In all the excitement over the NASA Mars rovers' various landings, photo shoots, malfunctions, recoveries and excursions, another aspect of their mission has been neglected: what could be called their teaching, as opposed to their learning, mission. As Spirit and Opportunity keep fit and busy on the Red Planet, the two cute, smart, pliant robotic explorers are giving us humans daily lessons in how we should live.
Here, in a nutshell, is their prescription-by-example: Live each day like a sober Victorian scholar who refuses to concede that the job at hand, no matter how apparently picayune, is not the most important thing in the world -- or the galaxy. In practical terms, that means living simply and soberly, taking things very slowly, getting lots of sleep, focusing like a laser on prescribed tasks, never giving up, and never, ever being distracted by the temptations of irony.
Life as it is "lived" by the very unironically named Spirit and Opportunity is a serious business.