Final Project

Rachel S.

Legislator:  Rodney Ellis, Senator

Mars: The Impact of Scientific Discoveries on Pop Culture

Whenever humans think about extraterrestrial life, the next step in manned space exploration, or possibilities for colonization in space, Mars comes to mind. Being close to earth and similar in size, Mars has always seemed both familiar and mysterious. The paradox of Mars’ proximity and scientists’ lack of knowledge about it up through the early twentieth century caused massive speculation and even hysteria about Mars and Martians. As scientific discoveries became more advanced and detailed, however, public opinion on Mars shifted to a more enlightened and hopeful perspective. It is doubtless that throughout history, scientific investigations and discoveries about Mars have greatly impacted the public opinion.

As early as 1570 BC, this trend was already in evidence. Relying solely on the naked eye for observation, Egyptian scientists noticed Mars’ red color and its retrograde motion. They referred to Mars as “Har Decher” (the red one), and “Horus of the Horizon,” a God who had the head of a hawk. They also spoke of the planet traveling backwards through the sky. The Egyptians knew little more about Mars than that it, Mercury, Venus, Jupiter, and Saturn were different from the sun, moon, and stars.

The Babylonians developed slightly more extensive studies of astrology. They called the planet “Mars Negral,” meaning the great hero or the king of conflicts. The Greeks and Romans also associated Mars’ red color with blood, naming the planet after the Roman god of war. Without the aid of telescopes, popular opinion on Mars was shaped solely by observations such as color and movement that could be made by the eye alone.

From 300 BC on, scientific understanding of Mars rapidly improved. In this sense, Aristotle led the pack; from observing the moon passing in front of Mars, he concluded that mars was farther away from Earth than the moon was. Later, the astronomer Ptolemy published his book Almagest, describing Ptolemy’s theories on planetary motion. Danish astronomer Brahe made detailed measurements of Mars’ location in the night sky. Kepler used his observations of Mars’ orbital motion to form his three laws of planetary motion. Galileo Galilei made perhaps the most significant contribution to the understanding of Mars by refining the telescope to the point where more details of the Martian surface could be seen. After Galileo’s adjustments, astronomers began sketching surface details of Mars, including Syrtis Major, which was first drawn by Dutch astronomer Christiaan Huygens. Huygens also theorized the size of Mars, its distance from Earth, and the length of its day; he made a drawing of Mars that included the Southern polar ice cap, and in 1698 published Cosmotheoros, a book about whether or not there is life on Mars. The subject of Huygens’ book indicates that even as early as the seventeenth century, the populace was already fixated on Mars and the idea of life on Mars.

A discovery made by Giovanni Schiaparelli fueled the fire. In 1877, Schiaparelli produced a detailed map of Mars including some geographical features he called canali, the Italian word for naturally occurring channels. Canali was mistranslated as “canals,” causing massive speculation as to who had built the canals. This was the age of canals, around the time when the Eerie canal and the Panama canal had been built. Martians, it was assumed, must be very intelligent and technologically advanced in order to have built these canals. Other scientists ate up the idea of Martian-built canals. Schiaparelli’s observations contributed to the image of Martians as powerful and ultra-advanced, leading the way to the horror branch of the science fiction genre. H.G. Wells’ novel The War of the Worlds illustrated the Schiaparelli-fueled Martian image. In the novel, technologically advanced Martians flee their decrepit home planet and invade Earth in order to take over its resources. In the end, the Martians are thwarted by terrestrial germs. The War of the Worlds caused mass hysteria when a radio dramatization done as a newscast by Orson Welles convinced many that Earth was, in fact, being invaded by Mars. The idea of Martians as evil, bloodthirsty geniuses lived on in science fiction throughout the next century, such as in the movies Devil Girl from Mars (1954), Flight to Mars (1951), and Planet of Blood (1966).

As the image of Mars was still foggy but largely in the public eye, propagandists began to make societal commentaries by portraying Mars as a utopia (or dystopia). In Charles Cole’s novel Visitors from Mars: a Narrative, an elderly inventor finds an advanced and rational Martian utopia. However, the novel is really more a criticism of earthly irrationality and lack of advancement than an effort to evoke a true picture of Mars.  The Soviet propaganda film Aelita, Queen of Mars depicted the horrors of a capitalistic Mars as opposed to the communism of the 1921 Soviet Union.  With the opposite message, the Cold War-era film Red Planet Mars depicts a utopian and capitalistic Mars that somehow topples the Soviet Union on Earth.

