FILE: ARES2.TXT AUTHOR: Martin E. Arant DATE: 05-20-89 SUBJECT: Mars Face ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- SUBMITTED BY: Martin E. Arant "The chance of finding intelligent life on Mars is one trillion to one, against!" Considering this view is held by the majority of planetary scientists and astronomers, is it any wonder that the scientific community immediately discarded the Martian face as a trick of "lighting and shadows." Is it any wonder that the search for extraterrestrial intelligence is relegated to the paradigm that ET will FAX home? Before discussing what has been discovered in Cydonia, the importance of the evidence which has been "unearthed" AND its implications, it is important to understand why this issue has not, until the recent release of compelling new evidence, been taken seriously by the scientific community. The Viking missions were sent to Mars, in part, to look for evidence of life, microbial life. No one expected to find artifacts or the evidence of an ancient civilization. When we take a close look at Mars and its evolutionary history, the reason for this presumption becomes very clear and totally understandable. Mars is the fourth planet from the sun, a "terrestrial" planet formed roughly 4.5 billion years ago from the same basic raw materials as Venus and the Earth. It is assumed that Mars underwent similar geological processes as our own planet during its early stages. This included volcanism, the "outgassing" of a relative thick atmosphere, and the presence of large amounts of liquid water on its surface. Water erosion is quite evident from the numerous riverbeds and channels which can be seen in the Mariner and Vikings photos. There is even growing evidence that an ancient ocean once existed in the northern hemisphere of the planet. Whereas the southern hemisphere is heavily crated (almost to the same degree as the moon), the northern hemisphere is relatively free of cratering. In addition, the Viking landers found large amounts of Chlorine in the Martian surface material. It is important to note that both Viking landers set down in an area that is below the "mean sea level" of the planet. The past presence of large amounts of liquid surface water is suggestive of both a past mean temperature far above the present temperature of -50F and a past surface air pressure much higher than the todays atmospheric pressure of 500 millibars (roughly one-half of one percent of Earths surface pressure). The fact that liquid water cannot exist today on the surface because of low temperatures and the absence of a dense atmosphere proves that the Martian environment once was at least "somewhat" more hospitable than it is today. Most geological and physical models seem to indicate that this "warm and moist" period lasted from only a few hundred million years to perhaps as long as one half billion years. The reasons for this are based on several well established facts. Mars is farther from the sun than Earth, is less than one half the size of earth, and has a surface gravity of roughly one third that of Earth. The geological engine which has so effectively recycled the Earths atmosphere simply ran out of steam on Mars. This apparently resulted in Mars "freezing to death" early in its geological history. The thick atmosphere, with its warming greenhouse effect, slowly escaped to space, leaving the planet cloaked in a thin veil of carbon dioxide; a dry, barren and desolate world, not much more than a rusted-out cog spinning slowly on the cosmic wheel Not time enough for complex life forms to evolve. Not time enough for Martians! The evolution of complex Martian life forms, however, is not necessarily required to explain the existence of intelligent remains on the Martian surface. Could it be that extra-solar beings colonized Mars sometime in the distant past? Is it possible that they just might have left a "sign" for us in the form of a human face. The idea is not quite so preposterous as it initially sounds. Consider This: There are over one-hundred billions stars in our galaxy alone. That means that there could be over 100 billion planetary systems, each possibly harboring a blue-green planet; each one, perhaps, destined to become home to a advanced civilization. When we consider this possibility, however, we quickly run into problems. Why would such a civilization choose Mars instead of Earth? Why did they leave after they colonized Mars? Why a "human face" on the surface? How could they have possibly known that the human form would eventually evolve on the third planet from the sun? But perhaps the best reason for discounting this scenario as a possibility has nothing to do with the calculation of odds and probabilities. It simply comes down to this: Very few scientists and researchers are willing to get within a light year of "extra-solar visitors." The subject has been oversold, over-hyped, and over-hoaxed! If one, therefore, considers the above, one is almost forced to come to the same conclusion as our planetary scientists and astronomers: There never has been an intelligence presence on Mars. The question would, therefore, seem to be settled and the subject closed. There can be no faces on Mars. There can be no pyramids on Mars. There can be no complex geometric alignments on Mars. In other words, THEY SIMPLY CAN'T EXIST... Only one problem: THEY DO!