I dont even understand the appeal of populating mars. Like its a big red dust bowl. Like shittier than the shittiest desert. Realistically, without some seriously sci fi shit to terraform the place, why would you want to live there? Unless you like being inside for the rest of your life.

Mars isn’t going anywhere, but people are. If you want to experience seeing humans make it to mars, it has to happen in your lifetime.

That said, I do think you have a valid point. I do think we have some responsibility to carefully research potential signs of life on other planets before we potentially contaminate it or risk bringing anything back with us.

I think is a popular amongst progressive

We also learned that we're really good at fucking up perfectly fine planets.