comments on some apparently unseen pictures of the "crab claw" ("bunny ears")
To all:
With respect to what is coming to be called the "crab claw", in some circles, and, evidently, derogatorily, as "the bunny ears", in others, the web page,
http://www.space.com/scienceandastronomy/mars_bunny_040310.html, the article, "Mars Opportunity: Hopping Along the 'Bunny' Trail", you see some of the comments apparently ubiquitous in the "traditional science" community, suggesting that interpreting the branched object shown in Opportunity's photos as anything other than detritus from the spacecraft is silly at best and psychotic at worst.
Very significant on the page, though, are two illustrations they offer of the object. Actually, three photographs are displayed, with links to pages that show the pictures in larger size, but two are of special interest. One of the pictures is the traditional one, taken from the lander, the first picture of the object, and, for the most part, the only picture of the object widely current, so far.
The other two pictures can be immensely important, however.
One is a black and white, evidently all but previously unseen, showing a splotch that is claimed to be the object, but, now, underneath one of the fold out panels of the lander. For all that the perspective is claimed to be unusual for Mars, being smaller than earth, it still seems too far away, in the original picture, to get covered by the lander's flaps. A point that may be being pushed is that the object was light, and was pushed by the wind, suggesting that it's just some foam from the lander.
The second offering on the web page seems pointed in the same direction. This is an animated gif, composed of three pictures of the object, taken "two minutes apart". In the sequence, the right branch of the object is depicted as moving to the left. It moves only a small distance, but the pictures do indicate its position to be different! The "explanation" given again insists that the object has to be some foam, and uses as "proof" the fact that, as the page with the larger picture claims, "the object can move in a light wind".
For all the overweaning gloating that "traditional science" engages in, proclaiming its reliance on "scrupulous reasoning", in fact, they are shockingly slipshod, and evidently geared only to "justify" their desired assertions. The first problem is the statement that the object must be light, because it is moving in a light wind. Yet there is no indication of a wind being present, at that time! Sand particles don't seem to be moving, and there seem no signs of the material on the flaps errantly moving to block the camera, after they were unfurled. Also, as transfixed as so many have been about the purported conditions transmitted from the lander, they would love to have been told if there was a wind! And NASA would have been more than happy to comply! It seems clear, then, that there was no wind to make the object move! They are asserting the unquestionability of their conclusion first, then deriving "facts" from that! They are saying that the object is foam from the lander, and that that is light, and that that must be what it is, without question! They then derive the assertion that there must have been a light wind, since the "foam" - don't even think of questioning that, because you have been ordered to think that's what it is! - is moving! They then, surreptitiously, turn it around, saying that it must be foam, because it is moving in the light wind that must be blowing there, because that would mean that it must be moving because it's light, which would mean that it must be foam!
Even more significant, though, is the nature of the pictures themselves. In the three photos, the right branch of the object moves steadily and unswervingly to the left! Those who want to fight the use of reasoning here would insist that that is proof of a wind, since the wind would constantly be moving in the one direction, right to left in the scene. But, even in a low pressure environment, with only a light wind, a piece of foam would not take two minutes to bend, maybe, 2 millimeters, then another two minutes to bend another 2 millimeters! The natural springiness of the material would cause it to sway back and forth, especially in a thin atmosphere, and light wind! A force so minimal that it would take four minutes to impel the foam branch, say, 4 millimeters would not have enough strength to keep it from oscillating back and forth! In which case, one of the pictures would have had to show it rocking the other way! It is entirely unlikely to think that the photographs were taken at the precise moments to coincide with the branch accidentally oscillating, first, 2 millimeters to the left, then 4 millimeters to the left!
But, if the object were a creature, moving its branch sluggishly to the left at a constant velocity, then the camera would have caught it in those positions, at those moments!
The reliance on the evidently conclusion-oriented pseudo-logical manipulation of facts that seems to hold sway in "traditional science", these days, seems without question. But you can't let the fact that they just stand there insisting that they know more than you do, so your only choice is to just shut up and believe what they tell you to believe, lead you to sign away your spirit!
Julian Penrod