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<s><|user|> And it's almost impossible to imagine the end of it that doesn't look like almost exactly like the beginning in terms of what land belongs to who and so on. But on the other side of a lot of human suffering, death and destruction of infrastructure.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yes. The thing that‚... The reason I proposed some sort of truce or peace a year ago was because I've predicted pretty much exactly what would happen, which is a lot of people dying for basically almost no changes in land and the loss of the flower of Ukrainian and Russian youth. And we should have some sympathy for the Russian boys as well as the Ukrainian boys, because Russian boys, because boys didn't ask to be on their frontline. They have to be. So there's a lot of sons not coming back to their parents, and I think most of them don't hate the other side. it's sort of like as this saying comes from World War I, it's like young boys who don't know each other killing each other on behalf of old men that do know each other. The hell's the point of that.<|end|>
<s><|user|> So Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that he's not, or has said in the past, he's not interested in talking to Putin directly. Do you think he should sit down man to man, lead a leader, and negotiate peace?<|end|> <|assistant|> Look, I think I would just recommend do not send the flower of Ukrainian youth to die in trenches, whether he talks to Putin or not, just don't do that. Whoever goes on the offensive will lose massive numbers of people and history will not look kindly upon them.<|end|>
<s><|user|> you've spoken honestly about the possibility of war between US and China in the longterm if no diplomatic solution is found, for example, on the question of Taiwan and One China policy, how do we avoid the trajectory where these two superpowers clash?<|end|> <|assistant|> Well, it's worth reading that book on the, difficult to pronounce, the Thucydides Trap, I believe it's called. I love war history. I like inside out and backwards. there's hardly a battle I haven't read about. And trying to figure out what really was the cause of victory in any particular case as opposed to what one side or another claim the reason.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Both the victory and what sparked the war and-<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah, yeah.<|end|>
<s><|user|> The whole thing.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah. So that Athens and Sparta is a classic case. The thing about the Greek is they really wrote down a lot of stuff. They loved writing. There are lots of interesting things that happened in many parts of the world, but people didn't write down, so we don't know what happened or they didn't really write in detail. They just would say, "We had a battle and we won". And what? Can you add a bit more? The Greeks, they really wrote a lot. They were very articulate one. They just love writing. And we have a bunch of that writing as preserved. So we know what led up to the Peloponnesian War between the Spartanand Athenian Alliance, and we know that they saw it coming.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Spartans didn't write‚... They also weren't very verbose by their nature, but they did write, but they weren't very verbose. They were. But the Athenians and the other Greeks wrote a line, and Spartan was really kind of like the leader of Greece. But Athens grew stronger and stronger with each passing year. And everyone's like, 'Well, that's inevitable that there's going to be a clash between Athens and Sparta. Well, how do we avoid that?‚' And actually they saw it coming and they still could not avoid it. So at some point, if one group, one civilization or country or whatever exceeds another sort of like the United States has been the biggest kid on the block since I think around 1890 from an economic standpoint.<|end|> <|assistant|> So the United States has been the most powerful economic engine in the world longer than anyone's been alive. And the foundation of war is economics. So now we have a situation in the case of China where the economy is likely to be two, perhaps three times larger than that of the US. So imagine you're the biggest kid on the block for as long as anyone can remember, and suddenly a kid comes along who's twice your size.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Maybe a good question to ask is, what are some things about China that people don't understand, positive just in the culture? What's some interesting things that you've learned about the Chinese?<|end|> <|assistant|> Well, the sheer number of really smart, hardworking people in China is incredible. There are really say how many smart, hardworking people are there in China? there's far more of them there than there are here, I think, in my opinion. And they've got a lot of energy. So I mean, the architecture in China that's in recent years is far more impressive than the US. I mean the train stations, the buildings, the high speed rail, everything, it's really far more impressive than what we have in the US. I mean, I recommend somebody just go to Shanghai and Beijing, look at the buildings and go to take the train from Beijing to Xian, where you have the terracotta warriors. China's got an incredible history, very long history, and I think arguably in terms of the use of language from a written standpoint, one of the oldest, perhaps the oldest written language, and then China, people did write things down. So now China historically has always been, with rare exception, been internally focused. They have not been inquisitive. They've fought each other. There've been many, many civil wars. In the Three Kingdoms war, I believe they lost about 70% of their population. So they've had brutal internal wars, civil wars that make the US Civil War look small by comparison. So I think it's important to appreciate that China is not monolithic. We sort of think of China as a sort of one entity of one mind. And this is definitely not the case. From what I've seen and I think most people who understand China would agree, people in China think about China 10 times more than they think about anything outside of China. So it's like 90% of their consideration is internal.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Well, isn't that a really positive thing when you're talking about the collaboration and the future piece between superpowers when you're inward facing, which is focusing on improving yourself versus focusing on quote, unquote improving others through military might.<|end|> <|assistant|> The good news, the history of China suggests that China is not inquisitive, meaning They're not going to go out and invade a whole bunch of countries. Now they do feel very strongly‚... So that's good. I mean, because a lot of very powerful countries have been inquisitive. The US is also one of the rare cases that has not been inquisitive. After World War II, the US could have basically taken over the world in any country, we've got nukes, nobody else has got nukes. We don't even have to lose soldiers. Which country do you want? And the United States could have taken over everything and it didn't. And the United States actually helped rebuild countries. So it helped rebuild Europe, helped rebuild Japan. This is very unusual behavior, almost unprecedented.<|end|>
