# Could we discover the remnants of an advanced Martian civilisation? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 10, 2015, 10:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697 "2015-05-10T10:54:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 16\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Anne\_Neville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Anne\_Neville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anne_Neville)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2015, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697/21 "2015-05-11T22:24:44Z")
> [@Musicat](#): > > I don’t believe Mars has tectonic activity now. No, it doesn’t. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2015, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697/22 "2015-05-11T23:26:55Z")
> [@](#): > > Quoth **Disposable Hero** : > > The science-fiction books ‘Mars’ and ‘Return to Mars’ by Ben Bova may interest the OP. Ooh, I didn’t know there was a sequel. Is it any good? (and suspend your disbelief about the heroes running out of film in their cameras) ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2015, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697/23 "2015-05-11T23:38:10Z")
> [@Anne\_Neville](#): > > No, it doesn’t. Would that be the same as “Yes, it doesn’t”? ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2015, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697/24 "2015-05-13T14:47:56Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > It depends on what you mean by ‘similar’. If they somehow developed an advanced society based entirely on soft biological materials (for example, all of their tools, structures, artifacts were no more substantial than a jellyfish, and all existed on or near the surface of the ocean), they might be hard to find - and once found, hard to recognise as a sentient society. > > But if by ‘similar’ you mean that they had fire, refined metals, used tools, carved stone, synthesised plastics; built electronic devices, etc - there would have to be something left to find. > [@Mangetout](#): > > Why not? - reasoning as follows: > > We’ve found fossils of soft-bodied organisms here on Earth that are at least as old as that > At least some of the tools and artifacts we make are more materially durable than soft-bodied organisms > > So in a billion years hence, it should be possible to find at least fossil traces of, I dunno, Barbie dolls or Rolex watches. The problem is that Mars isn’t like Earth. First, it has no liquid water, so there is no sedimentary rock being laid down. You need sediment to fossilize things. Second, it has no tectonic activity, and no precipitation, so after things get covered up they would most likely stay covered. We find fossils and such on Earth because tectonic activity pushes the rock formations containing them toward the surface, or because erosion removes what’s on top of them. > [@Musicat](#): > > Would that be the same as “Yes, it doesn’t”? It’s the same as “there is no tectonic activity on Mars.” That’s why it has [much bigger mountains](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tallest_mountains_in_the_Solar_System): its volcanoes can remain active for much longer (needless to say, it has no mountains formed by subduction.) ETA: I see what you were saying now. I think **Anne** also misread your post. ---
**Author:** ![halfreal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ccd318/32.png) [@halfreal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/halfreal)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2015, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697/25 "2015-05-13T16:38:55Z")
Radioactive waste deposits could be a telltale. Perhaps. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2015, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697/26 "2015-05-25T16:39:35Z")
> [@halfreal](#): > > Radioactive waste deposits could be a telltale. Perhaps. Again, after a few billion years? Would it not just be written off as slightly higher then expected readings? ---
**Author:** ![Haberdash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Haberdash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Haberdash)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2015, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697/27 "2015-05-25T18:11:45Z")
The chemical products of life were extensively searched for by the Viking program. Nothing was found. Everywhere on Earth there is evidence of life – soil itself is decomposed once-living tissue, there are microbes in every cubic yard of air and every thimbleful of water. It’s not conceivable that Mars would look as dead as it does if it ever supported biology. Present or past life on Mars, absent some esoteric definition of “life” that would be incomprehensible to us, is a disproven fantasy at this point. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2015, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697/28 "2015-05-25T19:15:51Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > The problem is that Mars isn’t like Earth. First, it has no liquid water, so there is no sedimentary rock being laid down. You need sediment to fossilize things. Second, it has no tectonic activity, and no precipitation, so after things get covered up they would most likely stay covered. We find fossils and such on Earth because tectonic activity pushes the rock formations containing them toward the surface, or because erosion removes what’s on top of them. Fair to say that I was operating on the assumption that the past civilisation we would have been seeking/finding would have been from a wetter period in the history of Mars (because civilisation requires life and life, whilst it may be possible without water, certainly needs it in the example we know about) Also. Water isnt the only thing that transports sediment; wind blown dust is another possibility, and tectonnic activity isn’t the only way in which subsurface rocks can be exposed - in the case of Mars, meteorites do it. Finally, there’s no need to speculate on how sedimentary rocks might hypothetically exist on Mars. We know they exist there. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2015, 1:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697/29 "2015-05-26T01:42:42Z")
