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SpaceX CEO Elon Musk hasn't been shy about his plans to colonize Mars. AP

Elon Musk hasn't been shy about his plans to colonize Mars.

For years, the billionaire has argued that humans must become a multiplanet species as quickly as possible to escape threats on Earth such as overpopulation.

Musk has said that by 2050, he plans to put 1 million people on the neighboring planet, with help from his space-exploration company, SpaceX.

Some of his contemporaries aren't so sure about the plan.

DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis was among the latest to point out an issue in the plans, The New York Times reported.

While Hassabis agreed the plan could work in theory, Musk was left speechless by Hassabis' suggestion that superintelligent artificial intelligence could follow him to Mars and destroy humanity, the Times reported.

The billionaire hadn't considered that risk and was so concerned he later invested in DeepMind to stay close to the technology, the report said.

Musk, a vocal AI doomsayer, has since launched his own AI company and an AI-powered chatbot.

Hassabis is far from the first to poke holes in the Tesla CEO and X owner's ambitions.

The Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates previously said Musk's ambition to colonize Mars wasn't a good use of money. Gates said funding important healthcare such as vaccine development was a better use of funds.

Four scientists previously told Business Insider that the plan suffered from technical, scientific, and ethical flaws. They said forming a colony on another planetary body, such as the moon, was more realistic than settling on the red planet.

The filmmaker Werner Herzog also took aim at the plans, once saying he thought the proposal was a "mistake" and an "obscenity."Herzog said he thought humans should focus on keeping Earth habitable, rather than looking for a new home.

Hassabis and Musk did not immediately respond to requests for comment made outside normal working hours.

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DeepMind boss found a flaw in Musk's Mars plan. He's not the first. - Business Insider