马斯克接受本·夏皮罗专访（完整版）

0:00Are we live or?

0:01I don't know, I assume we are.

0:02We're rolling.

0:03We're rolling.

0:04Okay.

0:05You guys are good.

0:06This is how normal we are.

0:07Yeah.

0:08You're just going to the front.

0:10Yeah, yeah, sure, sure.

0:11So, okay.

0:12Let's go see the chairs.

0:13You too.

0:14Yeah.

0:15Yeah.

0:16Lovely country of Poland.

0:17Yeah, exactly.

0:18Didn't expect to meet a nice girl like you here.

0:20Here we are.

0:21We're in Poland.

0:22They just brought us together.

0:23Exactly.

0:24So, I want to ask you about what feels like a giant war on the meritocracy on achievement.

0:29You're the richest person in the world. You've started three of the biggest companies in history.

0:32Non-sovereign, not counting sovereign.

0:34No, I can't not.

0:35And who would?

0:36And who would?

0:37It's a sound, not a sugar-pooten from, you know, I'm the buddy.

0:40Well, yeah, I mean, I'm a starter-war-ish.

0:42Exactly, exactly.

0:44If you were assassinations, I'd love this as well.

0:46Yeah, yeah, exactly.

0:47So, why do you think right now there is such a war?

0:52And it seems like on all sides of the political aisle,

0:54against people who achieve, against people who are smart.

0:59It feels like right now innovators are under attack.

1:02And again, it doesn't seem like that's super political.

1:04It seems like people on the right and people on the left

1:06have this giant theory that the economy,

1:09that whoever succeeds in the economy,

1:10must necessarily be rigging it,

1:12that innovators are somehow screwing the little guy.

1:15Now what do you make of that?

1:16Where's that coming from?

1:19Well, I mean, I think some of this

1:20is really just communism rebranded,

1:24just with different marketing.

1:26Fundamental to the free market or capitalism is meritocracy.

1:32It made the best product or service win, and the best product or service will be made by the team that works the hardest, as the most talented,

1:41and that is what results in great products and services in a capitalist economy.

1:46me. And, you know, I always blows my mind when I discover that, you know, kids coming

1:55out of college in America who have had things very easy take communism actually seriously.

2:01It blows my mind. I thought it was a joke. If I was on X, FK, Twitter, I was joking, but

2:09the ridiculousness of taking that seriously anymore. And then a whole bunch of people

2:13attacked me, like of course it's serious.

2:15I'm like what?

2:16You guys crazy just dust off your copy of dust,

2:20copper to all of you.

2:22What are you kidding me?

2:24I'm like how many times does that experiment bring

2:26run with terrible consequences?

2:28And you know generally for any given political philosophy,

2:35you have to say which side has to build the world to keep

2:38people in.

2:40That's the bad side.

2:42It's not subtle.

2:43It wasn't West Berlin that built the wall.

2:46Wait, you see this giant sort of myth making project that's

2:50taken place where, you know, if you are successful, they

2:53now have to rewrite history about you.

2:55So you've gotten the, you were apparently an emerald

2:58scion, you were brought uber wealthy.

3:00We were just one.

3:01We were just one.

3:02I'd like to see a picture of this mine.

3:04If everyone can dig this mine up, I'd love to see it.

3:07First of all, the entire emerald industry is like

3:09worth of pittance.

3:11And I've never been seen this mine.

3:18It's some random story that my dad made up, basically.

3:23My dad, who has many talents, I want to be clear,

3:27he's an extremely talented electrical and mechanical

3:31engineer, and a very talented artist.

3:33I mean, he could draw everything from like in the style

3:36of rambrons to watercolors to sketches, anything.

3:38you could sketch this room and then say do a caricature of anyone and he'll do a

3:42capture that matches their personality. It might be the best real-time artist I've

3:47ever seen. So he's got a lot of talents but unfortunately he has a few screws loose.

3:52Fast don't we all. And he actually went bankrupt in the 90s. So my brother and I

3:59have been supporting it financially for the last 25 years and we've inherited

4:04nothing from him, you know, so there's no anything.

4:08I arrived in Canada with just over $2,000 in Canadian

4:13Travelers' checks back when that was a thing.

4:16And one bag full of my clothes and a backpack full of books.

4:22That was my entire possessions.

4:24That's how I started, nothing more.

4:26And so why do you think people insist on rewriting the history,

4:29making it that you're in air?

4:31I mean, I get some of the same thing on mine or level, right?

4:33I brought the live.

4:34So I gave it air.

4:35Right.

4:36To air is human they say.

4:40But they air on the air.

4:45But there is something that's weird happening out there.

4:50You innovate and you make new things.

4:52And there is a drive to hem in that innovation.

4:55I was recently talking with a pretty major political figure in the United States who's

4:58not at the left.

4:59And he was suggesting, for example, that we need to have outlaw automated driving.

5:02He's going to put truckers out of work.

5:03Because if we don't automatically

5:05out love the new technologies, this kind of blood

5:07atism, then people are going to be out of work.

5:09It's going to destroy the society.

5:10And what we really have to focus on are the people who

5:12are going to be left behind by the technology.

5:14What do you make of that?

5:16Well, first of all, I think, ultimately,

5:18if you have digital superintelligence,

5:21I'm not sure there's a job for anyone.

5:23Yeah.

5:25So the whole AI discussion is a question in and of itself.

