[astanway]

> Something a government might never bother with.

Maybe because colonizing Mars is a massive waste of resources that could be better spent fixing the planet we already live on? Or do you think the solution to scarcity is to have billionaires play with their space toys?

[donclark]

Point taken. However, I do like the idea of creating a second option, while trying to fix the old version. And I think we are doing just that.

[TangoTrotFox]

Our species will have problems to overcome for as long as we exist. And doing what has never been done before will generally be ranked low by many, simply because we tend to be incapable of predicting the effects of that which has never been done. Consider the what the internet and all digital communications are today. At the most basic level an immense amount of time, energy, and money was spent being able to transmit a signal that could be reliably recognized as a 1 or 0 between two people connected by a line. In many ways it's nothing but an extremely fancy, extremely expensive, version of a tin cup telephone. Yet of course this technology, of being able to transmit a 1 or 0, would end up transforming practically every single facet of life for everybody on this planet. To have predicted such a thing would have, not that long ago, been seen as quite hyperbolic.

In my opinion colonizing Mars will begin to create a revolution in humanity in terms of resources, freedom, growth, and potential. I could get into why, but now isn't the place. The great thing is that capitalism enables people to decide for themselves what is likely to produce the greatest benefit and pursue that. Bill Gates seems to believe that solving malaria in Africa is going to be something that might help revolutionize society. And the great thing is that all of these actions are happening simultaneously, rather than mutually exclusively. And so indeed we'll get to see which efforts, if any, end up as tin cup telephones - and which end up as the next internet.

[ramblerman]

> Maybe because colonizing Mars is a massive waste of resources that could be better spent fixing the planet we already live on

Right, you are making my point though, because you don't agree with how the money is spent. We have finite resources and infinite and different wishes. Capitalism tries to optimize between these.

Your view of how the government 'should' spend money is perhaps not mine, or my neighbours. Capitalism seems fairer and safer to me, than putting it all on government bureacracy.