The best evidence so far for recent (and future) water flows on Mars

These gullies have been involved in an ongoing debate over the past few years. Now with higher resolution images from MRO, it is becoming almost certain that some of these were formed by recent liquid water:

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/090302-mm-mars-gullies.html

And that such water on Mars is cyclic in nature- and will return again in the (geologically speaking) near future.

A connected picture is emerging where Mars's huge axis tilt variation causes liquid water regions (and habitable zones) to form on Mars every few 100k years- kind of the opposite of ice-ages on Earth; we get ice-ages every few 10k years, whereas Mars gets water-ages every few 100k years!

Phoenix results are also showing similar evidence of more watery past for some of the stuff found in the north-polar region. Along with the recently cofirmed localized yearly release of Methane on Mars, this bodes well for finding some biological hotspots in the next few years.

Space X's Falcon 1 reaches orbit!

This will be remembered as the dawn of the era of fast, cheap and reliable commmercial space launch availability:

http://www.spacex.com/F1-004.php

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5iF-6npNsKa0n_7aLm8tJvuHWt4JgD93G1LC00

Awesome job Space-X. Congrats! There are many more great moments to come. Falcon 9, COTS demo, first mission to the Space Station, first manned mission to the Space Station, and then ofcourse missions to Mars. The odds of those happening have suddenly increased a lot today.

Comment: Has Space-X already shown that they can provide a reliable, fast availability and low-cost orbital launch system?

With this successful launch, they have already proven the cost effectiveness and speed to a great extent and silenced the naysayers- in a couple of 100 million dollars, 500 people (only now they have hit a strengthof 500) and 6 years, they have developed and built two rockets from scratch (Falcon 9 is being manufactured right now), designed Dragon, and launched Falcon-1 4 times. Also note the fast turnaround time forFalcon-1 launches. For the same scale of development and testing effort, NASA would have taken 10 billion dollars or more and 10s ofthousands of employees. Just to make minor modifications to the existing tanks and engines to transform them into Ares 1 and 2 has already cost NASA a few billion dollars, and is expected to take almosta decade. All the other supposedly private companies in orbitalspace services such Sea Launch, Mir Corp, SpaceAdventures, Orbital Sciences, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Arianne, have been doled out billions of dollarsand/or massive man-power and logistics suppor from the government to develop what they did, or have reused previously existing government-funded infrastructureto provide their "new" service.

Only two other companies come close to Space-X in the area of space services: Bigelow Aerospace and Space Dev- and they both are NOT working on orbital launch capabilties (as of now). They both do complement Space-X's launch capabilties - and hopefully will one day provide cheap space stations and a large group of paying astronauts (respectively) to Space-X.

The Clarke in the Multiverse

I read Childhood's End the first time when I was maybe 12. Another great novel of his was A Fall of Moon Dust- it was so full of suspense that I finished it in one sitting :-)

The strange thing is that I was watching Space Odyssey 2001 on Comcast in high-def just the day Sir Arthur C. Clarke died, and was mentioning to my wife how glad I was that he was still around.

Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov and Carl Sagan made me into what I am today. Clarke was the last living guru from my childhood. The three inspired me to work hard in science and maths and to get a PhD in Machine Learning (AI). Motivated by Isaac Asmiov's positronic brain, many scientists have been working on ideas that can bring AI brain-power closer to human-level intelligence, or even surpass it. Even if I personally don't succeed in something that big (though I am surely inspired enough to try), I believe one or more of the thousands of others inspired by the same great people will soon succeed in bringing about a new millenia-level shift for humanity; which breakthrough will be the first to affect us all is unknown, but that's what makes it exciting to live today - a Space Elevator, SETI discovering an alien signal from a nearby star, human-level AI, warp drive, unlimited human hibernation, ability to repair frost damaged cells, a cure for human aging, expansion of humanity on to Mars, terraforming of Mars, discovery of complex life-forms in the Europan ocean - the list is pretty long...

Here is another nice tribute article on Space.com for Clarke.

Another interesting idea: long live Arthur C. Clarke in our Multiverse; in some other Universe of our Multiverse, where longevity was discovered earlier than in ours (thanks again to one of his inspired pupils), he is still alive and kicking. Perhaps one day, from that Universe, he will figure out a way (with help from some other advances in physics and technology) to send a copy of himself back into ours. If it does not sound familiar, read Space Odyssey 3001 :-)

All our achievements can dissipate, the Indus Valley way

The Indus Valley Civilization is a classical example of an extremely advanced urban meritocracy that had all the signs of leapfrogging into the future, but which instead just dissipated over time as the climate changed.

It shows that the future is not guaranteed, no matter how promising everything looks at any moment in time.