5:29I do think in a positive AI future that there will be no shortage of goods and services.

5:39So it won't be universal basic income, it'll be universal high income.

5:45Now that all sounds good, but in terms of the book, Man Search for Meaning, well, to

5:52to the degree that you're defined by your career,

5:55you may have trouble finding meaning in life.

5:59So that's more the challenge that, you know,

6:04if one is to have an existential crisis,

6:05it's like, well, how can I do anything useful

6:08if the computer can do everything better than me?

6:11That will really be the challenge.

6:13Now maybe that'll be fine.

6:14Maybe you just play, you know, watch it in credit

6:16or movies, play video games and do water sports

6:19and computer just does everything else.

6:23But I guess that's the blind scenario.

6:25Have you read in banks?

6:27No.

6:28Highly recommend in banks the culture books.

6:31It's probably the best semi utopian future of AI,

6:39where the computers are far smarter than humans,

6:42but they take care of the humans.

6:44Like they care about the humans being happy.

6:46So in that future, I mean, I think one of the things

6:49you've talked about is the fact that the West is completely

6:53under reproducing.

6:54Not too do you personally.

6:55You've been very productive.

6:56And I have for kids.

6:57We're both ahead of this.

7:00But that would be presumably.

7:03You're my fifth.

7:05I'll talk to my wife.

7:06That would be one of the places to presume

7:07that people will have to put their efforts.

7:10And what's interesting is that the people who

7:12are putting their efforts in those directions

7:14tend to be by and large more religiously oriented.

7:17We're seeing the science of acumen as well.

7:19there is you kids and religious people have many, many kids, right?

7:22The atheist are bringing themselves out.

7:24I talked to Richard Dawkins, you know.

7:27Yeah.

7:27Yeah.

7:29I wrote the selfish gene, mind-watchmaker and whatnot,

7:33and coined the term me, my belief.

7:38And I said, well, you know, so how many kids do you have, Richard?

7:41Oh, one.

7:42OK.

7:43So you're going to have one kid, great.

7:45Yes, the birth rate tends to correlate with the degree to which someone is religious, the

7:56degree to which they have the least amount of education, and basically the poorer someone

8:01is, the less educated someone is, and the more religious they are, the more kids they

8:05will have.

8:06So those are objective correlates.

8:08So I'm going to make the case to you on a religious level that the only one of those

8:11things that is possible to have in the West and not get rid of all the glories of the West

8:15is a belief in a higher power or inner religious belief of some sort because you can be rich

8:20and I mean, I'm doing pretty well with that four days.

8:22You can't be like a nihilist or something.

8:24Right, exactly.

8:25Like, nihilism doesn't tend toward anything.

8:28And I know that you've thought a lot about that sort of stuff and how do you get out

8:31of that sort of the nihilist box and find what to do?

8:36Well, my religion for lack of a better word is one of curiosity, where we want to expand

8:45the scope of scale consciousness on Earth and beyond Earth and ultimately to other star

8:52systems.

8:53And in order to do that, we need to increase the number of conscious beings and we need

8:58to advance technology such that we can have a self-sustaining city on Mars, ultimately

9:05populate the whole solar system and then go beyond our solar system to other star systems.

9:11And therefore, we need more humans.

9:14First of all.

9:16So I mean, that's an amazingly different goal than what we've had for the past.

9:20Yeah, I propose this as a new philosophy.

9:22Yeah.

9:23Well, not new, but maybe niche, but hopefully getting a bit bigger.

9:30So with that philosophy in mind, the purpose of that philosophy is that the more we expand

9:38the scope and scale of consciousness, the more we are able to understand the reality

9:42that we live in, the nature of the universe.

9:46And to answer the questions that we have, and perhaps more importantly, to know what

9:53questions we are not asking.

9:55As Douglas Adams would say in Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, the answer is the easy

9:59the hard part, answers 42, what's the question?

10:03So I think that's a pretty optimistic, positive philosophy.

10:08Also has a lot of room for other beliefs, if you want to add them to the fundamental tenets of my belief structure are expand the scale of consciousness.

10:23I mean, more people, I guess more computers to the degree that they are conscious.

10:31And we want to pass through one of the great filters that, you know, you've fully with

10:40the Fermi Paradox and the great filter.

10:42No.

10:43Okay, so Enrico Fermi, great, amazing physicist, posed a very simple question.

10:51He said, we're the aliens because we've seen no sign of them.

10:56Now, a lot of people think they've seen signs of aliens.

10:59I have seen no evidence whatsoever of aliens.

11:02So that's a troubling question.

11:03Why not?

11:06So one of the answers, perhaps the most likely answer,

11:08is that we're at the tiny candle of consciousness

11:15that constitutes humanity is all that there is.

11:20in this vast doctors.

11:23And I think we should assume that that is the case until we

11:26actually have evidence to the contrary.

11:29And moreover, human consciousness only arose

11:34after 4 and 1 half billion years.

11:36It took a long time.

11:38And if it had taken even 10% longer,

11:41it probably would not have evolved

11:42because the sun is expanding.

11:45As the sun expands, it'll start heating Earth.

11:48and Earth will, the oceans will evaporate,

11:52will become more like Venus, inhospitable to life.

11:55So I think we may have made, we may have achieved consciousness,

12:01or consciousness that's capable of developing technology

12:05just in time.

