Perseverance reveals more detail on Martian organic chemistry

The Perseverance Mars rover has found evidence of a range of organic molecules that suggest a more complex chemical cycle on the planet than previously thought. The discovery in the Red Planet’s Jezero Crater might be the result of historic chemical interactions between water and rocks, or come from interplanetary dust or …

[CrackedNoggin]

Mapping Máaz: NASA Uses Navajo Language To Name Features On Mars - NPR

At the moment, Perseverance is working to learn more about a large rock named "Máaz" – Navajo for "Mars." .... But learning a new language can be tricky, even for robots. Perserverence's computers don't understand accent marks, so scientists have had to adapt.

So, UTF-8 is actually harder than rocket science. Who knew? Personally, I don't believe Perseverance will be able to succeed until it learns to speak like a native. It's time to send an upgrade to handle UTF-8.

[jake]

Re: Mapping Máaz: NASA Uses Navajo Language To Name Features On Mars - NPR

1) The rover's computer runs VxWorks, which speaks UTF-8 like a native.

2) The rover's command and control systems only use 1byte/char. Saves bandwidth between here and there.

3) There is no reason to tell the rover that the rock has a name, much less what that name is.

4) Consider the source of your quote. They are not exactly known for their rocket surgery.

[John Brown (no body)]

Re: Mapping Máaz: NASA Uses Navajo Language To Name Features On Mars - NPR

"So, UTF-8 is actually harder than rocket science. Who knew? Personally, I don't believe Perseverance will be able to succeed until it learns to speak like a native. It's time to send an upgrade to handle UTF-8."

I'm not sure Navajo is native to Mars. I could be wrong. There are many legends of Star People and Star Gates etc in Native American folk lore.

[Version 1.0]

Science is working hard, let's start working harder.

Finding this evidence is very good, we've thought it might exists for years now and it's going to be very helpful to start looking for more details. The possibilities of life on other planets in the solar system is low although a few moons might have some slight evidence. I'm confident that life exists throughout the Universe but all this evidence suggests that the chances are low and possibly intelligent life is very rare elsewhere in the Universe ... so maybe we are a very special life, a lot more fantastic than we think we are!

[jake]

Re: Science is working hard, let's start working harder.

"so maybe we are a very special life, a lot more fantastic than we think we are!"

Given human hubris, that would be very, very difficult.

[cookieMonster]

Re: Science is working hard, let's start working harder.

I blame the inhibitors

[John Brown (no body)]

Re: Science is working hard, let's start working harder.

"possibly intelligent life is very rare elsewhere in the Universe"

Considering how big we currently know the universe to be, the numbers of galaxies we can see, our knowledge vastly expanded by examples such as the Hubble Deep Sky image, it's simply incredible that Science Fiction has never envisaged more than a few dozen races in any of the concocted universe stories. Even SF like Star Trek with a "federation" spanning a whole quadrant of a single galaxy couldn't seen to imaging more than a few dozen intelligent species. So maybe the SF writers are correct, but even then, maybe being over optimistic :-)

[Bebu]

possibly intelligent life is very rare elsewhere in the Universe

Not exactly abundant on Terra either.