Words: Tom Ward
When Matt Damon became stranded on the Red Planet in Ridley Scott’s 2015 sci-fi The Martian, his survival became dependent on a multitude of complex factors, least of all his ability to grow potatoes in his own shit. When the rest of us, finally go to Mars we’ll hopefully found a solution to the Potato Problem (vast bags of frozen McCains, maybe). Then again, researchers may have more pressing issues to attend to, especially given Elon Musk’s recent predictions that he could start landing passengers on Mars in the next three to four years. Yes, not decades, but years.
Musk – an increasingly controversial figure – founded SpaceX in 2002 and carried out its first private commercial launch in 2013. The next decade saw Musk race to space missions, including ferrying NASA astronauts to the International Space Station, which it did in 2020, and carting private customers into the thermosphere, which it did in 2021. Rubbing shoulders with Musk as they jostled for pole position was Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic and Jeff Bezos’s Blue Orbit, which sent Captain Kirk actor William Shatner into space in 2021 (“All I saw was death),” Shatner would later write of the experience).
The mission to colonise Mars, however, seems a singular obsession for Musk who believes humans becoming an interplanetary species is the next step in our evolution and a necessary escape as global warming makes life on Earth untenable in the not too distant future. Earlier this month, he announced that at least the first step of this process could be closer than we think. Speaking via video link at the International Astronautical Congress in Azerbaijan Musk said of landing on Mars “I think it’s sort of feasible within the next four years to do an uncrewed test landing there.”
So ‘sort of feasible’, and no more mention of placing humans on Mars by 2024 (which could mean as early as two months’ time). It’s all starting to sound a bit like something Scott and Damon might have dreamt up themselves. “It’s actually quite expensive to go to Mars,” Bill Gates told the BBC earlier this year when asked if he thinks Musk’s mission to Mars is worth it. “You can buy measles vaccines and save lives for a thousand dollars per life saved… It just kind of grounds you. Don’t go to Mars.”
But not everyone agrees Musk is engaged on a fool’s errand. “Mars is a harsher place than any on Earth. But provided one can survive the regimen, it is the toughest schools that are the best. The Martians shall do well,” wrote American rocket scientist Robert Zubrin in 1996. In an essay titled ‘The Case for Colonizing Mars , Zubrin likens the colonisation of the moon to the European colonisation of America. “The true value of America was as the future home for a new branch of human civilization, one that as a combined result of its humanistic antecedents and its frontier conditions was able to develop into the most powerful engine for human progress and economic growth the world had ever seen,” he writes, arguing Mars could become a base for interplanetary commerce.
All of which sounds interesting, but would humans actually want to go live 34 million miles away with slim chance of a return ticket home? According to a 2021 essay published in Astronomy , the humans who settle on Mars may not stay human (as we know it for too long) “High radiation, low gravity and other environmental pressures could spur martian humans to mutate relatively quicker than on Earth,” writes Joshua Rapp Learn. Writing for space.com in 2021, Volodymyr Usov, chairman of the State Space Agency of Ukraine in 2020 and 2021, argues that humans will surmount our “our evolutionary limitations through technological and biological enhancements.” In other words, putting humans on Mars won’t just change the course of history, for those who buy the ticket, it will certainly change the very genetics of humanity as we know it.
So how close is all of this? Writing for the New York Times, Kenneth Chang argues that Musk and SpaceX’s strong track record of spaceflight breakthroughs is matched only by Musk “taking far longer than predicted to achieve his goals.” There remains technical and logistical issues to be overcome before an attempted Mars landing – even an unmanned one.
Before then, Musk is contracted to land NASA astronauts on the Moon as part of the Artemis III mission, scheduled for late 2025. Should Musk’s team be ready in time, this will undoubtedly provide many lessons for an eventual Mars landing. Until then, we’ll just be retreading old ground.
Become a Gentleman’s Journal Member?
Like the Gentleman’s Journal? Why not join the Clubhouse, a special kind of private club where members receive offers and experiences from hand-picked, premium brands. You will also receive invites to exclusive events, the quarterly print magazine delivered directly to your door and your own membership card.
