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Elon Musk wants to build a city on Mars, but Werner Herzog says the plans are unequivocally a “mistake.”
SpaceX CEO Musk plans to send the first humans to Mars in the mid-2020s, using the Starship rocket under development. Once there, Musk wants to build a self-sustaining city of one million people on Mars by 2050.
But the famous director Herzog tells Reverse there is a huge flaw in the second half of Musk’s plan.
In fierce criticism, Herzog describes the idea as “obscenity” and says humans should “not be like grasshoppers”.
In the interview, conducted earlier this month ahead of the release of a new asteroid documentary, Herzog also compares Musk’s plan to the rise and fall of communism and fascism in the 20th century. The 21st century will “quickly” put an end to “the technological utopia like the colonization of Mars,” he says.
Want to learn more about Musk’s plans for a SpaceX Mars city? Check-out Musk reads + for exclusive interviews, analysis and more.
Herzog is not at all opposed to the idea of going to Mars. In fact, the German filmmaker “would love to go [to Mars] with a camera with scientists. “But the long-term view of a city on Mars is a ‘mistake’.
Herzog’s main concern is that humanity “should rather seek to keep our planet habitable”, instead of trying to colonize another.
“We shouldn’t be like locusts, coming, grazing our planet, okay, and now where are we going?”
In short, Mars is not a habitable place. There is no liquid water on the surface, nor air to breathe. Solar wind means locals would be “fried like in a microwave,” Herzog says.
Musk has responded to this kind of criticism before. In 2018, he shared research suggesting water ice exists on Mars in the Korolev Crater, and hinted that the planet “needs a warm-up.” Over time, researchers have detected more than 1.2 million cubic miles of water ice on or near the surface of Mars.
Musk has repeatedly proposed a plan to heat the planet and release stored carbon dioxide, citing a 1993 research paper as evidence that it would work. He claims it would allow humans to walk around Mars with just a breathing apparatus.
This claim is controversial to say the least. A 2018 study found that if scientists released Mars’ carbon dioxide stores, it would generate an atmosphere of about 15 millibars of pressure – well below the 1,000 millibars found at Earth’s sea level. Musk responded to the research by writing that “there is a massive amount of CO2 on Mars adsorbed into the ground that would be released upon heating,” but the evidence is lacking.
“Thought alone is obscenity.”
The researchers also expressed concerns about the effects of space radiation on Mars. Musk said in 2016 that it was “not fatal” and “not too big,” but studies on the International Space Station and Earth suggest that time spent in space has significant health consequences. To get around the problem, Musk in 2017 offered solar storm shelters on ships, designed to become the first habitats. NASA scientists have also proposed a magnetic shield to protect against solar winds.
Another issue Herzog has with Musk’s ambitions relates to plans to use the supply ship to fly to Mars, set up a base and means to create more fuel, and then let the ships go home or go. venture further by laying the groundwork way. While Musk’s plan for a “multi-planetary species” is ambitious, Herzog is not convinced.
“I think Elon Musk stylizes himself as sort of a tech visionary,” Herzog says. “Because he has to sell his electric cars, it’s wonderful that he is doing it. He has to sell his reusable rockets. It’s wonderful that he is doing it.”
“But I don’t agree with him when he postulates and preaches about the colonization of Mars,” Herzog says.
“And I have to say not only to Elon Musk, but to everyone. And so I say it as simple as I can … it’s obscenity. Thought alone is obscenity.”
Musk has previously been criticized for focusing on moving to Mars rather than repairing Earth. During a 2019 stage appearance with Jack Ma, the Chinese billionaire told Musk that Earth “needs more heroes … making things better every day.”
The CEO of SpaceX replied, “I think it’s important for us to take the set of actions most likely to maintain consciousness in the future” – in case something happens to Earth, others terms.
Herzog compares Musk’s utopian vision to that of communism and fascism. Herzog says that the 20th century was “in its entirety a mistake”, which resulted in “the demise of great social utopias” like communism “as being heaven on earth”.
“No, it failed,” says Herzog. “Second failure, fascism, the race of Aryan masters will dominate and improve our planet Earth and truly improve humanity. Thank God these two gigantic utopias have come to an end.”
The same will happen to the Martian city of Musk, Herzog predicts.
“Our century will end very quickly a technological utopia like the colonization of Mars. We will end this utopia very, very quickly during this century.”
Herzog has previously discussed Musk’s ambitions on Mars with him. In the 2016 documentary Lo and Behold, reveries of the connected world, Herzog asked Musk in an interview for a “one way ticket” to Mars, adding that “I would be your candidate.”
Musk’s response at the time suggested he knew not everyone shared his enthusiasm: “I think we’ll want to offer round-trip travel because a lot more people would be willing to go if they think that , if they don’t like it, they can come back, ”Musk said.
But if the reason humanity is leaving Earth is because our own planet is in a mess, going home might be easier said than done.
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