RIVER CITY JOURNAL: THE MEANING OF LIFE IS REALLY CONFUSING

If you think there are dead microbes on Mars, go to the head of the class. If you can't say anything nice, come sit by me.

I'm confused. Not that this is anything new.

Is there life on Mars? And who cares?

In this business (I'm talking about the news business, the business whose mission is to inform, not confuse) decisions must be made every day that attempt to sort out the significant from the mundane, fact from fiction, reality from fantasy, trust from snake oil -- it's a really long list once you get started.

For example, you have Candidate A, this being the election season, who makes a pointed comment about Candidate B. In the current American political system, it is unfashionable for candidates to talk about themselves. It isn't modesty. It's an underhanded way to grab votes. Anyway, Candidate A makes this wild claim that ought to cause any ordinary voter immediately to despise Candidate B. Then Candidate B responds, usually slinging a fresh cow pile back at Candidate A. This goes on for weeks before the election. And those of us in the news business try to figure out exactly what it is voters should know about the candidates. Just that they have an intimate knowledge of barnyards? Or specifics like whether or not all manure comes from cows?

But you're asking yourself right now, "What in the heck does this have to do with life on Mars?"

That's exactly the point. You're confused too. I thought it would be better if we went through this little exercise on a level playing field: one confused columnist, a bunch of confused column readers.

So let's get down to business.

A while back everyone was talking about a piece of rock allegedly from Mars. I say allegedly, because I've never been to Mars, so I can't say for sure this rock is from Mars or from Dutchtown. I have been to Dutchtown, and I still don't recognize this so-called Martian rock.

This rock is allegedly 200 million to 1 billion years old, and it allegedly got knocked off that planet 16 million years ago, whizzed around in space and then fell on Antarctica 13,000 years ago. I say allegedly, because I can't find any newspaper clippings from 16000000 B.C. that mention the so-called Mars-to-Earth explosion. The closest I can come is a yellowing clip about this Percival Lowell who swore there are canals on Mars, and maybe one of those canals had a chunk missing here and there. But even Lowell didn't mention Antarctica.

All of this alleged information, however, didn't stop a bunch of allegedly respectable scientists from swearing up and down that the rock was indeed from Mars and had fossils of a life form that ceased to exist billions of years ago. I say the scientists are allegedly respectable, because they didn't swear on the Bible, which has a peculiarly different version of how we all got into the life business to begin with.

OK. So far so good. I've kept up with all of these alleged scientific developments, and I think most of you have too.

But, by golly, along comes one of the alleged NASA scientists whose findings resulted in all the recent hoopla, and he now allegedly is saying, "Whoa! Not so fast!" I say he allegedly said "Whoa! Not so fast!" or something like that, because I didn't hear him say it. But the gist of what he said, as I understand it, is maybe the wrong conclusion has been jumped to.

And who, pray tell, would make such a long leap? Why, the news media, the alleged scientist allegedly said. "The CBS Evening News" in particular, according to this finger-pointing alleged scientist.

Of course, the alleged scientist maintains, there may be -- just may be -- evidence of life on Mars in this mysterious rock that could just as easily have come from the dry creekbed in Kelo Valley over in the Ozarks west of here. But it's just too early to say for sure.

I'm going to go out on a limb here, confused as I am. I say there may or may not be life on Mars or anywhere else. I say that with wholehearted conviction, knowing there are some who say there is no life anywhere but on Earth and others who say there is definitely life elsewhere but we haven't found it yet.

You know what I think? I think if we prove either version, we will not have advanced civilization a whit. I can't think of any more useless information than knowing a microbe that's been dead for 3.6 billion years may have existed on a planet that you can't even see real well with the naked eye.

I mean, it's not like we're going to decide once and for all that there was a living speck on a distant planet and then jump on a rocket and go take a look like some gawking tourists.

Heck, we can't even figure out how to get to Dutchtown in the rainy season.

~R. Joe Sullivan is the editor of the Southeast Missourian.