Elon Musk: “You obviously need Mars to become self-sustaining and be…”

“It may be that civilization dies with a whimper rather than a bang and simply loses the ability to send ships to Mars. So You obviously need Mars to become self-sustaining and be able to grow by itself before the resupply ships from Earth stop coming. That is the critical civilizational threshold beyond which the probable lifespan of civilization is much greater. And how close are we technologically to be able to do that, to have a self sustaining settlement on the surface of Mars?” (02:34–02:44)

This is an excerpt from a raw transcript. The assertions have not been audited or verified. Tap the video to view the source footage and understand the context.