Today we have Elon Musk Elon, thank you for joining us, Thanks for
having me. So we want to spend the time today talking about your view
of the future and what people should work on. So to start off,
could you tell us you famously said when you were younger, there were five
problems that you thought were most important for you to work on. If you
were twenty two today, what would the five problems that you would think about
working on. B Well, first of all, I think, um,
if somebody is doing something that is useful to the rest of society, I
think that's a good thing. Like it doesn't have to change the world.
Like you know, Um, if you're doing something that has high value to
people, and frankly, even if it's something if it's like, um,
just a little game um, or you know, the some improvement in photo
sharing or something, if if does a small amount of good for a large
number of people, UM, that's I mean, I think that's that's fine.
Like stuff doesn't need to be changed the world just to be good.
UM. But you know, in terms of things that I think are most
likely to affect the future of humanity, I think um ai is probably the
single biggest item in the near term that's likely effect humanity. So it's very
important that we have the advent of AI UH in a good way. That
that is something that UM, if you if you could look into the crystal
ball and see the future, you would like you would like that outcome,
UM, because it is something that could go UM could go wrong UM,
as we've talked about many times UM, and so we really need to make
sure it goes right. UM. That's that's I think AI work working on
AI and making sure it's great future. That's that's the most important thing I
think right now, UM the most pressing item. So UH. Then UM,
I would say anything into do with with genetics. UM, if you
can actually solve UM genetic diseases, if you can prevent dementia or Alzheimer's or
something like that, that with genetic reprogramming, that would be wonderful. So
I think there's genetics. It might be the sort of second most important item.
I think, UM having a high band with interface to the brain like
UM, we're currently bandwidth limited. We have a digital tertiary self in the
form of our email capabilities of computers, phones, applications were effectively superhuman,
but we are extremely bad with constraint in that interface between the cortex and you're
sort of that that tertiary digital form of yourself, and helping solve that bandwidth
constraint would would be I think very important for the future as well. So
one of the I think most common questions I hear young people, ambitious young
people ask, is I want to be the next Elon Musk. How do
I do that? Um? Obviously the next Elon Musk will work on different
things than than you did. But what have you done or what did you
do when you were younger that you think sort of set you up to have
a big impact. Well, I think that's well, I should say that
I do not expect to be involved in all these things. So the the
the five things that I thought about the time in college, so quite a
long time ago, twenty five years ago, UM, you know, being
you know, making life multiplanetary UM, slttering, the transition to sustainable energy
UM, the Internet broadly speaking UM, and then genetics and AI. I
think I didn't expect to be involved in in all of those things. I
actually, at the time in college I sort of thought m helping with electrification
of cars was how we sought out and that's uh, that's actually what I
worked on as an intern was an advanced ultra capacitors with to see if they
would be a breakthrough relative to batteries for energy storage and in cars. And
then when I came out to go to Stamford, UM, that's what I
was going to be doing my grass studies on is as it was, working
on advanced energy storage technologies for electric cars. And then I put that on
hold to start an internet company in ninety five because um, there does seem
to be like a time for particular technologies when they're at a steep point in
the inflection curve. And and I didn't want to you know, do a
PhD at Stamford and then and what should all happen? Um? And then
and I wasn't entirely certain that the technology I'd be working on would actually succeed.
Um, like you can get you can get a you know, doctrine
on many things that ultimately are not do not have a practical bearing on the
world. UM. And I wanted to, you know, just I really
was just trying to be useful. That's the optimization. It was like,
what what what can I do that would actually be useful. Do you think
people that want to be useful to day should get PhDs? UM? Mostly
not so what is the best way? Yes, but mostly not. UM.
How should someone figure out how they can be most useful whatever this thing
is that you're trying to create, what would what would be the UM utility
delta compared to the current state of the art times how many people it would
affect. So that's why I think UM. Having something that has a that
that has a makes makes a big difference but affects a sort of small to
moderate number of people is great, as is something that makes even a small
difference but but affects a vast number of people. Like the area yeah,
you know under the curve, Yeah exactly, the area under the curve is
would actually be roughly similar for those two things. So it's actually really about
uh yeah, just trying to be useful and matter when you're trying to estimate
probability of success. So you say this thing will be really useful area under
the curve. I guess to use the example of SpaceX. When you made
the go decision that you're actually going to do that was kind of a very
crazy thing at the time, very crazy for sure. Yeah, well I'm
not sure about saying that, UM, but I kind of agree. I
agreed with them that it was quite crazy crazy if m If the objective was
to achieve the best risk adjusted return UM, starting a rock company is insane.
