Elon Musk talks Twitter, Tesla and how his brain works — live at TED2022

Summary

在这段引人入胜的视频中，埃隆·马斯克谈论了他对可持续未来的愿景，重点讨论了特斯拉和他对人工智能的看法。他提到，特斯拉不仅仅是制造电动汽车，更重要的是创建一个能够大规模生产电动汽车的系统。马斯克还探讨了自动驾驶技术的挑战，并透露他们正在开发的Optimus机器人，预测这将成为特斯拉最重要的产品。此外，他还提到了他对推特的收购计划，强调了他对推特作为自由言论平台的看重，并分享了他个人的成长经历和对未来的看法。

Takeaways

• 🚗 特斯拉的巨大成功不仅在于制造电动汽车，而在于创造了一个高效生产电动汽车的系统，这是实现可持续未来的关键。
• 🔮 埃隆·马斯克对人工智能发展的预测显示出他对未来技术进展的深刻见解，尽管有时候他的预测并不完全准确。
• 🤖 全自动驾驶技术的挑战在于需要解决真正的世界人工智能问题，包括高级视觉识别和理解复杂环境。
• 🌐 马斯克提出，要实现全自动驾驶，必须构建一个能够模仿人类大脑和视觉的系统，这意味着在计算机上实现真实世界的人工智能。
• 👥 通过解决自动驾驶的挑战，马斯克认为这将推动在其他领域应用真实世界人工智能的发展，如通过他们的机器人项目Optimus。
• 🏭 特斯拉在制造领域的创新不仅仅是为了生产汽车，还包括了推动制造业的现代化，例如通过高度自动化的工厂和生产流程。
• 💡 马斯克关于未来技术和人工智能的思考，反映了他对于科技如何塑造未来社会和经济的深刻理解。
• 📈 马斯克预测，机器人技术将在未来扮演关键角色，不仅在制造业中，也在日常生活中，通过提供个人助理和服务。
• 🚀 对于马斯克而言，探索和利用人工智能技术的最终目的是推动人类文明向前发展，包括通过改进交通系统、提高生产效率和改善生活质量。
• 🌍 马斯克对于可持续能源解决方案的推广，例如通过电动汽车和太阳能，体现了他对于解决全球能源问题和减少环境影响的承诺。

Q & A

埃隆·马斯克如何描述特斯拉的'机器制造机器'的概念？

埃隆·马斯克将特斯拉的'机器制造机器'概念描述为实现可持续未来的关键。他认为，不仅仅是制造电动汽车，而是要建立一个能够大规模生产电动汽车并保持利润率的系统，以资助进一步的增长。

为什么全自动驾驶技术难以实现？

马斯克指出，全自动驾驶技术之所以难以实现，是因为存在许多假阶段，人们可能认为他们已经掌握了问题，但实际上却达到了瓶颈。要真正解决全自动驾驶问题，需要解决现实世界的人工智能和复杂视觉问题。

特斯拉如何设想未来的家用机器人应用？

特斯拉设想，未来的家用机器人将能够理解家庭的三维结构，知道家中每个物品的位置，以及能够识别所有物品。这些机器人可以执行诸如整理房间、做饭、割草或为家庭成员提供服务等任务。

Outlines

00:00

🚀 开场与特斯拉工厂探秘

在这段视频中，主持人介绍了即将与埃隆·马斯克进行现场对话的节目。在与马斯克的对话之前，他分享了自己对特斯拉位于德克萨斯州奥斯汀的巨型工厂的参观经历。这座工厂在正式开放的前一天晚上，主持人得以独自探访，发现了马斯克所说的“制造机器的机器”，这是实现可持续未来的关键。此外，主持人还提到了他与马斯克进行的一次精彩采访，并展示了采访的一部分，聚焦于人工智能、特斯拉车辆销售的预测、自动驾驶的挑战以及对未来的展望。

05:03

🤖 特斯拉Optimus机器人的启示

在这一段中，马斯克讨论了特斯拉在开发自动驾驶技术过程中的一个关键发现——为了实现自动驾驶，他们需要解决真实世界的人工智能问题。这个认识为特斯拉开发Optimus机器人奠定了基础，一个可以在没有具体指令的情况下，在真实世界中导航并执行有用任务的机器人。马斯克认为，这将对制造业和家庭生活产生深远影响，从执行危险、枯燥的任务到家庭护理和娱乐。他还强调了人工智能监管的重要性，以及如何确保技术的安全使用。

10:03

🌍 马斯克关于收购推特的动机

在这一段视频中，马斯克讨论了他提出收购推特的原因，强调了他对于自由言论的重要性和推特作为公共讨论平台的角色。他提议开源推特的算法，以增加透明度和公众信任。马斯克还分享了他对于如何处理争议性言论的看法，主张在法律允许的范围内最大限度地促进自由表达。他强调了这项收购的目的不是为了经济利益，而是为了确保推特能够作为一个促进民主和自由表达的平台继续发挥作用。

15:04

💬 马斯克提出的推特改进措施

马斯克在这一段中提出了他对推特进行改进的计划，包括增加编辑按钮、消除垃圾邮件和欺诈性内容、以及减少自动化机器人的影响。他讨论了如何通过公开算法和手动调整的透明度来增强用户对推特的信任。马斯克还谈到了他对于内容审查和自由表达之间平衡的看法，强调了在不确定情况下倾向于允许言论自由的重要性。