12:08I find it remarkable that we are at this point in history

12:11where we're able for the first time to go beyond Earth,

12:16to send people, we said people to the moon in the early 70s, but not,

12:21essence, not gone back. But with the Starship rocket that SpaceX is developing,

12:28we had two test flights, we'll have many more this year, that that vehicle is

12:32designed to make life multi-planetary. It's the first vehicle that I just gave

12:37them during that, a permanent base on the moon and I said, yeah, Mars. So I think we

12:44Everyone want to get that done as soon as possible.

12:49The window of opportunity to make life multi-planetary and secure the future of consciousness may be

12:56open for a long time or may be open for a short time.

12:59I think it will be wise to, not assume that it will be open for a long time.

13:04So, when we act now, to act now to make life multi-planetary.

13:09And one of the things that's fascinating about your saying is that it assumes an innate

13:12level of belief and love for human beings.

13:16Yes.

13:17I love humanity.

13:18So why?

13:19I mean, it's a weird question, but I mean, really kind of why.

13:22I mean, we're not that great.

13:24We have amazing, particularly.

13:26We can be angels, we can be devils.

13:28Obviously, we have the capacity for all of the things in between.

13:31What do you think makes, aside from just the qualities

13:35that theoretically could be duplicated by AI

13:37in the very near future?

13:38What makes human beings unique and worthwhile?

13:40I'll tell you something.

13:41I think that maybe resonates.

13:45I think actually everyone loves humanity.

13:48Now, they may not love everyone in humanity.

13:51But you say, how many people want

13:55to be in solitary confinement?

13:57OK.

13:58How many people want to live alone in a forest by themselves?

14:02Almost no human beings want to do that.

14:05So actually, in reality, all humans love humanity

14:09and want to be part of humanity, with the rare exception of someone who's got severe psychological

14:16issues.

14:18So that's why solitary confinement is considered a terrible punishment in prison.

14:25Because even though other prisoners are probably not the finest examples of humans, you still

14:30want to hang out with them.

14:33So I think it's a natural thing.

14:37You know, as long as kids aren't taught to hate other people,

14:43I think the natural inclination is to love humanity.

14:47So I'm going to go back to some of the business conversation

14:49that I want to go back to the SpaceX of it.

14:52When it comes to business, what do you

14:54see as sort of the biggest obstacles to not only the success

14:58of your companies, but to success generally?

15:00because there seems to be this idea abroad that people can't duplicate the path.

15:05It basically used to be that people like you could succeed, but now it's totally finished

15:10and now you can't get ahead.

15:11America, the biggest change in that regard is for even more.

15:16There are new companies being formed all the time in the US.

15:19Well, what do you see as the obstacles to companies being successful increasingly in

15:25the West if there are obstacles to that?

15:28Well, I think excess regulation, you know, taxes do

15:34rash out every year, making a little difficult,

15:36a little harder every year as taxes rash out.

15:39But the regulatory creep is, I think, a massive danger.

15:43So laws and regulations are immortal.

15:47But the regulators and the lawmakers make new rules

15:52and regulations and laws and regulations every year.

15:55And so you have this, so every year you've got this sort

15:57of another layer of laws and regulations.

16:01I saw this getting to the point where everything's legal.

16:04You can't get anything done.

16:06Now, they say, well, how do they deal with it in the past?

16:09Well, the way they dealt with it in the past

16:11would there be a war.

16:13And the war would wash away the old rules and regulations.

16:17That's, we literally would take a war to change things.

16:22like Napoleon establishing the Napoleonic Code

16:27that overrode the old law systems,

16:32the loads in peasants,

16:35and for all that the bad that Napoleon did,

16:40I think he did more good, actually.

16:43So the evidence is in that, I think,

16:46maybe a third or half of all countries on Earth

16:48still run on the Napoleonic Code.

16:51So, and I would prefer to have some clean up process for laws and regulations that doesn't

16:59require a wall, that would be nice.

17:03I think that's something we need to institute, like basically garbage collection for laws

17:07and regulations.

17:08And one of the things that has been suggested, a book called the Sovereign Individual written

17:11in the late 90s, that basically suggested that we are entering the era of avoidance,

17:17that people are going to be able to be sovereigns.

17:20You talk about Savarnell, if earlier you're not king of something, but you are the head

17:24of your companies.

17:25And so in the future, people will just be able to move money around, locate where the regulations

17:30are the friendliest.

17:31And so the United States right now thinks that we have the advantage because we historically

17:34have.

17:35But that doesn't mean that that's how it's going to go in the future.

17:36You're seeing more and more companies, for example, going to Singapore or going elsewhere

17:40just to move away from those regulations.

17:42So avoidance, which wasn't a strategy in 17th century France, where you're going to go exactly,

17:46is now a very real set of possibilities

17:50for a lot of entrepreneurs.

17:51Yeah.

17:52Well, and regulation in the US,

17:54various by state as well.

17:55California is the most regulated state.

17:57So increasingly people seek to do things outside of California

18:01or outside of New York.

18:02Those are the two most heavily regulated states.

18:05So given all those things, do you think

18:08that there's going to be a backlash to regulation in America?

18:11Or do you think that the West is sort of America

18:13being a stand-in for that?

18:14sliding into this morass of regulation based on,

18:19honestly, it looks like to a certain extent jealousy,

18:21it looks like trying to tear down success

18:24in the name of fairness, as opposed to.

