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Comment by firebaze | Hacker News Reader

If there's one billionaire on the world I'd have no second thoughts about it's Elon Musk. I know I'll probably regret having said that in 20-30 years :)

Honestly, if there's one person on this planet which is furthering human future it's Elon Musk and his vision to have human habitats on other planets.

Facing climate change, wars, overpopulation etc.pp, if we had at least one other place other than earth - as hostile as it may be - and we start to sustain life there, all life on earth would suddenly be only one bet out of two (or more).

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Yeah, it seems to me like the classic artist-vs-the-art debate. Let's be honest, the guy IS rather brilliant in multiple fields and he's built large, effective organizations whose output is head and shoulders above everyone else. He's can also be an obnoxious ass with a juvenile sense of humour. If he were to turn out to be <insert vile thing here> tomorrow, the rockets will still land the Model3s will still be safer and more efficient than their competition.

FWIW, I fall on the "art" side of this debate. I didn't think highly of Jobs, but I still got the OG iPhone, MBPs, etc. I often wish Musk would STFU, but I still love driving my Model 3 and I'm saving up to buy a ticket on Starship.

"brilliant in multiple fields and he's built large, effective organizations" vs. "obnoxious ass with a juvenile sense of humour"

I'm shocked at how often I see people put these on an equal level. We forgave our last rocket guy for being a literal nazi.

> I'm shocked at how often I see people put these on an equal level. We forgave our last rocket guy for being a literal nazi.

Put like that, it does somewhat raises the bar for Mr Musk. Though the 60's compared with today's social standards would yield many difference for the better. Heck, many in the 60's would be in for one heck of a culture shock if they suddenly time jumped into today.

That all said - "We forgave our last rocket guy for being a literal nazi." is just begging for a Farside cartoon. Made me laugh.

Why can't Elon Musk be as uncharismatic and uninteresting as Mark Zuckerberg, sometimes I don't like his tweets! :__(

Musk is chaotic neutral. Zuck is neutral evil.

http://easydamus.com/alignment.html

lmao I agree completely

You had me until 'facing...overpopulation'. To boot, Elon Musk has talked about this [1].

We are not facing overpopulation. Population is contracting currently and will continue for at least a few decades.

[1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-s_4VnXHF64

Worldwide population is still projected to grow for many decades.

Birthrates are dropping.

Respectfully, I'd argue we are already overpopulated. The contraction will take a while to really take hold. Eventually we will no longer be overpopulated. I just don't think the Earth can sustainably support more than 2 billion people. But it will take quite a long time for us to fall that far and it will come with other issues. Additionally, it will take far longer for the oceans and atmosphere to recover but it eventually will.

I also don't understand how we think we'd do better on Mars than on Earth. We have near infinite resources and advantages here and we trashed it. We have none of those on Mars.

> I just don't think the Earth can sustainably support more than 2 billion people.

Of course Earth can sustainably support way more people than that. The problem is waste. The US alone loses 30-40% of the food it produces, worldwide it's something to ~1/3rd.

Centralized food and energy production (and other things tbh, but these two stand out) is certainly a lot cheaper, but it's obvious it was not the right move.

If everyone had to maintain their local food/energy production at the county, neighbourhood or even household level, there would be much less waste and more responsibility (something a lot of people need).

Fewer out of season products means less waste and pollution, as well.

I think we've shown what a greedy species we are. I don't know what we can expect people to live a smaller life and consume less voluntarily. In my opinion, given our track record, that is why I suggested a lower total as a max. Maybe one day we'll be able to create energy and food locally that is carbon neutral and then we could handle more population but that doesn't seem possible now or anytime soon.

> I also don't understand how we think we'd do better on Mars than on Earth. We have near infinite resources and advantages here and we trashed it. We have none of those on Mars.

Elon's goal isn't to do better on Mars. It's to have Mars as a backup of humans in case something happens to Earth (for example - big meteor).

As we sit now if we lose Earth, humans are finished. If we had a colony on Mars, at least humans as a species would continue.

“Over”-population depends upon your definition and judgement on the planets ability to sustain us etc.

But population declining? Nope! Here’s a great and accessible explanation:

https://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_global_population_gro...

The growth rate is slowing, but population will continue to expand till we add several more billion people. With our current population, there are many resources we are using unsustainably: soil, fresh water, seafood, raw materials, fuel, and carbon sinks. Any one of these things could cause extreme disruptions if a country or region's access is cut off or reduced. I think it's common to think of these kinds of warnings as alarmist. Compare this with the denialism and impact of COVID. At first it seems remote and impossible, as if life will certainly continue on like it always has, then suddenly every school in the world closes down and all borders are shut. If a bit of RNA can change the world so, imagine extreme regional food shortages.

I'm not convinced any of these things will be caused by demand shocks and material scarcity due to overpopulation, but rather, if at all, through coordination and resource allocation failures (politics, war, corruption).

My information on this topic comes from classes, books, scientific papers, and 8 years working in the environmental protection sector. There is a decades-old and growing scientific consensus that we have a multi-dimensional sustainability crisis incoming. And political factors are absolutely a part of this since shortages will happen regionally first and geopolitics will ensure that nations will act in self-interest. Things like the US-MX border wall and Brexit are arguably early impacts of climate change since it can be viewed as a strategic attempt to separate from areas likely to see large numbers of climate refugees in coming decades.

Causality and motivation are complex issues, so I'd like to read a well founded elaboration of your last statement. Did long-term strategic considerations of these bureaucracies truly lead to such foresighted, high-level decisions by governments and the public? If so, climate change might have been only an aspect of this.

Here's a taste at least[1]. You have both a former VP and the US military warning of climate influenced political instability. These ideas are definitely out there and circulating as part of the decision making process on things like homeland security. Books are written[2] and think tanks produce analyses[3]. Not everyone in our governments have goldfish attention spans and their information sources go beyond news-entertainment. I would never claim this is the only factor, but the ideas are out there and taken seriously.

[1]https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/brexit-climate-cha...

[2]https://www.amazon.com/Storming-Wall-Migration-Homeland-Secu...

[3]http://www.ourenergypolicy.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/Is...

For someone running a backup colony on another planet I wouldn't choose someone with as bad a pandemic policy as Musk.

> we start to sustain life there

Then you just have WW4 and we all die. Wars have been started for far worthless things (when you compare it to the game changing thing that would be to have a place in Mars), something like Mars would cause a lot of deaths way before humans get there and it would probably remove any motivation to actually fix human-caused problems in Earth because hey, thanks to Musk we can just leave to Mars. All those rich people that are now building bunkers could collectively purchase Mars (whatever that means) and leave Earth when it is beyond repair (right after squashing every resource out of it). I don't think humanity is anywhere ready for it even if the technology was ready right now. Our social systems are fragile and tend to centralization and authoritarian forms of governance

Life on Mars will always suck hopelessly compared to life on Earth. It's a terrible cold desert where you can't breath.

I was thinking of a terraformed Mars

Rich people building bunkers sounds like a conspiracy theory.

No billionaires are going to go to Mars for the lifestyle. Country estates, super yachts, fur coats and Rolexes on one side, and a plastic bubble habitat and nylon jumpsuit in a freezing airless desert on the other. How many of the elite are really going to go for the second? It just seems like fantastical thinking.

I wish it was.

https://edition.cnn.com/style/article/doomsday-luxury-bunker...

https://www.latimes.com/business/real-estate/story/2020-03-2...

By the way, by Mars I meant a terraformed Mars

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