14 DAY TRIAL // Ridley Scott’s “The Martian” is set to open in a few weeks and so, understandably, Mars - the planet, not the chocolate bar - is too in the limelight, along with protagonist Matt Damon and the rest of the cast.
Now, researchers would have us believe Mars is a desolate place. Nothing but frozen, dry plains and empty skies as far as the eyes can see.
True, there are some robots hanging around, but we sent them there so they don’t really matter. By all accounts, there’s not much happening on the Red Planet.
But we know better, don’t we? Mars isn’t just some alien desert and nothing else. There’s a lot of commotion going on, and we’ve got photos to prove it.
So, without further ado, here are some of the absolute oddest things seen on Mars over the years, definite proof that the Red Planet is more like Earth than brainiacs would have us believe.
The face
In 1976, NASA’s Viking 1 spacecraft beamed back an image of what appeared to be a face simply staring at us from deep space. Truth be told, the similarity was uncanny. The supposed alien face came complete with a mouth, nose and eyes.
Except that, in 1998, when NASA’s Mars Global Surveyor managed to get a closer look at it, the Martian face turned out to be a hill. An odd-shaped one, but a simple hill nonetheless.
The finger
If conspiracy theorists are right, then perhaps NASA should send a forensics team on the Red Planet before it does astronauts. Not to prolong the suspense, word has it there is a severed finger on Mars, perfectly filed nail and all.
Check out the gallery below to see it for yourselves. Note: if you think it looks more like a rock than a human finger, that’s because it is a rock. One that the Curiosity rover chanced to come across in 2012, to be more precise.
The woman
In 2007, NASA’s Spirit rover caught a glimpse of a human-like silhouette. The image soon went viral, with people saying the silhouette was that of a woman walking across the Red Planet, perhaps on her way to work or maybe back home.
Once again, scientists offered another interpretation: what the Spirit rover saw on Mars was not a woman, it was merely a rock. Yup, just like the face and the finger.
The iguana
Human memorabilia aside, it looks like there are also animals on Mars. Among them, an alleged iguana photographed by the Curiosity rover in January 2013.
Once again, researchers insist there is no alien zoo or anything of the kind on this distant orb. The supposed iguana was - all together now - a simple rock.
The door handle
If we were to believe conspiracy theorists, not only are there aliens on Mars, but they’ve been there for long enough to build homes. Homes complete with doors and, naturally, door handles.
Either this or a rumored door handle photographed by the Curiosity rover back in 2013 was too nothing but a rock polished by Martian winds to resemble one.
Except for these, there’s also a flower, a thigh bone, a helmet, a rat and a gorilla. Like always, scientists deny all rumors and insist they’re all just rocks, albeit ones that resemble animals or people.
So why do we see things on Mars?
The reason we tend to see all sorts of crazy things on Mars is because our brain is hard-wired to search for familiar patterns in images that, at a first glance, make no sense whatsoever. It’s what scientists call pareidolia.
The same psychological phenomenon explains seeing faces on grilled cheese, ketchup stains or maybe bruises. Rest assured, seeing faces where there are none to be seen does not make anyone crazy. As mentioned, pareidolia is perfectly normal.
