"...all of us came from Adam & Eve."

That's debatable. I am a Christian but I find that just because the Bible focuses on Adam & Eve as the first does not mean that they were all there was. (Note how Cain pleads to God, fearful that someone out there might take his life. Who's out there to kill him if Adam and Eve had only two kids?)

That my brother will never happen, we all know this and is another topic to discuss, but knowledge is out there. And to the Adam and Eve believers, are you telling me that we are products of insest? Isn't that wrong in the bible? Look humans have been telling stories to explain things since we've learned to communicate with each other. Now Im not knocking religion, we need something to believe in, but you cant put all your faith on something that was written by man.

Envy-Eternity wrote "... if Adam and Eve had only two kids?"
The Bible says Eve was called Eve because she was to become the mother of everyone living. Also, there were more than two children, Seth being the only one named (besides Cain and Abel) but also additional "sons and daughters" after Seth. (Gen 5:4)

AnthonyGarcia - Yes, the Bible condemns incest, but the proahibition against incest wasn't given until much later. To paraphrase your last sentence, We need something to believe in, but can you put faith in Science as written by man? I'm not dissing science, nor saying the Bible was written by man. But assuming the Bible was written by man, is not science also "written by man?"

yes, science is written by man (or as I prefer, humanity).

science is fallible, and yet, is designed to be self-correcting. science tests and tests and tests again - pushing every conclusion to see if [when] it will break.

the people who are most famous in science - galileo, einstein, hubble, pasteur - were all people who overthrew the status quo; science moves forward when that which was known before is altered or completely thrown out when something better [and PROVEN] comes along.

someone quoted [can't remember who] that at any time in science a beautiful theory can be torn down by an ugly fact.

religion is revealed, not discovered or proven. it is never questioned - unless one wishes to risk burning at the stake. ugly facts are ignored no matter how much they disprove a religious event [great flood, anyone? how about evolution? earth older than 6000 years? and on and on....].

> I say "Ni"! <

Dan of Earth,

Good post, I would like to comment.

"Outer space research then can go forward but only after we totally understand and have fully explored our oceans and figured out how to UNPOLUTE them and how to use hydrogen to provide all of our energy needs.”

Well......you are correct in that we need to get this information but this is precisely why we need and have outer space research. Unfortunately and ironically some of the information we need and that is being found as we speak is being shielded from us. (Incidentally, we don't need hydrogen - practically free energy can be siphoned from the energy fields that occur naturally around us)

"We came from our mothers & fathers and the common DNA in all of us came from Adam & Eve."

Well......I know you believe this but I believe that you will find the ultimate source of our ancestry was not Adam and Eve. There are clues out there in space that indicate otherwise, but the folks in the power cabals on this planet (the Illumanati) who have access to this information JUST AREN'T TALKIN'

This evidence and information is being hidden because of fears that the population can't handle the truth but also because this information will cause those who have power to lose that power and they don't want that. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Millions of our taxpayer dollars are already additionally being siphoned off that go to black projects that most of us are not being informed about - so I wouldn't sweat the space research money.

Quite frankly I am not the least bit worried about finding out the truth that has been hidden. ETs are benevolent and only good can come from contact with them. Their existence does not lessen the meaning of God.

The majority of folks living on our planet don't really take seriously the thought that God picked a woman on our planet to have a baby with. I am not trying to knock the folks that do believe this - I am just saying that I think we can handle the truth.

God is in all of us and we are all a part of God.

Dan:

The economy is only the good faith of the people in their Government. Rainlady2 has your answer. The money we spend on space travel stays here providing jobs so people can have healthcare provided by the government who get their money to pay for healthcare from the taxpayer who gets their money from the businesses that pay taxes, etc., ad nauseam.

Ole Bernie Madoff went to prison for doing the same thing Governments have been doing for milleniums. How dare anyone else do that. Just the United States OTC derivatives are worth a notional value of US $680 Trillion which is 10 times the Gross National Product of all nations in the world combined.

Notional value means no one really knows what they are worth. It is only on the good faith of someone that these futures are priced. And we should worry about a little thing like sending a piece of metal out into space??