20:04

🧠 马斯克的个人挑战和特斯拉的背景

在这段视频中，马斯克分享了他在个人和职业生活中面临的挑战，以及特斯拉的成立背景和它的使命。他讨论了特斯拉如何克服了创业初期的困难，并最终成为领先的电动汽车制造商。马斯克强调了他对于可持续能源的承诺，以及他对于特斯拉在未来能源转型中的角色和影响的看法。

Keywords

💡Twitter

推特是一家社交媒体和微博公司。推特在视频中被描述为“事实上的城市广场”,是一个公开讨论和交流思想的平台。埃隆·马斯克决定收购推特是为了让其成为一个更加包容和信任的平台。

💡言论自由

言论自由是指个人表达观点和思想的权利。视频中马斯克强调,推特应该是一个可以自由发表言论的论坛,在法律规定的范围内。他认为这对民主的功能很重要。

💡算法

算法指的是推特用来决定如何展示和推荐内容的计算机程序。马斯克建议推特应该公开其算法,这样用户就可以看到推文是如何被处理和展示的。

💡安全

马斯克认为,推特应该努力成为一个更加安全和受信任的平台,减少辱骂,欺诈和虚假信息。这有助于保护用户,并提高公众对该平台的信任。

💡封禁

指平台禁止某个账户发帖或使用平台的做法。马斯克建议推特应该更加谨慎小心地使用永久封禁,他支持使用暂时封禁或其他更温和的惩罚。

💡机器人

指自动程序,常用于社交媒体平台上进行spam或欺诈活动。马斯克认为消除这些机器人账户应该是推特的首要任务之一。

💡特斯拉

马斯克创建的电动汽车公司。视频中马斯克详细讲述了特斯拉早期生产中遇到的困难,以及他为实现大规模制造所做的努力。这使他积累了丰富的制造业经验。

💡可持续发展

指满足当代需求而不损害后代需求能力的发展。马斯克的使命是加速实现可持续能源的未来,这需要大规模转向风能,太阳能等可再生能源以及电动交通工具。

💡未来主义

指相信科技和人类理性可以创造出更美好世界的思想。马斯克坚信他的工作可以帮助实现一个令人激动的未来。

💡意识

马斯克认为扩大生物和数字意识的范围及规模,将使我们能够更好地理解宇宙的本质,这是他的主要驱动理念。

Highlights

Elon Musk discusses the impact and future of Tesla's Gigafactory in Austin, Texas.

Musk shares insights on the challenges and advancements in Tesla's self-driving technology.

Musk emphasizes the importance of sustainable energy and Tesla's role in promoting electric cars.

Elon Musk's interview unveils his vision for artificial intelligence in Tesla's operations.

Musk reveals Tesla's shift towards AI and its significance in the future of autonomous vehicles.

Musk highlights the potential of Tesla's Optimus robot in revolutionizing manufacturing and domestic tasks.

Musk addresses the challenges in predicting advancements in technology and Tesla's strategies to overcome them.

Discussion on the importance of a transparent and inclusive platform for free speech in relation to Musk's Twitter acquisition.

Musk's proposal for an open-source algorithm for Twitter to enhance public trust and reduce manipulation.

Insights into Musk's personal philosophy on free speech and its implications for Twitter's content moderation.

Musk shares his motivation behind the Twitter offer, focusing on the platform's role in democracy and public discourse.

Elon Musk's candid reflection on Tesla's near-bankruptcy phase and the intense effort to stabilize the company.

Musk's personal journey with Asperger's syndrome and how it shaped his communication and perspective.

Musk's vision for humanity's future, emphasizing sustainability, technological advancement, and optimism.

The interview concludes with Musk's commitment to fighting for a positive future for humanity.

