APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 06)

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Expand view Topic review: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 06)

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by Céline Richard » Thu Dec 16, 2010 8:43 pm

Chris Peterson wrote:Hard to know, but not, perhaps, so difficult to imagine.
Horrible!! They didn't try to serve humankind in order to help people, but to cook them :lol:

I prefer to imagine very nice aliens :)

Céline

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by Chris Peterson » Sat Dec 11, 2010 2:58 pm

Storm_norm wrote:I don't think you have to understand it Chris. but even you must agree that when you see the words "astronomy picture of the day" and look to see what it is that you would also be scratching your head if you saw a picture of a microbe, no less.
Nope. Each image comes with a caption, which I read. And in the rare case where there's an APOD that seems extremely disconnected from anything to do with astronomy, I just move on. My day doesn't revolve around the quality of the APOD image. I don't feel like cursing and never visiting the site again if I don't like the image. Seriously... what's the big deal?

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by owlice » Sat Dec 11, 2010 7:19 am

Storm_norm wrote:
Chris Peterson wrote:
judy wrote:sadly, i am going to give up on apod. the last three days and five out of the last ten days had pictures of the good old planet earth. i like it. i'm a resident of it. but, yes, i am complaining. i want to spend 60 to 90 seconds of every jam packed day looking at something other worldly. someplace way far beyond us. so, bye for now. :|
Seriously, I don't understand this sort of disgruntlement. The picture changes every day, and checking it takes, what, 30 seconds? Everybody's tastes are different; some images are going to knock your socks off, some you might not like. And of course, it will be different for everyone.

It isn't like you're paying for membership here!
I don't think you have to understand it Chris. but even you must agree that when you see the words "astronomy picture of the day" and look to see what it is that you would also be scratching your head if you saw a picture of a microbe, no less.
I think if I were scratching my head at the image, it would be because I hadn't yet read the explanation. It's perfectly clear why this image was chosen for APOD, moreso if someone was following news from NASA.

I suggest one might want to pay attention to the words under the picture; they are there for a reason!

I don't understand why people crab about APODs they don't like, especially if they don't post when they do like an APOD. (Well, actually, I do understand it -- people like to complain FAR more than they like to praise. I don't understand that, however, at all.) The chances are excellent that no matter what the subject of an APOD might be, there will be some subset of the 365 each year that one might not like as much as others. How hard it is to wait until the next day? And if that doesn't do it, how about looking at the recent submissions and voicing your opinion as to which you like?

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by Storm_norm » Sat Dec 11, 2010 7:02 am

Chris Peterson wrote:
judy wrote:sadly, i am going to give up on apod. the last three days and five out of the last ten days had pictures of the good old planet earth. i like it. i'm a resident of it. but, yes, i am complaining. i want to spend 60 to 90 seconds of every jam packed day looking at something other worldly. someplace way far beyond us. so, bye for now. :|
Seriously, I don't understand this sort of disgruntlement. The picture changes every day, and checking it takes, what, 30 seconds? Everybody's tastes are different; some images are going to knock your socks off, some you might not like. And of course, it will be different for everyone.

It isn't like you're paying for membership here!
I don't think you have to understand it Chris. but even you must agree that when you see the words "astronomy picture of the day" and look to see what it is that you would also be scratching your head if you saw a picture of a microbe, no less.

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by neufer » Sat Dec 11, 2010 4:01 am

Chris Peterson wrote:
Céline Richard wrote:
The Mono Lake was about to disapear?
Yes. The bloated cities of Southern California were sucking up all the water in the desert and the level of the lake was dropping. Other lakes of this sort (with no outlets) have disappeared because of cities diverting water. "Save Mono Lake" was a rally cry of California environmentalists in the 1970s and 1980s, and the effort was successful: laws prevented the extreme water diversion, and the water level of the lake has slowly been recovering.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mono_Lake wrote:
<<Mark Twain's Roughing It, published in 1872, provides a humorous and informative early description of Mono Lake in its natural condition in the 1860s. Twain found the lake to be a "lifeless, treeless, hideous desert... the loneliest place on earth."
Click to play embedded YouTube video.
In order to provide water needs for the growing City of Los Angeles, water was diverted from the Owens River into the Los Angeles Aqueduct in 1913. In 1941 the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power extended the Los Angeles Aqueduct system farther upriver into the Mono Basin. So much water was diverted that evaporation soon exceeded inflow and the surface level of Mono Lake fell rapidly. By 1982 the lake was reduced to 37,688 acres (15,251.8 ha) having lost 31 percent of its 1941 surface area. As a result alkaline sands and once-submerged tufa towers became exposed and Negit Island became landbridged, exposing the nests of gulls to predators (chiefly coyotes) and forcing the breeding colony to abandon the site.

