I am a Mars enthusiast, and lately have been wondering how safe Mars would be to live on after it hypothetically has been terraformed into a pseudo Earth. Obviously, the bigger health hazard would be the potentially high levels of radiation and cosmic rays from the sun. While Earth has a robust magnetic field, which shields the surface from most radiation, a terraformed Mars would not have one. But, assuming a terraformed Mars had a pressure of 1 atm at sea level, the atmosphere presumably would offer some sort of protection.
This question is partly a follow up to a previous question discussing radiation levels on Mars given its current tenuous atmosphere.
I am hoping to find out the following two things:
- How much radiation would reach the surface of a terraformed Mars
- How would this compare to the total radiation on the surface of Earth, minus the effects of both the relatively thick atmosphere and the magentic field, and
- How safe would it be for human, plant, and aquatic life
Regarding the last bullet point, presumably most ocean life, which exists at an average depth of some meters, would be completely safe, assuming Mars also had an atmosphere of 1 atm at sea level.
One reason I am asking this question is as a reality/sanity check. There is a lot of hype of colonizing and terraforming Mars. But if the resulting planet would still be hostile to life, there would not seem to be much point in doing it.