Turtle lookalike shells on Mars

Here's a NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS Curiosity Mastcam image from Sol 568 with a solitary green object present. It reminded me a little of the turtle shells but the surface looks more like a cactus or something.



mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/raw/?rawid=0568MR0023040010304019E01_DXXX&s=568

lets pretend that nasa found something on mars. I wonder what nasa thought when they saw the very first up close HD photo of something that another "intelligent being" made on another planet. what do you think was going through there minds at that moment??? I am curious to see what others think. thank you all. ben..

If it happened the way you describe, their reaction was probably similar to this classic bit . My best guess is someone somewhere has known the real Mars for a century, perhaps longer. I think on the surface they were publicly discredited, but somewhere Schiaparelli and Lowell's theories and observations were taken seriously. So I don't think anyone who has seen HD lossless Mars images wasn't ready for what they saw, they knew before NASA was formed as an agency. Some of the details have been leaking out over the years in the form of science fiction stories. For instance take James Fenimore Cooper's novel "The Spy" . Published in 1821, it tells the story of a Revolutionary War spy for George Washington named Harvey Birch who conducted his activities under the name "Mr. Harper". As a work of fiction it had action and romance. It was really the first American best seller (Cooper would go on to write "The Last of the Mohicans") setting a trend for fiction in the U.S. for many years to come. The prototype of Harvey Birch however, was based in reality. The general public would not be aware of the spy "Culper Ring" until confirmation was discovered in Washington's personal correspondence collection in 1929. In reality, "loyalists" Abraham Woodhull or Robert Townsend would spy for Washington under the name Culper (Sr. or Jr.). Many details of the story were fairly accurate and common knowledge for over 100 years before anyone really knew Washington actually had spies. Now there are several books written about it and even a fictionalized version on TV. What Mars fiction out there is really more accurate then we know?

Hi, Todd, you make a great point, and you hit the nail on the head!!! for me when you said: anyone who has seen HD Mars images wasn't ready for what they saw, they knew before NASA was formed as an agency.

Given the minerals detected near Nili Fossae , maybe a jade is possible (nephrite or jadeite).