Martian Mesa Anomalies

I am interested in hearing from trained geologists how likely it is, in their opinion, that such geometries as pointed out here: http://martiananomaly.com/ can result in Martian mesa as a result of natural causes.

Thanks in advance.

Dilip

Dilip; You can take almost any satellite photo of similar mesa features on earth and if you try hard enough, you can conjure up all sorts of geometric anomalies.

This is just the nature of resistant rock layers that have been eroded along fracture boundaries.

SORRY NOTHING MORE !

I haven't looked at the particular image perhaps. I can't remember. I have to admit, there is a great difference between Earth and Mars. Both the level of ordered expressed terrain is greater on Mars, and the original makeup of the two planets was estimated to be rather different. The history of conditions was differing almost entirely throughout several billion years, and the added mysteries of well ordered and completely unexplained structural assemblies are sure to give a century or more of confusion and disagreement.
Freezing conditions may account for much of the differences, and other aforementioned details will give a partial explanation, but the actual truth of the matter is that the most differing items are of completely unexplained and not carefully discussed failures of science professionals to find a stated accurate technical process estimation. The explanations given remind me of the technical approaches to UFO photos and report responses. Guess a little, change the story to suit the explanation concepts, and refuse to seek a detailing of the mysteries themselves.
We can assume that the forcing of ordered crystallinity was at work withoput much liquid water free in the atmosphere, and not much transport of liquid water during most of the formation processes, so the disordering and mixing of materials was not a matter of volumes of liquid, but may have actually been aided at times by thin film water transience, which can add to the ordering of charges, rather than solvent dis-ordering a material can produce in a charged environment.
A similar to biological process, the ordering of charges may have aided the Mars regularity of formations both small and large.
Ben may want to correct my statement about that possible influence.
I can warn you that I have actually seen private image crops which show rectangular entries, and other technological shaped items built onto Mars mesas in private collections, but if you take notice, the actual X,Y pixel locations, and usually even the source image file numbers are removed from those inexplicable 'anomolies'. I never bother with a presentation which denies others a critical disclaimer and critique process from the source images directly.
Again, I have seen terrain and small items on Mars which I would never expect from either mineralogy, nor from a dry forced crystalline assembly or repeated reordering over great time.
Whole HiRISE photos show similar geometric organized surfaces with multiple angles which are either consistent or patch-quilted into a series of patterns. Eroded lava tubes will commonly issue solids which with erosion will appear under a low power eyepiece as a fabric pattern grid, and Mars may have had a history of giving order in great sum to vast landscapes, over varied timing.
Now I'll look at your suggested images for a few minutes.
Note that I am not a trained geologist by my own statements and understanding here on this blog.
Try the 'Mar Trees NOT' topic for a better detailing of the processes of unusual orderliness and non-Earthly patterns.

Your image referenced was the well known Cydonia Mensae 'face' or faces, and should have been detailed as such.
I have resisted looking in detail at that imaged area for years now, and I'll take an hour to look at it now that I have posted a response. It is as unusual as 'Bounce Rock' to my understanding. Others have given image presentations of the spot which seemed very irregular upon close viewing, so I look at it. These smaller items I make reference to as Spiders of Mars and related terrain features are as well ordered, but in large number, and they are not normal Earth association shaped items.
I've never known how to respond about the 'faces', as there are others I've seen which are much more detailed and less irregular in symmetry orientation and measure. My findings are not large scale, therefore not likely to be presentations of a 'technology' process.
On Earth photos such odd regular similarities almost never occur.
Your large scale landscape items are great for landmarks, and hopefully someday we will relieve the mystery as to the normal weathering versus a hand of intelligence in off-symmetry sculpting of telescopic scale features. I would estimate the looseness of the constructed assembly is as important as the level of ordering.
To find non-terrestrial items of curiosity is one of my habits. I'll look more at items which are in ascendant orderliness, and at objects which may show a patterned recycling occurrence, or which may involve unexplained processes. Evidence of former life or fossils are too small for most all viewing other than rovers.
If I were to leave a trail of intrigue, I would leave a scene as your choice of locations, but with a careful detailing of more elaborate math or unusual repeated geometry in rigid precision. Why would anyone give a rendition of skulls with altered symmetry?
We saw several skull-like shapes in the MER rovers paths, and they were ignored as items of value in the program. Is that humor, distinct avoidance, or foolish handling of new science?
I can't say. I do not know the answer. These faces seem like an interesting large scale set of curiosity items and no more as yet. The detailed items of large number, as with the Spider/fan assemblies, show a population of small objects which may challenge identification, so I stay to those types of mysteries when not looking for the common and the understood.
I see no roads, no foundation pits or patterned constructions around your images other than the four oriented items.
Arts in space, or a well eroded assembly of terrain items of which a few show patterned content. The images will give me a quality standard to relate the originals to in taking a closer look.
Can you give the image numbers on your site, or is there a reason for the missing information? How about here on this blog?
Thanks, hoping you find others in your search.

