Should Human Objects on Mars Be Preserved?

LAWRENCE, KANSAS—ZME Science reports that anthropologist Justin Holcomb of the University of Kansas and his colleagues think that space exploration equipment and marks left on the Mars landscape by human activity should be preserved as artifacts. Human contact with the Red Planet dates back to 1971 and the crash landing of the Mars2 spacecraft, which had been launched by scientists from the Soviet Union. “Homo sapiens are currently undergoing a dispersal, which first started out of Africa, reached other continents, and has now begun in off-world environments,” Holcomb said. The probes, satellites, Viking landers, the Perseverance rover, and other materials are evidence of human movement, evolution, and history on Earth, he explained. “I’ve seen a lot of scientists referring to this material as space trash,” Holcomb said. “It’s critical to shift that narrative towards heritage because the solution to trash is removal, but the solution to heritage is preservation,” he concluded. To read about deep-water missions to recover relics of the space race, go to "Apollo Returns from the Abyss."