Science Forums 2

[CraigD]

Originally Posted by Thunderbird

NASA has on occasion suggested that the human race could one day colonize Mars, and also initiate life to take hold on the surface. I understand that there have been nigh Sayers in the past about the limits of science, and I hate to be one, but I do not believe this at all feasible. It is a dead planet, and always will be, period.... What do you think ?

The notion of quickly turning Mars into a world where humans could comfortably live without special full-body-covering suits with breathing and temperature control features is, I think, pretty unrealistic.

The idea that we could muddle with Mars on a global scale in a way that makes it somewhat less expensive for human habitation strikes me as not infeasible.

However, such actions any time soon would be, IMHO, a great mistake, because it would terribly complicate the study of Mars, and thwart increasing our knowledge of the solar system, particularly how the inner planets including our own, formed and change over time.

In the far future (when “the far future” will be, I can’t guess), making Martian surface conditions similar to Earth’s might prove a great feat of “show off” engineering and entertaining novelty. Such speculation is, IMHO, properly the domain of SF.

The main reason for terraforming Mars is to gain human living space, which Mars has potentially a lot of - although much smaller than Earth (about 11% Earth’s mass), it’s all dry land, with about as much land area as Earth. The likely tremendous financial and material cost and uncertainty of such a project (or even just getting humans to Mars), and the abovementioned cost to science, and the feasibility of simply building artificial human-friendly worlds (O’neill cylinders, etc.) at lower cost and greater certainty, and affording lower-cost space travel, argues against terraforming Mar.

Originally Posted by Thunderbird

It is a dead planet, and always will be, period....

Though not as obviously alive as Earth, I think the question of life on Mars is far from settled.

Originally Posted by Thunderbird

Does NASA know something about Geophysics that I do not?

I would hope that NASA and its affiliates, packed as they are with the most apt and educated specialists on the subject, know a lot about Geophysics that you, I, and the collective membership of hypography, don’t know.

They also, I think, have a penchant for and a vested interest in producing scientifically plausible and esthetically pleasing popular edu-tainment on the subject of terraforming Mars, as well as the means and will to do good science considering its possibility. NASA is not only a science and engineering organization, but a education and self-promotion one. I trust it’s people are and will remain grounded enough in respect for basic science to avoid actually attempting such a program as a grand PR stunt, or some dubious get-rich scheme.