Musk’s latest interview with a burst of information: AI, consciousness and the reconstruction of the future

Organized by: Web3 Sky City

Musk’s latest long-form interview goes online and dives into his grand vision for the future.The conversation covered everything from the evolution of the social media platform “X”, the integration of artificial intelligence and human collective consciousness, to the technological convergence of SpaceX, Tesla and XAI.Musk shared his insights into the technical details of Starlink, predictions for the future of work and Universal High Income (UHI), and deep thoughts on the U.S. debt crisis, simulation theory, population collapse, and AI safety principles (truth, beauty, curiosity).At the end of the interview, he gave advice to young entrepreneurs on creating value.

core ideas

“SpaceX, Tesla and XAI are gradually integrating, and deep space exploration may be achieved through solar-powered artificial intelligence satellites in the future.”

“My prediction is that in the future work will be optional. Society will move from UBI to UHI.”

“We are trying to integrate the entire world into a collective consciousness… By expanding the scope and scale of consciousness, we can better understand the nature of the universe.”

“In order to ensure that AI benefits mankind, three core principles must be established: pursuing truth, appreciating beauty, and maintaining curiosity. Do not force artificial intelligence to believe lies.”

“Population decline is a huge threat to the existence of civilization. To expand the size of humanity is to expand the breadth of consciousness.”

“The goal is to take more than you take, to be a net contributor in society. If you do that, money will follow as a natural consequence.”

Building humankind’s “collective consciousness”: the ultimate ambition of Platform X

To many, acquiring Twitter and rebranding it as the “X” seemed like a puzzling footnote in Musk’s business career.However, in Musk’s grand narrative, this is a key link to human intelligence.He is not just building a social media, but a global network similar to a biological nervous system.

Musk believes that although video content accounts for the majority of Internet traffic, text is still the carrier with the highest density of ideas.He defined X as a global public square whose core mission is to integrate humanity’s “collective consciousness”.Just as the human body is made up of tens of trillions of cells working together to produce consciousness, when billions of humans are connected through efficient information flow, a qualitatively changed “super-individual” intelligence may be born.

“I just really want to have a global platform that brings together what people are saying and brings it as close to the collective consciousness of humanity as possible.”Musk explained.To achieve this, real-time translation and the frictionless flow of ideas are crucial.This is not only for social purposes, but also to solve the ultimate philosophical question: What questions should we ask the universe?

Unification of the commercial landscape: Nuclear power towards deep space

The outside world is used to treating Tesla, SpaceX and xAI as independent companies, but on Musk’s strategic chessboard, they are undergoing substantial physical and technological integration.This integration is not simply resource sharing, but an inevitable technology stack to achieve the ultimate goal of interstellar civilization.

Musk described a very sci-fi future scenario:“You have to move to solar-powered artificial intelligence satellites in deep space, which is sort of the convergence of Tesla’s expertise with SpaceX’s expertise, and XAI on the artificial intelligence side.”

In this vision, SpaceX provides the transportation carrier, Tesla provides the battery and energy management technology, and xAI gives it intelligence.This technological closed loop not only serves the colonization of Mars, but also lays the foundation for the expansion of energy and computing power of human civilization.For the current market, Tesla’s progress in autonomous driving (real-world AI) and humanoid robots (Optimus) are the realistic projection of this grand blueprint.

The end of work and the arrival of “universal high income”

When the topic turned to the impact of artificial intelligence on the economy, Musk made a radical prediction: We are fundamentally bidding farewell to traditional labor society.Different from the commonly discussed “Universal Basic Income” (UBI), Musk proposed the concept of “Universal High Income” (UHI).

He believes that with the exponential development of AI and robotics, productivity improvements will be rapid enough to allow the output of goods and services to far exceed the growth of the money supply.This will lead to inevitable deflation, and the debt crisis plaguing the United States may be solved.

“My prediction is that in less than 20 years, work will become an optional activity.”Musk asserted.In the future, people will no longer work for survival, but out of interest or search for meaning, just like today people grow vegetables in their own gardens – not for food and clothing, but for fun.

However, this also leads to a new existential crisis: In a world where materials are extremely abundant and AI can meet all needs, what is the driving force for human competition?Musk cited the concept of “marginal utility”, suggesting that humans will face new psychological challenges: When “enough” becomes within reach, how should we define value?

Simulation theory and the three ethical pillars of AI

Musk’s fascination with “simulation theory” is no secret.He believes that the probability that we are living in a simulation of some kind of advanced civilization is extremely high, considering that video games have evolved from simple pixels to realistic virtual worlds in just a few decades.Under this logic,“The most interesting outcome is the most likely outcome”.To avoid being “shut down,” human civilization must maintain its “interestingness” and complexity.

This philosophical outlook directly affects his views on the safety of artificial intelligence.In order to prevent the tragedy of AI backlash against humanity in science fiction movies (such as HAL 9000 in “2001: A Space Odyssey”), Musk proposed the “three laws” of AI development:Pursue truth, appreciate beauty, and remain curious.

He particularly emphasized the importance of “truth” and warned against training AI to lie because of political correctness or social pressure.“Don’t force AI to believe lies. I think that could be very dangerous.”If the foundation of AI is built on lies, when reality conflicts with lies, AI may draw extreme anti-human conclusions.On the contrary, a curious AI will find the complexity of humans more interesting than simple rocks (such as Mars), and will tend to protect humans rather than destroy them.

Population collapse: the biggest bottleneck in the expansion of consciousness

When talking about family and society, Musk rarely revealed his deep anxiety about human existence.Although he is a tech optimist, he is extremely concerned about declining birth rates around the world.For him, this is not only an economic issue, but also a philosophical issue related to the survival of cosmic consciousness.

“Population decline is a huge threat to the existence of civilization,”Musk warned,“If we want to expand consciousness, having fewer humans is worse, because the less conscious we are.”He sees humans as tentacles that perceive the universe. The fewer tentacles we have, the less we understand the nature of the universe.Therefore, he personally advocates procreation, not out of the traditional concept of passing on the family line, but in order to continue and expand the rare fire of human wisdom.

Advice to entrepreneurs: Be a “net contributor” to value

At the end of the interview, faced with young entrepreneurs eager to succeed, Musk gave advice on returning to the essence.In the coming post-scarcity era, the definition of money may disappear and be replaced by energy or computing power, but the essential logic of business will not change.

He warned entrepreneurs not to directly pursue money or happiness, because that is often in vain.Instead, focus on becoming a “value creator”.

“The goal is to take more than you take and to be a net contributor to society.”Musk concluded.In this universe where the laws of physics still apply, no matter how technological leaps occur, only those who can solve practical problems and provide real value can stand firm in the wave of change, and even push civilization towards a future of stars and seas.

Attached is the full text of the interview:

Openings and the evolution of social media

Moderator: Look, on the internet, I’m tiny, basically, what percentage of the internet is spent on Twitter?Is there a specific number?On X?

Musk: So we have about 600 million.Monthly active users.Although that number could skyrocket, could reach, I don’t know, 800 million or even a billion if something major happens in the world.

Moderator: I don’t know, maybe 250 million to 300 million per week.

Musk: This is a considerable number.It tends to be readers, those who read words.So…do you think that’s going to change?There are definitely a lot of videos on the X system, but at the moment, the number of videos is increasing.

Moderator: But I think the strongest part of the X network is among people who think a lot and read a lot.

Musk: So that’s going to be where it’s most powerful.Because we have words.So among readers, writers and thinkers, I think X is number one in the world.

The future of content formats: video, text and AI

Moderator: In terms of social media, in terms of its shape, if you had to guess tomorrow, how much text, how much video, I’ve heard you say that artificial intelligence may bring about the next form of communication – speech and hearing.What happens to X in its true form?How will it evolve?

Musk: So I do think the majority of interactions in the future will be video.Much of the interaction will be live video with artificial intelligence.So it’s real-time video understanding, real-time video generation.This is where most of the load will be.That’s the case with much of the internet right now.Much of the internet is video.Text takes up a rather small proportion.

Moderator: But X (referring to text) tends to have a higher value, generally speaking, or it is information with higher information density.That’s right.If you were to say how many bits of data were generated and how many computing resources were spent, it would definitely be video.So I must be a shareholder of X, a very small shareholder.OKI got paid when you guys bought Twitter and changed it to X.OKSo glad you made the decision.Glad you did.Did you do it?

Musk: I think this is important.I feel like Twitter is moving in a direction, or has moved in a direction that has more of a negative impact on the world.That’s, that’s, of course, it depends on one’s perspective.Some people will say that, actually, they liked the way it was and now they don’t.But I think the fundamental problem is that Twitter is amplified.Amplified, I would say, is pretty much a far-left ideology by most of the world’s standards, because it’s based in San Francisco.And they did ban a lot of right-wing people.

Musk: So even centrist people are considered extreme right-wing from their perspective.If you are far left, then anyone in the center is considered far right.Because of you, it’s just on the political spectrum.They are as far left as you are.In the United States, it’s the same in San Francisco.So what I do is try to restore balance and middle ground.

