Word: martian
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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With whimsical and bogus tenderness, U. S. newspapers last week kissed their old favorite, the Man from Mars, goodby. Reason: Walter Sydney Adams, astute director of Mt. Wilson Observatory in California, said he had observed the Martian atmosphere for water-vapor content, found none or almost none-in any case (allowing for instrumental error) not more than 5% of the moisture in earth's air. In such dryness it seemed most unlikely that active animals could exist. In making his observations, Dr. Adams used "the most delicate spectroscope yet known...
...spectroscope splits light into patterns in which the "signatures" of various elements and compounds can be identified. Light from Mars comes through the earth's air blanket, which contains water vapor, so Dr. Adams had to separate the terrestrial vapor pattern from the Martian (if any). This he did with the help of a phenomenon called the Doppler effect: when a source of light approaches earth, its spectrum lines are shifted to the right, and when it is receding they are shifted to the left. At times when Mars is fast approaching or retreating, the Doppler effect should pull...
Astronomers have long known that Mars was dry, cold, almost airless. Years ago Dr. Adams found that the oxygen content of the Martian atmosphere must be less than 1 % of that in earth's air (TIME, Jan. 15, 1934). But many astronomers feel that the seasonal changes of the planet's markings must be due to some type of vegetation. For many years Dr. Percival Lowell's hypothesis, that the "canals" on Mars' surface were irrigation canals, prolonged the Man from Mars' existence. He is not wholly dead yet. Animal life may have flourished there...
...then Mars appears much older. It is smaller and colder than Earth, has lost most of its atmosphere and water. But a thin atmosphere it still has, perhaps containing a little oxygen. And Mars has a little water, as the white polar caps show. These caps melt in the Martian summer, accumulate again in winter. The excitement over possible Martian inhabitants was started in the 19th Century by the Italian astronomer Schiaparelli, who described hazy streaks on the surface, called them canali. This Italian word means "channels," was erroneously translated "canals," which connotes intelligent engineering...
Modern consensus, says Astronomer Jones, is that the markings are not canals but natural formations of some sort. So the existence of intelligent beings, or even of any animal life, on Mars is still anybody's guess. If there are any Martian creatures, they must have adapted themselves to a very slow rate of oxygen intake. But all observers agree that there are distinct seasonal changes in some of the Martian markings. Certain dark areas are green in summer, grey or brown in winter. It is hard to conceive that these changes could be caused by anything but vegetation...