<s><|user|> The US did conspicuous acts of kindness like the Berlin Airlift. And I think it's always like, well, America's done bad things. Well, of course America's done bad things, but one needs to look at the whole track record and just generally, one sort of test would be how do you treat your prisoners at war? Or let's say, no offense to the Russians, but let's say you're in Germany, it's 1945, you've got the Russian Army coming one side and you've got the French, British and American Army's coming the other side, who would you like to be just surrendered to? No country is perfect, but I recommend being a POW with the Americans. That would be my choice very strongly.<|end|> <|assistant|> Very much so. And in fact, Wernher von Braun, a smart guy, was like, 'We've got to be captured by the Americans.‚' And in fact, the SS was under orders to execute von Braun and all of the German rocket conditioners, and they narrowly escaped. They said they were going out for a walk in the woods. They left in the middle of winter with no coats and then ran, but no food, no coats, no water, and just ran like hell and ran West and Vice Sherlock, I think his brother found a bicycle or something and then just cycled West as fast as he couldn't have found a US patrol. So anyway, that's one way you can tell morality is where do you want to be a PW? it's not fun anywhere, but some places are much worse than others. Anyway, so America has been, while far from perfect, generally a benevolent force, and we should always be self-critical and we try to be better, but anyone with half a brain knows that. So I think there are‚... In this way, China and the United States are similar. Neither country has been acquisitive in a significant way. So that's a shared principle, I guess. Now, China does feel very strongly about Taiwan. They've been very clear about that for a long time. From this standpoint, it would be like one of the states is not there like Hawaii or something like that but more significant than Hawaii. And Hawaii is pretty significant for us. So they view it as really there's a fundamental part of China, the island of Formosa, not Taiwan, that is not part of China, but should be. And the only reason it hasn't been is because the US Pacific fleet.<|end|>
<s><|user|> And is their economic power grows and is their military power grows, the thing that They're clearly saying is their interest will clearly be materialized.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yes, China has been very clear that they'll incorporate Taiwan peacefully or militarily, but that they will incorporate it from their standpoint is 100% likely.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Something you said about conspicuous acts of kindness as a geopolitical policy, it almost seems naive, but I'd venture to say that this is probably the path forward, how you avoid most wars. Just as you say it sounds naive, but it's kind of brilliant. If you believe in the goodness of underlying most of human nature, it just seems like conspicuous acts of kindness can reverberate through the populace of the countries involved and deescalate.<|end|> <|assistant|> Absolutely. So after World War I, they made a big mistake. They basically tried to lump all of blame on Germany and saddle Germany with impossible reparations. And really there was quite a bit of blame to go around for World War I, but they try to put it all in Germany and that laid the seeds for World War II. So a lot of people, were not just Hitler, a lot of people felt wronged and they wanted vengeance and they got it.<|end|>
<s><|user|> People don't forget.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah, you kill somebody's father, mother or son, daughter, They're not going to forget it. They'll want vengeance. So after World War II, They're like, 'Well, the Treaty of Versi was a huge mistake in World War I. And so this time, instead of crushing the losers, we're actually going to help them with the module plan, and we're going to help rebuild Germany. We're going to help rebuild Austria and Italy and whatnot.‚' So that was the right move.<|end|>
<s><|user|> It does feel like there's a profound truth to the conspicuous acts of kindness being an antidote to this.<|end|> <|assistant|> Something must stop the cycle of reciprocal violence. Something must stop it, or I'll never stop. Just eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth, limb for a limb, life for a life forever and ever.<|end|>
<s><|user|> To escape briefly the darkness, was some incredible engineering work, xAI just released Grok AI assistant that I've gotten a chance to play with. it's amazing on many levels. First of all, it's amazing that a relatively small team in a relatively short amount of time was able to develop this close to state-of-the-art system. Another incredible thing is there's a regular mode and there's a fun mode.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah, I guess I'm to blame for that one.<|end|>
<s><|user|> First of all, I wish everything in life had a fun mode.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah.<|end|>
<s><|user|> there's something compelling beyond just fun about the fun mode interacting with a large language model. I'm not sure exactly what it is because I've only have had a little bit of time to play with it, but it just makes it more interesting, more vibrant to interact with the system.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah, absolutely. Our AI, Grok, is modeled after The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which is one of my favorite books, which it's a book on philosophy. it's- My favorite books, it's a book on philosophy, disguises book on humor. And I would say that forms the basis of my philosophy, which is that we don't know the meaning of life, but the more we can expand the scope and scale of consciousness, digital and biological, the more we're able to understand what questions to ask about the answer that is the universe. So I have a philosophy of curiosity.<|end|>
