# What is the real deal with Cydonia? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 20, 2006, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-deal-with-cydonia/381208 "2006-11-20T21:20:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Noelq](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/noelq/32/16438_2.png) [@Noelq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Noelq)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2006, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-deal-with-cydonia/381208/21 "2006-11-21T01:20:23Z")
[QUOTE=jjimm] Minor correction: **Noelq** ’s link is one of those bastard aggregator sites that takes advantage of misspellings. The correct URL is actually: [http://www.googlesightseeing.com/](http://www.googlesightseeing.com/) [/QUOTE] I apologize profusely for my error! I swear it was right when I typed it in… I blame the martians… ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2006, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-deal-with-cydonia/381208/22 "2006-11-21T02:10:33Z")
**Yellow\_Rights** , the supposed “faces” & “pyramids” on Mars are just wind-eroded rock formations, seen in shadow. Debunked ages ago. But if you want Life, in our Solar System, there’s a better bet than Mars. Jupiter’s moon, Europa. It has _oceans_. Oceans of _water_! > **[Europa (moon)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europa_%28moon%29)** > > Europa /jʊˈroʊpə/ ⓘ, or Jupiter II, is the smallest of the four Galilean moons orbiting Jupiter, and the sixth-closest to the planet of all the 95 known moons of Jupiter. It is also the sixth-largest moon in the Solar System. Europa was discovered independently by Simon Marius and Galileo Galilei and was named (by Marius) after Europa, the Phoenician mother of King Minos of Crete and lover of Zeus (the Greek equivalent of the Roman god Jupiter). > Slightly smaller than Earth's Moon, Europa is ... ---
**Author:** ![Hunter\_Hawk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/50afbb/32.png) [@Hunter\_Hawk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hunter_Hawk)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2006, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-deal-with-cydonia/381208/23 "2006-11-21T03:12:40Z")
OTOH, Farflung did have a great song about Cydonia on their _25,000 Feet Per Second_ album. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2006, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-deal-with-cydonia/381208/24 "2006-11-21T05:30:30Z")
My interest in Cydonia also become piqued when I found a mound shaped like a human skull, and another shaped like Pac Man. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2006, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-deal-with-cydonia/381208/25 "2006-11-21T16:10:35Z")
[QUOTE=Noelq] I apologize profusely for my error! I swear it was right when I typed it in… I blame the martians… [/QUOTE] I reported it so a mod can cut the link. ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2006, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-deal-with-cydonia/381208/26 "2006-11-21T16:38:41Z")
In my view, the whole “Face on Mars” thing would never have happened if there hadn’t been a data error leading to a black dot[right where the nostril would be](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Martian_face_viking_cropped.jpg). Without that nostril, sure it looks a bit like a face, but it wouldn’t have had the “wow factor” it originally excited. Put it down to a big fluke. ---
**Author:** ![rhettro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e274bd/32.png) [@rhettro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rhettro)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2006, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-deal-with-cydonia/381208/27 "2006-11-21T19:45:13Z")
Hoagland’s first book was actually pretty interesting. There is one picture that looks convincing with the face and several pyramid like shaped hill’s near by. Hoagland stated at the end of the book that higher resolution photos would either show the site to be extraterrestrial or a huge pile of rocks. Now that the high res photos of piles of rocks are available, Hoagland still can’t let the idea that they were built by aliens go. So much for scientific impartiality. ---
**Author:** ![Yellow\_Rights](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Yellow\_Rights](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yellow_Rights)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2006, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-deal-with-cydonia/381208/28 "2006-11-21T19:45:33Z")
Thanks for the input guys, those conspiracy sites make it sound so convincing lol. ---
**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:** [November 21, 2006, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-deal-with-cydonia/381208/29 "2006-11-21T21:01:42Z")
And as usual, everyone ignores the [_other_ face on Mars](http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap990315.html). 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2006, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-deal-with-cydonia/381208/30 "2006-11-21T23:44:23Z")
[QUOTE=Colophon] In my view, the whole “Face on Mars” thing would never have happened if there hadn’t been a data error leading to a black dot. [/QUOTE] Interesting, I hadn’t heard that before. Are all the black dots data errors? There’s a row of dots making an apparent hair line. Is that also a data error? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2006, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-deal-with-cydonia/381208/31 "2006-11-22T00:20:42Z")
[QUOTE=RJKUgly] I will say it looks like it was carved by water run-off . . . [/QUOTE] **That** would be a fact of monumental importance if it were true – it would prove that Mars once had not only free, nonfrozen water, but a whole **lot** of it, enough for a heavy precipitation cycle. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2006, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-deal-with-cydonia/381208/32 "2006-11-22T00:23:14Z")
[QUOTE=Bosda Di’Chi of Tricor] **Yellow\_Rights** , the supposed “faces” & “pyramids” on Mars are just wind-eroded rock formations, seen in shadow. Debunked ages ago. [/QUOTE] But the canals are **real!** ---
**Author:** ![JimOfAllTrades](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@JimOfAllTrades](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JimOfAllTrades)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2006, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-deal-with-cydonia/381208/33 "2006-11-22T20:12:17Z")
[QUOTE=BrainGlutton] **That** would be a fact of monumental importance if it were true – it would prove that Mars once had not only free, nonfrozen water, but a whole **lot** of it, enough for a heavy precipitation cycle. [/QUOTE] Yeah, I agree. It does look like to me something that would come from water swirling around, but I’m not even a partially educated layman when it comes to erosion and geology, so I’m probably way off base there. Most likely caused by wind and sand. But wouldn’t be cool if there had been that much water? ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2006, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-deal-with-cydonia/381208/34 "2006-11-22T20:31:27Z")
[QUOTE=Peter Morris] Interesting, I hadn’t heard that before. Are all the black dots data errors? There’s a row of dots making an apparent hair line. Is that also a data error? [/QUOTE] Yes, absolutely. They’re all over. Look at the larger picture [here](http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/mgs/cydonia2.html). All those same-sized black speckles are blank pixels caused by data dropouts in the original tranmission from Viking 1. ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2006, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-deal-with-cydonia/381208/35 "2006-11-22T20:32:35Z")
[QUOTE=Colophon] All those same-sized black speckles are blank pixels caused by data dropouts in the original **tranmission** from Viking 1. [/QUOTE] See what I mean? Data dropouts everywhere. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-deal-with-cydonia/381208.md?page=1)