WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.240 --> 00:00:04.000 If you can translate that into a product that people can experience and that they 2 00:00:04.120 --> 00:00:07.719 like and that delights them, then that's a good measure of the success of 3 00:00:07.799 --> 00:00:11.279 the product. I really like the fact that when people buy a car that 4 00:00:11.359 --> 00:00:16.839 they experience delight And for many people they've said, they've told me it's like 5 00:00:16.879 --> 00:00:19.879 the best product they've ever bought, and it made them happy. And there 6 00:00:19.960 --> 00:00:22.000 was one person who said, like, whenever they feel sad, they can 7 00:00:22.039 --> 00:00:24.239 just go to the go to their garage and look at the car and it 8 00:00:24.280 --> 00:00:27.920 makes them happy. And that's cool. That's really cool. So what actually 9 00:00:27.920 --> 00:00:31.519 made them happier? That's what they told me? The car? Yeah, 10 00:00:32.039 --> 00:00:36.039 what's your explanation behind this? Why this could make people happier? Pretty, 11 00:00:36.039 --> 00:00:39.079 it's a beautiful car. It does a few things like when you approach, 12 00:00:39.119 --> 00:00:44.079 the car senses that you're coming, and the handles extend and it prepares for 13 00:00:44.119 --> 00:00:46.719 you to come, and it's almost like a pet. But do you still 14 00:00:46.799 --> 00:00:51.119 have that kind of freshness when you use the car yourself or you have been 15 00:00:51.320 --> 00:00:54.920 used to that and lost the excitement. My case, it's a little tricky 16 00:00:54.960 --> 00:00:59.200 because I'm always looking for what's wrong in order to make the car better. 17 00:00:59.439 --> 00:01:03.159 I always have to be thinking. I actually think very critically, and so 18 00:01:03.200 --> 00:01:07.519 when I see the car, I see all the things that I think need 19 00:01:07.560 --> 00:01:11.519 to be fixed to make it better. And so it's certainly it's easy to 20 00:01:11.000 --> 00:01:17.200 lose the sense of wonder or just see the flaws, because it's a difficult 21 00:01:17.200 --> 00:01:19.959 thing to reconcile, because if you want to make something better, then you 22 00:01:19.040 --> 00:01:23.319 must analyze it for the flaws. Yes, but then that kind of prevents 23 00:01:23.359 --> 00:01:27.120 the enjoyment of it. It's a difficult it's a difficult dichotomy. It seems 24 00:01:27.120 --> 00:01:30.799 that you believe in the fact that we're all going to drive electric cars, 25 00:01:32.200 --> 00:01:34.959 and maybe someday only by computers, not by human beings, you still believe 26 00:01:34.959 --> 00:01:38.920 in that. I think it's fairly clear that to me, at least, 27 00:01:38.920 --> 00:01:42.560 that all transport will go fully electric. Better for the world from an environmental 28 00:01:42.599 --> 00:01:47.640 standpoint and from an economic standpoint. If we transition to electric transport sooner, 29 00:01:47.760 --> 00:01:51.000 we'll help with pollution, global warming and all that stuff. And I do 30 00:01:51.079 --> 00:01:53.840 think we're headed towards an age of autonomous transport, where you know, you 31 00:01:53.920 --> 00:01:57.280 just summon the car with your phone or something, and then get in and 32 00:01:57.519 --> 00:02:00.480 you just tell the where you want to go and it takes you there. 33 00:02:00.560 --> 00:02:05.439 It's going to happen very quickly. I think maybe in four or five years. 