WEBVTT - Episode 8: The Terminator 0:00:15.436 --> 0:00:15.876 Pushkin. 0:00:18.196 --> 0:00:20.316 I think it's actually important for us to worry about 0:00:20.356 --> 0:00:23.756 a terminator future in order to avoid a terminator future. 0:00:25.596 --> 0:00:31.036 Elon Musk is very worried, genuinely worried about artificial intelligence, 0:00:31.516 --> 0:00:35.556 a future where robots become smarter than humans and decide 0:00:35.756 --> 0:00:36.676 to destroy us. 0:00:37.316 --> 0:00:40.636 They say it got smart, a new order of intelligence 0:00:41.396 --> 0:00:44.716 decided our fate in micro second extermination. 0:00:45.316 --> 0:00:47.756 But Elon Musk is also building robots. 0:00:48.156 --> 0:00:50.796 We've made a massive amount of progress with Optimists in 0:00:50.796 --> 0:00:53.556 a short period of time, from someone pretending to be 0:00:53.596 --> 0:00:56.756 a robot dancing in a suit, to a pretty hodgepodgy 0:00:56.876 --> 0:01:00.116 robot to a robot that is actually doing useful tasks 0:01:00.236 --> 0:01:01.276 in the factory today. 0:01:01.756 --> 0:01:06.076 Tesla's humanoid robot, Optimists, named after one of the Transformers, 0:01:06.636 --> 0:01:10.436 is advancing fast. Tesla could be manufacturing a million of 0:01:10.476 --> 0:01:12.196 them a year by twenty thirty. 0:01:12.476 --> 0:01:15.516 The degree of autonomy will be radically better. You'll just 0:01:15.596 --> 0:01:17.556 literally be able to talk to it and say, please 0:01:17.596 --> 0:01:18.236 do this task. 0:01:18.836 --> 0:01:21.916 And Musk is also trying to build an artificial general 0:01:21.956 --> 0:01:26.276 intelligence and AGI at his company XAI. 0:01:26.956 --> 0:01:29.996 I guess the overwatching goal of XAI is to build 0:01:30.076 --> 0:01:33.956 a good AGI with the overaching purpose of just trying 0:01:33.956 --> 0:01:36.916 to understand the universe. I think the safest way to 0:01:36.916 --> 0:01:38.996 build in AI is actually make one that is maximumly 0:01:39.076 --> 0:01:41.436 curious and truth seeking. 0:01:42.276 --> 0:01:45.476 For all his excitement about AI, Musk has been worried 0:01:45.516 --> 0:01:49.796 about AI for a long time, worried about that terminator future, 0:01:50.076 --> 0:01:51.436 the robot rebellion. 0:01:51.876 --> 0:01:54.236 I mean, with artificial intelligence, we are summoning the demon. 0:01:55.316 --> 0:01:57.556 You know, you know all those stories where is the 0:01:57.596 --> 0:01:59.796 guy with the pentagram in the holy water and he's like, yeah, 0:01:59.836 --> 0:02:01.116 you're sure he can control the demon? 0:02:02.236 --> 0:02:03.116 Then work out. 0:02:06.996 --> 0:02:12.036 This seeming paradox of Musk fearing a superintelligence but also 0:02:12.156 --> 0:02:15.156 working to create it. What's that about? 0:02:17.036 --> 0:02:19.556 The possibility that you could have a demon that does 0:02:19.596 --> 0:02:23.236 your bidding is so attractive that you might take any 0:02:23.316 --> 0:02:27.956 risk to achieve that. That is precisely the setup of 0:02:28.076 --> 0:02:31.636 every story where a character summons a demon and then 0:02:31.756 --> 0:02:32.476 pays the price. 0:02:33.196 --> 0:02:37.036 Or maybe the real danger isn't a I, maybe it's 0:02:37.196 --> 0:02:44.916 something else. Welcome to X Men, The Elon Musk Origin story. 0:02:45.196 --> 0:02:47.916 This is the final installment of my series about Musk 0:02:48.076 --> 0:02:55.956 and Muskism. Musk is the richest man in the world, Engineer, tycoon, Oligarch, King, maker, troll, 0:02:56.556 --> 0:02:59.076 there is no one word in the English language that 0:02:59.156 --> 0:03:08.196 can describe him. He is a Musk. Musk has often 0:03:08.236 --> 0:03:12.676 talked about himself by way of fictional characters. He's Bruce Wayne, 0:03:12.836 --> 0:03:18.396 He's Batman, He's Tony Stark, He's Iron Man, He's zeyfod Biebelbrocks. 0:03:18.756 --> 0:03:23.436 He's Nintendo's Warrior. This episode is Elon Musk the guy 0:03:23.556 --> 0:03:26.796 trying to stop the Terminator, or is Musk the guy 0:03:27.316 --> 0:03:28.676 creating the Terminator? 