In the trailer, there's this line: "When Musk says that the future of humanity is to colonize Mars, he is selling us dreams. That's not happening."
That irritates me a lot. Everything extremely difficult (or thought to be impossible) is a dream until someone (or some company) works hard on it and invests in it for a long time. Those that would criticize Musk & SpaceX for chipping away at this seem to be effectively saying "do not try."
There are, I think, two things that the documentary is trying to do with this statement. The first is to remind people that even visionaries selling their actions on a noble cause must still be evaluated for the negative consequences of their actions. In this case, Musk is known to be the cause of quite a few deaths in the world thanks to things like eliminating USAID [1]. People like him need to be fairly evaluated not just on the good they might potentially unlock in the future, but the evil they are unlocking today.
The second thing is to point out that Musk may not be entirely honest about trying to colonize Mars, just as some politicians may campaign on a promise to make a country great again while robbing blind the rubes who vote for them.
[1] Although I think Mark Zuckerberg still beats him in the deadliest tech CEO race, given the role that Facebook plays in the Rohingya genocide.
jfoster · · focus · HN ↗
That irritates me a lot. Everything extremely difficult (or thought to be impossible) is a dream until someone (or some company) works hard on it and invests in it for a long time. Those that would criticize Musk & SpaceX for chipping away at this seem to be effectively saying "do not try."
jcranmer · · focus · HN ↗
The second thing is to point out that Musk may not be entirely honest about trying to colonize Mars, just as some politicians may campaign on a promise to make a country great again while robbing blind the rubes who vote for them.
[1] Although I think Mark Zuckerberg still beats him in the deadliest tech CEO race, given the role that Facebook plays in the Rohingya genocide.
johngruber · · focus · HN ↗
[dead]