In 1974, Stanford University graduate student David Gaines studied the Mono Lake ecosystem and was instrumental in alerting the public of the effects of the lower water level. The National Science Foundation funded the first comprehensive ecological study of Mono Lake, conducted by Gaines and undergraduate students from UC Davis, UC Santa Cruz, and Earlham College. In June 1977 the UC Davis Institute of Ecology published their report, "An Ecological Study of Mono Lake, California," which alerted California to the ecological dangers posed by the redirection of water away from the lake for municipal uses.

Gaines formed the Mono Lake Committee in 1978. He and Sally Judy, a UC Davis student, led the committee and pursued an informational tour of California. They joined with the Audubon Society to fight a now famous court battle to protect Mono Lake through state public trust laws. While these efforts have resulted in positive change, the surface level is still below historic levels and exposed shorelines are a source of significant alkali dust during periods of high wind.

Owens Lake, the once navigable terminus of the Owens River which had sustained a healthy ecosystem, is now a dry lake bed during dry years due to water diversion beginning in the 1920s. Mono Lake was spared this fate when the California State Water Resources Control Board issued an order to protect Mono Lake and its tributary streams on September 28, 1994. Since that time, the lake level has steadily risen.>>

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by Ken » Fri Dec 10, 2010 10:53 pm

Chris Peterson wrote:
Céline Richard wrote:What do you mean? :) The Mono Lake was about to disapear?
Yes. The bloated cities of Southern California were sucking up all the water in the desert and the level of the lake was dropping. Other lakes of this sort (with no outlets) have disappeared because of cities diverting water. "Save Mono Lake" was a rally cry of California environmentalists in the 1970s and 1980s, and the effort was successful: laws prevented the extreme water diversion, and the water level of the lake has slowly been recovering.

So not only can some bottom dwelling bacteria survive drinking the high arsenic concentrations of Mono Lake, but so can the people of Southern California! Many have suspected their alien behavior for decades.... :D

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by Chris Peterson » Tue Dec 07, 2010 9:30 pm

Céline Richard wrote:What might taste good for our alien friends is so difficult to imagine for us, indeed :lol:
Hard to know, but not, perhaps, so difficult to imagine.

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by Céline Richard » Tue Dec 07, 2010 9:07 pm

mexhunter wrote:If so,where appropriate, could bring to our alien friends a little apple pie sweetened with arsenic. :lol:
What might taste good for our alien friends is so difficult to imagine for us, indeed :lol:
Have a very nice day!

Céline

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by Céline Richard » Tue Dec 07, 2010 9:04 pm

Chris Peterson wrote:Yes. The bloated cities of Southern California were sucking up all the water in the desert and the level of the lake was dropping. Other lakes of this sort (with no outlets) have disappeared because of cities diverting water. "Save Mono Lake" was a rally cry of California environmentalists in the 1970s and 1980s, and the effort was successful: laws prevented the extreme water diversion, and the water level of the lake has slowly been recovering.
I am so surprised :o Thank you :D
I think it is a very important thing the Mono Lake has been saved, if biologists found out a new life form in this very lake.
I suppose the environmentalists are proud of them, since a scientific breakthrough, made in the Mono Lake. Because the international scientific community enjoys this lake a lot now. Indeed, the Mono Lake brings hope for the search for life in the Universe.
Have a nice day!

Céline :)

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by Chris Peterson » Tue Dec 07, 2010 3:13 pm

Céline Richard wrote:What do you mean? :) The Mono Lake was about to disapear?
Yes. The bloated cities of Southern California were sucking up all the water in the desert and the level of the lake was dropping. Other lakes of this sort (with no outlets) have disappeared because of cities diverting water. "Save Mono Lake" was a rally cry of California environmentalists in the 1970s and 1980s, and the effort was successful: laws prevented the extreme water diversion, and the water level of the lake has slowly been recovering.

