Elon Musk: Even if civilization has just a 1% chance of being annihilated, we should back up the biosphere on another planet.

“Sometimes people are puzzled as to why we're doing it. The reason we're doing it is to make life, consciousness, multiplanetary. So as to preserve the future of civilization and consciousness and life as we know it.

There's always some chance of something going wrong on Earth. Overall, I'm like fairly optimistic about Earth. Let's just say there's a 1% chance, for argument's sake of life as we know it and consciousness being annihilated on Earth. I think it's still, even if there's just a 1% chance of civilizational annihilation, you'd want to protect against that by having a second planet back up the biosphere effectively and ensure the continuity of life and consciousness.

This is the first time in the 4.5-billion-year history of Earth that it's been possible to do so. So we should take advantage of this window while it is still open. And you know, we don't want to be complacent and assume that there will be this constant upward trajectory of civilization. Hopefully that happens, but it might not. And so this is about protecting the future of life itself.”

Interview with Sandy Munro, May 27, 2025