Venus rotation

On 1/3/2010 9:27 PM, Sjouke Burry wrote:
Thad Floryan wrote:
On 1/3/2010 7:26 PM, Sam Wormley wrote:
On 1/3/10 9:09 PM, Ken S. Tucker wrote:

Recall our solar system has a lot of methane, would you call that's
a fossil fuel?
We use methane in our home to heat water, cook with and heat
our home in the winter. Ours is a fossil fuel as opposed to
a renewable resource such as landfill gas or cow farts.

So what about the massive amounts of methane detected on Mars
and renewing itself continuously?

Is that fossil fuel, landfill gas, cow farts, or Martian belches?

Tiny Martian sand fleas.

Hah hah! :-)

Who knows? There may be subterranean (hmmm, do we need a new word
for Mars?) life that won't be discovered until core drilling is
attempted. A Google search using "mars core drilling" brings up
some interesting projects and proposals, such as:

http://isse.arc.nasa.gov/doc/StrategiesForDrillingOnMa%201.pdf

http://www.kipr.org/papers/marte-is05.pdf

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/ames/multimedia/images/2006/marsdrill.html

http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=15157

http://www.docstoc.com/docs/15520058/AUTOMATED-CORE-SAMPLE-HANDLING-FOR-FUTURE-MARS-DRILL-MISSIONS

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/solarsystem/mars_drilling_000623.html

On Jan 3, 11:20*pm, Thad Floryan wrote:

Earth-based telescopes are detecting it and the claim has been made
its presence in Mars' atmosphere is being renewed since otherwise it'd
dissipate and disappear. That doesn't sound like "trace" to me.

By whom has this claim been made?

The Martian atmosphere consists chiefly of carbon dioxide. The carbon
dioxide isn't claimed to be in imminent danger of dissipating and
disappearing. Methane has a higher molecular weight than carbon
dioxide. Hence, if the carbon dioxide in Mars' atmosphere isn't going
anywhere fast, there's no pressing reason for the methane to be going
away faster.

If Mars had an _oxygen_ atmosphere, methane wouldn't last long because
it would burn up. But it doesn't, and so methane in Mars' atmosphere
could stay there for quite a while, it would seem to me.

John Savard

On 1/3/2010 11:32 PM, Quadibloc wrote:
On Jan 3, 11:20 pm, Thad Floryan wrote:

Earth-based telescopes are detecting it and the claim has been made
its presence in Mars' atmosphere is being renewed since otherwise it'd
dissipate and disappear. That doesn't sound like "trace" to me.

By whom has this claim been made?

By just about everyone doing any research concerning Mars.

A Google search using "mars methane" finds over 700,000 claims by
NASA, ESA, et al

The amount appearing in the atmosphere varies by season. You'll
find just the first page of Google results for the above-cited
search to be quite interesting.

BTW, many of those same URLs were cited here in SAA during 2009.

On Jan 4, 1:22*am, Thad Floryan wrote:
On 1/3/2010 11:32 PM, Quadibloc wrote:

By whom has this claim been made?

By just about everyone doing any research concerning Mars.

Ah, here we go:

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/ba...ne-media-mess/

10 parts per billion - in Mars' extremely thin atmosphere. Admittedly,
it's still a lot of methane - it would be enough to heat my home for a
very long time. But calling it a "trace amount" would not be out of
line at all.

However, even that skeptical article notes another one that got the
methane story right... and its title is "Large quantities of methane
being replenished on Mars". So you are apparently partly right...

http://www.universetoday.com/2009/01...ished-on-mars/

Ah. I overlooked the possibility, for example, that ultraviolet light
might destroy Martian methane.

Still, though, they're taking this as evidence of Martian volcanoes,
not life on Mars.

John Savard

On 1/4/2010 12:32 AM, Quadibloc wrote:
[...]
Ah. I overlooked the possibility, for example, that ultraviolet light
might destroy Martian methane.

The ESA web pages have more info and it's likely they'll be the ones,
not NASA, that discover the source(s) of the methane.

[...]
Still, though, they're taking this as evidence of Martian volcanoes,
not life on Mars.

As I cited earlier, there is NO evidence of active volcanism on Mars
at present, and the seasonal variance in methane production is quite
interesting.

On Jan 3, 7:38*pm, Sam Wormley wrote:
On 1/3/10 10:44 AM, Chris L Peterson wrote:





On Sun, 03 Jan 2010 10:22:32 -0600, Sam
wrote:

* *That's right, Gerald, and there is a good reason for that. The
* *science is too young to say definitively what all the causes are!

