In my opinion, the United States should fund a mission to Mars. This mission would strictly be for exploration and not for colonization. I believe that the mission should strictly be for exploration because there is just to much uncertainty about Mars. There are ground-breaking ideas and theories about mars continuously being discovered. Due to this, our current knowledge of Mars is insufficient and therefore it is too risky to colonize mars. I hold this position because I would like for the mission to Mars with humans for colonization to be a success, but in order for that to happen we need to do more research about mars. I believe that for that time being, we should continue to use rovers and robots to continue to broaden our understanding of Mars. It is just not safe enough for humans to go to for research, let alone colonize Mars.
With such an amazing feat of being able to go to Mars, comes the financial issues that come with it. According to Pascal lee, in the 1960s the Apollo lunar landing program cost around 24 billion dollars over 10 years. This means that NASA had invested around 4 percent of the U.S. GDP to do the Apollo mission. To make this more understandable, the U.S. DEfense Department spend about 24 billion per year during the Vietnam war. This means that doing the whole Apollo mission cost about the same amount as one year of war during the Vietnam war. Jumping 50 years later, NASA’s budget has increased to around 20 billion a year while the Department of Defense gets around 400 billion per year. The cost of the mission wouldn’t include just the spaceship and travel itself, but food, supplies, and water for the long journey whether it be a few crew members or a group of people looking to colonize Mars. In my final point, the U.S. government does not have the mission to Mars on its priority list, but other private companies such as Mars One and Space X do.
Along with financial issues, there could also be technical issues that may occur during the mission to mars. These technical issues would include propulsion, and landing. There is an issue with how we would actually land with the landers supersonic speed. One way to slow down a Mars lander would be to use supersonic retropropulsion during its final descent to the planet’s surface. This would include firing rockets in the opposite direction that are faster than the speed of sound to possibly slow down the lander. With the Martian atmosphere, the usage of supersonic retropropulsion is a must. There comes major issue and risk to this, by firing rockets at supersonic speed, we could potentially send shock waves that damage the Mars lander. This could potentially shake the lander apart. There would also be an excruciating amount of heat that is generated by the rocket exhaust that would heat up not only the rovers, but the crew inside. Also, NASA has little to no experience with supersonic retropropulsion which even further complicates its chance at succeeding.
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The last main issue that would occur with the mission to Mars would be health issues. It is extremely dangerous at all levels for human space exploration. The risk is similar to that of climbing Mount Everest. Mars has a harsh and unforgiving environment where one little mistake or incorrect calculation can result in huge failure, injure, and even death. The gravity on mars is less than that on Earth. Due to this, there would be major bone and muscle loss spending time on Mars. If those people or researchers would stay on Mars for an extended period of time, then due to the differences in gravity on Mars and Earth, they would have bone loss and muscle loss. This is because gravity is lower on Mars and this would allow the human body to lose bone and muscle loss due to less use. Along with bone and muscular loss, there would be mental health issues that would occur on the trip, let alone on Mars.
Humans crave attention and affection, so being isolated with a few people over a long period of time would cause them to basically go crazy. There would be love/hate turmoil that would occur because of the long journey. In a 2008 study, a group of people were locked in a confined space for a long period of time in order to simulate the mission to Mars. Events spiraled and went out of control when one of the crew members refused to have sex with her boyfriend and was accused of spending too much time with a third astronaut. The boyfriend ended up breaking the jaw of the third astronaut in frustration. Had this occured on the long journey to Mars, the behavioral results would have been detrimental to the mission. NASA has not investigated the issue of sexual relationships on simulations for the mission to Mars.
One argument that is commonly used against my position is that if we send a small team of researchers to Mars, why can’t we send those who can buy a ticket along with them. The answer to that is simple, it’s just too dangerous. There is still too much we don’t know about Mars and sending other humans who aren’t capable of helping with the research would mean they would just be getting in the way. In conclusion, we should do more exploration on Mars with rovers and eventually qualified scientists and researchers before we even think about sending other humans for colonization. It would be unethical to send these unqualified humans to Mars, it would literally be their death sentence because we don’t have the right technology or sufficient knowledge of Mars to send people to colonize.
