Space Forces by Ela Musk and Jeff Basos

6min Snip

00:00

Play full episode

Summary

Transcript

Episode notes

i think it's good to get started with a brief idea of the visions of, you know, space habitation and colonization that are offered by ela musk and jeff basos. I think speaks to their bigger term plans about going out space. Those are, those are plans that stretch into the ten, 30, forty hundred and 50 thousand year kind of time spans. A, elan musk wants to create a second earth, a kind of back up planet in case something goes uno terribly wrong here on our planet. Ah, he says that humanity needs to establish a presence in outer space, and specifically on mars. His original goal was to start an interest in n

Paris Marx is joined by Fred Scharmen to discuss Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos’ visions for space colonization, the inspiration they draw from the work of Wernher von Braun and Gerard O’Neill, and what’s wrong with basing our future on those ideas.

Fred Scharmen is the author of Space Forces: A Critical History of Life in Outer Space. He teaches architecture and urban design at Morgan State University’s School of Architecture and Planning and is the co-founder of the Working Group on Adaptive Systems. Follow Fred on Twitter at @sevensixfive.

🚨 T-shirts are now available!

Tech Won’t Save Us offers a critical perspective on tech, its worldview, and wider society with the goal of inspiring people to demand better tech and a better world. Follow the podcast (@techwontsaveus) and host Paris Marx (@parismarx) on Twitter, and support the show on Patreon.

Find out more about Harbinger Media Network at harbingermedianetwork.com.

Also mentioned in this episode:

Paris wrote about the billionaire space race and Jeff Bezos’ vision for space colonization.
Wernher von Braun was a Nazi before becoming chief architect of NASA’s Saturn V rocket. He appeared in a 1955 Disney program about space flight, but his past was also criticized, including in a song by Tom Lehrer.
Elon Musk has cited Isaac Asimov’s “Foundation” as an inspiration and Jeff Bezos saved The Expanse when it was cancelled.
Jeff Bezos’ ideas about space colonization come directly from Gerard O’Neill’s vision of space colonies floating in space.
Adam Mann asked in the New Yorker whether Mars was really ours for the taking.
The Just Space Alliance presents an alternative to the billionaire framing of space.