As I’m going through my old writings, I rediscovered this short piece that I wrote back in 2017. It was my reaction to some of Elon Musk’s claims back then about going to Mars to save humanity. I’m somehow surprised by how little this piece has aged and how relevant it still is today.
Unfortunately, not much has changed since 2017—except maybe that Elon’s vision of going to Mars, and many other claims, seems somehow more like business-driven market manipulation rather than an actual serious endeavour to go to Mars to save mankind.
It’s important to remember that Elon Musk, for all his achievements, is still a human being like anyone else. Just because he’s been successful in business doesn’t mean he’s infallible or always right.
I agree with some of his ideas, and I think he’s done an incredible job popularising technology and moving some concepts forward—electric cars, for example, or a brain-computer interface. But that doesn’t mean I’m blind to the hyperbole and marketing theatrics he often engages in. Some of his claims venture into territory that brushes up against the limits of what’s currently possible—if not outright contradicting the laws of known physics, like the Hyperloop or the idea of colonising Mars.
While I understand the curiosity and ambition that drive his vision of the future, I also believe that any rational, critically thinking person should approach dreaming about the future with a healthy dose of skepticism. Elon Musk is not an exception. So when he behaves as if he were, I lose trust in him.
If we go to Mars simply out of scientific curiosity, that’s fine. In fact, I’d take the exploration of space any time over spending billions of dollars on wars and meaningless destruction. But the notion of finding a second home for humanity on Mars strikes me as deeply flawed.
It’s a romantic idea, but not a realistic one. The energy and resources it would take to make Mars even remotely habitable are staggering—and that’s before considering the psychological, biological, and technological challenges. Rather than seeing it as an escape plan, we should focus on fixing and preserving the planet we already have.
