Wells' ending; it may not have worked

[Andy120290]

I'm sure everyone knows the ending of the War of the Worlds where the Martians die as a result of exposure to Earth's bacteria. But I believe that it may not have gone that way. Bacteria that lives on Earth would have no way of "attacking" very foreign lifeforms. Bacteria on Earth would be adapted to attack other Earth organisms. Martians are a completely different form of life. It is unlikely that the bacteria would be able to adapt to the Martians.

[theredweed]

Are you taking about the fact that Earth bacteria would no be able to attack Martian organisms, due to 'the lack of informaton' to dumb it down some what. Truth be told, we dont know what chemicals the Martian's would have in their system, so would not able to answer if they would be killed by Earth bacteria.

At the end of the day everything is a cell in its basic form and so the Martians are made up of cells, which allows Earth bacteria a 'way' of attacking the Martians.

[Andy120290]

I first thought of this idea while I was thinking about Robert Zubrin's book "The Case for Mars." Although the problem in the book is backwards. He was describing what the consequences (or the lack of consequences) of bringing a sample of Martian soil/rocks to Earth aboard an unmanned spacecraft. If there were life on Mars, such as Martian bacteria, it would pose little hazard to life on Earth. Basically, your taking a bacteria from Mars, a cold, hostile place, and trying to get it to infect completely different form of life. If you reverse the idea, you get what was described in Wells' book. But then again, if the two different forms of life were similar enough, then the Martians could be infected.

[Rob]

Presumably to use the blood that martians got from their human victims their chemical make up would have to be fairly similar.

[theredweed]

They are all chemicals in one form or another and they have different properties.

Our bodies don't get affected by our bacteria, the chemicals in a Martian body could be broken down very easily, however the increased level of oxygen in our atmosphere, may given them extra strength (as described in the book) but it also may be attacking certain Martian cells.

The Martians would be carbon based lifeforms, which makes their degeneration very possible with our atmosphere

[RustiSwordz]

Andy is right, it could go either way, very prone to attack or very resistant.

[theredweed]

I am on the fench to, I possible to things, the only way to be sure is the get a martian down here and sneeze on the little bugger

[wotwfan48]

theredweed said:

I am on the fench to, I possible to things, the only way to be sure is the get a martian down here and sneeze on the little bugger

hihi, very funny. it is fun that we member of wotwonline, can analyse a story, even if it is a Scifi, that keeps the story alive.
Chantale. ;D

[theredweed]

story!!! story???

Aa crap, I thought it was a historical document, dam me and my gulibility and horrible sister

[Lensman]

It's entirely possible that life originated in a spore which was carried to Earth or to Mars on a meteorite. Either Mars or Earth could have been the origin of life on both planets.

Many kinds of bacteria specialize in attacking one specific species, and the Martians would be immune to these. But many other kinds of bacteria can attack any type of flesh; IIRC the so-called "flesh eating" bacteria being one example of that. In such a case, so long as the Martians had the same basic body chemistry as ours-- and if life on both worlds had a common origin, they would-- then the Martians certainly might be affected.

[beecus]

lensman said:

It's entirely possible that life originated in a spore which was carried to Earth or to Mars on a meteorite. Either Mars or Earth could have been the origin of life on both planets.

Many kinds of bacteria specialize in attacking one specific species, and the Martians would be immune to these. But many other kinds of bacteria can attack any type of flesh; IIRC the so-called "flesh eating" bacteria being one example of that. In such a case, so long as the Martians had the same basic body chemistry as ours-- and if life on both worlds had a common origin, they would-- then the Martians certainly might be affected.

You beat me to it he he, there is a theory that life on Earth was the result of an meteor impact on Mars that sent bacteria Earthwards, so basically all life on Earth is Martian in origin anyway.

[Stewymartian]

Bacteria probably wouldn't have a problem multiplying within a Martian if the body chemistry is reasonably similar to Earth lifeforms (and since the Martians quite happily feed on us we can safely assume that this is the case).

A Virus on the other hand is a different story. In order to replicate a virus has to get into a host cell and use the host to reproduce itself. For this reason virus's are normally species specific, causing infection in only one specific host. There are exeptions and situations were virus's mutate and make a jump from one species to another (the emergence of HIV from SIV, for example). But the Martian, although based on similar chemistry will be different enough from any Earth creature to be unaffected by a virus. The virus would not be able to get into the cells of a Martian.

So it was probably the putrfactive bacteria and the commensal flora (the harmless bacteria that lives in our guts and on our skin) that killed the Martians and not the common cold.

[Killraven]

stewymartian said:

So it was probably the putrfactive bacteria and the commensal flora (the harmless bacteria that lives in our guts and on our skin) that killed the Martians and not the common cold.

So they basically rotted alive! Nice!

KR

[mastertemplar]

Think about it this way, there are billions of different types of bacteria, lots of good and bad ones. You have to think, if one of these bacterias managed to have a negative effect on a Martian it would kill them. Over the years everyone has seemed to think it is something that we know that kills, but realistically it could've have been a bacteria which helps with the growth of Apples.

And anyway, bacteria is adaptive, it is the equal most adaptive organism on earth, right next to viruses. It wouldn't take long for at least one strain of bacteria to evolve to effect the Martians.

[Killraven]

Good point Mastertemplar

And of course we all know the third most adaptive organism on this planet, don't we!?

KR