It was only a matter of time until some armchair archaeologist took it upon himself to "discover" bogus artificial structures in the celebrated Martian ice crater. Guys like this make my job really difficult . . .
Speaking of which, I'll be returning to Arizona in a few weeks for the filming of a Discovery Channel documentary. I'll be in Flagstaff, home of the Lowell Observatory. (I recently shaved my head, but I think my hair will have grown back to acceptable standards by then.)
41 comments:
Oh boy, another person who sees jpeg compression artifacts distorted further by photoshop's enlargement algorithm... and we have instant ruins!
Mac, don't let it get to you. I've been there. It's not fun.
The funny thing is that the image he's analyzing is a perspective view; it's not even an original picture. Honestly, you'd think someone determined to find "artifacts" could do better than this.
His ruins are kind of fuzzy and washed out, I have seen far better candidatures for artificiality.
Plus the other problem is they are on the rim of the crater, all the ruin type land forms I have viewed in the last 15 years have be on the plains or tucked against some small hill, never on the rim.
Having said that they are square and do have angels, of course how much did he blow them up, been my experience any thing over 160-180% does not work, to many photo artifacts introduced.
My fav ruins are the strange forms few miles north of the cydonia area.
The "ruins" near the crater are obvious JPG compression artifacts and should be familiar as such to anyone who's ever looked at pictures on the Internet.
The features under investigation in Cydonia (and elsewhere) are indisputably "real," although their origin remains an open question.
dante -
Between both Mac and myself, neither of us have found anything and prefer instead to examine what others (some with obviously too much time on their hands) come up with.
There are some enigmatic features, to be sure. Whether there are mundane explanations for them or not, even the scientists themselves are jumping to conclusions. There is no way of knowing for sure about features like the "face" without closer examination.
Why not the Face?
But if you don't want to look there, how about
a.) the D&M Pyramid
b.) the Crater Pyramid
or
c.) the Cliff?
That has got to be about poorest "Mars artifact" article I've ever seen!
It won't be the last!
Dante,
The image comparison you site is none other than JPL's "Picasso" hatchet job, using an improperly orthorectified version of the Face side by side with an *overhead* view (taken by Viking in the 1970s).
In this particular case, JPL managed to shove the Face's centerline to the feature's far right -- an expedient bit of trickery that I think was a perfectly intentional effort to "scotch this thing for good."
To put it another way, there's so much wrong with this comparison that it's spawned not a few technical papers by qualified scientists, foremost among them Mark Carlotto. You can reach his website at http://www.newfrontiersinscience.com
Or you might want to see what Lan Fleming of Johnson Space Center has to say: http://www.vgl.org
I am now politely backing out of this "argument," as I've addressed these very same issues so many times (in my book, online, and on radio programs) that I've long since lost track. I simply don't have time to "debate" with everyone who logs onto my blog with an ax to grind.
Please refer to my forthcoming appearance on the Discovery Channel.
axe, mac
axe
;)
oh geez... here we go again
do you know anything about how imaging optics on the mars orbiter and how the data is processed? Did you know you can download these raw images from malin space science's website as well as a repository at JPL and do the processing yourself in NASAview and Photoshop?
A little self-education never hurt anyone.
read this http://www.vgl.org/webfiles/mars/face/catbox2.htm
"Obviously, JPL and NASA have the leading specialists in imaging and image processing. So you can either say they are incompetent, which is absurd..."
Actually, I think one could very well charge the folks at JPL and NASA with a certain incompetence. The incompetence of which I speak is not in the area of imaging and image processing, but in their totality of scientific passion and vision. They seem to have a difficult time seeing past the narrow and myoptic strictures of their beauracracy. Without much apparent reflection, they settle for the hasty conclusion that initial impressions of a lost Martian civilization are spacey and far-fetched. And why (they reason) should they feel the need for such reflection? Their specialty is geology, not archaeology; they are simply not interested enough in pursuing so-called "far-fetched" possibilities outside the narrow scope of their speciality. There is a limited supply of funds, and they sure as hell aren't going to waste them on such "outlandish" speculations. Besides, respect from their colleagues is important to them - which means not taking the risk to entertain and/or defend such crackpot notions as traces of a past civilization on Mars.
