Absence of Liquid Water
Apparent lack of liquid water on Titan's surface has been cited by NASA astrobiologist Andrew Pohorille as an argument against life there. Pohorille considers that water is important not only as the solvent used by "the only life we know" but also because its chemical properties are "uniquely suited to promote self-organization of organic matter". He has questioned whether prospects for finding life on Titan's surface are sufficient to justify the expense of a mission which would look for it.
Read more about this topic: Life On Titan
Famous quotes containing the words absence of, absence, liquid and/or water:
“In this absence of nine years I find a great improvement in the city of New York.... Some say it has improved because I have been away. Others, and I agree with them, say it has improved because I have come back.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)
“Your absence has gone through me
Like thread through a needle.”
—William Stanley Merwin (b. 1927)
“Taking a good mouthful, I felt as though I had taken liquid fire; the tomato was chile colorado, or red pepper, of the purest kind. It nearly killed me, and I saw Gómez’ eyes twinkle for he saw that his share of supper was increased.”
—For the State of California, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“I respect the ways of old folks, but the blood of a rooster or a goat cannot turn the seasons, change the course of the clouds and fill them up with water like bladders. The other night, at the ceremony for Legba, I danced and sang my fill: I am a black man, no? and I enjoyed it like a true Negro should. When the drums beat, I feel it in the pit of my stomach, I feel the itch in my hips and up and down my legs, I have got to join the party. But that is all.”
—Jacques Roumain (1907–1945)