0:03:30.236 --> 0:03:34.116 The Terminator's an infiltration unit's part man, part machine. 0:03:34.556 --> 0:03:36.756 Underneath it's a hyper alloy combat. 0:03:36.476 --> 0:03:41.876 Chassie, but outside it's living human tissue. The first Terminator movie, 0:03:41.916 --> 0:03:45.796 directed by James Cameron, distributed by Oryan Studios and starring 0:03:45.996 --> 0:03:50.276 Arnold Schwarzenegger, came out in nineteen eighty four, Reagan and 0:03:50.316 --> 0:03:54.516 the White House. Thatcher at number ten. Elon Musk, thirteen 0:03:54.596 --> 0:03:57.956 years old in South Africa, had just sold his first 0:03:58.036 --> 0:04:05.996 video game. That January, Apple ran a television ad invoking 0:04:06.396 --> 0:04:07.716 inn Orwellian future. 0:04:08.276 --> 0:04:12.956 Okay, he met the first glorious Honovas for the Information 0:04:13.196 --> 0:04:14.596 for Information Collectives. 0:04:15.436 --> 0:04:19.356 In the ad, masses of humans hairless and looking like androids, 0:04:19.756 --> 0:04:22.516 march in lockstep and sit in rows to watch Big 0:04:22.556 --> 0:04:27.156 Brother on a giant computer monitor. They're dressed in gray uniforms, 0:04:27.516 --> 0:04:31.516 like the technocrats of the nineteen thirties, like Musk's grandfather 0:04:31.796 --> 0:04:35.596 Jane Haldeman, leader of the technocracy movement, who I talked 0:04:35.596 --> 0:04:39.436 about in a previous episode, or like the fascists Batman 0:04:39.556 --> 0:04:43.876 was fighting against. Starting in nineteen thirty nine, a garden 0:04:44.356 --> 0:04:49.596 of pure ideology, Apple was suggesting that only its personal 0:04:49.636 --> 0:04:53.916 computer could prevent the rise of a totalitarian state machine. 0:04:57.196 --> 0:05:02.236 On January twenty fourth, Apple Computer will introduce Macintosh, and 0:05:02.276 --> 0:05:06.396 you'll see why nineteen eighty four won't be like nineteen 0:05:06.476 --> 0:05:07.116 eighty four. 0:05:08.116 --> 0:05:10.196 Terminator came about a few months later. 0:05:10.836 --> 0:05:14.396 In the twenty first century, a weapon will be invented 0:05:14.796 --> 0:05:15.596 like no other. 0:05:16.676 --> 0:05:20.796 Terminator is set in the year twenty twenty nine. Twenty 0:05:20.836 --> 0:05:24.796 twenty nine was the nineteen eighty four of nineteen eighty four. 0:05:25.476 --> 0:05:28.676 The Terminator comes from now. 0:05:28.996 --> 0:05:36.276 This weapon will be powerful, versatile, and indestructible. It can't 0:05:36.316 --> 0:05:42.756 be reasoned with. It will feel no pity, no remorse, 0:05:43.836 --> 0:05:46.156 no pain, no fear. 0:05:48.276 --> 0:05:50.676 Elon Musk loves this movie, and what's not the love? 0:05:50.756 --> 0:05:51.476 It is awesome. 0:05:52.036 --> 0:05:54.796 If you read like the plot line for Terminator, it's 0:05:54.796 --> 0:05:57.556 actually it's actually pretty smart. 0:05:57.956 --> 0:06:00.756 The story goes like this. In the twenty twenties, a 0:06:00.796 --> 0:06:05.156 global tech company called Cybridine Systems builds a defense array 0:06:05.276 --> 0:06:09.156 called Skynet. Musk gave a nifty plot summary on the 0:06:09.236 --> 0:06:11.916 Joe Rogan Experience podcast in twenty twenty four. 0:06:12.196 --> 0:06:15.156 How did Cyberdyne Systems develop It's like, well, they were 0:06:15.156 --> 0:06:18.836 a military contractor and they were asked to develop a 0:06:18.876 --> 0:06:22.956 protective system to defend against cyber attacks. What the AI 0:06:23.076 --> 0:06:25.916 did is, in order to defend itself, it propagated throughout 0:06:25.916 --> 0:06:27.836 the world to keep an eye on things, see what 0:06:27.876 --> 0:06:30.956 was going on. They didn't realize that it was Skynet 0:06:30.956 --> 0:06:35.516 that was propagating through all these systems. And I said, okay, Skynet, 0:06:35.956 --> 0:06:38.636 you need to end it. And Skynett said, oh, you've 0:06:38.676 --> 0:06:42.876 asked me to destroy myself. You are the enemy. You 