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by Céline Richard » Tue Dec 07, 2010 9:34 am

Flick wrote:I think it important to remind us here that, except for the coordinated action of a dedicated group of whacko tree-huggers, this discovery (or controversy -- whichever) may not have been possible. Save Mono Lake!
What do you mean? :) The Mono Lake was about to disapear?

Céline

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by nstahl » Tue Dec 07, 2010 1:58 am

We owe tree-huggers a lot!

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by Beyond » Mon Dec 06, 2010 10:56 pm

NAH, i just clicked on your U-Tube link and saw the strangely garb'd fellow make some 'cold fire'.

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by neufer » Mon Dec 06, 2010 7:19 pm

beyond wrote:
orin stepanek wrote:
beyond wrote:Hey neufer, your phosphorus U-tube video seems to have been disabled by request. So everyone will have to go to U-Tube and search for it.
if you click on the start arrow; there is a disabled by request note and a watch on YouTube. Just click on the (watch on YouTube) link and you should be able to get it. :)
Nope! Even if i press Ctrl to disable pop-up blocker, it still doesn't work.
You can always hit the "Quote" button and then do a search for "youtube".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GIGOF_In9BM

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by mexhunter » Mon Dec 06, 2010 7:16 pm

Céline is right to motivate Judy for her not to give up the APOD.
While our Earth is also part of the universe, today's photo is another message. A message that suggests extraterrestrial life on planets far inhospitable environments.
If so,where appropriate, could bring to our alien friends a little apple pie sweetened with arsenic. :lol:
Greetings
César

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by Flick » Mon Dec 06, 2010 6:28 pm

I think it important to remind us here that, except for the coordinated action of a dedicated group of whacko tree-huggers, this discovery (or controversy -- whichever) may not have been possible. Save Mono Lake!

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by ScrappyLaptop » Mon Dec 06, 2010 5:52 pm

Yes, but...

(adjusts tin foil hat to the correct angle to better answer the Kenneth question)

...the big media stir was a *wonderful* distraction. Pretty much no one except the LA Times reported on the *other* thing that NASA had a (tiny) press release for that day. You know the one concerning boring accounting and budget stuff, which included mention that they may be planning on dropping the Astronaut corps (all 64 of them) from the payroll next year. They'll hang on to enough to get through the last few shuttle flights, including backups, but after that the astronauts "have no defined role in NASA's mission".
With NASA's budget under pressure and the space shuttle program set to retire, even the agency's most sacred cow — the 64-member astronaut corps — isn't safe from the possibility of cuts.

At the behest of the White House, the nation's top science advisors this month began a 10-month study of the appropriate "role and size" of the astronaut corps after the final shuttle mission next year.
From http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld ... 0486.story

Also interesting:
The National Academies investigators have been asked specifically to examine the T-38 fleet. More generally, they also will look into the role and size of the astronaut corps and the facilities used to support them.

The supersonic jets have been used by NASA for decades to prepare astronauts for the rigors of spaceflight. But such training may no longer be needed; NASA wants to launch future astronauts on capsules, which, unlike the winged shuttle, can't be flown once they begin reentry.
The article goes on to talk about how the primary purpose of the astronaut corps in the future may well be...PR. From another source:
NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said in a recent interview that his "foremost" mission as the head of America's space exploration agency is to improve relations with the Muslim world.

Though international diplomacy would seem well outside NASA's orbit, Bolden said in an interview with Al Jazeera that strengthening those ties was among the top tasks President Obama assigned him. He said better interaction with the Muslim world would ultimately advance space travel.
...I'd say that the person complaining about APOD being more focused on Earth than the crystal spheres might be noticing the trickle down results of a slight change in bias and leadership direction within the agency. Still, the least they could do is keep feeding us 20-year old Hubble pics. Can't get enough of those DSO's, personally and it looks like the replacement has slipped it's budget again.

