NASA announcement today: the discovery of a new lifeform unlike anything else.

[Jabberwock xeno]

BBBBUUUUUULLLLLL CCCCCCRRRRAAAAAAPPP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I cannot express my ANGER at this mountain of pathethic, vile words they call a significant discovery in words!

It is utterly pretentious and naive to assume that just because all life that we knew of required water, or had certain elements composing their bodies that all life in the UNIVERSE does!

As a 10 YEAR OLD CHILD I scoffed at NASA taking any minute signs as water as a sign of life, and ignoring everything else! I had wrongly assumed that they had enough COMMON SENSE to look further!

This embarrasses, no, shames, no, DISGUSTS me that we spent millions of dollars and over 45 years, to come to a conclusion that I MYSELF HAD MADE YEARS AGO!

Ugh, I am so enraged right now, I need to go maim something. (In a video game, mind you, so don't go send SWAT teams on my ass please.)

/END RANT

EDIT: before you call me obionxius and the like, read my response to those claims in the below posts.

 

[AlexWinter]

BBBBUUUUUULLLLLL CCCCCCRRRRAAAAAAPPP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I cannot express my ANGER at this mountain of pathethic, vile words they call a significant discovery in words!

It is utterly pretentious and naive to assume that just because all life that we knew of required water, or had certain elements composing their bodies that all life in the UNIVERSE does!

As a 10 YEAR OLD CHILD I scoffed at NASA taking any minute signs as water as a sign of life, and ignoring everything else! I had wrongly assumed that they had enough COMMON SENSE to look further!

This embarrasses, no, shames, no, DISGUSTS me that we spent millions of dollars and over 45 years, to come to a conclusion that I MYSELF HAD MADE YEARS AGO!

Ugh, I am so enraged right now, I need to go maim something. (In a video game, mind you, so don't go send SWAT teams on my ass please.)

/END RANT

Yeah it's alright for a ten year old to 'believe' what they want. But it's a long leap to actually get the evidence for this kind of stuff. It's pretentious and naive to assume you know what NASA have behind closed doors or that you could do a better job than them. Also I don't think you would have found many astrobiologists that would say that life on other planets strictly requires water to survive.

We've been looking for water-bearing planets because what we've learned from our own planet shows that that is our best chance of finding life instead of just sticking a magnifying glass wherever the fuck we feel like, that doesn't mean that we don't believe that planet's without water could hold life.

I'm sure many scientists would hypothesise that there is bacterial life on Titan and underneath the ice of Europa, which lack some of the aforementioned building blocks. I.e. Sunlight for Europe, Water for Titan.

I just think you're being a bit obnoxious.

 

[Jabberwock xeno]

I hope you are joking.

You REALLY need to get over yourself. Your ego is astounding.

There is a such a huge difference between one theorizing something probably exists and than it actually being proven as fact like NASA did.

I really really cannot stand people like you who come out of the wood works after the fact to claim knowledge of discoveries such as these as if had NASA just consulted YOU than we could have saved millions or even billions of dollars in R&D funding.

Who would have known that Jabberwock Xeno held the secrets of the cosmos? And at the age of 10 no less! Shocking.

Yeah it's alright for a ten year old to 'believe' what they want. But it's a long leap to actually get the evidence for this kind of stuff. It's pretentious and naive to assume you know what NASA have behind closed doors or that you could do a better job than them. Also I don't think you would have found many astrobiologists that would say that life on other planets strictly requires water to survive.

We've been looking for water-bearing planets because what we've learned from our own planet shows that that is our best chance of finding life instead of just sticking a magnifying glass wherever the fuck we feel like, that doesn't mean that we don't believe that planet's without water could hold life.

I'm sure many scientists would hypothesise that there is bacterial life on Titan and underneath the ice of Europa, which lack some of the aforementioned building blocks. I.e. Sunlight for Europe, Water for Titan.

I just think you're being a bit obnoxious.

Firstly, yes, I have a huge ego, I am aware of that.

But the reason why I am angry is NOT because I thought of it fist; the opposite in fact, I am angry because I had assumed that NASA, them being the most knowledgeable people in the field, had already considred and looked for life that DID NOT meet our idea of life as of now.

It's just that there was nothing ever suggesting that life without water or whatever WASN'T possible, ins't that the entire basis for the scientific theory? Hypothesis, and throw the idea away when something disproves it, not throw it away without proof for it? (in laymans terms anyways)

The whole field of astrobiology is largely speculative anyways, yet NASA limited their own potential and use with their tech and skills in space exploration by limiting the search for ET life to earth like environments.

I understand the importance of this finding towards NORMAL biology, but doesn't expanding the field to space kind of throw most known rules for life out of the book by default? it's the UNIVERSE for gods sake, we don't even know if our definition of life is acceptable for the most part.

For all we know, there could be a sentient race of what looks like a cross between a octopus and a venus flytrap made of Ionized Hydrogen or something, that is born spontaneously and doesn't reproduce! Hell, that could be the most common form of "life" in the universe and we would have no way of knowing!