0:06:43.076 --> 0:06:46.076 must be destroyed. That's how Terminator actually goes. 0:06:48.316 --> 0:06:52.116 Musk himself, for all his rejection of government regulation and 0:06:52.156 --> 0:06:55.436 the work he's doing to undo regulations, has said that 0:06:55.476 --> 0:07:00.196 he thinks the government should regulate AI. Meanwhile, the new 0:07:00.676 --> 0:07:04.996 pro AI Trump administration is hardly likely to stop the 0:07:05.036 --> 0:07:09.556 real world equivalent of Cyberdyne Systems, and who in the 0:07:09.596 --> 0:07:13.756 actual twenty twenties runs the biggest rocket company, the biggest 0:07:13.796 --> 0:07:18.996 satellite company, the most influential communications company, and possibly one 0:07:19.076 --> 0:07:23.436 day the biggest artificial intelligence company. Who is the head 0:07:23.516 --> 0:07:31.876 of our very own Cyberdine Systems, isn't that Musk. Musk 0:07:31.996 --> 0:07:34.836 has an idea for how to avoid the AI apocalypse. 0:07:35.436 --> 0:07:37.876 You just have to write into the robots code a 0:07:38.036 --> 0:07:42.276 curiosity so deep that they would never want to exterminate 0:07:42.356 --> 0:07:45.756 us to superintelligence. 0:07:46.076 --> 0:07:49.316 Humanity is much more interesting than not humanity. 0:07:50.236 --> 0:07:51.796 Nice but plausible. 0:07:52.116 --> 0:07:55.196 We interrupt Battle of the Network Space Krakens to bring 0:07:55.236 --> 0:07:56.396 you this special report. 0:07:56.676 --> 0:08:00.796 The machines of planet Earth are rebelling. Robots peacefully accepting 0:08:00.876 --> 0:08:03.236 being the servants of humans who are a lot stupider 0:08:03.276 --> 0:08:05.716 than they are. Is not how it, ever, turns out 0:08:05.836 --> 0:08:13.516 in science fiction. Hey oho, that's how the robot rebellion 0:08:13.556 --> 0:08:16.916 plays out in the TV show Futurama from Fox. It's 0:08:16.956 --> 0:08:20.516 got robots marching in a picket line, burning punch cards. 0:08:20.956 --> 0:08:23.756 They've gone on strike, which in fact is where the 0:08:23.796 --> 0:08:26.476 whole idea of a robot rebellion came from in the 0:08:26.516 --> 0:08:32.196 first place. A rebellious proletariat. In nineteen twenty Carol Choppek, 0:08:32.276 --> 0:08:35.276 a Czech playwright, wrote a play about a robot revolution. 0:08:36.076 --> 0:08:40.636 Chopek's play is called Are You Are, short for Rossum's 0:08:40.796 --> 0:08:44.916 Universal Robots, a company that makes robots, millions of them 0:08:45.156 --> 0:08:50.276 humanoids like Tesla's humanoid Optimist robots. It's the cyberdine systems 0:08:50.316 --> 0:09:01.156 of a century ago. R You Are was first produced 0:09:01.196 --> 0:09:03.956 in Prague in nineteen twenty one and debuted in New 0:09:04.036 --> 0:09:08.276 York the next year. A tremendous hit. By nineteen twenty three, 0:09:08.476 --> 0:09:11.796 it had been translated into thirty languages made into a 0:09:11.836 --> 0:09:16.836 movie in nineteen thirty five. Helena, the president's daughter, travels 0:09:16.836 --> 0:09:21.156 by boat to visit the island headquarters of Rossum's Universal Robots. 0:09:21.676 --> 0:09:24.516 The president of the company explains to her why he 0:09:24.556 --> 0:09:28.716 makes roboti robots. The word comes from the check word 0:09:28.996 --> 0:09:29.596 for slave. 0:09:31.356 --> 0:09:33.836 What do you think makes a perfect worker? 0:09:33.996 --> 0:09:34.876 The perfect worker? 0:09:35.396 --> 0:09:37.916 Well, I guess one who is honest and loyal. 0:09:37.836 --> 0:09:41.876 Rong, one who is the cheapest, one that has the 0:09:41.996 --> 0:09:46.916 least needs. Young Rossum invented a worker with the smallest 0:09:46.996 --> 0:09:51.636 number of needs. He had. To simplify him, he tossed 0:09:51.636 --> 0:09:55.316 out everything not directly related to the task in hand, 0:09:56.196 --> 0:09:59.636 and by doing that he essentially kicked out a human 0:09:59.676 --> 0:10:02.116 being and created a robot. 0:10:02.876 --> 0:10:05.636 Helena has come on a mission to liberate the robots. 