&gt; <i>&quot;I mean, a settlement on mars can have value, but it will only be the value that you&#x27;ll bring there.&quot;</i><p>This is actually true for most countries. America&#x27;s economic strength lies in the fact that it creates software, micro-chips, manufactured goods, entertainment, etc.<p>Tell me, where in the ground do you dig up a micro-processor? Or a hollywood blockbuster? Or a Tesla Model S? Or the source code for google&#x27;s search engine?<p>Economic value is primarily created by human activity. Once there is human activity on Mars there is the potential for economic value there. And once human activity on Mars is relatively self-sustaining, which we can achieve through building up the local industry combined with certain technological innovations, then that human activity will indeed provide things of net positive value to the rest of human civilization.<p>It seems so hard now, but in fifty or a hundred years we&#x27;ll look back and it&#x27;ll just seem normal and possibly even natural.<p>We tend to discount the truly incredible and jaw dropping amount of labor and ingenuity that has gone into building the prosaic world we see out the window every day. Even something like providing water to New York City is itself a herculean effort beyond the capability of even the entire human race only a few centuries ago. What we&#x27;ve done to network the world together digitally, to build engines of mass trade of manufactured goods across and between continents, to travel across land&#x2F;sea&#x2F;air from point to point with minimal overhead beyond the raw requirements imposed by the laws of physics, all of these things are awe inspiring creations when you give yourself the opportunity to look at them in whole. And many of them are vastly more difficult and in some cases more questionably of long term value than colonizing Mars.