But that was not that was not my objective. I had some of
the come to the conclusion that if something didn't happen to improve rock technology would
be stuck on Earth forever. Um And and the big aerospace companies had just
had no interest in radical innovation. UM. All they wanted to do was
try to make their old technology slightly better every year, and in fact sometimes
we would actually get worse. Um And, particularly in rockets is pretty bad.
Like the in sixty nine were able to go to the Moon with a
Saturn five, and then the Space Shuttle could only take people to lowth orbit,
and then the Space Shuttle retired. I mean that that trend is basically
trends to zero. If you also I think technology just automatically gets better over
a year, but it actually doesn't. It only gets better if smart people
work work like crazy to make it better. That's how any technology actually gets
better, and by itself. Technology if people don't work in it actually will
decline. Um. I mean you can look look at the history of civilizations,
many civilizations, and look at say, um ancient Egypt. Were they
able to build these incredible permids, and then they basically forgot how to build
permits, and and then even in hieroglyphics, they've forgot how to read hier
hieroglyphics. Or we look at Rome and how they're able to to build these
incredible roadways and aqueducts and indoor plumbing, and they've forgot how to do all
of those things. Um. And there are many such examples in history.
UM. So I think she always bear in mind that you know an entropy
is not on your side. Ye. One thing I really like about you
is you are unusually fearless and willing to go in the face of other people
telling you something that's crazy. And I know a lot of pretty crazy people.
You still stand out. Where does that come from? Or how do
you think about making a decision when everyone tells you this is a crazy idea?
Or where do you get the internal strength to do that? Well,
that's all I'd say. I actually think I think I fear feel fear quite
strongly, so as one as though I just have the absence of fear.
I feel it quite strongly. But there it's times when something is important enough,
you've believe it enough that do you do it in spite of fear.
So speaking of important things like people shouldn't think I should, people shouldn't think,
well, I feel fear about this, and therefore I shouldn't do it.
It's normal to feel fear, like you'd have to definitely something mentally wrong
if you should feel fear, so you just feel it and let the importance
of it drive you to do it anyway. Yeah, you know. I
Actually something I can be helpful isism some degree. Um, if you just
if you just accept the probabilities, then that diminishes fear. So um.
Starting SpaceX, I thought the odds of success were less than ten percent,
and I just accepted that. Actually, probably I would just lose, lose
everything, but that maybe would make some progress if we could just move the
ball forward, even if we died, maybe some other company could pick up
the baton and move and keep moving it forward so that we're still doing some
good. Um. Yeah. Same with Tesla. I thought the odds of
a car company succeeding were extremely low. What do you think the odds of
the Mars colony are at this point today? Well, um, oddly enough,
I actually think they're pretty good. Um, So like when can I
go? Okay? Um, at this point, I am certain there is
a way. I'm certain that success is one of the possible outcome for establishing
a self sustaining mass colony about growing mass colony. I'm certain that that is
possible, whereas until maybe a few years ago, I was not sure that
success was even one of the possible outcomes. Some meaningful number of people going
to Mars. I think this is potentially something that can be accomplished in about
ten years, maybe sooner, maybe nine years. I need to make sure
that SpaceX doesn't die between now and then, and that I don't die,
or if I do die, that someone takes over who will continue That shouldn't
go on the first launch, Yeah, exactly. The most launch will be
a robotic anyway, so I want to go. Except for the Internet latency,
Yeah, the INNRT latency will be pretty significant. Mars is roughly twelve
light minutes from the Sun and Earth is eight light minutes, so closest approach
Mars is four light minutes away that first approaches twenty a little more because you
have to you can't talk directly through the on speaking of really important problems um
AI. So you've been outspoken about AIM. Could you talk about what you
think the positive future for AI looks like and how we get there? Okay,
I mean I do want to emphasize that this is not really something that
I advocate or this is not prescriptive. This is simply hopefully predictive, because
who looks on a sailor will like like, this is something that I want
to occur instead of something I think that probably is the best of the available
alternatives. The best of the available alternatives that I can come up with,
and maybe somebody else can come with a better approach or better outcome, is
that we achieve democratrazation of AI technology, meaning that no one company or a
small set of individuals has control over advanced AI technology. I think that that's
very dangerous. Um it could also get stolen by somebody bad, you know,
like some evil dictator or country could send their intelligence agency to go steal
it and gain control. It just becomes a very unstable situation. I think
if you've got any any incredibly powerful aim. You just don't know who's who's
going to control that. So it's not as that I think that the risk
is that the AI would develop a will of its own right off the bat.
