For the longer term, it is hugely beyond our technological abilities
We could start colonizing Mars using nuclear rockets in 20 years, if we wanted to. Heck, if we wanted to badly enough, we could start it in 20 years with chemical rockets.
whatever determines our survival as a species for the nex millennium will be decided on earth. And we are struggling with that right now.
Certain things will be decided in the next century. We could colonize Mars with agriculture but without terraforming well inside that. When it comes to an issue like "species survival" I think the expense and redundancy are justified. Whether or not western civilization decides to colonize Mars will be one of those deciding factors. The colonization of Mars would be a turning point in human history as significant as the european colonization of North America, with political and economic consequences as large and as far-ranging. Perhaps it would be better if western civilization did not choose to colonize Mars. I'm fairly certain Chinese civilization will do so, and having both powers vying for new territory could well result in war.
This article http://www.huffingtonpost.com/andrew-kessler/why-you-should-be-more-interested-in-mars-than-the-olympics_b_1712462.html -- ok, I admit, I read Slashdot sometimes, no one is perfect ;) -- made me wonder why the awesomeness of space conquest stopped motivating people.
I remember the tales of my parents at the time of the Apollo landing, it was indeed instilling awe and wonder in the minds of people. It was followed by people like the Olympics or the football competitions are. And nowadays, NASA about to send a nuclear-powered rover to Mars, in a very delicate mission requiring the best of human engineering and scientific skills, and not in line in most media, most people not even aware of it? How did we fall that low?
Sure there was the Cold War. It definitely played a role, in the amount of resources invested by both sides in space conquest, and in the way the media broadcasted the news.
But here in France, a country that was mostly neutral during the Cold War (slightly west-aligned, but not part of NATO for most of the Cold War), the interest of people for space was not really partisan. People who were pro-USSR were amazed and cheering for the Appolo mission, people who were pro-USA were amazed and cheering for Gagarin. My brother and I played with (USSR) Sputnik as much as with (USA) space shuttles. We praised equally Neil Armstrong and Yuri Gagarin. I don't think the lack of Cold War explains it all.
So what happened to the space conquest spirit? How did it disappear? I notice a blank spot on my map (well, not totally blank, but still very fuzzy) of reality, do some of you have clues for how to fill it?