g ABODES - Much of Earth's mineral wealth was deposited billions of years ago when chemical cycles on our planet were very different than today's. Recently, scientists used geochemical data from minerals to yield surprising information about conditions on the ancient Earth. See article.
g LIFE - For many years, paleobiological researchers interested in the history of biodiversity have focused on charting the many ups (evolutionary radiations) and downs (mass extinctions) that punctuate the history of life. Because the preserved record of marine (sea-dwelling) animals is unusually extensive in comparison, say, to that of terrestrial animals such as dinosaurs, it's been easier to accurately calibrate the diversity and extinction records of marine organisms. See article.
g MESSAGE - When scientists get together to talk about extraterrestrial life, they certainly don't imagine little green men. In fact, our first contact with life beyond our planet probably will involve a microbe. See article. Note: This article is from 2001.
g COSMICUS - NASA and the European Space Agency have signed a statement of intent for the Mars Exploration Joint Initiative (MEJI), a proposed string of cooperative Martian lander and orbiter missions intended to prepare the way for a sample return. See article.
g AFTERMATH - Movie aliens often are like distant relatives: They resemble us in an unpleasant sort of way. This is hardly a surprise. Hollywood creates characters that audiences can identify with, and that's why its aliens are so anthropomorphic (and why Donald Duck looks more like a human than a duck.) But appearances aside, cinema aliens have another implausible attribute: they're nearly always at our level of technical sophistication. We frequently trade gunfire with them or chase them around in dogfights. This is silly, of course. Any beings capable of bridging the vast distances between the stars would be able to clean our clock when it comes to science and engineering. Visitors from other worlds - should any appear - would be enormously ahead of us from a technological viewpoint. See article. Note: This article is from 2000.
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