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NASA finds new type of life form.

B5CB5C Veteran
edited December 2010 in Buddhism Today
Looks like the Biology books will have to be re-written.
At their conference today, NASA scientist Felisa Wolfe Simon will announce that they have found a bacteria whose DNA is completely alien to what we know today. Instead of using phosphorus, the bacteria uses arsenic. All life on Earth is made of six components: carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus and sulfur. Every being, from the smallest amoeba to the largest whale, share the same life stream. Our DNA blocks are all the same.
But not this one. This one is completely different. Discovered in the poisonous Mono Lake, California, this bacteria is made of arsenic, something that was thought to be completely impossible. While she and other scientists theorized that this could be possible, this is the first discovery. The implications of this discovery are enormous to our understanding of life itself and the possibility of finding beings in other planets that don't have to be like planet Earth.
http://gizmodo.com/5704158/nasa-finds-new-life
:D

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Comments

  • fivebellsfivebells Veteran
    edited December 2010
    This story is almost certainly BS.
  • federicafederica Seeker of the clear blue sky... Its better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubt Moderator
    edited December 2010
    Yes.
    They also claim 3 men landed on the moon in '69.....

    I still don't buy it.

    So what's your point?
  • edited December 2010
    The validity of this story is questionable...

    However, they've been finding life on EARTH that is unlike life we've known. Simple bacteria living in situations that were thought to be quite impossible for life to survive.

    Point is, scientists have been discovering that life is actually quite adaptable. So, it HINTS that simple organisms could be living on planets even inside our very own solar system.

    Simple bacteria life on other planets may be a bit profound... But not exactly what humans are looking for, yeah? :)
  • robotrobot Veteran
    edited December 2010
    federica wrote: »
    Yes.
    They also claim 3 men landed on the moon in '69.....

    I still don't buy it.

    So what's your point?
    As I recall it was two men, third one stayed in the orbiter.
  • edited December 2010
    fivebells wrote: »
    This story is almost certainly BS.
    federica wrote: »
    Yes.
    They also claim 3 men landed on the moon in '69.....

    I still don't buy it.

    So what's your point?

    Are you guys being serious?
  • B5CB5C Veteran
    edited December 2010
    Are you guys being serious?

    I second that. :confused:
  • B5CB5C Veteran
    edited December 2010
    So it throws the theory that life needs carbon to be created. Maybe star trek is right!
    STDevilDark.jpg
  • edited December 2010
    This article puts it into a little bit better perspective:
    http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/notrocketscience/2010/12/02/mono-lake-bacteria-build-their-dna-using-arsenic-and-no-this-isnt-about-aliens/

    They are still carbon base, and still would thrive better on phosphorus. But they have adapted to their conditions, showing life has countless ways of thriving!
  • B5CB5C Veteran
    edited December 2010
    We are getting close of the possibility that carbon may not be needed.
  • edited December 2010
    Sure, I definitely think its possible.

    But I think if we are to ever find extraterrestrial life, it will most likely be carbon based. Its the most energy favorable.
  • ChrysalidChrysalid Veteran
    edited December 2010
    We are getting close of the possibility that carbon may not be needed.
    Not on the basis of this discovery, phosperous is only structural in DNA, arsenic has very similar chemical properties to phosperous so acts as a decent enough substitute. The coding parts of the DNA, the nucleotides that actually determine the genes and proteins made, remain identical to all other life on Earth.
  • B5CB5C Veteran
    edited December 2010
    Sure, I definitely think its possible.

    But I think if we are to ever find extraterrestrial life, it will most likely be carbon based. Its the most energy favorable.

    I wonder if we might find a solar system where there is more silicon than carbon.
  • ChrysalidChrysalid Veteran
    edited December 2010
    Sure, I definitely think its possible.

    But I think if we are to ever find extraterrestrial life, it will most likely be carbon based. Its the most energy favorable.
    Thing is, we have quite a restricted understanding of life, there may be many sentient entities out there that we simply would not recognise as being alive. They could be gaseous and appear as eddies or weather currents to us, they could be liquid and be dismissed as mere chemical oddities, or composed of plasma and live in the corona of stars.

