'Elon Musk was asked if he believes in God. His answer took…

'Elon Musk was asked if he believes in God. His answer took longer than anyone expected and it didn't land where the audience thought it would.

Most billionaires dodge this question. They give a diplomatic answer to avoid conflict. Musk didn't dodge it.

He said he agrees with the idea of a creator. That when he looks at the physics of the universe, the precision of the constants, the mathematical elegance of how everything holds together, it seems unlikely that it's all random.

But he didn't stop there.

He said he wasn't sure the creator is the version described in any particular religious text. That the universe itself might be the closest thing to God that he can understand. That the act of making life multi-planetary is, in his view, a way of honoring whatever force created consciousness by making sure consciousness survives.

He basically described his life's work as a spiritual mission without ever using the word spiritual.

Building rockets to Mars isn't just engineering to him. It's an answer to a question about whether the universe created intelligent life only to watch it die on one planet. He said that felt like a waste. Like the universe wouldn't bother creating consciousness if it was meant to end on one rock.

So his answer to "do you believe in God" was essentially: I believe something created all of this. And I think the appropriate response to that creation is to protect it by spreading it as far as possible.

That's not atheism. It's not traditional religion. It's a man who looked at the stars and decided the most reverent thing he could do was make sure we reach them.'