At this point it's getting hard to care about mars when 2-3 generations is enough time to really see this planet heat up. It doesn't help that we are draining lakes like crazy right now. I dunno, I used to get sooooo excited about this stuff and this past couple years it really is starting to feel like I can't reserve much joy for private industry since there's such little regard for the people and the planet in which we are surrounded by. Not even trying to be a hippie here, it's just so brazen these days. This is probably the part of me that sticks out the most in my engineering role, I tend to be surrounded by people who can just ... turn it all off in light of any and all "advancement". No matter the cost. I can't, I spend a lot of my time outside of work these days trying to take in being a human, connecting with others and taking in nature. Whenever I center myself there, it's just kind of difficult to care about getting to Mars. And you're very correct, there is literally no guarantee future generations can justify the effort/resources for such a venture. I dunno.
It's taken 100 years for humans to build a rocket that lands itself.
Gonna take even longer to establish a humans on Mars.
Ya need supply lines, radiation shielding, water... all in the next 2-3 decades if you want any shot at seeing it.
There's no guarantee future generations can justify the effort, resource use.
Yall gonna stay around 2-3 more generations to make sure they do?