> before we explored mars for indiginous life first!

We already have. It's a liveless rock. How much more do we keep moving the goal posts and beating that dead horse?

I remember an SG1 episode, they turned up on a planet which was a frozen wasteland for as far as the eye could see, no evidence of any life later than microbes.

Turns out the planet was earth - they were in Antarctica.

Clearly not comparable, but there's a big difference between salt flats in Namibia or the seater in Antarctica and landing in downtown manhattan or the Brazilian rainforest.

We've successfully sent half a dozen probes to mars, we've barely scratched the surface.

Maybe until we explored a bit more, than a few areas on the surface? Mars is HUGE.

Potential areas for life might be in vulcanic areas underground.

Might not be a high chance, granted. But the chances that anything from your project survives are far lower - but it would definitely damage research on current or historic life on mars a lot.

Eventually our microbial biomes will merge with any ecosystem or planet we visit. It's virtually guaranteed. This shouldn't stand in the way of our visiting, we should simply be prepared for intermixture.

> Maybe until we explored a bit more, than a few areas on the surface? Mars is HUGE.

That's true. But life does have a way of spreading around. And beware of constantly shifting the goal posts.