NASA to Hold News Conference on Astrobiology Discovery

Perhaps a good moment to re-read this:<p>Why I Hope the Search for Extraterrestrial Life Finds Nothing: <a href="http://www.nickbostrom.com/extraterrestrial.pdf" rel="nofollow">http://www.nickbostrom.com/extraterrestrial.pdf</a><p>tl;dr: "Because it means life is not incredibly unlikely (after all, it occurred on two planets in our own solar system); ergo what must instead be incredibly unlikely is the ability for life to progress to the point where it can spread across the galaxy (after all, no other life form has contacted us); ergo we are doomed."

I keep seeing stories pop up here that NASA has some upcoming announcement, but I never remember to follow up on the announcement day to find out what the hubbub was about. I'm starting to get annoyed that a government agency thinks it needs to save "the big reveal" for a press conference. Why not just make the announcement?

Likely scenario: they found ancient life forms in lake Vostok, deep below the Antarctic ice.<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Vostok" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Vostok</a>

Considering Streptococcus mitis already survived a period of 3 years on the Moon, and amino acids were found in soil retrieved by the Apollo astronauts, my hopes are high.<p>edit - source: <a href="http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/1998/ast01sep98_1/" rel="nofollow">http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/1998/as...</a>

Jason Kottke looked at the speaker list and thinks it's photosynthesis using arsenic. See this thread: <a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1953228" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1953228</a>

Would the discovery of microbial extraterrestrial life have any significant impact on your life?

They figured they should talk about their discoveries of life on other planets before Wikileaks says it first

Perhaps they've sussed out something about what we should expect to see in extraterrestrial life at the molecular (e.g. DNA) level. The biggest clue is the list of participants. One of them specializes in research on non-standard biology. I'm guessing the announcement will be something along the lines of, "It's life, Jim, but not as we know it", and it's right here on Earth!

I'm really hoping to officially hear we're not alone :)

This sounds very much like the plot of Deception Point: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deception_Point" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deception_Point</a>

mars is the result of an oxygen catastrophe where, unlike the earth, life did not survive.

The Andromeda Strain!

Maybe they will be announcing that Roswell has some secrets, after all.