Abundance Summit

audience and as you can see still trying to monetize hope. Yeah, yeah, you look like you're in great shape. I'm doing great. Last time I saw you >> sort of youth serum things going on or what? It's it's our longevity X prize. We're we're getting there, buddy. We're getting there. I think I think in our last conversation you're getting on board with the idea of extended longevity, yes? Uh Yeah. Okay. [laughter] I'll leave it at that. Some degree.

I mean like I don't know if we want everyone to live forever or whatever, but I think uh health span and and not you know, having an extended period [clears throat] of senescence where where you're just drooling on yourself sounds like a good idea. We we want to avoid that. Yeah. So, first off, congratulations on the merger of SpaceX and xAI. Baller move. Uh going to power humanity's first Dyson swarm? So, I'm curious uh Uh it truly truly is.

What's your timeline for launching these data centers and how much bandwidth do you think you can get in the first year? Give us a sense of the speed at which you're going to be making this happen. Uh yeah, so SpaceX is um has filed SpaceX is in a quiet period. I I can't actually uh tell you things that would cause a problems. Uh yeah. >> [laughter] >> I'll I'll leave it I'll leave it at that. I appreciate that.

But I can't wait for uh for the speed. You know, we had a conversation here on Monday with with Eric Schmidt uh and with one of the leads from one of the other hyper scalers. I won't mention who, but I'm curious where you feel we are in recursive self-improvement. Are we there? Do you see Grok doing recursive self-improvement at this point? And how and what's the timeline for AGI and ASI? Give us a sense of that.

Yeah, I I I think we're we've been on recursive improvement for a while here. Um you say if if it's really if you mean by like recursive self-improvement without a human in the loop. Is that what you mean? I do. I I on the on the AI software side. I mean humans are gradually getting less and less in the loop on the recursive self-improvement. So, you know, every successive model uh is is built by the one before it.

So, that that that that is happening to a large degree, but it's it's not yet fully automated. Um it may be there end of this year, but I'm not going to wait until the next year. Do you see a hard takeoff at that point? We're in the hard takeoff. Okay. Right now. Yes. I mean, look at I mean at this point I go to sleep, there's some massive AI breakthrough, and when I wake up there's another one. Yes. Yeah, it's hard to keep track, honestly.

It's a It's a bit of a head spinner. Yeah, well, I think a lot of that head spinning is happening from you, too. Yeah. Uh Well, you know, Grok is doing pretty well, and in some metrics by some metrics it's the best. For example, it's uh the best at predicting things, which I you know, it's arguably the the best metric for intelligence. Um the new Grok 4. 20 is it's really really good. Um we're we're currently behind on coding.

Um The reason I was put put late for this was that I was just in a giant sort of all hands sort of on coding, just going through all of the things that need to happen to uh essentially catch up and exceed uh our competitors on uh coding. Um which I think I think we'll do. I feel Yeah, we'll we should probably get there by the middle of this year.

Um And uh And then I I think people don't don't quite realize just how much intelligence there will be or you know, just how far it will exceed human intelligence. To a degree that is uh impossible to fully understand. Um but you can certainly imagine a situation where we Let's say if let's say a million times more energy is harnessed uh than all of Earth's current electricity usage.

That would still only be roughly a millionth of the sun's energy output. So, essentially if you increase Earth's economy by a factor of a million, it's still roughly a trillion So, since we're a trillionth of the sun's energy, if you increase Earth's economy in in in terms of electricity usage by roughly a million, you'll be roughly 1 millionth only of the sun's energy harnessed.

But what is it What is What is an economy or an intelligence using a million times more electricity than all of Earth's civilization think about or look like or do? It's going to be something pretty magnificent. Uh The challenge will be even vaguely appreciating that level of intelligence. Uh but it's it's safe to say it will it will solve everything you can possibly think of. Yes. >> Uh longevity being, you know, You're certainly one of them.

Um And um I I I do enjoy your unrelenting optimism. Um Thank you, pal. I see you I see you if you uh Hope. Hope. Yeah, exactly. You've taken to heart monetizing hope, uh which is pretty funny. Yeah, it was it was It was Grok's It was Grok's marketing advice to me when you roasted me on >> [laughter] >> Right. Okay. Grok was seeing you and saying you monetize hope.