Unless we use the current opportunity to expand beyond Earth soon, we might meet the same fate, and our descendants a few 1000 years later might wonder why we never moved on to the stars. Or worse, they may forget about us. Or there may not be any descendants, and the people examining our ruins might be aliens from a nearby system.

How unimportant can lost greatness become? Interestingly, most people outside India don't seem to have read about the Indus Valley Civilization in their school books, despite it being one of the pinnacles of the ancient era. There may yet come a day when no one will learn about the Apollo missions or the Hubble Space Telescope- if we give up our current chance to reach the stars, and get bogged down in inconsequential bickering.

Imagine where we would be if the Indus Valley Civilization had gone into the industrial age in 3000 BC, over 2000 years before the classical Greek civilization got its chance, 3000 years before the Romans got their chance, and 5000 years before the Europeans finally got their oppurtunity and used it.

There are other examples of lost "almost there" civilizations in human history, but Indus Valley was the first that came so close to the threshold and then dissipated.

Our current "Space Age" is the first threshold towards reaching the stars. Are we going to be one of the many in our galaxy that get this oppurtunity but never quite make it? Don't be so sure of the answer; but it is up to you, me, and all of us to make sure that it does happen!

Mars: The Foundation for an Interplanetary Civilization

I made a presentation recently to the local Austin Mensa chapter on behalf of the Austin Mars Society. Here is an html version of that presentation online. I suggest going through the whole presentation, in case you are interested to know more about where the future of space exploration is headed. However, do not miss the really nice part about the future of human society beyond Earth that starts from slide 124.

It took me a lot of time to bring this together- I have yet to find a presentation on the web that covers so many issues in combination; it is important that any prediction about the future incorporates the network of events that influence each other, and hence the future. Things do not happen in isolation. If I were to ignore all the non-NASA related changes happening in our World- political, economic and cultural, I would come up with a depressing, quixotic and grossly incorrect estimate of the future of Mars and Space exploration- something that would resemble what many of the traditional American media and this ex-NASA guy have done. Instead, I have tried to imagine what would happen because of these interacting World-changing shifts happening, especially: (1) massive growth in economies of India, China and a resurgent Russia, (2) major and ongoing advances in biotech, robotics, AI, electronics, material science (3) increased private entrepreneurship in space exploration; both manned and unmanned, (4) a revolution in SETI, telescopes and planet discovery that is only going to get bigger because of (2) and, (5) major findings on Mars making it more attractive than we could have ever imagined.

Hope you enjoy the ride! Any feedback is welcome. Click here to start the presentation.

Dumb & Dumber?

Being an engineer, a researcher and a technologist, I am often surrounded by a multitude of people with the same type of background wherever I go. Some individuals from this group of sucessful people from my age-group (20s and 30s), most of whom have never had to struggle in their life (the way a substantial fraction of humanity is still struggling) like to reason that a large number of people who appear lower-class and "not-so-smart" (such as many of the low-education migrant workers in USA, or the poor and illiterate in India) are somehow denstined to grow up poor and disadvantaged. And I feel a larger fraction of them who don't actually talk about it, probably feel that way privately. I have come across this attitude in multiple places and countries I have worked at; some even hint that the plight of these poor workers or their lack of success might even have something to do with their genetics. I find this attitude almost on the verge of being facism or xenophobia; and such a patronizing attitude comes from people who have never had to struggle in their life- they pretty much got every oppurtunity they could get thanks to their parents/upbringing- all they had to do was play the game to success. These people also point out that for this reason humanity is doomed; its being overtaken by poorer and less smart people who leave more descendants behind.

Whenever I hear such stuff, it makes me feel incensed, and instead of going through a discussion with every such person I come across, I thought this blog might help express what I feel, and perhaps change the mindset of some; if I do succeed in doing so, perhaps that would help make our society a bit more caring, and a bit more united. After all- how can humanity graduate from its womb and expand beyond Earth, if we harbor such selfish and "tribal" viewpoints?

There is a vast amount of scientific, social and historical literature out there that would show that such a class phobia is completely unjustified, but I would try to summarize the point here in a few lines. The question is, is it a less rich (politically correct way of saying it) or a dumber environment which causes people to grow up having a lower standardized IQ and a lower skill job? Perhaps a small amount of brain-speed variation is there on taking an exam that someone is born with, and perhaps there are a few savants and prodigies who are outside the distribution of the general population, but in general, we know now that the environmental factor dominates and not genetics; most of the humans who survived the evolutionary squeeze and near-extinction (when at one time just a few thousand homo sampiens were left behind), were extremely smart, and all of the human beings in the World today are pretty much copies of this small group of super-smart ancestors.