34 00:02:05.640 --> 00:02:09.520 Yeah, But how do you react to some the public opinions of skepticism 35 00:02:09.719 --> 00:02:14.000 because it seems a lot of people are watching you and say, let's see 36 00:02:14.000 --> 00:02:17.120 how far this kit can go? I suppose the skepticism about anything new that's 37 00:02:17.159 --> 00:02:23.039 normal and not expecting that people just believe me or But I think if you 38 00:02:23.080 --> 00:02:27.840 look at generally my predictions have they are more often correct than not. Really 39 00:02:27.879 --> 00:02:32.800 just talking about five years will have affordable electric cars that go long ranges and 40 00:02:34.599 --> 00:02:39.360 there will be autonomous Please, let's the slag. How do you see that 41 00:02:39.400 --> 00:02:46.080 contradiction? How could you reconcile? Its not exactly contradiction because I always say 42 00:02:46.159 --> 00:02:50.960 it's important for civilization to be a multiplanet species. So it's not like an 43 00:02:51.080 --> 00:02:53.520 escape from Earth and then we all leave Earth and try to go to Mars 44 00:02:53.560 --> 00:02:57.599 or something like that. Why don't we come now saving the planet instead of 45 00:02:57.840 --> 00:03:00.159 having the back door open. I do think at nineteen nine percent of our 46 00:03:00.159 --> 00:03:04.879 efforts should be focused on Earth, and really ninety nine point nine percent of 47 00:03:04.879 --> 00:03:07.800 our effort is focused on Earth. But I do think it's it's worth saying, 48 00:03:07.800 --> 00:03:12.000 Okay, let's take one percent and try to establish a self sustaining city 49 00:03:12.039 --> 00:03:15.759 on Mars and make life multiplanetary. And I think there's a couple of good 50 00:03:15.800 --> 00:03:17.919 reasons for that. First of all, there's always the possibility that there could 51 00:03:17.919 --> 00:03:21.960 be some terrible thing that happens on Earth that we can't and that we maybe 52 00:03:21.960 --> 00:03:23.960 don't anticipate them. If you look at the fossil record and the fact that 53 00:03:24.000 --> 00:03:28.039 there've been five major extinction events in the last five hundred million years, and 54 00:03:28.039 --> 00:03:30.280 what happened to the dinosaurs. They used to be here, they're not around 55 00:03:30.280 --> 00:03:34.479 anymore. So that's the defensive argument. And then there's the what I called 56 00:03:34.479 --> 00:03:38.120 maybe the inspiration argument or the excitement the building a city on Mars would just 57 00:03:38.159 --> 00:03:42.680 be this incredible adventure, that there'll be things in life that are exciting and 58 00:03:42.719 --> 00:03:44.840 inspiring that when you wake up in the morning, you're like, yes, 59 00:03:44.879 --> 00:03:47.680 I'm glad to be alive. And I think having this great adventure would be 60 00:03:47.800 --> 00:03:53.120 like that. So there is a proverb in Chinese called c and yotn which 61 00:03:53.120 --> 00:03:55.840 from two thousand years ago there was a man spend the whole day worrying about 62 00:03:55.879 --> 00:04:00.240 way of the heaven falls down. So everyone laughed at him, said, 63 00:04:00.560 --> 00:04:04.479 why can't you be concerned about something more pragmatic. Basically, so you're the 64 00:04:04.520 --> 00:04:10.280 guy who is worrying about maybe another millennium's way that we need to move to 65 00:04:10.319 --> 00:04:14.039 another planet. Okay, it's not moving to another planet, it's being multiplanet. 66 00:04:14.080 --> 00:04:15.199 We're still going to be on Earth, but we'll have Mars too, 67 00:04:15.439 --> 00:04:19.160 and we want to become a space frank civilization and a multiplanet species and ultimately 68 00:04:19.199 --> 00:04:23.920 be out there exploring the stars. I think that's a much more exciting future 69 00:04:24.240 --> 00:04:27.639 than a future where we're forever confined to Earth until some eventual extinction event. 70 00:04:27.800 --> 00:04:31.040 You basically taught yourself a lot of things in a computer programming as a child, 71 00:04:31.120 --> 00:04:38.120 and after taking physics and economics in college, you taught yourself auto technologies, 72 00:04:38.199 --> 00:04:42.399 and then rocketry, battery technology, and so on and so forth. 