But hey, if you you're going to manage to further monetizing misery >> Yes, but yes. Um For sure. Yeah. Um But but yeah, just the the when you when you have AI AI and robots are going to increase the the like economic output or or by by so many orders of magnitude we we we cannot possibly comprehend it. We're likely in the very short time to become a minority, then a vast minority, then a microscopic minority of intelligence on this planet.

Um Yes, not even on this planet, but in the solar system. >> Yes, for sure. Because um Like like if if you know, your best case outcome for uh Earth for intelligence is roughly 1 billionth of the sun's energy. Uh that's your best case outcome. Uh if you if you if you generate intelligence only on Earth. Intercept it, right? Yes.

Yes, cuz roughly one roughly half a billionth of the sun's energy hits Earth, and that's the vast majority of energy that that's out there um that that we can access. Uh so uh really the intelligence in the solar system will be many orders of magnitude greater than the intelligence on Earth itself. How May I ask you a question, Elon? Um how far out can you see? How many years out can you make reasonable predictions right now?

It's hard to predict the the path exactly, especially if it cuz often things are kind of an S curve or a series of S curves where it starts off slow grows exponentially hits linear zone and then goes logarithmic.

Um that generally has been what what I've seen with the breakthroughs in in AI AI for example is you'll you'll there'll be some breakthrough it'll do have an S curve but and then looks like it's just going to go to infinity but then you hit logarithmic returns until there's another breakthrough. Yeah. Um so progress in AI is just a sort of series of you know sort of overlapping S curves um or connected S curves.

Um I mean there was a point where you could probably predict out a decade or two decades. What are your thoughts now? >> Yeah. Okay, this is going to sound pretty crazy. That's okay. We we've been we've been talking about crazy all night. >> there's a separate acceptable audience to wild prognostications. Yes. Um >> [snorts] >> I'd say the economy is 10 times this its current size in 10 years. Greater than. Okay.

Um Yeah, you >> really saying something. Yeah, you said triple digit growth in in 5 plus years from now on on GDP. And 10x the economy. But in terms of your ability to >> Like I I I feel like that's uh that's that's a 10x in roughly 10 years um I feel is a I I actually feel like comfortable prediction uh with There's obviously if there's like World War or something um that that could put a kink in those plans uh or those expectations. Yeah.

Uh but in the absence of World War current trends continue I would say the the economy 10x in 10 years. Love it. Can you give us an We had a bunch of robots >> have a base on the moon. Yes. And we'll And we'll have >> have people on Mars. And we'll have mass drivers on the moon. Yes. Um I think so. In 10 years, I think I think we'll have a mass driver on the moon in 10 years. I love it. Uh Gerard K. O'Neill's vision uh being fulfilled.

Uh we had uh four robots on stage here this year um on the at the Abundance Summit. I I look forward to Optimus. I'm curious, Optimus 3 timeline and in [clears throat] particular when can I buy one or two? When's uh when do you expect Optimus to go into commercial uh for commercial sale? Or will you be leasing it? Well, we're in the final stages of completion of Optimus 3, which is really going to be by far the most advanced robot in the world.

Nothing's even close. Yeah. Um In fact, I haven't even seen any seen any demos of robots that are as good as Optimus 3, frankly. Maybe they're out there or they're secret or something, I don't know, but um You know, I I I have to make sure I'm saying things that are reasonably public as well, of course. Uh Of course. We're streaming this on X. Yeah. Okay, this is pretty public knowledge, I guess. >> Yes.

>> [laughter] >> Um Yeah, I I I think we'll start production on Optimus 3 this summer. Um but but very slow at first. Yeah. Um like it you know the sort of classic S curve ramp of manufacturing units versus time. Um and then probably reach high volume production around summer next year. Uh and then um you know, we'll we'll have Optimus 4 you know, the design likely next year.

