Biffi Fest Speech Finalist and Supporting PPT

What problems do we need to solve before people can live on Mars?

ACTUAL TITLE: Colonizing Mars means polluting Mars.

“The main problem to go to Mars is us: our mind is not prepared” Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World”

Finding the technology to reach Mars, overcoming the technological challenges that allow the return of the mission, assuming the enormous economic costs of building the spacecraft or even managing to alleviate the effects of cosmic and ionizing radiation are not, nor much less, some of the challenges to achieve the supposedly great space goal of the century. But the actual main problem is getting the human mind to be able to take on the risk and the decision it faces.

Breaking News!! *The billionaire Elon Musk has introduced to the world his new goal, to colonize Mars and send a "Noah's Ark" full of animals and plants, to transport life there. 

But Why? Isn't Earth enough anymore? Is it just a wish of a millionaire man to be the first to step on Mars? Is it a necessity? 

My name is Sofía González Díaz, I'm a student at American School and today I speak for my society, my generation, the one that is trying to save our world, that is aware that the space in which we live is no longer enough for us, it's destroying us day by day. 

The idea of ​​traveling to Mars and in general of looking for life on other planets does not come beyond the necessity, on earth we no longer fit, being beings not affected by natural selection, we adapt the world to our needs and not reverse as animals do, we have totally destroyed and monopolized the terrestrial and aquatic surface and affected the atmosphere of this planet and now we are in search of life on the Red Planet.

Life, according to scientists, has some basic requirements. It could exist anywhere in the universe where there is liquid water, a source of heat and energy, and abundant amounts of a few essential elements, such as carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, potassium and phosphorum

Mainly water, a chemical compound necessary for life. 

But the Red Planet does not contain water, Does it? -Evidence dating back to the 1970s says otherwise. When the Mariner 9 and Viking spacecraft first sent images of Mars back to Earth, there were signs of water, salt deposits becoming the first mineral evidence that liquid water is present. Billions of years ago, Mars had rivers and ponds, potential habitats for microbial life just like the first cells that appeared on Earth. This discovery raises questions about whether microbial life ever formed on Mars, and if so, how long. On Earth, at least, where there is water, there is life.

In 2018, a famous newspaper “The Conversation” published an article titled “Colonizing Mars means polluting Mars” in 1959 NASA organized meetings to discuss the need to sterilize spacecraft that could be sent to other worlds. Since then, all planetary exploration missions have been subjected to sterilization standards to balance their scientific objectives, which includes one less problem.

On the other hand, some more problems are:

• The population that will go to this place is most likely full of millionaires, businessmen, celebrities and even renowned scientists.

• Distribution of the territory

• And what will happen when neither Earth nor Mars is a safe place for the human population?

Humans couple the world without thinking about the damage that is caused by indulging not only needs but also luxuries and pleasures, whatever comes to mind.

The history of humanity could be summed up in one word: conflicts, whose synonyms can be wars and chaos, where each and every one of them proves that the human being will never be satisfied and will always look for more, be it here or on Mars. It doesn't matter how long the list of problems to live on Mars is, the main problem we must solve is to take responsibility for our own planet, on which we live and through which we breathe, stop running away and face it once and for all.

By Sofía Camila González Díaz 

Thanks