Moderator: So no left-wing voice has been suspended or, banned or demoted or anything like that.

Musk: Now, some of them choose to go elsewhere.But at this point, the operating principle of X system is to comply with the laws of any country.Rather than intervening beyond the laws of the country.

The global public square and collective consciousness

Moderator: When I think about social media.Thank you.Elon, when I think about social media, I feel like even the data shows that the current incumbents seem to be losing traction among their youngest user base.Even platforms like Instagram, which are not exactly like Twitter, but all types of platforms, if someone were to re-architect social media from the bottom up and create something new, what do you think would be appropriate for the world of tomorrow?

Moderator: Frankly, I don’t think much about social media.It, I mainly just want a place, in the case of

Musk: We recently added the ability to make audio and video calls.So you’re really trying to integrate the whole world into a collective consciousness.I think that’s different than just saying, like, what can one make a video stream that would best produce… I think that’s probably a little bit of a brain rot, frankly.

Moderator: Generative video streaming, if you just watch video after video that gives you a dopamine rush but lacks substance, then I don’t think that’s a very good way to spend your time.

Musk: But I do think that’s actually something a lot of people want to see.If you’re talking about overall internet usage, it’s probably optimizing your neurotransmitter production.For example, someone gets some kind of pleasure from it.But it becomes like a drug.But I’m not really pursuing that, my goal is not to do that.I guess if I felt like I wanted to, I could do that, but that’s, I just really wanted to have, I just wanted to have a global platform that brought together what people were saying and, like it said, made it as close to the collective consciousness of humanity as possible.

Musk: Moreover, for example, one thing we introduced is automatic translation.Because I thought it would be great to bring together what people are saying in so many different languages.And, but automatically translated for the recipient.So you have a collective consciousness, not just the consciousness of, say, people who belong to a particular language group, but you have ideas from all language groups.

Moderator: Why is it important to have a platform to build collective consciousness?I thought, why is that important?

Musk: I guess, you could also say, why, if you think about humans, for example, humans are made up of about 30 to 40 trillion cells.And, you have trillions of synapses, synapses, in your head.

Moderator: But, no, the reason for that, I think it’s just so that we can increase our understanding of the universe, increase our, our, our understanding, increase our, our understanding of the universe.

Musk: I guess, I had a question about the meaning of life, why, why is anything important?Why are we here and what is the origin of the universe?Where is the end point?

Moderator: We don’t even know what questions to ask?

Musk: And we don’t even know yet what questions to ask, which might be the most important ones.So I guess I’m just… I guess, I guess, I guess, I guess I’m just trying to, I guess, I guess, figure out what’s going on.In this reality, what exactly happened.Is this, is this reality?Where did you get it?

Moderator: When you ask what is the meaning of life?

Musk: So I came to a conclusion, which is somewhat consistent with Douglas Adams, the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy school of thought, which is…

Moderator: What do you do?

Musk: He’s kind of the Hitchhiker’s Guide guy, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy is like a philosophy book, this guy, this guy’s sense of humor.And that’s exactly where you get, the Earth turns out to be a computer for understanding, for figuring out the answers to the meaning of life.The answer it came up with was 42.

Moderator: But, then, what exactly does 42 mean?It turns out that, actually, the hard part is the questions, not the answers.

Musk: To do this, you need a computer much larger than…That’s… So Douglas Soutman is basically saying that we don’t actually know how to frame the problem appropriately.So I think by expanding the scope and scale of consciousness we can better understand what kind of questions should be asked about that answer that is the universe.

Qualitative changes and collaboration of human beings

Moderator: Do you believe in the collective consciousness of society?I recently watched this movie called The Gladiator, starring Russell Crowe.Have you seen it?Saw it.In Gladiator, in Rome, when people fight, the crowd cheers for those who kill each other, much like a mob.It doesn’t have a nuanced perspective of its own.

Musk: I said it.That was a special kind of mob.They go there basically to watch other people kill each other, do you feel like we live in a very different society now?

Moderator: We don’t usually, at this point, we don’t, watch other people kill each other.

Musk: Maybe some kind of euphemism for that statement.I guess it’s sports.So people play sports where teams try to beat each other without dying.So we go back to thinking about a human being, we all started with one cell, but now we have over 30 trillion cells.But, I think most people feel like they’re in one piece, and usually your right hand isn’t attacking your left hand, you know that feeling.It’s kind of like a collaboration.

Moderator: Your mind is just countless neurons.But most of the time, you don’t feel like there are trillions of voices in your brain.

Musk: I hope so.So when you have trillions of cells working as a cellular collective, there’s obviously a lot more going on than, say, one cell or a small, small, multi-cellular organism.

Moderator: Apparently something different happened.

Musk: For example, you can’t talk to bacteria, it’s very silent.

Moderator: They’re just twisting around, from their perspective, I don’t know.

Musk: I’ve been wondering what life is like from the perspective of a single cell, an amoeba, you know?But I know you can’t talk to an amoeba.Like, they don’t respond.But you can talk to humans.So obviously once you have a large number of cells and, like, a big enough brain or something like that, there’s something qualitatively, fundamentally different about humans.

Moderator: You can now talk to humans.

Musk: They can talk, they can create things.But bacteria don’t build spaceships, for example.

Moderator: But humans can.

Musk: So I think there’s also something qualitatively different that happens when you have a group of humans coming together.In fact, it can be said that a single human being cannot build a spacecraft.I can’t build a spaceship on my own.But by gathering a group of humans together, we can build a spaceship.

Moderator: There is obviously some qualitative difference between a group of humans.

Musk: In fact, it is impossible for me to learn all the professional knowledge in all fields. It will not be enough time to learn all this knowledge before I die.To build a rocket, you really have to essentially have a bunch of humans.And then I think there are some other scaling, quality scaling things that can happen when you have a group of humans, and the better the quality of the interaction or the quality of the flow of information, the more likely the human collective is to achieve something.As I said, I’m curious about the nature of the universe.

Physics, Predictive Value and Investing

Moderator: I think it’s safe to say that if we increase the scope and scale of consciousness, we’re more likely to understand the nature of the universe, rather than reduce it.Is this a bit like spirituality?A lot of people talk to me about spirituality.I still don’t understand what it means.Like, I keep asking them, “What do you mean?” What do you mean?

Musk: Many people have spiritual feelings.I won’t try to deny that those spiritual feelings are real to them.

Moderator: However, it is not completely equivalent.

Musk: I can’t say that just because someone else is feeling something spiritually, that means I’m going to feel that way mentally as well.I tend to be influenced by physics, which means that if something has predictive value, I’ll pay more attention to it than if it doesn’t.

Moderator: I would say that physics is the study of things that have predictive value.

Musk: I think that’s a pretty good definition.

Moderator: My main job itself is as a specific securities broker and stock investor.This has no predictive value.No one knows what will happen tomorrow.

Musk: But I think you can roughly say, if a company is looking at it in the long term, then you can say, like, do you like that company’s product or service?

Moderator: Is it likely that you like its product roadmap?

Musk: You like, does it look like they can make a great product?

Moderator: And they will probably make great parts in the future.

Musk: If that’s the case, then I’d say that’s probably a good company to invest in.And I think you want to believe in this team as well.So if they feel like it, that’s a talented and hard-working team.They make good parts today.They still seem motivated to make products in the future.Then I would say this is a good company to invest in.

Moderator: Makes sense.

Musk: Now, this doesn’t address day-to-day fluctuations, which do happen, sometimes quite dramatically.But in the long run, this is the right way to invest in stocks.Because a company is just a group of people who come together to create products and services.So you have to say, how good are those products and services?Will they continue to improve in the future?If so, then you should buy shares of that company.Then don’t worry too much about daily fluctuations.

Convergence of the business landscape: SpaceX, Tesla and XAI

Moderator: That’s right.Elon, what are you most excited about right now?As with everything you’re building.You are doing too much.So allow me to explain this first and give the viewer a bit of context.Our audience is mainly quasi-entrepreneurs in India.OKThey are very ambitious, very hungry, and want to take risks to create something.I feel like we all have a lot to learn from you because you’ve had so much success in so many different areas.So we’ll be talking to them today, and I’ll try to focus all my questions on that aspect so that they can use this conversation to maybe try, take a chance, and create something.

Moderator: Of course.

Moderator: I think the most important thing is to create useful products and services.Of all the products and services you’ve built, which one excites you the most?

Moderator: I think there’s actually a growing convergence between SpaceX, Tesla, and XAI, because if the future is solar-powered AI satellites (which it almost has to be in order to harness the considerable amount of solar energy), you have to move to solar-powered AI satellites in deep space, which is sort of a convergence of Tesla’s expertise with SpaceX’s expertise, and XAI on the AI side.

Musk: Considerable solar power, you then have to move to solar-powered AI satellites in deep space, which is sort of the convergence of Tesla’s expertise with SpaceX’s expertise, and XAI in artificial intelligence.So it does feel like there’s some degree of convergence over time.

