Re: Europa energy fluxes

[Robert J. Bradbury]

On Tue, 4 Mar 2003, Eugen Leitl wrote:

> It's one big petri dish. If there's life, it's closely related. If it
> isn't, it's a giant data blip that life emerges rather effortlessly, and
> that crosscontamination is way harder than we think despite ample material
> transport.

Eugen's points are valid.  I would only add that one may need to consider
that "ample material transport" has to lead to "dominance" for everything
to get spelled the same way.  If symbiosis is the "way of life" then some
quite interesting scenarios might develop (recent reports, I think mostly
in Science or Nature, document some *very* strange forms of "life"
(multi-nested genomes)).   If we have these on Earth (e.g. parasites
within parasites), then all bets may be off in extraterrestrial environments.

"Life" may travel -- but that isn't an argument that all life has to be
the same.  In fact if the Earth shows us anything, it may be that "diversity"
wins.

Robert

==
You are subscribed to the Europa Icepick mailing list:   [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Project information and list (un)subscribe info: http://klx.com/europa/