Build a Mars Civilization or an Asteroid Mining Empire?

Is the long-term future for us as a space-faring civilization in the image of Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos? Will we create a civilization on Mars or live in O’Neill cylinders mining asteroids?

We are seeing competing visions for humans in space emerging. The Elon Musk vision is about recreating civilization much the same way as it exists on Earth: Find another planet, such as Mars and build up cities with mines, farms and factories. It is a straightforward and understandable concept. Most people can relate to this idea. You are building stuff on the surface of a planet. We have a couple of thousand of years experience doing just that.

However, this is not the only future we can envision for ourselves in outer space. Others such as Jeff Bezos has instead focused more on space as a place to utilize resources and manufacture things. Bezos is fare more focused on space stations than Elon Musk. For example he has launched an initiative to build a private space station called Orbital Reef.

A rendering of the Orbital Reef space station as envisioned by Jeff Bezos and partners.