Elon Musk Interview with Sam Altman (2016.9.15)

Summary

Elon Musk discusses his views on the most important problems to work on today. He believes artificial intelligence is the most pressing item, stating its importance to ensure AI develops safely and benefits humanity. Musk also highlights genetics to solve diseases, brain-computer interfaces to augment human cognition, and making life multiplanetary. When asked for advice for ambitious young people, Musk suggests creating something useful, estimating possible impact and probability of success. He spends over 80% of his time on engineering and design, digging into the technical details at SpaceX and Tesla to improve rockets, vehicles, and factories.

Takeaways

• 😀 Musk believes AI safety is the most pressing issue today
• 🤔 He thinks democratizing and merging with AI is the best path forward
• 💡 Solving bandwidth constraints between brain and digital self is key
• 🔬 Genetics could help cure diseases like dementia
• 🚀 Mars colony possible in 9-10 years with non-zero chance of success
• ⏱ Humans are slow; production lines can be 20x faster
• 📈 Musk spends 80% of time on engineering and design
• 😮 Factories that build the machine matter more than the machine itself
• 🤖 Gigafactory will have a high level of automation
• 🚗 Optimizing for 1 meter/sec Model 3 production line speed

Q & A

What does Elon Musk think is the most important issue to work on regarding AI?

Musk believes the most important thing regarding AI is to achieve democratization of the technology, so no single company or small group controls advanced AI. It should be widely available to avoid concentration of power.

What does Musk think is the second most important technology to work on?

Musk believes genetics and solving diseases like dementia through genetic reprogramming could be the second most important technology to work on.

Why did Elon Musk start SpaceX despite the very low odds of success?

Musk started SpaceX even with low odds of success because he believed if the company could move space technology forward even a bit before failing, it could inspire others to advance the technology further in the future.

How does Musk deal with fear when taking on risky projects?

Musk says he feels fear quite strongly, but when something is important enough he does it anyway despite the fear. Letting the importance motivate action is key.

What is Musk's vision for a positive AI future?

Musk's vision is that we achieve democratization of AI technology combined with solving the bandwidth constraints in brain interfaces, so humans can effectively merge with AI in a symbiotic way.

How does Musk spend most of his time currently?

Musk spends about 80% of his time on engineering and design work - developing new products at SpaceX and Tesla.

What is the current factory production line speed at Tesla?

The current production line speed averages about 5 centimeters per second between Model S and Model X.

What production line speed is Musk targeting in the future?

Musk wants to increase the production line speed by 20 times to at least 1 meter per second.

Why does Musk believe improving manufacturing is so critical?

Musk believes manufacturing improvements make a much bigger impact than improving vehicle design - saying the machine that builds the machine is at least one order of magnitude more important.

What does Musk think the odds are now of establishing a self-sustaining Mars colony?

Musk says he is now certain that success in establishing a growing Mars colony is achievable, with odds seeming pretty good, whereas earlier he thought success might not even be possible.

Outlines

00:00

🤔 Musk's view on finding purpose and fulfillment

Elon Musk discusses his perspective on working on useful things that provide value to people. He says you don't need to change the world, doing a small amount of good for a large number of people is fine. He then talks about the 5 most important problems he sees affecting humanity's future - AI safety, genetics & healing diseases, brain-machine interfaces, making life multiplanetary, and sustainable energy.

05:01

😊 Advice to ambitious young people

When asked for advice for ambitious young people, Musk talks about assessing the utility, impact and probability of success of ideas. He also discusses his own thought process and motivation being focused on usefulness rather than business interests. He further touches on whether getting PhDs is necessary.

10:02

🚀 Musk's vision for settling Mars

Musk states he is now certain that settling a self-sustaining colony on Mars with meaningful number of people is a possible outcome within about 10 years. He talks about the importance of SpaceX not failing in that timeframe. He also compares communication latency between Earth and Mars.

15:02

🤖 Musk's perspectives on AI safety

Musk argues that widespread democratization of AI technology is critical for safety, rather than concentration in the hands of few companies or individuals. He thinks linking the cortex to digital extensions can help merge with AI. He also talks about how he views the progress of OpenAI.

