WEBVTT - Selects: How Mars Works 0:00:00.760 --> 0:00:03.920 Hello, friends. Have you ever been to Mars? I haven't. 0:00:04.120 --> 0:00:08.800 Do you know why? Because nothing ever happens on Mars. 0:00:10.720 --> 0:00:13.280 Did you catch that reference? If you did, then I'm glad, 0:00:13.320 --> 0:00:14.720 but I'm not going to spoon feed you and tell 0:00:14.760 --> 0:00:17.599 you what it was. This is how Mars works and 0:00:17.640 --> 0:00:21.319 it was from April and it is my pick for 0:00:21.360 --> 0:00:31.440 the Saturday Select. Please to enjoy Welcome to Stuff You 0:00:31.480 --> 0:00:40.239 Should Know, a production of I Heart Radio. Hey, and 0:00:40.280 --> 0:00:43.159 welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, Nur's Charles w 0:00:43.320 --> 0:00:46.320 Chuck Bryant, Jerry's over there. We all have um I 0:00:46.520 --> 0:00:51.080 boogers because this is an early morning, unusual, early morning 0:00:51.240 --> 0:00:54.240 edition of Stuff you Should Know. Welcome to the morning edition. 0:00:54.400 --> 0:00:58.040 We should just talk like this. We got on NPR, 0:00:58.200 --> 0:01:00.440 we got taken to task and it's nine an email 0:01:00.600 --> 0:01:04.640 from a morning talk show TV show host. Did you 0:01:04.680 --> 0:01:08.320 see it? Uh? About the Inquisition? Yeah? He's like, way 0:01:08.360 --> 0:01:11.199 to release the Inquisition on ash Wednesdays, kind of slapping 0:01:11.200 --> 0:01:13.360 the face. So I respond I said, actually it came 0:01:13.360 --> 0:01:16.120 out on Fat Tuesday and by sheer coincidence. He's like, 0:01:16.520 --> 0:01:19.039 thanks for the reply. I responded to him too. I 0:01:19.080 --> 0:01:20.520 was like, man, I wish I was that clever and 0:01:20.560 --> 0:01:23.880 said I had no idea. It was like our our 0:01:23.920 --> 0:01:31.119 medical marijuana episode being our four utter complete coincidence guaranteed everybody. 0:01:31.200 --> 0:01:33.480 I think, over the course of six hundred plus shows, 0:01:33.480 --> 0:01:36.800 you're gonna have some weird coincidences like that, you know. Yes, 0:01:37.280 --> 0:01:40.080 I certainly didn't know it was ash Wednesday. I didn't 0:01:40.080 --> 0:01:42.600 either until I went to the mall yesterday evening and 0:01:42.959 --> 0:01:45.000 a third of the people are were walking around with 0:01:45.120 --> 0:01:47.480 charcoal crosses on their forehead. Nice. It's like I had 0:01:47.480 --> 0:01:52.440 no idea Atlanta had this many Catholics good going there everywhere? 0:01:53.280 --> 0:01:55.920 They sure are well, I mean they didn't used to 0:01:55.920 --> 0:01:57.640 be got You know, I grew up Baptist here and 0:01:57.720 --> 0:02:00.600 I didn't know many Catholics growing up, But Atlanta became 0:02:00.640 --> 0:02:03.760 a transplant towns instead, exactly. And I'll tell you about 0:02:03.800 --> 0:02:08.320 another transplant chuck, possibly life here on Earth from Mars? 0:02:08.840 --> 0:02:13.520 Oh yeah, is this your intro? Have you got breaking this? No? 0:02:13.639 --> 0:02:16.120 That was it. But do you remember we did an 0:02:16.120 --> 0:02:20.480 episode on UM the origin of life on Earth? Remember? 0:02:21.400 --> 0:02:23.680 Oh yeah, yeah? And one of the possibilities that it 0:02:23.760 --> 0:02:28.400 was from Mars and one of the um pieces of 0:02:28.440 --> 0:02:34.720 evidence of this possibility was the Alan Hills Rock from Antarctica, 0:02:35.320 --> 0:02:40.600 a Martian meteorite that was discovered in that was studied 0:02:40.639 --> 0:02:44.320 and studied, and they thought in basically, Bill Clinton said, 0:02:44.360 --> 0:02:47.560 we found evidence of life on Mars. And then they 0:02:47.560 --> 0:02:50.239 studied it again and they were like, maybe not another 0:02:50.360 --> 0:02:54.720 studying it again, they're saying, yeah, it's possible. It's very 0:02:54.720 --> 0:02:57.839 possible that this four point one billion year old rock 0:02:58.120 --> 0:03:02.400 is showing evidence of fosse realized nano bacteria. And this 0:03:02.440 --> 0:03:05.960 is all still Bill Clinton saying this. Yeah, it is 0:03:06.040 --> 0:03:08.920 underwear at home. He's the authority. He's talking to the 0:03:08.960 --> 0:03:13.040 TV again. Nice. Uh, but yeah, we're gonna do how 0:03:13.080 --> 0:03:19.080 Mars works. Tom Hanks, this one's for you, big space guy. 0:03:19.320 --> 0:03:21.639 Oh yeah, sure, Okay. I didn't know if I was 0:03:21.680 --> 0:03:23.680 missing something there, like he did some movie that didn't 0:03:23.680 --> 0:03:27.000 know about. No, if I said, Gary Sinise, this one's 0:03:27.040 --> 0:03:29.840 for you, that would be a mission to Mars reference. 