SpaceX launch: Neil deGrasse Tyson says 'Elon Musk is a special kind of man, he puts his money where his mouth is'

SpaceX will launch two NASA astronauts to the International Space Station on Wednesday. Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson joins Yahoo Finance’s On The Move to discuss the historic launch of Americans into orbit, in nearly a decade.

Video transcript

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ADAM SHAPIRO: Welcome back to Yahoo Finance "On the Move." I'm Adam Shapiro. We're all waiting for a potentially historic moment this afternoon around 4:30 when SpaceX will hopefully launch one of its rockets with a Crew Dragon capsule on top with two astronauts heading to the International Space Station. The reason it's historic is it would be the [AUDIO OUT] a private company has launched astronauts into space.

And to help us understand why this is so crucial for the future of Space exploration-- easy for me to say-- we invite into the program astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. It is always good to see you. I've got to imagine you're excited. We all are, right?

NEIL DEGRASSE TYSON: Yeah, well, anytime you launch something from Earth, that's a good day, especially if it launches successfully. I think what's significant about this, yes, as you said, it is the participation of private enterprise as a major player in the movement of the frontier of space exploration. Now, frankly, this should have been going on decades ago. And in a small sense, it was.

For example, NASA didn't build all the things it launched into space. It basically had contractors. It had Boeing, Lockheed Martin. They would build the engine, the booster. And this was scattered across the country. And it became part of the space industrial complex. The difference was NASA speced it. NASA paid for it from tax money. And it was NASA's idea to do it. In this-- and that's why when the space ship's launched, it says NASA with the American flag on it.

Now that you have a private company who is pulling off their shelf a space ship that now the government wants, then that space ship gets to say SpaceX on it. And so that's a milestone. It's a business relationship milestone.

JULIE HYMAN: Neil it's Julie here. It's good to see you.

NEIL DEGRASSE TYSON: Hi, Julie.

JULIE HYMAN: So when you look at that SpaceX rocket, for us lay people-- and you're one of the best people, I think, at translating science for lay people-- what is exciting to you about this particular rocket or this particular technology and what we're hopefully going to see this afternoon if it's not derailed by the weather?

NEIL DEGRASSE TYSON: Yeah, so I haven't checked the weather forecast. It's always-- you know, as they say never plan your life around a launch because so many factors come in that can delay it. But for me, what SpaceX is doing is attempting, and I think largely succeeded, in just lowering the cost to space. And if you lower the cost to space, which would be the objective of any business model, a business model that a government doesn't always have or need when it does something first.

So if you lower the cost of access to space and can demonstrate it and reuse all the parts, this is something that's been fun to watch as SpaceX brings their rocket bits back from orbit and then does-- sticks the landing on these circular landing pads. This is a step towards making access to space so inexpensive that everybody participates, and it's no longer the purview of governments.

INES FERRE: Neil, Ines Ferre here. And that marriage between the government and private companies like SpaceX, as you mentioned, is so important in this mission. But also as far as the moon and then Mars is concerned, the US wants to have astronauts on the moon by 2024. Is that timeline really realistic? And also is the timeline of sending humans to Mars in this lifetime realistic?

NEIL DEGRASSE TYSON: Yeah, so for me it's not about-- it's not about timelines. It's about motivation. Because if you're motivated, you just do it, right? So what you're asking is if it's only about timelines-- if John Kennedy says let's land on the moon-- and when does he give that speech in 1962, and we land on the moon seven years later. Here it is 2020. Can we land on the moon four years later? There's no reason why we couldn't.

There's no reason why we can't go to Mars, land on Mars, setup up hab modules there. The question is, what would motivate you to do so, to spend that money. Generally, if you're the first to do it or you're the first to return to do it, the return on investment just isn't there. That's why my read of history tells me that geopolitical forces are what drives the return to space or the moving frontier of space.

It's a short meeting to think about this. If you want to send-- you-- you want to start a company that's going to send people to Mars just for fun? OK. So venture capitalists come in. They say, how much will it cost. I don't know, trillions of dollars. And they say, is it dangerous. Yes. Will people die? Probably. What's the return on investment? Well, nothing for the foreseeable future. That's a short meeting, OK?