    I think it was Stephen Hawking who said that the aliens we'd be most likely to meet, or to visit us, would be mechanical - robotic.
  • ChrysalidChrysalid Veteran
    edited December 2010
    I wonder if we might find a solar system where there is more silicon than carbon.
    There is more silicon than there is carbon on Earth. Sulphur is a more likely substitute than silicon.
  • B5CB5C Veteran
    edited December 2010
    Chrysalid wrote: »
    Thing is, we have quite a restricted understanding of life, there may be many sentient entities out there that we simply would not recognise as being alive. They could be gaseous and appear as eddies or weather currents to us, they could be liquid and be dismissed as mere chemical oddities, or composed of plasma and live in the corona of stars.

    I think it was Stephen Hawking who said that the aliens we'd be most likely to meet, or to visit us, would be mechanical - robotic.

    yes, has anybody seen the documentary Alien Planet?

    eosapien.jpg

    A floating intelligent life form.
  • edited December 2010
    Chrysalid wrote: »
    Thing is, we have quite a restricted understanding of life, there may be many sentient entities out there that we simply would not recognise as being alive. They could be gaseous and appear as eddies or weather currents to us, they could be liquid and be dismissed as mere chemical oddities, or composed of plasma and live in the corona of stars.

    I think it was Stephen Hawking who said that the aliens we'd be most likely to meet, or to visit us, would be mechanical - robotic.

    Are robots a form of life?

    If we amend our definition of what life itself is, then sure, the realm of possibility would be vast.

    Mars might be "alive".
  • ChrysalidChrysalid Veteran
    edited December 2010
    Are robots a form of life?
    Someone would have to invent a sentient, thinking robot and ask it.
    If we amend our definition of what life itself is, then sure, the realm of possibility would be vast.

    Mars might be "alive".
    Indeed. We have carbon-based bias.
  • ShiftPlusOneShiftPlusOne Veteran
    edited December 2010
    I, for one, welcome our alien overlords.
  • CloudCloud Veteran
    edited December 2010
    "Get Your Biology Textbook...and an Eraser!"

    The story is on http://astrobiology.nasa.gov/, so it's not BS. Specific link is http://astrobiology.nasa.gov/articles/thriving-on-arsenic/ for the full thing.
  • edited December 2010
    define what exactly is a robot? because if you think about it our bodies are robotic/mechanical. just not the metal and grease perspective.
  • fivebellsfivebells Veteran
    edited December 2010
    Are you guys being serious?
    I am about the life thing being BS, totally. Fede owns the moon claim. :)

    NASA has pulled this kind of shit before. I won't believe it until there's independent confirmation.
  • fivebellsfivebells Veteran
    edited December 2010
    OK, I take it back. This isn't the story I thought it was. I thought it was some alien lifeform, but actually it's a bacterium with a novel chemical capability. I guess that's plausible.
  • edited December 2010
    This finding is of great importance as it shows that a slightly different chemical mix can still support a carbon based life form. It does not fundimentaly alter the way life is defined, however it does help us to understand how life could evolve on a planet other than Earth.

    Sad to say the media, most of who do not understand basic science and want a splashy headline are very unclear in the way it is reported.

    a good example of this are the Mars rocks that do show some microscopic features that resemble those features produced by microbes. Although that was the report the headlines would have you think that life had been found on Mars and the quotes from the reseachers were so twisted as to be of no use.

    Or how Ida was paraded around as some type of missing link at the expense of its importance as a very well preserved tranisisional fossel from long before Humans were here.

    I for one am looking forward to reading the actual research paper to see what was found.
  • CloudCloud Veteran
    edited December 2010
    The view of the moon landing as being faked or a conspiracy has popped up a couple of times. I hadn't even heard of this view until a couple of years ago, but I did watch an episode of MythBusters not long ago that took the most popular and "condemning" conspiracy theories and debunked them. There's some info at http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/space/4279691 that I found through Google (there's a few different pages if you Google mythbusters moon landing yourself).

    Also http://mythbustersresults.com/nasa-moon-landing.

    I wouldn't bring it up if no one had said anything, but it made me smile. Despite all of this, people will still believe what they choose to believe, as the MythBusters team put it themselves:
    Despite what they found, Savage doubts that anything on the show will have an effect on conspiracy theorists. "I think it's predictable what their stance will be: That we're just shills for the Man!" he laughs.

