It's Friday, February 6th, 2015, and you're listening to Inquiring Minds. I'm Indra Viscontas.

And I'm Kishore Hari. Each week, we bring you a new, in-depth exploration of the space where science, politics, and society collide.

We endeavor to find out what's true, what's left to discover, and why it all matters.

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Indre, this week, I'm going to take you on a journey to Mars and back and back again.

What?

Andy Weir is the author of The Martian, which is a science fiction story that blends an

incredible amount of scientific accuracy into a narrative

about an astronaut getting stranded on Mars. It's a traditional dramatic story of a hero being stranded,

but it was the science that gives it a lot of realism. Our hero suffers through a number of trials

and tribulations and his struggle to survive unites the planet. And even though it's

cheaper to send robots into space, Andy and I talked about how funamental it was for humans to

wander and explore. Let's listen. Human beings have an inherent desire to go wander around and look at

stuff. I mean, so there are people who live like, you know, at the base camp of Everest.

...