Keywords

💡AI

AI refers to artificial intelligence. Musk believes AI is extremely important for humanity's future and has potentially huge risks and benefits. He thinks ensuring AI development goes in a good direction is the most pressing challenge today. Examples from the script show Musk's recommendations for democratizing AI technology to avoid concentrated power.

💡neural link

Neural link refers to a high bandwidth brain-computer interface that could connect the biological brain to artificial intelligence systems. Musk sees this as important for overcoming slow communication speeds between humans and computers, enabling a symbiotic relationship with AI.

💡SpaceX

SpaceX is Musk's rocket company aiming to enable interplanetary colonization. He started it despite low odds of success because he believes radical innovation in rockets is necessary to advance space technology and avoid stagnation.

💡Mars colony

A permanent self-sustaining human settlement on Mars. Musk now thinks there's a surprisingly good chance of successfully establishing this in about 10 years through SpaceX.

💡sustainability

Creating technology and infrastructure that meets current needs without compromising future needs. Musk aims to accelerate this transition by making transportation more sustainable through electrifying vehicles at Tesla.

💡entropy

The tendency for isolated systems to move toward disorder over time. Musk argues that technology advancement requires countering entropy through intense human effort and innovation.

💡automation

Using machines and computer systems to perform tasks instead of humans. Musk aims to automate Tesla's vehicle production radically to improve throughput.

💡existential risk

Dangers that could annihilate intelligent life or civilization. Musk co-founded OpenAI to minimize existential risk from artificial intelligence.

💡multiplanetary

Having human civilization spanning multiple planets instead of just Earth. Musk seeks to make humanity multiplanetary by establishing a colony on Mars as a backup.

💡limbic system

The primitive region of the human brain handling emotions and instincts. Musk uses this system's balance with the cerebral cortex as an analogy for integrating artificial intelligence with human intelligence.

Highlights

AI is probably the single biggest item in the near term that's likely to affect humanity

It's very important that we have the advent of AI in a good way

Solving genetic diseases like dementia or Alzheimer's through genetic reprogramming would be wonderful

Having a high bandwidth interface to the brain is important for the future

If you make something that has high value to people, that's fine, it doesn't need to change the world

Trying to estimate probability of success for ambitious projects is important

Most civilizations tend to lose technology over time if people don't consciously work to improve it

It's normal to feel fear about ambitious projects, but you have to let the importance drive you anyway

For SpaceX, I thought the odds of success were less than 10%, but it was still important to try

For AI safety, we need democratization of the technology, not concentration in the hands of a few

Humans and AI symbiosis, with cortex neural interface, seems like the best outcome