Transcripts

hello

so

in just a few minutes um elon musk will

be joining us here live on stage

for a conversation uh

rumor has it there are a few things to

talk about with him

um

we we we will see

but um before that

i just want to show you something

special

i want you to come with me to

tesla's huge gigafactory in austin texas

so the day before it opened last week

the evening before i was allowed to walk

around it

no one else there

and what i saw there was honestly pretty

mind-blowing

this is elon musk's famous machine that

builds the machine and his view the

secret to a sustainable future is not

just making an electric car

it's making a system that churns out

huge numbers of electric cars with a

margin so that they can fund further

growth

when i was there um none of us knew

whether elon would actually be able to

make it here today so i took the chance

to sit down with him and record an epic

interview

and i just want to show you

a nine

an eight minute excerpt of that

interview so here from austin texas elon

musk

i want us to switch now to think a bit

about artificial intelligence i i'm

curious about your timelines and how you

predict and how come some things are so

amazingly on the money and some aren't

so when it comes to predicting

sales of tesla vehicles for example

i mean you've kind of been amazing i

think in 2014

when tesla had sold that year 60 000

cars you said 2020 i think we will do

half a million a year yeah we did almost

exactly half a million five years ago

last time you came today we um i asked

you about for self-driving and um you

said yep this very year where i am

confident that we will have a car going

from la to new york uh without any

intervention yeah i i don't want to blow

your mind but i'm not always right

um

so talk what's the difference between

those two why why

why has full self-driving in particular

been so hard to predict i mean the thing

that really got me and i think it's

going to get a lot of other people is

that

there are just so many false stones with

with self-driving um where you think you

think you've got the problem

have a handle on the problem and then it

nope uh it turns out uh you just hit a

ceiling um and and uh

uh

because what happened if you if you were

to plot the progress

the progress looks like a log curve so

it's like yeah

a series of log curves so

uh most people don't like cookies i

suppose but it shows the show

it goes it goes up sort of a you know

sort of a fairly straight way and then

it starts tailing off right and and and

you start there's a kind of ocean

getting diminishing returns you know in

retrospect they seem obvious but uh in

in order to solve uh full self-driving

uh properly you actually just you have

to solve real-world ai

um you you you know because you said

what are the road networks designed to

to work with they're designed to work

with a biological neural net our brains

and with uh vision our eyes

and so in order to make it work

with computers you basically need

to solve real world ai

and vision

because because we we need

we need cameras

and silicon neural nets

uh in order to have to have

self-driving work for a system that was

designed for eyes and biological neural

nets

it you know when you i guess when you

put it that way it's like quite obvious

that the only way to solve full

self-driving is to solve real-world

ai and sophisticated vision what do you

feel about the current architecture do

you think you have an architecture now

where where there is

a chance for the logarithmic curve not

to tail off any anytime

soon

well i mean

admittedly these these uh may be an

infamous uh last words but i i actually

am confident that we will solve it this

year

uh that we will exceed uh

you're like what the probability

of an accident at what point should you

exceed that of the average person right

um i think we will exceed that this year

we could be here

talking again in a year it's like well

yeah another year went by and it didn't

happen but i think this i think this is

the year is there an element that you

actually deliberately

make aggressive prediction timelines to

drive people to be ambitious and without

that nothing gets done

so it's it feels like at some point in

the last year

seeing the progress on

understanding you that you're that the

ai the tesla ai understanding the world

around it led to a kind of an aha moment

in tesla because you really surprised

people recently when you said

probably the most important product

development going on at tesla this year

is this robot optimus yes

is it something that happened in the

development of fourself driving that

gave you the confidence to say you know

what we could do something special here

yeah exactly so you know it took me a

while to sort of realize that that in

order to solve self-driving you really

needed to solve real-world ai um

at the point of which you solve

real-world ai for a car which is really

a robot on four wheels uh you can then

generalize that to a robot on legs as

well

the thing that the things that are

currently missing are uh

enough intelligence enough to tell

intelligence for the robot to navigate

the real world and do useful things

without being explicitly instructed it

is so so the missing things are

basically real world uh intelligence and

uh scaling up manufacturing um those are

two things that tesla is very good at

and

uh so then we basically just need to

design the the uh specialized actuators

and sensors that are needed for a

humanoid robot

people have no idea this is going to be

bigger than the car

um but so talk about i mean i think the

first applications you you've mentioned

are probably going to be manufacturing

but eventually the vision is to to have

these available for people at home

correct if you had a robot that really

understood the 3d architecture of your

house and

knew where every object in that house

was or was supposed to be and could

recognize all those objects i mean that

that's kind of amazing isn't that like

like that the kind of thing that you

could ask a robot to do

would be what like tidy up yeah um

absolutely

or make make dinner i guess mow the lawn

take take a cup of tea to grandma and

show her family pictures and

exactly take care of my grandmother and

make sure yeah exactly and it could

recognize obviously recognize everyone

in the home yeah could play catch with

your kids yes i mean obviously we need

to be careful this doesn't uh become a

dystopian situation

um like i think one of the things that's

going to be important is to have a

localized rom chip on the

robot that cannot be updated over the

air uh where if you for example were to

say stop stop stop that would if anyone

said that then the robot would stop you

know type of thing

and that's not updatable remotely um i

think it's going to be important to have

safety features like that

yeah that that sounds wise and i do

think there should be a regular free

agency for ai i've said this for many

years i don't love being regulated but i

you know i think this is an important

thing for public safety do you think

there will be basically like in say 2050

or whatever that like a

a robot in most homes is what they will

be and people will

probably count

you'll have your own butler basically

yeah you'll have your sort of buddy

robot

probably yeah i mean how much of a buddy

do like do you do

how many applications you thought is

there you know can you have a romantic

partner

lot of a sex

inevitable

i mean i did promise the internet that i

would make cat girls we'll have we could

make a robot cackle

how are you because yeah

you know

so

yeah i i guess uh it'll be what whatever

people want really you know so what sort

of timeline should we be

thinking about of the first the first

models that are actually made and

sold

you know the the first units that that

we tend to make are

um

for jobs that are dangerous boring

repetitive and things that people don't

want to do and you know i think we'll

have like an interesting prototype uh

sometime this year we might have

something useful next year but i think

quite likely within at least two years

and then we'll see rapid growth year

over year of the usefulness of the

humanoid robots um and decrease in cost

and scaling out production

help me on the economics of this so what

what do you picture the cost of one of

these being well i think the cost is

actually not going to be uh crazy high

um

like less than a car yeah but but think

about the economics of this if you can

replace a

thirty thousand dollar forty thousand

dollar a year worker

which you have to pay every year

with a one-time payment of twenty five

thousand dollars for a robot that can

work longer hours

doesn't go on vacation i mean that could

it could be a pretty rapid replacement

of certain types of jobs how worried

should the world be about that

i wouldn't worry about the the sort of

putting people out of a job thing um i

think

we're actually going to have and already

do have a massive shortage of labor so i

i i think we'll we will have um

uh

not not people out of work but actually

still a shortage labor even in the

future uh but

this really will be a world of abundance

any goods and services

uh will be available to anyone who wants

them that it'll be so cheap to have

goods and services it'll be ridiculous

so

that is part of

an epic 80 minute interview

which we are releasing to people

members of ted 2022 right after this

conference um you should be able to

look at it on the ted live

website

um there's public interest in it we're

putting that out to the world on sunday

afternoon i think sunday evening but uh

but if you're into this kind of stuff um

definitely a good thing to do over the

weekend um

now then

hearing from elon live there's there's

huge public interest in that we have

opened up this segment to live stream

and so

we're joined right now by i think quite

a few people around the world um welcome

to vancouver welcome to ted 22 you're

joining us on the last day of our

conference here in a packed

theater

and

we've been hearing all week from

people with dreams about what the next

era

of humanity is going to be

and now arguably

the biggest visionary of them all elon

musk

[Music]

