N
ational Geographic has an article about how readily people are to volunteer for ‘single fare’ missions. According to the National, when Fox News (yeah, we know) reported about future Mars missions, 400 readers signed up for a possible trip. Apparently, everybody qualifies for such a dangerous mission, that is, in their own mind:
“I do VERY well with solitude, I am handy with tools, very good at making things work, have generated my own solar energy, built three houses (with my own hands) and am quite sane and stable”
I wash my hands a couple of times in a day, which would make me a qualified “marsonaut”.
It looks like Fox’s inspiration for their article comes from The Journal of Cosmology, which recently featured a long editorial about a possible mission to Mars (full editorial): the editorial contains a dozen of chapters, discussing the reasons why we should go and, my favourite, how to reproduce on Mars:
Moreover, the human female has evolved the cognitive and intellectual capacity to employ cosmetics, perfumes, colorful clothing, push up bras, high heels, and so on, which draw attention to her breasts and derriere, and which emphasize and exaggerate her sexual availability by mimicking the signs of estrus common in other social primates
No wonder people romanticize a mission to Mars.