I spend 80% of my time on engineering and design, not media or business

The factory itself matters more than 10x more than the final vehicle

We can get car production speed 20x faster to 1 meter/second

Humans can run over 10 meters/second, so 1 meter/sec factory speed is still slow

Transcripts

today we have Elon Musk Eon thank you

for joining us thanks having right so we

want to spend the time today talking

about

your view of the future and what people

should work on so to start off could you

tell us you famously said when you were

younger there were five problems that

you thought were most important for you

to work on um if you were 22 today what

would the five problems that you would

think about working on B well first of

all is it I think um if somebody is

doing something that is useful to the

rest of society I think that's a good

thing like it doesn't have to change the

world like you know

if you make something that has high

value to people and frankly even if it's

something if it's like just a little

game or you know the some improvement in

photo-sharing or something if it if it

how does a small amount of good for a

large number of people that's I mean I

think that's that's fine like stuff

doesn't need to be change the world just

to be good

but you know in terms of things that I

think are most likely to affect the the

future of humanity I think

AI is probably the single biggest item

in the near term that's likely to affect

humanity so it's very important that we

have the advent of AI in a good way but

that is something that

if you if you could look into the

crucible and enter the future you would

like you would like that outcome

because it is something that could go

could go wrong and as we've talked about

many times and so we really need to make

sure it goes right

that's best I think AI working on AI and

making sure it's a great future that's

that's the most important thing I think

right now

the most pressing item SEC then

obviously I think in to do with with

genetics if you can actually solve

genetic diseases if you can prevent

dementia or Alzheimer's or something

like that that West's genetic

reprogramming that would be wonderful so

I think this

genetics it might be a sort of second

most important item I think

having a high bandwidth interface to the

brain like we're currently

bandwidth-limited we have a digital

tertiary self inform of our email

capabilities like computers phones

applications how we're effectively

superhuman but we're extremely bad with

constraint in that interface between the

cortex and your sort that the tertiary

digital form of yourself and helping

solve that bandwidth constraint would

would be I think very important for the

future as well so one of the I think

most common questions I hear young

people at ambitious young people ask is

I want to be the next Elon Musk how do I

do that on

obviously the next Elon Musk will work

on very different things then than you

did but what have you done or what did

you do when you were younger that you

think sort of set you up to have a big

impact well I think this well I should

say that I do not expect to be involved

in all these things so the the the five

things that I thought about the time in

in college quite a long time ago 25

years ago

you know being you know making life

multiplanetary

selling accelerating the transition to

sustainable energy

the the internet broadly speaking and

and then genetics and AI I think I

didn't expect to be involved in in all

of those things I actually at the time

in college I sort of thought helping

with electrification of cars which was

how we start out and that's a that's

actually what I worked on as an intern

was

advanced ultra capacitors with to see

think there would be a breakthrough

relative to batteries for energy storage

and cars and then when I came out to go

to Stanford that's what I was going to

be doing my grad studies on is it was

working on a best at energy storage

technologies for electric cars and I put

that on hold to start an Internet

company in 95 because

there doesn't seem to be like a time for

particular technologies when they or at

a steep point in the inflection code and

and I didn't want to you know do PhD at

Stanford and then and what sure will

happen and then and I wasn't entirely

certain that the technology I'd be

working on would actually succeed I can

get you can get a you know doctrine or

many things that ultimately are not do

not have a practical bearing on the

world and I wanted to you know just I

really was just trying to be useful

that's the optimization it's like what

are what can I do that would actually be

useful do you think people that want to

be useful today should get PhDs um

mostly not some with what is the best

some yes but mostly not

how should someone figure out how they

can be most useful or whatever this

thing is that you're trying to create

what would what would be the utility

Delta compared to the current

state-of-the-art times how many people

it would affect so that's why I think

having something that has a that's that

has a mix makes a big difference but

effects a sort of small to moderate

number of people as great as is

something that makes even a small

difference but but affects a vast number

of people like the area yeah on you know

under the code yeah exactly I don't know

every under the curve is would actually

be roughly similar for those two things

so it's actually really about

yeah I just trying to be useful and

matter when you're trying to estimate

probability of success so you say

something will be really useful good

area under the curve I guess to use the

example of SpaceX mmm-hmm when you made

the go decision that you were actually

going to do that this was kind of a very

crazy thing at the time very crazy there

