You have to keep in mind we're teetering on the edge of an exponential explosion in knowledge. What's been done in decades with all of our rovers and probes on

You have to keep in mind we're teetering on the edge of an exponential explosion in knowledge. What's been done in decades with all of our rovers and probes on Mars could have been accomplished in a matter of days by a single human on the planet. That's not an exaggeration. For instance we're coming up on Curiosity 6th year on Mars in a couple of weeks. It's traveled, in this entire time, a bit less than 13.3 miles. There's an ongoing odometer available here [1]. And it's had some major instrumentation errors (such as with its drill) that a human could have trivially repaired on site. Only question is how long is it going to take us to get those feet on the planet. From there? I'd expect major discoveries will be a matter of months. [1] - http://curiosityrover.com/tracking/drivelog.html http://curiosityrover.com/tracking/drivelog.html