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Will we, Can we, ever become martians?
February 17, 2019 at 9:59 pm
(This post was last modified: February 17, 2019 at 10:00 pm by ignoramus.)
Extrapolating from the Mars thread, if we colonize Mars, have children there, etc, will there ever come a time where the new human Martians have speciated to the point of not producing fertile offspring with us foreigners from Earth?
If so, how and why? I'm trying to get my head around what we might look like?
Will we speak a new language one day?
Let's assume that travel to Mars will still be a big slow and rare occurrence.... No StarTrek bs allowed!. 
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RE: Will we, Can we, ever become martians?
February 17, 2019 at 10:24 pm
Speciation occurs when a portion of the current species is isolated from the others. So, yeah, it will eventually happen. If there are two groups left at that time, that is.
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RE: Will we, Can we, ever become martians?
February 17, 2019 at 10:29 pm
Yeah, but they'll just return to Earth to "probe" a few abductees...
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RE: Will we, Can we, ever become martians?
February 17, 2019 at 10:36 pm
(February 17, 2019 at 9:59 pm)ignoramus Wrote: Extrapolating from the Mars thread, if we colonize Mars, have children there, etc, will there ever come a time where the new human Martians have speciated to the point of not producing fertile offspring with us foreigners from Earth?
If so, how and why? I'm trying to get my head around what we might look like?
Will we speak a new language one day?
Let's assume that travel to Mars will still be a big slow and rare occurrence.... No StarTrek bs allowed!.
In order for that to happen, there'd have to be a separation-- not one but both planets' technology would have to be broken down so that there would not be travel between the two planets, and interbreeding.
But it seems to me you'd probably get a new race-- better adapted to life on Mars.
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RE: Will we, Can we, ever become martians?
February 17, 2019 at 10:44 pm
(This post was last modified: February 17, 2019 at 10:44 pm by ignoramus.)
^ How would one adapt, or evolve wearing a space suit their whole life?
Maybe tolerate higher temperatures better (to endure a life in a suit  )
I'm thinking diet will dictate to a large degree how we evolve...... (no shitty potato jokes please! lol)
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RE: Will we, Can we, ever become martians?
February 17, 2019 at 10:51 pm
It's certainly possible but I think it's doubtful. I see Mars as a dead end.
At the most optimistic, I see a genetically engineered new species optimized for Martian conditions.
I see two more likely possibilities:
1. Normal humans (perhaps with nano-tech enhancements) inhabiting rotating habitats designed to suit their needs,
2. Totally synthetic lifeforms adapted to the conditions of space.
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former.
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RE: Will we, Can we, ever become martians?
February 18, 2019 at 12:27 am
(This post was last modified: February 18, 2019 at 12:29 am by ignoramus.)
If I may also add a second scenario to this thread.
What if earth had a (near identical conditions, same age, etc) sister planet (like our moon, nice and close).
A meteor killed our dinosaurs. I wonder what life would have evolved on the sister planet?
Remember, mammals prospered because of the meteor which hit us only!
Who's 100% confident that both planets' life would have the same dna basics. (assuming life evolved on our sister planet)
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RE: Will we, Can we, ever become martians?
February 18, 2019 at 12:50 am
(This post was last modified: February 18, 2019 at 12:55 am by Anomalocaris.)
One common misconception is if we find another planet, and somehow find a way to live on it for a while, we will eventually be able to locate most of the minerals. ores and other basic raw materials locally and thus be able to replicate the fundamentals of a technological civilizations in microcosm.
This is a subtle but fundamentally wrong assumption.
Modern mineralogy has identified about 5000 different minerals on earth. Detailed investigation of the the chemical properties of the minerals and the conditions under which they could have formed indicates over 80% of them requires non-stable chemical environment somewhere along their formation process that could only be sustained through life. Either because life creates an atmospheric composition that directly, or through atmospheric gases dissolved in water, facilitate their formation, or life creates a chemical condition in air or water that protects the minerals from being destroyed quickly after formation, or created conditions that would have prevented the formation of alternative minerals that would otherwise have been chemically much more favored to form out of the same material and thus robbed our mineral the chance to form. In other words, in the absence of influences of sizeable presence of life, only 400 or so of the 5000 minerals we have on earth can ever form. Such vital minerals as hematite and magnetite, upon human civilization relies on essentially all of its basic need for iron, can not form in the first place without life on earth sustaining a chemically highly unstable molecular oxygen rich atmospheric composition on our planet. In fact most of the economically important minerals on earth can not have formed on any earth that hosted no life prior to our arrival.
Since mars is such a hostile world, it will be many millennia before it can be terraformed enough for humans to survive on its surface without a massive technological infrastructure.
Mars would not be able to support any massive independent technological infrastructure because mineral ores upon which any technological civilization require for key raw materials such as semiconductors likely simply arn’t There.
So for millennia, human habitate on mars will require sustained contact with earth for vital raw material input.
So far millennia, humans on mars can not be isolated from earth and still live long.
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RE: Will we, Can we, ever become martians?
February 18, 2019 at 2:05 am
'Ever' is a very long time.
By the end of this century? I'm not optimistic.
Right now, that kind of project is simply too expensive as far as I'm aware..
Things would need to get pretty bad on earth before such a thing would even be considered. I have a suspicion that we humans would pretty much have destroyed our environment long before any colonisation of Mars became a practical reality.
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RE: Will we, Can we, ever become martians?
February 18, 2019 at 3:07 am
(February 17, 2019 at 9:59 pm)ignoramus Wrote: Extrapolating from the Mars thread, if we colonize Mars, have children there, etc, will there ever come a time where the new human Martians have speciated to the point of not producing fertile offspring with us foreigners from Earth?
If so, how and why? I'm trying to get my head around what we might look like?
Will we speak a new language one day?
Let's assume that travel to Mars will still be a big slow and rare occurrence.... No StarTrek bs allowed!.
We will never go to Mars, the radiation would kill those who tried. If NASA is so sure we can why haven't they sent a craft to Mars and then returned it to earth, it's a tricky business making a round trip. If they can accomplish this then next will be sending live animals there and back, it would be highly unethical to send humans first. So it's just unreasonable to dwell on, even astronauts are saying we can't do it.
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