73 00:04:42.879 --> 00:04:46.879 What's the motivation behind all this? I just I find that I basically learn 74 00:04:46.959 --> 00:04:50.839 whatever I need to learn to accomplish an objective. And I think actually most 75 00:04:50.879 --> 00:04:55.839 people could do this, but they often self limit pure are capable of more 76 00:04:55.879 --> 00:04:59.279 than they think. But what I found is if you simply read a lot 77 00:04:59.279 --> 00:05:01.079 of books and talk to people. You can learn almost anything. But was 78 00:05:01.160 --> 00:05:05.120 reading also an escape or rescue to you? As a boy in school? 79 00:05:05.120 --> 00:05:10.639 I learned that you're the youngest in the class and bull it sometime, so 80 00:05:10.680 --> 00:05:13.480 what I was reading to you at that time? This is, of course, 81 00:05:13.519 --> 00:05:15.720 back in the days before there were video games, and TV wasn't very 82 00:05:15.759 --> 00:05:20.120 good either, And I was actually for quite a while the youngest and the 83 00:05:20.199 --> 00:05:25.480 smallest in the class. And my parents moved a lot, so I went 84 00:05:25.519 --> 00:05:28.959 through six different schools, so it's difficult to make friends. And then one 85 00:05:29.040 --> 00:05:31.199 year and then you've been in your school. The next books certainly were something 86 00:05:31.279 --> 00:05:34.480 that I found comforting, and I would read all the time, just all 87 00:05:34.519 --> 00:05:39.920 the time morning tonight though, the philosophers and religious texts and that kind of 88 00:05:39.920 --> 00:05:44.759 thing, and a lot of nonfiction as well, read the encyclopedia. And 89 00:05:44.800 --> 00:05:46.839 in fact, I remember when I was just in an elementary school, I 90 00:05:46.920 --> 00:05:49.879 was reading about ion engines and I thought they were super cool. And now 91 00:05:49.879 --> 00:05:55.160 we're launching satellites with ion engines. But how about real figures in history, 92 00:05:55.319 --> 00:05:59.439 Zach Newton or Einstein, so and so forth. Did you make up your 93 00:05:59.480 --> 00:06:03.480 mind to be someone great, someone who can leave a legacy in history for 94 00:06:03.639 --> 00:06:08.600 all humanity. No, I never thought there were no. Actually, when 95 00:06:08.600 --> 00:06:11.079 I was a kid, I didn't know what I would do when I grew 96 00:06:11.160 --> 00:06:14.879 up. I just wanted to be involved in things that were on the cutting 97 00:06:15.000 --> 00:06:16.639 edge, on things that were affecting the future of the world. But I 98 00:06:16.639 --> 00:06:21.240 didn't think anything great would happen at all. Were you certain about what you 99 00:06:21.279 --> 00:06:27.720 would achieve or Oh no? Was there also most like in your future? 100 00:06:28.000 --> 00:06:30.639 No? Inpact, I expected to fail. I expected to fail it still 101 00:06:30.720 --> 00:06:34.920 went ahead and do it. The reason I expected to fail was because most 102 00:06:34.920 --> 00:06:40.560 companies fail. So if ninety percent plus the companies fail and I have no 103 00:06:40.800 --> 00:06:45.759 track record of making companies work, then basically the most likely outcomings failure. 104 00:06:45.800 --> 00:06:48.720 But I didn't think it was super risky because I talked to my professor and 105 00:06:48.920 --> 00:06:53.680 said that I was going to try to start an internet company and that it 106 00:06:53.720 --> 00:06:57.839 would probably not work, and would you mind if I came back to class 107 00:06:57.920 --> 00:07:00.959 if it didn't work. He said, sure, no problem. And where 108 00:07:00.959 --> 00:07:04.120 did the original investment come from? The own pocket money will finance by our 109 00:07:04.160 --> 00:07:10.480 mother? Well, yeah, I had about three thousand dollars and a computer. 