0:03:29.880 --> 0:03:34.040 I did not see that. Mind bogglingly odd and pretty bad. Yeah, 0:03:34.080 --> 0:03:35.320 I heard, That's why I didn't see it. That and 0:03:35.400 --> 0:03:38.480 Red Planet didn't see either. One of those. Red Planet 0:03:38.480 --> 0:03:41.400 I don't know about. Yeah, but that kind of brings 0:03:41.480 --> 0:03:44.560 us to a point that we've long been fascinated with 0:03:44.640 --> 0:03:47.440 the red planet, going back to you know, War the 0:03:47.480 --> 0:03:51.600 World's and early science fiction and Martians and Mars has 0:03:51.640 --> 0:03:55.160 just always captivated us because you know, sometimes you can 0:03:55.880 --> 0:03:59.680 see it with a telescope and it's not like what's 0:03:59.680 --> 0:04:01.840 on the other side of a Venus Venus. Yeah, we 0:04:01.840 --> 0:04:04.040 don't know much about Venus, shrouded in mystery. There are 0:04:04.040 --> 0:04:07.080 no Venusians that we're afraid will come down here in 0:04:07.120 --> 0:04:10.800 attack Us. I think it's Venusians Venetians, which is different 0:04:10.840 --> 0:04:16.040 from Venetians, which are people from Venice, which, strangely enough, 0:04:16.520 --> 0:04:20.719 Um kind of coincides with the guy named Giovanni Siaparelli. 0:04:21.520 --> 0:04:23.320 He might not have been from Venice, but that man 0:04:23.440 --> 0:04:26.880 was definitely from Italy. Do you think, yeah, he was. 0:04:27.279 --> 0:04:30.560 Can you say his name for everybody, Chuck, who Giovanni Sarelli. 0:04:31.120 --> 0:04:33.880 That was good that guy. Man, Have you been practicing 0:04:33.920 --> 0:04:35.920 at home? No, I just I've been even a lot 0:04:35.920 --> 0:04:40.880 of pasta. That's good stuff, man, So um Schiaparelli in 0:04:40.960 --> 0:04:44.120 eighteen seventy seven decided to draw a map of Mars 0:04:45.040 --> 0:04:49.120 and his conception of Mars what became the popular conception 0:04:49.160 --> 0:04:54.120 if it wasn't already. UM was that Mars was a UM, 0:04:54.160 --> 0:04:59.239 a lush planet with civilizations, and he named the regions 0:04:59.279 --> 0:05:04.839 of Mars a corps lee like Elysium, which which UM 0:05:05.040 --> 0:05:08.719 culture believed that that was Heaven. I don't know, I 0:05:08.800 --> 0:05:11.279 can't remember, man, I haven't heard that. We you know, 0:05:11.360 --> 0:05:15.560 we've discussed it before, Elysium. I haven't retained that. UM. 0:05:15.600 --> 0:05:19.839 Another part was called Utopia Arcadia. Basically, all these different 0:05:19.880 --> 0:05:24.599 names for paradise reflected the idea that Mars was a 0:05:24.880 --> 0:05:28.760 very similar to Earth, most likely inhabited by intelligent beings 0:05:29.240 --> 0:05:35.159 and UM. As proof, uh, Schiaparelli drew canals that he 0:05:35.279 --> 0:05:40.520 noticed on the on Mars, which suggested that this advanced 0:05:40.560 --> 0:05:45.599 civilization had dug canals to UM route water from the 0:05:45.640 --> 0:05:48.600 polar ice caps which are visible here on Earth to 0:05:49.120 --> 0:05:52.960 the central locations where their civilizations were get water to 0:05:52.960 --> 0:05:55.880 the Martians. Yeah, and this established like what earth links 0:05:55.920 --> 0:06:01.400 thought of Mars for a hundred years. Almost about forty 0:06:01.480 --> 0:06:04.560 years after that, a US astronomer named Percival lowell Um 0:06:04.560 --> 0:06:07.360 wrote a book also about Mars, where he actually talked 0:06:07.400 --> 0:06:12.200 about civilizations, and Uh, the problem was he he wasn't 0:06:12.240 --> 0:06:14.479 really based on anything, it might as well have been 0:06:14.520 --> 0:06:17.159 science fiction, right, And yet they named the Lowell Observatory 0:06:17.240 --> 0:06:21.160 after him. He was an astronomer, so it's not like 0:06:21.200 --> 0:06:23.080 he was. He wasn't just making stuff up, but he 0:06:23.120 --> 0:06:24.920 didn't have like hard evidence. He made a lot of 0:06:24.960 --> 0:06:29.920 stuff up. Okay, he well, he interpreted it without any evidence. Yeah, 0:06:30.160 --> 0:06:32.799 and then wrote a book and that became the impetus 0:06:32.880 --> 0:06:37.159 for Mars based science fiction. Yeah, it really captured folks. 