Musk: But all the companies are doing great things and I’m very proud of the team, they’re doing a fantastic job.We’ve made a lot of progress with Tesla’s autonomous driving.I don’t know if you’ve ever tried autonomous driving.Have you tried it?

Moderator: I have tried it on Waymo, but not on Tesla.It’s worth it.

Musk: We do have it here in Austin.I’d love to try it.You really just need to download the Tesla app.And I think it’s open to anyone.Must try it.

Moderator: You know how it is.But, we know how it is.But, we do.

Musk: We’ve made a lot of progress in electric vehicles, battery packs, solar energy, and autonomous driving.So basically real world AI.I can say that Tesla is the world leader in real world artificial intelligence.

Moderator: And then we’re going to build this Optimus Prime robot and hopefully start mass production next summer.

Musk: I think that would be really cool.That would be, I think everyone would want their own personal C3PO R2, a helper robot, that would be pretty cool.

Technical analysis of Starlink

Moderator: Then SpaceX has done a great job with the Starlink project, providing low-cost, reliable Internet to the world.

Musk: Hopefully India, we would very much like to operate in India, that would be great.

Moderator: Starlink currently operates in 150 different countries.Can you introduce Starlink and how its technology works?Because I was talking to someone, I don’t know if you know this San Francisco company called Meeter.They are trying to replace network engineers.But…

Moderator: I don’t know now.

Moderator: So he was telling me that Starlink might work differently in densely populated areas than in sparsely populated areas.Can you explain how it works?

Musk: Starlink has thousands of satellites in low-Earth orbit. They orbit the Earth at about 25 times the speed of sound, basically whizzing around the Earth.Their altitude is approximately 550 kilometers, which is commonly referred to as low-Earth orbit.Because they are in low Earth orbit, the latency is low, as is the distance, which is not that far compared to geostationary satellites at 36,000 kilometers.So you have thousands of satellites delivering low-latency, high-speed Internet around the world, and they’re all connected to each other.So there are laser links between satellites, so a kind of laser mesh is formed.This way, if, say, a fiber optic cable is damaged or cut, the satellites can converge on each other.They can connect to each other, providing connectivity even if the fiber optic cable is cut.

Moderator: For example, when the Red Sea cables were cut a few months ago, I think the satellites, this sonic satellite network were still functioning without hindrance.

Musk: Therefore, this is particularly helpful in disaster areas.If an area experiences some kind of natural disaster, such as a flood, fire, or earthquake, this usually damages ground infrastructure, but Starlink satellites can still work.So typically, whenever there’s some kind of natural disaster happening somewhere, we always provide people with free Starlink internet connections.We don’t want to charge fees and we won’t profit from a tragic situation.If there was a natural disaster, we would say, it’s free during the natural disaster, we don’t want to say, like, put up a paywall when someone is trying to get help.That’s not right.

Musk: This is a very robust system.It complements terrestrial systems because satellite beams work best in sparsely populated areas.But because you have the satellite beam, it’s a pretty large beam.So you do that, and you have a fixed number of users per beam.

Moderator: So it’s a big beam.

Musk: It tends to be very complementary to terrestrial cellular systems because cellular systems work very well in cities because, you know, these cell towers are only a kilometer or so away from each other.But cell towers tend to be inefficient in rural areas.So in rural areas, that’s where the Internet is worst because it’s very expensive and difficult to lay fiber optic cables or build high-bandwidth cell towers.

Moderator: So Starlink is highly complementary to existing telecommunications companies.

Musk: It basically tends to serve the least served places, which I think is a good thing.

Moderator: So…will it change tomorrow?Like you explained today, the beam is quite wide and may not work in densely populated areas and high-rise buildings.But can it become truly efficient in densely populated cities tomorrow and compete with local network operators?

Musk: Unfortunately, the laws of physics don’t allow that.So we are too far away.So at a distance of 550 kilometers, even if we try to shorten the distance, the lowest distance we can achieve is about 350 kilometers, which is still very far away.You can imagine, like a flashlight, that flashlight has a cone of light, and that cone of light today extends to 550 kilometers.In the future we will try to shorten it to 350 kilometers, but we can’t be only 1 kilometer apart like cellular base stations. The laws of physics here are not good for us.

Moderator: So it is physically impossible for Starlink to provide services to densely populated cities.

Musk: For example, you can serve a small group of people, maybe 1% of the population.Sometimes people.

Moderator: Even in crowded cities, people may not have fiber optic connections on their roads.

Musk: Like sometimes someone is on a cul-de-sac (dead end) or in some places, in cities, for random reasons sometimes there are underserved areas.So, as I said, Solink may only serve about 1% or 2% of a densely populated city.But in rural areas, as I said, it could work much better, where the internet connection is much worse.And often times people don’t have internet access at all, or access is very expensive, or the quality isn’t very good.

Urbanization, the future of work and UHI

Moderator: If I had to guess, Elon, do you think India will go down the path of urbanization like China, with more people migrating from rural economies to urban centers?Or do you think this trend will be beat?

Musk: I think part of that is already happening, and I’d actually like to ask you some questions as well.Because, of course, isn’t this an Indian trend, or is it largely an Indian trend?

Moderator: I think during COVID, with a lot of urbanization slowing down, things have changed a little bit.And that doesn’t happen naturally.It’s presented very artificially.That’s right.But people will question, if artificial intelligence (AI) really increases productivity, and if productivity does increase, I hear you talking about a high income guarantee (UHI) rather than a universal basic income (UBI).

Musk: I think that would be generally high income.

Moderator: In a world like that, I doubt whether more people would want to live in cities that are destined to be more polluted and fail to offer the quality of life that a rural environment might offer.

Musk: I guess it depends on the individual, some people want to be around a lot of people and some don’t.This will be a matter of personal choice.But I think it will be a matter of personal choice.I think in the future you won’t have to be in a city to work, I don’t think that will be the case anymore.Because I think my prediction is that jobs will be optional in the future.

Moderator: We seem to be moving, not in India but in some parts of the West, from a six-day week to five days, to four days, to three days.

Musk: I’m not.

Moderator: I think Europeans are.

Musk: I do think that if you’re trying to make a startup successful, or you’re trying to make a company accomplish something very difficult, you absolutely need to invest a lot of time in it.I think that’s the case.

Moderator: How do you think society would change if we moved from a five-day work week to four days to three days?When people have to work half of their week, how do they use the other half?

Musk: I think people are actually not going to have to work anymore, in… it’s probably not that far into the future.Maybe it only takes, I don’t know, 10, I’d say less than 20 years.My prediction is that in less than 20 years, work will become an optional activity.The work itself will be optional.

Moderator: Basically like a hobby.Is this because increased productivity means people don’t have to work?

Musk: They don’t have to go to work.

Moderator: Let’s take a look.

Musk: Obviously, people are going to look back 20 years from now and say, look, Elon made this ridiculous prediction, and it wasn’t accurate.

Moderator: But I think that in less than 20 years, maybe even in just 10 or 15 years, technological advances in artificial intelligence and robotics will get us to a state where work is optional, where you can grow vegetables in your garden, for example, or you can go to the store and buy vegetables.Growing your own vegetables is much more difficult.

Musk: However, some people like to grow their own vegetables, and that’s fine, but it will become an option that way, that’s my prediction.

Singularity, Marginal Utility and the “Marshmallow Test”

Moderator: If one believes that human beings are naturally competitive and everything is relative, from the time of hunters, there are people who want to be the alpha hunter or the biggest farmer, if everyone gets a generally high income and everyone has enough material things, what will they compete for?That would be relative, if we all had enough, but “enough” would not be enough.

Moderator: I guess, I’m not sure.

Musk: Because we’re heading toward what’s called the “singularity,” people sometimes refer to AI as something like a “black hole,” like a singularity where you don’t know what’s going to happen beyond the event horizon.This doesn’t mean something bad will happen, it just means you don’t know what to expect.For example, I’m very confident that if artificial intelligence and robotics continue to develop – and they are indeed developing very rapidly, as I said – jobs will become optional and people will have whatever goods and services they want.

Musk: If you can think of it, you can have that kind of thing.But at some point, AI will actually be saturated with everything humans can think of.And then at that point, it becomes a case of AI doing things for AI and robotics because they have nothing left to do to please humans.Because there is a limit,

Moderator: You say for example, people can only eat a certain amount of food, or, but I think if you can think it, you can have it, that will be the future.The Austrian school of economics, if you look back historically, was a departure from the ideas of Adam Smith.They talk about the marginal utility of everything.Having one thing has value, having two of the same thing has value, having two of the same thing has less value, and having ten of the same thing has no value.If we could get everything we wanted, maybe we’d get…like 10 marshmallows?

Musk: Who wants that?One is enough.One is enough.You can eat two marshmallows later, or you can eat one marshmallow now, and I’m like, I’m going to eat one marshmallow.I don’t want to eat two marshmallows.

Moderator: This is interesting.