I realize that this post sounds hypocritical, i'm just so enraged that I can't properly express what I mean to say.

 

[Geekosaurus]

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/12/nasa-finds-new-life/

Press conference is in a half hour, but it's about an organism that uses arsenic instead of phosphorus in its DNA. This means that other planets don't really have to be like earth to support life. Might not seem big, but it's a major step forward in biology and SCIENCE.

LOL. I can just imagine you shouting the word science at the end of your sentence.

 

[Blind Sight]

Does this mean that it doesn't share a common ancestor with us? I.E. a few billion years ago, two different single-celled organisms developed, this one's ancestor, and our ancestor?

This could have huge implications regarding the probability of life on other planets. If life developed on Earth once, then the anthropic principle applies, and we have no idea how common life is. If life developed on earth twice, then we should suspect that most planets have life of some sort.

I assume that this organism developed with arsenic-based DNA as a response to living in the poisonous Mono Lake, in the same way that early life on earth adapted to oxygen (which was poisonous to them). I'm not really sure when it developed, which raises a lot of good questions.

BBBBUUUUUULLLLLL CCCCCCRRRRAAAAAAPPP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I cannot express my ANGER at this mountain of pathethic, vile words they call a significant discovery in words!

It is utterly pretentious and naive to assume that just because all life that we knew of required water, or had certain elements composing their bodies that all life in the UNIVERSE does!

As a 10 YEAR OLD CHILD I scoffed at NASA taking any minute signs as water as a sign of life, and ignoring everything else! I had wrongly assumed that they had enough COMMON SENSE to look further!

This embarrasses, no, shames, no, DISGUSTS me that we spent millions of dollars and over 45 years, to come to a conclusion that I MYSELF HAD MADE YEARS AGO!

Ugh, I am so enraged right now, I need to go maim something. (In a video game, mind you, so don't go send SWAT teams on my ass please.)

/END RANT

EDIT: before you call me obionxius and the like, read my response to those claims in the below posts.

God forbid they actually PROVE something rather then just assume. NASA's search for life projects were focusing on what they knew was true, which is a good way of going about things until you actually have evidence to back up different claims. True, the field of astrobiology is speculative anyway, but it's better to go with what you know rather then what you believe.

 

[Terminate421]

The moment it said California I started to think it'd possible on earth

Also, this could be possible:

It would have been preserved from the Dino ages, like a fossil or poop.
Right conditions in california would have allowed it too exist.

 

[Cowabungaa]

Perhaps, but people always want NASA to find the Squeeg Empire of Rigel 12 or whatever; finding arsenic-based bacteria is going to get some alien-obsessed people very upset NASA is spending time on that instead of looking for our tentacled masters.

They are looking for our cephalopod overlords, they're just doing it indirectly.

With research like this they basically ask themselves; "In what range can we go looking for life?" They try to determine what kind of planets we can look out for when the technology is right to directly search for life. Shame that lots of people can't seem to get that.

Firstly, yes, I have a huge ego, I am aware of that.

But the reason why I am angry is NOT because I thought of it fist; the opposite in fact, I am angry because I had assumed that NASA, them being the most knowledgeable people in the field, had already considred and looked for life that DID NOT meet our idea of life as of now.

It's just that there was nothing ever suggesting that life without water or whatever WASN'T possible, ins't that the entire basis for the scientific theory? Hypothesis, and throw the idea away when something disproves it, not throw it away without proof for it? (in laymans terms anyways)

The whole field of astrobiology is largely speculative anyways, yet NASA limited their own potential and use with their tech and skills in space exploration by limiting the search for ET life to earth like environments.

I understand the importance of this finding towards NORMAL biology, but doesn't expanding the field to space kind of throw most known rules for life out of the book by default? it's the UNIVERSE for gods sake, we don't even know if our definition of life is acceptable for the most part.

For all we know, there could be a sentient race of what looks like a cross between a octopus and a venus flytrap made of Ionized Hydrogen or something, that is born spontaneously and doesn't reproduce! Hell, that could be the most common form of "life" in the universe and we would have no way of knowing!

I realize that this post sounds hypocritical, i'm just so enraged that I can't properly express what I mean to say.

Obnoxious and ignorant aside, your 'rage' just tells me that you're incredibly ignorant about all the science connected to this topic, mainly because you apparently do not understand the significance of this discovery.

Phosphor was always thought to be one of the fundamental building blocks for life, that it couldn't exist without. This has been completely proven wrong, and if you can't understand how this changes the search for extra-terrestrial life then you really have to fresh up on your bio-chemistry.

Second, you apparently don't understand that we barely have the technology to directly search for life on other planets, let alone just completely throw away everything we know about life and look for...whatever and wherever, which might even be more difficult considering the vast size of the universe.

What you're proposing is basically throwing tiny darts at a humongous dartboard while blindfolded, and even that barely describes the stupendous randomness of that plan. Proof and hard data is what we need, and that's what this research gives us. Fuelling your sci-fi-tastic dreams does not.

 

[Cowabungaa]

Edit:
Little internet failure here.