With all the bad news, the political circus, and the dregs of Facebook, I almost missed this: Tuesday, SpaceX announced its plan to put humans on Mars in the next 15 years. And not just humans to visit and come back–humans to build a settlement and ultimately become self-sustaining.

Tim Urban at Wait But Why, my favorite explainer of hard things (where did ISIS come from? should I get married?) has a whole post up that explains the rockets and plan, and includes background info from his interview with Elon Musk. Go read it and feel better about humanity.

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(Even better? The first transport to Mars might be named after Zaphod Beeblebrox’s ship inĀ Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.)