[meteorite-list] Mercury question

From: Pete Pete <rsvp321_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Fri, 17 Jun 2011 16:19:57 -0400
Message-ID: <BAY153-w33CF6109A75A927450DFBCF86D0_at_phx.gbl>

I love it when scientific consensus gets turned on its head with facts!

(My first astronomy book, Golden Library of Knowledge, "The Moon", 1959, has three theories for the creation of lunar craters; volcanic, meteorite, and the bubble theory - popping bubbles while in a molten state)

 

I'm assuming that angrites are slowly being discounted from Mercury origin?

 

Cheers,

Pete
 


> From: sterling_k_webb at sbcglobal.net
> To: meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
> Date: Fri, 17 Jun 2011 13:20:09 -0500
> Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] Mercury question
>
> Carl, List,
>
> Only one Mercury question?
>
> What is revealed from the first bulk composition
> scans is that Mercury surface, and presumably its
> crust, is composed of high-potassium non-feldspar
> rocks. In a word, Mercury is nothing like it's
> "supposed" to be.
>
> Mercury appears to have been made (the rock
> part) from high-volatile stuff, a notion that stands
> everything everybody has ever thought about
> Mercury on its head.
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mrBCExa2Rgw&feature=player_embedded
>
> Being non--field-geologically literate, I would
> like somebody on the List to post a list of Earthly
> high-potassium non-feldspar rocks rich in sulfur.
> I suppose that would be a bunch of high-potassium
> metallic sulfides, because one of the things we're
> seeing is a lot of sulfur on the surface of Mercury.
> Those yellow markings and stains in the photos?
>
> I don't think anybody ever thought Mercury
> would be a place rich in volatiles -- completely
> illogical.
>
> Welcome to the Real World...
>
> When I started out every book said the craters
> on the Moon were volcanoes. We spent a noticeable
> amount of the time we were actually ON the Moon
> looking for the evidence for lunar volcanoes. There
> aren't any volcanoes on the Moon.
>
> In one of the early Messenger flyby's there was
> a featured imaged called "Spider" crater. I posted
> here that I was pretty sure it was a caldera volcano.
> Now it appears that a lot of the "craters" on Mercury
> MAY be volcanoes.
>
> It would ironic (at the least) if we were to go from
> "Moon volcanoes that are really impacts" all the way
> to "Mercury impacts that are really volcanoes"!
> http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/17/science/space/17mercury.html
>
> Even better would be if Mercurian volcanoes were caused by
> impacts, because every geophysicist on Earth rejects the
> notion that impacts could cause volcanoes (and flood basalts).
>
> As long as we are going to be wrong about most
> things, why not be wrong about everything? (I love
> that NYTimes headline "Close Up, Mercury Is Less
> Boring." Well, Earth Monkeys, at least it's not as
> boring as the NYTimes...
>
> Oh, the other thing is that the magnetic field of
> Mercury is bigger (stronger) at one pole than the
> other pole, just in case there's not already enough
> weirdness.
>
> I have an easy explanation; Mercury's core is
> EGG-SHAPED.
>
> Huh? Or two imperfectly merged cores of differing
> sizes from a giant impact that did not completely
> differentiate after the event.
>
> And let's not even get close to the question of how
> a volatile-rich planet with a huge iron core could FORM
> this close to the Sun...
>
>
> Sterling K. Webb
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <cdtucson at cox.net>
> To: "meteoritelist" <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
> Sent: Thursday, June 16, 2011 5:41 PM
> Subject: [meteorite-list] Mercury question
>
>
> > List,
> > I have a question.
> > With this new data from MESSENGER about the surface composition of
> > Mercury;
> >
> > http://messenger.jhuapl.edu/news_room/details.php?id=174
> >
> > What does this mean it terms of what a meteorite would be expected to
> > look like?
> > Would it be metallic -ish?
> > Anyone, Thanks.
> > Carl
> >
> > "Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for dinner.
> > Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote".?
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Received on Fri 17 Jun 2011 04:19:57 PM PDT