110 00:07:10.720 --> 00:07:13.920 And then my brother came and joined and he had about I think five 111 00:07:13.959 --> 00:07:17.439 thousand dollars, and then another friend of ours came he had six thousand dollars, 112 00:07:17.759 --> 00:07:20.319 so we really, this is not a lot. And in the beginning 113 00:07:20.480 --> 00:07:25.360 we were just we didn't have enough money to rent an apartment and an office, 114 00:07:25.879 --> 00:07:29.839 so the office was actually cheaper. We slept in the office, and 115 00:07:29.920 --> 00:07:31.920 we thought maybe it was more impressive to have an office. Can't have people 116 00:07:31.959 --> 00:07:35.360 come to an apartment. But at night we would just sleep on the couch 117 00:07:35.519 --> 00:07:39.040 in the office, and then we would go to the YMCA to shower. 118 00:07:39.160 --> 00:07:43.000 And in the very beginning, we only had one computer, so the website 119 00:07:43.000 --> 00:07:46.759 only worked during the day because at night I was programming software. We were 120 00:07:46.839 --> 00:07:49.959 brother and a friend joined you, but you were ready to fail. How 121 00:07:50.000 --> 00:07:53.800 did you convince them to join you? Oh, they thought it would fail 122 00:07:53.839 --> 00:07:56.480 too. How did that work out? It worked out pretty well. In 123 00:07:56.480 --> 00:07:58.879 the end. We ended up we ended up growing the business, and it 124 00:07:58.959 --> 00:08:01.560 ended up getting sold from three hundred million dollars. So when a young man 125 00:08:01.839 --> 00:08:07.800 someday god ten some millions and then a billion, we were blown away for 126 00:08:07.839 --> 00:08:11.240 a while. At least, Yeah, you bet, absolutely what did you 127 00:08:11.360 --> 00:08:13.720 do with that money? Yeah? For what was it? Like check like 128 00:08:13.759 --> 00:08:16.680 that? Yeah, that was awesome, right. Yeah. In fact, 129 00:08:16.920 --> 00:08:20.519 they mailed a check in. There's not a check in the mail, which 130 00:08:20.560 --> 00:08:24.560 is crazy. It was like this giant check in the mail. Yeah, 131 00:08:24.680 --> 00:08:26.560 that was one of the craziest things you did. Yeah, that was Yeah. 132 00:08:26.600 --> 00:08:30.720 I was with Peter Tiele, one of the co founders of PayPal. 133 00:08:30.920 --> 00:08:33.960 We were actually just driving up Sandy Hill Road. We're going to visit Mike 134 00:08:33.039 --> 00:08:37.080 Moritz at Square Capital, and Peter was asked me, so what can this 135 00:08:37.120 --> 00:08:41.360 car do? And then famous last words, I said, watch this, 136 00:08:41.639 --> 00:08:43.799 and I flowed it and did a lane change and the black wheels broke loose 137 00:08:43.919 --> 00:08:48.759 and the car spun around and then we hit the embankment and knocked the car 138 00:08:48.840 --> 00:08:52.480 into the air, which continued spinning like a discus, like three feet in 139 00:08:52.480 --> 00:08:54.720 the air. Bam landed going the original direction. It was like in a 140 00:08:54.759 --> 00:08:58.960 movie and blew out the suspension and I drove to the side of the road 141 00:08:58.000 --> 00:09:01.679 and I was like, Holy caw, that was crazy. After that, 142 00:09:01.720 --> 00:09:05.399 I took driving lessons on the McLaren because it's like a difficult car to drive. 143 00:09:05.639 --> 00:09:09.440 Are you a very prudent driver. Nowadays, I think I'm not a 144 00:09:09.600 --> 00:09:11.720 I think I'm a fairly prudent driver. I had a tough choice there because 145 00:09:11.759 --> 00:09:16.799 I could either provide all of the money for SpaceX or all of the money 146 00:09:16.799 --> 00:09:20.720 for Tesla and then increase the chance that one of them would survive, or 147 00:09:20.000 --> 00:09:22.320 I have to split the money. But if I split the money, then 148 00:09:22.399 --> 00:09:26.320 maybe both will die. You can imagine. It's almost like if you had 149 00:09:26.559 --> 00:09:28.600 two children and you have only so much food, what do you do? 150 00:09:28.759 --> 00:09:33.159 So what was the choice? I split it? At those closest moment of 151 00:09:33.240 --> 00:09:37.279 a failure, What did you say to yourself? Can I survive this? 152 00:09:37.840 --> 00:09:41.720 