Elon Musk’s SpaceX just overhauled its to-do list.
In an X post on Sunday, the CEO said that the company is shifting its focus from Mars to creating a “self-growing city” on the moon.
“It is only possible to travel to Mars when the planets align every 26 months (six month trip time), whereas we can launch to the Moon every 10 days (2 day trip time),” Musk wrote. “This means we can iterate much faster to complete a Moon city than a Mars city.”
The announcement is a big departure from Musk’s previous comments about reaching the red planet this year.
In 2020, the SpaceX CEO said he was confident that the company would land humans on Mars by 2026.
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“If we get lucky, maybe four years,” Musk said at an awards show in 2020. “We want to send an uncrewed vehicle there in two years.”
The space company has historically delayed ambitious projects because of their complexity and regulatory challenges. Last week, the company delayed the Artemis 2 moon mission, the first human moon mission in more than 50 years.
Mars is still part of the plan
In Sunday’s post, Musk added that SpaceX would continue building a Mars city, starting in five to seven years.
“But the overriding priority is securing the future of civilization and the Moon is faster,” he wrote.
Last week, Musk announced that SpaceX would acquire xAI, his AI company behind the chatbot Grok. XAI purchased the social media platform X in March 2025.
The CEO wrote that SpaceX’s xAI acquisition would create “the most ambitious, vertically-integrated innovation engine on (and off) Earth, with AI, rockets, space-based internet, direct-to-mobile device communications and the world’s foremost real-time information and free speech platform.”
In the memo, Musk shared plans to have “self-growing bases” and factories on the moon. He also mentioned having “an entire civilization on Mars.”
In humans, working memory — our ability to hold and use information in everyday life — is closely linked to general intelligence.
That means the ability for AI to remember things could be the key to realizing a superintelligent AI, a still theoretical version of AI that reasons as well or better than humans.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman thinks it’s hard to predict just how intelligent AI can really be because the possibilities of memory retention are limitless.
“Even if you have the world’s best personal assistant, they don’t, they can’t remember every word you’ve ever said in your life, they can’t have read every email, they can’t have read every document you’ve ever written, they can’t be looking at all your work every day and remembering every little detail, they can’t be a participant in your life to that degree. No human has like infinite, perfect memory,” Altman said recently on the “Big Technology” podcast.
AI, however, will definitely have the capacity for that, he said.
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“Right now, memory is still very crude, very early,” he said. Once AI is able to remember every granular detail of a user’s life, including even the small preferences they didn’t explicitly indicate, it will be “super powerful,” he said.
Altman added that it’s one of the future features he’s most excited about — and he’s not the only one.
Andrew Pignanelli, the cofounder of The General Intelligence Company of New York, a company that builds AI agents for businesses, said that memory will become the biggest focus for AI companies in the coming year.
“It will become the most important topic discussed and recognized as the final step before AGI,” Pignanelli wrote in a blog post. “Every model provider will add and improve on memory for their apps after seeing OpenAI’s success with ChatGPT memory (like Claude just did).”
Pignanelli, however, said that the industry is still a long way from perfecting long-term memory.
“Larger context windows continue to improve things, as they allow more data to be passed into the context window, which allows the agent to better read parts of a large memory index,” he wrote, in reference to the amount of information a large language model can process in a single prompt. “Even then, though, the vast level of detail that we need to reach to consider something AGI requires memory architecture improvements.”
Even shorter-term episodic memory hasn’t been fully solved yet, he said.
Solving that memory problem is the ticket to turning AI from something that feels artificial to something that seems human, he said.
“Our systems today get the interaction part right. In terms of a Turing test for interaction, we’re basically all the way there. But that’s only half of what’s needed to make a digital self,” he wrote.
“The first AGI will be a very intelligent processor combined with a very good memory system,” he said.
Ever since I was a little girl, I remember that friendships were a priority for me; I would constantly ask my mom to let me have friends over for playdates and sleepovers.
As a teenager, I had a Nokia brick phone and a driver’s license, and I could always be found planning to see friends or inviting them over to mine.
