Elon Musk is the new face of entrepreneur. Steve Jobs was brilliant--no doubt!--but Musk is something other. Steve Jobs at one point was running both Apple Computers and Pixar, driving back and forth between the companies several times per week. Musk has two companies he works at as well as a non-profit. Both companies are pushing the boundaries of innovation in transportation--one ground, one space--and the non-profit, super-hero style, fighting the good fight against the threat of killer robots.
This week, Elon Musk is going to launch a new technology that will bring Mars that much closer to Earth--or Earth-lings that much closer to becoming Martian. The title of the presentation says it all: Making Humans A Multi-Planetary Species.
This says it all. He's not selling a product. He's not tarting-up another incremental improvement to an old operating system (sorry Apple!)--no. He's laying out a vision for the future and humanity; he's doing some more major vision-casting, and he's announcing it to the world.
We all ask, what more can be done? And then Musk delivers something else. We all ask ourselves, what is possible? And then Musk paints a completely different picture of what 'possible' could mean. We ask ourselves if there are any real big thinkers these days--people like Einstein and Nicola Tesla, and Thomas Edison, and Alexander Graham Bell. There is: his name is Elon Musk.
The Raptor Test.
I don't know what Musk is going to say tomorrow. Musk has already announced the release of the SpaceX Raptor: a rocket engine that will launch a rocket directly to Mars. The lack of rocket innovation has been a hindrance to Mars travel, and has led inventors and rocket scientists to talk about space elevators as the only way. But not for Musk--he makes the impossible seem easy. He claims that with the Raptor engine, rockets will be launched directly to Mars as part of the interplanetary transport system that will thus turn humanity into a multi-planetary species.
Think about this--it's amazing. How many entrepreneurs do you know who think this big, and have the brains and money to pull it off?
We are watching the emergence of a new interplanetary civilization before our eyes. It's emerging--rapidly. It's Musk. And with Musk, others are trying to drag along by the hem of his cape. It won't be long. Technology feeds on itself and grows exponentially--especially when people are really pushing for solutions. With Musk and his teams, we could see a couple of major exponential leaps to space travel over the coming months and years. According to Space.com,
The company plans to launch an uncrewed mission to the Red Planet in 2018 using SpaceX's Dragon capsule and Falcon Heavy rocket, then follow that up with additional missions every 26 months for the foreseeable future, claims Elon Musk.
This is amazing. As one who reads and follows technology and the development of technology, I remain continuously floored by Musk. Indeed, I doubt we've seen anything like him and his companies in the past fifty to a hundred years. Like Tiger Woods, we ask 'How much more can this guy do?' But I doubt, unlike Woods, he'll disappoint.
Elon Musk A Super Hero Or Super Villain?
I am a skeptic. I don't just buy anything. And as I'm writing I am asking myself if I've gone off the deep end, or if Musk has gone off the deep end, or both of us. Needless to say, we are witnessing a profound revolution of technology that will impact interplanetary travel like we've never seen before, and Musk seems to be at the forefront.
While some CEOs are worried about making incremental improvements to someone else's technology, Musk is taking on the world with leaps and bounds. And as he makes leaps and bounds, he promises to take humanity with him.
But will they follow? . . .
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