There's a tumblr run by an astronaut living in space. Srsly? Srsly!

evangotlib:

lizlet:

climateadaptation:

Colonel Chris Hadfield currently lives on the International Space Station. He posts pictures of his work and the earth and your wee brain will explode. colchrishadfield.tumblr.com

Canadian Astronaut, currently living in space aboard ISS as Flight Engineer on Expedition 34, to be Commander of Expedition 35.

FOLLOWING.

Ditto.

Super cool.

SIGNAL BOOST.

Source: climateadaptation

philosfolly: Keepin’ it clean on Mars!  The thought of going to Mars has been in the minds of scientists going AT LEAST as far back as 1965 when NASA received their first up-close pictures.   I remember reading a book called MARS in middle school just for fun (there are so many books named just “Mars” that I can’t even begin to locate the exact one).  This book blew my mind by introducing the idea that humans could terraform the Red Planet.  Terraforming, you know, that hypothetical process of changing the climate, surface and other properties to make it inhabitable by humans.  It obviously makes sense to go to another planet and basically reconstruct it to be like your own - but this complaint is for another day and another article.  Maybe one day David Bowie and I could actually see sailors fighting in the dance hall on Mars, though. Anyway, I digress.  One thing scientists need to think about which didn’t cross my mind is that if astronauts want to walk along the terrain of the Red Planet, they need to be germ free.  Their spacesuits might contain Earth microbes or other ingredients of life - GROSS.  STOP CONTAMINATING, MARS.  The picture above is a mockup from April 2011 developed by the Austrian Space Forum.  They are apparently using  L.I.F.E. (laser-induced fluorescence emission) techniques to detect levels of contamination based on the fluorescent response.  The technique can be implemented with a laser and an iPhone?  WHAT?!?! But who says there is extraterrestrial life on Mars anyway?   What if we are the only intelligent beings in the universe?  I posed these questions to my 7th grade science teacher.  He looked at me and responded:  Well, that’s a narcissistic way to think about the universe. I wrote this.  And sadly, the anecdote at the end is very true.
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philosfolly:

Keepin’ it clean on Mars!  The thought of going to Mars has been in the minds of scientists going AT LEAST as far back as 1965 when NASA received their first up-close pictures.  

I remember reading a book called MARS in middle school just for fun (there are so many books named just “Mars” that I can’t even begin to locate the exact one).  This book blew my mind by introducing the idea that humans could terraform the Red Planet.  Terraforming, you know, that hypothetical process of changing the climate, surface and other properties to make it inhabitable by humans.  It obviously makes sense to go to another planet and basically reconstruct it to be like your own - but this complaint is for another day and another article.  Maybe one day David Bowie and I could actually see sailors fighting in the dance hall on Mars, though.

Anyway, I digress.  One thing scientists need to think about which didn’t cross my mind is that if astronauts want to walk along the terrain of the Red Planet, they need to be germ free.  Their spacesuits might contain Earth microbes or other ingredients of life - GROSS.  STOP CONTAMINATING, MARS.  The picture above is a mockup from April 2011 developed by the Austrian Space Forum.  They are apparently using  L.I.F.E. (laser-induced fluorescence emission) techniques to detect levels of contamination based on the fluorescent response.  The technique can be implemented with a laser and an iPhone?  WHAT?!?!

But who says there is extraterrestrial life on Mars anyway?   What if we are the only intelligent beings in the universe?  I posed these questions to my 7th grade science teacher.  He looked at me and responded:  Well, that’s a narcissistic way to think about the universe.

I wrote this.  And sadly, the anecdote at the end is very true.