No? You didn't question yourself. No, No, it's more it was 153 00:09:41.799 --> 00:09:46.480 just the difficulty is that in those situations, there's so much responsibility that you 154 00:09:46.519 --> 00:09:50.039 have to the employees and to the investors who have come along. So it 155 00:09:50.080 --> 00:09:54.080 would have been extremely I would have been really disappointed if I had not been 156 00:09:54.120 --> 00:09:58.440 able to keep my responsibility to have the company survive. You said you almost 157 00:09:58.519 --> 00:10:05.639 had to nervous breakdown. Where did the tenacity or the resilience come from? 158 00:10:05.720 --> 00:10:09.120 But I remember the closest I ever came to a nervous breakdown I never and 159 00:10:09.159 --> 00:10:13.000 I never thought I was someone who I thought nervous breakdowns. That's ridiculous, 160 00:10:13.200 --> 00:10:16.360 who could Why would people have such a thing. But I remember waking up 161 00:10:16.360 --> 00:10:20.440 on the Sunday before Christmas in two thousand and eight and thinking, damn, 162 00:10:20.639 --> 00:10:22.679 this is the closest I've ever gotten, you know, And it was looking 163 00:10:22.720 --> 00:10:26.919 pretty grown because at that point we even though the fourth launch of SpaceX had 164 00:10:26.960 --> 00:10:31.000 succeeded, we were still running out of money because we had three failures and 165 00:10:31.080 --> 00:10:35.639 only one success, still not enough. And then the financing round for Tesla 166 00:10:35.840 --> 00:10:39.399 had not closed, and we had only two days maybe three, I think 167 00:10:39.799 --> 00:10:43.639 it was like two or three days maybe to close it before Christmas. I 168 00:10:43.679 --> 00:10:46.519 was like, man, this is this could be a really bad end of 169 00:10:46.519 --> 00:10:52.080 the year. Maybe both companies will fail screen. I didn't cry apartments, 170 00:10:52.360 --> 00:10:58.240 no, no, I had. My sleep was difficult. I wasn't expecting 171 00:10:58.360 --> 00:11:00.679 to call. I actually thought they were on the case because it was so 172 00:11:00.720 --> 00:11:03.039 close to Christmas. I thought it was less than only a few days before 173 00:11:03.120 --> 00:11:05.399 Christmas, so I thought, there's no way they're going to call them. 174 00:11:05.480 --> 00:11:07.639 They must have gone home for the year. What they called them, They 175 00:11:07.639 --> 00:11:11.679 said that SpaceX had won this one point four billion dollar contract. What was 176 00:11:11.679 --> 00:11:16.159 your reaction to that piece of news. I said, I love you, 177 00:11:16.240 --> 00:11:20.960 which I don't think is normal response for NASA contracting officers. That was good. 178 00:11:20.960 --> 00:11:24.240 And then a few days later we closed the Tesla financing round on the 179 00:11:24.320 --> 00:11:28.240 last hour of the last day when it was possible, which was six pm 180 00:11:28.480 --> 00:11:33.039 Christmas Eve, two thousand and eight. So failure said not the most terrible 181 00:11:33.080 --> 00:11:35.080 things. Whether you have to learn from it and react to it. Yeah, 182 00:11:35.320 --> 00:11:39.440 exactly. When you're building something new, there's going to be mistakes, 183 00:11:39.879 --> 00:11:45.120 and it's important to recognize those mistakes, acknowledge them, and take corrective action. 184 00:11:45.759 --> 00:11:48.840 And the success of the company is very much more about how quick are 185 00:11:48.879 --> 00:11:52.279 you to fix the mistakes, not will you make mistakes or admit mistakes. 