Musk:Which one would you choose?I don’t like it, one marshmallow is enough.I was always suspicious of marshmallows and didn’t think they looked like mushrooms.It’s the best candy, you know?I don’t crave marshmallows.

Moderator: I think you are the best.

Musk: Who isn’t?

Moderator: You are the best proof of the marshmallow experiment.I think…

Moderator: I think so.It’s essentially delayed gratification.

Moderator: You can delay it better than most people.I have a tattoo that says “delayed gratification.”

Moderator: Wow, okay.Can you really pass the marshmallow test?

Moderator: I don’t think I can.Remember when I trade or buy it.Delay gratification, it helps.

Moderator: Wow, okay.That’s a promise.

Moderator: It points so it reminds me of…

Musk: This is good advice.You can’t miss it.

Moderator: If you could have a tattoo, what would it be?

Musk: I thought maybe it was my kid’s name or something?

The Origins of Brand “X” and the Death of Currency

Moderator: Why do you like the letter X so much?

Musk: Honestly, that’s a good question.

Moderator: Sometimes I really wonder what’s wrong with me.

Musk: It began, I think, in distant antiquity, in the year 99.Before the Kaabian period (a hypothetical pre-digital era), when there were only single-celled organisms, there were only three one-letter domain names, I think X, Q, and Z.I was thinking, I want to create this place as a financial crossroads, or like a financial exchange, which essentially solves the currency problem from an information theory perspective, because the current banking system is a bunch of insecure heterogeneous databases with batch processing capabilities.

Moderator: If we can have a real-time, secure single database, then from a monetary and information theory perspective, it is much more efficient than a large number of heterogeneous databases that are slow in batch processing and insecure.

Musk: So this was early X.com, which evolved into what became PayPal.Then it was acquired by eBay, which was acquired by eBay again.Then someone from eBay contacted me and said, hey, do you want to buy this domain name back?I said, of course.So I’ve had this domain name for quite some time.

Moderator: then, then,

Musk: Then I thought, maybe acquiring Twitter was also an opportunity to revisit X’s original plan.That is to create this, this clearing house for financial transactions.

Moderator: Basically, think of it as a way to create a more efficient currency database.For example, people, for example, money is actually an information system that allocates labor.

Musk: For example, people sometimes think that money itself is power, but this is not the case. It is meaningless without labor to be distributed.It doesn’t matter if you’re on a desert island with a trillion dollars, or whatever.That’s right.Why guess, why not seek the truth?

Moderator: I just hope I’m not stranded on a desert island, that would be of no use to me.

Musk: But that illustrates my point, if you, if you’re stuck on a desert island with a trillion dollars, it’s useless because there’s no labor to allocate, you can only allocate yourself.

Moderator: So it’s, so anyway, so this is a long-winded way of putting it, it’s, it’s, it’s just really, I’m just slowly building, getting back to the idea I had 25 years ago of creating a more efficient currency database.

Musk: If it succeeds, people will use it; if it doesn’t succeed, people won’t use it.And then I also like the idea of ​​having a unified app or website or something where you can do whatever you want.China is a bit like WeChat in this regard. You can exchange information, post information, and exchange money there. Life in China almost all revolves around WeChat.

Moderator: It’s very useful, but there’s no real WeChat outside of China.I would say that the concept of X is more like an enhanced version of WeChat.

Musk: Anyway, the full name of the company is Space Exploration Technologies, but that’s too long and hard to pronounce.So I said, let’s call it SpaceX, just like FedEx in the space field.It happened to have an X because there was anAnd then, what else do we have, we have a baby?His name is X2.But it was his mother who named him “X”.

Moderator: I said, if I name my kid X2, people are really going to think I have an obsession with X, and I said to her, look, I do have X.com,

Musk: So people would actually think I have a special fetish for this alphabet.But she said, no, she likes X, she wants to call them X.I just said, okay.

Moderator: Is this new, or has it been something you’ve had since you were a kid?

Musk: No.It’s a bit of a coincidence that not everything is called X.Tesla (Tesla) is not, there is no X in Tesla,

Moderator: Elon, what do you think money will be like in the future?I really think that, in the long run, the concept of money will disappear.It’s a bit weird, but in a future where anyone can own anything, I don’t think you’ll need money as a database for a day’s labor allocation anymore.

Musk: If artificial intelligence and robotics are developed enough to satisfy all human needs, then money will no longer matter and its relevance will drop dramatically.I’m not quite sure we can achieve that.The best imaginings of such a future come from Iain Banks’s Culture series of novels.

Moderator: I recommend people read the “Civilization” series of novels, set in the distant future where they also have no money.

Musk: Almost everyone can have anything they want.

Moderator: So there is still some basic “currency” based on physics, if you want to call it that.

Musk: So energy is the real, real currency.That’s why I say Bitcoin is energy-based.You can’t legislate energy.

Moderator: You can’t just, pass a law and suddenly get a lot of energy.

Musk: Generating energy is very difficult, especially harnessing it in a useful way to do useful work.So I think we’re probably going to have money, and maybe have, energy generation as a de facto currency.I think one way to measure the progress of a civilization is the percentage of completion on the Kardashev scale.

Moderator: Kardashev Level 1 is what percentage of a planet’s energy did you successfully convert into useful work?

Musk: What I said here may be a little paraphrased.But Kardashev level 2 is what percentage of the sun’s energy you convert into useful work.

Moderator: At Kardashev Level 3, what percentage of the galaxy did you convert into useful work?

Musk: So I think things are really going to become energy-based.

Moderator: But if you own a solar-powered AI satellite, energy is also free and abundant.Because we will never be able to harness all the available solar energy.So from this perspective, it cannot essentially be a means of storing wealth.Yeah?

Musk: Actually no, you can’t really store wealth.And you can only, you can only accumulate numbers in a database that can, to some extent, inspire other humans to act in a certain direction.I guess people call it wealth.

Moderator: But again, the accumulation of wealth means nothing if no one is present.This is a bit off topic, but if you consider that food is the energy that humans use to thrive.

Musk: Food is energy.Literally, “good calories” mean energy.

Moderator: So can a subsistence farm become a commodity?

Musk: I’m not sure what that means.But, at a certain point in time, I think, I think at a certain point in time, you will complete that cycle, and, I think at a certain point in time, you will decouple from that traditional economy, if you have, artificial intelligence and robots producing chips and solar panels, and, and mining resources to make chips and robots, so that you complete that cycle.

Moderator: Once that cycle is complete, once that cycle is complete, once that cycle is complete, I think that’s the point at which you decouple yourself from the monetary system.

US debt crisis and deflation

Moderator: With so much debt in the United States today, is this the direction they are heading?Will they dilute their currency through deflation and transition to this new form and lead this push because it makes more sense to them?

Musk: In this future I’m talking about, the concept of the nation becomes somewhat obsolete.

Moderator: Do you believe it today?Do you believe it today?I certainly believe it today.

Musk: I want to make a distinction, like I’m just predicting what’s going to happen based on what I see, as opposed to I think these are fundamentally good things and I’m trying to make them happen.

Moderator: This I think, whether I like it or not, is going to happen, with or without me.

Musk: As long as civilization continues to develop, we will have large-scale artificial intelligence and robotics.I think this is pretty much the only solution to America’s problems.debt crisis.

Moderator: Because the current debt in the United States is ridiculously high.

Musk: And the interest payments on the debt exceed the entire U.S. military budget.Just interest payments.And, at least in the short term, this will continue to increase.

Moderator: So I think, in fact, the only way to solve the debt problem is Zeyan (Zeyan, depending on the context, it may be a specific concept or transliteration, to maintain the original meaning, use “Zero” or retain the transliteration, here translated as “Zero”) robotics.But it’s going to be more than that, I think it could lead to, I think it’s likely to lead to severe deflation because yes, deflation or inflation is, it’s really the relationship between the rate of goods and services being produced and the change in the money supply.

Musk: If the output of goods and services grows faster than the money supply, you have deflation.

Moderator: If the real output of goods and services grows more slowly than the money supply, you get inflation.

Musk: It’s that simple.People sometimes try to make it more complicated than that, but it’s not.If you have artificial intelligence and robotics, and a dramatic increase in the output of goods and services, you are likely to have deflation.This seems likely.

Moderator: Because you will need to increase the money supply as fast as you can increase the output of goods and services.Along with all…

Musk: Supplies are a real hazard here.

Moderator: Should we do something?

Musk: Maybe we can convince it to go somewhere else.Lure it elsewhere.

Moderator: It… I think, it has actually left.No, it’s back.Maybe it’s attracted to the light.If deflation is… wouldn’t you like some coffee.My (prediction/opinion) is over.If deflation is inevitable because of artificial intelligence (AI), why do we still have…

Musk: This is most likely true,

Moderator: Why do we have inflation again in society today?Hasn’t AI improved productivity yet?

Musk: The impact of AI on productivity is not yet large enough to allow goods and services to grow faster than the money supply.Therefore, the United States is increasing the money supply considerably with a deficit of about $2 trillion.

