If there was non-photosynthetic life on Titan, using methane instead of water, how could we detect them?

Would anything Cassini has, or any of Huygens's instruments, have detected macroscopic life if it existed?

No. Unless they were big enough to have been photographed directly and recognizeable as life. Any life there is likely to be very small and if based on methane, would probably fuel debates on whether it was really life for quite a while. We just don't have a good definition.

Fuel debate indeed! (Is it life or is it fuel?)

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Later . . .

Depends on what we need. If we are running on fumes, fuel it is. I dont care if its waving!

Trees prove that an organism can be both.

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At night the stars put on a show for free (Carole King)

One Earth, One Sky - IYA 2009
All moderation in purple

And trees don't even bother to wave

I sense a moral debate over whether it is proper to burn friendly alien visitors to solve the energy crisis.

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Later . . .

Well, all these wind turbines around here are really messing up the natural scenery...

Wonder how expensive it is to convert a coal fired power plant to burn alien flesh?

We can just claim ignorance. Its easier to get forgiveness than permission.

"Water-based Earth Folk, I bring you greetings on behalf of the Methane People from Titan. Our reception has been most cordial, and I will now experience the 'cigar' just handed me by your leader. I think I'm supposed to use this device to actrivate it, and . . . "

"No!!!!"

KA-BOOM!

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Later . . .

Just methane alone wouldn't be a very good source of energy on Titan.

What would replace photosynthesis as the prime source of energy in the Titanian (?Titanic) biosphere?

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I would think the tidal pull of Jupiter would be an excellent source of energy.

Not on Titan.

why not?

edit: Oops! Tidal Pull of Saturn!

That would require some method of converting tidal energy into chemical energy, suitable for life to exploit. If the tidal energy causes some sort of low-energy volcanic activity, something like an alkaline vent, that would be excellent. I think that would most probably occur deep under a Titanian water ocean, if there is such a thing, which itself would be deep under the ice. Or could some sort of surface activity allow chemosynthesis in the hypothetical ethane lakes?

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New Orion's Arm Site . The Starlark . Against a Diamond Sky (OA Novella Collection) . OA Flickr set

thats what I was thinking. Arent the thermal vents on Earth formed due to tectonics, caused by the the tidal pull of the Moon ? The heating could be exploited by organisms to turn it into chemical energy that would support some life process.

Too many recent impact craters. Otherwise I would have held out hope. Titan is in a way too high a traffic area to have evolved complex single cells, in my opinion. Maybe at some point predating the ring formation, but not now.

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You think so? It's pretty far out from Saturn's inner moons, where I'd imagine most of the chaos is.

For all we know there could be macroscopic life on Titan, it isn't too far out a possibility. Some of the "rocks" Huygens saw could have been sleeping aliens!

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You can't really tell the difference between drunken rambling and sober blogging.

Not that I'm not enjoying the humor in this thread, because I am, but on a more serious note in answer to your question, Vultur the value of studying Titan in trying to answer the question how does life come about is precisely because Titan doesn't have any life.

Now what do I mean by that? It sounds like a contradiction. What I mean is that life has a way of erasing its origins simply by what it does as life. Studying the geologic history of Earth has its limitations precisely because life is one of the forces that has changed this planet along with things like plate tectonics and vulcanism.

At one time our oceans were green with iron. Then came stromatolites (i.e. cyano-bacteria) which converted carbon dioxide into molecular oxygen which in turn oxidized the iron thus causing sedimentation of hematite and limonite, turning our oceans blue and our atmosphere oxygen rich. But we can never see the Earth in its pristine condition before life existed, which according to recent geological evidence, appears to be pretty early in the history of this planet.

Titan, on the other, may be that pristine laboratory for researchers, simply because it does have all of those wonderful organic molecules like methane and ammonia that have not yet been altered by life. It is by examining this pristine world that researchers hope to gain some insight into at least some of the conditions they may have led to the evolution of life on this planet. But, they're not looking for life on Titan, per se. I think they would be shocked if they found it and would be utterly confused by it! On the other hand, with all of the different extremophiles that have been found on Earth I wouldn't entirely count that possibility out! LOL Stranger things have happened.

Eric

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“Out yonder there was this huge world, which exists independently of us human beings and which stands before us like a great, eternal riddle, at least partially accessible to our inspection and thinking. The contemplation of this world beckoned like a liberation.” - Albert Einstein

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