18:27I mean, it's here for the things.

18:28There's regulation, it's where she intended

18:30to serve the public good.

18:34You know, rules against one thing or another.

18:37Like the car industry gets, you know,

18:40has lots of rules in how to make a car.

18:44I mean, there'll be like piles of books in this room

18:47to cover just the US regulations,

18:50what is required to build a car.

18:53Those are, at least ostensibly,

18:55they're aimed for safety.

18:57But in terms of other regulations,

19:03yeah, I think generally we wanna be averse

19:07to any regulation that is anti-meritocratic.

19:09The point of fighting racism, sexism, and whatnot was not to replace it with another form of racism and sexism,

19:22but to get rid of racism and get rid of sexism, not to change it to another form.

19:30DEI is fundamentally racist and sexist.

19:33So I want to get back to the space conversation.

19:35That's fascinating.

19:36And I was telling you before we started this, my son is

19:38like the biggest SpaceX fan that's possible to be, because

19:40what you're doing is inspiring on a truly galactic level.

19:44So when we talk about getting to Mars, how realistic do you

19:50think that is?

19:50There's a book that just came out, reviewed in the Wall Street

19:52Journal, talking about all of the various obstacles to human

19:54beings actually living on Mars.

19:55Like we live in a pretty propitious place.

19:58I mean, the world is a pretty wonderful planet.

20:01And so, yeah, exactly.

20:03So what are the biggest obstacles?

20:05And what do you think the timeline is in terms of having a robust presence on other planets?

20:10Well, we're hoping to have the first humans on the moon in less than five years.

20:21Mars may be a little longer than five years.

20:24I'd be surprised if we don't have humans on Mars within ten years.

20:28Wow.

20:29Yeah.

20:30And then we're going to aim to have a lot of humans and build a city on Mars in a base on the moon.

20:35And how do we mobilize that many resources there that quickly?

20:39That's a lot of resources necessary.

20:41It's not like you can draw from the environment.

20:43A lot of resources.

20:44And I should say that in order to pass the familiar grateful

20:48to being a multi-pants species, the second planet

20:54has to be self-sustaining.

20:56So as it is being that if the resupply ships stop from Earth,

21:02stop coming for any reason whatsoever,

21:04could be mundane or serious, will Mars die out or not?

21:10So Mars has to be completely self-sufficient

21:14in order to pass the familiar gratefuls.

21:19That particular gratefuls I'm talking about

21:21is if something clams has happened to one planet

21:24is humanity gone or not.

21:27And how long will it take for that to be self-sustaining?

21:29When you say in 10 years people will be on Mars?

21:32like 40, 40 years years.

21:34So one of the things I think that captures

21:36the imagination about what you're doing

21:38is that you're speaking in ambitious terms

21:40that people have not spoken in the West

21:42for solidly half a century.

21:43Yeah, I mean really.

21:44It's an amazing thing.

21:45I guess I say it's often I can't do that.

21:47I mean, you say this stuff because it's you all the time.

21:49But the reality is that the last time people were talking

21:52about within a decade, we're going

21:53to have a man on the moon was JFK talking

21:55at the beginning of the 1960s.

21:56Yeah, it's like two hours.

21:57And it's been full on half a century since anybody talked

21:59like this and I think people find it shocking

22:02and I think maybe we should look at the other side of that

22:05to both sides.

22:05One, what makes you different?

22:09And two, why do you think that dream went away?

22:11Why do you think it was that for half a century

22:13after we put a man on the moon,

22:15we just kind of receded back into whatever the hell

22:18was else going on?

22:20Yeah, that's a long story.

22:24But the follow up to the shuttle,

22:28to the Saturn V was the space shuttle.

22:30Space shuttle could only go to the low Earth orbit.

22:34But the aspiration was to make it reusable.

22:37But the, unfortunately, did not succeed in that goal.

22:42The space shuttle was so difficult to refurb

22:45that it ended up costing as much as the Saturn V.

22:49And then the main, the primary structure

22:52of the space shuttle orbit is in some big orange tank.

22:55It's actually the primary airframe

22:57because it takes the load from the orbiter, the airplane-looking thing, and the side boosters.

23:04So you lose that every time.

23:05The side boosters landing the ocean and they're solid rocket boosters so that they have to

23:12get your back to the factory to get solid propellant loaded in.

23:16It got a long story short.

23:17The cost per flight of the shuttle ended up being roughly the same as a Saturn V expandable.

23:27So, but the shuttle had about a quarter of the payload to orbit and could not reach the

23:31moon.

23:33So, you know, so noble ideas at the start, but ultimately it was not a good design.

23:40So, and then the shuttle retired obviously and then we had nothing.

23:47That's not a good curve, going from the moon to low orbit to nothing.

23:54That does not extrapolate to being a multi-planet species.

23:57So that's why I started SpaceX, is to try to reverse that trend and get us back on to

24:07doing exciting things in space again.

24:11Things that make people excited to get up in the morning and say yes, the humanity is

24:14going to do some amazing thing in space.

24:17And one of the things that's so impressive about SpaceX is not just the aspiration, but

24:21the fact that it's a successful business and that you realize very early on, that it's

24:26not enough to have the aspiration.

24:27I mean, it was a government, put a person on the moon, that that's not the same thing

24:31as actually being able to build, you said, self-sustaining with regard to life on Mars,

24:35but a self-sustaining business that actually has the capacity and a profit-driven model to

24:39do something like that, to project.