I'll return.

Why is you site blocked from the Yahoo search process? Were you aware of that problem?
What was the size scale of your images?

The most interesting Cydonia image is this Mars Express observation i guess:

full caption: [link]

A very nice landmark indeed and a place to explore for humans during the next centuries for sure

MPJ.Scientists are not infallible nor are brain surgeons but I would trust their opinions over laypersons.
Dana; Dilip asked for the opinion of trained geologists and by your own admission you are not one.
The honest reply would have been to state this fact at the beginning of your unsubstantiated opinions.

Ben, i do agree with the current consensus of natural formation but with a rest of dought though. If, one day, it realy turns out there is something artificial on Mars this would be the place for looking.
Another interesting thing about this area is that it is located directly at the dichotomy boundary between the southern noachian highlands and the younger northern lowlands. Some even say it may have been a coastal area a long time ago.
So a scientific target as well as interesting from a tourists point of view

As all persons can be either pro or amateur, it is without saying that my acknowledgement in the entry was sufficient. I also have been far more verbose than yourselves as 'pro' and therefore not so avoidance related to the content. If you notice from the various entries the actual detailing is conducted by the not claimed to be professional groups, and the value lies there currently. Please answer the specific question with a real answer and less denial generalities.
Here is an example of the possible planet0wide mineralogical/geological aspect ordering some of the landmark as a possibility. This is apart of my long assembly of Mars geology history as a singular process, as it surely was a mix or singular.
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http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu/ESP_013930_0930
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I listen to you as a professional, and find the results valuable, but too careful, and not a 'risky' response at times.
Extensions of current views may explain the orderliness, or there may be a missing portion of info.

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Large scaled combinations of this could easily account for the patterned ground at the Cydonia region, which is just within the altered Lowlands area in the north. The area was heavily altered and influenced by chemistry which would have been transferred to most of the planet on the record of movement in that area.
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Spider processes could have mirrored the same source in patterned formation or alteration, and all may be related to the other.

Wrong image above at #8.
My apologies in the mis-coded images above-they are small, early Mars rover images, and are only a related similar formation processes in the Meridiani area, at a great distance from Cydonia location.