    "We're not too out there to educate people about any specific thing necessarily so much as we are to encourage critical and scientific thinking," Hyneman says. "And regardless of whether conspiracy theorists are right or wrong in their conclusions, it's good to think carefully about what is told and what is out there and make up your own mind. That's all we are really pro: making sure that you just don't swallow everything that you're fed, and look at it clearly and critically."

    The bottom line, Savage insists, is that we went to the moon. "The fact is, science isn't about coming up with the ultimate truth," he says, "because there is no such thing. It's about looking at the evidence and coming to conclusions. And if a conspiracy theorist wants to come to the most complicated possible conclusion based on the evidence, what we've done in this episode is shown that in fact going to the moon is a simpler solution than the conspiracy theory. And given Occam's razor and general scientific principle, that's the most likely explanation for all the evidence we have that we went to the moon: that we actually did."

    Namaste. :)
  • ShiftPlusOneShiftPlusOne Veteran
    edited December 2010
    Cloud, that won't do. "They" are in on it. The beauty of any conspiracy theory is that any evidence suggesting it's false can be easily dismissed by questioning the source and their motives. "Popular mechanics? Hearst Publishing's Popular mechanics? Hearst invented yellow journalism! It's all bought and paid for!".

    Having said that, that doesn't mean I think that the moon landing was real. Both sides have great points, and are great at debunking each other.
  • CloudCloud Veteran
    edited December 2010
    That's all I got SPO. People will cling fiercely to whatever they believe until they find reason within themselves to do otherwise. It's all about what you see, hear, smell, taste, touch and think. That's all. I've no interest in the moon but thought the information worth passing on, so consider me out of any debates or arguments about it that now arise. :)

    Much more interested in this new form of life!
  • edited December 2010
    Finding beings in other planets that don't have to be like planet Earth! Unfortunately, these scientists have no such luxurious time and space to explore sutra - owing to their karma obstacle. In the wisdom of sutra, there are uncountable living beings and planets as well as galaxies, it is not new. It is more productive if they choose to spend their invaluable time enjoying life of bliss with all their love ones and reading sutra.
  • fivebellsfivebells Veteran
    edited December 2010
    This finding is of great importance as it shows that a slightly different chemical mix can still support a carbon based life form. It does not fundimentaly alter the way life is defined, however it does help us to understand how life could evolve on a planet other than Earth.
    It's interesting, but actually not that important. We've known of bacteria finding ways to live in a "slightly different chemical mix" for decades. This is just NASA prostituting itself because it's running low on funds, as usual.
  • Buddha_RocketBuddha_Rocket Explorer
    edited December 2010
    Ha. Moon landing conspirators always make me smile. My parents met while working for NASA in Houston during Apollo in the '60s. I have also worked at JSC for a bit. Trust me, NASA was smart enough to put man on the moon then (I'm not sure about now) but not smart enough to fake it. That would be a lot harder. Government agencies are not the most efficient entities... its time has passed unfortunately.
  • edited December 2010
    bart_vs_aldrin.gif

    for those that don't know, that's Buzz Aldrin punching a moon-landing denier.
  • edited December 2010
    I was curious about that incident with Buzz Aldrin...found an article mentioning it and discussing lunar conspiracy theory in general. This bit at the end particularly moves me:

    Harrison Schmitt, the pilot of the lunar lander during the last Apollo mission and later a United States senator, said in an interview that the poor state of the nation’s schools has had predictable results. "If people decide they're going to deny the facts of history and the facts of science and technology, there's not much you can do with them," he said.

    "For most of them, I just feel sorry that we failed in their education."
  • B5CB5C Veteran
    edited December 2010
    fivebells wrote: »
    It's interesting, but actually not that important. We've known of bacteria finding ways to live in a "slightly different chemical mix" for decades. This is just NASA prostituting itself because it's running low on funds, as usual.

    No it's not.

    Majority of scientists believed that life can not live in a arsenic environment since 99.9% chance that everything organic that goes into dies. We found a life form on Earth that can live in it and also use arsenic as an option source to work with DNA and other biochemical processes.