I got to try to release a new robot design every year and I'm an improved robot design every year. When when Dave Blunden and I were at the Gigafactory, uh it was extraordinary experience, 11 and a half million square feet for the Tesla. And then I think you said you're building out 9 and a half million square feet for Optimus there as well, which is uh which is extraordinary. Um let's let's >> 9 square feet [clears throat] round numbers. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. I had to That'll be that'll be that'll be quite That that's going to be a a a a a new factory design, too. Like it's still not different from other factories. How far before we have robots building robots? I mean, you automated so much of the Gigafactory already uh where there are humans playing a small role. Do the robots just play the role that humans are playing in that regard? Uh we still have a lot of humans building things. Mhm.

Um you know, Tesla direct employees are uh building things uh or like basically people in the factory are either building or managing people who are building. Uh roughly 100,000. Uh so we have a lot of people. Is it To- Tesla total head count is around 150k. Of of which 2/3 are, you know, in the factory in one form or another. And then our suppliers there's probably uh maybe a a million or two million people in our suppliers type of thing.

So, it's it's a lot of people. Um What what we do expect that is that is that the output per per person at Tesla becomes very, very high. Yeah. So, we're not planning any like layoffs or reductions in personnel. In fact, we will increase our head count. Um But, the output per human at Tesla is going to get nutty high. When we were to Like you can't really believe it, you know.

When we were together um we discussed the idea of sustainable abundance on our podcast and you reinforced the idea that we have a coming age of universal high income uh which has become a point of discussion beyond UBI. But, I'm just wondering if you have any thoughts on how we get there. Have you reflected on that any further?

And and more so, you know, we talked about a time frame of civil unrest, you know, two, three, four, five years uh probably uh a lot of COVID-like checks in the interim until we get to a demonetization uh and a you know, deflation that leads us to UHI. Any more reflections on that? Cuz that's a really People need that hope and that vision. Yeah. >> I mean, to be clear, I don't I don't I don't think we should be sort of complacent.

We need to We do need to be careful because the future is a range of possible outcomes and uh they're not all great. Um But, I I at this point I I I I do agree with you that it's it's likely to be great. Um you know, it's probably 80% likely, maybe more likely to be great. And uh and I and I do think we'll have universal high income.

We're we're We're just issuing money to people, you know, and and they are really just uh because the output of goods and services will far so far exceed the money supply that um you know, that that that effectively have deflation cuz just deflation is just the ratio of the outputs of goods and services to the money supply.

Um so, that that's uh so if you if you if the rate of growth of of goods and services far exceeds the rate of growth of the money supply, which I predict will happen, uh then uh you'll have deflation. Yes. And a lot of a lot of people spinning up new companies, competing against each other, driving the price down, and increasing the variability and deflation. Faster and faster.

Yeah, it's basically AI and robots are going to make so much stuff and provide so many services that uh they'll actually run out of things to do for the humans. They'll just run out of things to do for the humans. And then they they'll you know, there's there's only so much that humans can even express that they want.

So, you go back to my example of like if you go a million times greater than the US economy, you you've long since saturated all human desire. Uh you know, like maybe like even if you go a thousand times more than our current economy, thousand times, you you you've probably already saturated saturated the human anything people can think of that they want. So, do do you think the the value of money is going to significantly decrease?

Will it Will we go post-capitalist? Yeah, I think money will stop being relevant at some point in the future. So, just as you're becoming a >> it's it's it's it's probably something like an in-banks uh culture sort of future. Um And I I think the AI down the road will really not use uh human currency. It will just care about uh power and mass, wattage and tonnage. Yeah. It's kind of ironic then, right?

Just as you're becoming a multi-trillionaire, money starts to have less value. Um Yeah. Pretty much. Um Uh yeah. You know, this this all this stuff is just really just trillionaire sort of represents like some percentage ownership in companies that I have >> Yeah. uh you know, built and it's not like sitting in a bank account, you know, it's just it's just literally I own a percentage of the companies.

The companies are doing lots of useful things. The value of the company grows. I own a percentage of the companies and that's the sums up to that number which seems high. Yeah. You know, it's I I I was interviewed by somebody who was asking me about your your drive, what drives you. And I said Elon's driven to solve problems. He's driven to make life in the world better by just solving the biggest problems over and over and over again.

