Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1228683
APRIL 2020 I SMT007 MAGAZINE 63 somebody on Mars. The bot- tom line is we could use tech- nology from the 1960s to take people to Mars; we just can- not bring them back. Now, I should point out that when people took that much more dangerous trip to Cal- ifornia in covered wagons, many died on the way. It begs the question, "Why aren't we sending people one way to Mars?" I didn't ask this to the audience because I didn't have time, but let's assume that you could live for six months. There may be a pos- sibility of getting supplies to you to live beyond that, but that's not guaranteed. Who would go? Who would be the Buzz Aldrin and Neil Arm- strong of Mars? Usually, a lot of attendees raise their hands. People want to volunteer. Look at the percentage of peo- ple who die climbing Everest, but people still want to do it. The only reason not to go in the '70s and '80s was if you built the vehicles to go one way, if nobody showed up and volunteered, it would be judged as unethical to put someone to sleep and let them wake up inside after the door was locked, especially if they didn't want to go. That's the only reason not to do it. I initially proposed that we send lawyers, but I quickly was told that it wouldn't work because they would lie about what they saw. NASA made a big mistake that has made Mars not as attractive as it was when we were kids. They sent all these robots out there and landed them only in the deserts; they didn't land one of them downtown (laughs). Downtown Mars, to some people, is Cydo- nia. It's a walkable distance from the face on Mars, but NASA has said that it isn't a face, but what if they had said, "We think that's man-made?" What would happen to the NASA budget? Feinberg: We'd be going there, no matter the cost. Rutan: Why would NASA kill its own budget? The bottom line is that to get people who will agree to go, you must tell them you're going to land in Cydonia where the pyramid-looking structures are. If they were pyramids, and if they did build a face so that Earth could see it someday, that might have happened millions of years ago. I think that would be interesting to find out. I'm not a believer that it was, but I'm curious. Note that I am a UFO skeptic. If you want to understand the details about what I think of UFOs, you can download the white paper on my website. Nolan Johnson: You referenced natural selec- tion for airplanes in your keynote as well. Are we stepping away from trying to use natural selection as a method to innovate? Rutan poses with SpaceShipOne on the tarmac in Mojave, California.