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Comment by tomrod | Hacker News Reader

The push for human on Mars is misguided in that we aren't taking enough risks.

We are one bad cosmic event from total known life annihilation. That would be a bad day

We are nowhere near being able to support and propagate life unaided on Mars. Life on mars as a backup for life on earth is like keeping bitcoin in case of a technological collapse.

Is this an argument for doing more or doing nothing?

It's an argument for doing the right things.

Today, that's more.

And how do you think we would go about achieving that capability?

Except Mars has already had total life annihilation, so I'm not sure what the point of using that as your argument is...

Stick a few people on an already-annihilated planet where they will never become self-sufficient, anyways?

If you want humanity to escape vulnerability on earth, your best bet is to not go into another gravity well at all. Esp one with no ionosphere, thin unusable atmosphere, brutal storms, and toxic fine sand everywhere.

The moon makes a lot more sense -- easier to manage shipping/trade with earth, no gravity well. And if you need off a planetary body completely, build orbitals.

Also many life-terminating events for earth -- local (galactic region) supernovae or other mass irradiating event, our own sun flaming out, etc. would just do the same to Mars.

What kind of cosmic event would transform Earth in a worse place to support life than Mars currently is?

Impact with a rogue planet?

Grey goo?

A directed gamma ray burst could affect the solar system: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RLykC1VN7NY A nuclear powered bunker seems much more pragmatic than generation ship(s) to another star system to survive one.

I would argue that a civilization that is actually capable of building a generation spaceship, should be capable of defending their planet from GRBs.

How? I have no idea.

Then again, we also have no idea how to build an actually working generation ship :D

In the long run an overheated planet Venus style is much harder to deal with than a cold, nearly airless one. Anything that triggered mass plant death and decomposition could do.

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