. ETs are benevolent and only good can come from contact with them.

am i the only person who hears music when reading the above?

www.youtube.com/watch?v=NzlG28B-R8Y

Well Dano, if humans are made in god's image, then god must be pretty screwed up!

i'm very sorry to hear about god's bad back and fallen arches.

Dan you correctly quote from the Bible when you wrote of creation ("in the beginning"). The Bible also say God is a spirit, which is not a physical being such as ourselves. We share with God an understanding of justice, a measure of wisdom, a capacity to love; from a Biblical perspective ours is limited, of course.

DNA? Yes. MNRA? Vaguely. TRNA (you got me there) and phosphodiester (Nope that's the limit of my anatomy class.) But aside from all this, you can get off your high horse, this article is pretty much meant to entertain: You could call it a by-product of humanity producing so many dunces that we can now label them according to a field of science...

I'm not on a high horse. The article is about a scientific topic. It is not about humanity producing dunces, or calling people names or curing world hunger. It has nothing to do with God. It's about a fascinating device/technology that is revolutionizing the study of disease, heredity, etc. The terms I mentioned are from highschool biology. If you had benefit of such study, you would recognize them and countless more (base pairs, telomeres, centromeres, mitosis, mieosis, ...) at a glance. You thought the article was for enternatinment because you lack even the erudition of a 12th grade HS student to give it some sensible context. It's lost on you and almost everyone else who made irrelevent and nonesensiclal comments above.

@Jack - This "chip" is so cool. It's potiental for quick DNA sequencing has so much importance in medical research and clinical situations. Too many say spend money to help humanity instead of space exploration, yet this is a perfect example of how something designed for planetary microbial analysis, can have a huge impact in medicine.

I read a little bit more about this at MIT's site, so this device is basically a microarray , using the PCR techniques, with the reagents built in for autonomous operation. I want one, I can use it for DNA analysis in my research. It's a whole lot quicker and easier than standard electrophoresis.

"It's not about humanity producing dunces, or calling people names... you lack even the erudition of a 12th grade HS student"

As I said, more for entertainment purposes than anything. You can't even make a point without adding something at the end to make you seem like a hypocrite. Nay-saying on those who call names but doing so yourself? tsk-tsk.

Sorry, actually my anatomy (which was likely the only reason I recognized the DNA and subsequent abbrievations) was Community College taught. About the only thing I learned from public grade schools was History and that teachers push studends through. I was very rarely or taught to appreciate the knowledge. Had to go to Community where, when it's out of your own pocket, you being to pay attention alot more :P That's why I couldn't tell you what telomeres would be or centromeres even though my teachers in High School probably went over them. But mitsosi, mieosis and base pairs, I could go into more detail about simply because I had to learn that stuff out of my own pocket.

I read this article for entertainment because I know how easily it will be swayed to such since there is very little in this article beyond; "LOOK a new toy!" As given by the inventor of this device (Carr) stating they're not even sure if there's anything to find but if there is they'll be working on something that may help find it. When the device is finished (and it's not unless this article was written by someone with no real information about this box) and they get it running I'll be more inclined to treat it with seriousness. But as is, no. It's just a brief bit of filler.

(For the record I still have my anatomy book. I figure; costs $100ish. Why not keep it?)

PS: Excuse my grammer mistakes. Ironically, my love for writing and reading has never advanced my shaky grasp of the bloody "," and ";".

Thanks for a sensible comment! I agree, we should all have one in our garage with our electron microscope and centrifuge.

@Envy - If you would take a moment and read about this project at MIT, you would have read that the researchers took a prototype of this device to a volcano in Argentina, in which the field tests were very successful. So you might want to take a more serious look, if you are truly interested, since they have a working prototype.

Envy_Eternity:

" But mitsosi, mieosis and base pairs, I could go into more detail about simply because I had to learn that stuff out of my own pocket."

No, you can't "go into more detail" about those things ... you can't even define them.

I will reiterate - this topic IS treated in high school biology. Someone with that much background would be able to appreciate this work. Applying it to the nacent field of "astrobiology" is akin to the work of Van Leeuwenhoek who took a microscope and discovered the existence microscopic protists (bacteria and such).

