MORE ON NASA

This is part of my next Livestock Weekly column:

Speaking of space, NASA is still concentrating on looking for signs of life on Mars. I can’t believe that there are still grown people who think that life will occur if you have water with chemicals like hydrogen and carbon along with some energy source like solar radiation or lightning. For many years we have known that life forms are highly complex DNA molecules containing an enormous amount of information in the cells that control the growth, life and reproduction. These complexities do not occur naturally. They must be the result of a really smart engineer who designed them in the first place. Apparently only the earth contains life forms. We have looked with all of our scientific tools for life elsewhere and found absolutely nothing. We have listened for messages from extra-terrestrials and heard nothing for 40 years. And yet we can’t believe that we earthlings are unique in the cosmos. The latest theory of how life got here on earth, since it could not have evolved, is that life came from space travelers years ago. The History Channel shows document graphic representations of beings clad in space suits on Egyptian and Mayan tombs supporting their idea of ancient extraterrestrials bringing life.

     It just may be that we are unique living plants and animals and there are no other planets with life forms in spite of all of the science fiction stories and movies to the contrary. The big question is whether we have been here for millions of years or for only 6,000. Which leads to the next question of how long we will continue to be here. Will the Sun play out in millions of years or will electromagnetic storms suddenly blast off from the Sun next week and wipe out all electric power and all computer driven vehicles in one storm rendering the modern world helpless? Only the subsistent farmers will be able to survive if they don’t get too sunburned. The end of the world has been argued forever and I enjoy listening to the ideas.