Bolder-dash writes:
quote:
Oh, I see. Nasa is now in the business of cataloging our pond scum. Gee, I was thinking they were in the space exploration business. Maybe they should change their acronym to avoid any confusion.
(*sigh*)
What are they teaching in our schools these days?
Hint: Why were the Mars rovers launched?
Oh, who am I kidding? You won't do your own homework, so I'm going to have to tell you directly: Yes, examining the biology we have here on earth is an important part of space exploration because part of space exploration is looking for signs of life. It's part of the reason that every object that is sent into space to land on a foreign body must undergo extensive decontamination in order to ensure that we don't introduce earth-based organisms to other worlds. We don't want to contaminate any life on other bodies with ours.
So in order to help us understand what life might look like on other bodies, it would behoove us to understand all the various ways life might exist on our own planet. It will help us to know what we're looking for.
As far as we were able to tell, life on earth is based upon carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, phosophorus, and sulfur. To see that it is possible to have biochemistry that can substitute arsenic for phosphorus will help us determine other ways to look for life.
quote:
So how long, and how much money has been spent looking for extra-terrestrial life?
Since at least the 70s. What do you think Viking was doing on Mars?
Hint: Is it possible for a space project to do more than one thing?
Oh, but there I go again asking you to do some homework on your own.
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I for one sure am glad they money hasn't been wasted giving kids dying of malaria medicine.
Right, because any research into anything that doesn't have immediate, material results is a complete waste of time. I mean, it isn't like quantum mechanics has ever had any material results.
Hmmm...I wonder what an investigation into how an organism might be able to continue living in the presence of arsenic might do to our understanding of basic biology and the treatment of toxicity. Madness!
Just because you aren't clever enough to figure out why something is valuable doesn't mean nobody else is. Are you one of the followers of Eric Cantor who seems to think that having people who know nothing about science going through NSF grants looking for "waste" is a good thing?
Rrhain
Thank you for your submission to
Science. Your paper was reviewed by a jury of seventh graders so that they could look for balance and to allow them to make up their own minds. We are sorry to say that they found your paper "bogus," specifically describing the section on the laboratory work "boring." We regret that we will be unable to publish your work at this time.
Minds are like parachutes. Just because you've lost yours doesn't mean you can use mine.