And if someone else were solving them, he wouldn't need to. But no one else is solving them. So, I just want to say, >> Yeah. thank you for that, pal. Thank you for that. Uh you're welcome. Um >> [applause] >> I >> [applause] >> I I am curious. Do you think that democracy and our modern institutions can keep up with a supersonic tsunami coming our way? Are they just going to fall in its way? They're just going to break down. How do we deal?

I mean, it's called the singularity for a reason, you know, which [laughter] is that it's hard to predict what happens in the in the singularity. I mean, Grok's logo is the singularity. >> I love it. It's a beautiful logo behind you, by the way. It's gorgeous. Yeah, thank you. Uh yeah. It It's sort of the light The light The The The halo around a a black hole is that the mass and light are falling in type of thing.

Um It's hard It's hard to know what happens inside the singularity. Um but it's going to be very interesting. I We're going to live in The future will be very entertaining. Of that I'm confident. >> Yes. Um And uh I I think also like AI and robotics also I mean we're going to solve our budget deficit, frankly, and and not just go bankrupt as a country.

Um So I I'm I'm You know, you've had an influence on me in that I'm like just I've just decided to be more optimistic. It's like we just should be more optimistic. >> Thank you, pal. >> I wasn't an optimist, but I was like maybe dwelling a little too much on the negative stuff. It's all It's all upside being an optimist. And a realist a little bit. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

You don't want to be complacent or just assume everything's going to go well, but try to make it go well. Um But I mean, there will be some pretty amazing things that happen.

So, if you've got uh humanoid robots that are that have very high dexterity and uh and and and are incredibly smart, it means that everyone on Earth will have access to better medical care than than uh than the richest person on Earth, which by the way, I would say like, you know, if I'm allegedly the richest person in the world I think actually sovereigns are richer than me, by the way.

But But it's like I like you know, I like I had to have like an like a neck surgery three times cuz the first two ones were done wrong. You know, like this is I'm like what the you know. Um >> [laughter] >> So And and I'm like my back still hurts a little bit. I'm like can AI please solve back pain? That would be a huge win. And I think it will. Yep. So you know, back pain sucks.

I think that's maybe like a you know, someone asked why do people get grumpy when they get older? It's cuz back pain. You know, it's like if your back hurts all the time you can't sleep well, you're going to be grumpy. We had uh Um but You you We had David Sinclair on stage this morning and he's going into human trials with ERW 100 his partial epigenetic reprogramming.

And uh one of the one of the papers recently published shows it uh enables joint repair. And so back pain may be one of the things that uh it eliminates. So Uh That'll be amazing. Yeah, for sure. For sure. >> Every honestly average happiness level for humans would just go up so tremendously if you just solve back pain because it's not a question of of if you will get back pain, it's when you know, you'll get back pain.

I I I keep on invite I keep on inviting you to come down to Fountain Life in in in Dallas. We'll we'll help you out, but sometime when you have time. >> you have like what do you I understand like you can get like MRI and CAT scans and everything, but like what do you do with that? You know, it's like I'm happy to happy to send you the list. I'll I'll DM you the list of therapeutics. >> some or something. Yeah, exactly.

>> [laughter] >> Uh you know, um listen, you've been so generous. Next up on stage with me is one of another great Moonshot entrepreneur Ben Lam who runs Colossal uh the de-extinction company. Uh you know, the woolly mammoth and 15 other species. I heard I heard you say you might want a mini woolly mammoth. Is that Is that true? >> Yeah, I think it'd be really cool to have a pet miniature woolly mammoth. That'd be pretty epic. Okay.

I'll I'll put a word in with you for you with uh with with Ben. >> [laughter] >> They're very adorable. Little things just running around trumpeting away and it's like look at this this >> [laughter] >> would be a great little pet. Amazing. And also I can somebody please do Jurassic Park in real life? I'd definitely go out even if there was some risk of death. That'd be super cool.

I think if anybody's going to do that it's it's Ben Lam in Colossal. He's re- he's engineering living life products. Someone asked him recently if he can make a Pikachu and he said probably. I think Yeah. Well, Jurassic Jurassic World or whatever that would be great. All right, I'll ask him. Elon, so grateful for you coming and joining us and sharing. Thank you my Thank you my friend. Let's give it up for Elon Musk. I have the power.

Nothing's going to stop us. >> [music] >> You have the power.