hey elon welcome

so elon um a few hours ago

you

made

an offer to buy twitter

why

[Laughter]

how'd you know

little bird

tweeted in my ear or something i don't

know

by the way have you seen the movie ted

about the bear

i i i have i have a movie

so um

yeah yeah so

was there a question

why why make that offer oh so

um

well i think it's very important for

uh there to be

an inclusive arena for

free speech

where

all yeah so uh yeah

um

twitter has become kind of the de facto

town square um so

uh

it's just really important that people

have the both the uh the reality and the

perception

uh that they're able to speak freely

within the bounds of the law um

and

you know so one of the things that i

believe twitter should do is open source

the algorithm

um and make any changes

uh to people's tweets you know if

they're emphasized or de-emphasized uh

that action should be

made apparent so you anyone can see that

action has been taken

so there's there's no sort of behind the

scenes

manipulation either algorithmically or

manually um

but

last week when we spoke elon um i asked

you whether you were thinking of taking

over you said no way said i i do not

want to own twitter it is a recipe for

misery everyone will blame me for

everything what on earth changed no i

think i think everyone will still blame

me for everything

yeah if something if if i acquire

twitter and something goes wrong it's my

fault 100

i i think there will be quite a few

arrows uh yes um it will it will be

miserable but you still want to do it

why i mean i hope it's not too miserable

uh but

um

i i just think it's important to the fun

like

uh

it's important to the function of

democracy

it's important to the function of

uh the united states uh as a free

country and many other countries and to

help

actually to help

freedom in the world

more broadly than the u.s

and so

i think it's uh

it's a

you know i think this there's the risk

civilizational risk

uh is decreased if twitter

the more we can increase the trust of

twitter as a public platform and so

i do think this will be somewhat painful

and i'm not sure that i will actually be

able to to acquire it

and i should also say

the intent is is to

retain as many shareholders as is

allowed by the law in a private company

which i think is around

2000 or so so we'll it's not like it

it's definitely not not from the

standpoint of letting me figure out how

to monopolize or maximize my ownership

of twitter

but we'll try to bring along as many

shoulders as we right as we're allowed

to you don't necessarily want to pay out

40 or whatever it is billion dollars in

cash you you'd like them to come come

with you in in

i mean

i mean i could technically afford it um

what i'm saying is this this is

this is uh this is not a

way to sort of make money

you know i think this is it's just that

i think this is um this could

my

strong intuitive sense is that uh having

a public platform that is maximally

trusted

um and and and

and broadly inclusive

um is extremely important to the future

of civilization but you've described

yourself i don't care about the

economics at all

okay that's that's core to hear you this

is not about the economics it's for the

the moral good that you think will

achieve you you've described yourself

elon as a free speech absolutist

but

does that mean that there's literally

nothing that people can't say and it's

okay

well i i i think uh

obviously uh twitter or any forum is

bound by the laws of the country that it

operates in um

so

obviously there are some limitations on

free speech uh in in the us and and of

course uh

twitter would have to abide by those uh

right rules so so so you can't incite

people to violence like that that the

like a direct incitement to violence you

know you can't do the equivalent of

crying fire in a in a movie theater for

example no that would be a crime yeah

right

it should be a crime but here's here's

the challenge is is that it's it's such

a nuanced difference between different

things so

there's

there's excitement to violence yeah

that's a no if it's illegal um there's

hate speech which some forms of hate

speech are fine you know i hate spinach

um

i mean if it's a sauteed in a

you know cream sauce that would be quite

nice

but so so

but the problem is so so so let's say

someone says okay here's one tweet i

hate politician x yeah next tweet is i

wish polite politician x wasn't alive

as we some of us have said about putin

right now for example so that's

legitimate speech

another tweet is i wish politician x

wasn't alive with a picture of their

head with a gun sight over it

or that plus their address i mean at

some point

someone has to make a decision as to

which of those is not okay can an

algorithm

do that well surely you need human

judgment at some point

no i think

the like i said

in my view

uh twitter should um

match the laws of the of the country of

and and and really you know

that there's an obligation to to do that

um

but going beyond going beyond that um

and having it be

unclear who's making what changes to who

to where

uh having tweets sort of mysteriously be

promoted and demoted

with no insight into what's going on uh

having a black box algorithm uh promote

some things and other not not other

things i think this can be quite

dangerous

so so so the idea of opening the

algorithm is a huge deal and i think

many people would would welcome that of

understanding exactly how it's making

the decision and critique it and

critique like i want to improve what

wondering is like like i think like the

code should be on github you know so

then uh and so people can look through

it and say like i see a problem here i

don't i don't agree with this

um

they can highlight issues right um

suggest changes in the same way that you

sort of update linux or or signal or

something like that you know but as i

understand it like at some point right

now

what the algorithm would do is it would

look at for example how many people have

flagged a tweet as obnoxious

and then

at some point a human has to look at it

and make make a decision as to does this

cross the line or not that the algorithm

itself can't i don't think yet um tell