0:06:37.160 --> 0:06:39.599 And that's when like I talked about war the World's 0:06:39.680 --> 0:06:43.040 and uh, Edgar Rice Burrows the Princess of Mars, and 0:06:43.720 --> 0:06:47.720 it's just always been just out there staring down at us. Yeah, 0:06:47.880 --> 0:06:50.200 it's speaking of war the World's. It even says it 0:06:50.240 --> 0:06:52.760 in this article. It did not cause the national panic 0:06:52.760 --> 0:06:57.560 in night. That's a myth. Did you know that? Um? 0:06:57.680 --> 0:06:59.840 I don't know. I'm not sure I knew the full stories. 0:07:00.000 --> 0:07:05.000 Supposedly when h when um uh who directed Citizen Kane? 0:07:06.600 --> 0:07:09.560 When Orson Welles carried out this radio. Yeah, yeah, it's 0:07:09.560 --> 0:07:12.040 scared everyone, right, it caused a panic. People were wild 0:07:12.080 --> 0:07:15.800 in the streets, committing suicide, like doing all sorts of stuff. No, 0:07:15.840 --> 0:07:20.560 it isn't true. Um. Apparently the newspapers got wind of 0:07:20.600 --> 0:07:24.960 this rumor and played it up, and um, the reason 0:07:25.040 --> 0:07:27.080 they played it up was to prove that radio couldn't 0:07:27.120 --> 0:07:29.080 be trusted as a source of news because it was 0:07:29.120 --> 0:07:31.880 a big competitor to newspapers at the time. Have you 0:07:31.920 --> 0:07:35.280 done a Don't Be Dumb on that? No? Maybe I will? 0:07:36.200 --> 0:07:39.280 Can I plug that? Go ahead, Josh? As a web 0:07:39.280 --> 0:07:42.600 series called Don't Be Dumb? That is very funny and 0:07:42.760 --> 0:07:47.720 uh strange, and you learned stuff. It's like the perfect 0:07:47.720 --> 0:07:50.960 one to three punch. Weird funny and you walk away 0:07:50.960 --> 0:07:54.120 with some knowledge. Thanks man, And everyone likes it that 0:07:54.160 --> 0:07:56.080 watches it, so we just need more people to watch it. 0:07:56.120 --> 0:08:00.960 Give me the weird sausage fingers. Steve McQueen, clap, that's 0:08:01.000 --> 0:08:05.480 that is weird? Oh the director? Oh yeah, he was 0:08:05.480 --> 0:08:09.360 clapping weird, wouldn't he at the Oscars? Apparently he and um, 0:08:09.480 --> 0:08:12.560 the screenwriter who won an oscar for that movie, Yeah 0:08:12.600 --> 0:08:14.720 for twelve Years of Slave do not like each other 0:08:15.680 --> 0:08:18.680 over the writing credit. Oh yeah. The writer walked right 0:08:18.680 --> 0:08:20.920 past him, and Steve McQueen didn't even turn to look 0:08:20.960 --> 0:08:22.760 at him as he was walking up to get his oscar. 0:08:22.800 --> 0:08:25.000 I did kind of notice that Yeah, well, if you 0:08:25.080 --> 0:08:27.720 read delisted, he rooted it out and found out that 0:08:27.760 --> 0:08:29.960 it was over a writing credit. Is that why he 0:08:30.000 --> 0:08:37.880 was clapping weirdly? He was showing his disdain with sausage. Weird. Alright, So, UM, 0:08:37.920 --> 0:08:40.480 this weird early fascination with Mars, Like I said, we 0:08:40.520 --> 0:08:42.680 didn't have a lot of information other than just sort 0:08:42.679 --> 0:08:45.600 of looking at it from Earth. UM. And it wasn't 0:08:45.640 --> 0:08:49.360 until the sixties and seventies that we started in many 0:08:49.400 --> 0:08:53.840 countries started exploring Mars, but we started sending UM orbiters 0:08:54.800 --> 0:08:57.720 to take a closer peak and then eventually orbiters led 0:08:57.720 --> 0:09:02.240 to landers and rovers and it's been like kind of 0:09:02.280 --> 0:09:05.520 a prime directive of NASA for a while. Yeah, one 0:09:05.520 --> 0:09:08.120 of them. And and it was UM. When they scrapped 0:09:08.120 --> 0:09:12.520 the Space Shuttle UM program. I