Someone told me that they want to go to Mars so they can survive when people finish wrecking the Earth.
I was surprised by that, but probably shouldn't have been. People always like to avoid bad stuff instead of facing up to it. That seems to be normal.
Going to Mars is a nice idea and I like that, but thinking of it as a solution to the environmental train wreck that the human race has made of the Earth, is not at all nice. It won't even work.
If we can't make a go of it on our home planet, why should we be able to manage on a new planet that will take a huge effort to make it even livable? If we don't figure out how to repair the Earth and carry out the plan for repair, then we will only wreck Mars or wherever else we go.
It reminds me of a 9-year-old girl I met on a plane trip. Said, "Wherever you go, there you are." She meant that you can't get away from your problems if you are the problem.
Going to Mars is a good idea if we just want to do it, not if we are going there to escape the consequences of humans destroying the Earth and not bothering to fix the damage in time.
We are perfectly capable of undoing the terrible harm we have done to our wonderful home, the Earth. We don't have a lot longer to start, or it will be too late and our end on our Earthly home will be certain, although not a quick end.
Avoiding a lingering and awful end of human life on Earth, will not be easy. We have waited so long to start working on it, that our chance for an easy way to fix our mess is gone. We chose the hard way by our inaction.
We really need to get started on this right away.
