From: Terry W. Colvin (fortean1@mindspring.com)
Date: Wed Feb 26 2003 - 19:46:19 MST
Science Frontiers, No. 146, Mar-Apr, 2003, p. 2
BIOLOGY
The outer ocean of life
Conventionally, Island Earth is girded by a thin biofilm confined to dry land,
the hydrosphere, the deep ocean muds, and the crevicular crust. This is a
very limited view of cosmic life. The earth is an island all right, but the
ocean of space that envelopes us is also pregnant with life we scarcely
know---and perhaps something more profound than life-as-we-know-it.
Earth. An international group of scientists claims to have found clumps of
extraterrestrial bacteria high above the earth's palpable atmosphere.
Although these bacteria resemble terrestrial species, they have been
detected some 41 kilometers above the earth's surface. Their density
distribution suggests that they are incoming rather than just outward
leakage from the terrestrial biosphere. In fact, the estimate is that
one-third of a *ton* of extraterrestrial life falls into the gravitational
clutches of earth every day! Evidently, some stays aloft, some falls to the
earth's surface.
(Anonymous; "Life on Mars Controversy," *Meta Research Bulletin,* 11:62, 2002.
Source cited:
< http://www.space.com/searchforlife/bacteria_space_010731.html >).
Venus. While scientists strain to justify and detect life on Mars, they may
be looking in the wrong direction. The surface of Venus may simmer at 900
degrees F, but its outer atmosphere is more benign. That something alive
may be there is suggested by dark clumps in the ultraviolet images of the
Venusian atmosphere. The patches could be islands of bacteria subsisting
upon the energy in the strong flux of solar ultraviolet light.
A team at the University of Texas, El Paso, theorizes:
...that microbes could be living in the clouds 30 miles [48 km] up
in the Venusian atmosphere, where conditions are relatively balmy---
water droplets are present, the temperature is 150 degrees
Fahrenheit and the atmosphere is similar to what it is on Earth.
Using data from the Russian *Venera* space missions and the U.S.
*Pioneer-Venus* and *Magellan* probes, the team found chemical
oddities there that could be explained by the presence of living
microbes.
(Ackerman, Todd; "Life on Venus May Be Microbe Clouds," Houston *Chronicle,*
October 14, 2002. Cr. D. Phelps.)
Comment. Thus, at least two of the solar-system's planets seem to be awash
in the cosmic sea of life. But there may be more to all this than the mere
*presence* of life in the solar system. See Comments following DID ID HAVE
DIMENSIONAL LIMITS?.
-- Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1@mindspring.com > Alternate: < fortean1@msn.com > Home Page: < http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/8958/index.html > Sites: * Fortean Times * Mystic's Haven * TLCB * U.S. Message Text Formatting (USMTF) Program ------------ Member: Thailand-Laos-Cambodia Brotherhood (TLCB) Mailing List TLCB Web Site: < http://www.tlc-brotherhood.org >[Vietnam veterans, Allies, CIA/NSA, and "steenkeen" contractors are welcome.]
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