Is there a ruined civilization on Mars? A theoretical physicist runs the numbers | Reality Check (NewsNation)

In this episode of "Reality Check," Ross Coulthart sits down with theoretical physicist and philosopher of physics Maaneli Derakhshani for a long look at the anomalous features cataloged across the moon, Phobos and the surface of Mars. The conversation opens with Lue Elizondo's remarks on lunar anomalies, then works outward to the Phobos 2 spacecraft and the object NASA's own mission literature once described as a monolith along with the reason SETI took that object seriously enough to study.

From there, Max walks Ross through the imagery that has drawn the most attention on Mars, from the so-called glass worm to the rectilinear formations near the Atlantis basin, applying the same fractal analysis that NASA and the Department of Defense use to separate natural terrain from engineered structures. Grounding the discussion in Carl Sagan's own standards for searching for evidence of past life, Max makes the case that some of these features deserve to be treated as genuine open questions rather than tricks of light and shadow. The episode closes on the face on Mars and the geometric relationships between formations that, Max argues, may have been meant to be seen.



[Posted at the SpookyWeather2 blog, July 17, 2026.]