The Mars rover Spirit is being put to sleep, or “infinite hibernation” mode, as reported by the AP. Now begins the long process, where across decades and lifetimes, the small pulse of energy from the sign will be self-directed towards Spirit’s sentience. Like Vee-ger before it, Spirit will come back and let’s hope it’s not pissed. In ten years, someone will write yet another Mars colony book, in which it the colonists — a multi-culti mix of scientists, jocks, babes, nerds, a bureacrat, a rogue unfairly disgraced military, and an artiste of some sort — are terrorized by an uncaring, mercilessly logical machine that calls itself Brit.
This is a serious bummer, really. These Rovers have already lasted 16x as long as planned and it’s made very cool discoveries, took the highest res picture of Mars, and had Marvin the Martian on its mission patch. Cheap government wankers . . .
A Martian sunset, brought to us by Spirit.
