Populating Planets

Another ambition also fires the imagination of many​—the desire to populate and exploit other planets. George Henry Elias, in his book Breakout Into Space​—Mission for a Generation, writes: “The construction of an interplanetary civilization is essential to the survival of our species. . . . We humans now occupy an entire planet, and it is time for us to move on to a larger habitat. An empty solar system awaits us.” His immediate sights are on the planet Mars.

One person who definitely thinks man should go to Mars is Michael Collins, former astronaut who piloted Gemini 10 in 1966 and also piloted the command module of Apollo 11, which took man to the moon. In his book Mission to Mars, he says: “Mars seems friendly, accessible, even habitable.”

Bruce Murray, longtime manager of Pasadena’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, strongly advocates a joint United States-​Russian venture to Mars. As a cofounder of the Planetary Society, he has recently pushed the “To Mars . . . Together” initiative. He says: “Mars is the planet of the future. It will constitute a playing field for the adventuresome members of future generations.”

Marshall Brement, former U.S. ambassador to Iceland, writes: “The two countries can teach each other much in this field [of space]. The Soviet manned space program is second to none; Soviet cosmonauts hold all the records for time in orbit. . . . Commitments by both nations to establish together a station on the moon, to circumnavigate Venus, and to land on Mars could have great scientific value.”

The Planetary Society, which includes as a founder Cornell University astronomer Carl Sagan, published “The Mars Declaration,” which stated: “Mars is the world next door, the nearest planet on which human explorers could safely land. . . . Mars is a storehouse of scientific information​—important in its own right but also for the light it may cast on the origins of life and on safeguarding the environment of the Earth.”

We have already seen that many scientists are optimistic about mankind’s ability to reach Mars and settle on it. Human curiosity and a yearning for knowledge will no doubt continue to impel men and women to expand the frontiers of discovery. One of the purposes of the Hubble Space Telescope, according to a NASA fact sheet, is to “search for other worlds, other galaxies and the very origins of the universe itself.” NASA also states: “The outlook for space activities in the 21st century is exciting and challenging. We can envision such important achievements as industries operating in orbit, Moon bases, and manned expeditions to Mars. Now that the space frontier has been crossed, there is no turning back.”