While strolling through my news today, the story grabbed my eye: “NASA Scientist Finds Evidence of Alien Life,” dated March 5th, 2011. Exciting would be such an understatement. According to the report on Digital Trends on Yahoo News, Dr. Richard B. Hoover, an astrobiologist at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, claims to have found fossilized bacterium which are similar to Earth bacteria, but are not identified as anything known on the planet.
Two reasons I find this credible from my admittedly limited standpoint: 1) For the bacteria to be fossilized within the meteorite, the little critter would've obviously needed to be inside of it before falling to Earth, and yup, that would mean it's extra-terrestrial. 2) Dr Hoover is inviting critical analysis from the scientific community.
It's the second reason that really gets me. In the past, when anyone has claimed to “prove” existence of ...well...anything not only is criticism discouraged, the results are defended. Real scientists know to let skeptics have a free reign of their evidence since science is, after all, skepticism itself. It's that willingness to let his findings be shot down, if need be, which wins me over.
Imagine how exciting this must be for Dr Hoover. Heck, I'm just sitting here at home, and the thought of proof of life from other world's has me giddy like a schoolgirl. To actually be Dr Hoover must be an amazing thought right now. As long as this evidence pans out, he'll be in the history books of science, and not just a footnote.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
0 Whaddya Think?:
Post a Comment