In the mid-twentieth century, scientists began to question the canal theory. Clyde Tombaugh, a member of the Lowell observatory, suggested that the canals were actually fractures. Later, some scientists proposed that the canals were actually optical illusions. Gradually, the idea of an evil and advanced Martian race began to fall from popularity. In 1962, the Soviets began to attempt Mars flybys and landers; by 1969, the U.S. was also launching Mars flybys. This outpouring of Earth-to-Mars exploration stimulated a new trend in science fiction: the colonization of Mars by humans. Ray Bradbury was one of the earliest science fiction writers to explore this trend; his episodic Martian Chronicles depicted the colonization of Mars and the consequences for both earthlings and Martians. Later colonization novels often omitted the existence of a Martian race, especially after numerous scientific missions looking for life on Mars failed to find even a microbe. Robert Heinlein wrote many books concerning space travel and Martian colonization, including Stranger in a Strange Land and Podkayne of Mars, which includes some interesting albeit fictional details about life in the colonies. Later entries in the colonization genre painted a grimmer picture; Phillip K. Dick’s The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch and A. Bertram Chandler’s Bitter Pill showed the base and dehumanizing conditions of Mars as Earth’s penal colony. Science fiction returned to social commentary in Kim Stanley Robinson’s Red Mars, Greg Bear’s Moving Mars, and Gregory Benford’s Martian Race, which explore the social and political ramifications of colonizing Mars.

Further Martian missions, which have become more and more frequent over the years, have amounted to a mandate for the eventual colonization of Mars. At first, we feared that Martians would outgrow their planet and move on to conquer ours; ironically, the exact opposite seems to be occurring. Extended space living missions such as Mir and SpaceLab are just steps towards the day when humans will live on Mars. Pop culture has accepted this possibility as the new manifest destiny. One website circulates the “Mars Petition,” which claims that “the time has come for humans to journey to Mars.” At least, the time is coming.

Public opinion on Mars has ranged from mystery to certainty, apathy to wonder, terror to hope, and the shifting power in this opinion has been science’s curiosity and need to question existing theories. The progress of Mars in the public eye mirrors the progress humans have made in understanding Mars as a planet. Mars always has and always will inspire writers, filmmakers, and other artists.  

Mars in the human mind: a timeline

Ca. 1570 B.C. to 1293 B.C.: Egyptians observe Mars’ retrograde motion and name it “Horus of the Horizon,” the red one, a god with the head of a hawk.

Ca. 400 B.C.:  The Babylonians observe Mars, calling it “Mars Nergal,” meaning Great Hero or King of Conflicts  

Ca. 350 B.C.: The Greeks and Romans call Mars Ares and Mars, respectively, both being the god of war.

Ca. 300 B.C. Aristotle concludes that Mars is higher in the heavens than the moon

Ca. 130 Ptolemy publishes Almagest, describing Ptolemy’s ideas of the orbits of the planets

1580 thru 1600 Brache measures Mars’ position in the night sky

1609 Kepler publishes his first two laws of planetary motion

1.   The orbit of each planet is an ellipse with the sun at one of its foci

2.  Each planet will sweep out equal areas in equal time

1609 Galileo is the first to observe Mars using a telescope

1610 Galileo observes the phases of Mars

1619 Kepler publishes his third law of planetary motion

3.   The square of the orbital period is proportional to the cube of the body’s mean distance from the sun

1636 Francisco Fontana makes the earliest known drawing of Mars based on telescopic observations

1638 Fontana produces a drawing of Mars in the gibbous phase

1659 Huygens describes a feature on Mars now believed to be Syrtis Major

1659 Huygens estimates the size of Mars as about 60% of the size of earth

1666 Cassini observes that Mars has a polar cap

1666 Cassini estimates the length of a Martian day as 24 hours, 40 minutes long

1672 Huygens Makes a drawing of Mars including the southern polar ice cap

1698 Huygens publishes Cosmotheoros, a book about whether or not there is life on Mars

1719 Maraldi observes both polar caps of Mars

1726 Jonathan Swift publishes Gulliver’s Travels, in which the Laputians have discovered two moons of Mars. Makes reference to Kepler’s laws.