If the above mentality doesn't kill science, I don't know what does. While, technically speaking, what they may be doing at JPL and NASA may be science, it certainly lacks the spirit of most great scientists of the past. Would Galileo and Copernicus have made their revolutionary discoveries, had they been so concerned with beaucratic specialization, funds, and the respect of their colleagues? Those men were driven by a passion for truth, which is why they left no stone unturned -- and in some cases risked their livelihoods and most certainly their reputations.
Finally, I think there IS quite a bit of compelling evidence for articifial structures on Mars (particularly in the Cydonia region). At first I approached the whole idea very skeptically, because a superficial glance at the disputed photos only seemed to show a bunch of oddly shaped rocks. Then I did my research and discovered that there are all sorts of geometric subtleties involved, not only in the structures themselves but also in their placement (as if by careful design and strategy). Eventually I came to the conclusion that what we are looking at are *most probably* artificial structures. It still boggles my mind...
Exegesis from the novel VALIS by Philip K. Dick 1981
“The next step in the One's plan was that the Two would become the Many, through their dialetic interaction. From them as hyperuniverses they projected a hologram-like interface, which is the pluriform universe we creatures inhabit. The two sources were to intermingle equally in maintaining our universe, but Form II continued to languish toward illness, madness and disorder. These aspects she projected into our universe.”
Ok, so the base explanation for this big cover up goes something like this;
This Gnostics take on our universe (corrupted and deranged), explains what is going on with this war that Hoagland and Mac have been waging against NASA.
Just as there are fighters for the healing truth information that can restore sanity to our Mad, Mad, Mad, world, so also there are people who are privy to, and knowledgeable of this pre history esoteric Cosmology, and have decided to throw in there lot with the insane creator God who rules this universe.
Why?
Well the bad guys usually have the nice office, (NASA), and a bigger bank account, (JPL), because, well after all it is the deranged Gods world we are living in.
And the resistance suffers from poor financing, (my job at the store), lousy living conditions (Macs Blade Runner apartment), and friends and relative who think you are turning into a nut job!
But the fight continues, with the vast majority of humanity standing on the sidelines, with their thumb up their ass.
>>"does anyone have a "best candidate" for an artificial structure on Mars? Please don't say the face."
My best candidate would be the D&M pyramid. I can imagine natural processes forming "the face", but the D&M has some very regular features that are hard to explain this way. At the same time, some of the features do look natural which means it might be an artificial structure that was altered by natural processes or it might be a natural feature that was shaped and also later eroded. However, I am still not willing to say the feature is definitely artificial. Obviously then, I would say the same thing about "the face".
Well then if that’s not the way the universe works, how come Philip Plait has a fancy NASA government university money paid house, while our sane universe resistance leader Mac has to live in a dank rusty submarine/fallout shelter?
Why does Philip and Kissinger get all the party girls hanging off their arms while poor Mac walks the empty streets alone, O wait, Macs got Danica now, but that’s not going to last.
Anyone who assumes that Richard Hoagland somehow speaks on behalf of anomalies on Mars is, shall we say, "challenged."
JPL knew exactly what it was doing when it unleashed the "catbox" and the "Picasso" on an unsuspecting public. That's what makes this business so disturbing.
That wasn't the end of it, either. Although you don't hear much about it now, JPL's MOLA elevation map of the Face was comically unrepresentative.
We will know the truth of Mars' landforms...hand- or time- made...when we get there and look for ourselves.
Arguing about what they are NOW, is a bit like arguing about whether a ship going over the horizon will fall off the earth entirely or just sail over the curve and out of sight.
We wont know until we know, and then we will know. Half of you will be triumphant, and the rest chastened.
I meanwhile tilt back in my Barcalounger and watch the live shuttle mission stream...and IM Danica... :)
Kyle
UFOreflections.blogspot.com
"did you include the following in your studies? are you a mathematician?
http://www.math.washington.edu/~greenber/DMPyramid.html"
A wise man once said, "The most perfidious way of harming a cause consists of defending it deliberately with faulty arguments."
Hoagland, are you reading this?
But I did not arrive at my conclusions concerning Mars by reading Hoagland. I did so by carefully studying the photos, which show a redundancy of geometric shapes which are also often symmetrical. In general, they also appear to be mutually situated or configured in a manner that does not strike me as being natural by any means.