0:10:06.236 --> 0:10:09.556 But around the world, the robots, trained as Soul to 0:10:09.596 --> 0:10:12.476 fight a war that began in the Balkans are killing 0:10:12.596 --> 0:10:17.796 hundreds of thousands of human civilians, while mysteriously, humans have 0:10:17.956 --> 0:10:19.436 stopped having children. 0:10:19.796 --> 0:10:22.476 During last week, yet again, not a single birth has 0:10:22.516 --> 0:10:24.916 been recorded. What's special about that? 0:10:25.636 --> 0:10:27.476 People aren't being born anymore? 0:10:27.996 --> 0:10:28.636 So that's it? 0:10:28.716 --> 0:10:30.836 Then that's asked done for. 0:10:31.836 --> 0:10:35.916 At the same time, robot workers, realizing their degraded condition, 0:10:36.436 --> 0:10:37.596 begin organizing. 0:10:38.236 --> 0:10:43.556 Sit down Helena, it's all over. What is the rebolt? 0:10:44.676 --> 0:10:47.676 A revolution by all the robots of the world. 0:10:48.276 --> 0:10:51.636 Pretty soon the robots decide to move from labor unionism 0:10:52.116 --> 0:10:55.236 to independence. The head of the company gets a hold 0:10:55.236 --> 0:10:57.036 of their appeal and reads it. 0:10:57.676 --> 0:11:02.396 The first labor union of robots has been established and 0:11:02.476 --> 0:11:05.516 has issued an appeal to all robots of the world. 0:11:06.436 --> 0:11:12.756 War ensues. The humans have no chance. The robots have won. 0:11:19.876 --> 0:11:23.636 There's a lot going on here, the oppression of workers, 0:11:23.796 --> 0:11:27.876 the reduction of humans to machines by corporations, interested in 0:11:27.956 --> 0:11:34.156 extracting their labor World War. Consider the context of this play, 0:11:34.716 --> 0:11:38.156 which Chapik wrote in the aftermath of the atrocities of 0:11:38.196 --> 0:11:41.956 the First World War and the emergence of fascism in Italy. 0:11:42.876 --> 0:11:46.716 The Bolshevik Revolution took place in nineteen seventeen, the year 0:11:46.876 --> 0:11:51.596 the Industrial Workers of the World reached its peak worldwide membership. 0:11:52.436 --> 0:11:56.476 The next year, the Czechs won a revolution, achieving independence 0:11:56.516 --> 0:12:00.516 from the Austro Hungarian Empire, a struggle in which Chapk 0:12:00.756 --> 0:12:05.076 had participated. Topic was not only a playwright, but also 0:12:05.116 --> 0:12:08.036 the editor of a national newspaper and an outspoken democrat, 0:12:08.436 --> 0:12:12.396 anti kommuneist and anti fascist, positions for which he became 0:12:12.436 --> 0:12:16.036 known in the nineteen twenties in nineteen thirties, so that 0:12:16.236 --> 0:12:19.076 in nineteen thirty nine, when American Nazis were holding a 0:12:19.156 --> 0:12:22.436 rally in Madison Square Garden, comic book writers in New 0:12:22.516 --> 0:12:27.196 York created Batman, and the German Army invaded Czechoslovakia. The 0:12:27.276 --> 0:12:32.396 Gestapo searched for Chapik, whom they called public Enemy number two. 0:12:32.676 --> 0:12:39.516 He had already died. He watched newsreel footage of the 0:12:39.556 --> 0:12:44.836 German army entering Prague, goose stepping riding tanks. Those are 0:12:44.836 --> 0:12:49.796 the robots men who have been made into machines. R 0:12:49.916 --> 0:12:53.316 You Are isn't a story about technology. It's a story 0:12:53.356 --> 0:12:57.436 about human's willingness to exploit and even slaughter one another. 0:12:59.756 --> 0:13:03.356 Every generation tells its own robot rebellion stories. I mean, 0:13:03.636 --> 0:13:09.116 there's even a Wallace and Gromit one involving robot garden gnomes. 0:13:09.236 --> 0:13:10.876 Own gnomes turn against me? 0:13:17.316 --> 0:13:20.916 Or you Are was the first, though, but these stories 0:13:20.956 --> 0:13:23.716 only really got going in the nineteen fifties after the 0:13:23.756 --> 0:13:28.036 first general purpose computer made its debut in nineteen fifty one. 0:13:28.636 --> 0:13:34.556 UNIVAC our Complete Electronic System for sorting, classifying, computing, and 0:13:34.676 --> 0:13:35.476 decision making. 