Neil deGrasse Tyson Doesn't Think Elon Musk's SpaceX Will Put People On Mars

I interpreted it as saying that there's no market reason to put people on Mars first, so SpaceX as a corporation wouldn't do it.

But my understanding is that Elon Musk has a personal reason for going to Mars, and that SpaceX's commercial efforts are being used to fund that private goal.

Exploration is not Tyson suggests, solely a government-sponsored activity. Private and philanthropic societies have funded many explorations. The National Geographic Society and The Explorers Club continue to fund exploration.

Tyson is right from business perspective. There is no business value in going to Mars. There are only rocks there and even if you sell ad space from the rocked and get sponsor, it will not cover the risk × value. If business is going into space, it's going to near earth asteroids. Cheap to operate lifting capability is essential to everything related to space and SpaceX is doing right thing there.

I don't think manned mission to Mars should be priority for NASA either. "You absolutely have to have person there to decide what to do" argument is not convincing if you would spend the same amount of money for robotic missions to Mars and it's moons.