The craving for friendship has continued ever since, with my incessant desire for it fuelled by an innate need to feel accepted. I moved a number of times when I was a kid, and I fought against the outsider mentality by developing relationships that would help me become part of social circles.
I moved from the US to Wales
As an adult, I moved from the US to Wales, and once again, had to find a way to fit in — through friendship.
I invited myself to people’s houses for coffee and asked them to go for walks with me. I texted and rang to check in on friends I had made through church, work, my kids’ school, and my husband’s previous social circles.
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These friends were incredibly important to me, and I had to hold on to them. I felt the only way to do this was to maintain frequent contact, more often than not initiated by me.
In recent years, I found myself thinking: What would happen if I didn’t text, call, or plan to meet up with friends? Would they get in touch with me?
It’s led to little monthlong experiments — going quiet to see who I’d hear from, if anyone.
The results have been both disappointing and frustrating, yet reaffirming. There were some friends who didn’t make any contact (and I felt rejected as a result), others who got in touch with me.
All of my childhood fears about exclusion and rejection were acutely felt once again.
I’m a loyal friend
I had lots to think through. Did I mind being the one who initiated the friendship — the one who kept it going? Was my concept of friendship too intense for other people? Were there some friendships I was willing to put in the work, even if I felt it wasn’t always reciprocated? Was I a needy friend?
This soul-searching led me to understand a few things about myself and the nature of friendship.
I’m a loyal friend who values deep, meaningful relationships that require time and effort. I make space for close friends, even though I work full-time, am married, and have three children, and I crave friendships with people who share the same values. A twice-a-year check-in just doesn’t do it for me. I want sisterhood.
However, this is not necessarily a value that everyone else has, and that’s OK. I suppose some people don’t need such intense friendships. Or perhaps they already have them with family or other friends. I can’t get frustrated with or feel rejected by friends who don’t have the same idea of friendship as I do.
To avoid frustration and feelings of rejection, over the last year, I’ve decided to mentally note which friends want the depth of friendship I offer and those who are happy with a surface-level relationship.
I stopped chasing friends
I leaned into those deep friendships (three of them) — people who valued relationships as much as I did. They feel like my village, those who depend on me, and those who I can depend on. They’re the ones who check in with me, just as I check in on them. It’s not me who initiates everything — they’re texting and calling too. They’re fiercely loyal.
But I stopped chasing friends who didn’t seem to place the same value on friendship as I do. I didn’t cut them out (and would happily still see them for a coffee), but I didn’t prioritize contact as I had before. I didn’t feel any resentment, but rather an understanding that we had different ideas of what friendship entailed. And that’s totally OK — I can accept this without feeling rejected or unwanted. When we do see each other, at school gates, on the streets, or for an infrequent meet-up, I enjoy their company, expecting no more than they are able to give.
And then, there were a couple of friends whom I knew I would have to initiate contact with if I wanted to maintain our friendship — I’d have to accept that for it to continue. I appreciated their friendships too much to only see or hear from them occasionally.
Over the past year, with these changes in place, I feel completely content in my friendships, as I have never before. I know where I stand with friends, and as a result, don’t feel rejected — no longer that child with an insatiable desire to be accepted by everyone. I know I’m wanted and loved, not by everyone, but by a few, and that’s enough now.
China’s missile arsenal is expanding rapidly, and new maps and data from the Pentagon show its size and reach.
China’s missile branch, known as the People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force, has seen substantial growth in recent years as Beijing builds new platforms for conventional and nuclear strike. Its capabilities threaten US, allied, and partner forces.
The latest Pentagon report on China’s military offers estimates for the number of launchers and missiles in the Chinese arsenal, including the country’s intercontinental ballistic missiles, key parts of its nuclear deterrent.
Chinese ICBMs include missiles likethe DF-5 and DF-41. The Pentagon estimates China has 550 ICBM launchers and 400 missiles with estimated ranges beyond 5,500 km, the threshold for classification as an ICBM.
Estimated numbers of missiles and launchers for Chinese missiles, specifically ground-launched cruise missiles (GLCMs), short-range ballistic missiles (SRBMs), medium-range ballistic missiles (MRBMs), intermediate-range ballistic missiles (IRBMs), and ICBMs.