Of course, many explanations provided by scientific investigation are
not "definitive"... which of course does not mean that the explanations
are bad ones, nor that they aren't substantially correct. The
explanation that convective processes are the primary driver of plate
movement is very well accepted, and is supported by an increasing volume
of data as research advances. (That there is convection in the core and
mantle is certain, as these have been directly observed.)
_________________________________________________

Chris L Peterson
Cloudbait Observatory
http://www.cloudbait.com

* *Agreed.
* -Sam

It is amazing that a thread which attempts to introduce the idea that
the rotation of the planet's interior and its links to planetary
shape and crustal motion veers towards an atmospheric gas and life of
Mars,something which I know is dear to your hearts.A few weeks ago the
world leaders issued a pledge to keep global temperatures within a
certain range thereby reaching an intellectual nadir for our race,they
would just as well pledge to halt the seasons or stop the tide from
coming in yet people seem fine with this behavior and the standards
attached to it.

This is never a story about one person against everyone else, it is
about setting standards where none exist and if people are prepared to
ignore the basic planetary facts organised around the rotation of the
Earth and subsequently ignore the geological or climatological
implications of planetary dynamics then there is little I can do about
it.

http://books.google.ie/books?id=8roA...emarks&f=false

There is something poignant in reading Harrison's work as he struggles
to demonstrate the merits of his watch against a group who just do not
like him or his achievement yet that dull and dismal trait is still
present even as you ignore Harrison's explanation for daily rotation
in 24 hours where 1 hour and 15 degrees of geographical separation
form the basis of watches as rulers of distance based on rotation at
15 degrees per hour.

I do not know why people betray their astronomical heritage knowing
now just how dangerous empirical conclusions can become via the
attempt to force social policy through a reckless conclusion based on
pollution linked to climate.I have done my part to demonstrate that
exciting and productive work can be done in linking planetary dynamics
and geology ,climate ,planetary history or some other enjoyable facet
and it only requires a little effort to turn away from the novelties
and alarmism of empiricism.

On Jan 4, 2:06*am, Thad Floryan wrote:
there is NO evidence of active volcanism on Mars
at present,

The methane itself _is_ evidence, since it is being released in
occasional large plumes.

Biology is an exciting possibility, but because it is so exciting, we
must be extremely cautious, and wait until ironclad and irrefutable
proof of life on Mars has been found, before breaking out the
champagne.

John Savard

On Jan 4, 5:28*am, oriel36 wrote:
A few weeks ago the
world leaders issued a pledge to keep global temperatures within a
certain range thereby reaching an intellectual nadir for our race,they
would just *as well pledge to halt the seasons or stop the tide from
coming in yet people seem fine with this *behavior and the standards
attached to it.

It is not really as much like King Canute as you think.

They are only pledging to abstain, in their own behavior, from doing
things that would cause the temperatures to go outside that range.

Except, of course, they haven't really done even that, which is one
thing many people are not "fine with".

John Savard

On Sun, 03 Jan 2010 22:20:57 -0800, Thad Floryan
wrote:

There appears to be no active volcanos presently on Mars per...

"Volcanic" can include geochemical processes requiring only enough heat
to produce liquid water. That level of volcanism may be largely
undetectable by current monitoring tools (except for byproducts like
methane, of course).
_________________________________________________

Chris L Peterson
Cloudbait Observatory
http://www.cloudbait.com

Quadibloc wrote:
On Jan 3, 11:20 pm, Thad Floryan wrote:

Earth-based telescopes are detecting it and the claim has been made
its presence in Mars' atmosphere is being renewed since otherwise it'd
dissipate and disappear. That doesn't sound like "trace" to me.

By whom has this claim been made?

Just about everyone researching Martian atmospheric chemistry. Main
announcement about this time last year. eg

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/ma...rsmethane.html

Roughly 10ppb detected in plumes which vary with the seasons.

The Martian atmosphere consists chiefly of carbon dioxide. The carbon

CO2 atomic mass 44 (with traces of heavier isotopic forms)

dioxide isn't claimed to be in imminent danger of dissipating and
disappearing. Methane has a higher molecular weight than carbon
dioxide. Hence, if the carbon dioxide in Mars' atmosphere isn't going
anywhere fast, there's no pressing reason for the methane to be going
away faster.

Wrong on just about all counts. CH4 is atomic mass 16 (with traces of
heavier isotopic forms) and so much lighter than CO2. It is certainly
prone to being broken down by hard UV. And there is enough trace oxygen
there at 0.13% and ozone at 30ppb to make methanes lifetime short due to
oxidation reactions. Formaldehyde is also seen at around 130ppb.

There is also plenty of dust in the Martian atmosphere which is probably
crucial in the catalysis of the destructive gas phase reactions in such
a rarefied atmosphere. It is interesting that the emissions follow the
seasons, but it will take mass spectrometry or another cunning method of
checking for isotopic selectivity to prove if it is life or an inorganic
weathering reaction producing/releasing the methane.

If Mars had an _oxygen_ atmosphere, methane wouldn't last long because
it would burn up. But it doesn't, and so methane in Mars' atmosphere
could stay there for quite a while, it would seem to me.

We know from the Viking probes that there is either life or superoxides
of iron in the dust on the surface of Mars (with a preference for the
latter based on the hard solar uv sterilising the environment).

Regards,
Martin Brown