>From Hoyt:
> Possibly silicon based? > > http://www.marsisalive.it/ > >http://www.martianlifeforms.com/ Doubtful. As the famous phrase from "X-Files" goes: "I want to Believe!". I really DO want to "believe", or more to the point: see evidence of complex life forms that may have at one time thrived on Mars. I bet many Vorts do as well. I still hold out that there's a decent chance we'll eventually run across a paradigm changing photo... or perhaps many. Unfortunately, IMO, the two websites that have been cited above attempting to suggest potential fossilized Martian life forms was a disappointing safari trip, at least for me. All I saw was fuzzy imagery occasionally accompanied with circles and arrows and statements attempting to suggest that this particular rock or that patch of sand, could be a "worm", or perhaps the head of an reptile or amphibian. FWIW, I personally saw Martian rock, sand, and shadow. What do I base this stodgy personal opinion on? Besides being employed in the IT field I have also been a science fiction & astronomical artist for close to 40 years. While I have never come close to making much of a living from the sale of my artwork I have had my work published within and on the front covers of a number SF books. Here's a list of some of the publications: http://svjart.orionworks.com/publication-list.htm A good artist learns to scrutinize shape, shadow, and form in order to reproduce an illusion of 3-D reality on paper or canvas. An even better artist learns the technique of impressionism in order to suggest 3-D form which, under closer scrutiny, turns out to be nothing more than strategically placed blobs of pigment splashed on canvas. The irony here is that a good impressionist will invariably cause the observer to fill in all the necessary 3-D detail themselves. Acquiring such a trait, of filling in the holes, probably helped our distant ancestors survive by learning to distinguish the vertical stripes of a collection of reeds from the stripes of a tiger hiding behind the reeds looking for a snack. In our modern society however, this is less of a survival issue. It's safe for an artist to learn the skill of repeatedly disengaging, at will, certain portions of brain function whose job it is to assemble the most plausible interpretation from a conglomeration of indistinct form and pattern - because... we don't have to worry about being eaten by tigers anymore. An artist can learn how to temporarily modify their brain functions in order to emulate an autistic-like perception of viewing our environment at a more basic granular level. Acquiring this ability helps an artist determine just how much pigment - or perhaps the blurring of an image - is necessary in order to allow the fertile imagine of the observer to fill in all the glorious fiddle-d-bits. A master impressionistic science fiction artist who manipulated this technique was the late John Berkey, (August 13, 1932 - April 29, 2008): http://www.johnberkey.com/ I'm still amazed at how Berkey "did it" - all from splotches of paint on canvas. All I can say is that the master made it look so easy! It ain't. As for Martian life... I'd give Curiosity a fighting chance to finish her mission. NASA plopped the plucky little robot smack dab at the base of an ancient riverbed. Right now it looks like Curiosity is trying to negotiate her way through a vast dumping ground of discarded cement dumped there from thousands of cement trucks. Curiosity is currently meandering her way up a huge alluvial fan deposit, complements of the ancient river. Oodles of photos have already revealed rounded pebble and rock encased within sand. Such an aggregate conglomeration was most likely formed by the continuous action of running water smoothing away the sharp edges of pebbles. That's lots of flowing water, and the passing of a fair amount of geological time. I'd keep snooping around this ancient dumping ground of solidified gravel for a while. Then start traveling upstream. I gather that's exactly what they plan on doing. In conclusion, IMO, the 6 O'CLock news coming from these two websites was nothing more of an example of our primitive brains working overtime trying to discern a tiger out of random patterns. I'll wait for: "Film at eleven!" Regards, Steven Vincent Johnson svjart.OrionWorks.com www.zazzle.com/orionworks tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/newvortex/
