| The primary points the article raises are: * Potential life after recent detection of suspected liquid deep water * Not enough reserves of gases remaining to eventually thicken the atmosphere * Lack of a magnetic field to preserve the remaining and new atmosphere if created 1. Life has always been possible on Mars. The discovery of liquid water improves this but doesn’t affect possible colonization efforts. Short term, people will be setting up to survive either on or near the surface. It will be important to stay away from such areas except for study, but that doesn’t preclude human settlement efforts. 2. Terraforming in any form is a long term (centuries) goal. The state of the atmosphere won’t degrade in anymore significant way in the mean time. There are more than enough resources in the solar system to import material if that ever becomes a goal for Martians. 3. There are proposals already for satellites in Lagrange points between Mars and the Sun to generate artificial magnetic fields to slow down and prevent the stripping of the atmosphere. By the time technology like this is required, millions of people will already be living there for at least a century or more. So overall the gist of the article would be like telling colonists to the Western Hemisphere in the 1500’s that it’s not worth trying because building a highway across the continent is impossible with current technology. While true at the time, there was no need for such a long term goal back then and wasn’t for centuries. Plus one thing about Mars is that no one’s there to displace. Scientifically I care a lot about planetary protection and discovering if life exists there, but that is ultimately less important than colonizing Mars. It’s not like it’s going to spring complex life on its own and we would ruin those chances. It’s a planet’s worth of gravity and natural resources that aren’t going to do anything on their own. |