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> I fail to see how one could actually live on Mars without sacrificing 30 or more years of lifespan. Maybe they just cant can't, but don't care. Some people c
by donkeyd 9y ago
> I fail to see how one could actually live on Mars without sacrificing 30 or more years of lifespan.
Maybe they just cant can't, but don't care. Some people could be willing to decrease their lifespan in order to colonize a different planet, making the human race interplanetary.
Also, theoretically, people will evolve over time to be able to handle those conditions. We're used to making plans a couple years ahead. When thinking of interplanetary colonization, we should think many generations ahead.
- vkou 9y agoEvolution happens over many generations, if people who are less fit for survival die before, or are prevented from reproducing. You don't want to go down that road.
- seanp2k2 9y agoThe alternative is to stay on a planet where 20-40% of people don't even "believe in" evolution or taking care of the planet which their eventual descendants would need to inhabit, many times in favor of short-term capital gains. I fail to see how we're not already, as of about a hundred years ago, pretty screwed either way.
- vkou 9y agoWhat makes you think that all the worst aspects of our myopic culture won't follow us into space?
- ericb 9y agoReproductive fitness is less scary--it doesn't always mean "prevented from reproducing" * Imagine 20% of the population has adaptations that make them better suited to mars--they keep their teeth, their bones are stronger, they do well in sports, they have more energy to take care of kids, so they have 1 extra kid on average. In one generation, that percentage is 30% and in one more it is 45%, one after that and it is the majority and heads toward 100%. What we'll be looking at is speciation. Also, evolution is at-work on our population as we speak--it doesn't take breaks.