Dry Mars

Bad news from Mars:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - It made a big splash when scientists announced in 2006 that images from a NASA spacecraft indicated water apparently had flowed on the surface of Mars in the past decade but new research casts doubt on that finding.

Other scientists on Friday said new images and computer simulations strongly indicate that a landslide of sand and gravel is a more likely explanation for the bright deposits in gullies previously touted as evidence of recent water flow.

It may be bad news for those of us with our 14-year-old dreams of terraforming Mars or Hugo Award winning Science Fiction authors, and B-Movie producers. But science doesn't care what fantasy we may hold dear to our hearts, it cares about figuring out the way things work.

And that science does have a joyous beauty, and dream, all of its own. One that doesn't require ever-increasingly elaborate-delusions and a well-funded political movement to make it "work." And scientists, by-and-large, certainly aren't blatant liars and rip-off artists.