24:41Yeah.

24:42I mean, to be clear, at the start of SpaceX, I gave us less than 10% chance of success.

24:46I thought we'd probably die.

24:49But I think if something is important enough, it's worth doing, even if you think it's going

24:53to fail.

24:54And we almost did fail.

24:55The first three launches, Vassmall rocket, failed, only the fourth one launched, succeeded.

25:01And if we, if that fourth one had failed, we would be dead.

25:05So it's close.

25:08At this point, you know, I'm not going to worry.

25:10SpaceX is quite prosperous.

25:12SpaceX did about 80% of all payload to over the last year of Earth.

25:17about 12% and the rest of world at 8%.

25:21So in this year, if things go well, SpaceX will do 90% of all payload to Earth.

25:26And then as Starship really takes off, SpaceX will be doing at least based on what other

25:32companies are currently doing, which is around three, four, hundred tons to orbit.

25:38SpaceX ultimately will be doing several hundred thousand tons to orbit, maybe a million tons

25:43to orbit.

25:44It's amazing.

25:45what you mentioned there, that is a sort of skin of the teeth thing. I mean that's

25:48been true in a lot of companies that you've worked with. I mean that was true in

25:51Tesla also, that it was a real skin of the teeth thing. Yeah. And so maybe you

25:56can talk a little bit about what does that feel like? I mean as a CEO,

25:59yeah, you must do you enjoy the risk? Do you enjoy that stressful?

26:04Well, I don't see grisps for risks, say.

26:09Tesla had many close calls with death.

26:14The natural state of a car company, America, is dead.

26:17I mean, the only two car companies

26:18that have not gone bankrupt are Ford and Tesla.

26:21GM and Chrysler were in bankrupt until 2009.

26:25There have been hundreds of car bankruptcies before.

26:28So it's one of those things where, like I said,

26:31the natural state of a car company is dead.

26:33So you have to keep pulling rabbits out of a hat to not be dead.

26:36Do you think that your personality is suited to that,

26:38and that's why you're successful at this,

26:40that you think that you're unique to the companies you pick,

26:42that you're pulling rabbits out of hats?

26:44Is it that every company is pulling rabbits out of hats?

26:46Pull so many rabbits out of hats, like an ark or rabbit.

26:48It's funny to be there.

26:51I mean, I'm good at solving technology problems.

26:53So and rockets and cars, both technology problems,

26:59a very strong team.

27:01They work with me.

27:02And yeah, so far so good.

27:06Now onto X, which is its own set of issues and difficulties.

27:11You come in, and for many of us, it was like you're coming

27:14into save free speech.

27:16And it was, I think, really a signal moment, because it is

27:20very clear that there is a sensorious hand that's been

27:22placed on all of these tech companies.

27:24And you came in and you said, we're going to open this

27:26place up, and you definitely did.

27:29And the blowback has been absolutely wild.

27:31I mean, really tremendous.

27:32And pretty clearly coincident with the amount

27:35of mainstream media hatred of you.

27:38You went from being Golden Boy, Time Magazine, Newsweek,

27:43we all love you, everyone loves you.

27:45Where's that one go?

27:46SNL, right, like now if SNL had you on,

27:48there might be a riot in the street.

27:49Because apparently, by opening up free speech, you've...

27:54I mean, I think there's like a small section

27:56of the sort of elite media that hate me.

27:59But if I go down the street, people are really super friendly.

28:03So I think the average citizen is a fan, or suddenly doesn't hate me.

28:10I mean, I am the most involved account, most interactive account in social media by far.

28:18So I think technically there's people on Instagram with more followers,

28:22but in terms of interactions.

28:25I have the most interacted with social media accounts on Earth.

28:31Recently passed 169 million followers.

28:35So can 169 million people be wrong?

28:37I know we'll find out in the next election cycle.

28:42But when you feel that, do you think

28:45that that was a reaction to the fact

28:47that you were basically saying the thing you're not

28:49supposed to say, which is that the sources of information

28:51that people are receiving are in fact siphoned off

28:54and censored.

28:56Yeah, exactly.

28:59It was actually amazing to me how much the legacy media

29:06walks in lockstep.

29:08There's nobody breaks ranks.

29:13And now we have x that breaks ranks,

29:16and it doesn't just go with whatever the approved narrative

29:19is.

29:21I think for many in the public, they don't quite realize just

29:23how much the deception is really going on with the media.

29:29The biggest deception is the choice of narrative,

29:32because they can write a story about this,

29:35or write a story about that.

29:36And only a few stories can go on the front page.

29:39So you're deciding essentially what people should pay attention to.

29:44So instead of it being something that,

29:47what people pay attention to being what people actually care about,

29:50it's actually what a handful of editors care about.

29:52They're telling the people what to pay attention to.

29:56So the deception by choice of narrative is a big thing.

29:59So that's why I really want the narratives

30:01to bubble up organically from the people

30:04in the case of the ex-system, which they do.

30:08And people should be allowed to say things

30:11that are within the law.

30:16If the law isn't good enough,

30:18then great, we'll talk to your elected representative

30:21and have passed law to change that.

30:23But otherwise, we need to stick to hold true

30:27to the Constitution and the laws and allow people

30:30to say things, even if we don't like what they say.

