Extraterrestrial Life: Where is Everybody?
The results from the Viking search-for-life experiments on Mars will undoubtedly continue to fuel fierce debate among exobiologists for a long time.
For science, the discovery of life on Mars would have been a momentous achievement, adding immeasurably to our understanding of the nature of living beings on earth and the origin of life. For humankind at large, it would have been a monument to our time with lasting impact on our view of nature and our philosophical beliefs. As it is, one of the greatest scientific and engineering enterprises of the 20th century has yielded results that, in their final consequence, are neither positive nor negative but inconclusive-and very definitely far from final.