[meteorite-list] Mars life concerns

[Ron Baalke]

>  
> 1 to 1,267,650,600,228,229,401,496,703,205,376.
>  
> The above number represents the probability of a coin being  flipped 100 
> times and yielding 100 tails in a row. Maybe I missed a factor  of two, but that 
> is really not important.  (and for 50 times it is still on  the order of 
> Avogadros's number).  The point being, the probability of  getting 100 organisms of 
> all the same species from the zoo that lives in, on and  around humans is much 
> worse than these odds, due to competition.  So maybe  double the amount of 
> digits to the left of the decimal point?  Or maybe  with some dependence they 
> improve...that's would be quite an improvement...to  "most likely".

That's a big number, but totally irrelevant to the discussion at hand.
The scientists took a swab of a foam insulation from the camera, and incubated
it for 4 days, and observed growth of S. mitis.  What are the odds
of getting 100 organisms after 4 days of incubation allowing it to grow and
multiply?  

Ron Baalke