Alien Jellyfish or Camera Glitch? Experts Debate Odd Photo Taken on Mars - PetaPixel
A mysterious object captured in a Mars Curiosity Rover photo has sparked online speculation about alien life. Experts suggest the 'jellyfish' shape is likely a camera artifact caused by a cosmic ray strike or a transmission glitch.
Why it matters
It highlights how pareidolia and digital artifacts can lead to viral misinformation regarding space exploration and extraterrestrial life.
A photo taken by the Mars Curiosity Rover a few years ago has resurfaced online, and that’s because it shows something strange on the horizon.
Taken on Curiosity’s Right Navigation Camera on August 20, 2023, there is a figure hovering on the horizon. Through human eyes, which are admittedly prone to pareidolia, a domed head and tentacles appear to hover above the ground — kind of like the invaders in War of the Worlds .
Cue recent headlines like “Mysterious ‘jellyfish’ spotted in NASA Mars photo sparks theories of life on the Red Planet,” by the Daily Mail . But whatever it is, it really is on the original photo , per NASA’s website.
There was a photo taken just 13 seconds earlier, which doesn’t show the “jellyfish.” That led to some people speculating that a giant invertebrate is scuttling around extremely quickly over the Martian surface.
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