If there’s a place that has been constantly in the mind of all space lovers in terms of a future home in space of mankind, that’s Mars. Impossible not to think here about cultural references – music, fiction and even science, recently– pointing at a moment not so far when humans actually try to live in space.
I personally think KSR’s trilogy was what best has been written in this sense – dreams but with scientific ground. And if you need a reminder about how harsh Mars can possibly be, have a good read at The Martian (the book, not the movie) – it gives you a fair idea.
Point is, distance apart, Mars is our best bet of a life on another planet/celestial body, and not, or not only for gravity (even though this is an important point, at least until we don’t build facilities taking care of this issue on the long term. But real artificial gravity is a complicate one.) It is because, some time ago (bets are all on) Mars did have an environment not so dissimilar from the one we know today – water-rich, for a start. And the conditions on the planet are the most suitable we can possibly imagine at the moment for terraforming a planet.
One day not so far away Earthians will walk on the Martian soil, looking at a sunset a bit different from the one we use to enjoy on the blue planet.
In the meantime, I’m afraid we’re stuck with the imagery Curiosity and the other probes send us from the Martian home.
But good enough for dreaming.
A lovely article:)
Thanks – I meant to insert more views from Mars, but it’s taking me more time than expected to extract them from videos and footage from Curiosity. I’ll add a media gallery later on 🙂