Page 64 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - August/September 2017

64 The Face on Mars: Fact & Fiction

The Face on Mars: Fact &

Fiction

By Nola Taylor Redd

When the Viking 1 mission returned photos of
the Martian surface in 1976, the image of a
rocky face in the Cydonia region captured the
public eye. Was it a trick of light and shadows?
A remnant of an ancient civilization? Let's take
a look at this intriguing landform.

Discovery and study

As the Viking 1 mission circled the red planet in
search of a landing site for its sister ship, Viking
2, it snapped photos of Mars for engineers at
NASA to study. On July 25, 1976, it captured the
image of a pile of rocks that greatly resembled a
human face. When NASA released the
photograph almost a week later, they described
it as a "huge rock formation in the center [of the
photo], which resembled a human head."
Although NASA scientists quickly
determined that the face was created by tricks of
light and shadows, the imaginative public seized
Although one of the most popular studied perceptional learning - the increased
on the idea that it did not form naturally. Some
people believe that the face is the remnant of an landmarks on Mars, the face is by no means the sensitivity to a stimulus due to repeated
only group of rocks to lie in a visually pleasing exposure.
alien civilization, suggesting that other rocky
configuration. Viking captured several other In a telephone interview, Watanabe gave
outcroppings in the area may be a crumbling
intriguing images, including the Galle crater in the example of cars, which most of us see every
extraterrestrial city. Since 1976, the face has
the southern highlands, boasting a curved day without thinking about them.? This
appeared in a number of popular culture
mountain range and two mountain clusters that automatic processing can be an advantage
references citing it as an indication of life on
create the appearance of a smiley face. A lava because we can respond immediately to an
Mars at some stage of the planet's history.
flow pattern on the large volcano Alba Patera oncoming car.
Books, movies and television have all taken part
looks a great deal like the popular Muppet But having this information so ingrained
in speculation on the "true" origin of the Martian
rubble. Kermit the Frog. The Mars Express images can also cause us to mistake things that are not
captured a skull-shaped mesa. And other, vaguer cars.
In April 1998, NASA's Mars Global
faces dot the surface of the red planet. To show how this can happen, the
Surveyor took more detailed images of the face.
Such structures are not particularly researchers trained people in a lab setting with
Other high resolution images subsequently
indicative of alien life. Even on Earth, what were essentially "subliminal messages."
taken by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and
formations such as the "Old Man of the Subjects watched a computer screen
the European Space Agency's Mars Express
Mountain" in New Hampshire can create with moving dots that were made so faint as to
revealed that original analysis of the images was
aesthetically pleasing imagery without be almost invisible.? In a preliminary test, the
correct; the suggestion of a face is an optical
extraterrestrial intervention. [] subjects could not guess which way the dots
illusion revealed only as the light hits the surface
and wells of the rocks at specific angles. were moving.
Face on Mars: Why During a subsequent training session, the
subjects were asked to identify letters on the
Making faces on Mars
People See What's Not screen - while the dots continued to move in the
background.?
The face on Mars lies in an area known as the There Afterwards, the subjects again tried to
Cydonia region, which falls between the planet's guess the direction of the dots.? Surprisingly,
cratered southern highlands and the smoother
The ability to take in visual cues and basically they tended to guess the direction that the dots
northern plains. Some scientists think this area
fill in the blanks allows humans to process had been moving during the training session.?
would have once lain near a giant Martian
information very quickly, but new research For some reason, the increased concentration on
ocean, back when the planet had enough of an
shows that it also can lead to misperceptions - the letters allowed them to subliminally perceive
atmosphere to hold water on its surface.
like seeing things that are not there. the dots.?
The rocky outcropping that creates the
"It's a manifestation of over-learning, "They learned without even noticing it,"
illusion is approximately a mile across and bears
such as when we find a man's face on Mars' Watanabe said.?
a resemblance to buttes or mesas from the
surface or in a forest or on a cloud," said Takeo But these guesses had nothing to do with
American West. It likely formed from a Watanabe of Boston University. "We've over- what the subjects were currently being shown
combination of landslides and collected debris.
learned human faces so we see them where they during the second test.? In fact, in some cases,
Other mesas are scattered across the
aren't." there were no dots at all on the screen.
Cydonia region, and the orbiters have measured
In 1976, NASA's Viking 1 Orbiter "Learning has been regarded as only
them while circling over the area. The results
spacecraft photographed a small patch on the good for us," Watanabe said.? "But the downside
revealed that there was nothing unique about the
surface of Mars.? The shadows from one of the is if you learn something too well you may not
structural formation of the face itself; it
mesas gave many the impression of a human see what is really there."
resembles its neighboring landforms. Both the
face - a face that has taken on a certain life of its These findings are reported in this
Global Space Surveyor and the Mars Express
own. week's issue of the Proceedings of the National
captured enough data to create a three- To study how our eyes may sometimes Academy of Sciences. []
dimensional look at the fascinating formation.
fool us, Watanabe and his colleagues have