Ed Elson

So in other words, if we could basically download our brains onto a chip and then send those chips out there, that's going to be the future of interstellar travel.

That's how we will potentially discover life on new planets.

Am I understanding that correctly?

That's what we're here to do.

Because I actually agree with you that that is the way, I mean, that's the only way that it would make sense if we were to achieve interstellar travel.

But I'm sure there are also a lot of people who are listening and thinking this feels very dystopian, sci-fi, scary.

I don't like this idea.

Why are we turning ourselves into robots?

Do you ever think about that at the same time?

I get the sense that this is something that really drives you, that we need to get out there and we need to understand what is actually happening in the universe.

It's just crazy how little we know about it.

And I...

I could also imagine that from your position, it's probably kind of frustrating.

I mean, it's certainly frustrating for me that we're moving... It feels as though we're moving...

Not slowly, but we're never going to know the answers to these questions.

Really?

You think that we'll know the answer to aliens in our lifetime?

What is the rate of progress that we're seeing right now?

Because, I mean, if it's exponential, then it seems that there's a higher and higher probability that we'll know the answers to these questions.

As someone who's sort of building on the frontier, like how fast is the pace of progress that we're seeing in the space industry right now?