Over millions of years, the timescale in this study, the calculations aren’t all that accurate anymore. Knowing approximately where everything will be next year is one thing, but in 3 million years? We can only give a ballpark estimate.

If they could calculate it with exact precision, they would. They can’t, so they aren’t.

I don’t personally know what solutions are used, but certainly something is done to prevent contamination on the launchpad. It could be as simple as sealing the fairing after the payload is fitted ( it’s not like the spacecraft is just sitting around exposed to the elements until it’s loaded ). The people who do this…

There is something lost if Martian microbial life that could be contaminated or out-competed by terrestrial life. A big part of going to Mars for scientists is to try to find life there than is distinct from life on Earth.

Drumming up business for whom?

The rovers are extensively sterilized and quarantined before flight. Their contamination risk is very low.

It already drifted away from the Earth, into it’s intended Solar orbit, which is why this is even being discussed.

There’s a very massive difference between not being able to sterilize something 100% and not bothering to do so at all.

Aside from the gas giants and the Sun, likely only the Earth and Venus have sufficient atmosphere and gravity to completely burn this object up and even then it’s not a 100% guarantee that nothing could reach the surface unscathed.

Also, I’m glad that Melosh agrees that an extinction level event would be a setback from our point of view.

I highly doubt they went to the time or expense of stripping the car down to it’s base components, sterilizing everything and reassembling it in a sterile environment when they weren’t required to do so.

The other stuff that leaves Earth orbit is generally sterilized to help prevent contamination and other steps are taken as well, like crashing Cassini into Saturn to protect it’s moons.

Bacteria that can survive in space wouldn’t be too fussed by the Martian environment unless CO2 is especially toxic to it. Other planets are hostile to humans, but not necessarily so to extremophiles.

Mars has a very thin atmosphere, so at least some of the debris would probably reach the surface intact. If bacteria can survive in space, it would likely do alright on Mars, but no one can know for sure.

Escaping Mars is much easier than escaping the Earth, but it’s certainly possible there are Earth meteorites on Mars.

You’re assuming the formulas used, and especially the numbers plugged into them are 100% accurate. There’s a lot about the solar system that we simply don’t really know with perfect accuracy and we have no way of actually knowing how much we don’t know. Just think about how little was actually known about Pluto and…

It’s not the best word he could have used, but the specifics of the powertrain likely weren’t important to the study. Electric motors can be dirty as well, as can all surfaces on any car.

That’s not how blog titles work. They have to be click-bait bullshit, because click-bait works and clicks are everything.

He really, really isn’t. Messi is basically Maradona 2.0. Gretzky is one of a kind.

Messi has his own share of responsibility for Argentina not winning anything. It’s nobody else’s fault but his when he misses penalties.