    The best thing about this discovery is that It creates the idea that life is very common in our universe. If a life form can live in a area that is deadly too most organisms. There is a great chance that life can be created in not so perfect conditions.

    Also Obama gave NASA a budget raise.
  • fivebellsfivebells Veteran
    edited December 2010
    For a rational person, it shouldn't change the subjective probability of extra-terrestrial life at all. Anyone who believes that life could only occur with the chemistry found on Earth is guilty of a failure of imaginiation.
  • federicafederica Seeker of the clear blue sky... Its better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubt Moderator
    edited December 2010
    fivebells wrote: »
    OK, I take it back. This isn't the story I thought it was. I thought it was some alien lifeform, but actually it's a bacterium with a novel chemical capability. I guess that's plausible.
    But the moon landing - in my opinion - isn't....:p
    Ha. Moon landing conspirators always make me smile. My parents met while working for NASA in Houston during Apollo in the '60s. I have also worked at JSC for a bit. Trust me, NASA was smart enough to put man on the moon then (I'm not sure about now) but not smart enough to fake it. That would be a lot harder. Government agencies are not the most efficient entities... its time has passed unfortunately.

    Until they can come up with a better response to an in-depth and much respected, serious, scientific BBC programme, picking their claims to pieces bit by bit, with something more than "Damn well did, so there!" I'm still sceptical. Call it an 'Ehi Passika thing....! :D
    upalabhava wrote: »
    for those that don't know, that's Buzz Aldrin punching a moon-landing denier.
    yeah, liars hate exposure.....:poke:
  • edited December 2010
    Seriously???
  • B5CB5C Veteran
    edited December 2010
    We have photos of the landers from SPACE!
    http://www.newscientist.com/gallery/apollo-site-images/2
    apollo11apollo15labelled.jpg
    apollo14footprintslabelled.jpg
  • fivebellsfivebells Veteran
    edited December 2010
    Photoshop runs in space, you know. :)
  • edited December 2010
    fivebells wrote: »
    Photoshop runs in space, you know. :)

    LOL
    Shoop-Da-Whoop.png
  • federicafederica Seeker of the clear blue sky... Its better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubt Moderator
    edited December 2010
    upalabhava wrote: »
    Seriously???

    Yes.
    Can you prove definitively, otherwise, where NASA have been unable to do so?
    We have photos of the landers from SPACE!

    Oh yeah, three extremely long shots of the moon's surface covered in big white arrows showing tiny specks does it for me, yup, I'm fully convinced.:rolleyes:

    Photos of 'landers in space' they may be....
    Photos of definitive proof that a man actually strode onto the surface of the moon - they ain't.
  • ChrysalidChrysalid Veteran
    edited December 2010
    federica wrote: »
    Photos of definitive proof that a man actually strode onto the surface of the moon - they ain't.
    How about the fact that scientists from around the globe regularly fire lasers at reflectors placed on the moon by astronauts to calculate changes in the moon's distance from Earth and rotation?
  • B5CB5C Veteran
    edited December 2010
    I can't believe you all are with the same conspiracy boat as birthers, 9/11 truthers, and Sasquatch believers.
  • ChrysalidChrysalid Veteran
    edited December 2010
    I can't believe you all are with the same conspiracy boat as birthers, 9/11 truthers, and Sasquatch believers.
    What's a birther?
  • ShiftPlusOneShiftPlusOne Veteran
    edited December 2010
    Those who think Obama wasn't born in America. I had to look it up as well.
  • ChrysalidChrysalid Veteran
    edited December 2010
    Those who think Obama wasn't born in America. I had to look it up as well.
    Oh, thanks. I thought they were just called racists. No one kicks up a fuss about Arnie being a governor and not being born in America, perhaps that's because he's a Republican though.
  • fivebellsfivebells Veteran
    edited December 2010
    Fede, I'm really interested in the arguments invalidating the video evidence, showing long takes of men in suits appearing to move under greatly reduced gravity.
  • Buddha_RocketBuddha_Rocket Explorer
    edited December 2010
    federica wrote: »
    But the moon landing - in my opinion - isn't....:p



    Until they can come up with a better response to an in-depth and much respected, serious, scientific BBC programme, picking their claims to pieces bit by bit, with something more than "Damn well did, so there!" I'm still sceptical. Call it an 'Ehi Passika thing....! :D


    yeah, liars hate exposure.....:poke:

    Do you have any idea how insulting all of this is?