30:34In fact, that's obviously the true test for free speech

30:37is that someone says something you don't like,

30:40because otherwise it's obviously not free speech.

30:42What do you think?

30:43Is the biggest thing you can do?

30:44You're going to crash me all the time on the X platform,

30:46like whatever.

30:47Yeah, and just crash me on the X platform,

30:49what's the wrong one?

30:50So what do you think is the biggest untold narrative,

30:52the thing that the media have been missing

30:54for years and years or suppressing for years and years?

30:58Well, there's a few things, but I've generally tried

31:05to say to increase the so-called overtune window

31:08of what can be discussed, what is it okay to discuss

31:11without being ostracized?

31:14Certainly attacking DEI would have been ostracized

31:18before and not anymore.

31:22And, you know, anything that sort of says sort of,

31:29or that the media ignores, the public can then, you know,

31:34raise it on the X platform

31:36and make that an actual topic of discussion.

31:41So, I mean, you probably think of it,

31:45can think of a few reasons, or a few reasons.

31:47Oh, I mean, obviously one of the big ones

31:49when you were first buying X was the unwillingness

31:52to say that men exist and women exist as actual biological

31:55categories.

31:55Oh, yeah.

31:56And that one came up a lot.

31:57You could get suspended for that.

31:58Oh, yeah.

31:59Oh, yeah.

32:00You couldn't even debate the subject

32:02without getting suspended.

32:03That was a huge one.

32:07There are a bunch of no-no's that you just

32:08weren't allowed to do.

32:09And I think that a lot of people are grateful for the broadening

32:12of the overton window.

32:13That does, as a person who's trying to do good in the world,

32:17one of the things that I've always

32:19said about people who are in charge of these tech platforms is that it's very difficult

32:25to be that job because there is obviously something that's outside the over-10 window

32:30where you say like it's my platform, I just don't want this on the platform. How do you

32:34decide that? I mean to a certain extent it is a cotty under a tree basically saying

32:38I just, you know, this is too much for me, I know when I see it kind of definition.

32:42But we're trying to be as objective as possible. Is something breaking the law or most likely

32:49likely breaking the, we don't get judged the same for sure, but this was being said, seemed

32:56to be illegal. Like someone saying they're going to murder somebody, I think, threats

33:00of murder are illegal, for sure. And, you know, so that would result in a suspension. And

33:13Then there's a separate thing which is something either

33:19sort of potentially pornographic or not safe for advertisers.

33:26Meaning the topic is too contentious to expect that

33:29advertisers will advertise with that account.

33:35You take like Dom Deluca as an example recently where he says

33:40some pretty edgy stuff.

33:42And that's OK, but just as he has the right to say edgy stuff,

33:49some of which is untrue and he gets community

33:52known at all the time.

33:54But advertisers also have the right to not advertise

33:59on Don Deluca's posts.

34:03So it's like his freedom to say we want,

34:06but he can't coerce advertisers to advertise.

34:12So when you look at the future of X,

34:15you've talked about X being kind of an everything company.

34:17What does that actually look like?

34:20I just mean, all the things that you would want to use online.

34:25In China has WeChat, which is,

34:27you kind of live on your WeChat in China.

34:30So you buy things on WeChat, you post,

34:35you know, if text, audio, video to various feeds.

34:40Yeah, payments, it's sort of like everything.

34:46So I want to try to have an app that at least allows you to do everything on X. You don't

34:52have to, but if you want to, you can.

34:55So I mean, all these...

34:57Well, I think what PayPal should have been basically.

35:01So you have three massive and growing companies. How do you balance all that? I mean, you also

35:07have a ton of kids. I mean, you make me look like I'm childless and by the number of children

35:12that you have, how do you balance all of those life demands?

35:14Well, my older boys are in college and high school, so they're, you know, they don't want

35:22much of my time because they're like, you know, 17, 19.

35:25Yeah, sorry, a three and a half year old and you're carrying them around.

35:27Yeah, he loves hanging with me. So I bring X round, yeah, I try to spend as much time

35:34as possible, I guess.

35:36So what is the day in the life like?

35:38Is it just different every single day?

35:40It's different for every single day.

35:42Yeah.

35:44I mean, I do a lot of engineering meetings and design meetings.

35:48So when I head to Tesla, Palo Alto later tomorrow,

35:56I'll be going through engineering design reviews

36:01of optimists and your vehicle programs of our Tesla AI

36:06for self-driving, Wednesday will be a bunch of product meetings

36:11on software, the X platform, so improving audio visual calling.

36:19So you can not just DM, but you can actually do

36:22call voice and video calls.

36:25And then also do group voice and video calls.

36:30Obviously, we want to introduce payments later this year when we get the approvals.

36:37Is it the engineering part of it that excites you the most?

36:39Which part of these things?

36:40I'm a product guy, so I developed technology products.

36:45That's what I do.

36:47So you're known as you can be a demanding boss, so the rumor goes.

36:51So I mean, I have expectations.

36:53Yeah, that's how I mean.

36:55So what do you think being a good boss should look like to people?

37:02How many employees do you have at your various companies at this point?

37:06Tesla's about 140,000, SpaceX, 15,000.

37:12Foreign companies I think 300, you're like about 300.

37:16X is around 1,300.

37:19So that's a lot of employees.

37:22So how do you think a boss ought to interact with employees?

37:26I mean, because obviously there's a balance between it's sort of Tommy LaSorta, the manager

37:31of the Dodgers, and once said that managing a baseball team was like holding a dove.

