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140 Mars mission may be able to penetrate as deeply as 1 kilometer, nearly two-thirds of a mile.*” Archaeology on Earth is growing more sophisticated in its ability to infer elements of intelligence from physical remains. It is not just a search for evidence of humanity, argued anthropologist Paul Wason of the Templeton Foundation, but for evidence of intelligence, intention, or purpose. Part of being an agent with a plan is a deeply evolved ability to recognize the work of other purposive agents—whether in sophisticated electromagnetic wave patterns or in an ancient garbage dump.” Like other approaches to the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, astro- archaeology is subject to being discredited by extravagant claims. A prime example is the monuments of Mars. In 1972, the Mariner 9 spacecraft photographed Martian features that bore some similarity to pyramids. More provocatively, one of the Viking spacecraft orbiting Mars in 1976 imaged a butte in the Martian region known as Cydonia that seemed to resemble a huge human face staring up at the sky. Freelance science writer Richard Hoagland, who discovered the image in 1981, promoted the idea that this was evidence that intelligent life had existed on Mars.” When the Mars Global Surveyor’s Orbital Camera imaged the Cydonia region in 1998, the Face appeared to be nothing more than a jumble of rocks, peaks, and ridges, its resemblance to a human visage caused by a coincidental alignment of sunlight and camera angle. Although this dis- credited the idea that the Face had been constructed by intelligent beings, there was an interesting implication: This was the first time NASA pro- grammed a planetary probe to search for possible evidence of an alien civilization.” Some advocates remain undiscouraged. A small group of researchers known as the Society for Planetary SETI Research has been studying images of Mars since the 1970s, searching for surface anomalies that might have resulted from intelligent activity (they published The Case for the Face in 1998). Such humanoid “faces” are images of ourselves transplanted to an alien environment—a product of the human hunger for patterns that we recog- nize. If aliens ever did build a face on Mars, it would be more likely to look Wen aba sha i oe Mind-Stretcher. Confronted with the greatest works of past civilizations, humans often have believed them to be beyond the powers of ordinary mortals. Some have attributed them to superior beings; the Aztecs thought that the dead city of Teotihuacan had been built by gods. If we encounter Direct Contact The Monuments of Mars like them than like us.