[SunkenCiv]

Thanks 2ndDivisionVet.

For Chris McKay, a planetary scientist at NASA's Ames Research Center in California, the moral implications are clear: we should help our neighbours. Earthlings might not have been able to intervene when Martians were dying en masse (we were just microbes ourselves), but now, billions of years later, we could make it up to them.

Microbial life on Mars was detected by Lewin's experiment on the Viking lander. It should be studied, not least because it might be the key to producing Earthlike conditions on Mars, y'know, with some patience on our part. It's a healthier attitude IMHO than that of Bob Zubrin, who was quoted as saying "that's insane" regarding holding up the (at best problematical) human colonization of Mars over native microbial life. A two-list ping! First off, it's one of *those* topics, but in a different way.

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[Grimmy]

I think I remember either reading or hearing something along the lines of a lack of or too weak of a magnetic shield around Mars makes terraforming possible.

Too much radiation gets through and there’s nothing (or not enough) to keep the solar wind from stripping the atmosphere... or something like that?