Hi,
I am new to this board, so please be gentle to me

I am writing because of the following images I've seen:

Please look at
http://www.curiousnotions.com/mars/mars_islands.html
and
http://www.marsanomalyresearch.com/e...vegetation.htm


What I am curious about is the following:
1) These images seem resemble 'undisputed' signs of vegetation, namely around the south pole on mars; mind you there are many more available!
2) On 'mainstream' press releases I only read statements like '...if water ever abundant on mars...' or '...perhaps life could emerged million of years ago...'.

My question: Why are scientists, or analysts so carefull to formulate 'signs' of present life?(if in fact present) One might almost think they prefer to focus on rocks and pebbles instead of the images of plant life on mars.

What do you think of these images?

greetings
Patrick, the Netherlands

Well, that might work a whole lot better if the web server were up and running, now, wouldn't it? :roll:

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GhiaPet Home Page

changed the URL's, so they can be viewed!

First, welcome on board.

If you go to the link on the first website for the original picture you see this info:
So these "trees" would be a good faction of a km (kilometer) across. That would be one big tree! It seems highly unlikely. Its a very dangerous thing to judge something purely by its apparent shape, particularly from one viewpoint. We have all seen clouds that look like horses, or meatloafs, but that doesn't make them a horse. Humans just love looking for patterns. Look around this website for a lot of discussion about this.

Lastly, they don't even look like trees to me.

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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

Arthur C. Clarke's 'bushes' eh?

Before anyone jumped the gun and claimed these were actually shrubberies, they were observed over a stretch of time. One of the characteristics of these formations is that they emerge over the Martian winter, and recede in the spring. The original thought on their composition was thusly confirmed - it's a seasonal permafrost (oxymoron i know) layer of (i think) frozen CO2.

Conditions on Mars, in the open air (what air?), are not at all conducive to life. This is why there is a focus on 'rocks and pebbles-' geologists are interested in the time when Mars would have been more hospitable - when that was and how accomodating it was.
It's a shame that Beagle 2 was lost - its mission focus was on evidence for life, rather than Martian geology (the two MERs specialty).

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bunk: Empty talk; nonsense.
de·bunk: To expose or ridicule the falseness, sham, or exaggerated claims of.
http://home.iprimus.com.au/eddo/images/fredheadtsp.gif

Actually, the second website (as listed now) makes quite a point of the fact that these things must be over half a mile across; heck, the title of the page is "Giant Plant Species Found On Mars". So I don't think they're overlooking that point.

They remind me of the frost patterns on my window, personally. Coincidence? I think not!

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GhiaPet Home Page

Very true but:

(sorry for my bad english)

<<IF>>, plants needs to absorb basic ingredients to survice in nature they need, in the case of mars, more surface, meaning larger exposure of their 'branches', to be able obtain these ingredients, in the environment they life in. Thus explaining their larger size, as opposed considered normal on earth.

Take an example of plants adjusting to their environemnt, e.g. a cactus on earth, which is designed to sustain aride climate, by adjusting it's biological design.

These images do, not in my opinion, resemble a geological structure.

Would you recognize a martian tree if you saw one?

incidently, I don't think they are trees either but I had to ask the question

And to continue your analogy, compare the sizes of desert plants to rainforest plants, e.g. sequoias and redwoods. Harsher conditions tend to produce smaller lifeforms, not larger. Especially if the harshness is scarcity of resources.

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GhiaPet Home Page

I don't think that's plant life. I've seen those images before and they could represent any number of things, inluding water seeping through the surface or some sort of network of small canyons and dunes. I personally have very little knowledge of those features, but I know they are most likely not plants. If they were plants, then they would be nothing like plants on Earth because they can very apparently thrive and grow to huge sizes in extremely harsh conditions.

Consider all the angles. I know that it's not likely that these things are plants because I realize:

1. plants of that size require lots of nutrients to keep them alive.

2. Plants like that don't grow in conditions like arctic desert; it's much too dry, and cold, and it's not generally conducive to large forms of life.

3. Mars has incredibly harsh weather and atmosphere: planet-wide dust storms, subzero temperatures at night, just to name two things. Not somewhere you want to visit for a while.

But hey, perhaps they absorb mostly barren rock and dust as
nourishment.


Edit: We'll just say I don't type very fast.

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h00!

[quote="skrap1r0n"]Did you really expect martian trees, if they are truely vegetation, to be the same as on earth?

Erm, it's a seasonal formation... Why would a plant melt and sublimate in the spring?

Well, there is an incredible amount of diversity in our planet's ecosystem. All plants on earth are rather easily identified as plants no matter what the look like. Some are even red instead of the usual chlorophyl green and you can still recognize them!

I still don't think they're plants. If anything, they look more like a form of fungus growing on a petri dish or even something in the back of the fridge.

So, cuboctahedron, I have two direct questions for you and I want direct answers. Here they are: 1. Do you really believe these things to be plant life? 2. Why do you (if you actually think they are) think they are plants?

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h00!

Basically, I believe that, any species adopt to its nature based on it's suroundings. If vegetation on mars can capture life-ingredients for survival by exposure 'plant'organism with more surface to obtain these ingredients from their obtainable 'air', it will do so. There are many examples on earth where organism adopt itself to their (hostile) environment.