    My father was one of the most honest people you would have ever met. Unlike Buzz, he would have just smiled and kept walking. However he didn't risk his life like Buzz did.

    I grew up in the Johnson Space Center community and most of my friends and family have worked for NASA. That includes those who died on the space shuttle etc.

    During Apollo 13 my parent's apartment across from the space center turned into a flop-house for those working 24 straight hour shifts in mission control. (my mom was pregnant with me at the time). They slept on their floor to get some rest as they tried to get the crew back to Earth.

    My father died less than two years ago, he was everything to me so this gets me a little riled up. I watched the Discovery Channel's "When we Left Earth" HD documentary series with him the hospital across from JSC as he was dying of cancer. His Apollo 11 awards are the first thing you see when you walk into my mom's home. And he was a much better person than you will ever be. You should be ashamed.

    Take it from me, we landed on the moon.

    That Discovery Channel show was great too: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_We_Left_Earth:_The_NASA_Missions
  • edited December 2010
    Do you have any idea how insulting all of this is?

    My father was one of the most honest people you would have ever met. Unlike Buzz, he would have just smiled and kept walking. However he didn't risk his life like Buzz did.

    I grew up in the Johnson Space Center community and most of my friends and family have worked for NASA. That includes those who died on the space shuttle etc.

    During Apollo 13 my parent's apartment across from the space center turned into a flop-house for those working 24 straight hour shifts in mission control. (my mom was pregnant with me at the time). They slept on their floor to get some rest as they tried to get the crew back to Earth.

    My father died less than two years ago, he was everything to me so this gets me a little riled up. I watched the Discovery Channel's "When we Left Earth" HD documentary series with him the hospital across from JSC as he was dying of cancer. His Apollo 11 awards are the first thing you see when you walk into my mom's home. And he was a much better person than you will ever be. You should be ashamed.

    Take it from me, we landed on the moon.

    That Discovery Channel show was great too: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_We_Left_Earth:_The_NASA_Missions

    The Moon landing is a historical Fact

    Not only do people who deny the Moon landing insult the brave men and women who risked, and continue to risk thier lives. to continue the exploration of the universe , it is also a denial of the great benifits to medical science and other areas that this venture has bought.

    Many of the cardiac and other medical sensors that save thousands of lives today were first used to moniter the Asronauts on thier trip. Much of the other tech that was developed during this time, computers and other electonic breakthoughs has been used to help people all over the world.

    And our understanding of who and what we are and how the Universe and planet that we live on work have taken a vast leap due to the efforts of the people who worked at NASA and other places during this time.

    Its like stateing that Watson and Crick did not really discover the Stucture of DNA in 1953, dispite all that this discovery has lead to.

    Rocket, I salute your parents and all of the others they worked with for the effert that they put in to make the world a better place. I am sorry for the loss of your father not so long ago. I know this does not really help, but he was part of one of the great leaps in human history.

    All the Best.
  • Buddha_RocketBuddha_Rocket Explorer
    edited December 2010
    Many of the cardiac and other medical sensors that save thousands of lives today were first used to moniter the Asronauts on thier trip.

    Thanks. It's funny that you bring this up. My dad worked on the medical sensor telemetry from space during Apollo. There is a funny/true scene in the Apollo 13 movie where the crew gets sick of wearing them and tears them off.
  • B5CB5C Veteran
    edited December 2010
    Chrysalid wrote: »
    Oh, thanks. I thought they were just called racists. No one kicks up a fuss about Arnie being a governor and not being born in America, perhaps that's because he's a Republican though.

    That is because in the US Constitution.

    A president must: As a governor of a state, you don't have to be a natural born citizen of the United States. Unless it states in the state's constitution.

    Obama father was a Kenyan and his mother was a American. They claim he was born in Kenya and that Obama's birth certificate is faked even though Obama released a copy of his Hawaiian birth certificate. They also believe Obama is a closet Muslim.

    BIRTHERS.jpg
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