37:33You want to hold it tight enough that it doesn't get away, but not so tightly you squish it.

37:36So what do you think is the optimum employee management strategies for the budding entrepreneur

37:44out there?

37:45I don't know.

37:46I just leave with my team and we go around the table and talk about what everyone got

37:50done this past week and what they're planning to do next week, and then try to make some

37:55decisions about product design and direction or solve some particular technology problem.

38:02They're quite collegial, my meetings.

38:05They're not, you know, it's not me talking.

38:09I talk the least of the meetings.

38:11We're talking about information and limiting information flow, and obviously you and I

38:16I was just at Auschwitz today, which is a heavy experience.

38:19And one of the things that we were learning about and talking

38:23about was how limited flow of information allows for

38:27atrocities to happen.

38:29What was your takeaway?

38:30Exactly.

38:32Essentially, yeah, when the Germans came in, the first

38:35thing they did was shut down all the press.

38:37So everything was heavily censored.

38:40So you can say anything unless it was

38:42pre-rept by the government.

38:45So I think really, free speech is the bedrock of democracy.

38:53And free speech is what allows atrocities to be called out

38:57and for people to be aware of them.

38:58That's why the Germans wanted to shut down the price immediately.

39:03So in a way, I think we should do everything

39:09we can to preserve free speech.

39:12And when we lose free speech, I think

39:14we lose democracy.

39:15One of the other things we were talking about earlier

39:17to touch back on it was the DEI of it.

39:19And one of the things that you and I

39:22had been discussing a little bit offline

39:23is the fact that DEI effectively is a conspiracy theory

39:27in which there is a cadre of powerful people

39:29who are at the top and they control everything else

39:31that's happening.

39:32And because those powerful people are at the top,

39:34they are exploiting everybody else

39:36and they have to be taken down more than one peg.

39:39And that conspiracy theory matches very,

39:42aligned very closely with anti-Semitic conspiracy theories.

39:45I think the idea is very extremely anti-Semitic.

39:48That's cool.

39:50So yeah, absolutely.

39:55And it's just generally anti-minute meritocratic,

39:59which I think is very dangerous.

40:02You want to have a society where you succeed based

40:08on your skills and hard work.

40:11That's it.

40:12And it doesn't matter about your race, gender, creed,

40:14religion, nothing.

40:16Just are you good at your job?

40:17Do you work hard?

40:19Do you have high integrity?

40:21Nothing more.

40:22That's it.

40:23Stop there.

40:25And it seems as though, in our society right now,

40:28there's an objection to that.

40:29But that objection, it seems to me, can only be sustained.

40:33If you are tacitly acknowledging that you will not

40:36succeed in the meritocracy, the people who

40:38are pushing this the hardest.

40:39Yeah, it's patronizing, frankly.

40:41Yeah, I mean, it's essentially making the argument,

40:43I'm not succeeding.

40:44The reason I'm not succeeding is because no one can succeed.

40:46And so it's an argument, to a certain extent,

40:50of the unsuccessful, or people who feel as though they are,

40:53they deserve more.

40:54And one of the things that occurs to me

40:56is that I'm not sure that anybody, quote unquote,

40:58deserves anything other than what your hard work

41:00and innovation bring you in life.

41:02I think DEI also, for those who were promoted

41:06based on their skills in merit and hard work,

41:09It undermines the credibility of their promotion or their status.

41:14Was it real or was it the EI?

41:16You know, and it takes away the respect that they deserve.

41:22One of the things about meritocracy that I think people forget is that it's the only system

41:25ever devised that has positive externalities.

41:28Yeah.

41:29Any other sort of system that you create is going to have negative externalities because

41:31you're literally just cronying with X group and whatever that group is, that group is going

41:36to get the benefits.

41:37And if you're not part of that group, then you get screwed.

41:39And meritocracy is the idea that the people who are going to succeed are people who innately

41:44are capable of creating for everyone else.

41:47I mean, you mentioned earlier how many employees you have.

41:49And people will talk about your level of personal wealth.

41:51But that level of personal wealth is largely stock holding.

41:54And that stock is encompassing.

41:55Yes, it was entirely stock.

41:56Yeah, exactly.

41:57I mean, it's like you're sitting on a giant wad of cash somewhere.

41:59I mean, you are, but not like dad.

42:01Yeah.

42:02It's just when I created the companies, I felt that it was important.

42:04Now, in my first company, I didn't have any money for my first internet company.

42:08I just had a hundred thousand dollars in student debt.

42:11But for those companies, it was the very early days that internet calls up to.

42:16But for old companies subsequently, I basically doubled down.

42:22I took the money from Zip2, invested it in X.com PayPal, and then took the PayPal money,

42:29invested that in creating Tesla and SpaceX.

42:35Because I didn't feel right that I should ask investors

42:39to invest if I was not prepared to invest my own money.

42:43I think the whole other people's money thing is not right.

42:45You wanna have skin in the game and put your capital

42:50where the capital of the company you're creating

42:54there with investors capital.

42:55And as a result of that, I own a lot of shares in the company.

43:01And the better the company does, the more valuable the shares are.

43:05But that's because the pie has grown.

43:07And so you have to say, what's at the root of a lot of the negativity is an axiomatic

43:15flaw that the pie is static, that it's a zero sum game.