To answer a question posted if I believe they are plants, I copy a statement from the link mentioned earlier:

... color gradations in same. The darker areas represent fresher healthier vegetation and the lighter the color grading the more and more unhealthy and dying or dead the vegetation...

It's namely this 'grading' that equally occurs on earth.

Perhaps the quest for other lifeforms beyond earth (not talking about UFO's or green men), is considered the same , as a few centuries ago, when a human was burned alive when saying the earth was a sphere as opposed to being flat.

Please bare with me, we sent probes to mars to detect (past) life, if any, but somehow it it considered heretage, if <<LIFE>> itself would be detected.

If this is NOT life, based on it's formation and properties, please debunk it for me (that's what I am here for anyhow)

You still didn't answer my questions.

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h00!

fair:
you mention:
"
So, cuboctahedron, I have two direct questions for you and I want direct answers. Here they are: 1. Do you really believe these things to be plant life? 2. Why do you (if you actually think they are) think they are plants?
"

answers:
1) Yes, I do, as explained above; again not referring to ufo's hype or green men, just plain plant-life on mars.
2) Based on the grading of color; basically the structure remains, but the color changes.

Two things:

1) You can't shift the burden of proof like that. You can't prove a negative - so if you want to claim these are plants, you need to support that position with evidence.

2) Unless you're ignoring me - I've already told you what these things are...

They look like bushes! But they're not...

Defrosting sand dunes...

I've been gentle with you but you're gonna wanna start reading this stuff...

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bunk: Empty talk; nonsense.
de·bunk: To expose or ridicule the falseness, sham, or exaggerated claims of.
http://home.iprimus.com.au/eddo/images/fredheadtsp.gif

Thank you for answering my questions directly. It was most helpful. But I still have some more.

1. What does a grading in the color have to do with plants? I realize they look rather like roots or branches of some kind, but there are still problems...

2. The "plants" seem to thin out towards the bottom of the images. What would make them do this if they are, in fact, vegitation? Life follows fairly recognizable patterns, and I've never seen large plants act like those are supposed to. The patches aren't even linked to each other.

3. The Martian environment in in many ways like that of the arctic desert - dry and really cold. Barely any life (besides microbial) is found there. Why do you think that Mars should be any different?

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h00!

I'll read the links you've provided!, hopefully that explains some of my questions surely.

You might want to back up this claim a bit as well, though it doesn't directly pertain to the topic, of couse. The one about the burning, that is.

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quote: "The dunes are located in the south polar region and are expected to be completely defrosted by November or December 1999. North is approximately up, and sunlight illuminates the scene from the upper left. The 500 meter scale bar equals 547 yards; the 300 meter scale is also 328 yards"

Question; Does this occus also on the noth pole?

Dear JohnOwens,
there is nothing to regret about that statement, since those are facts, I'm afraid.

We agree however that this topic has nothing to do with the statement mention on my behalf, I suppose.

I don't see why it shouldn't, I had a quick look though and couldn't find any really good matches.

But if you want you can:
Have a browse if you like.

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bunk: Empty talk; nonsense.
de·bunk: To expose or ridicule the falseness, sham, or exaggerated claims of.
http://home.iprimus.com.au/eddo/images/fredheadtsp.gif

Can you give us information on that event?

I am very troubled, Freddo, by your comment that "I've already told you what these things are..."

If you are so utterly certain about conditions on Mars, I wonder a little that NASA didn't send the probe to your house. [-X

Wha?

You're not making sense. Are you claiming that we don't know what the climactic conditions on Mars are? We've been looking at this planet a little longer than the two MERs have been there... We know how hot and cold it gets, how much air is about - and we watch the seasons change as the CO2 frost sublimates into the atmosphere. This gives us the ability to explain what we do and don't see when we look at Mars - trees kilometres wide doesn't factor into it.

We may not be 'utterly certain about conditions on Mars,' but that doesn't automatically render us utterly ignorant.

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bunk: Empty talk; nonsense.
de·bunk: To expose or ridicule the falseness, sham, or exaggerated claims of.
http://home.iprimus.com.au/eddo/images/fredheadtsp.gif

They could be lots of things. I don't really think they are trees, although I wouldn't rule it out completely. But for you to say you know for sure what they actually are is silly. Again, they could be lots of things.

I don't think so. Silly is landing a NASA probe in my backyard. Silly is claiming that plant life, kilometres across, are capable of emerging in the spring each year - but totally disappear after a short time. Oh and come back again the following year.

It's a geological process which we understand.

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bunk: Empty talk; nonsense.
de·bunk: To expose or ridicule the falseness, sham, or exaggerated claims of.
http://home.iprimus.com.au/eddo/images/fredheadtsp.gif

I remember this coming up a while back and reading NASA's take that this was frost. freddo spared me the trouble of looking it up with his link. Daffy, while not ruling anything out and saying it "could be a lot of things," do you have any better ideas? If so, put it on the table. IMO the frost hypothesis makes sense and the folly of this being Martian plant life has already been addressed.

My only objection was to Freddo's claim that he knows exactly what they are. I mean why go to the planet at all? That said, I really don't think they are plants...although I do think they should be examined more closely.

The argument against frost, btw, is that the areas in shadow seem to expand first. At least, that was according to an article at Space.com. No, I don't have any better ideas...which is exactly why I surely would like to see them investigated better. I don't think we do know for certain what they are.