Earlier this week NASA began to tease us with tantalizing hints regarding a major announcement, and the interwebs began buzzing with the possibilities. The safe money was on the possible world changing announcement that the Cassini-Huygens spacecraft– which is currently sending back massive amounts of data from Saturn—had confirmed the existence of microscopic life on Saturn’s moon Rhea. If that were the case, it would be the first example of extra-terrestrial life, and the scientific world would never be the same! But that wasn’t it.
The dark horse bet was on NASA making some form of announcement following the mysterious X-37B mini space shuttle that was launched by the military and has been orbiting the Earth unmanned for the past seven months. The exact nature of its mission is unknown, which had some believing that when the X-37B lands on December 6 (weather permitting), it might herald the announcement of something on the horizon regarding the next generation of space travel. Perhaps the press conference would be to debut the secret, and previously unseen new spacecraft that will return us to the stars! Not so much.
As the world held its breath, anticipating the moment when NASA would bring out buckets to offer the audience a place to let their recently blown minds dribble out of their ears, the accumulated five person panel discussed a new finding of epic proportions. Alien life has been discovered! Sort of.
NASA has announced that it has found alien life! In a lake in California.
The announcement was in regards to the discovery of a new organism that is so different in its makeup that it can realistically be considered alien, just not extra-terrestrial. The discovery occurred in Mono Lake, California, in an area that contains a very high concentration of arsenic in levels considered too harsh to nurture life, and poisonous to man. The organism accepts arsenic in its makeup instead of phosphorus, and the DNA found is considered totally foreign to all other life on Earth.
While the discovery in itself is important to the advancement of science, what it signifies is much more important. The current consensus from scientists has typically been that if and when life is discovered in space, it will be on a planet that is in some ways similar to Earth. The life might be fundamentally different, but certain similarities must be present– such as the distance of the planet from its star to allow temperatures that are neither freezing nor boiling, a particular level of oxygen and carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, and some form of water. The discovery today renders all of those truths false, and opens up the idea that life may exist in places that have been overlooked as too toxic for life to exist.
So while the announcement may not have been as “sexy” as many people thought, and the implications might not be felt in our lifetimes, the very nature of this organism challenges the beliefs that we have held as certainties. Life can exist in alien environments, and it may be completely different from anything ever dreamed of.
[Update: Just to clarify, as one of our readers pointed out, the reason NASA is considering this a "major" discovery is that this organism is the first, and only organism ever found to not have phosphorous in its makeup. From a scientific standpoint it is a significant discovery.]
The fact that it still has DNA, all be it altered, means it stems from the same origins as everything else which makes this announcement rather boring really. The hype before the release was pointing towards a second origin of life being found on earth which would have been massive news however this is basically just another extremophile which has found a way swapping phosphorous for arsenic which is rather good but doesn’t deserve the hype it has achieved.
every living thing, alien or not, has DNA. smh some people jeez go back to shcool
ya but thats just based on earth science, the universe is infinite or at least massive, so to say that how life exists is taught in school is just naive. other life forms don’t have to have dna to be alive, look at quantum physics and you’ll learn that not everything that you think you know or you have been taught is really how it seems. by the way what we see and perceive due to our 5 senses is only 1 millionth of what reality is. so look who’s not intelligent now petey………..
That is true. Just because we say its true, doesn’t mean that it is. It is simply a basis for which we currently understand something. Do we know the universe is infinite? No, we do not. Something could live without DNA, we just have not seen it yet.
We only think fact is something we see for ourselves, but how much do we truly know? Not Enough.
there was a volt open in Europe many years back with bug that hade no dna it was a sewer that hade been closed of for more than 200 years and hade no water or light or fresh air and that is what was strange thy said the bugs hade no dna it was more than 0 years ago I don’t remember all the info but I do remember that
It sounds like a bottom feeder (crayfish)
agreed but the fact still remains that with it being a non phosporous entity which to me is utterally mind blowing is a discovery beyond beleaf that forces all of the known science to evaluate all known information about life because if something that is impossible becomes possible than it is to be beleaved that out there there might just be something that is like us but differend in so many ways upon the line of aspects that make us humans. on a further note who knows there might be something that looks like us but breathes co2 instead of oxygen or something that eats dirt insted of food all of the possibility are mind blowing so i have to say is if u just open your mind and think of the impossible than who knows 1 day u might ust be proven wrong
* Albeit…
Just because it has DNA doesn’t mean it stems from the same origins. DNA could easily occur in life forms on other planets, just because it’s from somewhere else doesn’t mean it will turn out completely different. That’s like saying that if we ever do make contact with extra-terrestrial beings, they can’t look even slightly similar to us because they are from another planet. Just because you walk on two legs doesn’t mean Aliens have to have three or more.
You sound ignorant as hell. DNA is made of chemicals that are prevalent throughout the entire universe. The organism uses arsenic, a metalloid instead of phosphorus. From a scientific, biological standpoint this is groundbreaking. Uninteresting to me though because I’m very aware that NASA has found many traces of life at least across our solar system. They are funded too much money and have been around too many years to not have found life until this point.
lol you wish they found life. There’s an alternative explanation for everything they find on mars. Amazing how a generation has their heads filled with sci-fi television and now aliens are an accepted fact. It only seems obvious because of how you’ve been raised up.
