Once the outstanding physicist Enrico Fermi got into a dispute with the theoretical physicist and convinced ufologist Edward Teller. The future developer of thermonuclear weapons launched into reasoning that many stellar systems should be "according to the principle of similarity" inhabited by aliens. To which Fermi threw a sarcastic remark: "Have you ever thought about the fact that if aliens exist, then where are they all?"
The surface of Mars sometimes shows something that could be mistaken for the remains of buildings
Dispute of scientists
Over time, this question has taken on the form of a paradox, and for almost 65 years it has haunted the enthusiasts of interplanetary contacts. What was not suggested for explanation! And the version of the uniqueness of earthlings, and the idea of a space reserve, and the assumption that other civilizations are “non-technical”….
One of the latest hypotheses is related to probes-berserkers. These "space conquistadors", according to the Californian physicist John Brandenburg, could destroy the Martian civilization, and possibly destroy the neighboring planet Phaethon.
At first, Professor Brandenburg was inclined to the version that a colossal explosion of a natural nuclear reactor took place on Mars several hundred million years ago, filling the planet with radioactive debris and dust.
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In his reasoning, he relied on the discovery of an underground nuclear reactor in the bowels of the Oklo mine, which was launched by nature about a billion years ago. Then, in the rocks of West Africa, an underground stream washed the uranium deposit, playing the role of a neutron cooler and moderator.
Explosion in the Acidalian Sea
In the Brandenburg model, a vast ore body of converging veins of uranium-235, thorium and potassium existed for about a billion years at a kilometer depth beneath the Martian Sea of Acidalia. The leaked underground waters launched a nuclear reaction, for which the uranium concentration had to be within 3%.
Several hundred million years later, the Acidalia reactor began producing nuclear fuel in the form of uranium-233 and plutonium-239 faster than burning it. The strong neutron flux also led to the formation of large quantities of radioactive potassium isotopes. At some point, the reactor went into critical mode - the water boiled away, which led to an increase in the neutron flux and the start of a spontaneous chain reaction involving uranium-233 and plutonium-239.
Due to the large size of the ore body itself and its position at a kilometer depth, the reaction continued without explosive destruction up to sufficiently high burnup rates.
According to calculations by Brandenburg, the energy of the explosion was equivalent to the energy from the fall of a 30-kilometer asteroid. However, in contrast to the asteroid impact, the explosion center was closer to the surface, and the depression formed by it was much shallower than the impact craters.
The region with a high concentration of thorium is located in the northwest of the Acidalian Sea in a wide shallow depression. The presence of traces of thorium and radioactive isotopes of potassium indicates that a nuclear catastrophe occurred several hundred million years ago.
Atomic disaster model
According to planetary scientists studying the structure of the surface of the Red Planet, its features are associated with "ordinary" geological processes, and not with an old atomic explosion. In this they are supported by the researchers of Martian meteorites, who do not find any anomalies of their isotopic composition.
Reasoned criticism of the hypothesis of the explosion of a "natural Martian reactor" forced Professor Brandenburg to change his point of view and suggest that once in the atmosphere of Mars two powerful thermonuclear explosions took place.
The American physicist bases his new hypothesis not only on old arguments of an increased concentration of xenon-129 gas in the atmosphere, but also on new data on the presence of isotopes of uranium, thorium and potassium on the surface.
Based on the patterns of gamma radiation from radioactive elements, Brandenburg believes that the epicenters of the explosions were in the north of the Acidalian Sea and on the Utopia plain. At the same time, the spectrum of xenon isotopes in the atmosphere of Mars resembles similar parameters in the fission of fast neutrons during nuclear tests on Earth.
At the same time, the absence of significant craters in these areas suggests that the explosions occurred above the surface, like the famous Tunguska meteorite. The thermonuclear bombs dropped on Mars were thousands of times superior to the most powerful terrestrial counterparts. Brandenburg even tried to calculate the dimensions for the largest "alien bomb" and received a huge device with a diameter of one and a half hundred meters.
Thermonuclear bombardment of Mars
Martian xenon gas isotopes resemble the components of the earth's atmosphere recorded in the explosions of atomic and thermonuclear bombs. Another sign of a powerful hydrogen bomb explosion on Mars is the anomaly of isotopes of heavy noble gases. For example, the distribution of the Martian isotopes of krypton is somewhat similar to their distribution on the solar surface, in the depths of which a thermonuclear reaction is raging.
Professor Brandenburg believes that the thermonuclear strikes on Mars were far from accidental. In the past, the Red Planet could well have had a climate close to that of the Earth, and biological evolution could lead to the emergence of a humanoid civilization. Maybe the famous "ruins" in the region of Kydonia, where the weathered hill "Martian Sphinx" is located, and rock formations resembling "five-pointed pyramids" are of artificial origin?
If so, then these archaeological artifacts indicate the existence of an ancient Martian civilization of the Bronze Age level. Perhaps these sprouts of alien intelligence were uprooted by some ruthless hand as a result of a terrifying planetary catastrophe.
Ultimately, in a very short period of time, the Martian biosphere disappeared, and the climate became completely unlike Earth. But what could have destroyed a hypothetical Martian civilization?
Berserker raid
The famous British astronomer Edward Harrison believed that the old galactic civilizations should do their best to seize the valuable resources of their neighbors, and destroy them in their "galactic expansion".
Harrison assumed that hostile probes made it to the solar system. At the same time, they destroyed not only the primitive culture of Mars, but also the high-tech civilization of Phaethon - the planet that circulated between Jupiter and Mars.
For a long time in the scientific and popular literature, the hypothesis of the death of the planet Phaethon, torn apart by the gravity of Mars and Jupiter, was discussed in every possible way. It was believed that this is how the main asteroid belt could arise. True, some modern computer models cast doubt on this original hypothesis. The main counterargument here is related to estimates of the total mass of asteroids, which appear to be too small.
At the same time, one of the catastrophic scenarios of the gravitational interaction of a planetoid similar to Phaeton and asteroids involves a sharp change in their orbits. Most likely, this is the reason for the catastrophic bombing billions of years ago, when some of the asteroids began to dangerously cross the orbits of Mars, Earth and the Moon, falling out on their surface.
Phaethon himself, having brought chaos into the inner part of the solar system, disappeared: moving in a highly elongated orbit, the planet could dangerously approach the sun and be absorbed by it. Recently, another version of this hypothesis has appeared, according to which Phaethon did not die, but due to the effect of the "gravitational sling" was thrown to the outskirts of the solar system, replenishing the population of the Kuiper belt or even the Oort cloud.
Harrison, along with like-minded people from the University of Massachusetts, developed a hypothesis that life on Mars was destroyed by a large fragment of Phaethon, the size of Martian moons. The impact of such a planetoid could disrupt the atmosphere and vaporize the seas.
It is still difficult to say which version is more plausible - an impact (or several) of cyclopean asteroids or a thermonuclear attack from space. In any case, if the Martian civilization existed (and this is quite justifiably denied by official science), then its destruction is a formidable sign of the presence of hostile cosmic forces of natural or artificial origin. In the latter case, we get another version of the Fermi paradox, including the scenario of "star wars".
Does this mean that the main danger to human civilization can be created by another intelligent life, much ahead of us in development?
Oleg FAYG