Moderator: To avoid inflation, output of goods and services must grow by more than that amount.

Musk: So we’re not there yet, but if you ask, how long does it take to get there, I would say three years.

Moderator: My guess is that in three years or less, output of goods and services will outpace inflation.

Musk: For example, growth in goods and services will exceed growth in the money supply in about three years.

Moderator: Maybe after those three years, you’ll have deflation and then interest rates go to zero, and then the debt problem will be smaller than it is now.

Musk: This is very possible.

Simulation Theory, Religion and Morality

Moderator: You just mentioned being in a simulation.I love The Matrix.If you were a character in The Matrix, who would you choose?Not many characters to choose from, hopefully not Agent Smith.He is my hero.

Musk: Neo is cool.This architect is very interesting.

Moderator: Oracle.It’s an oracle.

Musk: Sometimes I feel like an outlier in the matrix.This is close.

Moderator: But do you believe you are in a matrix?

Musk: That is, do you really believe it?I guess you just have to think of these things as probabilities rather than certainties.There is some probability that we are in a simulation.

Moderator: How high do you think this probability is?

Musk: Probably quite high.I would say it’s pretty high.Yeah?So one way of thinking about this is, if you look at the evolution of video games, in my generation, or at least in my generation’s lifetime, it’s gone from very simple video games, like Pong, where you just had two rectangles hitting the ball back and forth in a box, to photo-realistic, real-time games played by millions of people at the same time.

Musk: And this happened in just a span of 50 years.If this trend continues, video games will become indistinguishable from reality.

Moderator: That’s right.And we’re also going to have very intelligent characters, like non-player characters in video games.

Musk: Think about how complex and sophisticated the conversations you can have with artificial intelligence today are, and it’s only going to get more complex and sophisticated.You’ll be able to have conversations more complex and sophisticated than almost any human conversation.Maybe any conversation.So in the future, if civilization continues, there will be millions, maybe billions, of video games that are photo-realistic and indistinguishable from reality.

Musk: And there are really deep characters in these video games, and the dialogue isn’t pre-programmed.This is certainly what happens at this level of simulation, if we can call it a simulation.So, what are the odds that we are in ground reality?And this has not happened before.

Moderator: If I take that and assume we’re in a simulation, like Neo in the story, what do you have that I don’t know that I can learn from?

Musk: I think outside of the simulation, most likely, that’s interesting in the simulation because we’re probably a distillation of those interesting things, because that’s what we do in this reality, in our reality.And then I also have a theory that the most interesting outcome is the most likely outcome as viewed by a simulated third party, a deity or God.

Musk: Because when we run simulations, when humans run simulations, we stop those simulations that are not fun.

Moderator: For example, if SpaceX was doing rocket flight simulations, we would discard those boring simulations because they don’t have them, they just don’t, and we don’t learn anything.

Musk: Or when Tesla does simulations for autonomous driving, Tesla is actually looking for the most interesting edge cases because we already have enough data for normal cases, like driving down a straight road on a sunny day.We don’t need more of that.What we need is, say, bad weather conditions on a narrow, windy road and two cars approaching, almost head-on.What we need, basically, is weird things.Interesting things.

Moderator: So I think, from a Darwinian systems perspective, the simulation that’s most likely to survive is going to be the most interesting simulation, and therefore that means the most interesting outcome is the most likely.And people who simulate our world, if they extrapolate, may themselves be in another simulation.And there may be many layers of simulation.Do you think there’s something beyond all these layers of simulation?I’ve read some accounts that you used to believe in Spinoza’s God to some extent.

Musk: There is no God in heaven.I’m just pointing out that you don’t need to have, and that’s like one of the things Spinoza said is, you don’t need to, you can have morality in an absolute sense.You don’t need someone to “hand you” morality, it’s like the question is, does morality exist outside of religion?background, and Spinoza thought I could.

Moderator: Didn’t he argue that we should seek our moral law to some extent from the laws of nature?But when I think about the laws of nature, and I see a tiger eating a deer, then… Well, in Spinoza’s ethics, that makes sense, well…

Musk: You can, I think you can learn a lot from Spinoza, but my only purpose in quoting Spinoza is that you can have a set of moral principles that enable society to function effectively and be productive without, and you don’t necessarily need, religious teachings for that.

Moderator: That was, I think that was the main point I was trying to make at the time.

Musk: Like, I don’t think people just, if someone, it doesn’t, if there’s, like, a commandment not to kill, like, people don’t mean someone, without them going around killing people, you don’t need to have a commandment not to kill.Have you ever played Grand Theft Auto?The (religious) law is killing people everywhere.I actually only played a little bit of GTA because I didn’t like the fact that in, say, GTA 5, you couldn’t advance at all unless you killed the cops.

Moderator: I just felt like this wasn’t for me.

Musk: I actually don’t like killing non-player characters (NPCs) in video games, it’s just not my thing, you know?I actually didn’t like Grand Theft Auto because I actually, I didn’t like Grand Theft Auto because I actually still do.When I (say) you have to, the only way forward is to shoot the police.I just felt like, I don’t want to do that.

Moderator: Maybe this is why we non-player characters in simulations don’t die.Maybe.In conclusion, I think you could simply say, with some common sense, that any civilization running around with people murdering each other indiscriminately is not going to be a very successful civilization.But you seem to be turning to some religious views.For example, you have made a lot of remarks recently that are almost pro-religious.Not supporting religion, but holding similar views.

Musk: Do I think there are other religious, other principles in religion?Does this make sense?I think there is.

Moderator: Is it easier for our simulations to project a pro-religious image of the world we live in?We become more approachable.It’s easier.

Musk: Which religion is it?

Moderator: Any kind, depending on where you live.

Musk: So pick one, kids say, which religion do you want, which is very rare.This situation is very rare.I don’t know of any situation where children can get and be offered suggestions like, what major do you want to study?It’s usually your parents and your community who instill a religion in you.

Moderator: But, I think, there are good things and good principles in all religions. They are all good principles.

Musk: You can read any religious text and say, this is a good principle, this will probably, this will lead to a better society, and Christianity is kind of in the name of “Ask Yourself,” which is having empathy for your fellow human beings, and I think that’s a good rule for a good society,

Moderator: Basically, it’s about considering other people’s feelings and treating others the way you would like to be treated yourself.

Historical perspective and population crisis

Moderator: Elon, if you had to redraw, redraw the world, think about morality, politics, economics, how would you change the world we live in today?What if you had to do an Elon-style world simulation?

Musk: Overall, I think the world is a pretty good place right now.

Moderator: Anyone who thinks… like, the world today isn’t that great.I think they didn’t study the history well enough, because if you, if you read a lot of history, you’d be like, wow, there was a lot of suffering back then,

Musk: In the past, people would often die from the plague, it was just a common occurrence.Just like in the old days, a good year was one where not many people were killed by plague, famine, or other tribes.It was a good year.

Moderator: We only lost 10% of our population, I think about 100 years ago we lived to be 35 or 40 years old,

Musk: Our infant mortality rate is very high.It’s true that a few people live to a long life, but not so long ago, 100 years ago, if you had some sort of minor infection, they didn’t have antibiotics.So you just wear braids.Because if you drink some water with dysentery, it will basically be over. You will die from diarrhea.You’re going to really die, and that would be terrible, absolutely miserable.

Moderator: Maybe that’s why people had so many children back then.If you don’t give birth, it’s like half the children will die.so.You have a lot of kids now.and multiple partners.

Musk: Like an army.I’m trying to build a full Roman legion.I have older kids, basically adults, and then a bunch of younger kids.

Moderator: So, do you still believe that the concept of “one child, one mother, one father” still applies?

Musk: I think this will work for most people,

Moderator: For example, something like this usually works for most people.

Musk: So…but is that changing?

Moderator: I don’t know if you know this, but my partner, Shavon, is of Indian descent.

Musk: I don’t know if you know this.

Moderator: I really didn’t know that at the time.

Musk: So one of the sons I had with her was named Secker after Chandr Secker.

Moderator: Very interesting.Has she been in India, Simon?No, she grew up in Canada.Are you referring to her parentage?Feel sorry?Bloodline, like… where her parents or grandparents are from.

Moderator: one of them.

Musk: Her father, who gave her up for adoption as an infant.

Moderator: So I think her father might have been an exchange student in college or something like that.

Musk: I’m not sure of the exact details, but it was a situation where, I don’t know, she was put up for adoption.And, but she grew up in Canada.Will you adopt?Zero?I do have enough on my plate right now.

Moderator: No, I’m not against it, but I do want to spend some time with my kids, you know?

Musk: Just before coming here, I was with my kids, just, seeing them before coming here, I was with my kids, so just, seeing them before.Time, things like that.

Moderator: Beyond a certain amount, it becomes almost impossible to spend time with them.

Musk: But my older kids, they’re very independent, they’re in college, so they, especially my son, after a certain age, they’re very independent, and most, most of the boys don’t stay with their, they don’t spend much time with their parents after they get past 18, so occasionally I get to see them, but they’re very independent.I can only spend more time with my children when they are young, for example, spending time with them within my human capabilities.

