The Curiosity rover will land on Mars, August 5. It will travel 12 miles in two years, analyzing soil and looking for a habitable environment. It will look for water, carbon and sources of energy, three things required for the presence of life.
When I got into astronomy over 50 years ago, Mars was little more than a light in the night sky. Now, it is a real place with geology and geography. Astrobiologists maintain that water once flowed and that fossilized microbes may await discovery. There was that meteorite in the mid-90s supposedly from Mars and containing fossils that turned out to be a sham. Imaginations can run wild. The movie 2001: A Space Odyssey forecasted routine travel to the moon by 2001. Instead, that year is remembered for the 9/11 attacks. When Carl Sagan was doing Cosmos in 1980, I thought we would be on Mars in my life time. Now, I doubt it. I also question the benefits of going to other planets. It is rough enough finding hotels in American cities and dealing with foreign languages in other countries. At least, we can breathe on earth. We can't breathe on the moon or Mars. (Not to mention the temperature extremes).
