Y Combinator Startup Podcast - #4 - Elon Musk on How to Build the Future

Episode Date: May 15, 2017

Sam Altman interviews Elon Musk for a series called How To Build The Future, which you can watch on YC’s YouTube channel (https://youtube.com/ycombinator). Read the transcript here (http://blog.ycombinator.com/elon-musk-on-how-to-build-the-future/).

Hey, this is Craig Cannon, and you're listening to Y Combinators podcast. Today's episode is with Elon Musk and Sam Altman. Sam's the president of YC Group and he interviewed Elon for a series called How to Build the Future, which you can watch on YC's YouTube channel. I don't think Elon needs much of an introduction, so let's get right into it. Today we have Elon Musk. Elon, thank you for joining us. Yeah, thanks for having me. 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? If you were 22 today, what would the five problems that you would think about working on B? Well, first of all, I think if somebody is doing something that is useful to the rest of society, I think that's a good thing. It doesn't have to change the world. Like, you know, if you're doing something that has high value to people, and frankly, even if it's something, if it's something, if a lot of, if it's something, if a lot of, if it's something, if it's,

it's like just a little game or, you know, some improvement in photo sharing or something. If it has a small amount of good for a large number of people, I mean, I think that's fine. Like, stuff doesn't need to be changed the world just to be good. But, you know, in terms of things that I think are most likely to affect the future of humanity, I think AI is probably the single biggest item in this. near-term that's likely to affect humanity. So it's very important that we have the advent of AI in a good way. That is something that if you could look into the crystal wall and see the future,

you would like that outcome. Because it is something that could go wrong, as we've talked about many times. And so we really need to make sure it goes right. that's that's i think i work working on i and making sure it's great future that's that's the most important thing i think right now

um the most pressing item so uh then um obviously anything in to do with with genetics um if you can actually solve um genetic diseases um if you can um prevent dementia um alzheimer or something like that with genetic reprograming that would be wonderful so i think this

genetics it might be the 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 in the form of our email capabilities like computers, phones applications we're effectively superhuman but we're extremely bound with constraint in that interface between the cortex and you're sort of that that

tertiary digital form of yourself and helping solve that bandwidth constraint would be, I think, very important for the future as well. So one of the, I think, most common questions I hear young people, ambitious young people ask is, I want to be the next Elon Musk. How do I do that? Obviously, the next Elon Musk will work on very different things 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 first of all I should say that I do not expect to be involved in all these things. So the five things that I thought about the time in college quite a long time ago, 25 years ago, you know, making life multi-planetary, accelerating the transition to sustainable energy, the Internet, broadly speaking, and then genetics and AI. I think I didn't expect to be involved in all of those things.

Actually, at the time in college, I sort of thought helping with electrification of cars was how I would start out. And that's actually what I worked on as an intern was advanced ultra-capacters to see if there would be a breakthrough relative to batteries for energy storage in 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 was working on advanced energy storage technologies for electric cars and then I put that on hold to start an internet company

in 95 because there does seem to be like a time for particular technologies when they're at a steep point in the inflection curve and I didn't want to do a PhD at Stanford and then watch it all happen and then and I was

entirely certain that the technology I'd be working on would actually succeed. You can get a doctrine on 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 can I do that would actually be useful. Do you think people that want to be useful today should get PhDs? Mostly not. So what is the best way to use? Some, yes, but mostly not. How should someone figure out how they can be most useful?

Whatever this thing is that you're trying to create, 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 makes a big difference but affects a sort of small to moderate number of people is great, as is something that makes even a small difference, but affects a vast number of people. Like the area under the curve.

Yeah, exactly. Area under the curve would actually be roughly similar for those two things. So it's actually really about just trying to be useful and matter. When you're trying to estimate probability of success, so this thing will be really useful, good area under the curve, I guess to use the example of SpaceX. 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, for sure. Yeah. Well, I'm not shy about saying that. But I kind of agree. I agreed with them that it was quite crazy. Crazy if the objective was to achieve the best risk-adjusted return, starting a rock company is insane.