the difference between

legal and okay and and definitely

obnoxious and so the question is which

humans you know make make that

core i mean do you have do you have a

picture of that right now twitter

and facebook and others you know they've

hired thousands of people to try to help

make wise decisions and the trouble is

that no one can agree on on what is wise

how do you solve that

well i i i think we would want to er on

this if if in doubt

uh

let let the speech that let it exist uh

it would have you know if it's a

you know a

a gray area i would say let let the

tweet exist

um

but

obviously you know in a case where

there's perhaps a lot of controversy uh

that you would not want to necessarily

promote that tweet if uh you know so the

i'm not i'm not saying this is that i

have all the answers here um

but

i i do think that we want to be just

very reluctant to delete things

and and have um

just just be very cautious with with

with permanent bands uh you know

timeouts i think are better or uh than

sort of permanent bands

and um

but just just in general like i said

uh how how it won't be perfect but i

think we wanted to really uh have

like so the possession and reality that

speech is as

free as reasonably possible

and a good sign as to whether there's

free speech is

is

is someone you

don't like allowed to say something you

don't like

and if that is the case then we have

free speech and it's it's damn annoying

when someone you don't like says

something you don't like

that is a sign of a healthy functioning

uh

free speech situation

so

i think many people would agree with

that and look at the reaction online

many people are excited by

you coming in and the changes you're

proposing some others are absolutely

horrified here's how they would see it

they would say wait a sec we agree that

that twitter is an incredibly important

town square it is a it is you know where

the world exchanges opinion about life

and death matters

how on earth could it be owned by the

world's richest person that can't be

right

so how how do you i mean what's the

response there is there any way that you

can

distance yourself from the actual

decision-making that matters on content

at

in some very clear way that is

convincing to people

well like i said i think the

it's it's very important that like the

the algorithm be open sourced and that

any manual uh adjustments be

uh identified like so if this tweet if

somebody did something to a tweet it's

there's information attached to it that

this that action was taken and i i i i

won't personally be uh you know in their

editing tweets

um

but you'll know if something was done to

promote demote or otherwise affect uh a

tweet um

you know

as for

media sort of ownership i mean you've

got you know um mark zuckerberg owning

facebook and

instagram and whatsapp um

and with a share ownership structure

that will

have

mark zuckerberg the 14th still

controlling those

uh entities

so

literally um

what's that need we won't have that on

twitter

if if you commit to opening up the

algorithm that that definitely gives

some level of confidence um talk about

talk about some of the other changes

that you've proposed so you

at the edit button that's that's

definitely coming if you if you have

your way yeah yeah

and how do you i mean i i think

i mean

one

frankly

um

the

top priority i have i would have is is

eliminating the the spammings and scam

bots

and the bot armies that are on twitter

um

you know i think i think these these fun

influence

that

they're not they're they're they they

make the product much worse

um if i see if you know

if i had a dogecoin for every crypto

scam i saw

[Laughter]

more you know 100 billion dollars

do you regret sparking the sort of storm

of excitement overdose and you know

where it's gone or

i mean i think deutsche is fun and you

know i've always said don't bet the form

of dogecoin uh fyi

yeah

but i i think i think it's it's i like

dogs and i like memes and uh it's got

both of those

and

but just on the on the edit button how

how do you get around the problem of so

someone tweets elon rocks and it's

tweeted by two million people um and um

and then then after that they edit it so

i'm elon sucks and um and then all those

retweets

they're all embarrassed and how how do

you avoid that type of

changing of meaning so that retweeters

are exploited

well i think uh you know you'd only have

the edit capability for a short period

of time and probably the thing to do at

upon the edit would be to zero out

all retweets and favorites

okay

i'm open to ideas though you know

so in one way the um algorithm works

kind of well for you right now i just i

wanted to show you this this is so

this is a typical tweet of of mine kind

of lame and wordy and whatever and look

at and the amazing response it gets is

this oh my god

97 likes

um and then i tried another one um

and uh

29 000 likes so the algorithm at least

seems to be at the moment you know if

elon musk expanded the world immediately

um not bad right

yeah i guess so i mean that was

cool

i mean you but but you've

so help us understand how it is you've

built this incredible

um following on twitter yourself when

i mean some of the people who love you

the most look at some of what you tweet

and they they

they think it's somewhere between um

embarrassing and crazy some of it's

amazing i mean

[Laughter]

is that actually why it's worked or why

why has it worked

i mean i don't know i mean i i'm

you know tweeting more or less stream of

consciousness you know it's not like let

me think about some grand plan about my

twitter or whatever you know i'm like

literally on the toilet or something i'm

like oh this is funny and then tweet

that out you know

that's

that's like most of them

[Laughter]

you know over sharing

but um but you are obsessed with getting

the most out of every minute of your day

and so why not you know

um

so

i don't know i just like try to tweet

out like things that are interesting or

funny or

you know and then people seem to

like it

so if if you are unsuccessful actually

before i ask that let me ask this if i

don't

yeah so how can i say

is uh funding secured

[Music]

