Re: Life on Mars =

Life on Mars = Zilch, unless it has sequestered itself underground or
under/within ice.

Even though "Mars and Earth share the same atomic chemistry in the
same habitability zone around the same star", there seems to be a
missing critical factor of Mars salt, and the little pesky matter of
planetology fact that Mars is much older than Earth.

Besides having the necessary abundance of raw elements, you'll need a
good amount of gravity, a viable magnetosphere and a nifty GW/tidal
forced moon of sufficient mass nearby. Mars has hardly any of those
factors to work with, and hasn't had such for hundreds of millions if
not a good billion years.

What ever happened to most all the salt of Mars?

The ongoing focus upon Mars is entirely unwarranted. Mars simply is
NOT hardly Venus *** kicking worthy, at least not as of the last few
hundred million if not a good billion years. If there are ETs to ever
being had, they are as such not likely descended from Mars. Mars has
long been one cold and cosmic traumatised dead old sucker of a planet
for quite some time. Even under the best of conditions and that means
along with a good magnetosphere, which most likely would have required
a nearby massive moon of damn near the worth of ours, or perhaps at
least Sedna, whereas that little orb of Mars being a mostly fresh
water environment would have been at best somewhat iffy for at most
accommodating 0.1% of Earth's population (extensively having to
survive underground). As of today Mars can't support an individual
soul unless it were made up of rad-hard DNA, plus having imported most
every joule of energy. Even robust little robotics are somewhat hard
pressed to surviving within that less than minimal environment that's
rather badly depleted of just about everything, whereas there's more
mineral or raw element potential to behold upon and within our moon
that has more than enough solar derived energy to process whatever, as
well as nearby for getting those essential beer and pizza deliveries
from Earth.

Venus offers more than its fair share of what it takes. Venus is
still getting rid of 20.5 w/m2 (roughly 256 fold greater than Earth,
and that's suggesting perhaps thousands of fold greater than anything
Mars as to offer), and that's in spite of the greenhouse CO2/S8
atmosphere and of that acidic cloud layer of S8 that's perhaps more
solar energy reflective than not. What's left of Mars is some
potential remainders of raw ice that's covered by dry-ice that's
covered by mostly a rather pathetically thin atmosphere of mostly CO2
that yields almost no solar or cosmic influx protection whatsoever,
and it's hardly worthy of moderating the influx velocity of whatever's
physical. In a silly word, Mars SUCKS!

How much salt does ETI require? and why otherwise do we have so much
spare salt?

With all the very best of intentions, or otherwise, we can make our
calculations or especially manipulate those spendy 3-D animated
supercomputer forced models of whatever to say just about anything
you'd care to pay for, especially hocus-pocus worthy since so little
is known with any certainty of Earth's planetology, and otherwise
because we've got next to nothing known first hand about our very own
massive and nearby moon of such unusual surface mascons and otherwise
loads of sodium. We actually know of more first hand truths about
Mars than about our moon. In other words, your best swag that's based
upon whatever hard or soft numbers pertaining to our moon are nearly
as good as most. Too bad we still haven't "the right stuff" for
accomplishing that nifty do-everything science platform situated
within the moon's L1, much less upon the physically dark and nasty
surface of our moon (perhaps the likes of China or India will fix
that).

Within the first 50 km of Earth's surface we've got roughly 2.5e19 m3
of mother Earth's bedrock to draw upon, of which the raw element of
such as common/terrestrial rock salt is worth 2.2 g/cm3. Trust me
when others and I say that Earth's primary rock is not all that salty,
as to account for having leached out 1.5e19 kg of that sodium/Na
stuff.

Mountains of extremely hard rock formations have often been formulated
rather quickly as antipodes. Rock formations via lava flows or from
the results of gradual plate tectonic vertically forced rock are not
the same thing as antipode forced rock (often granite that's supported
upon a base of basalt) that's relatively low in sodium and clearly
hard enough to resist hundreds of millions if not a few billion years
worth of atmospheric erosion. As best we know, Earth hasn't entirely
renewed or otherwise turned over its surface for the past 4+ billion
years, but it has in fact been seriously impacted, as well as having
been frozen to nearly the tropics of Cancer/Capricorn and then thawed
for no apparent terrestrial or local solar reason, giving diatoms the
run of thriving within most everything by way of whatever added
stellar illumination (most likely Sirius) had to offer.

Softer and/or porous "alkaline basalt is relatively poor in silica and
rich in sodium. Alkali basalts predominate among the lavas of the
ocean basins and are also common in mountain belts." There's little
if any argument that much of Earth's salt is in fact obtained from our
salty oceans that arrived at some unknown time, similar to our ocean
basin formations having been created at some unknown time, as similar
to Earth's seasonal tilt having gotten established at some unknown
time, and otherwise similar to why Earth had all of those horrific ice
ages and subsequent thaws for some entirely weird and thus unknown
reasons that seem to have little if anything to do with whatever's
terrestrial, obviously having next to nothing to do with the various
species of humanity that was relatively few and far between at such
early times.

