![]() It is quite possible that the first manned exploration of Mars will be accomplished by the private sector, followed by private developers who know that if people will buy houses in deserts and flood plains on Earth, they’ll buy them on Mars.īut these interplanetary entrepreneurs should remember a simple rule: if the government has to pay you to build somewhere, it’s not out of generosity. We have already seen how government-funded space programs-the ones that brought us Sputnik and Apollo-have been replaced by private corporations and spacefaring billionaires. Such capitalization of terraforming does not seem implausible. “Generous funding attracts gigantic corporations that compete to expand their businesses and emerge as the most influential force behind the terraforming,” explain the rules. The briefly described premise of Terraforming Mars is that a World Government has decided to make Mars so hospitable for humans that they don’t need to walk around in space suits. Rather, the genius of Terraforming Mars is that it takes a topic that should be as dry as a Martian dust storm and turns it into a fun family game that elegantly captures many of the essential processes necessary to make a planet of milk and honey. Although the topic is formidably complex-how many people do you know who are qualified to renovate planets?-the game is not a hard-core scientific simulation requiring degrees in astrogeology or exobiology. It’s that lure of the grandiose that explains the pull of Terraforming Mars. God may have created Earth in seven days, but rendering Mars into Tahiti will take centuries. Some religions believe that humans were created in the image of divine beings, and what could be more god-like than stewarding an entire planet? In that vein, Terraforming Mars, developed by Jacob Fryxelius, is a game in which each turn represents not a year, but a generation. There is something foundational about the concept of terraforming. Cities, roads, homes, factories, and laboratories will appear as humans try to make a home for themselves.īut will that new home look like their old one? Would Mars be sustainable or become an environmental disaster? To help us find out, we have Terraforming Mars, a board game of humanity’s epic attempt to turn Mars into Earth. ![]() And when enough of them do, they will do what people always do when they arrive in a new place: they will build things. Eventually, humans will set foot on Mars. For love of knowledge or lure of profit, the human drive to explore the unknown is too strong. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter whether we land on Mars in five years or 50 years, or whether the first expedition wears a corporate logo or the NASA emblem. While no one would mistake the two planets for twins, add some RVs, tents, and people in shorts to the image in your mind of the rust-colored Martian landscape and you would think you’d stumbled upon tourists in the Nevada or Arizona deserts. Although Mars is half our size, it does have polar ice caps, water buried in the soil, and an atmosphere. Most important, Mars is geologically much more similar to Earth than the sizzling rocks and oversized ice cubes that comprise the rest of the solar system. ![]() It may seem far-fetched but remember this is the guy who already launched himself into space once. Space entrepreneur Elon Musk has even unveiled plans for a Mars-capable rocket. Yet as interplanetary moves go, the Red Planet isn’t such a bad journey: the average distance between Earth and Mars is just 140 million miles, which is feasible to reach with current technology. If and when humans colonize the stars, they could “terraform” alien worlds by modifying their atmosphere, climate, and ecology to make them more like home.Īnd what better candidate for terraforming than Mars? True, it lacks a few amenities that people look for in a new neighborhood, such as breathable air, liquid water, and soil that can grow food. And then there’s the other estimated 8.7 million species here, each with its own environmental needs.īut other planets are a different matter. Maybe instead, there would be an abundance of clean water and greenery.Įxcept that we can’t redo Earth: most of its current human tenants would surely object to being evicted while we bulldoze their planet, not to mention the impossibility of finding some kind of motel to house 8 billion people while Earth is built anew. What if we could create a new planet without all the centuries of ecological errors that haunt us now? On Earth 2.0, there could be no air pollution or desertification. What if we could rebuild Earth from scratch? ![]()
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