through it. The wire is instantly vaporized and coronal filaments radiate into the air from the plasma discharge channel. It is the radial discharges of the corona that provide the clue to the origin of the "sand dunes" on Mars. It is well known that lightning passing through dry sand will form crumbly, glassy tubes of welded sand, known as fulgurites. It seems likely that the sand dunes in the Martian valleys are ridges of glass! They were formed by a corona discharge from the main lightning stroke. Photo of exploding wire experiment at. Courtesy of Ed Bondarenko, Telstra Labs, Melbourne, Australia. The width of the Martian channel seems to be influenced by the width of the corona and depth of the discharge, which in turn is dependent on the conductivity and nature of the near-surface rock. [Photo caption] A "gully" in Gorgonum Chaos. The image is about 3 km square. Notice that a little liquid seems to have seeped from a stratum near the top of the south-facing channel wall. A narrow lightning stroke at depth produces a V-shaped explosion channel. A broad corona in poorly conducting soil seems to produce a flatter floored channel. There are a few examples where a little water seems to have trickled down channel walls from a near- surface layer. That may be misleading because it could be an artifact of the electrical discharge, which seems to introduce an asymmetry in the pattern of erosion in opposite walls. See Gorgonum Chasma and also the asymmetric erosion of the north and south walls of Valles Marineris. ------------------------------------------------------------------ So if the huge channels on Mars were not carved by catastrophic floods in the remote past, what are the chances of finding subsurface water on Mars now? Although the giant channels on Mars were not carved by water, there is better evidence, apart from the small seepage channels, that Mars had more water in the past. It comes from the peculiar appearance of some Martian craters, where mud seems to have flowed away from the crater's rim. It is not the sort of thing that can be explained by an explosive impact. However, it is expected from an electric arc impinging on a moist anode surface. In the experiment shown here, an arc from a suspended cathode has struck a moist clay anode, representing the Martian surface. Unlike the jumping cathode arc, the anode arc "sticks" to the spot and rotates to form a circular scar, while water comes to the clay surface and flows gently away from the rim of the scar. [photo caption] An arc striking a moist clay anode. The clay has become quite wet surrounding the arc scar. Experiment courtesy of Rod Browitt. [photo caption] Here is an example from Mars. The larger, unnamed crater is 10 km across. Notice the rotary terracing effects of the spinning arc in the crater floor and the tendency in large craters to leave a central peak relatively untouched. An impact cannot explain these features, nor the lack of damage caused by one crater to the other. Ballistic emplacement of the ejecta has been ruled out by geologists. These "rampart" craters are widely distributed on Mars, which indicates a former "moist" environment over the entire planet. Recently, the Mars Odyssey spacecraft has been measuring neutrons from the atomic debris caused by cosmic rays smashing atoms as they penetrate the Martian crust. From the neutron energies it is possible to determine the presence and rough depth of hydrogen atoms beneath the surface. The assumption is made that any hydrogen signal is due to subsurface mineral-bound water. In the diagram below, the blue areas returned the stronger hydrogen signals. As expected from the (as yet untold) recent history of Mars, the south Polar Regions have the highest abundance. There is a caution to be added however. As a report in Science* noted, "The hydrogen signature extends willy-nilly beyond the lander targets across any number of geologic terrains." The regions are "very hard to reconcile with what we know about geology or topography," says planetary scientist James Bell of Cornell University. "They don't fit the distribution of particular rock types, rock abundance, dust, or even atmospheric water vapor, notes planetary scientist Bruce Jakosky of the University of Colorado, Boulder." Plasma arcs are the most efficient means known for implanting ions into a solid surface. That could account for the lack of correlation with the geology. The problem facing NASA may well be that the hydrogen signature in the lower latitudes is mainly from implanted hydrogen ions and not from water. Summing up: With the available evidence and some insights into the recent history of the solar system it is possible to confidently answer some of the questions about Mars: * YES, there was some water, and probably life too, on Mars in the recent past. However, the water was mostly stripped off along with the atmosphere. There is abundant evidence of catastrophic winds, electrical erosion and hemispheric differences arising from that process. * The carbon dioxide "ice caps" and remnant atmosphere are from an exogenous source - Venus. * And NO, the giant channels on Mars cannot be used as evidence of a "Noachian" flood time on early Mars. When the history of Mars is finally told, the irony in the use of that name will become clear. ------------------------------------------------------------------ In an editorial, "Where's the sparkle?" in New Scientist 8 June 2002, NASA is accused of having run out of things to say. The story of water on Mars has been heard too many times, even though there was some new information. It "only served to strengthen the cynical view of NASA as an agency obsessed with spin and devoid of new ideas and goals." But to have really new ideas and goals requires new people and NASA is firmly in the grip of "old" experts. As Max Plank wrote ruefully, "An important scientific innovation rarely makes its way by gradually winning over and converting its opponents. What does happen is that its opponents gradually die out, and that the growing generation is familiarised with the ideas from the beginning."** Meanwhile, NASA's Cassini mission to Saturn is due to arrive there in 2004. Be prepared for some BIG surprises, particularly concerning Saturn's giant moon, Titan. You see, the primordial and greatest god of old was Saturn, not the Sun. Titan is a very close relative of the Earth, Mars and Venus. Sorry NASA, life's too short to wait for you! *Science 2002 June 14; 296: 1962 ** Max Planck, (1858-1947) from Scientific Autobiography, 1949. 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