remember NASA was saying like, 0:09:12.559 --> 0:09:15.160 don't worry everybody, We're gonna go to Mars. We're gonna 0:09:15.160 --> 0:09:19.559 focus on Mars. That's why we're not doing the shuttle anymore. UM. 0:09:19.600 --> 0:09:22.320 And apparently they are. There was just as recently as 0:09:22.440 --> 0:09:27.679 yesterday NASA testified about its budget and UM and they 0:09:27.679 --> 0:09:29.760 were saying, well, we've got a really great thing plan. 0:09:30.120 --> 0:09:33.440 We're gonna get this asteroid. We're gonna maneuver it with 0:09:33.480 --> 0:09:36.160 a robot into lunar orbit so we can go visit 0:09:36.200 --> 0:09:40.720 it later. And the senators at this hearing basically said boring, 0:09:41.480 --> 0:09:44.439 like yeah, They're like, what's this backup Mars mission listed? 0:09:44.480 --> 0:09:46.640 And they're like, oh, well, we're talking about doing a 0:09:46.679 --> 0:09:52.360 man fly by a venus and Mars. Sentators are like, Mars, Mars, Mars. 0:09:52.400 --> 0:09:54.440 So it looks like NASA is gonna be forced to 0:09:54.480 --> 0:09:56.360 go to Mars, whether they like it or not. So 0:09:56.440 --> 0:10:00.760 it's still captivating. If it's captivating. The dumb dums and Congress, well, 0:10:00.840 --> 0:10:04.199 they even said, like the asteroid mission, that's not gonna 0:10:04.400 --> 0:10:08.600 spur the public the public imagination, like going past sending 0:10:08.640 --> 0:10:12.000 a person past Mars, that's what you want to do NASA. 0:10:12.640 --> 0:10:16.160 And NASA is like, all right, but there's gonna we 0:10:16.160 --> 0:10:19.360 could probably mind the asteroid and the senators I went 0:10:19.480 --> 0:10:23.560 Mars Mars Mars and they all went to a bar afterward. Yeah, okay, Jim, 0:10:23.559 --> 0:10:25.080 you want to go to Mars And he was like 0:10:25.080 --> 0:10:29.400 all right, yeah, I guess so. Um alright, so where 0:10:29.400 --> 0:10:33.199 should we start here? Um, well, let's start with the 0:10:33.240 --> 0:10:37.240 origin of Mars. It seems pretty appropriate. Yeah, it's pretty fascinating. 0:10:37.240 --> 0:10:42.559 I love how scientists piece together ancient history of the cosmos, 0:10:42.640 --> 0:10:45.319 you know, yeah, without having ever sent a geologist there. 0:10:45.360 --> 0:10:49.040 It's all I mean, even before the rovers, it was 0:10:49.080 --> 0:10:53.400 basically all just based on photographs and and surmising from those. 0:10:53.720 --> 0:10:57.240 Now we've got the Curiosity rover, the third rover up there. 0:10:57.320 --> 0:10:59.360 It's still up there, right yeah, yeah, or it doesn't 0:10:59.400 --> 0:11:03.880 come home, does it. No, it will, but it's still operational. Yeah. Um. 0:11:03.960 --> 0:11:05.800 And they were thinking, I think it was a two 0:11:05.880 --> 0:11:07.800 year mission, but it could go longer than that. I 0:11:07.800 --> 0:11:09.920 think it's already gone a little longer than that, because 0:11:09.960 --> 0:11:11.720 I think it went wasn't really already. I think it 0:11:11.760 --> 0:11:14.760 went up in late two thousand eleven. So I think 0:11:14.760 --> 0:11:18.400 it's been there a little over two years. Well, good going, Curiosity. 0:11:18.559 --> 0:11:21.520 I might be wrong. Um. All right, So there's basically 0:11:21.600 --> 0:11:26.160 five things that they surmise happened to four Mars, which 0:11:26.160 --> 0:11:30.040 will will list and then get into in more detail. Um. 0:11:30.080 --> 0:11:35.600 It initially formed from clumping together of little, tiny objects 0:11:35.679 --> 0:11:38.120 until it made a big round planet. It was an 0:11:38.120 --> 0:11:41.959 accretion disc. Yeah, like just like Earth, Just like Earth. Uh. 0:11:42.000 --> 0:11:44.920 Then there was a lot of meteor bombardment all over 0:11:45.200 --> 0:11:48.319 the Solar System, and Mars was of course affected just 0:11:48.360 --> 0:11:51.640 like Earth. Just like Earth. In the Moon, the mantle 0:11:51.920 --> 0:11:54.440 was very hot and pushed through the crust, lifting up 0:11:54.440 --> 0:11:57.840 portions of it. And then there were a couple of 0:11:58.440 --> 0:12:00.200 uh they don't know how many, but at least a 