I'm sure by now most of you know about the Mars landing. 25 years ago, I would have thought that was awesome.

I think going and destroying another planet that already seems to have had its fair share of hard knocks is a waste of money.  There is speculation we started there and ruined Mars first before coming to Earth.  I agree with you, Element.  We should use that money to clean up Earth. I like it here with all the animals and plants and love the oceans.  I would miss it. This post was edited by Merlin at November 27, 2018 4:08 PM MST

Considering how we're doing our level best to kill off Earth, we are going to need to have someplace else to live.

Hear you, Ele. I feel the same way about self-driving cars, for instance. To think of all the more pressing possible uses for such resources and minds...

But we, humanity, seem to consider it something of our destiny, inevitably. And learning more about other planets does help us understand our even more beautiful own.

Aristotle observed:  "Man desires to know."   (Acquiring knowledge is an "entitative habit,"---i.e., one that arises out of the nature and structure of ourselves.)

i wouldnt nnind going to live there nnyself

Why?  For the exact same reason people climb mountains - because it's there.  Humans have an insatiable curiosity.   But don't worry, Mars isn't the only planet we're still exploring.   We have yet to figure out how earth works.

This planet is running out, we need someplace else. Of couse, breaking the Einstein barrier is required to find desirable real estate, but Mars is a start. Baby steps.

Lot of cynicism in that thread, and flawed because you could level such charges as "waste of money" etc. at any human endeavour that has no obvious purely-functional link to the dull minutiae of everyday life for most of us. That could be anything: the natural sciences, the arts and crafts, pure academia, sports...

Whilst it is right to consider financial cost, that alone is a weak reason for rejecting the study out of hand, but explains why a lot of major science research nowadays is highly co-operative internationally.

If though, the criterion is of pure "use", we are on dangerous ground. If there is no useful purpose in analysing astronomical bodies, then there is no purpose either in creating great works of art, studying ancient literature and cultures, climbing mountains or exploring caves, playing football; none even in just listening to the symphony or opera, admiring the painting or the Ancient Greek play, visiting beautiful landscapes or watching the match.  No point even in stepping outside on a clear Winter's night and admiring the night sky with your own, naked eyes.

Such a criterion is very negative. It can even be self-destructive for the individual, by drawing one's personal little world ever tighter about one in a sort of protective shell. Protecting from what, though? Thinking? Appreciating? Understanding? At national level, it diminishes culture; a dangerous process whose ultimate expression is the intellectual, social and aesthetic emptiness espoused by extremists like the Khmer Rouge and the Taliban, of very different excuses but similar motive.

Fortunately, that is not the natural human condition. We are highly-developed animals that like to think, appreciate and understand.