Rosetta probe delivers jaw-to-the-floor find: Molecular oxygen Rosetta has both delighted and upset astronomers after the probe sent back data that indicates the discovery of molecular oxygen on Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko. The scientists are excited because the O2, detected in the thin cloud of stuff surrounding the comet, is going to give them a pile of new science; and upset …
...when they evaporate after someone heats them up with some actual measurements.
Sort of a "whoompf" type sound. There may be a cloud of smoke.
Unfortunatley it's usually closely followed by the sound theoriticians make when they learn that all their previous papers are wrong.
Sort of a "sniffle" sound.
There's no sound quite like it for cheering up the experimentalists!
Beers all round I think.
Not really. If the funding has already been awarded, you just use it to do some science in the same area, but based on the new data.
The "BASTARD!" would come in if you've just /submitted/ an application whose premise is ruined by the new data; because it now has 0% of getting funded (instead of e.g. 30%), and all the work writing it will have been for naught.
Maybe we have been assuming that life is only associated with planets, but there maybe other types that wake from deep freeze on comets.
Great, now I'm thinking of some Elder God sleeping in there, and we're only going to wake it up if we keep flying probes past it...
You are aware that the theories about solar system formation work from the outside in? As in, they start assuming an homogenous mix of interstellar crap and get refined on observation accounting for the clumpy nature of realty.
This is how science works. The sound you are listening for almost never happens as it is associated with the other major explanitory technique - "God did it. Stop asking questions."
And one comet a solar system formation theory does not destroy.
Maybe planets are bigger than comets - duh.
Maybe the energies involved go up as some power of the body's mass. Maybe a tiny comet would retain primordial oxygen, while heavier planets import sufficient kinetic energy with each mass contribution that they get hot enough to bake the oxygen, as well as melt rocks.
I seem to recall that another famous comet, Shoemaker-Levy, achieved a fairly high temperature as it contributed its mass to the planet Jupiter. Any primordial oxygen accompanying Shoemaker-Levy would have done what? Hmmm...?
This all appears to be perfectly obvious. Any primordial oxygen hovering around the planets?
(PS. I've met Levy. Lovely chap. Autographed my copy of his book.)
Dear Supercillious Bleu
It is an understatement for "This is an extremely interesting result for everybody."
It is a euphemism for "FUCKING HELL, LOOK AT THIS!"
Sorry you were not able to grasp that, did you need the joke alert?
PS: I am not Little Mouse
I am sorry to have mistaken you for Little Mouse.
Mainly, I must apologise to Little Mouse, who probably would not confuse euphemism with understatement.
Although my mistaken comment seems to have amused a few, likely including the Mouse.
I am not sure that you know the meaning of 'supercilious', but you have a good line in blowing a fuse.
This post has been deleted by its author
Do not 'believe' any of the Ministry of Truth news outlets, including 'Discover', 'Nature', et al....
or the INGSOC controlled EPA, NASA, NOAA cabal....see titled article at FauxScienceSlayer....
Every atom and molecule in the Universe is under constant erosion from radiant energy and particle bombardment decay. The EPA demonized Nitrous Oxide in diesel exhaust combines with natural plant produced Isocene, C5H8 to produce the dreaded, GROUND LEVEL OZONE, producing fictitious 'asthma' symptoms. Ozone, O3 has a half life of thirty minutes, partly due to reactive nature and partly because it absorbs cancer causing UVA, a health benefit the WEAPONIZED EPA refuses to recognize. Ozone at 84 PPB in the atmosphere is NO problem. Ozone at one PPM has been used for domestic water treatment in Paris and thousand of other cities for over a century. Read
"New Think Progress and the Ozzard of Wiz"....reject totalitarian PROGRAMMING.
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