I'm not sure I agree with the proposal that NASA is deliberately being dishonest. In my mind it's more likely that this is just another case of beauracratic, *compartmentalized* thinking. Americans tend to think like cogs in a machine -- that is, they tend to see only those truths which are relevent to their immediate interests and are blind to everything else outside of that scope. This usually leads to being able to see the big picture only in parts, semi-truths and half-truths. In addition to this, Americans are also intensely pragmatic; creativity and imagination are often stifled in favor of systemic technicalities and efficiencies. When we take these factors into consideration, we begin to see how NASA might have ended up doing something so mindless and irrational as promoting the "catbox" image. Following policy, disparate orders from a higher tier in the works, and miscommunication could very easily have resulted in our so-called "dishonest" unleashing of the "Face" and the "Picasso" to the public.
So, IMO, there's no *conspiracy* going on at NASA regarding the artifacts on Mars.
Ken--
Unfortunately, most people just can't grasp the issues you mention; they've been trained to take sides either as a "believer" or a "skeptic," with no time for evaluating context. This is the intellectual vacuum in which 99% of Mars anomaly discussion takes place.
You must also factor in this: NASA/JPL/MSSS have never once in their pronouncements about the Face stated what criteria they would use to determine whether a feature is artificial or natural. And the Face is about the only anomalous feature they've discussed so far.
For purposes of comparison, think about these criteria for judging tattoo art, from a tattoo festival last year. “Judging criteria include crisp lines, smooth gradients of color, and flow of the design so it works with the muscle structure and contours of the body.” Even tattoo aficionados have more clearly articulated criteria for what distinguishes good tattoo art from indifferent tattoo art than NASA has for assessing planetary SETI questions!
I doubt that planetary geologists have any training whatsoever in art of archeology -- certainly no statements coming out of the mainstream commentators has shown an ability to discuss what would distinguish a possible sculpture from a big pile of rocks.
When thinking about the visual literacy of the mainstream planetary scientists it might be instructive to consider the comments made about a "Picture of the Day" feature last year in which the writer condescendingly described a Martian feature in a crater as a "peace sign." It showed that nobody there could even detect a graphic image that had been in use in popular culture for decades. The feature was missing the lower bar at 6 o'clock from the center, thus making it a Mercedes-Benz logo, not a peace sign (which was based on the semaphore flag positions for N and D, signifying Nuclear Disarmament.
WMB--
Yeah I agree that it is both possible and plausible that NASA is being deliberately dishonest. In my opinion it just seems more likely that the "catbox" image was released as a bureacratic fuck-up on their part. And why should they go to the trouble of correcting that? They have more "important" things to do than cater to a bunch of Hoaglands out there accusing them of conspiracy.
Mac--
The "intellectual vacuum" of which you speak is a misfortune which I see also. Maybe you should write a second book in order to address it. ;)
"If there was even the slightest evidence in the photos (however they are processed) of artificiality, real planetary scientists would be all over it."
And this is what I contend: That there are hardly any "real" scientists left today -- and least among those with "professional qualifications." A technocratic mentality has evolved in our present era which has stifled the scientific spirit. The fire, the passion which has consumed all "real" scientists in the past has been reduced to a mere flicker in the souls of those now constricted by bureaucracy and pragmatism.
Would you consider Einstein to have been an armchair researcher? Would you dub him as a "crank" scientist? He worked in a clerk's office; he was not an offical physicist with "professional qualifications". The same can be said of many other "real" scientists of the past.
What is "obvious" (according to you) is actually ambiguous on the surface of Mars -- which is why spirited and imaginative persons have taken up the task which our "professional" scientists should be doing in the first place. What if there really ARE ruins on Mars, as it vaguely appears to be? Only imagination to perceive such a potential, and the scientific passion to go find out for certain, will ever allow us to take steps which lead to such a discovery. As it is, your absolute skepticism is no different from the so-called "scientists" who ridiculed Copernicus for proposing a helio-centric system as opposed to a geo-centric one. "Only a fool would be unable to see the obvious - that the sun revolves around the earth," they sneered.
There is balanced skepticism and absolute skepticism. The latter (which you exemplify) has always been the enemy of science AND of progress.
"yes comparing people like Hoagland to Einstein certainly clarifies the situation. Now I understand."