I think it's more that's the consumers that someone may use it in a
way that is bad, or and even if they weren't going to use it
in a way that's bad, that somebody could take it from them and use
it in a way that's bad. That that I think is quite a big
danger. So I think we must have democratrazation of AI technology and make it
widely available. And that's you know, the reason that obviously, you mean,
the rest of the team you know, created Open the Eye was to
help with the democtras, help help spread out AI technology so it doesn't get
concentrated in the hands of a few. UM. And but then of course
that needs to be combined with solving the high band with interface to the cortex.
UM. Humans are humans are socla, yes exactly, UM. But
you know, we already have a situation in our brain where we've got the
cortex and limit system, and the limit system is kind of the I mean,
that's that's the primitive brain. It's kind of like the your your instincts
and um whatnot. And then the cortex is the thinking upper part of the
brain. Those two seem to work together quite well. Um. Occasionally your
cortex and limbic system they disagree, but they generally works pretty well. And
it's like rare to find someone who I've not found someone who wishes to either
get rid of the cortex or get rid of the living system. Very true,
Yeah, it's that's unusual. So so I think if if we can
effectively UM merge with AI, like UM, improving that the neural link between
your cortex and the the your digital extension of yourself, which already, like
said, already exists, just has a bandwidth issue, UM, and then
then effectively, UM, you become an AI human symbiote UM and and if
that then is widespread with anyone who wants it can have it. Then we
solve the control problem as well. We don't have to worry about UM some
sort of evil dictator AI because kind of we are the aim collectively, that
seems like the best outcome I can think of. So you've seen other companies
in their early days that starts small and get really successful. UM, hope
I don't get asking this on camera, but how do you open aye is
going as a six month old company, I think should go pretty well.
I think we've got a really talented group of Opening Eye and yeah, really
really talented team and they're working hard. UM. Open Eye is structured as
uh see a five one through a nonprofit UM. But you know, many
nonprofits do not have a sense of urgency. If it's fine, they don't
have to have a sense of urgency UM. But Opening EYEASUM because I think
people really believe in the mission. I think it's important UM, and it's
it's about minimizing UM the risk of existential harm in the future. And so
I think it's going well. I'm pretty impressed with what people are doing in
the talent level, and obviously we're always looking for UM great people to join
who believe in the mission for people. Yes, all right, just a
few more questions before we wrap up. How do you spend your days now?
Like? What what do you allocate most of your time too? My
time is mostly split up between SpaceX and and Tesla, and of course I
try to spend it's a part of every week at Opening Eye UM. So
I spend most I spend basically half a day at open eye most weeks,
um. And then and then I have some opening eye stuff that happens during
the week, but other than that, it's sax or tesla. Like what
does your time look like there? Yeah, so that's a good question.
Um. I think a lot of people think I must spend a lot of
time with media or on business see things. But actually, almost almost all
my time, like eighty percent of it is spent on engineering and design.
Engineering and design, so it's um, developing the next generation product. That's
percent of it. Um. You probably don't remember this a very long time
ago, many many years, you took me on a tour of SpaceX,
and the most impressive thing was that you knew every detail of the rocket and
every piece of engineering that went into it. I don't think many people get
that about you. Yeah, I think a lot of people think I'm kind
of a business person or something. It's just fine, like business is fine,
but like I really it's you know, it's like it's SpaceX. Gwyn
Shotwell is chief operating officer. She kind of manages legal, finance, sales
and kind of general business activity. And then my time is almost entirely with
the inteering team working on improving the Falconine and the Dragon spacecraft and developing the
most colonial architecture. And then at Tesla it's working on the Model three and
yeah something. The design studio typically UM happy day a week dealing with this
aesthetics and and look and feel things, and then most of the rest the
week is just going through engineering of of the car itself as well as engineering
of the factory. UM because the biggest epipany I've had this year is that
what really matters is the is the machine that builds the machine, the factory
UM, and that is at least towards magitude hotter than the vehicle itself.
It's amazing to watch the robots go here and these cars just happen. Yeah.
Now, this actually is has a relatively low level of automation compared to
what the Giga factory will have in what Model three will have. What's the
speed on the line of these cars? Actually, the average feed on the
line is incredibly slow. It's probably about UM including both X and sum,
it's maybe five, you know, five centimeters per second? And what can
you do? This is very slow? Or what would you like to get
to I'm confident we can get to to at least one per second, so
a twenty fold increase that would be very fast. Yeah, um, at
least I mean, I think quite a one meter per second. Just put
that perspective, is a slow walk or a co medium speed walk. A
fast walk could be one and a half meters per second, and and then
the fastest humans can run over ten meters per second. So if we're only
doing points oh five meters per second, that's very slow current current speed.
And at one meter per second, you can still walk faster than the production line