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Elon Musk made his first fortune when eBay bought PayPal in 2002 for $1.5 billion. He used his share of the money to start the rocket company, SpaceX. Then, he began talking about very big plans for the future of humanity. He wanted humans to become ‘a multi-planetary species’ and said he was accumulating resources to 'extend the light of consciousness to the stars’. Soon he was talking about establishing human settlements on Mars. Future-of-humanity questions used to belong to religion and philosophy; under ‘Muskism’ they belong more to engineering and entrepreneurship. People have been dreaming of escaping to Planet B for a long time, but what’s the real cost of those dreams for the people left behind? As President Trump talks up the Mars programme, while dismantling aid initiatives around the globe, Jill Lepore traces Silicon Valley's existential catastrophism to an extraterrestrial vision of capitalism.

Jill Lepore is the Kemper Professor of American History at Harvard University and Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. She’s also a staff writer at The New Yorker and an acclaimed author.

Series Producer: Viv Jones
Researchers: Simon Leek, Oliver Riskin-Kutz, Thomas Farmer
Editors: Richard Vadon, Hugh Levinson
Sound design and mix: James Beard, Graham Puddifoot
Commissioning Editor: Dan Clarke
Original music by Corntuth
Production Coordinators: Jack Young, Maria Ogundele