Windblown dust doesn’t work quickly enough to form fossils, though your point is taken. ---
**Author:** ![Urbanredneck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ea5d25/32.png) [@Urbanredneck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urbanredneck)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2015, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697/30 "2015-05-26T04:49:30Z")
Well if say the Martians wanted to really have a permanent marker and somehow buried a granite obelisk or some type of metal like say titanium and somehow marked it with say some large formations of solid rocks, then yes we might find it. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2015, 6:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697/31 "2015-05-26T06:23:51Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Windblown dust doesn’t work quickly enough to form fossils… I wonder if that is necessarily as true in other environments than Earth where the local gravity, the thickness and composition of the atmosphere etc are all different. In any case, desert sediments probably would preserve some durable artifacts created by a technological civilisation. ---
**Author:** ![eburacum45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eburacum45/32/8690_2.png) [@eburacum45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eburacum45)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2015, 8:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697/32 "2015-05-26T08:20:07Z")
> [@Haberdash](#): > > The chemical products of life were extensively searched for by the Viking program. Nothing was found. Some people think that the exact opposite is true. > **[National Geographic](https://www.nationalgeographic.com/)** > > Explore National Geographic. A world leader in geography, cartography and exploration. Personally I think that the experiments on Viking were completely inadequate to detect life, but that would be true of almost any experiment we could devise, even today. The possibilities of false negatives and false positives are both too great to allow the reliable detection of any conceivable form of life. ---
**Author:** ![eburacum45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eburacum45/32/8690_2.png) [@eburacum45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eburacum45)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2015, 8:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697/33 "2015-05-26T08:32:13Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Sure, but those are very thin winds. They won’t erode as much as Earthly winds would. The winds on Mars may be thin, but they are persistent; all exposed surfaces on Mars show signs of aeolian erosion - that’s why the rocks are such interesting shapes. One relic of Earth civilisation would last a long time- glass; we might expected to find coke bottles and paperweights billions of years from now in sedimentary rocks. Trouble is, there seem to be few sedimentary rocks on Mars. A glass artifact might be buried in a wind-blown deposit, but when and if it is exposed the glass would erode away under the influence of the feeble winds. I doubt if we’ll see any three billion year old coke bottles on the Martian surface. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2015, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697/34 "2015-05-26T13:57:57Z")
> [@eburacum45](#): > > Trouble is, there seem to be few sedimentary rocks on Mars. We haven’t exactly looked everywhere, and yet we seem to have found [quite a few examples](https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=sedimentary+rocks+on+mars&es_sm=122&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=vHtkVbOdBsWyUc22gZAO&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAQ&biw=1366&bih=705) > [@](#): > > A glass artifact might be buried in a wind-blown deposit, but when and if it is exposed the glass would erode away under the influence of the feeble winds. The same is true of fossils on Earth - there is a window of time in which it must be buried before the elements destroy it, and there is (longer) window of time in which it must be discovered once exposed, before it wears away. These factors don’t stop us finding fossils on Earth (naturally-exposed ones, that is, without digging them up). ---
**Author:** ![eburacum45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eburacum45/32/8690_2.png) [@eburacum45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eburacum45)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2015, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697/35 "2015-05-26T21:18:02Z")
Ah yes- wind-deposited sedimentary rocks. Water-deposited rocks seem to be considerably rarer. I suppose it might be possible for particularly durable relics to be eroded out of the rock- worth keeping an eye out for them. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2015, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697/36 "2015-05-26T22:22:40Z")
I think the rocks in the fourth photo down on this page were water-deposited: > **[Curiosity discovers extensive evidence that water once flowed on Mars](https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/146253-curiosity-discovers-extensive-evidence-that-water-once-flowed-on-mars)** > > Mars rover Curiosity, after a brief sojourn for Christmas and New Year, has hit a science "jackpot," discovering extensive evidence that water once flowed over the surface of the Red Planet. In the next few days, Curiosity will use its percussive... That said, if Mars wasn’t tectonically active back then, these would indeed be rarer - you need landmasses thrust up so they can be eroded and run down as fine sediments into estuaries and floodplains. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-we-discover-the-remnants-of-an-advanced-martian-civilisation/719697.md?page=1)