Alien Anomalies

qmantoo · Teaching the truth

RE: JPL says " ROCK " I say " WOOD "

Eaol · Veteran Member

Question: Why would a cut piece of wood be just sitting around in the middle of a desert? That's my biggest question.

One single drop · Senior Member

As far as I know, rocks are a mixture of different minerals or they are consisting of fine monomineral particles like the chalk and the limestone you mentioned, which both are Calciumcarbonate, but with some different history of creation.
Minerals have a homogenous structure. Minerals are homogenous "bodies", rocks are mixtures of minerals.
In the case of fossilized wood the theory says, the former cells of the wood have been replaced by Si0 2 in a way that the shape of its cellstructures are still visible.

Ps: Thanks for the Beagle thread and for asking ESA. Surprisingly, as you said, you got an answer. That`s positive. From time to time, we have to be reminded....

qmantoo · Teaching the truth

yes, if you just saw the piece at the top right, you would think it was wood perhaps.

Just thinking to myself really, not criticizing or disagreeing with you in any way ...
I wonder when is a fossil a rock because technically sandstone is sand, limestone is chalk or small pieces of shell, coal is plant material compressed, oil is liquid so cannot be called rock, what is the difference between mineral like quartz and rock and what NASA or geologists call a rock or stone?

One single drop · Senior Member

Just a sample..

A piece of weathered schist in the Eifel mountains , Germany. Schist is a metamorphic rock, sediments which have been transformed by some high temperature and pressure. Some metamorphic schists contain garnets, distributed in a similar way, as the knobs of the mars rock. I wish this mars rock is indeed fossilized wood...

Beschreibung Schiefer anstehend.jpg

Schiefer in der Eifel, direkt anstehend, verwittert

eigenes Foto Fotograf Steffen Heinz (

Caronna

14:05, 1. Mai 2006 (CEST))
gemacht am 30.4.2006

de.wikipedia; description page is/was here

.

Caronna at de.wikipedia
Genehmigung
(Weiternutzung dieser Datei

)

GFDL

by the author.

http://de.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Datei:Schiefer_anstehend.jpg&filetimestamp=20070321074101

qmantoo · Teaching the truth

No, actually, they may be correct. I COULD be wood, but also COULD be rock. In my opinion, anyway.

I have seen this 'blue stuff' which I suspect may be like lichen in other places and it seems to like 'growing' or appearing on rock, so I would favour the rock over the wood. But I could be wrong of course, it also has certain characteristics of old wood on Earth.

Element115 · Member

well obviously I hadn't done an investigation under a microscope as the
object is on Mars.

One single drop · Senior Member

"Looks like" fossilized wood ,would be the right expression. Did you do an investigation under the microscope using a thin slice section of this rock ?

What are these small knobs attached to the surface or maybe penetrating the rock ? This interesting thin coating they point at and which seems to be partly removed by erosion is what ?

Element115 · Member

http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/press/opportunity/20100324a/ChocHills_Sol2147B_L257F.jpg

a closer look.

Element115 · Member

correction, the title was:

" Rock with Odd Coating Beside a Young Martian Crater, False Color "

Element115 · Member

O.k. I can't believe that JPL is trying to pass this image off as
a rock. actually the title was " Rock with strange substance "

WHAT ?!?! who really cares about the substance, CLEARLY this
is not a rock but wood.

Notrockbutwood

http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/press/opportunity/20100324a.html

http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/press/opportunity/20100324a/ChocHills_Sol2147B_L257F_br.jpg