Myths of Mars

People throughout history have believed that there is life on other planets. Until recently people believed the pseudo science from science fiction and from the human imagination.

Mars in Comics and Cartoons

Even on Loony Tunes, Marvin the Martian made frequent appearances in many outer space adventures. Accompanied by his faithful green dog, K-9, Marvin the Martian is the original "alien." Marvin has a unique out-of-this-world appearance, a disintegrating ray gun and a superiority complex to top it off. Marvin's dream in all his cartoon adventures is to conquer Earth. He has not succeeded yet, but he keeps on trying. (Marvin the Martian ©Warner Bros.)

In Japan animation and cartoons are very big among the youth. Sailor Mars (depicted at right and left) is a Japanese animation favorite among the youth of Japan. Her real name is Raye Hiro, she is 14 years old, her birthday is on April 17th and her astrological sign is Aries. Her hobby is fortune telling. Her favorite colors are red and black.She has two pet crows, Phobos and Deimos. Raye attends a private school which is why she has a different school uniform from everyone else. She and friend, Serena, fight a lot, but they become true friends. In the Japanese Manga (comics), Raye's mother is dead and her father's a politician. Talk about power! (citation:(left) http://www.angelfire.com/ma/MarsPower/MarsPower.html (right)http://uts.cc.utexas.edu/~kaze/sailormoon/mars.html) Sailor Moon is copyright © 1992 Naoko Takeuchi/Kodansha, TOEI Animation. English Language Adaptation © 1995 DiC Entertainment.

Lowell's Mars

If Percivel Lowell, (an astronomer in the late 1800's) were alive today I wonder if his logic would have changed? The logic of his time stated that: Mars is smaller than Earth ...therefore... lower gravity ...therefore... thinner atmosphere ...therefore... lower atmospheric pressure ...therefore... water leaks away into space...therefore... water on Mars is precious and canals are needed to move water to key regions. Martians are forced to move water from the poles to the arable regions at lower latitudes. In Lowell's imagination the dark green areas on Mars are vegetation. These dark regions show distinct seasonal changes. In addition, Lowell believed that there was very little surface relief and no significant mountain ranges to obstruct the building of straight canals. The lack of water would have caused life to move out of the oceans much earlier on Mars than Earth. Therefore, Martians are more highly evolved than Earthlings. They would have to be smarter to cope with their global ecological catastrophe. They are peaceful and contemplative, without the complications and wars that Earth people often inflict on themselves. Martians might be three times the height of Earthlings, 27 times as efficient, 81 times stronger. Canals are too small to be seen directly; the irrigated, vegetated bands along the canals are being viewed, or viewing effects allows their direct detection. There are 437 canals, most very straight (possible great circle routes), some as long as 1,500 kilometers, very uniform width (~50 kilometers), some double, that have been mapped by Lowell. There are locations, all in dark areas, where as many as seven canals converge. Pumping stations (with 6' diameter pipes...) are at "oases" at canal intersections.

Percivel Lowell, Yerkes Observatory

There are proposals to build signal mirrors, fires in the Sahara, messages in Siberian snow...to inform Martians that Earth too contains intelligent life.

There are reports of certain dark markings on Mars spelling out the word "Almighty" in Hebrew (New York Tribune).