Topic Battle

Mars has maintained structural integrity for 4.603 billion years, a duration so vast it reduces all human timescales to statistical insignificance. The planet witnessed the formation of Earth's oceans, the emergence of life, and the entire arc of human civilisation while barely completing a single orbital wobble in relative terms.

Projections suggest Mars will persist for another five billion years until solar expansion renders the inner solar system uninhabitable. This longevity operates on scales that human cognition struggles to meaningfully process, making the iPhone's four-year lifespan appear almost comically ephemeral.

Visiting Mars currently requires resources exceeding $2 billion per mission, approximately eighteen months of travel time, and acceptance of a radiation exposure equivalent to 300 chest X-rays. No commercial booking systems exist, and the waiting list consists entirely of government agencies and one particularly ambitious billionaire.

Visual access to Mars proves considerably easier—a modest telescope and clear skies suffice. However, meaningful interaction with the planet's surface remains restricted to an exclusive club of robotic rovers, making Mars perhaps the least accessible entity in this comparison by several orders of magnitude.

Mars provides precisely zero direct utility to the average human's daily routine. One cannot check emails on Mars, nor can Mars remind you of appointments, calculate tips, or provide turn-by-turn directions to the nearest coffee establishment. The planet remains stubbornly unresponsive to all user inputs.

However, Mars does provide indirect utility as a gravitational stabiliser within the solar system and as a focal point for human aspiration. Its presence in the night sky has inspired countless individuals to pursue careers in science and engineering, creating ripple effects of innovation that eventually produce devices like the iPhone.

Mars possesses name recognition spanning millennia, having been observed and documented by ancient Babylonian astronomers as early as 400 BCE. The planet's distinctive reddish hue earned it associations with war gods across multiple civilisations—Nergal, Ares, and Mars himself providing the nomenclature we use today.

Unlike the iPhone, Mars requires no marketing budget. Its presence in the night sky serves as a perpetual advertisement for cosmic wonder. Every culture with access to clear skies has developed mythology around this rust-coloured wanderer, ensuring recognition that predates written history by considerable margins.

Mars maintains a carbon-neutral existence, having generated precisely zero emissions throughout its 4.6 billion year lifespan. The planet neither consumes resources nor produces waste, existing in a state of environmental equilibrium that sustainable development advocates can only dream of achieving.

Indeed, Mars serves as a potential solution to environmental impact rather than a contributor. Terraforming proposals suggest the planet could eventually absorb excess human population, reducing strain on Earth's ecosystems. Mars represents possibility rather than burden in environmental calculations.