i i have sufficient uh assets to

complete the

uh

it's not a forward-looking statement

blah blah but

i have to i mean i can do it if possible

right um

so um

and um

i mean i should say actually even in the

in

originally

the

uh with with tesla back in the day

funding was actually secured

i want to be clear about that

um in fact this may be a good

opportunity to to to clarify that um

if funding was indeed secured um and uh

i should say like why why do i do not

have respect for the sec in that

situation and i don't mean to

blame everyone at the sec but certainly

the san francisco office

um it's because the sec

knew that funding was secured

but they pursued the

an active public investigation

nonetheless at the time tesla was in a

precarious financial situation

and i was told by the banks that if i

did not agree to settle with the sec

that they would the banks would cease

providing working capital and tesla

would go bankrupt immediately

so that's like having

a gun to your child's head

so i was forced to concede to the sec

unlawfully

those bastards

and and and now that they they say

it makes it look like i lied when i did

not in fact lie i was i was forced to

admit that i lied for to save tesla's

life and that's the only reason

given what's actually happened

given what's actually happened to tesla

since then though aren't you glad that

you didn't take it private

yeah i mean

it's difficult to put yourself in the

position at the time tesla was under the

most relentless short seller attack in

the history of the stock market

uh there's something called short and

distort

um where the barrage of negativity that

tesla was experiencing from short sales

wall street was beyond or belief tesla

was the most shorted stock in the

history of stock markets

this is saying something

so

you know this was affecting our ability

to hire people it was affecting our

ability to sell cars

it was

uh

they were

yeah it was terrible um

yeah they wanted tesla to die so bad

they could taste it

well most of them have paid the price

yes

where are they now

um

so

so that was a really strong statement i

mean obviously a lot of people

who who support you i thought would say

you have so much to

offer the world on the upside on the

vision side don't don't waste your time

getting getting distracted by these

these battles that bring out negativity

and and and make people feel that you're

being defensive or like people don't

like fights especially with with

powerful government authorities they'd

rather they'd rather buy into your to a

dream do do you like aren't you

encouraged by people just just to edit

that

in that

you know temptation out and uh

go with the bigger story

um well i mean i i would say like you

know i'm sort of a mixed bag you know i

mean well you're a fighter and you you

don't you don't you don't you don't

you don't like to lose and and you you

you are determined that you don't

basically i i mean you are sure i don't

like to lose i'm not sure many people do

um

but the truth matters to me a lot really

like

sort of pathologically it matters to me

okay so so you don't like to lose if in

this case you are not successful in you

know the board

does not accept your offer you've said

you won't go higher is there a plan b

there is

i i think we i think we would like to

hear a little bit about plan b

for it for another time i think

another time yeah all right

[Applause]