0:12:00.200 --> 0:12:04.480 couple of periods of lots of volcanoes going on, say 0:12:04.480 --> 0:12:09.200 it just like lava flows. And then finally the planet 0:12:09.200 --> 0:12:11.679 cooled down and the atmosphere thinned out to leave this 0:12:11.840 --> 0:12:16.120 with Mars unlike Earth, right, uh, And it Mars formation 0:12:16.440 --> 0:12:20.079 was virtually identical of the process that formed Earth. It's 0:12:20.120 --> 0:12:23.199 about half the size, but there in the beginning as 0:12:23.240 --> 0:12:26.559 far as makeup and the processes that they were undergoing, yeah, 0:12:26.760 --> 0:12:29.960 they were virtually identical. Yeah. And being half the size 0:12:30.040 --> 0:12:33.440 is pretty key to uh, why it's not like Earth 0:12:33.880 --> 0:12:37.800 more um one of the reasons. So I guess we 0:12:37.800 --> 0:12:39.599 should get into some more detail about this, Huh. I 0:12:39.640 --> 0:12:41.760 think we should. The accretion that you talked about, the 0:12:41.840 --> 0:12:45.360 small objects about it took about a hundred thousand years, 0:12:45.920 --> 0:12:48.800 and as the gravitational field got stronger, it kept pulling 0:12:48.800 --> 0:12:51.080 in more of this stuff and it would crash into 0:12:51.120 --> 0:12:55.000 the planet and uh and get hot basically and just 0:12:55.200 --> 0:12:58.920 sort of meld together. Yeah. I was like, oh, Mars, 0:13:00.240 --> 0:13:02.520 and that was interesting. I looked at why planets are around, 0:13:03.320 --> 0:13:05.880 and the reason why is because the gravitational field and 0:13:05.920 --> 0:13:10.320 the spin. Uh it's sucking everything into the dense core. Yeah. 0:13:10.320 --> 0:13:14.600 Well it's the core. The gravitational field behaves like it's 0:13:14.640 --> 0:13:17.320 coming from the center, and everything else thinks it's coming 0:13:17.320 --> 0:13:21.280 from the center. So the only way to get everything 0:13:21.360 --> 0:13:23.240 is close to the center as possible is to make 0:13:23.280 --> 0:13:27.160 a sphere like Obviously, if you had a square, that 0:13:27.200 --> 0:13:30.120 would be a corner that's not as close as other parts. 0:13:30.280 --> 0:13:33.280 That would be a creepy planet like a cube. Yeah, 0:13:33.320 --> 0:13:35.000 but I wondered, you know, or why doesn't it look 0:13:35.000 --> 0:13:38.120 like an asteroid, Let's say, but asteroids don't have the 0:13:38.160 --> 0:13:40.880 kind of gravitational force to draw everything in like that 0:13:40.920 --> 0:13:45.640 to form that sphere. It's called isotactic adjustment. Yeah. I 0:13:45.720 --> 0:13:48.880 just thought, wait a minute, all these things are perfectly round. 0:13:49.559 --> 0:13:52.640 We're not perfectly around. Want more pyramid shaped planet would 0:13:52.640 --> 0:14:18.200 be kind of cool? Um. All right, So that was 0:14:18.200 --> 0:14:22.560 the acretion, and now you have gas being released from 0:14:22.640 --> 0:14:26.200 cooling after the core and mantle and crust have formed 0:14:26.200 --> 0:14:30.920 in this hot ball. Right, and as the as the 0:14:30.960 --> 0:14:34.720 gases are being released in the hot ball, um, they 0:14:34.880 --> 0:14:40.360 are forming this atmosphere. They're supporting an atmosphere. They're floating 0:14:40.360 --> 0:14:44.680 out and um kind of hanging around. Yeah, you know. 0:14:45.680 --> 0:14:48.640 And um, so you've got an atmosphere in place. You 0:14:48.720 --> 0:14:53.040 have a molten core, you have a softer mantle, and 0:14:53.040 --> 0:14:57.880 then a crust that formed. Yeah. And um, as that 0:14:57.880 --> 0:15:01.240 that softer mantle and the woont and core press up, 0:15:01.400 --> 0:15:06.000 you have volcanic activity, yeah, which releases even more heat 0:15:06.160 --> 0:15:10.040 and gas, which makes the atmosphere even thicker. And at 0:15:10.080 --> 0:15:12.360 this point they think that there is a period of 0:15:12.600 --> 0:15:17.280 um water presence on Mars where it was raining. So 0:15:17.320 --> 0:15:21.480 then after you've got a primitive atmosphere. And then, as 0:15:21.520 --> 0:15:25.160 it says in the article by Craig he's a great 0:15:25.160 --> 0:15:29.240 writer for us. Yeah, PhD, that's right. Uh he said 0:15:29.240 --> 0:15:32.320 March Mars couldn't catch a break, which was pretty accurate, 0:15:32.360 --> 0:15:35.920 And it was pounded by meteors in the Solar system, 0:15:36.120 --> 0:15:41.400 forming craters and basins and all sorts of interesting landforms. 