APOD: Gale Crater (2011 Jul 29)

[Beyond]

Now, wheres the Mars bars to go with all the pictures of Mars

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap050401.html

Aw, c'mon bystander. That ones a bit soggy already

[saturn2]

Mars: has or not has water.
Mars: has or not has life.
The Red Planet is a mystery.
The rovers are very important in the investigation of Mars.

[saturn2]

I think Ann wrote a wrong thing, indeed.

[racerguy76]

My first question is, Why do we need to know if life did exist on Mars? Is there fear that something alien may still exsit on the planet that could infect of hurt us?

And second, Sky Crane? Thats so crazy it just might work.

[DavidLeodis]

The image is superb. The definition amazes me considering it will have been taken from quite some distance away (the JPL release did not give that distance) as Gale Crater is 96 miles across!

Talking of seeing things in images the central part looks like a developing embryo.

[rstevenson]

My first question is, Why do we need to know if life did exist on Mars?

We are human. It is human to wonder. We wonder what's over the hill. We wonder what's across the ocean. We wonder what's on other planets. Science is just organized wondering.

Rob

[neufer]

Click to play embedded YouTube video.

My first question is, Why do we need to know if life did exist on Mars?

We are human. It is human to wonder. We wonder what's over the hill. We wonder what's across the ocean. We wonder what's on other planets. Science is just organized wondering.

We are human. It is human to wander. We wander over the hill. We wander across the ocean. We wander on to other planets. Science is just organized wandering.

[owlice]

neufer, thanks for that video; I love it!!

[Ann]

Ann an ignoramus? "Say it isn't so!" Ann, you are my hero {along with Shoeless Joe Jackson}.

Where is the "smiling and blushing" smilie? Thank you, islader2!

But, eh... who is Shoeless Joe Jackson? Okay, Google, here I come...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoeless_Joe_Jackson wrote:

Joseph Jefferson Jackson (July 16, 1887 – December 5, 1951), nicknamed "Shoeless Joe", was an American baseball player who played Major League Baseball in the early part of the 20th century.
...
Jackson, who played left field for most of his career, currently has the third- highest career batting average in major league history. In 1911, Jackson hit for a .408 average. It is still the sixth-highest single-season total since 1901, which marked the beginning of the modern era for the sport. His average that year also set the record for batting average in a single season by a rookie.[1] Babe Ruth later claimed that he modeled his hitting technique after Jackson's.
...
According to Jackson, he got his nickname during a mill game played in Anderson, South Carolina. Jackson suffered from blisters on his foot from a new pair of cleats, and they hurt so much that he had to take his shoes off before an at bat. As play continued, a heckling fan noticed Jackson running to third base in his socks, and shouted "You shoeless son of a gun, you!", and the resulting nickname "Shoeless Joe" stuck with him throughout the remainder of his life.

Yes, I feel somewhat enlightened!

I think Ann wrote a wrong thing, indeed.

Hey, I write wrong things all the time.

Ann

[podkayn]

I've read both pages of these Gale comments, and no one has mentioned two pet peeves of mine. Are we to understand that North is 'up' in the picture? It isn't stated. Also, which direction is the Sun's rays coming from? In looking at craters and landscapes without live-forms to give a reference, it is very easy to reverse up/down based only on shadows. Most of the little circles look more like convex bubbles than concave craters, for example, but I'm thinking that they are actually small, recent craters?

Does anyone know? Thanks.

[racerguy76]

As great as that video is, I don't think it was enough to get funding for exporing Mars.

One would think these missions to Mars are checking that it is safe for us to go there, or have we determined that yet?

It's all fine, no giant red worms.

[rstevenson]

One would think these missions to Mars are checking that it is safe for us to go there, or have we determined that yet?

It's safe -- if you can feel safe in a space suit wandering about on a rocky planet that has only a tiny air-pressure, almost no oxygen in the atmosphere, and temperature extremes beyond anything you'd experience in the Antarctic. Oh, and radiation from space too, since the thin atmosphere won't stop much of it. And harsh oxidizing chemicals in the soil/dust that will inevitably get back into your living quarters with you, there to cause anything from rashes to emphysema. Not quite a walk in the park, but safe from rioters, car-jacking, Ponzi schemes and such. For now.

Rob

[bystander]

Probably also safe from lions and tigers and bears (oh my)

[i]Baloo the bear, Leo the lion, and Shere Khan the tiger Noah's Ark Animal Rescue Center in Locust Grove, GA[/i]

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[neufer]

Not quite a walk in the park, but safe from rioters, car-jacking, Ponzi schemes and such. For now.

But we can have it Terrorformed in a jiffy

[neufer]

Probably also safe from lions and tigers and bears (oh my)

[i]Baloo the bear, Leo the lion, and Shere Khan the tiger [b][color=#FF0000]Noah's Ark[/color][/b] Animal Rescue Center in Locust Grove, GA[/i]

---

Revelation 13:2 And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard,
and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion:

Art Neuendorffer

P.S., no more religious than Noah's Ark actually.

[neufer]

Gale, Walter Frederick (1865–1945)
by Harley Wood

<<Walter Frederick Gale (1865-1945), banker and astronomer, was born on 27 November 1865 at Paddington, Sydney, son of Henry Gale and his wife Susannah Gordon. He was educated at Paddington House School. After five years working in insurance and commercial offices, he joined the Savings Bank of New South Wales in 1888. After retiring in 1925 he was manager of Hoskins Investments Ltd until 1938.

Gale's interest in astronomy was stimulated by his father and firmly established by the appearance of the Great Comet of 1882. About 1884 he built a telescope with an 18-cm mirror, the first of many that he owned. Elected a fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society, London, in 1893, that year he visited Chile with a Lick Observatory eclipse expedition, and observatories in the United States of America. He valued the contacts then made.

Back in Australia, Gale was a founder and organizing secretary in 1894 of the New South Wales branch of the British Astronomical Association and then secretary for several years. Later he was president for twenty years. He formed the habit of sweeping the sky on every clear night and discovered independently seven comets. In three cases, 1894 II, 1912 II and 1927 VI, priority was recognized by attaching his name to the comet. He also discovered some double stars which bear his name and a ring nebula. He was leader of a party to observe the eclipse of 1922 at Stanthorpe, Queensland.

An assiduous observer of the planets Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, Gale published drawings in the Journal and Memoirs of the British Astronomical Association. In 1892 he described oases and canals on Mars; Gale was an ardent supporter of the suggestion of life on the planet. On the other hand, he was one who held that the great turbulent activity in the atmosphere of Jupiter must be evidence of an internal energy source—this is now recognized.

When the Government Savings Bank of New South Wales closed in 1931 Gale became chairman of a committee formed to protect depositors, and had to control several turbulent meetings, one by getting the Town Hall organist to drown the noise. His interests included coins, stamps and handwriting; he regularly played cards, solo and poker. In all his fields he was prepared to assist and advise others, particularly the young, and was a frequent and able public lecturer on astronomy.

Gale twice received awards from the (Thomas) Donovan Trust and in 1935 the Jackson-Gwilt medal of the Royal Astronomical Society 'for his discoveries of comets and his work for astronomy in New South Wales'. He was chairman of the board of visitors of Sydney Observatory and a trustee of the Public Library of New South Wales in 1913-37.

Gale's usual sweep of the sky was frustrated by cloud on 1 June 1945; later that night he died in a few minutes from a heart attack; he was cremated. He was survived by his wife, Violet Marion, née Birkenhead, and by two sons and four daughters.>>