Announcement

**kcshocker11** · March 6, 2011, 06:01 PM

OOPS - Dont know how I missed it!

**WstateU** · March 6, 2011, 06:37 PM

**wsushox1** · March 6, 2011, 06:39 PM

Originally posted by kcshocker11

OOPS - Dont know how I missed it!

No worries. I have done that before in this forum as well.

**SB Shock** · March 7, 2011, 05:49 PM

Re: Evidence of Alien Life

Originally posted by wsushox1

A scientist from NASA has found fossils of bacteria inside of a comet. This is huge, this could be the evidence needed to say alien life (bacteria count) exist in other places besides earth. He has invited 100 scientists to review his work and sent 5,000 invitiations to other scientists to review the paper and offer their conclusions.

If this happens to vetted successfully, then what an amazing discovery it will be.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/digitaltrend...nceofalienlife

It is being publicized by the Journal of Cosmology which science credentials are weak and which is going out of business.

FWIW, this professor thinks it is bogus.

I'm looking forward to the publication next year of the discovery of an extraterrestrial rabbit in a meteor. While they're at it, they might as well throw in a bigfoot print on the surface and chupacabra coprolite from space. All will be about as convincing as this story.

While they're at it, maybe they should try publishing it in a journal with some reputation for rigorous peer review and expectation that the data will meet certain minimal standards of evidence and professionalism.

Otherwise, this work is garbage. I'm surprised anyone is granting it any credibility at all.

Page not found | ScienceBlogs

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2011/03/did_scientists_discover_bacter.php

NASA has released the following statement distancing them from the story

“NASA is a scientific and technical agency committed to a culture of openness with the media and public. While we value the free exchange of ideas, data, and information as part of scientific and technical inquiry, NASA cannot stand behind or support a scientific claim unless it has been peer-reviewed or thoroughly examined by other qualified experts. This paper was submitted in 2007 to the International Journal of Astrobiology. However, the peer review process was not completed for that submission. NASA also was unaware of the recent submission of the paper to the Journal of Cosmology or of the paper’s subsequent publication. Additional questions should be directed to the author of the paper.” – Dr. Paul Hertz, chief scientist of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington

An astrobiologist from New Mexico Tech had this to say

Rocks, even the most high density materials, are prone to microfractures. Microorganisms are notoriously splendid at working their way into incredibly minute microfractures…

Showing that the bug that you have actually is NOT a contaminant organism that made its way into a meteorite is a practically unsolvable problem. If you turn up an organism whose chemistry, way of coding information, or something else (besides morphology) indicates that it is significantly (and I MEAN significantly) different from anything that has ever been seen on Earth, THEN you might have a chance of proving this. Pictures of tube shaped structures don’t do it.

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2011/03/07/followup-thoughts-on-the-meteorite-fossils-claim/