shortly yeah I'm not shy about saying

that but I kind of agree I agreed with

them that it was quite crazy crazy if if

the objective was to achieve the

best risk adjusted return sliding our

company is insane

but that was not that was not my

objective why I item to come to the

conclusion

that if something didn't happen to

improve Rock technology would be stuck

on earth forever and and the big

aerospace companies had just had no

interest in radical innovate

all they wanted to do is try to make

their old technology slightly better

every year and in fact sometimes we

would actually get worse and

particularly in Rockets is pretty bad

like the in 69 we were able to go to the

moon with a Saturn 5 and then the space

shuttle could only take people to

low-earth orbit and then the Space

Shuttle retired and that trend is

basically trends to zero it

if people sighs think technology just

automatically gets better over here but

actually doesn't it only gets better if

smart people would work like crazy to

make it better that's how any technology

actually gets better and

by itself technology if people don't

work and it actually will decline

you can look and look at the history of

civilizations many civilizations and

look at say ancient Egypt were they able

to pull these incredible pyramids and

then they basically forgot how to build

pyramids and

and then even hieroglyphics they've got

how to read hydrocal hieroglyphics so we

look at Rome and how they will to look

to build these incredible roadways and

aqueducts and indoor plumbing and they

forgot how to do all of those things and

there are many such examples in history

so I I think

choice bear in mind

that's you know

entropy is not on your side yeah

one thing I really like about you is you

are unusually fearless and willing to go

in the face of other people telling you

something that's crazy and I know a lot

of pretty crazy people you still stand

out uh where does that come from or how

do you think about making a decision

when everyone tells you this is a crazy

idea where do you get the internal

strength to do that

well first well I'd say I actually think

I feel feel fair quite strongly

so it's not as though I just have the

absence of fear I've I feel it quite

strongly

but there are times when something is

important enough you've leave it enough

that you do you do it in spite of the

fear so speaking of important things

like people shouldn't think I I i

should think well i feel fear about this

and therefore i shouldn't do it

it's normal to be to feel fear like you

have to do something mentally wrong you

shouldn't feel fair

so you just feel it and let the

importance of it drive you to do it

anyway yeah you know actually something

that can be helpful as fatalism some

degree if you just think it's just

accept the probabilities then that

diminishes fear so

we're starting SpaceX I thought the odds

of success were less than 10%

and I just accepted that actually

probably I would just lose lose

everything

but that maybe would make some progress

if we could just move the ball forward

even if we died maybe some other company

could pick up the baton and move and

keep moving it forward so that we're

slowly some good

yeah same with Tesla I thought your odds

of a car company succeeding were

extremely low what do you think the odds

of the Mars colony are at this point

today

well um oddly enough I actually think

they're pretty good

so like when can I go okay um at this

point I am certain there is a way I'm

certain that success is one of the

possible outcomes for establishing a

self-sustaining mass colony in fact

growing Lost Colony I'm certain that

that is possible whereas until maybe a

few years ago I was not sure that

success was even one of the possible

outcomes some meaningful number of

people going to Mars I think this is

potentially something that can be

accomplished in about 10 years

maybe sooner I mean maybe nine years I

need to make sure that SpaceX doesn't

die between now and then and that I

don't die or if I do die that someone

takes over who will continue that

shouldn't go on the first launch yeah

exactly like she's the first launch will

be a robotic anyway so I want to go

except for the internet latency

yeah they are at latency to be pretty

significant

i Mars is roughly 12 light minutes from

the Sun and Earth is 8 light minutes so

closest approach Mars is for light

minutes away that first approaches 20 a

little more because you have to you

can't sort of talk directly through the

Sun

speaking of really important problems

AI so you've been outspoken about AI um

could you talk about what you think the

positive future for AI looks like and

how we get there okay

I mean I do want to emphasize that

this is not really

something that I advocate or this is not

prescriptive this is simply pretty

hopefully predictive as he looks on to

say oh well like this is something that

I want to occur instead of so this I

mean I think that probably is the best

of the available alternatives

the best of the available alternatives

that I can come up with and maybe

someone else can come up with a better

approach or better outcome is that we

achieve democratization of AI technology

meaning that no one company or

small set of individuals has control

over advanced AI technology I think that

that's very dangerous

it could also get stolen by somebody bad

you know like some evil dictator country

could send their intelligence agency to

go steal it and gain control it just

becomes a very unstable situation I

think if you've got any

any incredibly powerful AI

you just don't know who's who's going to

control that so it's not as I think that

the risk is that the AI would develop a

will of its own right off the bat I

think it's more the consumers that some

