re: Not a bad idea
Based on what has been found, it's really not Earth based, but there are hints in the soup that once was Mars that life could have risen at least microbial. We don't know about that yet, but the signs for that probablity is there.
We need to dig deep where ther's geological sign that life could have developed. There's at least two or even three billion years of dust storms to dig though, but we'll get to the bottom of this issue.
If there is or was microbial life, great, if not, so be it. Either way NASA would have fulfilled one of it's goals and that was and is to search for life outside Earth.
Personally, I really don't care if a rhuman or robot gets to dig the historic moment one way or another.