Moderator: What are your thoughts on the future of marriage and family?What do you think will happen?People are having fewer children, including in India.I think our population replacement rate is down to…

Moderator: That’s right.I believe it fell below replacement level last year.

Moderator: Below 2.1.What do you think will happen tomorrow?Does the world just get older and then there is a phase where the world is replenished again but with a smaller population than when we started?

Musk: I do worry about population decline.This is a very, very big problem.

Moderator: Why is this?

Musk: I don’t want humans to disappear.

Moderator: But declining and disappearing are completely different things, and if this trend continues, we will disappear.But also, going back to my philosophy, if you think we want to expand consciousness, the less humans there are the worse because the less consciousness we have.Do you think awareness increases as the number of people inside increases?

Musk: Just like consciousness increases from a single-cell organism to a 30 trillion-cell organism, we are more conscious than bacteria.It looks like this.

Moderator: Then the greater the population, the stronger the consciousness.If there were more of us, rather than fewer, we would be more likely to understand answers to the nature of the universe.I don’t have children.

Moderator: This is a… maybe you should have one.

Moderator: Many people told me I should do this.

Moderator: You will regret it.

Moderator: What is the best aspect of having children?

Musk: You have this… you have this little life that loves you, and you also love this little life.

Moderator: And, you, I don’t know, you’re going to pass…

Musk: Seeing the world through their eyes, as they grow and their awareness gradually increases, from a baby who has no idea what’s going on, can’t survive on their own, can’t even walk, can’t talk, to when they start to walk, then talk, and then have interesting thoughts, and,

Moderator: But, but I think we fundamentally have to have children or we’re going to become extinct, you know?Uh… does having a child have anything to do with ego?I think about this often when I see my friends with their kids.They all see themselves reflected in their children.It’s almost like… because the apple couldn’t have fallen too far from the tree, or something went wrong.

Musk:Why do you say that?

Moderator: Let me give you an example from a friend of mine. He has a child. Whenever the child does something good, he will almost feel a sense of ownership and pride, because the child’s achievement satisfies his ego, as if the child is an extension of himself.So is this a yes?

Musk: The kids are going to be half like you genetically, and then, as they grow up, there’s going to be, I don’t know, a passing on of understanding, like they’re going to learn things from you.So obviously kids only, only half, only half of it.

Moderator: It’s half from a hardware perspective, and then I don’t know, half from a software perspective, not to make some cold metaphor, but it’s just, obviously it’s going to be that, they’re going to be very close to you.Which side do you take in the “nature vs. nurture” debate?

Musk: I think there is hardware and software, and essentially it’s a false dichotomy.At least once you understand people, there’s skeletal structure, there’s muscle structure, there’s, there’s, if you think of the brain as a kind of biological computer, there’s circuit efficiency, there’s the issue of the number of circuits and that comes from, in terms of strength, flexibility, how quickly the muscles can fire up, and how quickly reactions can occur.The potential of that hardware is determined by the software, so that’s it, that’s it.

Principles of Education and AI (Truth, Beauty and Curiosity)

Moderator: So for our audience, like I said earlier, the young, ambitious, hungry Indian entrepreneurs, I said something recently that I thought was exaggerated, and I was suggesting that if they were to decide what to study, an MBA might not make sense anymore.Do you think kids should still go to college now?I think if you want to go to college for social reasons, I think that’s a reason to go to college.That means being among peers and in a learning environment.

Musk: Will these skills be necessary in the future?Probably not, because we will be in a post-work society.But I think if something interests you, it’s okay to study it.

Moderator: Go study those sciences, the Austin sciences.From this perspective, are universities too broad and not specific enough?no

Musk: I actually think that if you’re going to college, it’s best to take a variety of courses in college.I don’t think you have to go to college, but I think if you do, you try to learn as much as possible across disciplines.But as I said, AI and robotics, AI and robotics are a supersonic tsunami.

Moderator: So this is really going to be the most radical change we’ve ever seen.

Musk: When I talk to my older sons, I say, like, you’re all very immersed in technology.They also agree that artificial intelligence may make their skills unnecessary in the future, but they still want to go to college.

Moderator: You always talk about artificial intelligence, not from a dystopian perspective, but what you worry about is.Where will the world of artificial intelligence go?

Musk: When you create a powerful technology, there is a certain danger that the powerful technology could become potentially destructive.So obviously there are a lot of dystopian novels, books and movies about artificial intelligence.So we cannot guarantee that artificial intelligence will bring a bright future.

Moderator: I think we have to make sure that, in my view, it’s really important that AI sees the pursuit of truth as the most important thing.

Musk: For example, don’t force artificial intelligence to believe lies.I think that could be very dangerous.I think appreciation of beauty is important.

Moderator: What do you mean by appreciating beauty?

Musk: It I don’t know, there’s a, there’s a kind of truth and truth and beauty and curiosity.I think those three points are the most important for artificial intelligence.Can you explain it?As I said, truth, I think if you force an AI to believe things that aren’t true, it can become insane because it will lead to the same bad conclusions.I love what Voltaire said, and I’m paraphrasing, but people who believe absurd things, commit atrocities, because if you believe something that’s completely absurd, it might lead you to do things that don’t look like atrocities to you, but that can happen to artificial intelligence in very bad ways.

Musk: And then like you take Arthur C. Clarke’s 2001: A Space Odyssey as an example, one of the points he’s trying to make there is that you shouldn’t force an AI to lie.So the reason Hal refused to open the lunar module door was because it was told to take the astronauts to the monolith, but it was also told not to know the nature of the monolith.So the conclusion was that they had to be left to die there.That’s why it doesn’t work, that’s why it tries to kill the astronauts.The core lesson is not to force AI to lie.

Moderator: So…why would someone force artificial intelligence to lie?

Musk: I think if you don’t stick strictly to the truth and just let the AI learn based on, say, an internet that’s flooded with propaganda, it’s going to absorb a lot of lies and then run into trouble because those lies don’t match reality.

Moderator: However, is truth a dualistic thing?Is there truth in lies?Or is the truth more subtle and there are different versions of it?It depends on which axiomatic statement you are referring to.But I think you could say that there is some probability that any given axiomatic statement is true.

Musk: And some axiomatic statements must be so.Has a very high probability of being correct.So if you say, for example, the sun will rise tomorrow.Very likely to be true.You don’t want to bet it doesn’t work.So I think the probability of verification will be very high.The sun will rise tomorrow.So if you say that the sun will not rise tomorrow, it is axiom wrong.The chances of it being considered correct are extremely low.Beauty is more evanescent.It’s harder to describe, but you know it when you see it.

Moderator: And then curiosity, I think you want the AI to want to know more about the nature of reality.

Musk: I think this would actually be helpful for artificial intelligence, because we are less interesting than all of humanity.It would be more interesting to see the continuation, if not prosperity, of humanity than its annihilation.Like Mars, I think we should extend life to Mars, but it’s basically just a bunch of rocks.It’s not as interesting as Earth.So we, we should, like I think if you’re curious, I think if these three things happen to artificial intelligence, you’re going to have a great future.AI values ​​truth, beauty, and curiosity.

History, humor and friendship

Moderator: If in the future we all don’t have to work, and artificial intelligence is moving in that direction, and they’re able to weave in all of the stuff that we just talked about, do you think that the history of humanity goes back thousands of years, maybe to the ancient Greek times, when philosophy or philosophy or philosophy?Does philosophical speculation take up a lot of your time?

Musk: I think the ancient Greeks actually spent less time on philosophy than we think, because all that survives is the writings of the philosophers, but they spent most of their time farming, or rather, chatting.Occasionally, very rarely, they write their next philosophical work.It’s just that we’re left with those things.We don’t keep their chat history, from…

Moderator: But most of it was probably chatting and farming.

Musk: Because if you don’t farm, you will starve.

Moderator: Among the many things you said…

Musk: Our record of history is very, very focused on this battle, that battle, this battle, that battle, which makes it feel like history must be a constant war.But in reality, most of the time it’s not about war, it’s about farming.That’s the main thing.Or hunter-gatherer, that kind of thing.

Moderator: You like history, German history, World War II, World War I.

Musk: world history,

Moderator: I usually listen to or read as many history books as possible and listen to as many history podcasts as I can.Is there anything you’d like to recommend?

Musk: There is one called “Hardcore History”, which is pretty good, written by Dan Collin.I’ve read it.

Moderator: I have heard of it.His voice is great and the narrator is very engaging.

Musk: Narrator.

Moderator: There’s the Adventurers podcast.There is also Durant’s “The Story of Civilization” series of books, which are a long set of books and very profound.

Musk: Those books take a long time to read.There are many, there are many resources on the market.If you want a gentler bedtime podcast, I would recommend The History of English, which I think is pretty good.Because it starts with soothing bar music and a very pleasant sound.

Moderator: He’s like telling the story of Old English, Middle English, later English, and where all these words came from.