But that was not my objective. I'd simply come to the conclusion that if something didn't happen to improve rocket technology, would be stuck on Earth forever. And the big aerospace companies had just had no interest in radical innovation. All they wanted to do was try to make their old technology slightly better every year, and in fact

sometimes it would actually get worse. And particularly in rockets, it's pretty bad. 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. I mean, that trend is basically a trend, to zero. If you always think technology just automatically gets better every year, but it actually

doesn't. It only gets better if smart people work like crazy to make it better. That's how any technology actually gets better. And by itself, technology, if people don't work in it actually will decline. I mean, you can look at the history of civilizations, many civilizations, and look at, say, ancient Egypt where they were able to build these incredible pyramids, and then they basically forgot how to build pyramids. And then even hieroglyphics, they forgot how to read hydroglyphics. So we look at Rome and how they're able 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 think sure always bear in mind that, 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. Where does that come from or how do you think about making a decision when everyone tells you this is a crazy idea? Or where do you get the internal strength to do that? Well, first of all, I'd say I actually think I feel fear quite strongly. So it's not as though I just have the absence of fear. I feel it quite strongly. But there are times when something is important enough, you believe it enough, that you do it in spite of fear.

So speaking of important things. Like people shouldn't think, well, I feel fear about this, and therefore I shouldn't do it. It's normal to feel fear. Like you'd have to do something mentally wrong if you didn't feel fear. So you just feel it and let the importance of it. drive me to do it anyway. Yeah.

You know, actually something that can be helpful is fatalism at some degree. If you just accept the probabilities, then that diminishes fear. So, when I started SpaceX, I thought the odds of success were less than 10%. And I just accepted that actually probably I would just 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 keep moving it forward. So that we'll still do some good. Yeah, same with Tesla.

I thought the 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, oddly enough, I actually think they're pretty good. So, like, when can I go? Okay. 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 moss colony, in fact, growing moss 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, 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? You shouldn't go on the first launch? Yeah, exactly.

The first launch will be a robotic anyway, so... I want to go except for that internet latency. Yeah, the internet latency would be pretty significant. Mars is roughly 12 light minutes from the sun and Earth is eight light minutes, so closest approach Mars is four light minutes, away, that for this approach is 20, a little more because you can't sort of talk directly through the sun.

Speaking of really important problems, AI, so you have been outspoken about AI. 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 hopefully predictive. Because people will say, well, like, this is something that I want to occur, instead of something 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 somebody 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 a 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 or 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 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 concern is that someone may use it in a way that is bad.

And even if they weren't going to use it in a way that's bad, that somebody could take it from them and use it in a way that's bad. That I think is quite a big danger. So I think we must have democratization of AI technology and make it widely available. And that's, you know, the reason that obviously, Yumi and the rest of the team, you know, created Open AI, was to help with the democracy,

help spread out AI technology so it doesn't get concentrated in the hands of a few. 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 the limbic system and the limbic system is kind of the primitive brain it's kind of like your instincts and whatnot and then the cortex is the thinking

of a part of the brain those two seem to work together quite well occasionally your cortex and the cortex system may disagree, but they... It generally 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 their cortex or get rid of the Olympic system.

Very true. Yeah, that's unusual. So I think if we can effectively merge with AI by improving that the neural link between your cortex and the digital extension of yourself, which already, like I said, already exists, just has a bandwidth issue. And then effectively, you become an AI human symbiote,

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 we are the AI collectively. That seems like the best outcome I can think of. So you've seen other companies in their early days that start small and get really successful. Hope I know we're asking this on camera, but how do you think Open AI is going as a six-month-old company? It seems to go pretty well.

I think we've got a really talented group at Open AI. It seems like that. Yeah, a really talented team and they're working hard. Open AI is structured as, you see, a five-year-five-year-old. 5-1c3 nonprofit. But many nonprofits do not have a sense of urgency. It's fine. They don't have to have a sense of urgency.

