Within the last decade, scientists have discovered evidence of what appears to be water on Mars, and NASA was recently planning to put people on that planet. Scientists and politicians justify this multi-billion-dollar project with talk of military objectives and climate change. I cannot help but cringe. We have not been able to accept responsibility for our impacts on this planet, yet we are going to impose ourselves, with our coincident blunders, on another. My hope is that, by the time we get to Mars, we will be aware of our blind ineptitude and will have made concerted efforts to change our perspective and our behavior.

According to our cherished paradigm of natural selection, with its survival of the fittest and slow, steady, minor variations, life should always be evolving to a better state, yet we appear to be in serious danger of destroying the environment that sustains us. If our species and others are in danger, and if natural selection, survival of the fittest, and the corporate market system that reflects this paradigm will not lead us out of the mess, what will?