0:15:41.480 --> 0:15:43.640 And you know, the same thing happened here. But we 0:15:43.680 --> 0:15:48.520 had like water and things like that too, cause erosion 0:15:48.560 --> 0:15:51.480 and fill it, fill it in. On the Moon, there 0:15:51.520 --> 0:15:53.520 isn't anything like that, so you still see those craters. 0:15:54.440 --> 0:15:56.680 And but the same thing happened on Mars. Yeah, and 0:15:56.720 --> 0:16:00.120 actually there was water on Mars um that bombard it, 0:16:00.160 --> 0:16:03.200 and the that caused the magma to come up out 0:16:03.240 --> 0:16:09.080 of the core of of Mars, creating volcanic activity and 0:16:09.120 --> 0:16:12.400 shifts in the mantle and the crust. Um all released 0:16:12.520 --> 0:16:16.280 hot gas into the Martian atmosphere, which thickened it and 0:16:16.760 --> 0:16:22.760 increased its temperature, which led to rain, yes, rain, flooding, erosion. 0:16:23.160 --> 0:16:26.880 So there was like a period at least for a 0:16:26.880 --> 0:16:30.680 little while of um the presence of water on Mars. 0:16:31.360 --> 0:16:36.320 There still list, dude, the presence of unfrozen flowing water. 0:16:37.080 --> 0:16:41.120 Uh yeah, there's not flowing water right as of September 0:16:41.240 --> 0:16:43.640 last year, they found water in the dirt. Yeah, it's 0:16:43.640 --> 0:16:46.720 pretty exciting. Two points per cubic foot. Yeah, but but 0:16:46.760 --> 0:16:49.960 it's a spoiler. Sorry, actually it can't be a spoiler. 0:16:49.960 --> 0:16:52.720 But that happened in the bat right, Yeah, but if 0:16:53.400 --> 0:16:56.440 if you haven't heard of it any yeah, alright, sorry, 0:16:56.560 --> 0:16:59.000 Uh so, then Craig likens to Mars at this point 0:16:59.080 --> 0:17:03.720 is a soft boiled and as the eggshell is cooling, uh, 0:17:03.760 --> 0:17:08.920 the the yoke is gonna start busting through the mantle. 0:17:09.040 --> 0:17:11.280 And that's like on Earth is what is going to 0:17:11.400 --> 0:17:14.879 form things like volcanoes. And again those volcanoes and that 0:17:14.920 --> 0:17:18.640 activity led to that atmosphere in the periods of rain 0:17:18.720 --> 0:17:22.960 and flooding and erosion Olympus Mons. Yeah, that's a good 0:17:23.000 --> 0:17:25.720 pixie song. Was that a pixie song for a dream 0:17:25.720 --> 0:17:28.720 of the Olympus Mons? Nice? Yeah, I don't think I 0:17:28.760 --> 0:17:34.840 did that one. What's that on? Uh? Yeah, okay, Uh. 0:17:35.000 --> 0:17:38.040 Olympus Mons is the largest volcano there and it's like 0:17:38.320 --> 0:17:40.760 it makes Mountain Everest look like a mole hill. As 0:17:40.760 --> 0:17:43.840 a matter of fact, it's the largest point in the 0:17:43.920 --> 0:17:49.040 known Solar system, the highest point. Yeah, yeah, the tallest um. 0:17:50.000 --> 0:17:53.920 Remember our myth busting episode where we showed that Mount 0:17:53.960 --> 0:17:57.160 Everest wasn't the tallest mountain. It's mounta Loa Yeah. Yeah. Um, 0:17:57.320 --> 0:18:02.200 on Earth, mounta Looa is um something like it. It's 0:18:02.280 --> 0:18:07.359 six miles from the ocean floor. Uh, yes, the rises 0:18:07.720 --> 0:18:10.520 six nice chuck and um it's a hundred and forty 0:18:10.520 --> 0:18:14.000 miles wide at its base. That's a big mountain. On 0:18:14.119 --> 0:18:17.359 Earth on Mars, which is again half the size of 0:18:17.400 --> 0:18:23.800 Earth in diameter. Olympus mons is sixteen miles tall. And 0:18:23.800 --> 0:18:26.520 and that's not from an ocean floor either, Yeah, you know, 0:18:26.760 --> 0:18:29.280 because there is no ocean on Mars exactly. But if 0:18:29.280 --> 0:18:33.800 you want to see something cool, type in Mars, what 0:18:33.840 --> 0:18:36.680 would Mars look like with ocean and people have done 0:18:36.720 --> 0:18:39.560 like um simulations of it. It looks really neat, like 0:18:39.680 --> 0:18:43.720 vacation worthy, like you would want to go there to vacam. 