Is there life on Mars after all?

FINDING MARS: NASA’s Spirit Rover took a photo that showed a woman-like figure descending a shallow slope.

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New Delhi: Men are from Mars, women from Venus---or so the saying goes.

So what is a woman doing on the red planet?

A photo taken by NASA’s Spirit Rover showed four years back shows a woman-like figure descending a shallow slope. NASA didn’t make a fuss then, but now it has created a furore, and the images were only shown on Chinese websites.

The point is if human faces can be seen in the clouds then that doesn’t mean that they are really there.

HG Wells had people running for their lives after airing War of the Worlds on the radio. And in 1976, a human face's photo from NASA's Viking orbiter had people swearing they had finally found ET.

NASA however, dismissed it as a trick of nature and lighting. Much more believable are the frozen carbon dioxide clouds on Mars.

Found recently, their unusual shape suggests Mars still has cyclical air currents like those on Earth.

Mars could have had flowing water once as rovers have found surface chemicals and what looks like a dry seabed that usually need water to form.

To see Mars for yourself you have to go to Google Mars. Just like Google Earth, it gives you high quality satellite images that you can zoom into for free.

Like Mars, other distant planets that could harbour life have been found. Not just scientists, but millions like you and me use our PCs to hunt for ET through the SETI project.

So it may be just be human to want to reach out or perhaps we want proof that we aren't freaks of nature and that life will go on even after we are gone.