WalterP Posted September 14, 2020 Share Posted September 14, 2020 https://www.almaobservatory.org/en/press-releases/possible-marker-of-life-spotted-on-venus/ Thank you. Walter. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderator LogicalFallacy Posted September 14, 2020 Moderator Share Posted September 14, 2020 I read this article in our paper. They were good enough to link the actual study. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-020-1174-4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
disillusioned Posted September 14, 2020 Share Posted September 14, 2020 Very cool stuff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pantheory Posted September 15, 2020 Share Posted September 15, 2020 From this link we see that a chemical which is only produced by life here on Earth, has been found in the clouds of Venus. Because the atmosphere of Venus is much larger than the Earth's atmosphere it extends to heights many times higher than clouds here on Earth. At the height this chemical was found temperatures average about 85 degrees F, about 29 degrees Celsius, very present indeed If it is a sign of life, that floating bacterial life is basking in very pleasant weather and with atmospheric pressures not that different from the surface of the Earth. The question would then be, is this life similar to bacterial life on Earth or not? If so it originally could have come from the Earth's atmosphere by some means, or even that Earth's life could possibly have come from Venus. I think the odds are that there is another explanation for this chemical in the upper atmosphere of Venus, but in time we can bring back quantities of compressed gas from the atmosphere by robotic means and return them to Earth without ever having to land on the hotter-than-hell planet (about 900 degrees F). Such a mission would be immensely interesting for planetary biologists and countless others including us X- 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tsathoggua9 Posted September 16, 2020 Share Posted September 16, 2020 Fascinating! I can't wait to see how this plays out. (I know that it is not "definitive proof", just yet....) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pantheory Posted September 18, 2020 Share Posted September 18, 2020 I found this link proposing that early Martian life, if any, could have used sulfur and solar energy to produce food. In the Martian atmosphere there is a great deal of sulfuric acid which rains down about half way to the surface before it evaporates then rises again in a seemingly never ending cycle. The possible atmospheric life of this OP could use the sulfur in this acid for its metabolism. https://sciworthy.com/early-martian-life-may-have-used-sulfur-as-an-energy-source/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pantheory Posted September 18, 2020 Share Posted September 18, 2020 My editing function isn't working. When I said Martian atmosphere and life above I meant Venusian life. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pantheory Posted September 18, 2020 Share Posted September 18, 2020 Here's a good link explaining the details of possible life existing in the clouds of Venus. One might note that even if there is no existing life in these clouds now in that there probably is another explanation for the observed phosphere, we could still likely engineer life that could live there. This could be part of a long term plan to terraform Venus to have more earth like conditions. Enough of the right kind of quickly multiplying bacteria in the atmosphere could block out more of the sun cooling down the planet somewhat. Next the bacteria could eat up much of the atmospheric CO2 causing dead bacteria to fall to the surface as hydrocarbons and future fertilization for crops . A less dense atmosphere would have less of a green house effect. https://eos.org/articles/could-life-be-floating-in-venuss-clouds Although this is just a board game and science fiction now, it has the possibility of becoming reality some day. "Terraforming Mars and Venus next." https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/231965/terraforming-mars-venus-next 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderator Joshpantera Posted September 22, 2020 Moderator Share Posted September 22, 2020 I guess there's at least two pretty glaring take away's. One is that if true, life will pop up where ever it can pop up. Another is that life will transfer between planets - if that's the case and our upper atmosphere seeded life over to Venus somehow. It just seems to point towards the veracity of life which ever way it would have got there. The same with the prospects of life on moons below ice sheets and the other scenarios. If it's there, life must be pretty god dammed certain to pop up where it's possible for life to pop up. And pushing more towards mundane in the grand scheme, more so than extremely rare as once thought. I'd argue that the Copernican principle should apply to life if this is how it actually works. We wouldn't be as special as previously and commonly assumed, surprise everyone!!! Who couldn't see that one coming??? No privileged place in the universe, again........ 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
♦ Fuego ♦ Posted September 28, 2020 Share Posted September 28, 2020 Here is a cute 11 minute video by a professor talking about phosphine and Venus https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKWiOwt7eCo 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pantheory Posted September 28, 2020 Share Posted September 28, 2020 On 9/21/2020 at 7:54 PM, Joshpantera said: I guess there's at least two pretty glaring take away's. One is that if true, life will pop up where ever it can pop up. Another is that life will transfer between planets - if that's the case and our upper atmosphere seeded life over to Venus somehow. It just seems to point towards the veracity of life which ever way it would have got there. The same with the prospects of life on moons below ice sheets and the other scenarios. If it's there, life must be pretty god dammed certain to pop up where it's possible for life to pop up. And pushing more towards mundane in the grand scheme, more so than extremely rare as once thought. I'd argue that the Copernican principle should apply to life if this is how it actually works. We wouldn't be as special as previously and commonly assumed, surprise everyone!!! Who couldn't see that one coming??? No privileged place in the universe, again........ If it is Earth life blown to Venus in the past then life still could be extremely rare in our galaxy. Earth life through asteroid strikes could also be transported all over our solar system including its planets and moons by such collisions. Such life could have originally come from Earth, but in the same way this original life could have started on Mars or Venus etc. and transported to Earth in the same way. So all solar system life could have come from Mars, Venus, one of Jupiter's moons etc. An alternative could have been that life originated in a dense interstellar cloud and was present during planet formation and rained down on all of the stars, planets and moons in our galactic vicinity during their formation. If so all such life would be related to each other. If so our sun and solar system was created from such a cloud along with hundreds or thousands of other stars and their planetary systems in our vicinity. The results would likely be that many neighboring stars to us would have at least some related elementary life in their solar systems. IMO opinion life would be very difficult to form naturally based upon its complications, plants and animals etc. here on Earth based upon the limited age of the Earth so I would suspect life could have come from such a large interstellar cloud, could have evolved inside a large comet with liquid water inside, or from a previous planet in our galactic neighborhood that is much older, from a planet that has already expired, or from a planet that collided with Earth in its early formation causing the creation of our moon. In many of these scenarios life could still be much older than our Earth and still be a very rare occurrence in our galaxy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderator Joshpantera Posted September 29, 2020 Moderator Share Posted September 29, 2020 6 hours ago, pantheory said: In many of these scenarios life could still be much older than our Earth and still be a very rare occurrence in our galaxy. Rare in the scheme of the magnitude of deep space, but at the same time able to pop up where conditions will allow. And transfer. I'm a fan of abiogenesis by simple deduction. How else? Life transferring from place to place has to pop up on it's own somewhere. And of course one doesn't cancel out the other in terms of abiogensis and panspermia both actively working throughout space and existence. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pantheory Posted October 1, 2020 Share Posted October 1, 2020 “Hints of bacteria on Venus are encouraging, but finding life beyond Earth is the easy part. A new analysis suggests the evolution of human-like intelligence on another planet is more improbable than we like to imagine” https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg24833020-600-why-were-in-for-a-long-wait-to-hear-from-intelligent-aliens/#ixzz6ZeL0tS8t Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alreadyGone Posted November 13, 2020 Share Posted November 13, 2020 We all wonder about Uranus also. In a general way of course. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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