186 00:11:52.519 --> 00:11:56.679 Absolutely, and if you see the difference between a startup that is successful and 187 00:11:56.720 --> 00:12:01.440 one that is not, and it's because the successful one they both made mistakes, 188 00:12:01.720 --> 00:12:05.519 but the successful one recognize the mistakes fix them very quickly, and the 189 00:12:07.080 --> 00:12:11.879 unsuccessful one tries to deny that the mistakes exist. Extremely smart people are sometimes 190 00:12:11.000 --> 00:12:16.000 quite arrogant because they believe in what they believe in right, and so when 191 00:12:16.000 --> 00:12:20.720 they face criticism less likely to admit they can make mistakes? Was that in 192 00:12:20.799 --> 00:12:24.120 your case? I learned it when I was doing when I was studying physics. 193 00:12:24.159 --> 00:12:26.720 In physics, you're taught to always question yourself. You're taught to always 194 00:12:26.759 --> 00:12:30.679 assume that you're wrong, not assume that you're right, and you have to 195 00:12:30.720 --> 00:12:33.559 prove yourself not wrong. And so I think that physics framework is really where 196 00:12:33.600 --> 00:12:39.200 I lent it, and it's very effective for uncounterintuitive things that aren't obvious. 197 00:12:39.480 --> 00:12:43.120 So you are very famous in saying that failure is actually an option, and 198 00:12:43.240 --> 00:12:46.080 if you're not failing, that means you're not innovative in that. Yeah, 199 00:12:46.120 --> 00:12:48.639 it's not like I like failure. Who likes failure? Is terrible? But 200 00:12:48.960 --> 00:12:52.919 if you only do things that are certain to succeed, then you're only going 201 00:12:52.960 --> 00:12:54.519 to be doing very obvious things. I know, Matacle, you can tell 202 00:12:54.559 --> 00:13:05.600 where elect always tells you don't are touching up You're being innovative can be very 203 00:13:05.600 --> 00:13:11.279 exciting life, but doing business sometimes persistence sometimes could be very boring. Do 204 00:13:11.320 --> 00:13:16.879 you have the same fun from innovation as from business running a business rather to 205 00:13:16.960 --> 00:13:22.399 be just an innovator, engineer instead of a business owner or runner. I'd 206 00:13:22.399 --> 00:13:26.000 love to just do innovation and just do engineering. But you raise a good 207 00:13:26.000 --> 00:13:28.320 point because a lot of life in general, in any job there is you 208 00:13:28.360 --> 00:13:33.519 have to do your chores. There's nobody else can do that for you. 209 00:13:33.840 --> 00:13:37.679 Yeah, I think to be successful almost anything, you can't. You have 210 00:13:37.759 --> 00:13:41.559 to do the tough stuff and as well as the enjoyable stuff. You have 211 00:13:41.600 --> 00:13:43.759 to do the boring stuff as well as the non boring stuff. And if 212 00:13:43.759 --> 00:13:46.799 you don't do your chores, then bad things will happen. But if they 213 00:13:46.840 --> 00:13:50.080 don't do the things that they don't like to do, then the company will 214 00:13:50.080 --> 00:13:54.000 be in trouble. You have to you Basically, it's more fun to cook 215 00:13:54.039 --> 00:13:56.240 the meal than to clean the dishes. Okay, but you need to clean 216 00:13:56.279 --> 00:13:58.360 the dishes. You need to do both. Yes, you need to do 217 00:13:58.399 --> 00:14:03.600 both exactly. So what are some of the ideas that excites you today? 218 00:14:03.919 --> 00:14:09.559 Because there are so many brilliant ideas around the world, How could you keep 219 00:14:09.639 --> 00:14:13.879 focused on the things you're doing instead of being distracted by so many other good 220 00:14:13.879 --> 00:14:18.919 ideas. There's not a lot of opportunity and electrification of cars, of aircraft 221 00:14:18.000 --> 00:14:22.840 and of boats, And I think there's a particular opportunity for a supersonic vertical 222 00:14:22.879 --> 00:14:26.000 takeover and landing electric jet. That's something I'd love to do at some point 223 00:14:26.039 --> 00:14:31.080 in the future if might time allows. Were you certain about what you would 224 00:14:31.120 --> 00:14:33.399 achieve? Oh? No, I thought it was most likely. And also, 225 00:14:33.480 --> 00:14:37.759 even machines are taking a lot of functions away from us, there are 226 00:14:37.799 --> 00:14:43.320 still functions that we have to deliver ourselves. For example, fatherhood. So 227 00:14:43.360 --> 00:14:46.759 how would you educate your five boys? Actually I created a little school. 