i that that's a nice tease all right so

um

i i would love

to

try to understand this brain of yours

more ilan i i if with your permission

i'd like to just play this this is the

oh actually before we do that

um here was one of the of the thousands

of questions that people asked i thought

this was actually quite a good one um if

you could go back in time and change one

decision you made along the way

do your own edit button

which one would it be and why

do you mean like a career decision or

something

just any decision over the last

few years like your decision to invest

in twitter in the first place or your

anything um i mean the

the worst business decision i ever made

was

um

not starting tesla with just jb straval

by far the worst decision i've ever made

is not just starting tesla with jb

that that that's the number one by far

all right so jb strabo was was the

visionary co-founder who who who was

obsessed with and knew so much about

batteries and your your decision to go

with tesla the company as it was meant

that you got locked into what you

concluded it was a weird architecture

now this this

there's a lot of confusion tesla

tesla did not exist in any

tesla was a shell company with no

employees uh no intellectual property

when i invested but the

a false narrative has been created by um

one of the other co-founders uh martin

everhard and i don't want to get into

the nastiness here but uh

i didn't invest in an existing company

we created a company yeah and

ultimately the creation that company uh

was was done by

uh jv and me um and

unfortunately there's a someone else and

another co-founder who has made it his

life's mission

uh to make it sound like he he created

the company which is false wasn't there

another issue

right at the heart of the development of

the tesla model 3 where tesla almost

went bankrupt and i i think you have

said that part of the reason for that

was that you overestimated the extent to

which it was possible at that time to

automate a a factory a huge amount was

spent

kind of over automating and it didn't

work

and it nearly took the company down is

that fair

uh i mean

first of all it's important to

understand like what what has tesla

actually accomplished that is that is

most noteworthy um it is not the

creation of

an electric vehicle or creating

electrical vehicle prototype or

low volume production

of a

of a car that they've been

uh hundreds of cars startups over the

years hundreds and uh in fact at one

point um bloomberg counted up the number

of electric vehicle startups and they i

think they got to almost 500. yeah so

the hard part is not creating a

prototype or going into limited

production

the the the absolutely difficult thing

which has not been accomplished by an

american car company in 100 years is

reaching volume production without going

bankrupt

is the actual hard thing

um the last company american company to

reach volume production without going

bankrupt was chrysler in the 20s right

and and and it nearly happened to tesla

yes it but it's not like oh geez i guess

if we just done more manual stuff things

would have been fine

of course not uh that is definitely not

the case uh

so

we basically messed up

almost every aspect of the model 3

production line

from

from cells to packs to

driving voters

motors

body line the paint shop

uh

final assembly

um

everything everything was messed up

um and i lived in that fa i lived in the

fremont and and nevada factories

for three years

fixing the that production line running

around like a maniac

through every part of that factory

living with the team

i slept on the floor

so that the

the team who was going through

a hard time

could see me on the floor

uh

that they knew that i was not in some

ivory tower

whatever pain they experienced i was i

had it more and some people who knew you

well

actually thought you were making a

terrible mistake that you were driving

yourself you were

you were driving yourself to the edge of

sanity almost and yeah and

and that you were in danger of making

bad

choices and in fact i heard you say last

week elon that that you because of

tesla's huge value now and and you know

the the significance of every minute

that you spend that you are in danger of

sort of

obsessing over spending all this time to

the point of to the edge of

sanity

um

that doesn't that doesn't sound super

wise isn't that like your your your time

your your completely sane centered

rested time and decision making

is more powerful and compelling than

that sort of i can barely

hold my eyes open so surely it should be

an absolute strategic priority to look

after yourself

i mean there wasn't any other way to

make it work

there were three years of hell

17 8 2017 18 and 19

with three years

this longest period of excruciating pain

in my life

uh

there wasn't any other way and we barely

made it and we're on the ragged edge of

bankruptcy the entire time

so

so when you felt like i want

pain

i don't like it

um

those were three or three so so much

pain

but it had to be done or tesla would be

dead when you looked around the

gigafactory that we saw images of

earlier

um last week and just see where the

companies come i mean do you feel that

that this this challenge of

figuring out the the new way of

manufacturing um that you that

you actually have an edge now that it's

different that you've figured out how to

do this and

and um from

those three years

what won't be repeated you've actually

figured out a new way of manufacturing

at this point i think i know

more about manufacturing than anyone

currently alive on earth

between that

yeah

i'll tell you i can tell you how every

damn part part in that car is made

which basically if you just live on the

factory live in the factory for three

years and

that was nice that was a poignant note

or something

someone wants to compose a symphony to

that uh expression of confidence uh

something like that i have no idea what

that is

anyway yeah

every aspect of a car six weeks to

sunday i know

i mean you you you

talk about scale right now you're in the

middle of writing your new master plan

and you've said that scale is at the

heart of it

why does scale matter why are you

obsessed with that what are you thinking

yeah well see

in order in order to accelerate the

advent of sustainable energy

uh there must be scale

because we've got a transition um a vast

economy that is currently uh overly

dependent on fossil fuels to a

sustainable energy economy one where the

energy is uh

yeah i mean we got to do it

so so the energy's got to be sustainably

generated with wind solar uh hydro

geothermal i i'm a believer in nuclear

as uh as well i think ever talk about

and

uh and then you you

since solar and wind is intermittent you

have to have stationary storage

batteries and and then we're going to

transition all transport um

to to electric uh

if we do those things we have a

sustainable energy future the faster we

do those things the less risk we

the less risk we

put to the environment

uh so sooner is better uh and and so

scale is very important um

you know it's not about it's not about

press releases it's about tonnage what

was the tonnage of

of batteries produced

and obviously done in a sustainable way

and and our estimate is that

approximately 300 terawatt hours of

battery storage is needed to transition

uh transport uh

electricity and and heating and cooling

uh to a fully electric situation others

may

there's there may be some

different estimates out out there but uh

our estimate is 300 terawatt hours yeah

so we dug into this a lot in the

interview that we recorded last week and

so people can go in and hear that more

but i mean the context is that is i

think about a thousand times the current

install battery capacity i mean the

scale up needed is

breathtaking basically yeah and and and

um

yeah so so your vision is to commit

tesla to try to deliver on a meaningful

percentage of what is needed yeah and

what and call on others to do the rest

that this is what this is a task for

humanity to massively scale up our

response to change change the energy

grade

yes it it's

it's like basically how fast can we can

we scale um and encourage others to

scale

to get to that 300 terawatt hour

installed uh base of batteries right

and then of course uh there'll be a

tremendous need to recycle those

batteries which is i and it makes sense

to recycle them because the raw

materials are like high grade ore um so

people shouldn't think well they'd be

this big pile of batteries now they're

going to get recycled because the

even a dead battery pack is worth about

a thousand dollars so

um but but this is what's needed for a

sustainable energy future so we're going

to try to take the set of actions that

accelerate the day of and bring the day

of a sustainable energy future sooner

okay

there's going to be a huge interest in

your master plan when you when you

publish that um meanwhile i just i would

love to

understand more

what goes on in this brain of yours

because it is it is a pretty unique one

i want to play with your permission this

very funny opening from snl saturday

night live can we have the volume there

actually please sorry

it's an honor to be hosting saturday

night live i mean that

sometimes after i say something i have

to say i mean that

[Music]

so people really know that i mean

that's because i don't always have a lot

of

international variation in how i speak

which i'm told makes for great comedy

i'm actually making history tonight as

the first person

with asperger's to host snl

[Applause]

and i think you followed that up with at

least the first person to admit it the

first person to admit it

but i mean

so this was a great thing to say

but i i would love to

understand

whether you know how you think of of

asperger's like whether you can give us

any sense of even you as a boy how what

what the experience

was or as you now

understand with the benefit of hindsight

can you talk about that a bit

well i think i think everyone's

experience is going to be somewhat

different

but i guess for me the

social cues were not uh intuitive so

i was just very bookish and i didn't

understand

this i guess

others could

sort of intuitively understand uh

what watches meant by something

i would just tend to take things very

literally as just like the words

as spoken word exactly what they meant

but but then that

didn't turn out to be wrong

you can't they do not they're not simply

saying exactly what they mean

there's all sorts of other things that

are meant it took me a while to figure

that out um

so

i was you know bullied quite a lot

um

so

i didn't i did not have a sort of happy

childhood to be frank was quite quite

rough um

and um

but i read a lot of books i read lots

and lots of books

and so that you know

sort of

gradually i sort of understood more from

the books that i was reading and watched

a lot of movies

and

you know just

but it took it took me it took me a

while to understand things that most

people

intuitively understand

so i've wondered whether it's possible

that that was in a strange way an

incredible gift to you and and

indirectly to many other people

in as much as

brains you know are plastic and they

they they go where the action is and if

in for some reason the external world

and social cues which so many people

spend so much time and energy and mental

energy obsessing over if that is partly

cut off

isn't it possible that that is partly

what gave you

the ability to

understand inwardly

the world at a much deeper level than

than most people do

i suppose that's certainly possible um

i think this may be some value also from

a technology standpoint because

i found it uh rewarding to spend all

night programming computers

um just by myself and

i think most people

most people don't enjoy typing strange

symbols into a computer by themselves

all night

they think that's

not fun but i thought it was i really

liked it um so so i just programmed all

night by myself and

um i found that to be quite enjoyable

um but but i think that is not uh normal

[Music]

