[3RTB297]

Yeah, it's full-on fantasy. Why would we as a species waste time terraforming a planet proven to let its atmosphere evaporate into space? Why waste energy to drag materials from Earth there instead of spending the same energy and materials to fix whatever problems Earth has?

At least in a billion years we can expect we would be either extinct already from our own actions, or hope to be advanced enough as a species to move Earth's orbital path out a touch every couple millennia to keep us in the Goldilocks zone.

Maybe by then we can terraform the Mars by crashing a few dozen comets and detritus from the asteroid belt into Mars to keep the Martian iron core, add heat enough to keep it molten and spinning for a while, add enough mass to get the gravity about 9.8 m/s2, reboot a tectonic cycle, combine 2 satellites into 1 good one, and try to add water to the system overall.

You know, just a regular Tuesday for whatever species we evolve into.

[JumpCrisscross]

> Why waste energy to drag materials from Earth there instead of spending the same energy and materials to fix whatever problems Earth has?

One of these is a challenge at the frontier, the other an exercise in stewardship. They attract different personalities.

[legulere]

I guess the argument is, that there is just some initial resource usage to get a self sufficient mars colony and all further development can happen without resource strain on earth