228 00:14:46.960 --> 00:14:50.000 Yeah, what kind of school could you describe to us? Sure, it's 229 00:14:50.000 --> 00:14:54.159 small, it's only got fourteen kids now and it'll have twenty kids in September. 230 00:14:54.639 --> 00:14:56.639 It's called ad Astra, which means to the stars. That's maybe a 231 00:14:56.679 --> 00:15:01.320 bit different from most other schools is that there aren't any grades. There's no 232 00:15:01.480 --> 00:15:03.440 like grade one, grade two, grade three type of thing, and making 233 00:15:03.480 --> 00:15:07.480 all the children go in the same grade at the same time like an assembly 234 00:15:07.519 --> 00:15:11.639 line. I know. Because some people love English or languages, some people 235 00:15:11.679 --> 00:15:16.200 love math, some people love music and different abilities at different times, it 236 00:15:16.240 --> 00:15:22.960 makes more sense to cater the education to match their aptitudes and abilities like That's 237 00:15:22.960 --> 00:15:28.440 one principle. Another is that it's important to teach teach problem solving or teach 238 00:15:28.480 --> 00:15:31.000 to the problem, not to the tools. So this would be like, 239 00:15:31.159 --> 00:15:35.679 let's say you're trying to teach people about how engines work, or you could 240 00:15:35.720 --> 00:15:37.679 start by a more traditional approach would be to say, we're going to teach 241 00:15:37.679 --> 00:15:41.879 you all about screwdrivers and wrenchers, and you're going to have a course on 242 00:15:41.919 --> 00:15:46.360 screwdrivers, a course on wrenches and all these things, and it's a very 243 00:15:46.360 --> 00:15:48.159 difficult. A much better way would be like, here's the engine. Now 244 00:15:48.240 --> 00:15:50.320 let's take it apart. How are we going to take it apart? Oh, 245 00:15:50.360 --> 00:15:52.840 you need a screwdriver. That's what the screw driver's for. You need 246 00:15:52.879 --> 00:15:56.799 a wrench, That's what the wrench is for. And then a very important 247 00:15:56.799 --> 00:16:00.720 thing happens, which is that the relevance of the tools becomes a aren't so 248 00:16:00.919 --> 00:16:04.960 your five boys are in that school and two when this is from school, 249 00:16:07.120 --> 00:16:11.039 they like it. They like it? Yeah, and you want to keep 250 00:16:11.039 --> 00:16:15.200 them away from regular schools. No, I just didn't see that the regular 251 00:16:15.240 --> 00:16:18.960 schools. They weren't doing the things that I thought should be done those two 252 00:16:18.960 --> 00:16:22.960 principles. They weren't adhering to those principles. I thought, let's see what 253 00:16:22.000 --> 00:16:26.279 we can do, maybe creating a school will be better, and actually hired 254 00:16:26.320 --> 00:16:30.720 a teacher from the school they were at who also agreed with me that there 255 00:16:30.759 --> 00:16:33.519 was a better way to do it. Have they surprised you in a way 256 00:16:33.559 --> 00:16:37.480 of their innovative thinking. Yeah, it seems to be going pretty well. 257 00:16:37.559 --> 00:16:40.200 The kids really loved going to school. I think that's a good sign. 258 00:16:40.480 --> 00:16:42.600 I hated going to school when Isaac kid it was torture. The fact that 259 00:16:42.639 --> 00:16:47.559 they actually think vacations are too long. They want to go back to school. 