So we're not going to Mars just because it's in our DNA and we're humans. No, it's not why we went to the moon. We tell ourselves-- we tell ourselves that because that's-- because we're Americans, and that's part of the American narrative we give ourselves. But we were at war. Let's just be honest about that. And there's no greater motivation than war for doing things that you wouldn't otherwise do as a business model.

So we could get to Mars quickly. I don't think it's going to happen anytime soon. And I'm-- I think I'm more realist than a pessimist. But I don't want to stand in the way of the people who are dreaming this because there could be some breakthrough. And I could be wrong. So I don't get in their way. But that's-- my read of history tells me it's not going to happen unless geopolitics drives it.

JULIA LA ROCHE: Hi, Neil. It's Julia La Roche. Thank you so much for joining us. And speaking of motivation, the visionary behind this, Elon Musk, of course. I know you've spent time with Elon at SpaceX's headquarters. I was wondering if you could share with our viewers just a bit about him. What is it about Elon?

NEIL DEGRASSE TYSON: So I mean, Elon, he's a special kind of person who-- well, it helped first of all that he went into this business a billionaire, OK? There's a famous saying. He might have started it, actually. You know, how do you make a small fortune in space, start with a big fortune, then you can make a small-- a small fortune.

And so with him, he's a visionary that wants to put his money where his mouth is. You know, talk is cheap. It's always been cheap. And he says, I'm going to build rockets. And he starts building rockets. I'm gonna build an electric car and compete with the big auto makers. He builds an electric car. This is a good thing to have in your society, people who have big ideas that dream big and execute on them in the face of naysayers. So yes, he's a very-- he's an uncommon person in our world.

ADAM SHAPIRO: And I think a lot of us loved when he launched that Tesla roadster into space with a rocket. Man, but I gotta ask you, Neil, you know, there is a risk in all of this. And NASA requires that the Crew Dragon capsule have one in 270 chance of catastrophic failure. What does that really mean? And what is the likelihood? I mean, we all pray that this is a successful and safe launch.

NEIL DEGRASSE TYSON: Yeah, so you one in 270, I don't know how they came up with that number. I think it's-- it's-- it's sensible. You don't want this to be more dangerous than anything people have done before. And you could look at the risks that shuttle astronauts knew and accepted riding the shuttle. We lost, you know, two out of 100 and some missions. So you had a 2% chance of death in the shuttle program.

If you're moving forward in time with more advanced spacecraft and you have the legacy of 50, 60 years of space exploration behind you, you shouldn't be going into space accepting risks as poor as what people have accepted before. So that's a start.

But it remains true that space is hard. Speed kills, OK? We remember from highway signs. So this is why this where the phrase god speed. Instead of god be with you as you exit the door, which is the original form of the term goodbye, we have god speed. It's like, OK, we did everything we could. Now you've got to appeal to something else if you're gonna come back alive. So that sentiment is understandable.

So these two astronauts, they're-- you know, they're the right stuff and for the modern era. And they know they're doing it first. And they know. And they're accepting the risk.

So now, you don't want to-- you don't want to reduce the risk so much that you end up taking no risk at all. Then you might as well just move back to the cave. The first person to exit the cave was taking risks. And half of them got eaten by saber-tooth tigers, right? So what happened to Ernie? Oh, he never came back. You know, we never found him. We got to keep moving on.

So without risk, we wouldn't be where we are today. And I'm happy to live in a society where the people who like taking risks more than I like taking risks, we all benefit from the bravery of such people.

ADAM SHAPIRO: I think a lot of us are rooting for a successful launch at around 4:30 this afternoon. Let's hope the weather holds. I think they're saying now a 50-50 chance because of the storm clouds in Florida. But Neil deGrasse Tyson, astrophysicist, we will be rooting along with you if they go-- what is it? All systems go. All the best to you.

NEIL DEGRASSE TYSON: Yeah, thank you. Thank you very much. And all of you, thanks for those questions.