ABOUT THIS EPISODE
What if going to Mars changes what it means to be human?
We've spent decades asking whether we can get to Mars. But evolutionary biologist Scott Solomon wants to ask a different question: what happens to us once we stay?
In this episode, I sit down with Scott, a faculty member at Rice University and author of Becoming Martian: Our Future Beyond Earth (MIT Press), to explore the science of what a permanent human presence on Mars would actually look like. Not the rockets. Not the politics. The biology.
We talk about the rovers already crawling across the Martian surface and what they've discovered, the unanswered questions about whether humans can even reproduce in space, and what the NASA Twins Study revealed about what deep space does to the human body at a genetic level. Scott Kelly spent a year in orbit while his identical twin stayed on Earth. What they found changes everything.
We get into it all: will babies be born via c-section only, bodily changes, that children born on Mars may never be able to visit Earth. And we wrestle with the biggest question underneath all of it. Are we rushing toward a future we're not ready for?
Scott is one of those rare scientists who can make you feel the weight of deep time and the excitement of what's coming in the same breath. I hope that this one will change how you think about how fast we are trying to get to Mars.
Got a hot take? Think you’re not wrong about something? I want to hear it. Call me and leave a voicemail at (205)538-3202 and follow along on Instagram @HesNotWrongPodcast, and let’s keep the conversation going.
Make sure to subscribe, leave a review, and join me every Sunday morning - grab your coffee, and let’s talk.
Follow on YouTube, Instagram, & TikTok: @HesNotWrongPodcast
Subscribe on Subtack: https://substack.com/@hesnotwrong
Contact: chad@hesnotwrongpodcast.com
www.HesNotWrongPodcast.Com
