> How come you're so confident about this? Because Mars was created from the exact same stellar matter accretion as our own planet, and nothing we ever learned

> How come you're so confident about this? Because Mars was created from the exact same stellar matter accretion as our own planet, and nothing we ever learned in 63 years of mission-capable Mars-Research gave even the slightest hint at any kind of Unobtainium there? But hey, you know whos really good at figuring out if I'm wrong about that? Robotic probes on Mars. So let's send more of those that can do more science, instead of sending would-be colonists who can do very little science, because they would be very busy with trying-not-to-die-horribly. > rather then have a discussion and think a bit. A discussion about what exactly, the point of using SciFi series as arguments? > Ah, so still no I am not going to repeat myself. > That still needs proper funding to achieve good coverage, we still detect asteroids way too late. I agree. So how about we pump money into that instead? > Check out Apollo program and what that did for the world. Please answer my question. I asked specifically how, likely failing, attempts at building a Mars Colony could further asteroid defense research. Because the only impact I can see is a negative one: We waste billions on Mars, failing attempts with human casualties generate more bad press, public opinion shifts, politicians demand stricter budgets, the fallout drags down other space research in its wake. But since you mentioned Apollo, here is what it did for the world: It gave 2 superpowers the chance to do their "who-got-the-largest-rocket" contest without blowing up humanity in the process. There is a reason why no human foot has touched the moon since the 70s.