Elon Musk’s War of Words With Neil deGrasse Tyson Over Mars Colonisation Rumbles On

Elon Musk has responded recent criticism from Neil deGrasse Tyson of his plan to colonise Mars. The famous astrophysicist has been publicly outspoken about Musk’s plans and even went so far as to state that people would die as a result. Elon Musk’s war of words with the astrophysicist has been simmering, but, like his relations with Jeff Bezos, seems to have come to the boil again.

Neil deGrasse Tyson Slams Elon Musk’s Plans for Mars Colonization

Tyson made headlines when he explained his perception of the issues with Bill Maher on his talk show: 

“For him to just say, let’s go to Mars because it’s the next thing to do. What does that venture capitalist meeting look like? ‘So, Elon, what do you want to do?’ ‘I want to go to Mars?’ ‘How much will it cost?’ ‘$1 trillion.’ ‘Is it safe?’ ‘No. People will probably die.’ ‘What’s the return on the investment?’ ‘Nothing.’ That’s a five-minute meeting. And it doesn’t happen.”

But Elon Musk has been remarkably critical of the interview and once again reinforced his desire to go develop a colony on our neighbouring planet.

Musk has recently spoken about plans to send uncrewed spacecraft to Mars by 2026 and has promised a crewed mission before the end of the decade, something that has been met with a lot of skepticism from scientists and the wider community.

Not the first round in Elon Musk’s war of words

Acclaimed astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson has previously spoken about many of the reasons he does not think the mission will be a success, or even get the financial backing to get off the ground:

“NASA doesn’t have a spacecraft but Elon does. Here’s my spacecraft to Mars. We end up paying him to use his spaceship to get to Mars. So I don’t see it happening until governments judge that it’s geopolitically in our interest. Otherwise, I don’t see it as just exploration.”

He raised the point about finances and the fact that a mission would be remarkably expensive at a time when spending such high figures may not make sense for the government. “At some point somebody has to pay for it,” Tyson explained. “Just being interested in something is not the same thing as paying for it.”

Tyson has previously been critical of SpaceX and claimed they had not done anything “that NASA hasn’t already done” in a video shared on social media in September.

Elon Musk’s war of words comes with his seemingly growing relationship with President Trump. This influence could see changes to regulations:

“Starship is capable of building a city on Mars and a city on the moon. That’s what it’s designed to do. But we’re being massively slowed down by regulatory molasses, “ Musk said in a speech prior to the election, before recently retweeting a video on 29th of November where he explained this was “not anymore” the case.