A Year of Curiosity

The Curiosity rover has been on Mars for a year now.  While the rover captured the public's eye with its exciting landing, I've been waiting for a while, watching the science roll in.  This article provides a good summary of everything that the probe has accomplished in the past year:

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2013/08/curiosity-year-discoveries/?pid=9781&viewall=true

The confirmation that Mars had fresh liquid water at its surface is the most exciting piece of news.  The implications should be obvious, where there is water, life usually follows.  Unfortunately, Curiosity isn't equipped to look for ancient or current life, so we'll have to wait for the next rover to find the answer to those questions.  However, the prospects for current life on Mars do not look good, as Curiosity was unable to detect any methane in the Martian atmosphere.  Methane had previously been detected, and since methane almost always comes from an organic source, modern life on Mars seemed likely.  This result doesn't mean there isn't currently life on Mars, but the odds are against it.  The rover is still going strong, and hopefully the future will prove to be as productive as the past year for Curiosity.

Global Warming

I just read an interesting article on the current global warming situation, which can be found here:

http://www.cnn.com/2013/07/24/world/climate-arctic-methane/index.html?hpt=hp_t3

If methane is being released, that means that the average temperature of the planet is going to rise.  What the article doesn't really talk about is the exponential nature of methane release.  There's a lot of methane frozen in permafrost, but only a small amount is entering the atmosphere right now, as the temperature isn't warm enough.  But the released methane raises the temperature even more, which means that more permafrost melts, and even more methane enters the atmosphere.  This cycle will continue until all the methane is released, and by that point the planet will be rather warm.  A situation like this has happened before, about 55 million years ago.  The planet's temperature shot up to an average of 90 degrees Fahrenheit, and there were no ice caps.  I know we're supposed to feel bad for the plight of polar bears, but let's face facts, ice is the enemy of life.  The only reason life exists there is because they've found some way to cheat, but if there was no ice, biodiversity would explode, as the environment would become suitable to more generalized life.  The downside is that if the ice were to melt, the oceans would rise quite a bit.  These are the facts.  Hopefully I've presented things in as unbiased a manner as possible.