BELIEVE IT OR NOT, WE HAVE A WORD FOR THIS

FYI the study of alien life is xenology (an awesome Scrabble word, just hook onto any letter for a bingo).

I hope there's some xenology in with the areology.

I believe they're looking for evidence of water, which means the object of their areology may well be an investigation of xenology. Let's hope they don't air any xenophobia.

are they looking for evidence of xeriscaping?

It's definitely a xeric landscape.

Here's where I was introduced to the idea of Areology and Areoforming:



Cycloptichorn

Basic alien life would be exobiology.

Xenology would be "alien life and civilisation".

Maybe...

Great series . . . we discussed this before. I don't recall if i told you, but i found those books just sitting out on the sidewalk, when people leave boxes of books out for whoever wants them.

By the way, the Final Jeopardy question was something like: "This study is called areology." I had never heard the word before, but it was easy enough to guess. Thirty years ago, making a guess on a $20 bet was risking a substantial sum, but i was cocky.

Cool find! I paid full price for them, back when I still paid for physical media. I also really enjoyed his Years of Rice and Salt.

Cycloptichorn

And here I was thinking areology had something to do with a circular area of darker skin...

Up, up . . . get your mind above the bust . . .

I've not ever heard of that, i'll have to check it out. I haven't kept up with Science Fiction/Science Fantasy over the last few decades.

Here's my top recommendation for sci-fi right now:



Super fun book, I really, really enjoyed it. I was actually sad when the book was over.

Cycloptichorn

One of the blurbs on the news last night was that back here on Earth, scientists will attempt to genetically modify a bacterium that can thrive in the Martian environment/atmosphere. Once that bacterium starts to mutate the possibilities are endless; that is if one believes in evolution!

. AGI and all international geologic references use the terms "planetary geology" or even "Martian geology" to define the crustal dynamics "geophysics" "geochemistry" etc. MSL will be studying planetary geology, dont try to change what is already established.

If jeopardy meant this anwer to mean the actual STUDY of the surface , materials, structures, dynamics etc. of the planet, they would have been wrong. We dont use a made up prefix like areo, to precede areophysics or areochemistry, itd never be approved by the ed committees on publication.

(cf Glossary of Geology 6th ed) "Planetary geology"

The word Areology is a neologism.

Cycloptichorn

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geology_of_Mars

From what I've seen, I believe the word we have for this is 'desert'.
What a big surprise!

I already knew a lot of you guys have no sense of fun. You didn't need to prove it to me.