Cydonia is 'downwind' from the Chryse outflow basin and channel origins of the 'liquid' presumed materials which flowed from the Tharsis northern surface path which includes the Vallis Marineris rift depression passages. The surface of the highlands generally south of the Cydonia region shows both large surface impact and 'cone/mound' features, and the area north of the Cydonia 'faces' show many smaller elevated 'cone/mound' features. The erosion slumping of the mounds forming the basis of the 'face' mounds shows force and other alteration potential arriving from the northern plains realm, and from the southern transition to Highlands realm. Using images of Cydonia Ben or other professionals might be able to describe the sequences of events which are rather complex and 'scene altering'.
I would like to present a few details which are of possible general Mars value, as the area is new to my viewing, and I'll make changes in my impressions as I detail the HiRISE images I am downloading now.
Here is a first series of related aspects from current missions(early MER and early HiRISE photos).
First to replace the images of reply #8.
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A view of a relatively complete 'blueberry' spheroid lower formation, with the spherical 'berry' embedded in the layers. We are viewing the stem and two arched or curved 'wing' structures extending beyond the hidden spheroid. The features are marked. Sol 039, other images of the day from MER Opportunity linked and marked in this entry.
The scale size is a fraction of an inch here.
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The connection to Cydonia features is tenuous, but related to the Mars Spider formations, and the 'blueberries', or spheroids, which I show here related to a larger Cydonia 'mound', as a possible volcanic structure, or upwelling oceanic lower spreading/subduction formation.
Ben may want to challenge my suggestion that the margins of the Northern Lowlands are similar to Earth's oceanic spreading zones in some aspects and that the process of tectonics plate movement was underway all across Mars, with obvious recorded differences in the two planets structurally.
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I see in the mound imaged by HiRISE, in this altered and marked small 'browse' image, the character of polygonal possible 'postpile' or, embedded 3D layered, type, formations of a very large size scale, and the shaping and detailed content of a 'Spider' or smaller 'blueberry' spheroidal formation as would be seen in the Meridiani region. I have prepared an inset sub-image from a Opportunity MI original, marked by file number, with a secondary image giving a differing viewpoint of the same 'blueberry' formation also marked with notations. At the bottom of the MER MI image is a matching violet colored box showing the small 'blueberry' spheroids have close association with the polygonal layered material as a mixture of varied formations with a close physical relative size scale, appearing similar in both scales of view.
To find such co-incidence as others in these images should be agreed as the basis of the science of the new Mars re-adjustment period following a vast new cataloging of new and formerly never seen information. These all extend the older views of Mars and make the newer views more the current science, and the older 'staid' views no longer adequate.
New impressions are in order with the newer more detailed information.
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A view of the Opportunity Sol 039 MI structures at a varied angle, giving the association of polygons to the 'blueberry' spheroidal, and polar Spider structures as a common formation and process. As the formation may reveal varied controlling environmental causes, or effects and actions, the information is general and specific to the sites shown,
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The source images have been altered and some rotated to associate the shapes and patterns. The size scale differences are enormous.

Cydonia features are related to both the blueberry spheroids and the Spider polar formation of Mars.

The area was very active, and influenced by large scale planetary actions. Even the 'face linear 'side to side' features are perpendicular to major concentric rings in sequence which point to some of the largest events on Mars still viewable.
Forces have thrust material from the southern and the northern directions in planet-wide events, both across the material surface, and across the atmosphere/surface boundary, moving volumes of material, and altering the Cydonia formations and mounds or mesas.
Even the Tharsis bulge stress faulting and fissures were just below the most noticible surface features nearby Cydonia, and they are angled toward some of the more resistant linear mound peaks and point to the Cydonia location, as a possible formation influence.
Large volumes of out-gassing and flow movement processes were present in relatively recent timing, as they are clearly well shaped, and detailed, and remain the surface features.
I'll post additional images in a second posting reply.

Ben, you may believe my extensions of thought are too far-flung or distended, but the matches are as real as many others we argue here. I did not present a 'professional' case, only a survey view of new images, with more detailing to be shown.
If requested by the topic host, I'll present this on an additional topic for discussion.

I expected at least one mis-statement to correct again. the sentence at #9 above;

'Even the 'face linear 'side to side' features are perpendicular to major concentric rings in sequence which point to some of the largest events on Mars still viewable'
should have read,

'Even some of the 'face' linear 'side to side' features are parallel to major concentric rings in sequence and the perpendicular source angles point to some of the largest events on Mars still viewable. '

Many of the ancient events in the area are not much viewable now, and some are missing entirely, except in the remaining effects of aged materials related and still near the surface. My referenced 'major' events are seen in the Google Mars views, with many nearly not seen even there, without editing alterations of takes from the Google Mars imagery. I believe the altered views and the original views of Google Mars are not permitted for publishing even in a blog such as this, so I'll check on the permissions.

A view of an ESA/DLR/FU berlin/G.Neukum source image from MPJ's thumbnail links at reply #4, with marked areas of Cydonia mesa/mound linear features which match varieties of polar Spider formations, and, in alternatively colored boxes, several flows with margins showing large numbers of small sized cones erupting gas or more along the alteration fronts. A source of energy in a variety of directions, various force types, and periods of timing, giving character to the Cydonia mesa/mound patterns.
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Dana; I can't argue with your comparison of the similarity of various sized features.

Although, I don't think it is particularly unusual.

My problem is their origin and I can only explain them in terms of my experience as a geologist.

I apologize for an comments about what you see.