0:18:43.720 --> 0:18:46.560 I mean, it's like a sunny beach with it looks 0:18:46.600 --> 0:18:50.120 like Earth, but with weird continents um. And then it's 0:18:50.119 --> 0:18:54.440 three seventy miles across Olympus mons Is. That's large. It's big. 0:18:54.560 --> 0:18:57.200 And they have like pictures if you google it, uh, 0:18:57.520 --> 0:19:01.880 compare it to Everest and it just dwarfs it, that's right. 0:19:02.080 --> 0:19:03.679 And you can see pictures of it too, you know, 0:19:04.560 --> 0:19:07.359 they snapped photos of it. It's pretty impressive. It's been 0:19:07.640 --> 0:19:14.320 large volcano which eventually went dormant. All the volcanoes on 0:19:14.359 --> 0:19:18.639 Mars went dormant, that's right, somewhere possibly about three billion 0:19:18.720 --> 0:19:24.399 years ago, and um as the volcanoes went dormant, the 0:19:24.400 --> 0:19:28.720 the the heat was released. Basically Mars had no more 0:19:28.760 --> 0:19:32.040 heat to give from its core um, which meant the 0:19:32.080 --> 0:19:35.400 atmosphere wasn't being fed any longer, so it thin, which 0:19:35.480 --> 0:19:38.119 led to a drop in temperatures. Yeah, and how we 0:19:38.160 --> 0:19:40.199 mentioned earlier, how the the fact that it was smaller 0:19:40.240 --> 0:19:43.000 than Earth is one reason why it's not more like Earth. 0:19:43.040 --> 0:19:45.679 That's the reason it cooled so fast, like Earth wouldn't 0:19:45.680 --> 0:19:48.480 have cold nearly as fast, no, huh. And um it 0:19:48.640 --> 0:19:53.040 also kept a magnetic field going thanks to its molten core. 0:19:53.600 --> 0:19:56.639 Mars did not any longer, so you got a thin atmosphere, 0:19:57.000 --> 0:20:01.160 cold temperatures. Um. The atmosphere that was there started freezing 0:20:01.160 --> 0:20:05.480 and falling two Mars and was stored as ice. Any 0:20:05.520 --> 0:20:08.200 water that was already on the planet's surface turned into 0:20:08.240 --> 0:20:12.680 perma frost, and um Mars became it underwent what's called 0:20:12.680 --> 0:20:16.919 the Great desiccation event, where it became a barren, deserted 0:20:17.560 --> 0:20:20.560 desert planet. Yeah, and before that, these were this kind 0:20:20.560 --> 0:20:22.720 of happened in cycles for a while, like the volcanic 0:20:22.760 --> 0:20:25.959 action and then the gas is being released and like 0:20:26.320 --> 0:20:30.880 major flooding from water, until like you said, eventually it's 0:20:30.920 --> 0:20:34.320 the cold, not hot, but cold, dusty place that we 0:20:34.400 --> 0:20:38.120 love today. Yeah, And what's um interesting is that Earth 0:20:38.160 --> 0:20:41.040 and Mars were so similar as they formed and about 0:20:41.119 --> 0:20:44.600 at the same time. About three billion years ago, Mars 0:20:44.640 --> 0:20:48.080 underwent the Great Desiccation Event and Earth underwent the Great 0:20:48.119 --> 0:20:51.560 Oxygenation Event, which gave rise to all life here on Earth. 0:20:52.520 --> 0:20:56.840 The the appearance of algae, which created a breathable atmosphere 0:20:57.320 --> 0:20:59.959 almost at about the same time. So they totally diverse, 0:21:00.240 --> 0:21:02.480 two different paths that have around the same time. I 0:21:02.520 --> 0:21:06.120 wonder if the main reason was because of its size. Yeah, 0:21:06.119 --> 0:21:09.760 the cooling another Earth. Yes, it's interesting. Had it been 0:21:09.800 --> 0:21:13.600 the exact same size, who knows, maybe we'd be like 0:21:14.320 --> 0:21:19.560 going there and back right now, right on vacation like Swarnegger. 