Comment by kemotep | Hacker News Reader

Comment by kemotep | Hacker News Reader

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Musk held an event earlier this year where he outlined how SpaceX was going to get 1 million people to Mars by the 2050’s. That’s not really being skeptical. The plan he outlined is so ambitious that it is entirely unrealistic to the point of being almost straight fantasy.

The number of Starships needing to be built, the amount of launches necessary to send that many people, and other details don’t line up.

I am not skeptical that SpaceX could do a mission to Mars by the 2050’s, sending a small team to explore the planet and come back. I am skeptical of SpaceX being able to launch hundreds Starships loaded with a hundreds of people and everything they need for building a self sufficient colony, by 2026.

The plan Musk outlined has SpaceX sending people to Mars at the same time they send people to the Moon.

Here is a link to the presentation: https://x.com/SpaceX/status/1776669097490776563

Yes how outlined how it it was possible. He is still sceptical and believes it has a low chance of success. And he knows that if it happens it will most likely take longer.

But the point that matters here is that even if only 0.00001% of this goal is achieved, its fantastic.

So when we evaluate their plan we should evaluate it as 100% success or failure. We should evaluate the chance that they are 0.00001% successful.

And we can still be sceptical of that 0.00001%. Since doing that is hard as fuck and will need not just SpaceX but many others as well.

But what SpaceX is doing, is for the first time making it possible to seriously consider that 0.00001%.

It would be significantly less people required to be sent as if enough fertile male-female pairs are sent then childbirth can 4x or more the original number of colonists.

Technically, only 1 male is needed

Musk timelines are always absurd, but SpaceX has eventually done a lot of stuff previously thought to be infeasible. I remember ULA pooh-poohing reusability.

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