Two things to point out: (1) the social factors for increased intelligence are still at work, and (2) these poor workers are genetically as smart as any of us. Now there is more evidence from orangutans supporting this hypothesis. This should allay any xenophobia less dumb people might have against more dumb people leaving more descendants behind, and at some basic level we are all much more like each other than it may appear superficially; it also points to the amazing plasticity of the human brain. The huge gaps in individuals today are mostly an artifiact of the huge gaps their respective societies historically contained, and which might take another few generations to slowly go away.

This also means that the days of antisocial relics such as N. Korea, Burma, S. Arabia and others are numbered; they will either evolve into more socially tolerant (and consequently more intelligent) societies, or will slowly decline into oblivion. Being an optimist, I believe in the former; the most decadent societies of today are still progressive enough, and have enough external World-view filtering in (compared to say 12th century Europe) that their own people will force the countries out of the social (and consequently an intellectual and technological) stagnation they are currently in. This theory also explains why grafting open societies (such as the war in Iraq right now) can at best act as a catalyst (and at worst a failure)- most of the work of building a rich and open society out of a decadent one has to be done by the local people gradually, and would require at least one generation to become self-feeding and stable, even with massive external support (as a younger, smarter and more socially rich generation grows up and takes the reins of the society from their decadent ancestors).

Small Islands in a Vast Ocean: Moon or Mars?

(I wrote this story originally on May 2, 2004)

Imagine you are an alien species that has evolved on a small green island somewhere on a very large planet, whose surface is mostly water with a sprinkle of small islands, most of which are either frozen or blazingly hot, or for some other reason, inhospitable. With recent advances in technology, your species is beginning to discover other islands nearby, and a realization is starting to dawn among the intellectuals in your society that your island is perhaps too good to be true - lush forests with eternal streams of fresh water surround fertile farms that produce plentiful and a wide variety of crops every year. Over the last few centuries, your species has mastered enough technology, and with technological and social advancement, the population of your Island called Earland, has now stabilized to a densely populated but an efficient and culturally enriched civillization. Most individuals of your species are preoccupied with living on this beautiful island, and they do not understand why anyone would look for more space to live.

In spite of these gains, some of your species, including you, are extremely curious, just like your nomadic ancestors who eventually expanded and settled the whole Earland island. You want to find out what other kinds of islands are out there, and if there is anyone like you out there, also wondering about you. You are also worried about the future. Your scientists have found archeological evidence that many other species existed on your island long before your species came along, that have long since vanished without a trace. Evidence has also been found for others that went extinct because of disease, and that at certain prehistorical times, large Tsunamis and volcanic events destroyed virtually all complex life on your island. You believe that all the eggs are in one basket. For your species to survive, a second island is needed as a home.

This is the first time your group is trying to set up a permanent base on another island to save your species from the virtually guaranteed long-term extinction. Not surprisingly, the general lack of awareness among most members of your democratic society has resulted in only small amounts of public resource being allocated for this task, which is a lot less than the amount your society spends on football games. Assuming no major technologicalbreakthrough, for the next 20 years there is only going to be enough money and resource to perhaps explore and settle just one new island. Maybe after 20 years, if you can prove to your society that all the eggs do not have to be in one basket, and that there is really an alternative, they will allocate you more resources for further exploration. If you fail, perhaps the current trickle of funds will also dry up, and perhaps it would be too late for the next Tsunami, the next eruption of the dormant volcano on your island, or the next big plague. With the increasing integration in the recent years of people from various parts of your island, the risk of a disease wiping everyone out has becoming more likely.

Your recently developed telescopes have revealed a nearby island called Marland which is barely habitable, but which can be easily improved within a few decades to become lush and green like your island, and support a large population - it has large amounts of fresh water and land that could be made arable, and is only a bit colder than Earland. In fact there is some evidence of existing and past greenery on it. Discovering these organisms would reveal answers to your own origins. Did you come to Earland from another island, or did you evolve independently.

The other options are extremely hot, cold, or very far away islands that could be habitable - no one even knows for sure that another fertile island exists. It might be 50 to 200 years before your technology will allow visiting one of these farther, potentially habitable islands, and without technology to visit the nearby Marland, such technology will never develop. You will have to develop ships that can travel 10,000 times or more faster than current ships, and then travel to these distant dreamlands over many years. And once you reach there, for all you know it might be already occupied by other people, who may not welcome the colonization effort. You are also scared that they might be having the same ideas. For now, your species is trying to build stronger telescopes to find if there are any other fertile islands at all.

There is also a nearby extremely barren land, called the Moonland, where you can only live inside caves, and it has perhaps a tiny amount of fresh water frozen deep inside one cave. There is no life on this island, and can never be. You enjoy looking at the strange desolate landscape of Moonland from your island; the contrast with the lush greenery around you is bewildering and a bit disorienting. Someone has to be crazy to want to settle down on the Moonland, although there are a few astronomers who would love to be under the clear sky of this dry island. The promising island of Marland is reachable in 6 months with your boats. Now the dumb question is- where should your species go first?