Wow, not much for promoting science are we? EVERYTHING that lives on Earth, or so we thought, had as part of it’s core makeup DNA with Guanine, Adenine, Thymine, and Cytosine, using phosphates to metabolize. The big deal is that instead of phosphates, this form of life uses arsenates. No other form of life on Earth does so, which would make this life fundamentally different from other life on Earth.
Now it seems the bacteria in question actually prefers phosphates, according to recent studies, so yes, in fact it is just another extremophile that uses arsenic instead of phosphorus. However, if you believe science is not hypeworthy, perhaps you should stick to your 100 channels of sports on TV, because there are positively hundreds of athletes who are certainly more hypeworthy, and worthy of the millions of dollars this hype brings them. Poo on science, what has science ever done for us?
I have some questions. What is the big bang make of and where did this stuff come from? What or whom started the big bang. If we came from a monkey. Why are monkeys still here? They should be us. Why is the earth just the right distance from the sun with a moon to help it orbit and control the sea currents (cooling & warming the Earth)? Is there more earth make plants in the universe with life, on it like ours. I think its a safe bet there is. Intelligent design is a fact. The humans you called Creators was created though Intelligent design (GOD).
if an a single omnipotent being was the answer they would need these things to line up so perfectly for life to thrive. that kind of thinking makes the world flat… LMFAO!!
*would NOT need… ..my bad… lol
Your young and dumb, the older you get the more you’ll believe, there’s much more then just this life. Schools teach what they want the sheep to believe. One of us is going to have a big surprise. With the 75 years I’ve had on earth and facing death in Vietnam, your wrong.
I am not a bible person. Do I believe in god? Yes, I can say that I do. But how I believe is different from the impression I got from your posting. I believe God made rules in this universe and does not interfere in a way to break the rules he set. Do we know them all? No, but as humans trying to understand life we are making guesses based on the information that we have. Some theories that are taught can be wrong and others could be close. Those are my opinions and beliefs. To say someone is wrong for an opinion or beliefs is not something one should do. To you I may be young because I am half your age but I am certainly not dumb.
I didn’t call you, Young and dumb. Now I am calling you young and very dumb. Don’t say I can’t. I can say what I want. You say you believe in god, but you have no faith, you have fear. I don’t care if you young people believe in GOD. I can’t save you,only you can save yourself. Find the truth. I have, I am LDS.
I really wanted to stop reading your comment after the question, “If we came from a monkey. Why are monkeys still here?” that questions demonstrates your complete lack of knowledge of evolution. just because u served in a bloody war and your old does not make u wise. I’m not trying to brag but i got through very tough classes in the Naval Nuclear Power program more easily than others, not going to get into details but i saw good people give it their all in classes like physics and radiation fundamentals and fail. i even tried to help some guys that were honestly trying just to see them give 100% and fail while i gave 50% and passed. Again, not trying to brag. I am not genius level by any means. I had friends put less effort than me and get better grades and have better understanding of complex concepts than i could by reading and lecture. I have seen and had intellectual conversations with genius level people, most are kind of awkward. although i am not a genius i recognize that I am smarter than the average joe, not particularly proud of it really as it makes conversations difficult with narrow minded people. For a long time i thought people were dumb because they were too lazy to pay attention in school. but after seeing people try and fail i realized that, that is not the case at all. Some people are born with a higher level of thinking. sad but undeniably true. The Navy’s Nuclear Power Program is the hardest academic school the Navy has for enlisted men. At the Navy Nuclear Power Training Command (NNPTC) i have met some of the finest minds from all over our great county. young and old!
Back to the evolution topic… saying “I don’t believe in evolution” is just like saying “I don’t believe in gravity because i never cared to learn about it” Gravity exists and we can study it through experiments and observations. just like evolution exists and we can observe it unfold through time. the only difference is that evolution a complex concept sometime taking millions of years for organisms to change through natural selection. look at the fossil records and see that there were other human like creatures on this planet a million years ago. Neanderthals? what exactly do you think they were?
wow i just went way too far with this rant.. sorry I’m bored right now waiting for something to download. sorry old dude but if u try to say u don’t believe in evolution among an intelligent crowd you will be laughed out of the room. lol
Intellectual growth should commence at birth and cease only at death. you have a big ego, little man.
The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life. Attitude, to me, is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, the education, the money, than circumstances, than failure, than successes, than what other people think or say or do. It is more important than appearance, giftedness or skill. It will make or break a company… a church… a home. The remarkable thing is we have a choice everyday regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day. We cannot change our past… we cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude. I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it. And so it is with you… we are in charge of our Attitudes. Your attitude is very small today, little man.
And your attitude, of course, is huge, calling him little man and belittling him with every chance you get. Go spiderman! You show him who’s holier-than-thou!