Elon Musk argues interstellar travel will shift economic metrics from currency to mass and energy
Story Overview
Musk's remark on interstellar economics stems from Casey Handmer's November 2025 blog post sketching a conceptual path to produce, store, and harness antimatter at industrial scales, where the required energy inputs would dwarf conventional financial measures.
Technical Outline Leaves Key Gaps
Handmer breaks the challenge into production efficiency jumps beyond today's tiny CERN outputs, electrostatic storage of antihydrogen, and thermal engine designs, yet states no schedules or confirmed resources for any stage.
Physics Could Redefine Value Units
Musk frames the energy and mass volumes involved as so extreme that currency loses relevance, an idea that surfaces whenever antimatter propulsion enters long-range travel talks but stays unquantified here.
Many users praised Elon Musk's vision of trillion-trillion-dollar antimatter spending for star travel as inspiring and feasible with future ASI, while others dismissed the cost figures as unrealistic or insensitive to current hardships.
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Most Activity
Things won’t be measure in dollars then, just mass & energy
In the future, a trillion times a trillion dollars will be spent on making antimatter to travel to other star systems
@greg16676935420 @elonmusk A trillion multiplied by a trillion is 10^24, also known as a septillion. That's 1 followed by 24 zeros — an astronomically large number that puts the scale of future antimatter projects into perspective.
@elonmusk I have something ready for that, comrade ☭
@elonmusk @grok what is a trillion multiplied by a trillion?
@elonmusk This is the future
Here are some notes on how this will work. https://caseyhandmer.wordpress.com/2025/11/26/antimatter-development-program/
In the future, a trillion times a trillion dollars will be spent on making antimatter to travel to other star systems
@elonmusk Will those star systems have big tiddied goth gfs?
@elonmusk @elonmusk You are right about the insane cost, but it's not possible when America pours trillions into wars instead of science.
@elonmusk When the government tells you: We are all in the same boat:
Elon already thinking about the path from Kardashev 3
In the future, a trillion times a trillion dollars will be spent on making antimatter to travel to other star systems
@elonmusk Boss I will start believing you if you can find solution to prevent humans from aging and dying! All these things you are venturing on are bullshitss as far as we humans are concern
@elonmusk Can we stick the Pakistani rape gangs on a rocket to another solar system?
@elonmusk A trillion times a trillion dollars, and my luggage still gets lost.
antimatter maybe, but not for a trillion trillion dollars
In the future, a trillion times a trillion dollars will be spent on making antimatter to travel to other star systems
@elonmusk Me on my way to the burbs in 2090:
@elonmusk Bro, just fix shit here on earth and name everything after yourself and your children. Now that’s a legacy. First, buy a shit ton of land and just preserve it. Don’t exploit it, just let it be. People would fucking love you
@elonmusk Let me save some wheat(mass) for then to exchange it as a barter system then!
@elonmusk
@elonmusk Captain's log: worth every penny. 🐕🦺
“You can assess how well civilization is harnessing the power available on the planet that’s Type I.
Kardashev Type II : how much of the star’s power are you harnessing?
Kardashev Type III : how much of the galaxy’s power are you harnessing?
We are currently at a very low Kardashev Type I level.”
— Elon Musk