I don't know where you went to HS or Com Col, or who was paying, or how much your anatomy book cost - this topic isn't about any of those things and it isn't about you. It is about molecular biology and I am now quite convinced that you know absolutely nothing about that topic. You may be able to cite chapter and verse from the bible, but you cannot cite a single author or Nobel laureate from the science of molecular biology. You cannot elaborate on a single scientific principle or quantitative fact about this topic. You are hard-pressed to compose a coherent english sentence. And yet you are able to spew forth volumes on this topic that you know nothing about and seem to wear your ignorance as a badge of honor.

Take you cue from TReed. "Read Something"!

I don't know Jack. Do you have anything relevant to contribute?

JackDanger,

Sending this chip to Mars has everything to do with anything everyone is writing in this comments section.

The chip is looking for life. It is looking for similar life; may find different life; may find nothing. All those that are commenting here must have at least read some of the words in the article. If so, then the article has done its job. It is creating lively conversation about life itself. I say bravo to the author for bringing us together even though we are apart.

And God said," E.T., phone home"!

Terraforming is a myth. To turn Mars into a Earth-equivelent is impossible for several reasons:

1) Gravity. This is the big one. It's not just about humans flying off the surface -they wouldn't, there's enough there to hold us- it comes down to gravity's influence on the elements. Do you think rain can just naturally fall? Nope. It's because of Earth's gravity that rain can even form. Liquid water is (apparently) VERY rare in the galaxy. As in, Earth could very well be the only planet that has it. H20 in liquid form is unsual. H20 crystalized (frozen) less so but it's not actually H20 in most cases. I can't pull the Periodical Table up and print all the variations we know of which resemble our H20 but, suffice to say, there's quite a few. But none of them would be good for humans. It's not like salt water where you can boil out any impurities. You'd be trying to use a process of nuclear fission or fusion to perfect a element to be human friendly.

2) Temperature. This puts the nail in the coffin of terraforming. Mars is further from the Sun. Much further. As in 207,000,000 km from the Sun at closest. 249,000,000 km at furthest. This is a big deal because it spends a very significant amount of time traveling further away (as do all planets). And the planet is getting colder during those times. -120 C I believe is where it levels out before warming up. That would take Earth's worst winter in the Arctic Circle, adding half itself over to equal. This temperature would kill any Earth based life-form. Forget humans; the sturdiest plant in the world has a snow-ball's-chance-in-hell of not lasting beyond the first day of the Mars' winter. In fact, in order for the Land Rover to actually work they had to specifically design it to withstand -47 C just to move about. I really doubt that was cheap to do. The distance also serves as a stab to the heart of terraforming which takes X amount of time: Because terraforming would take (and this would be on a good 'day') months or years to even begin to show a sign of progress in the course of a Martian year, would crash any advance accomplished. But even if you planned for your project to transform the planet in less than 30 days, you're work wouldn't be maintainable because of:

3) Atmosphere. Mars has little. As in none. Without atmosphere you can't retain anything. More specifically, without atmospheric preassure you can't keep your: Temperature, humidity, weather patterns in the confines of the planet. Mars is approximately a third the size of Earth. It's mass, by default, is less than Earth to the point that it could not sustain 1 terraforming project if you gave it a thousand. All the oxygen, carbon-dioxide, helium and what-have you in the world could be instantly copied and transferred to Mars but within the course of a year it'd be gone. Mars can't hold on to it. How do you create an atmosphere? You can't. Not without the basics. And Mars does not have any of the basics. As I just detailed: Gravity, Temperature, Atmosphere. These are three things the Earth has in such a finely tuned design that if even one of these were off it'd fall to pieces. Mars is not Earth, it could never be Earth. Sorry but that's life. Humanity (in effect) is doomed to either kill itself off, be killed off (Sun going out, astroid, ect) or get lucky and find out there is a God who's got His own plans. I'll take my chances with 3 but I don't blame you if they all look kind of bleak.

I'm of the belief that until we become more than heavily armed hairless apes, wiser universal forces will make sure we don't get far enough off the planet to do much harm. And if we kill earth mother with our ignorance, then the human race needs to die with her.

confusedalaskan: Don't be confused about anything. And don't worry so much. The Earth will be here a lot longer than will mankind. It is only conceit on the part of humans to think they will outlast what has been here for 4.6 billion years (solar system) before they existed and 13.75 billion years after the universe started. And conceit to think mankind can keep the Earth from changing from what it looks like today.

