Elon Musk Called a 'Super Villain' After Suggesting Nuking Mars [Watch]

Elon Musk recently shared that it might be feasible to nuke Mars. Stephen Colbert called him the billionaire businessman a “supervillain”.

CBC reported that during a recent interview on CBS’ “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert”, the host at one point asked Musk about his plans for planet Mars. Musk seemed unfazed by the fact that the red planet was deemed uninhabitable. He said that Mars can actually be warmed and made more hospitable to human life. The first option would be slower, which involved waiting for the natural release of greenhouse gases. The second approach would involve blasting thermonuclear bombs on Mars’ poles to make it warmer. As a result, Mars can become very much like Earth.

“You’re a super villain, that’s what a supper villain does. Superman doesn’t say we’ll drop thermonuclear bombs, that’s Lex Luthor, man,” Colbert told the Tesla and SpaceX CEO.

Musk seemed unaffected by Colbert’s statements. USA Today revealed that for years, Musk has been particularly interested in Mars, saying that he wanted to visit the planet in the future. He might even have plans to build a colony there someday. Musk mentioned that his rocket company, Space Exploration Technologies or SpaceX, can ferry astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS) two to three years from now. Currently, the Falcon rockets of SpaceX delivers cargo to the ISS.

A lot of social media users were actually excited about Musk’s idea and shared their support online, saying how the business magnate actually uses his powers for good purposes and that to be great, one has to actually come up with insane concepts.

MSNBC wrote that currently, Mars appears like a dry and dead planet, but it also has polar ice caps that contain about equal parts carbon dioxide and water. Nuclear bombs can be used to vaporize the ice caps and release the materials into the atmosphere. When the atmosphere becomes thicker, the greenhouse effect will occur, where energy from the sun will be absorbed by Mars, released as infrared radiation and trapped. As the heating process continues, more carbon dioxide will be released until the surface pressure of the planet would be high enough for liquid water to exist, making it more habitable for plants that produce oxygen.

Michael Shara, curator astrophysics department of the American Museum of Natural History, said that the idea of nuking Mars might initially be good in theory, but it would require more computations and centuries before people can actually start living there.