1784 William Herschel addresses the Royal Society on the subject of Mars

1809 H. Falaugergues records observing yellow clouds on Mars

1877 Schiaparelli produces a map of Mars with surface features he called “canali”

1877 Asaph Hall discovers Mars’ two moons

1894 Lowell observatory established to study Mars

1898 H.G. Wells publishes The War of the Worlds

1901 Charles Cole publishes the utopian novel Visitors from Mars: A Narrative

1905 C.O. Lampland of the Lowell observatory photographs 38 Martian canals

1907 Alfred Russel Wallace proposes that craters observed on Mars were the result of the impact of meteorites

1912 Chemist Arrhenius proposes that observed changes in Martian albedo features are the result of a chemical reaction

1920’s Seth Nicholson and Edison Pettit estimate the temperatures of Mars

1921 The Soviets produce the dystopian propaganda film Aelita, Queen of Mars

1938 Orson Welles makes the panic-inducing radio broadcast of H.G.Wells’ War of the Worlds

1940 J. W. Hewing’s novel From Earth to Mars is a late Utopian novel

1950 Tombaugh proposes that the Martian canals are really fractures

1950 Rocketship X-M, a sci-fi film about a perilous mission to Mars

1951 Flight to Mars depicts human-like Martians battling over limited resources

1951 Ray Bradbury publishes his Martian Chronicles

1952 Red Planet Mars an anti-communist propaganda film

1953 International Mars Committee Established

1953 The War of the Worlds is made into a movie

1953 Invaders from Mars

1953 Abbot and Costello Go to Mars

1954 the film Devil Girl From Mars, a sci-fi horror flick

1950’s NBS produces radio versions of various science fiction novels

1959 The Angry Red Planet evil Martians battle earthlings

1960 Soviet space forces attempt two Mars fly-bys, Marsnik 1 and Marsnik 2

1961 Heinlein publishes Stranger in a Strange Land

1962 Photographic History of Mars published

1962 Soviets launch attempted Mars flybys Sputnik 2 and Mars 1, attempted Mars Lander Sputnik 24

1963 Heinlein publishes Podkayne of Mars, about a teenage girl living in a Martian colony

1964 US launches attempted Mars flyby Mariner 3 and Mars flyby Mariner 4; Soviets launch Mars flyby Zond 2

1964 Robinson Crusoe on Mars

1965 Phillip K. Dick publishes The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch, a cynical prediction of Martian colonies

1965 Soviets launch Zond 3, a lunar flyby and Mars test vehicle

1966 Planet of Blood

1969 US launches Mars flybys Mariner 6 and Mariner 7; Soviets launch Attempted Mars orbiters Mars 1969A and Mars 1969B

1971 US launches attempted Mars flyby Mariner 8 and Mars orbiter Mariner 9; Soviets launch attempted Mars orbiter/lander Cosmos 419, Mars orbiter/attempted lander Mars 2, and Mars orbiter/lander Mars 3

1973 Soviets launch Mars flybys mars 4 and Mars 7, Mars orbiter Mars 5, and Mars lander Mars 6

1974 A. Betram Chandler publishes The Bitter Pill

1975 US launches Mars orbiters and landers Viking 1 and Viking 2

1976 Frederick Pohl publishes Man Plus

1978 a musical version of The war of the Worlds is produced

1986 Invaders from Mars

1988 Soviets launch orbiters/ landers Phobos 1 and Phobos 2

1989 Lobster Man from Mars

1990 Total Recall

1992 US launches Mars Observer

1992 Kim Stanley publishes Red Mars

1993 Greg Bear publishes Moving Mars

1996 US launches Mars Global Surveyor and Mars Pathfinder; Russia launches Mars 96

1996 Mars Attacks!

1998 Japan launches Mars orbiter Nozomi, US launches Mars Climate Orbiter

1999 US launches Mars Polar Lander, attempted Mars Orbiter, and Deep Space 2

1999 Gregaory Benford publishes The Martian Race

2000 Red Planet, Mission to Mars

2001 The Mars Petition circulates on the internet

2001 US launches Mars Orbiter

Bibliography

“100 Years of Martian Fiction”  http://scifidimensions.fanhosts.com/Mar00/mars_books.htm

“Are We Alone?” http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/88aug/easterbr.htm

“Explore Mars” http://www.astrodigital.org/mars/history.html

“Mars Exploration” http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/mep/history/early.html

“The Mars Petition” www.thinkmars.net/petition.html

“Mars in Science Fiction” http://www.scifan.com/science/mars/marsbiblio.asp

“Planet Mars Chronology” http://www-mgcm.arc.nasa.gov/mgcm/fun/mars_chro.html

Last Updated: 09/07/01