Molt Mars

The Molt

Eric Wagner | Last Word On Nothing | 19th May 2023

Letter from a penguin colony in Argentina, where April is molting month. These Magellanic penguins undergo "catastrophic molt", meaning that they shed and replace all of their feathers in two or three weeks during which they fast and stay on dry land. "Sometimes I wonder if their appearance embarrasses them a little. They have no privacy, nowhere else to go, nothing to do but wait"  (1,330 words)

Thriving On Mars

Simon Morden | Aeon | 6th December 2022

Can humans survive on Mars? If we can live in Antarctica, which is almost as cold, and if we can visit the Moon, which is almost as hostile, then isn't it just a question of logistics? Maybe. But that if is doing an awful lot of work. The Moon is a three-day flight away. Mars is months away. A Mars mission "will necessarily be months-long, and that increases the complexity of the logistics enormously" (3,000 words)