Mars Spirit Duracrust Soil Anomalies

On Sat, 20 Mar 2004 15:02:04 -0700, Greg Crinklaw
wrote:

Jan Panteltje wrote:

** S P L A S H **
Not only do you falsify what I wrote, i am also sure the soft yiou
write is a bad as your postings.
Idiot

March 20, 2004

Jan Panteltje wrote:

http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/galle...0P2977M2M1.JPG

Do you see it? I am sure there is a 'prosaic' explanation for all of
this.
I love it I love it:-) man you are good, I did not notice it before.
Now we will hear it is an image artifact I am sure :-(
Tell yo uwhat, mars is as ALIVE as can be

L I F E do you hear that guys?
* L * I * F * E *

Probably, but ... I did a little digging around, and discovered that the pebble layer could be explained by a bizarre
martian form of 'desert pavement', you can google it out, and I managed to load the image on one of my DTN laptops and
crank up the contrast, and the stalk suddenly become a shadow mirage, so that is out too, so that only leaves the bizarre
underlying soil grain micro threading left to consider, and the ubiquitous salts and water and compost like texture to the
soil. Life would have to be very clever to survive in this environment, but we now know there is water, and we know life is
.... wow ... very clever!

On the other hand, desert pavements origins are highly controversial, but the latest theories do involve water, and there
is ample evidence that water vapor and other evaporates are filtering up from the ground all over Mars. The Rio Tinto paper
I posted showed that it only takes three species of microorganisms to close the iron cycle, so I imagine 4 billions of
years of evolution could develop and closed carbon and sulfur cycle too. Obviously, if the bacterial system was diminishing
on a planet that was icing up, the geochemical systems would be expected to start reverting to their natural abiotic
processes, and this may be what we are seeing here.

Finally, I do see subtle non-concentric layering in the small smooth pebbles.

Thomas Lee Elifritz
http://elifritz.members.atlantic.net

Greg Crinklaw wrote in message ...
Jan Panteltje wrote:

** S P L A S H **

That would be the sound of someone going off the deep end.

--
Greg Crinklaw
Astronomical Software Developer
Cloudcroft, New Mexico, USA (33N, 106W, 2700m)

SkyTools Software for the Observer:
http://www.skyhound.com/cs.html

Skyhound Observing Pages:
http://www.skyhound.com/sh/skyhound.html

To reply remove spleen

Why am I never able to see these things? Maybe its like those "magic
eye" images where no matter how much I squint I cant see the monkey in
the rowboat or something else supposedly sane ppl assure me is there
in the noise.

On Fri, 19 Mar 2004, Thomas Lee Elifritz wrote:

Besides all the obvious anomalies in these latest series of soil
photomicrographs, the apparent stickyness, the numerous threaded
grains, soil fibers, unusual soil micro patterning and micro
texturing, that we have now come to expect and love, and even besides
the unusual rounded pebbles and micro spherules, there is this small
'stalk' sticking up above the duracrust :

http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/galle...0P2977M2M1.JPG

What are we looking at and at what scale? The serpent dune
with the dark stuff in the shadow from Spirit's trenching?

Quit be a sensationalist flashing pornographic pictures and
start being a scientist describing the settings of photos.

Do you see it? I am sure there is a 'prosaic' explanation for all of
this.

On Sat, 20 Mar 2004, Thomas Lee Elifritz wrote:
|Not one of you has addressed the ramifications of the image, rounded
|layered apparent concretions and/or biomineralizations on top of an
|aeolean sand dune,

Well, let's see. Windspeed is highest on the topmost point of a dune,
and that would be the point that also receives the most sunlight. So,
if there is going to be a lifelike process going on anywhere, positioning
it on the top of a dune is one of the best places to put it. I have
yet to hear of wind doing anything other than distributing seeds, but
if there were an energy transfer that could be realized by having
things shake around a bit, if only to shake off salts and dry ice,
and leave water behind, that would explain a lot.

|fine grained thread infested subsurface,

Well, maybe my computer's graphics card is not good enough, but I can't
quite make out the little filaments like the rest of you can. If
someone, anybody, could please draw me an idealized line around each
half-buried filament, that would help me see it.

|and an apparent secretion husk still clinging to one of the pebbles.

You don't think they are the petrified remains of worms - dare I say it -
trying to get into the seeds? The dimple marks could be 'wounds' that
the spherules suffered while secreting a substance to drive them off,
and then the secretion would eventually get so thick as to seal the
spherules off from the outside world, and the spherule would have
to wait until a rainy season softened it up enough to break out
again, and the cycle repeats.

If both seeds and worms were suddenly buried in a mudslide, that
might explain how they were preserved for a few hundred million
years.

March 21, 2004

William Elliot wrote:

On Fri, 19 Mar 2004, Thomas Lee Elifritz wrote:

Besides all the obvious anomalies in these latest series of soil
photomicrographs, the apparent stickyness, the numerous threaded
grains, soil fibers, unusual soil micro patterning and micro
texturing, that we have now come to expect and love, and even besides
the unusual rounded pebbles and micro spherules, there is this small
'stalk' sticking up above the duracrust :

http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/galle...0P2977M2M1.JPG

What are we looking at and at what scale? The serpent dune
with the dark stuff in the shadow from Spirit's trenching?

Go to :

http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/opp.../micro_imager/
http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/spirit/micro_imager/

Pick the soil micrographs with the highest jpeg resolution, the larger files, for the
clearest images, or alternatively, since we don't have access to tiffs and actual photo
reproductions, go to :

http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/press/spirit/
http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/galle...s/opportunity/

and use the highest resolution press release images that you can get your hands on, they
are much clearer than 1024 by 1024 *jpegs*. Everything is also archived at :

http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/

where you can get a better idea of what is available and the actual file sizes in the
actual chronological order of their release.