There are examples in the Cydonia region of cones, mounds, channels, erosion in what should be depositional active areas, as in this example following, and many other active causes for the 'mesa' erosion, but no explanation I can think of for the human faces and skulls other than basaltic type mineralogy.
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These are not the closest views available. Closeups show apparent true liquid smaller channels and possibly just ice melt.
The channel appears fault based, probably as it is straight in the deeper levels, but that is common for liquids to erode faults in loose material.
No dust in the channel.
Pooled missing material flows now just front rims viewable.

An example from the IR 'Red' version of this source HiRISE image, PSP_007770_2205, which shows the front edges of the 'wet' flow of solids all across the smaller image frame. The size is 2X, altered slightly for contrast and sharpness, and as can be seen, the solids are left cohesive at the limits of movement, with the main flow volume now depressions of missing material.
As these are referred to as 'mud volcanoe mounds' commonly, it is necessary to find the actual content of water or other liquids influence to prove a liquid state, and not a fluidized solid was present. The trough/channel bottoms are not flat depositional areas, so the liquids may not be responsible for the formations.
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'No dust in the channel.'

Dana - those are dunes in the depressions. Dunes = consolidated dust. This effect was interpreted by Hoagland as glass tubes and as vehicle tracks. (giggle). Cydonia only got public attention because an early, very very poor resolution image of an eroded mesa (common in this area)looked like a face. Like Ben I don't think there is anything unusual here.

This eroded mesa still looks roughly like a face in newer observations like this :
http://viewer.mars.asu.edu/planetview/inst/themis/V10598012
Nice effects swithing to different bands btw...

or the reference MEX observation of re4

No worries - its just nature

My concentration on the smaller items at Meridiani and the larger scaled items from the MRO HiRISE satellite imaging gives me an impression of rather unique objects on Mars, with unexplained differences in the mix of items, which, when resembling Earth type items, are either dismissed as unimportant, or, not interesting as they are as yet unexplained by others. Finding the unusual seems to equal a denial or dismissal without a studied response from many here.
I can see the angularity of strong residual linear portions of the 'facial' and skull patterned mounds, and know there is a story behind the patterns. Not a subject to dismiss lightly.

Here is a view of the PSP_007962_2635, the dark streaks and spots related the Spider patterns of the polar region. This shows there is a detailed growth, 'cycle', and ending landslide process in the dark dune spots. Not something to dismiss lightly as well. This may relate to the local mounds also.
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Dana; I don't think folks on this forum dismiss lightly the items you mention.

The problem is we try to explain them based on an earthly environment we are familiar with and if they don't fit there aren't many comments you can make.

These polar processes which are co-incident in the far north and south, Spiders, fans, dark growth or alteration processes, resemble the peak of the 'face' mound, and the connection otherwise is relatively slim as yet to my viewing, however, as the areas may have experienced similar climate and conditions at times, it seems worthy of a close look.
I need to do some work on finding a mathematical inclined person who can give a simple equation for the various features in the most undistorted appearances. If you know of someone who is not busy doing research professionally, please ask for a token amount of resource applied to these process appearances. The answer is not in the equation, only the process ordering. The real question dilip was asking is about the math of the terrain mineral assemblies in large scale, and I was offering basalt as mineral which has a propensity of near right angle graininess, or fissure at small scale.
The smaller angle measures could be the local former large scale events by incidence angle, and rarefaction line formation, uplifting stresses, and other relater causes.
At the core of the polar dark streak feature is a series of mounded cone-like shapes with a short armed 'starburst' or star-dune type outer periphery. They are hard to view, and many dark streaks have these at the core, similar to the Spider formations.
Local cones in Cydonia may be very different however.

While browsing some old observation i rediscovered a nice MEX observation - it fits to the context of this topic.

Full caption

Explanation by the MEX-Team: "These concentric ridges are superimposed by the linear yardangs which indicates that the ridges are older than the yardangs. The origin of these ridges is still debated. Supposedly they are older structures laid open by the erosional force of the wind, maybe they are lava flow fronts or frontal moraines of ancient glaciers. Another possibility are several layers of landslides which have been eroded. Later they were superimposed by sediments and then exposed again. "

Somehow it looks like earthly open cast mining

MPJ; Looking at the anaglyphs of these linear features (wich is slower than molasses in winter) they appear to be more erosional features than yardangs.

Any one else want to comment.