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Its the wild wild west of the 21st Century. Exploring the oceans would be cool too - we would find all the stuff that we have dumped in them for the last few thousand years. Don't know why but exploring the ocean floor does not appeal to me in the same way. Its probably all those Star Trek's and Star War watching for all those years.

It was interesting that the last time they sent a deep sea probe into the water they discovered about 12 new species of fish on the way down. Usually they are turned off to conserve power.

I can't see Mars ever having a sustainable atmosphere: it would most likely just float off into space. Oh, and no magnetic core, so no shielding from solar radiation. Plus low gravity isn't very friendly to humans if you spend your entire life in it, apparently.

I'm with Phil on not raping another planet, a la the aliens in Independence Day. The best we can hope for is a few small bio-dome type colonies, at least with any near-future technology... barring some breakthough that defies the laws of physics.

However, the survival of the species does depend on leaving the planet at some point: it's only a matter of time before the place is hit by a meteor, swallowed by the sun, or we kill it off ourselves. I know this is simply delaying the inevitable demise of our species (assuming the universe will either suffer heat death or contract again), but it's fulfilling our biological drive.

The highly cynical will argue that the US government want to increase space-funding in order to give taxpayer's money away to their industry buddies instead of spending it on social projects.

Methane on Mars has been detected. It should be destroyed quickly, however, it is not and therefore must be being replenished. The big question is: Biochemistry or Geochemistry (or life and geology to you and me!).

Being the hopeless cynic I am, I vote for geochemistry. Mars is dead as far as the kind of "cute and fluffy" life some people are hoping for goes.

I was hoping that it would be bacterial life not cute and fluffy. But I know what you mean!

Slashdot have reported that NASA is funding a study to see if small robots could be dropped on the Moon to create a landing pad for a moonbase. Not strictly a factoid about Mars but still an interesting stepping stone.

An interesting webcast regarding space debris from the Guardian.

Gravity Sensing Satellite fires its Star Trek sounding Ion Pulse Engine to keep it in orbit!

NASA are debating whether to return to the Moon by 2020 and build a moon base or not. Personally I think that a moonbase construction would be a good test and pre-curser to Mars colonisation. Interestingly the Russians are being the first to start the Mars colonisation plans with a 105 day simulation of a space flight to the red planet in a bid to understand the psychological effects of being that out of contact with other human beings.

Mac OS X 10.5.7 has been released. This is Apple's Webpage that describes what has changed. It is rumoured to be the last update prior to OS X 10.6.0 Snow Leopard. Generally nothing major, some tweaks to the way mail works is probably the biggest change you will notice.

Damn. Wrong thread. Apple OS X has nothing to do with Mars! Will change later.

Russia to save their International Space Station modules and are developing a core module that will enable key modules to be replaced as they wear out. The current ISS design makes it nearly impossible to replace these key modules. I wonder who designed that then (Americans?!).

Warpship theoretical ship is designed by Physicist Dr. Richard Obousy. The ship uses 'dark matter' to propel it through space.

Ooh, warpship. The downer is that it relies on string theory being correct, and if it isn't there's also a chance of a black hole. Not liking those odds.

NASA have proposed a plan to develop a 2.8MW nuclear reactor that can be launched into space and used for colonisation of either the Moon or Mars. It represents a much more efficient way of generating electricity when compared with solar but there are the obvious risks!

This seems to be taking yet another page from Red Mars which is just freaky!