Of course, if there were a moon as of prior to 10,000 BC, as such we'd
have those multiple forms of solid proof and very objective evidence
of such because, folks as having survived way back then and even prior
to 15,000 BC were actually extremely intelligent and thereby fully
capable of their having taken notice of and having lived by way of
that nifty moon light and unavoidable tidal forces as having been
contributed by that nearby moon that's greater than a thousand fold
massive by ratio than any other such moon, as well as providing strong
evidence as depicted of their having to migrate due to the seasonal
changes that otherwise w/o moon should been more of a monoseason w/o
that icy proto-moon having previously impacted Earth, with many having
suggested Earth's orbit w/o moon has having been more elliptical and
perhaps even a bit tilt worthy unstable.

Even if Mars were only as old as Earth, the erosion and whatever
leaching process, along with the freeze dried nature of Mars today
being nearly a vacuum realm of a nearly frozen orb to its core, is
good reason as to why whatever elements of Mars salt should still be
on deck (sort of speak). From all indications as derived from the
best available science, Mars is actually hundreds of millions if not a
good billion years older than Earth, which means the erosion and/or
leaching process of obtaining whatever salts from within its various
bedrock is simply way past due, especially if that were the one and
only way for a given planet to obtain its salt.

Next to h2o, I'd place the element of salt as being 2nd in line to
sustaining that very essential DNA/RNA code of life as we know it,
which doesn't mean that other places of a more or less salty
environment couldn't easily accommodate and/or sustain other life
every bit as intelligent if not more so, especially if some of that
other life were merely half as genetically survival intelligent and/or
as having been intentionally or by accident imported along with a
degree of expertise or applied technology (such as us humans are soon
enough becoming capable of doing another planet or moon).

Fortunately there are the very good and unfortunately more than our
fair share those bad sorts of germs or bugs that are still a whole lot
more survival smarter than most of us humans, and there are those
extra survival smart little robust spores or perhaps more than a few
diatoms that wouldn't even require a protective spacecraft in order to
survive some vast interplanetary panspermia trek (fully interstellar
worthy if safely sequestered within an icy proto-moon or thriving
onboard whatever atmospheric enhanced proto-planet), that would
without any naked question entirely nail our frail DNA in more nasty
ways than most of us can count. Human biology and physiology is
essentially a somewhat dumbfounded collective of rather poorly
engineered DNA/RNA (meaning there's a lot of nifty DNA/RNA code that
we're missing or having lost along the way), that's continually in
need of our frail existence being extensively educated as well as
protected from just about everything (including from ourselves),
meaning that our natural ability to survive isn't all that great
unless all that surrounds us is within a somewhat narrow spec, and
that our partner or neighbor isn't continually attempting to implement
our demise as based upon those new and improved ways of terminating or
otherwise eating us alive.

Of potentially older and/or as forced evolved via intelligent design,
and thereby of likely smarter ETs that were given more or less of an
environment to work with, as such these species of intelligent folks
could actually be considerably better off at their having survived in
places we'd consider as hell, or worse. Though being such a survival
evolved or educated smart ET doesn't hardly require their being space
travel worthy, or even RF communications capable, or for any good
reason the least bit interested, which only makes for most everything
SETI somewhat pointless, if not pathetic.

Being ET smart is simply being alive when most of us dumbfounded
humans if given the same environment or circumstances would have been
long dead. However, the toasty and thus newish planetology
environment of Venus is not the least bit insurmountable, especially
with all of those raw elements and vast renewable energy resources at
hand, which makes Earth look downright wussy (though obviously near
ideal for the sorts of such a dumbfounded village idiot species as
we've proven to be). To have once upon a time survived Mars
(especially as of the last billion years), now that would have been a
highly intelligent and robust ET, whereas if there was so much as a
Martian worm, I'd be seriously impressed.

As the terrestrial sequestered intelligent life that we supposedly
are, if we weren't so freaking arrogant and summarily faith-based
dumbfounded past the point of no return, as such we wouldn't require
1% of the salt and perhaps not 10% of the water. How the heck did we
get stuck with more than our fair share of h2o and Na?

In fact, a good question as to how little h2o and Na/sodium is doable
on behalf of sustaining ETI is still worth more than a few good
arguments, because if any Earth like planet having just 1% the water
and 0.1% the salt would obviously be quite worthy of holding our
attention, even if it were merely a moon of Jupiter or Saturn, or God
forbid Venus that offers more of just about everything, including more
than most of us can shake our born-again fist full of Old Testament
burning sticks at.

If it weren't for all of the orchestrated damage-control, and/or the
born-again naysayism of this mostly anti-think-tank of a Usenet from
hell, as such we'd be first hand and if need be hot foot accomplishing
Venus as of a decade ago.
-
Brad Guth

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