43:20That if someone else succeeds, it's because they took more than their fair share of this

43:24fixed pie.

43:25but it's not a fixed buy.

43:28Obviously, the, there's a lot of, now I want some pie.

43:32I'm gonna go.

43:35I'm gonna go.

43:38Pie.

43:40But obviously the economic pie has grown considerably

43:45from what it was in the past.

43:48The output of goods and services, the productivity per person

43:52dramatically greater than it has been in the past.

43:54So when you create a new company and you will create

43:58new products and services, you're growing the

44:05bundle, as they say, Pi again, of you're growing the amount

44:11of goods and services available to people.

44:16So you've not taken anything away from anyone.

44:19you've created something new, and you've given people

44:23new products and services they didn't have before.

44:27You know, like we wouldn't use to have an iPhone,

44:29we wouldn't use to have computers,

44:31we wouldn't use to have cars or be able to fly in airplanes.

44:35We wouldn't use to have many of the life-saving medicines

44:38that we have today, these are all new things.

44:40The pie is going tremendously.

44:42This is one of the, I think this is the fundamental distinction

44:44between innovators and business people

44:45and people in the free market and the political class.

44:48the political class operates almost solely on the basis

44:51that the pie is fixed.

44:52Because if the pie is fixed, then the way that you get elected

44:55is by promising more of that pie to such and such a person.

44:59Or you promise that by seizing money from the private sector,

45:01you're personally going to grow the pie.

45:03And it seems to me that the first mark of a politician

45:06you shouldn't listen to is I can fix all of your problems.

45:09And that basically rules out in your way everybody.

45:11Because it seems like everyone in the political class

45:13is into the I can fix all of your problems.

45:15When it seems like what I actually

45:16need is people who are entrepreneurial and innovative

45:19to solve this problem in front of us,

45:21maybe so that we can then move on to the next problem

45:23that's in front of them.

45:24Yeah.

45:25Basically, the reality is that the government is really just

45:30a corporation in the limit.

45:32Government is the ultimate corporation.

45:34It's not different from a corporation.

45:36It's just the ultimate corporation.

45:38And it's a corporation that is a monopoly.

45:40And also, it can't go bankrupt unless the country goes

45:45bankrupt and has monopoly on violence.

45:49So how much more do you want to give to the world's biggest

45:53corporation that has monopoly on violence?

45:57Probably not, probably less.

46:00And I mean, if you look at countries like East

46:04and West Germany or North and South Korea,

46:07cases where there's just an arbitrary line that's been

46:09drawn, that could use the one country,

46:12arbitrary line is drawn because of a war.

46:15What is the productivity difference for one to the other?

46:20West Germany had a productivity five times greater

46:23than the East Germany.

46:27And it's not like West Germany was just the sort

46:30of bastion of capitalism.

46:31They're like half socialist.

46:34So even with, so what that means,

46:37if they have socialist and the other side

46:38is 100% socialist or communist,

46:40then you really have something like a 10 to 1 difference

46:44in productivity if something is done by the government

46:47or done by the private sector.

46:49That's why you, but I'm not someone who says abolish

46:52the government.

46:52I just say let's have the government do the least amount

46:55because the less the government does,

46:57the more the economy will prosper

46:59because anything done by the government,

47:01it's going to be five to 10 times less efficient.

47:04Like think of the DMV.

47:07I'm trying not to.

47:08Yes.

47:10If we're going to get out of DEI, what's the best way to get out of DEI?

47:13Well, I think DEI is starting to fade.

47:18First of all, DEI is actually illegal because it discriminates in the base of race, sex,

47:29sexual preference, and all those other things.

47:32That is actually illegal.

47:34So somehow, they managed to get this illegal thing in place.

47:40But now we're starting to see a large number of lawsuits

47:44saying, no, actually, the law says you cannot discriminate

47:48on the basis of sex, sexual identity, and race.

47:54So I think DI is on its last legs.

48:00It's going to be a root because it's illegal, actually.

48:04literally. So I know running out of time. So I wanted to I do want to ask you, you

48:09know, you've had such a fascinating light, but what is the if there was an

48:13experience that defined you like the the encapsulating experience that defined

48:17you as a person? What would what do you think that is? I don't know if there's one

48:21single experience that defined me. And philosophically I read a lot of books

48:26in philosophy, a lot of religious books, and I did have an

48:32existential crisis when I was about 12.

48:36And then Red hijack is the galaxy,

48:38which is really a book in philosophy that just guides

48:41this humor.

48:42And that gave me a new philosophy,

48:46which is to try to understand the meaning of life.

48:51And then if you take axiomatically

48:54that you want to understand the meaning of life,

48:56the nature of the universe, then in order to do that,

49:00you have to expand the scope.

49:02the scope and scale of consciousness, and get out there and explore the galaxy, and then

49:11you can better understand the meaning of life.

49:14It's funny that you and Thomas Aquinas and my monadies all come to this end sort of conclusion

49:18because the basic premise religiously for them was explore the universe, therefore you're

49:23exploring God, every exploration of the world around you is in essence an exploration

49:27of God's system and brings you closer to the divine.

49:29And you're getting there in sort of a backwards way, even if you don't know what I'm getting

49:33to, the divine per se.

49:34Right, I'm not just agreeing with those who believe in God.

49:37I'm saying that even if you do believe in God, let us go out there and explore God's wondrous

49:44creation.