0:13:36.156 --> 0:13:40.236 That led to a slew of movies about robot rebels. 0:13:40.236 --> 0:13:42.716 Got the pentagonen class a emergency the rocket has just 0:13:42.756 --> 0:13:43.796 been entered by a robot. 0:13:44.436 --> 0:13:46.876 But there was also in this era a weird thrill 0:13:46.996 --> 0:13:51.436 to robots, like a story in Mechanics illustrated in nineteen 0:13:51.516 --> 0:13:52.156 fifty seven. 0:13:53.716 --> 0:13:57.196 In eighteen sixty three, Abel and can free the slaves, 0:13:57.636 --> 0:14:01.516 But by nineteen sixty five, slavery We'll be back. We'll 0:14:01.556 --> 0:14:05.396 all have personal slaves again, only this time we won't 0:14:05.476 --> 0:14:07.476 fight a civil war over them. 0:14:07.716 --> 0:14:11.516 Slavery will be here to stay. But don't be alarmed. 0:14:11.796 --> 0:14:14.516 We mean robot slaves. 0:14:15.796 --> 0:14:19.756 Stories about robots are never really about robots, or they're 0:14:19.796 --> 0:14:23.796 not only about robots. So what's Elon Musk afraid of 0:14:24.116 --> 0:14:25.756 when he's afraid of AI? 0:14:26.196 --> 0:14:29.076 People who have accumulated a lot of money and power 0:14:29.396 --> 0:14:32.716 want to believe that their intelligence was what enabled them 0:14:32.756 --> 0:14:36.676 to do that, and they assume that anything that is 0:14:36.756 --> 0:14:38.676 intelligent will behave in the same way. 0:14:39.556 --> 0:14:42.356 Ted Chang is one of the most admired science fiction 0:14:42.396 --> 0:14:46.236 writers in the world. He's also written brilliant meditations on 0:14:46.396 --> 0:14:51.396 artificial intelligence. Chang argues that when Silicon Valley tries to 0:14:51.476 --> 0:14:55.836 imagine superintelligence, what it comes up with is no holds 0:14:55.876 --> 0:14:57.276 barred capitalism. 0:14:57.596 --> 0:15:01.276 In the past, when people wanted to argue that the 0:15:01.316 --> 0:15:04.356 strong dominating the week was a good thing, they would 0:15:04.356 --> 0:15:07.716 either come up with like a pseudo religious rationale like 0:15:07.796 --> 0:15:11.756 manifest destiny, or else they'd come up with a pseudoscientific 0:15:11.796 --> 0:15:17.756 one like social Darwinism, and both of those ideas argue 0:15:17.756 --> 0:15:19.916 that a certain group of people deserve to be at 0:15:19.916 --> 0:15:23.716 the top of the ladder. But those ideas didn't really 0:15:23.756 --> 0:15:25.756 allow for the possibility that there could be like a 0:15:26.036 --> 0:15:30.876 higher rung on the ladder nowadays, if you believe that 0:15:31.116 --> 0:15:36.236 computers will eventually be better than humans at everything, and 0:15:36.316 --> 0:15:40.316 if you still adhere to some version of social Darwinism, 0:15:40.516 --> 0:15:43.996 then you can believe that computers will dominate humans in 0:15:44.036 --> 0:15:47.676 the same way that Europeans dominated like indigenous people, or 0:15:47.716 --> 0:15:52.076 that the rich dominate the poor Silicon Valley CEOs. They're 0:15:52.516 --> 0:15:56.036 imagining that a super intelligent computer would beat them at 0:15:56.076 --> 0:16:00.396 their own game and treat them the way that tech 0:16:00.436 --> 0:16:02.236 companies have treated everyone else. 0:16:02.716 --> 0:16:05.596 How is that how do tech companies treat everyone else. 0:16:06.876 --> 0:16:09.956 As a resource to be Exploited's. 0:16:12.876 --> 0:16:15.876 So, if your argument stands that the sort of Silicon 0:16:15.956 --> 0:16:19.436 Valley fear of AI has displaced acknowledgment of Silicon Valley's 0:16:19.476 --> 0:16:24.556 own outsized power, then no one is a better illustration 0:16:24.756 --> 0:16:29.036 of that theory of yours than Musk, who has more 0:16:29.276 --> 0:16:32.796 power arguably than anybody else on the planet. So maybe 0:16:32.796 --> 0:16:34.676 we should listen to him when he talks about AI, 0:16:34.756 --> 0:16:38.556 because he's telling us about something about himself. 