1. Distant frozen islands. Not reachable for another 50 to 200 years.
   
2. Marland: a large island that could be easily made habitable, and that can support a large population. 6 months trip.
   
3. Moonland: the barren nearby island that is 2 days trip but has nothing on it. You have explored it before and found nothing too interesting on it, besides a base for astronomy.
   
4. Camp in the open sea nearby.
   

The answer is trivially obvious to you, but unfortunately there is politics involved, and people are still arguing about which island to visit first. Many are not even aware of the differences between the islands' habitability and are clamoring for setting a big camping site on the nearby barren island first, and then trying to grow food in caves by using a complex set of mirrors to get sunlight in. And even more amazingly, there are people who have been camping a few 100 feet out in the Sea for months and years, in open, unprotected boats. It takes them a few minutes to get to this 100-feet-off-the-shore camp, and these campers keep coming ashore for food and your society keeps sending them everything they need, although support has recently been declining after a few fatal accidents in which some people drowned trying to make this back-and-forth trip for more food/relief. This has been going on for over 30 years now, and it has been 35 years since your people last camped on the barren Moonland.

The campers are being funded by many groups in your island, and they claim their camping in the open, nearby water is justified because they are trying to figure out the effects of spending many years in the ocean on members of your species - especially the effect of open sun, wind, and saline water. You try to tell them that we could design enclosed vessels to go to Marland, so they don't have to waste time figuring out the long-term effect of open weather on travellers, but all goes down a deaf ear. Obviously you cannot deprive them of the only argument they have for their existence; a large number of people are employed by your government to keep these camping trips going, and these people are scared of losing their jobs. It is a political hot-button issue, but the utter wastefulness of the whole situation is very evident to exploration-minded people like you. What should you do (besides writing and reading this blog)?

Connection with reality:

I guess at this point, to anybody who is interested in space exploration, it must be clear that this story was a metaphor to demonstrate all sorts of issues with (1) exploration focussed either on low-Earth-orbit, or (2) on the Moon, or (3) no exploration and colonization at all. The large open ocean is our solar system, camping in space is bringing all your consumables along and throwing the unprocessed trash out. The open-camping is worse and corresponds to a space-station with no gravity- it is somewhat trivial to create artificial gravity by spinning a habitat on a long tether with a counterweight on the other end. There are ways to get around radiation problem similarly with just water and fuel surrounding you! The main motivation people give for the space-station is: "We are trying to figure out the long-term effects of zero-gravity and radiation exposure on human beings and how to mitigate it before we can go to Mars!"

Exploration of other places for the sake of exploration is good and I support that, but until we learn to live as a separate colony on the most hospitable planet outside Earth i.e. Mars, it would be pointless to try to develop a base on all the more inhospitable places using more exotic technology. It is equally pointless to camp in space where there are no resources, or to try to design near-100% recyclable systems- if you are on the surface of a planet, the system does not have to be closed, as you can draw in resources (air, water, soil), use it to generate useful materials, and then dump the treated waste out- similar to the process used by responsible but densely populated countries such as Belgium, Germany or Japan (a popular misconception is that US is good at this just because it is a developed country. Ask yourself if you live in USA- how do you dispose off your AA batteries and plastic wastes?).

There are very few locations in our solar system which will support more than just a camping mission in the foreseeable future. One such planet is Mars. It has all the raw resources that Earth has in a readily usable form- water, minerals, soil, air and last but not the least, protection against cosmic rays and solar wind in large areas of the planet (see my earlier blog on this issue). It is the stepping stone to exploring and colonizing the rest of the Universe. That is what all the fuss is about!

The Planetary Society represents the largest public space advocacy group, and it has made an official policy over the last few years that the manned exploration of Mars should be THE next goal for us. Unfortunately, soon after the big Moon-Mars initiative was announced by President Bush in 2004 (which prompted the original version of this story), the implementation got bogged down in petty politics and it has now become mainly a Moon initiative, with a use-and-throw program that provides the capability to camp on the moon for a few days by 2018, with hardware that will be hardly of any use beyond that. Things are already starting to break down as the political support for even the Moon program has started to waver, and the funding is once again not being given to the point needed- NASA is slowly shrinking the Moon program by throwing out critical pieces that would have made the program usable for Mars missions. All this is happening even though the Moon manned program is supposed to be a rehearsal for the eventual colonization of Mars. Tens of billions of dollars are still being wasted on keeping the camping in the low-earth orbit going, in spite of the fact that if this money was diverted on developing systems for a robust and permanent settlement of Mars, we would get the low-earth camping (by 2010) and the Moon-base (by 2012) for almost free, and we would reach Mars by 2016 rather than in 2036 (A date 30 years in the future means that for all you know, it will not happen).