According to Musk, it’s imperative to make sure that there’s enough of a seed of human civilization somewhere else besides Earth, and that is for the simple reason that it might be needed to bring civilization back, in effect shortening the length of the forthcoming dark ages. “It’s important to get a self-sustaining base ideally on Mars, because Mars is far enough away from that [if there’s a war on Earth] the Mars base is more likely to survive than a moon base,” he explained. “But I think a moon base and a Mars base that could perhaps regenerate life back here on Earth would be really important.”