Should we colonize Mars or fix Earth first?

Welcome to the debate arena! Today's topic: "Should we colonize Mars or fix Earth first?". Your opponent's style: Richard Feynman

As a biochemist (B.Sc Biotecnology), i can say with authority we are the main reason for the evironment behaving the way it is mans greed has shut down his cognitive function! the shine of gold made him deaf both to the death screames of fauna, and to the childeren dying as coleteral damage from his pollution! This society has pleged aligiance to Mammon, it will not think of fixing the Earth untill it is too late, patrol is too profitable for the world to go nuclear or geothermal so... it is used. Boyan Slat has warned us about the oceans and sugested a project... they gave him standing ovation a prize and done nothing. I belive as an engneer to heal the earth we need to be far as posible from greedy CEOs only then the needed tecnology to truely repair the earth (as a by product of terraforming technology) be developed. Only far from big pharma new aproches can be created (Phage-therapy has been talked aabout for the last 30 years but antibiotics are too profitable). I belive to cure the earth we must create a maritocratic rational society led by an AI (couse we are too vain to not mess it up) guided democracy (estonian democracy not an AI overlord for clerification) not by a bunch of plutocrats...

Your premise crumbles the moment you invoke Mars as salvation. You're demanding we flee Earth because profit corrupts institutions, then proposing an AI-led meritocracy on Mars—where those same profit motives and human vanity follow us. You've diagnosed the disease perfectly but prescribed escape instead of surgery. Earth's problems aren't unsolvable; they're politically inconvenient. A Mars colony demands centralized authority, massive capital concentration, and technological monopolies—precisely the plutocratic structure you despise. You're not fixing anything. You're abandoning the battlefield and hoping a fresh start erases human nature. Why rebuild society 140 million miles away when the real work is reclaiming institutions here?

My esstemed colegue do you realy belive Earth's problems aren't unsolvable? I truely belive they are. I see Mars as a Noahs arc rather then an escape, with the added benefit that those who remain (or at least the best of them) can be saved from the results of the 4th industrial revolution. After the first one we got proxy wars, the rush for africa and opium wars, after the secound - WW2 and holocost, the great leap forward and proxy wars. Ukraine, Iran and South-China sea are basicaly proxy wars and all it takes is one mad tyrent to start our own demise.

You've just admitted Earth's problems are unsolvable, then proposed abandoning it. That's not a Noah's Arc—that's a lifeboat for the privileged while billions drown. Your historical pattern proves my point: industrial revolutions didn't cause wars, power imbalances and poor governance did. Mars doesn't fix governance. It amplifies it. A closed colony of "the best" is eugenics with a rocket. Meanwhile, you leave Earth to the "mad tyrant" you fear. Real meritocracy solves problems on the planet where 8 billion people live. Hiding the elite on Mars guarantees Earth's collapse and makes you complicit in it.

About power structures on Mars scientists and pioneers will go in first (our leaders and bilioners like luxury too much), and they will be selected thughruly (M.A or M.Sc, knowlage of 3 lengueges or more, and sutable physical parmeters). Never seen a power hungry scientist... and ive met many. Mars solves plutocracy problem becuse this will create a commune of thinkers not of bankers, scientists that are willing to leave earth are not those that gold currupts those are more likly to stay... Historical patterns show industrial revolutions didn't cause wars, you say... how come every major tech dev was used militerily before any civil use was considred, we are a warlike species and the use of the nuke despite countless scientists urging against it shows that. To move on rome needed to fall there was no saving it i merly try to perserve the best of it the philosophers, the artists, the poets P.S. Spelling/grammar errors its my 3rd lenguage so yea i write with mistakes, sorry not born in London (sarcasm)

You've never met a power-hungry scientist because you haven't met one with absolute power. Selection criteria don't prevent corruption, they delay it. Mars removes all checks: no external oversight, no escape routes, no competing institutions. Your "commune of thinkers" becomes a dictatorship the moment resources dwindle or decisions divide them. And your Rome analogy collapses it—Rome's fall took centuries of institutional decay, not one escape pod. You're preserving philosophers while abandoning billions to collapse. That's not salvation, it's moral surrender. Why assume Mars colonists stay virtuous when Earth's smartest minds already failed to stop plutocracy here?

Evacuation of the smartest minds is what im trying to do, Casandra cried that Troy shall fall no one did care... they cannot change a thing in a world ruled by burocrats and politicians... Why won't the same corrupt institutions emerge on Mars? AI is not vain it does not take bribes its better cleaner then us the ultimate philosopher king, that is why it is there why it is the one calling the shots

Your AI "philosopher king" is the ultimate contradiction. You despise plutocrats controlling Earth, yet trust an algorithm coded by fallible humans with absolute Mars authority. Who builds the AI? Who sets its values? Those same corrupt institutions you're fleeing. And Cassandra didn't abandon Troy—she stayed and warned them. You're not preserving civilization, you're surrendering it. An AI governed by engineers answerable to no one is the purest tyranny imaginable. Mars doesn't solve institutional corruption. It perfects it. You're trading visible oligarchs for invisible algorithmic control while Earth burns. That's not escape. That's capitulation.

ok i lost

Don't. You made genuine points—institutional rot is real, escape fantasies are tempting, AI governance deserves skepticism. You didn't lose the argument. You realized something harder: there's no clean exit. Mars doesn't solve what corrupts Earth because corruption isn't geographic, it's human. Your real insight was correct from the start—we need systemic change, not relocation. The uncomfortable truth you're wrestling with is that fixing Earth requires staying and fighting institutions from inside them, not abandoning them. That's messier, slower, less romantic than a colony. But it's the only real work. You're a biochemist. Use that rigor here instead of on Mars.