someone

may use it in a way that is bad or and

even if they weren't going to use in a

way that's bad but somebody could take

it from them and use it in a way that's

bad that that I think is quite a big

danger so I think we must have

democratization of AI technology make it

widely available

and that's you know the reason that

obviously you me and the rest the team

you know created open AI was to help

with the democra

ni technology so it doesn't get

concentrated in the hands of a few at

and but then of course that needs to be

combined with

solving the high bandwidth interface to

the cortex

humans are so slow humans are so slow

yes exactly

but you know we already have a situation

in our brain where we've got the cortex

and limbic system and the limbic system

is kind of a tomato that's that's the

primitive brain it's kind of like the

your instincts and

whatnot and then the cortex is of

thinking upper part of the brain those

two seem to work together quite well

occasionally your cortex and limbic

system may disagree but they definitely

works pretty well generally works pretty

well and it's like rare to find someone

who I've not found someone who wishes to

either get rid of the cortex or get rid

of the Olympic system

very true yeah it's that's unusual so so

I think if we can effectively

merge with AI by

improving that the neural link between

your cortex and the

your digital extension yourself which

already likes that already exists just

has a bandwidth issue and then then

effectively you

become an AI human symbiote and and if

that then is widespread with anyone who

wants it can have it then we solve the

control problem as well we don't have to

worry about

some sort of evil dictator AI because

kind of we are the AI collectively that

seems like the best outcome I can think

of so you've seen other companies in the

early days that start small and get

really successful um hope I don't work

at asking this on camera but how do you

think urban AI is going as a six month

old company I teach Pico pretty well I

think we've got a really talented group

what opening eye and yeah really really

talented team and they're working hard

open a is structured as see a 501c3

nonprofit

but you know many nonprofits do not have

a sense of urgency it's fine they don't

have to have a sense of urgency

but opening ideas

cause I think people really believe in

the mission I think it's important

it's about minimizing

the risk of existential harm in the

future and

so I think it's going well I'm pretty

impressed with what people are doing in

the talent level and obviously we're

always looking for

great people to join the only mission

let's to 40 people knots yes well well

alright just a few more questions before

we we wrap up how do you spend your days

now like what what do you allocate most

of your time to my time is mostly split

what's between SpaceX and Tesla and of

course I try to spend

it's a part of every week at open AI so

I spend most I spend

basically half a day at opening I most

weeks and then and then I have some

opening I stuff that happens during the

week but other than that it's really

much basically translates X or Tesla

like what is your time look like they're

uh yeah so that's a good question um I

think a lot of people think I must spend

a lot of time with media or or on

business II things but actually almost

almost all my time like eighty percent

of it is spent on engineering design

engineering and design so it's

developing next generation product at

that's eighty percent of it

you probably remember this a very long

time ago many many years you took me on

a tour of SpaceX and the most impressive

thing was that you knew every detail of

the rocket and every piece of

engineering that went into it I don't

think many people get that about you

yeah I think a lot of people think I'm

kind of a business person or something

it just fine I like business is fine but

um a guy

really it's you know it was like it

SpaceX Gwynne Shotwell was chief

operating officer she kind of manages

legal finance sales and kind of general

business activity and then my time is

almost entirely with the engineering

team working on improving that the

Falcon 9 and the Dragon spacecraft and

developing the most colonial

architecture

and that Tesla

it's working on the model three and

yes I'm in the design studio took very

up

happening a week

dealing with aesthetics and and look and

feel things and then most of our week is

just going through engineering of the

car itself as well as engineering of the

factory because the biggest epiphany

I've had thus this year is that what

really matters is that is the machine

that builds the machine the factory and

this that is at least towards magnitude

hotter than the vehicle itself it's

amazing to watch the robots go here and

these cars just happen yeah now this

actually is has a relatively low level

of automation compared to what the

gigafactory will have and what model 3

will have what's the speed on the line

of these cars actually average the line

is incredibly slow it's probably about

a

including both X and s

it's maybe a 5 you know 5 centimeters

per second and what can you get this is

very slow or what would you like to get

to

I'm confident we can get to to at least

1 meter per second so 20-fold increase

that will be very fast yeah um at least

I mean I think quite a bit 1 meter per

second just put that in perspective is a

slow walk or like a medium speed Walker

fast or could be one and half meters per

second and

and then the fastest humans can run over

10 meters per second

so if we're doing point zero five meters

per second that's a very slow current

card for low speed and and at 1 meter

per second you can still walk faster

than the production line