The Bear Case for Mars

What if colonisation is much harder than advocates hope for? Can it still be done, and should it be? And are there other options if Mars is out?

Today SpaceX conducted its first flight test of the full Starship rocket, which after a number of engine and control problems on ascent, failed near the point of stage separation. It has taken a long time to get to this point; the last test flight was almost 2 years ago and it is over a year since the first Starship/Super Heavy stack when Elon Musk claimed the orbital test would be occurring soon after. Its a reminder that, although progress is being made, things rarely go as planned when developing something this complex. This neatly connects to something I had been intending to write about anyway - what if the entire endeavour of Mars colonisation hits insurmountable barriers?

I’ve made the positive case for colonising space in general many times, and have done so specifically for Mars as well. But the success of this enterprise is not guaranteed - the problem of gravity, for instance, might turn out to be intractable. Alternatively a legal regime might impose severe restrictions on…