MDRS 165 Journalist Report
Tomoya Mori
Sol 9
Earth date: 03/15/2016
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So I’ve been thinking about what “living a life” is.
In my yesterday’s report, I talked about how comfortable life on Mars is, and I suggested that “(perhaps) we should be feeling more nervous.” Shannon then replied to my report (thank you Shannon!) stating that “life on Mars will be very much like what (I am) experiencing.” She continued that many of the crews “fail to slow down and actually try to live life.”
So now I am asking myself, what does “living a life” mean? Ok, I don’t really want to go into a deep discussion because I’m not a big fan of philosophy. So let me start by comparing my life back on Earth and my new life here on Mars.
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Earth: I would get up as early as 6:30AM, take a shower, have a breakfast and get ready for my 9:00AM class. Between classes I would respond to emails, eat, think about the future of space exploration, spare some time to develop a biz model for my company idea. In the evening, I would see my girlfriend, get dinner, have some study sessions and go to bed by 12:00AM. End of the day.
Mars: I would get up at around 7:00AM, read a book while waiting for other crew members to wake up and get breakfast together. I would then prepare a cup of coffee before our HSO leads a morning exercise. On an EVA day (pretty much everyday for me), I would quickly go to the bathroom, get changed in my flight suit and leave the hab for about 3 hours. After lunch, I would import photos from the EVA, edit them before I go take a nap (usually 1h). Then work on my daily journalist report (now) and submit. By the dinner time I am too exhausted to do anything other than chillaxing with the crew (play Monopoly, watch a movie). End of the day.
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I honestly don’t see much difference between the two lives. Ok, things I do are different, of course, but fundamentally the same. My day can be roughly divided into: Work Life (student / journalist), Social Time, Meal Time and Sleep Time. The only difference I can find is that I have much more personal time back on Earth than here. This probably is because I am sharing the hab with 5 other crew members, and also because the daily task leaves no time for personal stuff. But as Mars becomes more colonized tasks allocated for each crew member will decrease, which automatically increases personal time for everyone.
Let me get to the point. If this is what “living a life” means and my life in two completely different location is identical, then, living anywhere in the solar system might not really change how humans behave.
Should we, then, conclude that human being is a boring species? Or should we think more optimistically and conclude that human being is highly adaptive?
Turning ourselves into a spacefaring species might be exciting, and it sure will advance our technology. But as Paul Adams, the VP of Product at Intercom, said, “Technologies will come and go, but the fundamental social behavior patterns of people will remain the same.”
Would human being ever evolve as a species?
(Yeah ok, this is a sample size 1 thought experiment, but it still is interesting to think about)