But opening it does. I think people really believe in the mission. I think it's important. And 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. and the talent level. And obviously we're always looking for great people to join.

It's close to 40 people now. Yeah. That's fine well. All right, just a few more questions before we wrap up. How do you spend your days now? Like, what do you allocate most of your time to? My time is mostly split, well, it's between SpaceX and Tesla. And, of course, I try to spend part of every week at Open AI.

So I spend basically half a day at Open AI most weeks. And then I have some Open AI stuff that happens during the week. But other than that, it's really SpaceX and Tesla. And what do you do when you're at SpaceX or Tesla? What does your time look like there? Yeah, so that's a good question. I think a lot of people think I must spend a lot of time with media or on businessy things. But actually almost all my time, like 80% of it is spent on engineering and design.

engineering and design. So it's developing next generation product. That's 80% of it. You probably don't 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. And 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. Which is fine. Like, business is fine. But really, it's, you know, it's like it's SpaceX. Gwyn Schottwell is the 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 the Falcon 9 and the Dragon spacecraft and developing the Mars colonial architecture. And at Tesla, it's working on the Model 3 and, you know, some in the design studio,

typically a half a day a week, dealing with aesthetics and look and feel things. And then most of the rest of the week is just going through engineering of the car itself, as well as engineering of the factory. because the biggest epiphany I've had this year is that what really matters is the machine that builds the machine, the factory, and that is at least towards magnitude harder than the vehicle itself. It's amazing to watch the robots go here and these cars just happen. Yeah. Now, this actually has a relatively low level of automation

compared to what the Gigafactory will have and what Model 3 will have. the speed on the line of these cars? Actually, the average speed of the line is incredibly slow. It's probably about including both X and S. It's maybe

five centimeters per second. And what can you go to? This is very slow. What would you like to get to? I'm confident we can get to at least one meter per second, so a 20-fold increase. That would be very fast.

Yeah. At least. I mean, I think quite a... One meter per second, just put that in perspective, is a slow walk, or like a medium-speed walk. A fast walk could be 1.5 meters per second, and then the fastest humans can run over 10 meters per second. So if we're only doing 0.05 meters per second, that's very slow, current speed. And at one meter per second, you can slow walk faster than the production line. I'm looking for a new video game to play. Can you give me a recommendation? Overwatch?

I play Overwatch. Anything else? Overwatch is amazing. Overwatch is amazing, yeah. Generally, Blizzard does great stuff. Well, there's Hothstone. I haven't tried that one yet. Yeah.

I know people love it. That's what my kids play the most, is Hothstone. Also from Blizzard. I'll check that out tonight. All right, well, thank you very much for the time, and I've got to get going. Cool. Do you play anything besides Overse?

I mean, we try the new DOSX? I have tried the new DOSX? a day's X. The best game I played recently, and it's not a super new game, is the Last of Us. Oh, is it really? It's from a couple of years ago. Sure. I loved it. Okay, Last of Us. Yeah. You like that, too? Is it really good? Uncharted, too. Yeah. Yeah, I've heard good things about uncharted. It was just, I've never seen. Storytelling like that in a video game. I mean, honestly, I think that's really neglected. I mean, that's the criticism I heard of the latest

Deosax. The storytelling is kind of lame. Like, whereas the one The prior DeosX, and the original DeiSX was, the storytelling was amazing. I don't know if anybody's played, do you play the original DeusX? That was killer. As games have become more like the replacement for the NFL, I think the storytelling just gets generally neglected. So it was like especially striking to play one that was like absolutely cinematic storytelling. Yeah, and some of the oldest games, the graphics and sound were terrible, so they had to rely on storytelling. Like the old Mario games had an incredible story.

Yeah. All right. Thanks for listening. please remember to subscribe to the show and leave a review on iTunes. After doing that, you can skip this section forever. And if you'd like to learn more about YC or read the show notes, you can check out blog.Ycommodator.com. See you next week.