/sci/ - Science & Math

>>4755277

>And new species are important, why?

From a commercial standpoint, pharmaceuticals. From a scientific standpoint, genetics, taxonomy, explaining more about aquatic stages of evolution and discovering new forms of life.

>"Finding out if there is or ever was life on Mars would fundamentally change how we perceive the universe and ourselves as a planetary biosphere."

You won't find life on Mars. You'll find it on Europa, and ocean world. Even so, it's stupid and childish to care more about a microbe just because it's on Mars than something like this, just because it's in our ocean.

Why would you want to go down there? In space there's infinite possibilities. There might be some aliens that are scary, but also some that are beautiful and friendly. In the deep ocean it's 100% nightmare abominations. Everything is hideous insanity fuel and wants to kill you. It's everything bad about space with none of the good. In space, you search out new life. In the deep sea, the life finds you, and your body is never recovered.

What is the point of finding new life forms there if everything we find is just freakier and more poisonous than the last thing and it keeps getting worse and worse? For fuck's sake stop looking. We are obviously not meant to go there.