so i mean it does you know i've thought

a lot about

it's a riddle to a lot of people of of

how you've done this how you've

repeatedly innovated in these different

industries and it it does you know every

entrepreneur sees possibility in the

future and then acts to make that real

it it feels to me like you see

possibility just more broadly than

almost anyone and can connect with so

you see scientific possibility based on

a deep understanding of physics and

knowing what the fundamental equations

are

what the technologies are that are based

on that science and where they could go

you see technological possibility and

then really unusually you combine that

with

economic possibility of like what it

actually would cost is there a system

you can imagine where you could

affordably make that thing and that that

sometimes you then get conviction that

there is an opportunity here put those

pieces together and you could do

something

amazing

yeah i think one aspect of whatever

condition i had um was i was just

absolutely obsessed with truth

just obsessed with truth

and and so the obsession with truth is

why i studied physics

because physics attempts to understand

the

the truth the truth of the universe

physics just it's just what are the

provable truths of the universe

um

and and true and truths that have

predictive power

um

so for me physics was sort of a very

natural thing to study

nobody made me study it it was

intrinsically interesting

to understand the nature of the universe

and then computer science

or information theory

also to just i understand uh logic and

and

uh

you know there's an also there's an

argument that

you know that you the that information

theory is actually operating

at a more fundamental level more

fundamental level than than even physics

um

so

uh just yeah um

the physics and information theory uh

were really interesting to me so when

you say truth i mean it's it's not

like some people

so it's what you're talking about is the

truth of the universe like the

fundamental truths that drive the

universe it's like a deep curiosity

about what this universe is why we're

here simulation why not you know we

don't have time to go into that but i

mean it's you're just deeply curious

about

what this is for what this is this whole

thing yes i mean i think the why the why

of things is very important

um

i i actually

uh when i was a i don't know

so young teens

uh i i got quite depressed about the

meaning of life

um and i was trying to sort of

understand the meaning of life looking

at reading religious texts and and

reading books on philosophy

and i got into the german philosophers

which is definitely not wise if you're a

young teenager i have to say

can be ripped out but dark

so

[Music]

much better at as an adult i um and and

then actually i ended up reading um the

hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy

which is actually a book on philosophy

just sort of disguised as a silly humor

book but but actually the book it's

actually a

philosophy book

and

uh adams uh makes the point that

it's actually the

the question that is harder than the

answer

um you know this sort of makes a joke

that the answer was 42. um that number

does pop up a lot um

and 420 is just 10 14 10 10 times 10

times more significant than 42. okay

you know there's um you can make a

triangle with 42 or 42 degrees and two

69s

um

so there's no such thing as a perfect

triangle or is there

but even more important than the answer

is the questions that was the whole

theme of that book i mean is that yeah

basically how you see meaning then it's

the pursuit of questions yeah so i have

a sort of

you know a proposal for a world view or

a motivate a motivating philosophy which

is to understand

what questions to ask about the answer

that is the universe and the to agree

that we expand the scope and scale of

consciousness

uh

biological and digital

uh we will be better able to to uh ask

these

these questions to frame these questions

and to understand

why we're here how we got here what

what the heck is going on

and so that that is my driving

philosophy is to expand the scope and

scale of consciousness that we may

better understand the nature of the

universe

elon one of the things that was most

touching last week

was uh was seeing you hang out with your

kids um here's if i may

um

it looks vaguely like a ventriloquist

dummy there

[Laughter]

i mean how do you know that's real

um

so that's x and and you know you're it

was just a delight seeing seeing you

hang out with him and

what

what what what's his future

going to be i mean i don't mean him

personally but the world he's going to

grow up in

what future do you believe he will grow

up in

well i mean a very digital future

um

a very a different world than i grew up

in that's for sure

um

but i think we want to obviously do our

absolute best to ensure that the future

is good uh for everyone's children

um and

and that

you know that the future is something

that that you can look forward to and

not feel sad about

um

you know you want to get up in the

morning and be be excited about the

future and we should fight for the

things that make us excited about the

future you know the future cannot it

cannot just be that one

miserable thing after another solving

one sad problem after another there got

to be things that get you excited like

you're like you want to live

these things are very important

you should have more of it

and it's not as if it's a done deal like

it's all it's all to play for like the

future may be

horrible still there are scenarios where

it is horrible but you you see a pathway

to an exciting future both on earth and

on mars and

in our minds through artificial

intelligence and so forth i mean in your

in your heart of hearts do you really

believe that you are helping deliver

that exciting

future

for

ex and for

others

i'm trying my hardest to do so

i

you know

i love humanity and i think

that

we should fight for a good future for

humanity and i think we should be

optimistic about the future and fight to

make that optimistic optimistic future

happen

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i think that's that's the perfect place

to close this thank you so much for

spending time coming here and for the

work that you're doing and good luck

with finding a wise course through on

twitter and everything else all right

thank you

hey guys

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