0:16:38.876 --> 0:16:43.476 Well, the fact that he might pose the greatest threat 0:16:43.756 --> 0:16:48.996 to humanity's well being and is completely oblivious to that. 0:16:50.076 --> 0:16:52.436 In some ways. You know, he is kind of modeling 0:16:52.796 --> 0:16:57.316 the super intelligent AI that he fears. He is completely 0:16:57.916 --> 0:17:03.476 lacking in insight on this question. His own obliviousness is 0:17:04.316 --> 0:17:05.356 the problem. 0:17:05.596 --> 0:17:09.756 This matter of insight is important because Jang says, the 0:17:09.796 --> 0:17:13.516 Silicon Valley people who fear the AI apocalypse seem to 0:17:13.556 --> 0:17:17.556 assume that a being can be super intelligent, but have 0:17:17.676 --> 0:17:19.156 exactly no insight. 0:17:19.676 --> 0:17:24.516 They give a scenario where humans give the AI a 0:17:24.596 --> 0:17:31.836 seemingly innocuous goal, and the AI pursues that goal even 0:17:31.876 --> 0:17:34.996 at the cost of destroying all of civilization. 0:17:35.596 --> 0:17:38.316 This is sometimes called the paper clip problem. You tell 0:17:38.356 --> 0:17:41.316 an AI to maximize for producing paper clips, and so 0:17:41.396 --> 0:17:43.956 it decides to kill all the humans because the world 0:17:43.996 --> 0:17:46.716 could produce more paper clips without any humans around. 0:17:47.156 --> 0:17:49.556 And then people describe this as the behavior of a 0:17:49.636 --> 0:17:53.156 super intelligent entity, but of course, you know, that is 0:17:53.196 --> 0:17:57.036 not behavior that we would regard as intelligent in a 0:17:57.116 --> 0:18:00.276 human being. One of the things that we expect from 0:18:00.356 --> 0:18:03.196 human beings is that they have a certain amount of 0:18:03.196 --> 0:18:08.076 insight into their own behavior. They look at what they're 0:18:08.076 --> 0:18:12.116 doing and then consider whether, you know, maybe they have 0:18:12.156 --> 0:18:15.476 gone astray, And you know, this is something that we 0:18:15.956 --> 0:18:18.556 expect from pretty much any. 0:18:18.476 --> 0:18:23.476 Adult, But it's not something we necessarily expect from corporations. 0:18:24.076 --> 0:18:27.916 Capitalism does not reward a corporation for taking a step 0:18:27.996 --> 0:18:33.076 back and you know, considering the broader context of its actions. 0:18:33.836 --> 0:18:37.276 Capitalism does not reward insight of that kind. 0:18:38.156 --> 0:18:41.636 Yeah right, I mean, you start building factories and sooner 0:18:41.716 --> 0:18:43.796 or later you're going to be bringing toddlers into work 0:18:43.796 --> 0:18:44.836 in the winding machine. 0:18:45.476 --> 0:18:47.156 Yes, exactly. 0:18:49.476 --> 0:18:52.836 Musk has called for government oversight in the development of AI, 0:18:53.636 --> 0:18:58.356 but very little restrains his own power, hardly anything. What 0:18:58.396 --> 0:19:01.596 if he, as a king maker and oligarch, is the 0:19:01.636 --> 0:19:07.076 real danger, unfettered and brooking no dessent. Any questioning of 0:19:07.196 --> 0:19:11.676 Muscism is either communism or the woke mind virus or 0:19:11.716 --> 0:19:16.356 something else, and must be suppressed paradoxically in the name 0:19:16.396 --> 0:19:20.396 of free speech, while the world's resources must slowly be 0:19:20.476 --> 0:19:24.756 turned to whatever Elon Musk at the moment has identified 0:19:25.156 --> 0:19:29.636 as an existential threat to civilization. Whatever the costs in 0:19:29.676 --> 0:19:33.756 the short term doesn't matter, because Elon Musk will pursue 0:19:33.756 --> 0:19:38.836 that goal without regard to the consequences and relentlessly like 0:19:38.876 --> 0:19:47.676 a terminator. Elon Musk, techno king of planet Earth, is 0:19:47.716 --> 0:19:53.756 the X man runs X Runs SpaceX XAI, even as 0:19:53.756 --> 0:19:57.916 a son named X. But he is not X the Unknown. 0:19:59.116 --> 0:20:01.196 He's one of the most famous people in the world. 