Are there any dinosaurs (other than what look like birds or cockroaches) running around on Earth today? One has to wonder if the dinosaurs had some cognitive reasoning and wondered how they could stop over populating the Earth so they wouldn't destroy it. Then said, "Oh crap." when they watched as the meteor that will create the Chicxulub Crater in Cancun fell to Earth. They probably said to themselves, "I guess we won't have to worry about over population anymore".

The Earth is going to be just fine. Mankind is going to have a little more trouble than they can handle in 50 or so years, but the Earth will heal and be just what it wants to be at the specific time it is being.

Exactly - See "The Genetic Code". You made a useful comment. Thanks

@JD - The reason Mars is not considered as being the object that Earth, is basically the make up of the rocks. Moon rocks are much more like rocks on Earth than Mars rocks are to Earth. You say to spend more money in cleaning up our own planet. We actually have many good clean energy alternatives, the problem is with society in accepting the use of these alternatives. Oil companies buy up patents for cleaner energy options to prevent them from coming to market. A perfect example occurred in the mid '70's during the oil crisis that was going on. An engineer developed a carburetor that got a 100 miles to the gallon. What happend to it? An oil company bought the patent and destroyed the design. Status quo with the money wants things to stay the same so they can milk as much money out of the existing resources. Next, there isn't much political will to push this forward quickly. The president can say he wants it, but it is the congress that can make it happen and the oil lobbyists are not ready to allow this to happen.

Then you say after we got our planet clean to focus our efforts on getting past the speed and time barrier. Yet to keep the knowledge and technology moving to be able to reach the speeds you are talking about, we need to keep research continuing in space engineering. Unlike the views of many people on these blogs, any particular technology is not unilateral to one area. It's multilateral. The chip in this article uses current DNA microarray technology for gene analysis, it uses nanotechnology and it pushes the edge of autonomous devices. The last two aspects of technology can be used in reaching a cleaner Earth sooner, rather than later.

Anthony, may I add a bit?

Evil and greedy - perhaps; there are certainly many (too many) examples of such. And also a huge number of examples of goodness and generosity.

What I would add as a motive in Newtonian inertia - "an object at rest tends to stay at rest". We want to keep doing what we are doing now.

Cheers! ~Michael (AFM*Radio / Astronomy.FM)

michael, you silly lovable goof - typical of the astronomer to see everything as a physics problem!  ;-P

> I say "Ni"! <

Guilty as charged...

And I believe those who have good hearts will prevail. It would be hard to feed yourself if we didn't have

elbows, but if we feed each other we could eat forever.

Thank you for the apology. Although, I didn't take it in a negative way, I thought it was insightful. I'm not the brightest star in the sky but I do know logic, I just needed the information to see if it fit in my puzzle.

thanks again

take care.

But finding life now on Mars is a crazy idea.

Finding life on Mars is a distinct possibility, and a scientific question worthy of investigation.

I don't think so, Skip; more like the crocuses blooming in the Spring.

I've admitted I'm not the smartest tool in the shed. And its sad that I'm are called dumb for the lack of certain knowledge you have or don't have. I don't disagree with anyone on this subject, I'm always up to hearing peoples thoughts on how life began, although I'm more interested with "why". I checked out this page because it is interesting. I was taught not to leave angry, so have a good day and may peace be with you.

Thanks Jack, glad you liked it.

I don't mind the occasional "humorous" comment of clever bon mot, but what is passing for humor on this board is pitiful and it seems like it's beginning to dominate along with the religious and political babble.

I don't consider myself especially smart or clever and much of the science goes right over my head, but I do enjoy reading about it and what it might mean for our future and the future of my children and any possible grandchildren. I just get tired of all the juvenile comments, bronze age mythology and political nonsense.

Have a great day.

Gets what ? Alter the photos and you'll see what you want to see ?

There is also very little environment to sustain any life whatsoever on Mars. And this is what you call someplace more hospitable ? or are you just being sarcastic ( I can't tell ) ?