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

Comments and questions about the APOD on the main view screen.
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Re: APOD: Mono Lake: Home to the Strange GFAJ... (2010 Dec 0

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

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

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

Post by nstahl » Tue Dec 07, 2010 1:58 am

We owe tree-huggers a lot!

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

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

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

Post 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 :)
"The cure for all the sickness and mistakes, for all the concerns and the sorrow and the crimes of the humanity, lies in the word "Love". It is the divine vitality which from everywhere makes and restores the life". Lydia Maria Child

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

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

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

Post 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

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

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

Post 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.

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

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

Post 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?
Chris

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

Post 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
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