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by Beyond » Mon Dec 06, 2010 5:36 pm

orin stepanek wrote:
beyond wrote:Hey neufer, your phosphorus U-tube video seems to have been disabled by request. So everyone will have to go to U-Tube and search for it.
if you click on the start arrow; there is a disabled by request note and a watch on YouTube. Just click on the (watch on YouTube) link and you should be able to get it. :)
Nope! Even if i press Ctrl to disable pop-up blocker, it still doesn't work.

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by Chris Peterson » Mon Dec 06, 2010 4:26 pm

rjgowdie wrote:I wonder if Mono lake is an ancient crater, and the microbe wasn't a hitchhiker on the meteor.
Mono Lake is not a meteor crater.

More to the point, and pretty much overlooked in all this, is that this microbe is not naturally occurring, but was adapted in the laboratory. It is not even certain that arsenic is replacing phosphorus in the DNA backbone (although the inference is a reasonable one), and in any case we are only talking about a subtle modification of a lifeform that is evolutionarily related to all the other lifeforms ever discovered on Earth.

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by owlice » Mon Dec 06, 2010 4:10 pm

As God as my witness, I'll never go hungry again!

judy, judy, judy...

by neufer » Mon Dec 06, 2010 4:05 pm

owlice wrote:
judy wrote:
sadly, i am going to give up on apod. the last three days and five out of the last ten days had pictures of the good old planet earth. i like it. i'm a resident of it. but, yes, i am complaining. i want to spend 60 to 90 seconds of every jam packed day looking at something other worldly. someplace way far beyond us. so, bye for now. :|
Did you check out the recent submissions here on Asterisk? There are lots of those to look at. Sometimes there are even polls so you can vote for your favorite.

Oh, and there are lots of HiRISE images, too. Oh, and Spitzer pictures. And Hubble shots. And... well, you get the idea!

If it weren't for APOD, Asterisk wouldn't be here, and you wouldn't have all those fabulous images to see on one place. So...no need to give up on APOD; there's plenty here to look at, and tomorrow is another day.
Fiddledee dee!

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by Chris Peterson » Mon Dec 06, 2010 3:57 pm

judy wrote:sadly, i am going to give up on apod. the last three days and five out of the last ten days had pictures of the good old planet earth. i like it. i'm a resident of it. but, yes, i am complaining. i want to spend 60 to 90 seconds of every jam packed day looking at something other worldly. someplace way far beyond us. so, bye for now. :|
Seriously, I don't understand this sort of disgruntlement. The picture changes every day, and checking it takes, what, 30 seconds? Everybody's tastes are different; some images are going to knock your socks off, some you might not like. And of course, it will be different for everyone.

It isn't like you're paying for membership here!

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by Chris Peterson » Mon Dec 06, 2010 3:50 pm

kentmere wrote:Interesting APOD! Shame about the spelling of the element P. It is phosphorus, not phosphorous. The latter implies a particular state of chemical combination for phosphorus. Why do astronomers have such difficulties with elementary chemistry?
I don't think that most astronomers have serious difficulties with elementary chemistry. But astronomers are not chemists, so it is easy enough to see how a simple spelling error like this might go unnoticed (that is, this is NOT a chemistry error, except by accident).

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by owlice » Mon Dec 06, 2010 3:01 pm

judy wrote:sadly, i am going to give up on apod. the last three days and five out of the last ten days had pictures of the good old planet earth. i like it. i'm a resident of it. but, yes, i am complaining. i want to spend 60 to 90 seconds of every jam packed day looking at something other worldly. someplace way far beyond us. so, bye for now. :|
Did you check out the recent submissions here on Asterisk? There are lots of those to look at. Sometimes there are even polls so you can vote for your favorite.

Oh, and there are lots of HiRISE images, too. Oh, and Spitzer pictures. And Hubble shots. And... well, you get the idea!

If it weren't for APOD, Asterisk wouldn't be here, and you wouldn't have all those fabulous images to see on one place. So...no need to give up on APOD; there's plenty here to look at, and tomorrow is another day.

Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

by orin stepanek » Mon Dec 06, 2010 2:05 pm

beyond wrote:Hey neufer, your phosphorus U-tube video seems to have been disabled by request. So everyone will have to go to U-Tube and search for it.
if you click on the start arrow; there is a disabled by request note and a watch on YouTube. Just click on the (watch on YouTube) link and you should be able to get it. :)

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