Meet the new ostensibly "inexplicable" space photo

540939main_messenter_orbit_image20110428_1_full_full.jpg

Face on Mars, meet the X on Mercury. Coming soon to Coast-to-Coast AM, this photo was taken by NASA's Messenger probe. NASA says the X is the result of two separate meteor strikes whose craters are outside the area that can be seen in this photo. When each meteor hit the Mercurian (?) surface, the force of impact threw off material that left behind its own, smaller, craters when it hit the ground. What you're seeing here isn't really an X, but two unrelated, intersecting lines of secondary crater chains.

Or, at least, that's what They want you to believe.

Maggie Koerth-Baker is the science editor at BoingBoing.net. She writes a monthly column for The New York Times Magazine and is the author of Before the Lights Go Out, a book about electricity, infrastructure, and the future of energy. You can find Maggie on Twitter and Facebook.

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Anonymous

This is clearly a message for Mulder and Scully. Keep fighting the good fight you guys!
Deidzoeb

I see a hornet, and a happy bear, a lot of cartoony eyes looking to their left. Forget that, this is the scarred side of Two-Face’s coin.
Editz

I vote for Cartman:

http://www.dwfoto.com/images/cartman_angry.jpg
Chuck

There’s a half-drawn line at the bottom of that X. The whole thing looks like an unfinished rune, which, of course, means that the Vikings made it to Mercury.
- jonathanpeterson
  
  rune? Looks more like a partially-melted pentagram. OMG actual, physical proof of the existence of Hell!
  
  Well, that or a DOOM transport pad.
allybeag

Quite appropriate on a day when we’re all voting away like mad here!
_Username

Space pirates ?
RebNachum

I see the Flame Dagger of the Assassins. (Al Qaeda’s reaching out, apparently.) But we might dig in the middle anyway.
RadioSilence

Sure it isn’t a swastika?
Is that why we never found the secret Nazi Moon-base; because the Nazis were on Mercury all along?
- Michael Smith
  
  Is that why we never found the secret Nazi Moon-base; because the Nazis were on Mercury all along?
  
  Clearly its because none of the Apollo missions landed where they could explore the far side.
traalfaz

I suspect that those chains are actually formed by series of broken up pieces of rock/comets that were broken up by tidal forces of the sun. Whenever a loosely bound object like a comet approaches/goes around the sun (or any large enough object) tidal forces tend to want to tear it apart. This is what happened to Shoemaker-Levy 9 before it hit Jupiter in 94.
youenjoymyself

cbwallday….arrested development…..good call
RedShirt77

If I was there and had a shovel, I would definitely dig for treasure.
olmsteader

X if for Xenu, who lived near the sun.
- Anonymous
  
  Y is a question that should be asked by someone.
Anonymous

Upside down Fantastic Four Logo
Anonymous

It’s….

The Fantastic 4!

http://img715.imageshack.us/i/mercury4.jpg/
JM

They cut from the photo the legend right below the X: “build face here”.
Brainspore

I just hope they don’t find a big X drawn on Venus, because that would mean we’re next.
Anonymous

lol that’s so funny. the x marks the spot thing from the first commenter was the same exact first thought that came to mind when i saw this picture.
Anonymous

Looks like Death Star aim.
@carloshc
Flaminica

Any resemblance to electric discharge machining is entirely coincidental.
Anonymous

No. No. Turn it clockwise about 100 degrees. It’s an anarchy symbol.
bnschlz

With the barb at the bottom it’s clearly a half-drawn pentagram, perfectly circumscribed by the larger crater.
claude badley

Funny how this image is made public so soon after the release of Obama’s “birth certificate.”
Boba Fett Diop

It’s obviously the hidden city of the Ziox people, before they established their empire in northern Alberta. Somebody call Zap Rowsdower!
- penguinchris
  
  ROWSDOWER!?
  
  Even by internet/MST3K standards, that’s a pretty obscure reference!
  - Antinous / Moderator
    
    Apparently, you haven’t watched the interview on the DVD.
Lobster

God damned SPACE PIRATES!
jfrancis

Planet X
Hootie McBoob

“…the Mercurian(?) surface…”

I’d go with “Mercurial”, just for fun.
- sabik
  
  “…the Mercurian(?) surface…”
  
  I’d go with “Mercurial”, just for fun.
  