260 00:16:48.039 --> 00:16:52.159 Yeah, exactly. There are so many young people, the millennium generation 261 00:16:52.600 --> 00:16:59.279 who wants to start up their own company with all these accessibility of the internet 262 00:16:59.480 --> 00:17:03.079 and such a big market. What's your advice for them, because sometimes they 263 00:17:03.160 --> 00:17:07.359 may easily go to the day dreaming part or the wish for thinking part. 264 00:17:07.519 --> 00:17:11.359 What's the balance between imagination and pragmatism? Basically, I do think that in 265 00:17:11.480 --> 00:17:15.759 terms of creating a company, what Edison said, which was like, it's 266 00:17:15.759 --> 00:17:18.839 one percent inspiration nineteen nine percent perspiration, is true. A lot of it 267 00:17:18.920 --> 00:17:23.079 in creating a company is execution. You start off with an idea, and 268 00:17:23.119 --> 00:17:27.680 that idea is mostly wrong, and then you adapt that idea and keep refining 269 00:17:27.680 --> 00:17:33.359 it, and you listen to criticism. Some criticism you discard, you try 270 00:17:33.359 --> 00:17:37.039 to discard the wrong criticism, try to listen to the correct criticism, and 271 00:17:37.079 --> 00:17:41.559 then engage in for self improvement and constantly refining it and making it better. 272 00:17:41.880 --> 00:17:45.519 And you have to work super hard, and that's very important. And then 273 00:17:45.599 --> 00:17:49.400 just keep making keep iterating on a loop which says, am I doing something 274 00:17:49.480 --> 00:17:52.400 useful for other people? Because that's what a company is supposed to do. 275 00:17:52.559 --> 00:17:57.200 A company is just a group of people gathered together to produce a product or 276 00:17:57.240 --> 00:18:02.319 service, and a company should only exist if that product or service is truly 277 00:18:02.400 --> 00:18:11.759 useful to customers. Al Masaco, we should you come way show, But 278 00:18:11.880 --> 00:18:17.319 you're not going to be running Tesla all the time, or what's the next 279 00:18:17.319 --> 00:18:21.279 step for you? I certainly I'll be running Tesla and SpaceX into the foreseeable 280 00:18:21.319 --> 00:18:25.680 future. And a key goal with space with, a key go with Tesla 281 00:18:25.960 --> 00:18:30.640 is to be able to make an affordable, great electric car, a sort 282 00:18:30.640 --> 00:18:33.240 of third generation car, because you can only change the world for electric cars 283 00:18:33.279 --> 00:18:37.839 if people can afford to buy a great electric car. The affordable electric cars 284 00:18:37.880 --> 00:18:41.279 are not great, and the great electric cars not affordable. We need them 285 00:18:41.359 --> 00:18:44.799 great electric cars that are affordable. So that's the goal with SpaceX with Tesla. 286 00:18:44.880 --> 00:18:47.599 Now with SpaceX, that's a bit of a longer term goal because we 287 00:18:47.640 --> 00:18:52.759 need to make reusability work with rockets. That's fundamental to improving the cost of 288 00:18:52.799 --> 00:18:56.240 spaceflight by a factor of one hundred. And then we need to make the 289 00:18:56.319 --> 00:19:02.440 rockets really big and be able to send large amounts of people in cargo to 290 00:19:02.880 --> 00:19:06.200 Mars. And right now nobody's been to Mars. This is a very tall 291 00:19:06.240 --> 00:19:08.160 Hilty client. Do you want to be one of those to try the trip? 292 00:19:08.599 --> 00:19:11.680 I'd like to. I'll go as long as I think SpaceX will be 293 00:19:11.680 --> 00:19:15.680 okay without me, then I'll go to Mars. So do you feel there 294 00:19:15.759 --> 00:19:19.519 is a kind of destiny for you? No, I feel, but I 295 00:19:19.559 --> 00:19:25.119 don't know if there's any merit to that feeling. What are the rules that 296 00:19:25.200 --> 00:19:29.119 you want to live by? Because it seems that you have broken many rules, 297 00:19:29.160 --> 00:19:30.680 But what are some of the rules that you would buy by. I 298 00:19:30.680 --> 00:19:34.200 want to be useful and I want to be able to look back and say 299 00:19:34.200 --> 00:19:37.440 that my actions had a good effect on the world. Wonderful. Thank you 300 00:19:37.480 --> 00:19:40.799 so much for a time. Yeah, thanks for having me. I really 301 00:19:40.839 --> 00:19:41.759 enjoyed the conversation