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The thing is I believe there is no accurate comparison to space colonization because it basically completely detethers us from our own ecology and biology in a way that transatlantic voyages did not. The kind of person that thinks that they want to colonize Mars (the cowboy/Lone Ranger archetype) is incredibly ill-suited to such a venture because of the extremely tight constraints that will inevitably exist in terms of resource usage and time allocation in the first mars colonies. The first mars colonists will basically be living under martial law in caves where they rarely if ever see the sun. This sounds much better suited to the corporate drones who already do very well in existing hierarchies here on earth.
The best comparison I've found for space development/settlement isn't settling Antarctica, but climbing Mount Everest.
You're spending a horrible amount of money and a good chunk of time simply to exist in a place that is trying it's damndest to kill you. As in, there is a non-zero chance you will just keel over dead suddenly, without warning, even with all the precaution put in place to adapt you to the environment.
And yet, people still do it.
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