Quit be a sensationalist flashing pornographic pictures and
start being a scientist describing the settings of photos.

Sigh ... Unfortunately, the latest JPL press release of the Serpentine Dune Trench Wall
at :

http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/galle...20040319a.html

is a whole *231 kB*, less than the highest resolution photos released. I wonder if they
do that on purpose, as well as releasing high resolution versions of low quality
microscopic images, but that is another subject.

At the opportunity site, the soil micrographs reveal numerous pristine 'threads of
grains' that is, the highly ordered undisturbed decomposition remnants of the spherule
and outcrop pebble fragments. These linear chains of crystallized and homogenous grains
appear to have simply fallen away from the spherules and pebble fragments and lie
undisturbed in the soil in their original positions, often arranged in polyhedra
reflecting the internal or intrinsic structure of the original facies (or species, take
your pick). They are clearly visible to the trained eye, and do not appear to be jpeg
artifacts, shadows, or random arrangements of soil particles, rather, appear to be the
decomposition skeletons of the dehydroxylated structures. Amazingly, you can also see
the spherules arranged in similar patterns on a macroscopic scale in the high resolution
pancams, where the spherules have simply dropped into place in their original position
as the outcrop eroded (decomposed, presumably by dehydroxylation) away round them. The
linear chains of spherules are clearly visible, and certainly are not random, but are
actual reflections of their formation pattern within the outcrop.

At the Spirit site, things appear to be complicated, as we are not dealing with outcrops
or bedrock, merely aeolean soils and apparently, glacially deposited fluvials. However,
the soil grain threading and micro patterning is still clearly visible in some of the
soils here too, and surely, many of the photomicrographs show ordering and structure
reminiscent of 'prairie soils'.

Now, given the context of water, ice and soils on another planet, as these apparent
pseudo fossils are encountered, they cannot simply be dismissed as inorganic abiotic
structures, even though this may be entirely possible, they individually have to be
described and demonstrated *not* to be of biogenic origin, as that also is certainly
feasible. Given that we only have access to jpeg reproductions of binary images, and
minimal spectroscopy, it is a daunting challenge, but these pseudo fossils continue to
appear with startling regularity, and as they continue to accumulate, I propose that
they will become increasingly more difficult to explain away by abiotic inorganic
processes, and it will become increasingly apparent that Mars was in the distant past a
suitable habitat for highly evolved (what here on Earth we refer to as extremophile)
microscopic life.

Do you see it? I am sure there is a 'prosaic' explanation for all of
this.

With another planet, with a roughly 24 hour rotation period, abundant water ice, soil
and solar irradiance, life seems fairly prosaic, making the life debunkers here seem
particularly odd and out of place, especially on a science newsgroup. Almost all usenet
science newsgroups have these types, though, they are easy to spot.

Thomas Lee Elifritz
http://elifritz.members.atlantic.net

Will you answer my question?
What's the scale of the photo and
what are we seeing, a dune, a trench, the shaded side of a dune or what?

Do interpet, don't elaborate, don't give additional information,
don't give general discussions, don't give further details.
Just answer my question, plain and simple in 15.348549 lines or less.

In otherwords don't be a preacher with 50 billion digits of accuracy,
be a scientist with a usefully accurate answer.

"Thomas Lee Elifritz" skrev i en meddelelse
om...
March 19, 2004

Snip

the numerous threaded
grains, soil fibers, unusual soil micro patterning and micro
texturing,

Feel free to post an image of your find

that we have now come to expect and love, and even besides
the unusual rounded pebbles

Feel free to post an image of your find

and micro spherules,

Feel free to post an image of your find

there is this small
'stalk' sticking up

Feel free to post an image of your find

snip

Do you see it?

"Thomas Lee Elifritz" skrev i en meddelelse
...

snip

Considering these are science newsgroups, the whole sequence of
responses seems so mature.

Knowing your history here makes it well founded

Not one of you has addressed the ramifications of the image

Feel free to post an image of your find

fine grained thread infested subsurface,

Feel free to post an image of your find

and an
apparent secretion husk

Feel free to post an image of your find

still clinging to one of the pebbles.

A pebble in your universe is something different in the geological universe

A purely
inorganic deposition scenario for these features would be almost
unprecedented,

Source?... Do you want us to take your word for it?

I have no idea what you idiots are trying to prove,

That's obvious.

but it certainly
isn't your scientific maturity.

Your history here have worn down our sense of scientific maturity.

"Thomas Lee Elifritz" skrev i en meddelelse
...
March 20, 2004

snip

... I did a little digging around, and discovered that the pebble layer
could be explained by a bizarre
martian form of 'desert pavement', you can google it out,

Mr Elifritz style of documentation

and I managed to load the image on one of my DTN laptops and
crank up the contrast, and the stalk suddenly become a shadow mirage, so
that is out too, so that only leaves the bizarre
underlying soil grain micro threading left to consider, and the ubiquitous
salts and water and compost like texture to the
soil. Life would have to be very clever to survive in this environment,
but we now know there is water, and we know life is
... wow ... very clever!

Clever enough to evade you

On the other hand, desert pavements origins are highly controversial,

Sources?

snip

The Rio Tinto paper
I posted showed that it only takes three species of microorganisms to
close the iron cycle,

Mr R Schenck pointed out to you why your considerations on The Rio Tinto are
in error