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Chelsea Gohd, a reporter for Futurism, recently interviewed Steve Fuller on Elon Musk’s plans to turn humans into a multi-planetary species. Her report, including the details of Musk’s plans can be found here. What follows is the full interview, only part of which was published in the article:

1. Do you think human beings are capable of becoming a multi-planetary species?

Yes, in two senses, one trivial and one not so trivial. The trivial sense is that there is no reason why we couldn’t survive in other planets – perhaps located in other star systems – that have roughly the same environmental conditions as the Earth. We just need to find them! The not so trivial sense is that we may be able to ‘terraform’ various currently uninhabitable planets to make them more-or-less habitable by humans. This would require enormous infrastructure investments that could be quite risky, at least at the start. But if there’s enough planning, capital and political will, it too could be done.

2. What do you think of Elon Musk’s recent statements insisting that becoming multi-planetary is “insurance of life as we know it”

I think he’s basically right but his way of putting it is a bit coy. It’s clear that he’s imagining that we may be heading for global climate catastrophe, and so in a general way he’s trying to insure that humanity continues to exist in some form. However, the ‘in some form’ is the key bit. Musk’s space escapades are really doing nothing for the bulk of humanity who are most vulnerable in the face of a global climate catastrophe – namely, the poor. He’s talking about preserving the people who would probably survive anyway on Earth, namely, the rich and the talented, who usually have access to the rich. In any case, even if Musk manages to establish a package holiday tour company to shuttle people back and forth between the Earth and, say, the Moon or Mars, we’d still be talking about only a small fraction of the Earth’s population that would be actually part of the final mission to airlift ‘us’ to a safe haven when the final catastrophe strikes.

3. What steps would need to be taken for us to, hypothetically, reside on more than one planet?

It really depends on which planet we’re talking about. Generally speaking, there’s what the cosmologist Paul Davies has called a ‘Goldilocks Enigma’, namely, that alternative planets are either too hot or too cold, the air is too thick or too thin, etc. So we need to address the question in more general terms because the details can vary significantly depending on the target planet. The two general strategies are that we either try to make the planet habitable by ‘terraforming’ it or we try to make ourselves compatible to the planet through some prosthetic enhancements or genetic modification of our default Homo sapiens form. In the latter case, we might think about ‘preparing’ people to live beyond the Earth as either an extreme version of the battery of vaccinations that kids routinely receive (only now we’d be potentially talking about gene therapy and silicon chip implants) or as an outright breeding of people – perhaps from embryonic stem cells – who are specifically suited for the conditions on the other planet.

4. Is Mars our only/best option for another planetary location?

This is the sort of thing that should be left open to venture capitalists like Musk to speculate about because depending on which planet you choose, the challenges will be different and the investors may have particular angles on how to deal with some of these, as opposed to others. This is what the ‘Goldilocks Enigma’ looks like from a market perspective.

5. There are those few who think that a Moon colonization is a viable option — do you think that it is possible/a good idea?

The Moon would be a good place to explore at a multi-lateral level – including perhaps the UN – in order to offload some activities currently done on Earth in the spirit of easing environmental and political pressures on our planet. In other words, I don’t see the Moon as some alternative Earth in the making but rather an Earth colony. Thus, I could see it as a tourist destination, a place for activities that tend to be conducted in relative isolation from the rest of humanity – ranging from universities to prisons – and possibly a source of useful minerals (but that would require very energy efficient spacecraft).

6. We have had a drastic impact, as a species, on planet Earth. Is it ethical for us to do same to other planets?

That’s the wrong way to look at the matter. The question is whether our humanity is necessarily tied to our current biological mode as Homo Sapiens. We have already transformed our basic apelike existence massively – from life expectancy to intellectual achievement – in a few thousand years. In other words, as we’ve remade the planet, we’ve also remade ourselves, and we are now in a position to do both more substantially. This is in keeping with the Russian ideology of ‘cosmism’, a fascinating hybrid of science and theology that inspired the idea of space travel in the early 20th century. One of its founders, Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, spoke of the Earth as simply the cradle which humanity needs to leave to test itself against outer space. The Cosmists believed that we are gods in training, and if we’re up to the task we need to show that we can retain and even extend ourselves under conditions that challenge the default settings of our physical existence. So this is the ethics at play here – one that embraces risk and displays courage.

Furthermore, with advancements in quantum computing and machine learning, many notable public figures, including Stephen Hawking and Elon Musk, have indicated a growing concern with the imminent threat of AI surpassing human intelligence (Gosset, 2017). For instance, Darrell M. West, a political scientist, has proposed a protectionist framework that appeals to transhumanism, in which he restructures socioeconomic policy to account for changes in technology-induced unemployment. In particular, he posits that “Separating the dispersion of health care, disability, and pension benefits outside of employment offers workers with limited skills social benefits on a universal basis” (West, 2015). Expounding upon this equivocation, a more viable solution to potential unemployment is the realization of a multi-faceted policy which advocates the improvement of STEM-related education on a broad economic base, with habituation programs for the unskilled workforce. That is, with the implementation of appropriate and reformatory policies concerning the future development of AI technologies, this sector provides an economic incentive for new job creation, compatible with industrial development.


Prompt: What are the political implications of artificial intelligence technology and how should policy makers ensure this technology will benefit diverse sectors of society?

In recent years, the rapid development and mass proliferation of artificial intelligence have had various sociopolitical implications. It is a commonly held belief that the emergence of this technology will have an unprecedented impact on policies and political agendas. However, such discourse often lacks a geopolitical and social dimension, which limits the breadth of analysis. Further, little consideration has been given to potential employment and public policy reform. Growing concerns have been raised regarding the potential risk inherent in the evolution of strong AI, which provides the basis for transhumanism, whereby it is conjectured that AI will eventually be able to surpass human intelligence. As such, it is incumbent upon the upcoming generation of policymakers to implement and adopt necessary measures, which will provide a careful, multilateral framework, ultimately achieving market-oriented technological advancement with respect to employment and public policy.

Machine learning, the interplay of computer science and neuroscience, is a rapidly developing field that has been a source of much political controversy in recent years. While emerging technologies have significantly improved production quality and efficiency across industries, they have also raised concerns such as job displacement and other unfavourable socioeconomic implications (Karsten & West, 2015). In particular, the growing shortage of job opportunities has furnished increasing levels of unemployment and has, in various instances, lead to unwanted economic stagnation. On the subject of potential future unemployment, many policymakers have proposed an increase in Earned Income Tax Credit, which provides a collateral basic income and encourages profit-sharing (West, 2015).

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SpaceX founder Elon Musk has famously said he’d like to die on Mars — “just not on impact.” But where will humans live in space? That was the focus of a good-natured debate that took place at this week’s “New Space Age” conference at Seattle’s Museum of Flight.

Chris Lewicki, president and CEO of Redmond, Wash.-based Planetary Resources, took up the case for going to asteroids and Mars. Seattle-area entrepreneur Naveen Jain, co-founder and chairman of Florida-based Moon Express, spoke for the moon.

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In late 2018, tourists will be heading into space and there is a race on to get them there. Virgin Galactic will at last take paying customers beyond the stratosphere. But their efforts might be eclipsed by SpaceX, a company planning to send two tourists around the Moon. Taking them farther into space than any human since 1972.

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