To Mars By 2023—Are You Ready?
According to the Dutch space company Mars One, humans will colonize the red planet Mars by the year 2023-Just 11 years from now! Initially, it would be a four-person team to arrive, and later they would be joined by additional people every two years. The expected travel time is a projected seven years! To add credibility to the project, it has the support of a Nobel laureate, theoretical physicist Prof. Dr. Gerard 't Hooft.
Paul Römer, the co-creator of Big Brother, is also a promoter of the project, so it is possible that the news is just a publicity gimmick for a new reality show. However, assuming that is a a truthful report, would you volunteer to be a member of the four-person team if offered? Remember, the journey would be one-way, since the idea is to permanently settle in the planet.
The red planet lacks atmosphere, therefore, the settlers have to spend their life in confinement—isn’t that just a glorified prison? What makes our life so interesting on this earth is the interaction with strangers, making us intellectually content. More than the nature, the trees, the rivers, the birds, the winds and the mountains, people need people, and often “other” people, to draw energy from them to survive and grow. This is often overlooked by the “Libertarian” theorists and the extreme rightwing conservatives, who preach that they are only for themselves.
Indeed, No man is an Iland, intire of it selfe; every man is a peece of the Continent, a part of the maine, as said by the English writer John Donne in 1624.
So, think again, is living and dying on Mars really as romantic as it may sound?
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