Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2020/09/14/possible-sign-of-life-on-venus.html
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Still only halfway through his scale.
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So what they’re saying is…
♬ It’s a godawful small affair 
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Musta got lost…
I really hope not. Or at the very least, I hope it’s just simple microbes.
Not because it wouldn’t be awesome, but because as far as we can tell large scale alien civilizations don’t seem to exist. Humanity’s prospects look a whole lot better if the explanation for that is “life is rare” or “intelligent life is rare,” compared to if it’s “intelligent life almost never achieves something like that.”
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Biogas signaling possible life on Venus? Are we certain that men are from Mars?
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On that note, let me recommend one of the best Soviet era SF films, Planeta Bur (Planet of Storms). Its a cute bit of brain candy about a mission to Venus. Its got big robots, lizard people, and carnivorous plants! Footage of the film was cribbed by Roger Corman and used in at least 2 other films.
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The researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of Manchester, and their colleagues
The lead author on the paper (and the person who first spotted the signal) is Prof Jane Greaves, from Cardiff University. I can see why a US based blog would want to mention the US involvement, but it’s a bit rude to blank the people who actually instigated the research.
And for UK folks, apparently there’s a Sky at Night special on it tonight on BBC Four.
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Hopefully whatever lives on Venus can’t survive the intolerably harsh climate of earth.
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This is one scenario where quarantining returning vehicles (like Apollo) would be absolutely justified.
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Data: There once was a man from Venus. Whose body was shaped like a…
Picard: That’s enough, Data!
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That’s a right and proper xkcd because,
in a lab (“PH₃” is phosphine) you can make phosphine this way:
3 KOH + P₄ + 3 H2O → 3 KH₂PO₂ + PH₃
But that takes some high temperature and pressure; y’know, like they have on Venus
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I mean, I entirely agree with the general principle, that chemicals associated with life on a planet full of the stuff are much more likely to be evidence of alien chemistry on a planet not known to have any. But picking that specific example…I don’t really associate Venus with water and alkaline conditions. 
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Yes that particular reaction, obviously ill chosen by me, is one among many, here’s another:
by disproportionation of phosphorous acid
4 H₃PO₃ → PH₃ + 3 H₃PO₄
no water (which is probably available in the atmosphere of Venus) nor alkalinity necessary
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