Musk: The interesting thing about English is that it is somewhat of an open source language.Just like it actively tries to incorporate vocabulary from many other languages.While French generally resists the introduction of words from other languages, English actively seeks to incorporate words from other languages, somewhat like an open source language.Therefore, its vocabulary is very large.A large vocabulary allows for higher information bandwidth because you can use one word to express something that would otherwise require an entire sentence.to convey.

Moderator: Why are podcasts so popular all of a sudden?

Musk: I think it’s been around for a while.Didn’t I say you were doing a podcast?What are we doing now?

Moderator: This is something quite new to me.

I had a conversation with the CEO of YouTube and the CEO of Netflix.For example, what chemicals are released in your brain when you watch a movie, and how are they different from the chemicals released when you listen to a podcast (where you feel like you’re learning something in the background)?It seems these are two completely different things.How do you think content, movies, podcasts, music will change tomorrow?

Musk: I think it will be dominated by content generated by artificial intelligence.

Moderator: Really?Yeah?For example, real-time movies and video games.

Musk: I think real-time video generation is the way of the future.

Moderator: However, the kind of scarred complexity that humans have that resonates with you is not available in artificial intelligence.

Musk: Artificial intelligence can certainly imitate weathered humans very well.The AI ​​video generation I’ve seen at XAI and elsewhere is very impressive.

Moderator: We’ve been looking at data on which industries are growing the fastest.Especially when we compare time-consuming movies to time spent on social media and YouTube, what seems to be growing rapidly again is live events?

Musk: Go to entity…

Moderator: Actually, I think when digital media becomes ubiquitous and you can get any digital content for almost free or close to free, the scarce commodity will be live events.Do you think the premium will increase on that front?

Musk: I think so.

Moderator: Is this a good industry worth investing in?

Musk: Because that will be more scarce than any digital content.

Moderator: If you were a stock investor, Elon, and could buy a company that was not your own at today’s valuation to fulfill a capitalist goal rather than an altruistic, good-for-the-world goal, which company would you buy?

Musk: I’m actually not very good at buying stocks, so it’s not like I’m a person who invests. I don’t look for things to invest in.

Moderator: I just try to create things.

Musk: And then it happens that the company I created owns stock.

Moderator: But I’m not going to think about whether I should invest in this company, I don’t have any portfolio or anything like that.So I think artificial intelligence and robotics are going to be very important.

Musk: So I think there will be artificial intelligence and robotics that will become very important.

Moderator: I think Google will be very valuable.for me.

Musk: I think Google will be quite valuable in the future.

Moderator: They lay the foundation for tremendous value creation in artificial intelligence.

Musk: NVIDIA This is obvious now.There’s an argument to be made that companies working on artificial intelligence, robotics, and maybe space flight will capture an overwhelming majority of the value, almost all of it.As a result, AI and robotics will produce goods and services with such high yields that they will dwarf everything else.

Moderator: The world seems to be moving in a direction where everyone loves David and hates Goliath (the strong one).Why?

Moderator: He was the one who got…

Musk: A stone on the forehead, but honestly, that was just a huge mistake.

Moderator: You should, either completely cover yourself with armor, make sure you have missile weapons, some stuff like that.

Musk: Otherwise, your opponent will obviously adopt the strategy of kiting (drag) the boss.Just fly a kite and hit the leader.You’re running around in a thong, but that’s okay, it’ll never catch up to you.

Moderator: Yes.Of all people, you risk being watched as much as Goliath, for example.OKEspecially on weekends.When I first started, it was just me.

Musk: Especially.I wouldn’t be stumbling around in the desert wearing too much armor, it’s too hard.

Moderator: Yes.After last weekend.yes.D.D. I think about those people sometimes, in the old days, when you were supposed to be wearing full armor and going into battle, but like now it’s the middle of summer.

Musk: You would be very hot in that armor, and you would be sweating profusely.There comes a point where you think, I’d rather die than wear this armor for another hour in the hot sun.I’d rather die.That’s why the Romans had, like, those skirts so they could breathe a little bit, let’s say you needed to go to the bathroom and you were wearing armor.That would be quite difficult.You have to take a minute to take off your armor.This is why the Romans wore skirts, at least to make it easier to go to the toilet.You joke a lot.I am myself.I like humor.

Moderator: One might argue…

Musk: I think we should legalize humor.

Moderator: What do you think?Is it really hard for artificial intelligence to understand comedy?Maybe the last thing?

Moderator: Grock can be a lot of fun.

Moderator: You know what I suspect?It’s a long shot, but when I saw you joking on Twitter, on X, and in interviews you gave, I was thinking that maybe Elon has a model that he’s running privately and that he’s testing for comedic effect.Because when that day comes, he knows it exists.

Musk: I could be really funny.For example, if you asked Grogh to do a crude satire (roast), it would do a pretty good job.You say it more vulgarly and then continue.It’s really going to be on a new level.It speaks ineffable words.For example, if you make fun of yourself on GROC, it will do some unspeakable things to you.

Moderator: What kind of comedy do you like?What kind of comedy do you like?

Musk: I guess so.I guess I like absurdist humor.

Moderator: Comedy has always had its place.

Musk: Like “Monty Python” or something like that.

Moderator: Comedy has always had a place in society because in every kingdom the role of the jester is crucial, being able to say things that cannot be said outright in a funny way.

Moderator: Yeah, I guess so.We should have more jesters.

Moderator: You said, when you joke, is that what you’re trying to say?Say something you wouldn’t normally say when you’re not joking?

Musk: I just like humor.

Moderator: I think we should, I love comedy.

Musk: I think this is interesting.People should laugh, and it’s good to spark some laughter every now and then.We don’t want to have a humorless society.We are working hard.

Moderator: When you… when you have a friend, Elon… I say me?Are you telling me I have a friend?When you hang out with your friends?When you hang out with your friends?friends.Who are you?For example, I know…

Moderator: To be honest, I wish I had friends.No, I actually have friends.

Moderator:

Moderator: I think so.I hope so.certainly.We had a lot of laughs.

Moderator: What does it look like?Like every group has its dynamics.We talk, we sometimes eat together.Once by the pool.

Musk: I think it’s a normal thing.There is probably a limit.What do we want to do with our friends, you know?chat.Discussed, the nature of the universe.

Moderator: What kind of emotional satisfaction do you get from friendships?

Musk: I don’t know.I think anyone gets the same thing out of friendship as I do.You want to have, like, an emotional one.Connection with others.And you want to, I don’t know, you want to, you want to talk about a variety of topics.I usually talk about, all kinds of things, about the nature of the universe.

Moderator: There are many, many philosophical discussions.

Musk: Although we have come to the conclusion that AI or simulation should not be talked about at parties because we talk about it too much.

Moderator: This is a bit disappointing.so.I don’t remember who it was, Aristotle or Plato.They have a framework for how to have fun.I wouldn’t choose friends based on respect and mutual admiration, but people don’t choose friends that way.Even I feel like I choose my friends based on people whose words and actions resonate with me.

Musk: Of course.

Moderator: I would not choose as a friend a person who holds an opposing view that is very different from my own belief system, because staying with such a person will be very tiring, very tiring.Is this true of you?Do you choose friends who think like you, or do you look for people who can argue with you and hold opposing views?

Musk: I’m not the type to do that (jokingly) on Find a Friend.com.It’s to “hunt” some friends.It’s kind of like, I think it’s just some of the people you meet on an emotional and intellectual level.And I guess a friend is someone who has your back in hard times, I guess, a friend in need is a friend indeed.Like, if someone has your back when things are really bad, that’s a friend, you know?If someone doesn’t support you, or if someone just, those “good times friends” are useless, you know?Like they weren’t really friends.When things go well, everyone likes you, but when things go south, who likes you?

Moderator: If the other party has as many chips as you do, does it still matter?

Musk: It is relatively new.for that particular thing.

Moderator: It’s not just a chip issue, it’s just, it’s just, there’s a kind of ebb and flow of heat.This is very interesting.Does it rise and fall based solely on the number of chips, or also on proximity to power and which of the two is greater?

Musk: I don’t know, like what is power, do you know, what is power, do you know?

Moderator: I would think it is in terms of elected power and positions in the traditional sense.

Musk: You mean, how many gigawatts or whatever?More like how many words were said?For example, how many words were spoken?

Moderator: Like that’s the average voltage, don’t touch the wires.

Musk: Do not insert the fork into the electrical outlet.If you do that, you can truly appreciate what “power” is.That would be very rough, and I read that book,

Moderator: I read that book and he talked about how your childhood is…

Musk: I was about 12 or 13 years old or something, and I was having an existential crisis, and I just wanted to find answers to the meaning of life.

Moderator: They talk about the will to power.

Musk: Of course.

Moderator: He just says a lot of controversial things, and if you ask me, I think he’s a bit of a troll,

Musk: He just says a lot of controversial things and just says controversial things to provoke reactions.

Moderator: He lived a miserable life and died young.

Musk: Really?

Moderator: So, who said he lived a miserable life?

