Mars Colonization As A Hothouse For Offworld Human Culture …

In an era when even in Antarctica researchers can tap into iTunes, its hard not to wonder if such connectivity is causing formerly seemingly remote parts of the world to lose their edgy sense of place. And thats just here on Earth. What happens when humans move offworld? Will Mars Mars pioneers want the Red Planet to remain as remote and untamed as when they first risked life and limb to get there?

After returning to her hometown of Oakland in the first half the last century, Lost Generation author Gertrude Stein famously wrote but there is no there there. Her observation wasnt a late nonsensical nod to Dadaism, but rather a statement about how development was skewing the landscape of her childhood. Thus, to paraphrase Stein, will the first Mars colonists find that the Red Planet is really there there? Or will interplanetary communication hinder the Red Planets own cultural evolution by continually tethering it to mother Earth? Even though [Mars colonists] will be fully committed to their vision of colonizing Mars, they will still experience the typical emotional change curve of shock, anger, rejection, acceptance, healing, astronaut trainer Mindy Howard, Founding Director of The Netherlands-based Inner Space Training, told Forbes. On the International Space Station (ISS ISS), astronauts are able to have real-time conversations with Earth and to speak with a psychologist in real time if needed. This will not be possible on Mars, because there will be about a seven minute time delay.

Even so, its likely that even a couple of decades after a Mars One-type colonization project makes its first inroads on that desolate red landscape, they will continue to cherish regular Earth contact. Thats something thats unlikely to change until a colonized Mars develops its own sense of culture in a way that may not be possible until the colonists overcome the physical constraints on offworld procreation. Or even until a portion of the planet is actually terraformed.

Howard says the full

This NASA image shows a view by the Mars Rover Spirit of a sunset over the rim of Gusev Crater, about 80 kilometers (50 miles) away. (AP Photo/NASA/JPL-Caltech/Texas A&M/Cornell University)

How will the harsh Martian environment affect the evolution of a separate human culture on the Red Planet?

Although Martian environmental features will influence the new colonists culture as it evolves; they may talk about red mountains instead of blue ones, the environment itself will have no influence on the underlying cultural structure, Richard Handler, a professor of anthropology at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, told Forbes.

Given ongoing [Earth] contact, it would [probably] take hundreds of years for a truly distinct separate Mars-based human culture to emerge, said Handler.

But that doesnt mean that once it does, it wouldnt have its own vibrancy.

[Mars culture] will start like Houston or Singapore, all squeaky clean and futuristic, and it will evolve into layered complexity like Mumbai and Rio with energy and color, Michael Fischer, a multi-disciplinary professor at MIT, told Forbes. Human Mars culture, he asserts, will either evolve to incorporate the Red Planets novel conditions or it will whither and collapse.

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Mars Colonization As A Hothouse For Offworld Human Culture ...