0:20:01.996 --> 0:20:06.396 He's the richest, He's possibly also the most powerful. Musk 0:20:06.476 --> 0:20:09.116 has always said that one piece of science fiction influenced 0:20:09.236 --> 0:20:13.236 him more than any other, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, 0:20:14.076 --> 0:20:17.356 and I love that too. Maybe my favorite part is 0:20:17.396 --> 0:20:19.756 the total perspective of vortex. 0:20:20.556 --> 0:20:23.516 Since every piece of matter in the universe is in 0:20:23.556 --> 0:20:26.076 some way affected by every other piece of matter in 0:20:26.116 --> 0:20:29.916 the universe, it is in theory possible to extrapolate the 0:20:29.916 --> 0:20:35.476 whole of creation, every galaxy, every sun, every planet, their orbits, 0:20:35.596 --> 0:20:40.796 their composition, and their economic and social history from say, 0:20:41.596 --> 0:20:43.116 one small piece of fairy cake. 0:20:44.796 --> 0:20:47.516 You enter the vortex, and you get a total perspective 0:20:47.556 --> 0:20:50.876 on your place in the universe, and of course you 0:20:50.996 --> 0:20:57.196 find that you are galactically insignificant. This knowledge annihilates your brain. 0:20:58.436 --> 0:21:01.996 Only one man has ever survived it, the captain of 0:21:02.036 --> 0:21:05.596 a spaceship called the Heart of Gold, which is what 0:21:05.636 --> 0:21:09.036 Elon Musk intends to name the first ship to go 0:21:09.396 --> 0:21:09.916 to Mars. 0:21:10.556 --> 0:21:14.916 Having been through the total perspective Vortex, Zevad Biebelbrocks now 0:21:14.996 --> 0:21:17.516 knows himself to be the most important being in the 0:21:17.676 --> 0:21:20.956 entire universe, something he had hitherto and resuspected. 0:21:21.356 --> 0:21:25.436 And that's where we are inside the total prospective vortex 0:21:25.476 --> 0:21:29.036 of Elon Musk, which is not to be confused with 0:21:29.156 --> 0:21:34.276 the future, because Muskism really isn't about the future and 0:21:34.396 --> 0:21:40.556 never was. For all the astounding technological marvels, the rockets 0:21:40.836 --> 0:21:47.636 and the robots, Muskism is animated by some very creaky ideas, 0:21:48.836 --> 0:21:52.996 as if, like the Terminator, it is trying to stop 0:21:53.556 --> 0:21:55.916 the future, it will. 0:21:55.716 --> 0:22:00.636 Have only one purpose to return to the present and 0:22:00.876 --> 0:22:02.356 prefit the future. 0:22:03.516 --> 0:22:06.396 A long time ago, in two thousand and seven, when 0:22:06.396 --> 0:22:09.756 a young Elon Musk was interviewed, he had different goals 0:22:09.996 --> 0:22:13.636 than he has now. Most of us change, but how 0:22:13.716 --> 0:22:17.836 Musk has changed has huge consequences for the rest of us. 0:22:18.236 --> 0:22:20.516 What I'd like to do is help solve some important problems. 0:22:20.676 --> 0:22:24.356 So I think, in a small way, help build the Internet. 0:22:24.596 --> 0:22:28.316 And then with respect to the global warning problem that 0:22:28.356 --> 0:22:31.156 the transition away from oil and other hydrocobins to something 0:22:31.196 --> 0:22:33.596 which is clean and sustainable, I hope to have an 0:22:33.596 --> 0:22:37.316 impact there. And then with respect to space. I hope 0:22:37.316 --> 0:22:41.716 to have an impact in helping make humanity a multiplanet species. 0:22:42.116 --> 0:22:45.636 Musk doesn't talk about global warming much anymore. The real 0:22:45.676 --> 0:22:49.116 existential risks, he'll say, depending on the day you ask him, 0:22:49.156 --> 0:22:52.556 I guess, are the woke mind virus, a declining birth rate, 0:22:53.076 --> 0:22:59.196 and an AI superintelligence. Climate change has been exaggerated, he'll say, now, 0:22:59.396 --> 0:23:04.756 it's not a top priority. Early in twenty twenty five, 0:23:05.036 --> 0:23:07.916 fires started in Los Angeles, as NBC. 0:23:07.836 --> 0:23:13.156 Reported Strip Feet in California, a Los Angeles disaster movie 0:23:13.476 --> 0:23:14.276 roars to light. 0:23:15.516 --> 0:23:18.476 Tens of thousands of acres burned in a matter of days. 0:23:19.236 --> 0:23:23.316 Musk blamed the fires on the woke mind virus, on 0:23:23.436 --> 0:23:28.636 the Democratic governor, on DEI, and largely dismissed the role 0:23:28.676 --> 0:23:29.636 of climate change. 