Now you are deliberately caricaturing my arguments. It has been pointed out to you above, more than once, that Hoagland is not necessarily representative of those who believe there may be artificial structures on Mars. Hoagland aside, unless you are prepared to label many of the "real" scientists of the past as cranks and armchair speculators, your argument that we should not take anyone seriously unless they have "professional qualifications" -- is null.
Dante, we've not yet seen anything to indicate that the current crop of planetary geologists are able to coherently discuss criteria beforehand for determining artificial object vs. natural object, especially using only satellite images. I've brought this up before mainstream space enthusiasts before, and none of them has been able to produce any evidence of this information being discussed.
Do you have access to articles or discussion of this subject by mainstream scientists or advocates that none of the others I've asked have had?
And I'm talking serious discussion, not goofy giggles and "take me to your leader" bullshit.
Pseudoskeptics gloat that the debate is over because they can't see the "roads" and "stripmalls."
And they're only half-joking.
If there are artifacts on Mars, then they are likely extremely old and pose an unprecedented challenge to archaeology. There have been many ruins here on Earth once thought to be natural until analyzed with the tools of 20th century science.
Dante,
If you want to take personal potshots -- and I really don't know what else a condescending reference to profiteering Mars authors could possibly be (since I'm pretty sure you know I've penned one of these scandalous tomes) -- please don't do so in hopes that you'll upset me; I've heard it all before.
Okay, what would be convincing evidence, Dante?
Talk archeological talk. Use the vocabulary or art, architecture or archeology
to discuss how a scientist would tell a pile of rocks from an eroded piece of architecture or sculpture. For all his faults Tom Van Flandern can talk about what a plantary SETI perspective would look for. What do you think of his criteria?
This business of "we won't know until we get there" has an implied missing link. That being, what would it take to make NASA switch a landing site from one of more geological interest to look at something of ambiguous artificialty? What features would it take beamed back from Mars to make them give elementary archeological training to astronauts?
Sorry Dante, I could only give a cursory look at the two images, as Google maps always crash on my elderly machine and the other computer here is down for the afternoon.
But from what I saw of the image, there wasn't anything that raised a red flag with me at all as being something that was possibly artificial. Could
you talk about what you saw there that one could hypothetically wonder about artificiality?
The McDonald's sign example you gave is exactly what I meant by non-serious, and goofy.
Should planetary geologists be the ones to assess possible artificiality? I'm reminded of the maxim, "If your only tool is a hammer, all your problems look like nails."
I'm both an artist and a writer, and as such I am inclined to explore statements by mainstream scientists to see if they are accurate. On too many occasions I have found that when they are trying to describe features on Mars that some have said could be artificial, they are incapable of even describing what they are seeing accurately, and thus can't possibly reach useful conclusions.
I'd like to hear your opinion on Tom Van Flandern's criteria for considering whether the Face is normal.
You avoided discussing Van Flandern's original criteria, and brought in some irrelevancy about Photoshop operations instead.
Here, to refresh your memory (or as introduction, if you didn't know what I meant) are some of his criteria:
Bilateral symmetry of the Face: If natural, the chances are negligible that the shadowed side of the object would resemble a symmetric half of a human face, and ought to be a random pile of rocks or sand. If artificial, the mirror image of the visible half face is to be expected.
Culturally significant location: A culturally meaningful location of the structures, such as on the equator or in the lowest valley on the planet, would suggest artificial design; whereas a seemingly random location would suggest a natural formation.
Orientation: A human face has a natural "up" and "down". A polar-aligned north-south orientation of a face structure suggests artificiality, while any other orientation suggests a natural formation.
>Functionality: The faces on Mount Rushmore in South Dakota are visible to people on the ground. The "Face" on Mars stares up into space, yet cannot be seen from any other planet, even with our largest telescopes. A lack of obvious purpose suggests a natural object, although we cannot hope to guess all possible purposes of its hypothetical builders. An obvious purposefulness would suggest artificiality.
http://metaresearch.org/solar%20system/cydonia/mrb_cydonia/new-evidence.asp
While not a comprehensive list (this was from 1997, and I should note I do not agree with Van Flandern on all anomaly issues by any means), it's a framework that is far more detailed than anything mainstream planetary scientists have articulated to explain why their subjective opinions about possible sculptural forms are more valid than other peoples' subjective opinions of possible sculptural forms.
"You avoided discussing Van Flandern's original criteria, and brought in some irrelevancy about Photoshop operations instead."
