[meteorite-list] Mercury Fragments on earth (not)

From: Michael Fowler <mqfowler_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu, 04 Aug 2011 21:10:59 -0500
Message-ID: <CAB39E42-D83D-4F5E-B54D-B01A1145F0D7_at_mac.com>

Perhaps, Sterling, you are saying we should keep an open mind.

I don't totally disagree, but....

There are some things that can help distinguish a meteorite from other rocks, no matter where it comes from.

Number one: It will have or had a fusion crust.

If you take the number of Martian meteorites found with at least some fusion crust, then according to the authors calculations there should be 1/2 to 1/3 as many Mercurian meteorites found also with fusion crust. If so, they should already have a class established like SNC, even if we don't know where they are from. Keep in mind that we thought the SNC meteorites were in some way special, long before we were certain they were from Mars.

Were you saying a Mercurian meteorite won't be recognized as a meteorite or just that we won't be able to tell if is from Mercury?

Mike Fowler

PS At the time when we could have said there are no lunar meteorites, the total number of meteorites known was about 7,000 compared to todays totals of maybe 100,000 and growing! When a science is in its infancy, obviously there are many things yet to discover.

> There was a time when you could say: "The fact that
> Lunar meteorites have not been found on Earth is
> prima facie evidence that there are none."
>
> There was a time when you could say: "The fact that
> Martian meteorites have not been found on Earth is
> prima facie evidence that there are none."
>
> Humans have stared at both and had no idea of what
> they were looking at. Martians were frequent enough
> to get and maintain a class all their own for centuries
> before we knew, and Lunars we probably just tossed
> over our shoulders without a thought.
>
> I say:
>
> This is a time when you (or I) can say: "The fact that
> Mercurian meteorites have not been found on Earth is
> prima facie evidence that we can't recognize them!
> We don't know what they are. We are probably quite
> wrong about what to expect."
>
>
> Sterlng K. Webb
Received on Thu 04 Aug 2011 10:10:59 PM PDT