  “Hermian”, surely?
Anonymous

I’d hate to see the size of that screwdriver!
Mister44

Arrgghhh – you found me booty!

or

Space Jesus!
Anonymous

This post typifies common bad thinking within the sciences.

Yes, you can mention meteor craters, secondary impacts, etc. You are discussing causes and means.

No, you can’t therefore say it is not an ‘X’. Science has almost nothing at all to say about intentionality, much less an exotic intentionality that might be appearing on a remote planetary body.

This is not to suggest that the image is significant. Science simply has nothing to say about the significance of an image like this. To pretend like it does is to use the authority of science to promote your own view of what is plausible and meaningful.
jackbird

Those of you seeing raised domes are probably conditioned by extensive computer UI use to assume the light source is coming from the upper left of the image.

On Windows, as well as in the copy of Firefox 4 I’m staring at, that’s how highlights and shadows on interface widgets are drawn. Not sure about the Mac, but my guess would be that it’s the same.
JM

The only certainty about this pic is that consequences will never be the same…
MarkM

I, for one, welcome our new graffitist Martian overlords.
arikol

Damnit! Who erased half of my pentagram summoning circle?
Grant Henninger

This must be where Captain Kidd buried his treasure. I had no idea the Quedagh Merchant had space travel capability, that’s fairly awesome for a 17th century merchant vessel.
Evan Rappaport

Call Duck Dodgers, it’s the only known supply of the shaving cream atom!
Lobster

“So, what’s the barb at the bottom?”

“Doesn’t count.”
Wordguy

Naturally occurring or not, that’s where I’ll dig first when I get there.
DarthVain

There be Treasure!

Of course they didn’t show you the image next to it that says:

“Here be Dragons!”

Ye been warned says I!
Anonymous

Hot-crossed planet
pjcamp

You can’t play an X and an O in the same square.
Anonymous

It is obviously the Planet X the Summerians reported.
Anonymous

And once again we run into the human brain’s pattern hunting mechanisms vs random distributions.
cbwallday

Those are balls.
- dwdyer
  
  Reminds me — I’ve always had the problem of not seeing craters but raised domes. I can’t seem to manage to get my brain to switch to see depressions.
  - olmsteader
    
    Rotate the picture 90 deg clockwise or tilt your head left and it is pretty obvious they are craters.
    - dwdyer
      
      Oh, I *know* they’re craters, but even tilting around any straight-on shot like this I see lumps. Some slight visual processing defect, I imagine.
JonS

Reposted from this article …
http://www.boingboing.net/2011/05/04/huge-asteroid-to-fly.html#comments
… and tangentially related to this one about Mercury’s X.

Maggie, are you still accepting naÃ¯ve questions?

We know that any sufficiently large asteroid hitting Earth = Teh Bad. That much is obvious. But, what would the consequences for Earth of a big asteroid hitting our Moon? I have no idea, but assume(!?) it would = teh bad, but not Teh Bad?

Cheers
Jon
planettom

“So forget any ideas you’ve got about lost cities, exotic travel, and digging up the world. You do not follow maps to buried treasure and ‘X’ never, ever, marks the spot.”
—Indiana Jones (in INDIANA JONES AND THE LAST CRUSADE)
jphilby

TWO nearby craters ejected IDENTICAL-sized ejecta at PRECISELY 90 degrees? YEah sure NASA we’re that gullible.

The real story? 753 million years ago a very VERY large spaceship roared (so to speak) past Mercury. It’s Terrawatt gamma cannons burst into life for 300 milliseconds as they scoured a Kilroy into that desolate surface. THEY KNEW that one day it’d be appreciated by the lifeforms which were even then emerging from the oozing murk on Planet Two. The name of that ship? was MESSENGER!!
geobarefoot

Humans are such silly Gestalt creatures.
Drabula

leave it to you scientistic secular types to totally overlook the fact that this is really a cross and a sign that Jeebus loves Mercury too.
- Anonymous
  
  jeebas is here for you, dont be frightened of the space racoons – Draculeb
pfooti

Clearly the underground bunker/bakery where all the Jeebus Pies come from.
Anonymous

I knew Steve Jobs was an alien!