US Department of Defense
For China’s medium-range ballistic missiles, such as China’s DF-21s or hypersonic DF-17, the Pentagon assesses that China has 300 launchers for 1,300 missiles with ranges between 1,000 and 3,000 km. The report also documented increases in the number of launchers and missiles for some notable systems. China’s intermediate-range ballistic missiles, like the DF-26 missile, jumped from 250 launchers in last year’s report to 300 this year, and the number of IRBMs total went from 500 to 550.
These figures illustrate how heavily Beijing has invested in a powerful, diverse missile arsenal. The Pentagon highlighted in its reportthat the Rocket Force could play an important role in a Chinese invasion of Taiwan or other regional conflict.
According to the latest report, China’s rocket force “is prepared to conduct missile attacks against high-value targets, including Taiwan’s C2 [command and control] facilities, air bases, and radar sites” as well as deter or delay the US or its allies and partners from coming to Taiwan’s aid.
The Pentagon said that the Rocket Force has continued to rehearse strikesin recent military exercises, including 2024 drills simulating an invasion or blockade of Taiwan.
The estimated ranges of Chinese missiles relevant to a Taiwan fight.
US Department of Defense
One map in the report shows the estimated reach of Chinese missiles that could be particularly relevant in a fight over Taiwan, weapons such as ship- and shore-launched surface-to-air missiles for knocking out hostile aircraft, as well as anti-ship cruise missiles fired from naval platforms like Chinese destroyers and land-based close- and short-range ballistic missiles.
Another Pentagon map shows the estimated reach of China’s conventional strike missiles, including the DF-17 and DF-21 MRBMs, the DF-26 IRBM, and the newly fielded DF-27 ICBM, which, like the DF-26 and some DF-21s, has an anti-ship role in addition to land attack.
Many of these systems can reach across the first island chain, which includes Japan, Taiwan, and the Philippines, while longer-range missiles extend toward the second island chain and beyond.
The DF-26 is concerning for US planners. The weapon, nicknamed the “Guam Express,” can be armed with either conventional or nuclear warheads and reach US installations on Guam. It can target US aircraft carriers and other surface ships as well.
Bombers, like China’s H-6, carrying CJ-20 cruise missiles could threaten parts of Alaska. And then the ICBMs can range significantly further. The DF-27can, for instance, range parts of the continental United States.
The estimated ranges of Chinese missiles with regional reach.
US Department of Defense
The Department of Defense report also looks at China’s nuclear strike options, such as land-based ICBMs and submarine-launched ballistic missiles.
China test-launched an ICBM, specifically a DF-31B missile, in September 2024, firing it from a position on Hainan Island into the Pacific. The test was the first beyond the country’s borders since the 1980s and allowed China to verify ICBM performance. The Department of Defense suspects weapons tests like these may become more regular.
This year, at a military parade in Beijing, China unveiled new, previously unseen ICBMs, shocking China watchers. Those weapons, including the new DF-61 and DF-31BJ, are not included in the Pentagon’s assessments.
China also continues to bolster its nuclear warhead count, estimated at over 600 warheads. Although 2024 saw a slower rate of production than previous years, the Pentagon still assesses that the Chinese military is on its way to 1,000 warheads by 2030, only a fraction of the US and Russian stockpiles.
The estimated ranges of Chinese nuclear missiles.
US Department of Defense
A Pentagon map estimating the ranges of Chinese missiles available for nuclear strike indicates that three — the DF-5, DF-41, and DF-31 — all have the continental US well within range, while the submarine-launched JL-3 missile can hit most of it from waters near China. On a submarine positioned farther out, more targets could be within striking distance.
Despite these continued advancements, questions remain on the differences in quality and capabilities of Chinese weapons and training compared to the US. The Pentagon also believes China is still navigating the impacts of a vast anti-corruption campaign in the military that has particularly targeted PLARF officials.
The campaign could be detrimental if driven by political agendas, or it could deliverlong-term improvements if it addresses actual problems within the force. At this point, it’s unclear how the changes will affect it.