0:21:20.920 --> 0:21:23.679 That was a good one, or Colin Farrell. Did you 0:21:23.680 --> 0:21:27.280 see the remake? No? Although I heard the Robo Cup 0:21:27.359 --> 0:21:30.879 remake was like surprisingly good, I haven't seen expecting that. 0:21:30.920 --> 0:21:33.919 I haven't seen it either. Yeah, that's why I'll definitely 0:21:33.920 --> 0:21:37.439 wait for TV for that one. You know, Uh, you 0:21:37.520 --> 0:21:40.400 really don't care about seeing that one. Not even DVD 0:21:40.760 --> 0:21:45.720 like TV. Well, I don't watch DVDs, Okay, I'm streaming 0:21:45.720 --> 0:21:49.080 like the rest of the modern world. Not even a 0:21:49.160 --> 0:21:55.480 laser disk Uh, should we talk about what it's like there. Yeah, 0:21:55.520 --> 0:21:59.280 on the surface, Yes, the surface of Mars Um scientists 0:21:59.320 --> 0:22:04.280 have divided into three major parts, the Southern Highlands, the 0:22:04.320 --> 0:22:06.960 northern plains, and the polar regions, which we already said 0:22:07.000 --> 0:22:10.280 you can actually see from Earth polar ice caps. Yeah, 0:22:10.720 --> 0:22:12.960 just like Earth, but the ice caps are made of 0:22:13.359 --> 0:22:16.560 carbon dioxide, so it's dry ice ice caps, and then 0:22:16.600 --> 0:22:21.439 underneath there's water ice yea. So the southern highlands are vast. 0:22:22.480 --> 0:22:24.440 I love our morning shows. It's always a little more 0:22:24.480 --> 0:22:28.480 like laid back. I feel like, yeah, like I'm sleepy. Yeah, 0:22:28.760 --> 0:22:32.879 you're not riddled with anxieties yet. That comes on about noon. Yeah, 0:22:33.040 --> 0:22:35.560 I haven't had enough coffee yet. So you've got your 0:22:35.560 --> 0:22:38.159 Southern Highlands, and like I said, they are extensive and vast, 0:22:38.400 --> 0:22:42.000 and uh, it is elevated. It's the the highest part 0:22:42.000 --> 0:22:45.280 of Mars and heavily cratered and again the highest part 0:22:45.320 --> 0:22:48.760 of the solar system, right, because that's where Olympus Moms is. 0:22:48.920 --> 0:22:51.840 That's right in the southern region, the Southern highlands. Uh. 0:22:51.880 --> 0:22:55.520 And they scientists think it's ancient um these highlands because 0:22:55.640 --> 0:22:59.400 of the craters, because the cratering happened close to four 0:22:59.440 --> 0:23:02.639 billion years ago, and that was just meteors kind of 0:23:02.680 --> 0:23:06.639 just pounding the solar system all over the place. So 0:23:06.680 --> 0:23:09.280 the southern Highlands are high and then there's a very 0:23:09.520 --> 0:23:15.840 um pronounced drop of several kilometers down to the um 0:23:16.080 --> 0:23:19.399 northern plains, which are low lying regions. There are a 0:23:19.400 --> 0:23:22.480 lot like the seas on the Moon um but they 0:23:22.520 --> 0:23:27.400 do feature raised areas plateaus, a couple of them. Yeah, 0:23:27.440 --> 0:23:30.119 the cinder cones. Yeah, well, the cinder cones are on 0:23:30.160 --> 0:23:33.240 the plateaus. I think basically the mantle bulged up through 0:23:33.240 --> 0:23:36.280 the crust. It's thinner in the northern region and the 0:23:36.280 --> 0:23:41.560 mantle just pushed up and formed like continent sized plateaus. Um. 0:23:41.600 --> 0:23:45.000 That are called crustal upwarps. That's a great word. Yeah, 0:23:45.040 --> 0:23:49.120 I kept thinking I was reading it wrong. Nope, crystal upwarps. Uh. 0:23:49.160 --> 0:23:52.200 And the these crystal upwarps, there's two of them. One 0:23:52.280 --> 0:23:55.600 is the smaller it's Elysium membered Paradise that right, and 0:23:55.680 --> 0:24:00.000 the other one is called Tharsis. Arcis in the Northern 0:24:00.240 --> 0:24:05.040 Hemisphere is divided into eastern and western hemispheres. Tharsis is 0:24:05.080 --> 0:24:09.160 in the west and Elysium is in the east. Yes, 0:24:09.240 --> 0:24:11.879 celestial names are so cool, it really are You know, 0:24:12.080 --> 0:24:17.160 what do we have on earth? New Jersey not thar No, 0:24:18.600 --> 0:24:25.040 we start a campaign to rename New Jersey tharsus Um 0:24:25.119 --> 0:24:27.560 and then like the main city could be Tharsist City, 0:24:27.600 --> 0:24:32.160 which sounds super futuristic, and in fact it's Newark. Every 0:24:32.160 --> 0:24:38.240 citizens issued to sparkly silver jumps. Oh. U, so you've 0:24:38.280 --> 0:24:40.800 called out Olympus Mons is the highest point. That is 0:24:40.960 --> 0:24:44.720 where in the it's in the region which this article 0:24:44.760 --> 0:24:47.960 is confusing because it mentions the sarsest Reason region in 0:24:47.960 --> 0:24:52.680 the southern um the hemisphere and in the northern hemisphere. Uh. 0:24:52.680 --> 0:24:55.280 And I looked all over the place to find definitively 0:24:55.359 --> 0:24:58.399