I think Dante has consistently avoided a lot of the relevant points that we (you, me, Mac, WMB) have been bringing up. If he can't answer a contention we raise, he simply ignores it. Take a second look above and see for yourself.
"Until that time, Occam's razor would fall on the side of natural formations and the human propensity to project and see ourselves in everything from clouds to hills of dirt."
Which side does Occam's razor fall on in the case of this apparent "parallelogram"? :
http://www.mactonnies.com/imperative43.html
It looks to me like there's something -- an artificial structure of some sort -- buried there under the sand. Or am I merely projecting and seeing myself in the evidence of this photo, too?
Or how about this image (scroll down to 10-10-02)?:
http://www.mactonnies.com/imperative34.html
Dost mine eyes deceive me? That looks like a...square.
Geez...Can it be...??
Nah. We're just seeing things, right?
Here's more discussion on that square (good job, Mac):
http://www.mactonnies.com/imperative37.html (scroll down to 4-7-03)
Now I ask you, how in the hell is something like this supposed to be natural? (Also note where this "square" happens to be situated: "this assortment is located along an axis that intersects both the Face and the D&M Pyramid.")
"ken that themis image is notorius and has no provenance to prove it is real (maybe you should read a bit too instead of just looking at the pictures), and the parallelogram could be geologic.
What is needed is a photo of something that simply cannot be explained by any known geologic process. Then there might be a starting point."
Does geologic process produce perfect squares and parallelograms? Well, maybe -- very, very, very rarely. Why then is the Cydonia region so replete with such geometric features, so close in proximity to one another?
Tell me, Dante, why is it that you think the natural explanation is more likely here than the artificial explanation? When we come across a perfect square or a parallelogram on the ground here on earth, which usually turns out to be the case? That it is natural, or that it is artificial? We're talking probabilities here...
Your mentality is: "Unless something simply cannot be explained by any known geologic process -- even if it's something as improbable as a perfect geometric formation -- it is most likely natural."
Now why, in your mind, is it more likely natural than artificial? This is what I want you to explain to me.
Actually, the diagramming work I've done on the Face HAS shown it to be quite bilaterally symmetrical. Maybe one of these days when I finally get a new computer I can get back to work and finish the article about the Face geometry. 9/11 kind of threw that one into stasis.
Till then, you might find this article of Lan Fleming's at VGL to be quite thought-provoking. And there are some useful comments in this thread at Bad Astronomy from last year that discuss how one might tell artifacts from natural features on a human scale.
http://www.vgl.org/webfiles/mars/structcmp/structcmp.htm
http://www.badastronomy.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=12900&highlight=
A question of nomenclature I still don't understand: the Face keeps being referred to as a "mesa," and every geological definition I've googled of "mesa" says that it is from the Spanish for tabletop, because of its flatness. Lan's article illustrates that with a Thai mesa. But as you can see, other than the perimeter the Face is not in the least bit a flat table-like feature at all.
WTF?
Dante, I am still waiting for your explanation.
“I dont see any reference provided for this tidbit. Where does he get this info from? Any competent researcher would reference something like this, otherwise its just hearsay.” —Dante
I gave the original link, when WM Bear quoted it he said it was from the link I’d given, and it took about 15 seconds to confirm it on Google using a phrase from that passage.
Three strikes, you’re out.
"You should publish your observation on mesas. That sounds to me like a further argument in favor of artificiality."
Problem is, it's more of an observation about clueless scientists. And as such sounds to me like a further argument in favor of public thrashings, or at the very least tarring and feathering. ;)
Lan Fleming wrote another useful article (I'm too tired to find the link, should be at the VGL website) about the rather pointless effort put toward mapping the contours of the Face. As I recall there had been only a couple of passes, both of which missed the higher elevations. Kind of like doing the 34th Street area in New York, and neglecting to factor in the Empire State building.
Dante--
Since you have not answered me, I have no recourse but to assume that you have none. Yet again you are being evasive of points that could prevent you from maintaining your skepticism. What is this but intellectual dishonesty at its worst? As it is, you are merely masquerading as scientific; in reality your objectivism is a mere cloak and pretense. You are using your so-called adherence to hard empiricism as a smoke screen for an obstinate will to maintain your initial opinions -- even at the cost of honesty and reason. At bottom you and the fundy creationist are one and the same animal.
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