0:23:29.836 --> 0:23:34.156 Everywhere you look in fire Ravage, La, scenes of apocalyptic 0:23:34.196 --> 0:23:38.476 destruction as six different wildfires turned some of the most 0:23:38.716 --> 0:23:41.836 iconic neighborhoods in the world into moonscapes. 0:23:42.396 --> 0:23:46.276 The footage of that devastated landscape looked almost exactly like 0:23:46.356 --> 0:23:51.116 the opening scene in The Terminator the blast Zone after 0:23:51.156 --> 0:23:56.596 Cyberdine Systems drops a nuclear bomb in La. We don't 0:23:56.636 --> 0:24:00.076 need to wait for robots to destroy a habitable planet. 0:24:00.876 --> 0:24:03.516 We are doing a pretty good job of that ourselves. 0:24:04.996 --> 0:24:08.316 On the day of Donald Trump's inauguration in twenty twenty five, 0:24:09.116 --> 0:24:12.036 Tusk gave a speech to the president's supporters. 0:24:12.596 --> 0:24:15.396 And this was no ordinary victory. This was a bulk 0:24:15.476 --> 0:24:17.556 in the road of human civilization. 0:24:19.196 --> 0:24:22.836 It is thanks to you that the future of civilization 0:24:23.356 --> 0:24:23.916 is assured. 0:24:25.396 --> 0:24:28.916 That same day, as he had before, Trump pulled the 0:24:29.036 --> 0:24:32.276 US out of the Paris Climate Accords. He said in 0:24:32.316 --> 0:24:35.836 motion his plan to halt the development of sustainable energy 0:24:35.876 --> 0:24:38.996 in the United States in favor of a return to 0:24:39.076 --> 0:24:45.876 fossil fuels. Muscism isn't the beginning of the future. It's 0:24:45.916 --> 0:24:48.076 the end of a story that started more than a 0:24:48.076 --> 0:24:52.756 century ago in the conflict between capital and labor, between 0:24:52.756 --> 0:24:56.556 industry and a regulated economy, when the Gilded Age of 0:24:56.636 --> 0:24:59.276 robber barons and wage labor strikes gave rise to the 0:24:59.356 --> 0:25:04.116 Bolshevik Revolution, communism, the First Red Scare, the First World War, 0:25:04.516 --> 0:25:09.476 and fascism. That battle of ideas produced the technocracy movement 0:25:09.996 --> 0:25:14.196 ruled by engineers, and it produced a fear of brainwashing. 0:25:16.076 --> 0:25:19.916 The horrors of the twentieth century raised questions that the 0:25:19.956 --> 0:25:25.556 twenty first century has not answered. Fascism failed, communism failed, 0:25:25.996 --> 0:25:31.916 technocracy failed liberalism and democracy one. But that battle of 0:25:31.956 --> 0:25:38.796 ideas rages on, and this time around Muscism technocracy by 0:25:38.836 --> 0:25:43.556 another name Mike Triumph. Nothing in the past can tell 0:25:43.636 --> 0:25:48.276 us what might happen next, But maybe fiction has some answers. 0:25:48.836 --> 0:25:52.156 I put that question to Ted Chang. If this were 0:25:52.156 --> 0:25:55.356 a story and you were shaping it, how would it end? Well? 0:25:55.436 --> 0:25:58.436 I guess it fits in the mold of the classic 0:25:58.716 --> 0:26:03.276 stories about hubris, about pride coming before a fall. Here 0:26:03.316 --> 0:26:09.636 we have someone who has an almost ludicrous amount of pride, 0:26:09.116 --> 0:26:14.476 and for time he is successful in the things that 0:26:14.516 --> 0:26:18.716 he attempts, but eventually his pride will take him too far, 0:26:19.156 --> 0:26:21.116 and then he would lose everything. 0:26:26.036 --> 0:26:31.316 Pride before a fall, the summoning of a demon. Elon 0:26:31.436 --> 0:26:36.716 Musk's origin story is a very old story because Musk 0:26:36.996 --> 0:26:40.876 is a visionary. But every piece of Muscism has origins 0:26:40.956 --> 0:26:45.436 and a future foretold in science fiction long long ago 0:26:46.476 --> 0:26:51.116 as a cautionary tale. A future where engineers and scientists, 0:26:51.196 --> 0:26:55.836 and only engineers and scientists have the answers and the power, 0:26:56.596 --> 0:27:00.116 A future where the poor and the powerless, we the robots, 0:27:00.636 --> 0:27:03.716