Posthuman Blues

Much ado over the new ESA Mars Face images has centered on the odd, steeple-like protrusion seen in the image above. As the steeple, or "horn," only detracts from the Face's resemblance to a humanoid face, it would seem to be good evidence that the controversial Face mesa is indeed nothing more than a lumpy hill. But only if the horn is a genuine formation.





Mars-watchers who've followed the Cydonia controversy have seen the Face formation modeled repeatedly by computers in an attempt to assess its shape and peer at it from angles inaccessible from orbit. Interestingly, the ESA's "horned face" is the first such computer-derived image to indicate a steep conical protrusion near the purported "brow"; this invites the question of whether we're seeing actual surface topology, an error introduced by the ESA's software, or even a deliberate attempt to make the Face appear less face-like (a challenge to which JPL rose in 1998 with its infamous "catbox" release).





Curiously, a review of "shape-from-shading" images based on reliable spacecraft data fails to show a feature corresponding to the ESA's "horn." Or, for that matter, anything particularly close.





For example, the photo below (taken by the THEMIS camera aboard the Mars Odyssey), shows essentially what we expected to see from the Viking and Mars Global Surveyor images. No obvious sign of a "horn."





Here's another, perhaps less flattering, THEMIS image. Again -- where's the "horn"? The low sun-angle should all-but-ensure that we see its shadow on the Face's distorted eastern side. Alas, we don't.





Neither do we see it here, in this partial image of the Face's western half.





More tellingly, we don't see it in any of Mark Carlotto's digital models or in painstaking forensic sculpture by Kynthia.

Why not?





Because, simply, it's very likely not there. But assuming it does certainly expedites the "debunking" process.

(For more images of the Face formation -- none of them suggesting the ESA's mysterious "horn" -- click here.)