Haven't made it out to Departure, mainly on account of being fragged out and it being cold and windy outside.
However my reticence to go out has been rewarded by the news that NASA has discovered
a significant amount of water on the moon.
This is, I feel,
incredibly good news. Depending of course on the size of ice there is on the moon, it could be feasible to make a more permanent presence there.. and then, of course, as the moon's gravity is only one-sixth of the Earth's, it'd make it easier to travel to other planets in the solar system. It'd be a bit like the ISS only much much bigger! :)
Of course, this now also brings with it other problems. If there is water on the moon, and we subscribe to what I like to think of as "the Star Trek fallacy[1]" of "life as we know it" by which water would have to be present, what happens
if scientists now detect some form of life, living or extinct, within that "significant amount of water"?
First there's that whole issue of whether there would be sustainable compatibility between the human race and the other lifeform(s)? If it was some form of microbe, would it be fatal to humans? As we as a race would not probably have had any exposure to it for the last x-thousands years, the human race would probably not have any antibodies against any form of extraterrestrial microbe.
Then there is what I think could be a bigger problem. If some form of life was to be found what would be the reaction of the religions on this planet who all proclaim that god made life on this planet and this planet alone? It'd sort of pee over the whole "garden of Eden" idea, don't you think? Once you challenge one of the fundamental mainstays of those religions what would happen amongst the disillusioned people who had previously subscribed to those religions?
[1] The 'Star Trek fallacy' is the concept of "life as we know it", which generally subscribes to such ideas that for life to exist on a planet there has to be water and oxygen. There are life forms on this planet which survive in environments without oxygen and water just happens to be a very simple molecule with a multple valency.