Welcome to Mars

We will travel to Mars.
 
We will colonize Mars.  Folk have to. 

Too many ways for our species to be destroyed on Earth.  Most likely we shall be the cause of our destruction.  Whether by wars between nations, or because of nuclear, chemical, or biological Armageddon brought about by state terrorism or terrorists who are not aligned with a nation, call such terrorists ngts: non governmental terrorists.  Or it could be a matter of meteorite(s).  If
nothing else does us in, and if we do not prepare, and societies are not good at preparing for
much of anything, then the next ice age could well end Homo sapiens.  Make no mistake, our
time on Earth is limited, it is evolution's way.  Hence our need to journey to Mars and to colonize Mars.  Eventually, we will have to go beyond Mars, but first steps first. 

Our trip to Mars requires the highest degree of disciplined technology married to creativity.  We know how to get small payloads to Mars, we have landed the Martian rovers.  Starting in 1997 with Sojourner and going on to the current two rovers, Curiosity and Opportunity.  Successfully landing a much larger Martian lander (or whatever we call the module that will transport people from their star ship to Mars' surface) is another matter, a greater challenge.  Such enterprises provide opportunities to go beyond anything we have accomplished before, and in the process of achieving the most  daunting challenges we learn so many new ways of applying technology here on Earth as well as in the arena of space flight and, as per this discussion, in matters dealing with entry, descent, and landing (or EDL), one of the two most dangerous and most difficult facet of space travel. 

One might well wonder why.  Why spend the massive amounts of money required to explore space, or to simply go to Mars?  Why take such risks?  At one level the answer is simple enough, even obvious.  As  President Kennedy put it, in an address delivered at Rice University in 1962:

          The exploration of space will go ahead, whether we join in it or not, and it is one of the
          great adventures of all time, and no nation which expects to be the leader of other
          nations can expect to stay behind in the race for space.

There is more to it than the pedestrian and pragmatic admission that folk will explore space therefor we too should take part in this endeavor.  Indeed, the most significant reason is not discussed enough:

          There is no strife, no prejudice, no national conflict in outer space as yet. Its hazards are
          hostile to us all. Its conquest deserves the best of all mankind, and its opportunity for
          peaceful cooperation many [sic] never come again. But why, some say, the moon? Why
          choose this as our goal? And they may well ask why climb the highest mountain? Why,
          35 years ago, fly the Atlantic?  (Quoted from President Kennedy's speech of 12 September 1962 at Rice University)

I believe that space exploration is our destiny and, if we allow it, our salvation.