(Apr 4, 2024 07:23 PM)Yazata Wrote: https://twitter.com/spacesudoer/status/1...6125778173
I'm increasingly starting to feel that the challenges of colonizing Mars aren't much different from those of colonizing the Moon -- and actually greater due to the distance. ("NASA paying four companies to learn how to make fuel on the Moon")
Elon is probably still entertaining the idea that the Red Planet can be terraformed. But I don't see that being realistically possible until fully self-replicating machines are developed, and multiply by billions or trillions on its surface, as cooperative instruments of environmental transformation. And by then it will probably be superfluous whether Mars can be made like Earth. The machines will already be adapted to surviving in its current status, and human colonists a rather purposeless addition or ornamental slash luxury element.