as we all know a close examination of Mars indicates that the potential for a previous society remains. the end of this civilization could have come in several ways. the theory i propose is orbital change. if the orbit of the Mars was once much closer than ours and slowly drifted away from the sun they environment would have most certainly changed. the same for earth and the remaining planets. inside of our orbit. as for the birth of new planets, that could be caused by the sun at which time would generate enough force to move the previous planet out of its orbit. this leads me to believe that the infinate cycle of the universe is more eternal than originally thought. the only end would be when the star (our sun) eventually runs begins to diffuse. i am interested to hear what comments are to be had about this theory.

I don't think we have enough evidence now to actually say if there was life on mars. History of water being flowing on that planet doesn't really mean that there was life on it. However, its still possible, but not enough proof!

You have got an interesting theory there about the life-cycle of the sun and the planets.

Rotating gas and dust in a nebula condense and contract into a disc where the central portion of that disc forms the star and the remaining gas and dust condense to form planets. That is how our solar system formed too, according to the scientists.

Talking about the sun forcing the planets out of orbit, its not really possible. The planets are bound to the sun gravitationally and the Sun have to fight its own very strong gravity to force a planet out of the orbit.

Adding to that,
The life of the sun eventually does end. The sun has already lived half of its life, after around 5 billion years or so, the sun will enter the red-giant phase when the outer shell will expand. Now during that time, the inner planets probably will be completely "eaten away", which includes the earth. That would be our(earth's) end if we survive all the other catastrophes that will be coming to our way in the future!


[edit on 8/3/2004 by jp1111]

Erm no, what do you mean as we all know? Their is no current evidence for a past civilisation.

state your evidence

No current evidence...all evidence proves there was no past civilization on Mars.

Mars has been a "dead" world for a long time, the only real erosional features remaining are eolian.

This is such a slow process of weathering that on such an arid planet as Mars and with such a small atmosphere...any evidence of past civilizations would not be "ruinous" but literally pristene and as if it were made yesterday.

Except it would be tainted a butterscotch from dust...

I do not know if this has been posted on this forum, but astronomers say that based on their data our Moon's gravitation pull has kept us at a stable 23* tilt or so. Mars's 2 satellites are tiny and do not offer that stability, so they suggest that Mars woobles a great deal and this causes big chages in it's climate. There is evidence from data we have collected that Mars indeed woobles on an axis, we just have not had been able to observe first hand how soon those changes can occur over there. Sounds logical to me, not the society but an "alive" Mars with flowing waters and weather.

Yeah that evidence I've seen it before, I think the wobble difference for Mars is something of 50 degrees, so intense that at times each hemisphere will be completely coated in ice, however unlike its polar caps, it'd be far more thin, more like a layer of permanent frost.

I'd have to think more on how such extremes would affect a planet with such a small atmosphere. But it would not create a greater amount of weathering, the lack of moisture is what prevents much weathering. The lack of atmosphere inhances that greatly.

I'm not much into geology, but I have a question...
Does the mars' unstable wobble affect only the atmosphere/climate or it does cause unstabilities in the geological processes taking place inside the surface of the mars also? I was wondering, if there could be life way below the surface!

[edit on 8/4/2004 by jp1111]

Well first off I only heard of the idea that Mars has a wild wobble, and I can't remember where from, might even be the exact source that jrod heard it from. It could be very unreliable.

It's not really a concern right now, because for the past 3 billion years Mars has been essentially the way it is right now, and so more important is figuring out how that happend and what it was like before that happend.

The atmosphere is so thin on Mars that 30% of the atmosphere transfers from hemisphere to hemisphere as the seasons change at the poles causing the icecaps to melt/freeze.

So any such wobble would be significant on the atmosphere, since the atmosphere is really the only remaining geologic process on Mars besides bolide impacts, then the wobble's significance would be completely in how it has shaped dune features on Mars...

What affects it has on the Martian dust storms and such.

Geologically, Mars does seem to indeed have been very wet, it is devoid of massive river channels and devoid of hydrological weathering, which denotes that Mars has been submerged.

At least the northern and lower half. The northern hemisphere is lower in elevation than the southern and so far into the past water could have condensed in the highlands and accumulated in the low lands. This would, over millions of years without plate tectonics have reduced the world's mountains into mole hills and caused the generally flat surface we see today.

Then that water sits around for a while, oxidizing iron and such, and then is fully absorbed into the crust as the planet cools.

Then a billion or so years later, a massive meteorite hits where the Hellas basin is today, causes a mantle plume where the Tharsis bulge is today, causing volcanism in that part.

The bulge causes crustal extension which because there really is no faulting to break along, just rips a gigantic rift where the Valles Marineris is today.

That releases a lot of water that was in the crust back over the surface of Mars causing the most recent and last evidences of ancient hydrological activity on the surface of Mars.

The Volcanoes go dormant, Mars becomes the dead world it is now.

That's about it...

Life under the surface? Doubtful. Life has limits, and a world that has no major tectonic activity probably won't be able to sustain life for more than a few million years.

Reason is mainly resources...life forms are not very "mobile".

Life on Earth has spread where there are resources, but when the resources are used up the life forms don't generally move to a better location, they die. Humans differ and more evolved species like buffallo and gazelle and water buffalos of Africa and birds have gained the instinct to migrate.

But again, they migrate from one specific area to another specific area, if both areas die out they die with it.

Mars is the only area for any life that would have been there and it died out.

Without tectonic activity you have limited volcanism, at least in the case of Mars, and therefore no new fertile soils are extruded. Without a hydrological system you have no erosion and deposition to create the vast fertile stable platforms or valleys//basins that we have here on Earth.

So any life form that did exist, would have eaten all its food, and then died as no rains would decompose rocks into nutrients, no floods would bring soils, no volcanoes would replace depleted lands by spewing forth its glory or being exposed as a batholith to be weathered into fertile soil.

So subterranean isn't "more" hospitable on a world that has no geological activity because nothing is recycled as the "great recycler" does not exist (that recycler is geological activity.)

See, life needs an external source of energy, it in itself can not exist.

For instance, bacteria at the bottom of the sea near thermal vents. The energy source is the earth, the earth creates food for the bacteria (sulfurs) and it eats it to produce energy.

Trees...they with the help of the energy of the sun, are able to take the earth and make it into its food.

Phytoplanktans, the earth erodes into the sea and they live off that stuff.

While life may get its food from another life form...in the end all life is dependent upon the earth producing that base foods...the earth in a sense is on the very bottom of the food chain

And this works on earth because the earth creates mountains which erode into food...and when that food is used up, it is subducted by tectonics and creates more mountains...this doesn't happen on Mars, when all the chemicals and minerals and such are transformed by the life forms there, there is nothing that can transform them back...

This is because of the laws of thermodynamics, energy is always lost in the process so you can never fully recreate what was transformed.

You eat a banana, you can not with in a closed system, turn your feces back into a banana...impossible.

However in a system with unlimited energy...at least in our terms...you can.

That unlimited energy is the sun and the earth...Mars lacks that internal energy to take waste products and melt them down to recrystalize as rocks and start the process all over again.

Any life forms on Mars certainly would have eaten everything by now.

Wow what a long drawn out post