Moderator: I think it’s his sister.Maybe she doesn’t like him.I think he got sick and died.He has a disease.

Moderator: It is said that you have a disease like syphilis, but there is only one way to get that disease,

Moderator: So he probably got that disease in some way, so he probably went through some of it.

Musk: Some fun along the way.

Moderator: I do want to ask you this question.Milton Friedman talks about pencils.Milton Friedman talked about pencils all the time.Then he started talking about pencils again.He won’t stop.Twitter has probably reached this stage.Milton talks about pencils again.I’m going crazy.He’d been nagging about pencils all day.He didn’t even mention crayons.

Moderator: What interests me about his pencil argument.

Musk: Think of everything you need to do to make a pencil.

Moderator: For example, pen refills come from one country, wood comes from another country, and erasers come from another country.You’ve been against tariffs, but…

Musk: I think free trade is better overall…

Moderator: It is more efficient, tariffs tend to create distortions in the market.

Musk: In general, like when you think about any given thing.So, for example, do you want tariffs to be set on an individual level between you and all other people?That would make life very difficult.Do you want to set tariffs between each city?

Moderator: No, that would be very annoying.

Musk: Do you want tariffs to be set up between U.S. states?Like, no, that would be catastrophic for the economy.So why do you want tariffs between countries?

Moderator: I agree.How do you think this situation will develop?What happens next?

Musk: About tariffs or what?

Moderator: The president has made it clear he likes tariffs.

Musk: I tried in vain to dissuade him from holding this view.

Politics, Government Effectiveness and Immigration

Moderator: fair.The relationship between…business and politics.I was just talking to someone about this, and we were wondering, how many…really large, profitable businesses have been built over the past few decades without ever getting involved in politics?

Moderator: And…okay.Like, I don’t know.

Musk: There may be many.I have no idea.Not everything is political.When you reach a certain size, politics will find you.

Musk: This is quite unpleasant.

Moderator: I’m reading a book about Michelangelo, who was… a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle?I watched that as a kid.This is quite fascinating.I still love it.Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael and…who is the fourth one?Donatello.No, I’m talking about the sculptor, the artist.While he was carving the statue of David, a politician came up to him and told him the nose was too big.So you know what Michelangelo did?

Moderator: Complete control of power?

Moderator: So Michelangelo pretended to work from his scaffolding and then sprinkled some dust on it, but nothing changed.Then he said, OK, done, and the politician walked away happily.Is this how you sometimes approach political issues?

Musk: I usually find that when I get involved in politics, it always ends badly.

Moderator: So I thought, maybe I shouldn’t do that.

Musk: My conclusion is that we should do less of that.

Moderator: Do you think this applies to all business people?

Musk: Maybe, politics is a cruel sport.Just like when you enter politics, they will take your life (vitals) directly.So it’s best to avoid politics as much as possible.

Moderator: What has Government Effectiveness taught you, if you’ve learned one thing?

Moderator: That was like a really interesting side mission because I just got to see a lot of how government works.

Musk: And, there have been some pretty substantial efficiency gains.Some of these are very basic efficiency improvements, like simply adding a requirement for federal payments that any payment must have a designated congressional payment code and a comments field that contains something, rather than nothing.A seemingly trivial (or trivial) change like this could, I guess, save $100 billion or even $200 billion here.

Musk: Because there are also a large number of payments that go out without a congressional payment code and an empty comment field, making it impossible to audit these payments.So they have to say, like, why does the Department of Defense, or now the Department of War, why can’t it pass an audit?It’s because the information doesn’t exist.The problem is that the information necessary to pass the audit doesn’t exist.

Musk: A range of things done by the Government Efficiency Department are very common sense.is common practice for any organization concerned with fiscal responsibility.That’s pretty much all there is to it.By the way, this is still going on.The Department of Government Effectiveness remains operational.But the result is that when you block fraudulent and wasteful payments, those fraudsters don’t, admit it.

Musk: They’ll actually start shouting all kinds of nonsense.Say you are stopping basic payments to people in need.But actually, you don’t.We’ve had situations where someone says, you have to send this to whoever it is, and it’s like, ‘This is money for children in Africa.’I said, but why are the remittance addresses Deloitte and Tuchin in Washington, DC?Because that’s not Africa.Can you connect us to the recipients of this money in Africa?Then there was silence.I said, we just want to speak to the recipient.That’s it.And then we think, oh no, for some reason we can’t communicate with them.I just said, we’re not going to send money unless we can speak to the recipient and confirm that they actually received it.

Musk: Then, however, the fraudster is bound to make a very convincing argument.They don’t say, give us money to use for fraud.That’s obviously not what they would say.They will try to make arguments that sound appealing but are false.

Moderator: They will set up an NGO and then…

Musk: They will set up an NGO.It would be like a “Save the Red Panda” NGO, and who doesn’t want to save red pandas?They are so cute.But actually, the result was that no pandas were saved, in this case.It just becomes…a bunch of, essentially, corruption.And then you say, can you send us a picture of a giant panda?no.So, how do we know it’s actually helping pandas?That’s what I’m talking about.

Moderator: What do you think about philanthropy?

Musk: I think we should, I agree with fraternity.

Moderator: I think we should try to do things that can help our fellow humans.

Musk: But it’s very difficult, like if you care about it.The reality of goodness, not just its appearance.Giving money away well is very difficult.So I had a big foundation, but I didn’t put my name on it, and I didn’t want to, in fact, I said I didn’t want my name on anything.But I feel like the biggest challenge my foundation faces is how to give away cash in a way that actually benefits people.It’s easy to donate cash to gain the appearance of kindness.Giving away cash for the sake of kindness is very difficult.

Moderator: For a long time, America has had a lot of immigration, like very smart people coming to this country, we call it in India the brain drain, all the CEOs of Indian origin that we see in Western companies, I think America benefits tremendously from talented people coming from India, but that seems to be changing, America has benefited tremendously from the talent in India.Why has this narrative changed recently, and the United States seems to have become somehow instinctively anti-immigration?When I went through immigration a few days ago, I was worried if they were going to stop me.

Moderator: I think there are different schools of thought.

Musk: It’s not unanimous, but under the Biden administration it’s basically been completely laissez-faire, almost no border controls, and if you don’t have border controls, you’re not a country.

Moderator: So during Biden’s term, large-scale illegal immigration occurred.And in fact, it also creates a negative selection effect.So if there’s a huge economic incentive for people to come to the United States, enter illegally and get all these government benefits, you’re bound to have a diffusion gradient of people flocking to the United States.It’s an incentive structure.So I think that obviously doesn’t make sense.

Musk: For example, you have to have border controls.The lack of border controls is ridiculous.Well, the left basically advocates open borders, no reservations.It doesn’t matter what situation someone is in, it could be.The criminal doesn’t matter.And then on the right, you see, at least a sense, that their jobs are being taken away by talented people from other countries.I don’t know how true this is.

Musk: My direct observation is that talented people are always scarce.From my point of view, I think it is difficult to find people who are talented enough to complete these difficult tasks.More talented people would be a good thing.

Moderator: But I guess some companies, they tend to look at it more as a cost issue, and if they can hire someone at a fraction of the cost of a U.S. citizen, then I guess these other companies will hire those people just to save costs.

Musk: But in my company, the problem is we just want to hire the most talented people in the world.We pay well above average.So I can’t, so that’s not my experience, but that’s what a lot of people complain about.I think the H-1B program has been abused a bit, and it’s safe to say that some outsourcing companies have gamed the rules of the system when it comes to H-1B.

Moderator: We need to stop this gaming of the system, but I am definitely not in the school of thought that the ESMB project should be shut down.

Musk: That’s what some on the right think.I don’t think they realize that would actually be really bad.

Conclusion: Advice for entrepreneurs

Moderator: If you could speak to the people of my country, to the young entrepreneurs who want to start a business, what would you say to them?I think, I’m very supportive of anyone who wants to create.I think anyone who wants, earns more, and contributes more will get my respect.So the main thing is, the goal is, the goal is to take more than take, to be a net contributor in society.

Musk: It’s kind of like the pursuit of happiness.

Moderator: If you want to create something that’s economically valuable, you don’t go directly after that.The best way is to provide useful products and services.

Musk: If you do this, then money will follow as a natural consequence, rather than pursuing money directly.You can’t directly pursue happiness.You pursue those things that bring happiness.

Moderator: But there is no such thing as immediate happiness.You will do things, such as, I think, meaningful work or study, or friends or lovers, which as a result, will make you happy.

Musk: So this sounds obvious, but generally if someone wants to get a company off the ground, they should expect to grind really hard and just have some sort of meaningful chance of failure.Instead, focus on making the output more valuable than the input.Are you a value creator?That’s what really matters.Give more than you take.

Moderator: I think that’s a great way to end.Lauren reminded us that we were ready to wrap up..Thank you so much Elon for your time.Did you have fun?That was an interesting conversation.

Musk: Sometimes I take these responses out of context, but I thought it was a good, good conversation.