So apparently NASA has called a news conference on December 2 to "discuss an astrobiological finding that will impact the search for evidence of extraterrestrial life."

http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2010/nov/HQ_M10-167_Astrobiology.html

So I'm not quite ready to pop the champagne cork yet or anything--this clearly isn't first contact or anything like that--but this could be very very interesting indeed, and is something to keep an eye on. I just hope they aren't phrasing it in a misleading way to get the press in, and then announce that they've found another comet, or decided to re-institute Pluto or something.

One way or the other, this will be the first thing I check when I get home on Thursday.

Oh I don't care about Pluto. Just an example of stupid things they could talk about.

Breaking news about this is that they also have an oceanographer in the mix...specifically, an expert on hydrothermal vents. I think that rules out Mars, but can anyone say...Europa Europa? Or perhaps, clash of the Titan? (Also worth noting: a biologist will be there too.)

God damn I love this. Even if all they have found are itty bitty microscopic fossils of bacteria, that would be final, irrefutable and conclusive proof that we are not the only life in the universe. And holy crap, the implications of finding more evidence of life *in our very own back yard* like this would be simply staggering.

Sathien said it best:


Get out the mashed potatoes and clear Devil's Tower...Thursday cannot get here fast enough.

BlazingGlory wrote:

A slightly scarier though is if the old Voyager probe just pinged us back some info that something did open it up and read its contents.

Although it's far fetched, this would actually make the most sense, given the wording of the press release. It seems likely they haven't *actually* found anything specific yet ("IMPACT the search for ET life"), but a ping back from one of the Voyagers would fit. As would any conclusively intelligent but unidentifiable signal.

Most likely, as you said, they found some bacteria (still awesome) or, worse given how much my imagination has fired so far, just tell us more about O2 readings on one of Saturn's moons or something. I don't mind pointing out I will be extremely pissed if that's all it is. (The O2 I mean; ET bacteria would still be pretty damn awesome.)

EDIT: sigh. Killjoy to bring us back down to earth: http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2010/11/30/snowballing-speculation-over-a-nasa-press-conference/

Still. We'll see.

Rydog wrote:

I'm sorry, as cool as some type of living organism living on another planet/moon may be, its just not going to get me that excited. I was actually under the impression we have found such things in the past. Say we found bacteria on Mars, what does that mean? That some day we could inhabit the planet? That greater life forms USED to live there? I'm really curious, I'm not being sarcastic.

Well--were it conclusively proven--even tiny little microbial fossils would prove that it is not only possible for life to develop outside the Earth (which we pretty much already know by now), but that life *actually EXISTED* outside the Earth. That's a big deal. Especially if we find evidence of life in our own backyard, that shows that we as living beings are not nearly as unique as we once thought--for life to have occurred not once, but twice in a space as small as our solar system would mean that it must not only EXIST out there, but that it's relatively common. And if that much life is potentially out there, that means that, odds are, at least some of it is intelligent.

And THAT is something to be super excited about. At least for me.