<s><|user|> There is generally a feeling like this AI system has an outward looking, like the way you are sitting with a good friend looking up at the stars, asking pod head like questions about the universe, wondering what it's all about. The curiosity that you talk about. No matter how mundane the question I ask it, there's a sense of cosmic grandeur to the whole thing.<|end|> <|assistant|> Well, we are actually working hard to have engineering math, physics answers that you can count on. So for the other AIs out there, these so-called large language models, I've not found the engineering to be reliable. It unfortunately hallucinates most when you at least want it to hallucinate. So when you're asking important, difficult questions, that's when it tends to be confidently wrong. So we're really trying hard to say, okay, how do we be as grounded as possible? So you can count on the results, trace things back to physics first principles, mathematical logic. So underlying the humor is an aspiration to adhere to the truth of the universe as closely as possible.<|end|>
<s><|user|> that's really tricky.<|end|> <|assistant|> It is tricky. So that's why there's always going to be some amount of error. But do we want to aspire to be as truthful as possible about the answers with acknowledged error. So that there was always, you don't want to be confidently wrong, so you're not going to be right every time, but you want to minimize how often you're confidently wrong. And then like I said, once you can count on the logic as being not violating physics, then you can start to bull on that to create inventions, like invent new technologies. But if you cannot count on the foundational physics being correct, obviously the inventions are simply wishful thinking, imagination land. Magic basically.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Well, as you said, I think one of the big goals of XAI is to understand the universe.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yes, that's how simple three word mission.<|end|>
<s><|user|> If you look out far into the future, do you think on this level of physics, the very edge of what we understand about physics, do you think it will make the sexiest discovery of them as we know now, unifying general relativity and quantum mechanics? So coming up with a theory of everything, do you think it could push towards that direction, almost like theoretical physics discoveries?<|end|> <|assistant|> If an AI cannot figure out new physics, it's clearly not equal to humans, nor has surpassed humans because humans have figured out new physics. Physics is just deepening what's inside into how reality works. And then there's engineering which is inventing things that have never existed. Now the range of possibilities for engineering is far greater than for physics because once you figure out the rules of the universe, that's it. you've discovered things that already existed. But from that you can then build technologies that are really almost limitless in the variety. And it's like once you understand the rules of the game properly, and with current physics, we do at least at a local level, understand how physics works very well. Our ability to predict things is incredibly good. Degree to which quantum mechanics can predict outcomes is incredible. That was my hardest class in college by the way. My senior quantum mechanics class was harder than all of my other classes put together.<|end|>
<s><|user|> To get an AI system, a large language model be as reliable as quantum mechanics and physics is very difficult.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah. You have to test any conclusions against the ground truth of reality. Reality is the ultimate judge. Like physics is the law, everything else is a recommendation. I've seen plenty of people break the laws made by man, but none break the laws made by physics.<|end|>
<s><|user|> it's a good test actually. If this LLM understands and matches physics, then you can more reliably trust whatever it thinks about the current state of politics in some sense.<|end|> <|assistant|> And it's also not the case currently that even that its internal logic is not consistent. So especially with the approach of just predicting a token predict token, predict token, it's like a vector sum. You're summing up a bunch of vectors, but you can get drift. A little bit of error adds up and by the time you are many tokens down the path, it doesn't make any sense.<|end|>
<s><|user|> So it has to be somehow self-aware about the drift.<|end|> <|assistant|> It has to be self-aware about the drift, and then look at the thing as a gestalt as a whole and say it doesn't have coherence as a whole. When authors write books, they will write the book and then they'll go and revise it, take into account all the end and the beginning and the middle and rewrite it to achieve coherence so that it doesn't end up at a nonsensical place.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Maybe the process of revising is what reasoning is, and then the process of revising is how you get closer and closer to truth. At least I approached that way, you just say a bunch of bullshit first and then you get it better. You start a bullshit and then you-<|end|> <|assistant|> Create a draft and then you iterate on that draft until it has coherence, until it all adds up basically.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Another question about theory of everything, but for intelligence, as you're exploring this with XAI, creating this intelligence system? Do you think there is a theory of intelligence where you get to understand what is the I in AGI and what is the I in human intelligence?<|end|> <|assistant|> No, I in team America. Wait, there is.<|end|>
<s><|user|> No, it's going to be stuck in my head now. Yeah, there's no me and whatever in quantum mechanics, wait. I mean is that part of the process of discovering, understanding the universe is understanding intelligence?<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah. I think we need to understand intelligence, understand consciousness. I mean there are some fundamental questions of what is thought, what is emotion? Is it really just one atom bumping into another atom? It feels like something more than that. So I think we're probably missing some really big things.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Something that'll be obvious in retrospect. You put the whole consciousness and motion.<|end|> <|assistant|> Well, some people would quote like a soul religion, be a soul. You feel like you're you, I mean you don't feel like you're just a collection of atoms, but on what dimension does thought exist? What dimension does do emotions exist? Because we feel them very strongly. I suspect there's more to it than atoms bumping into atoms.<|end|>
<s><|user|> And maybe AI can pave the path to the discovery whatever the hell that thing is.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah. What is consciousness? When you put the atoms in a particular shape, why are they able to form thoughts and take actions and feelings?<|end|>
<s><|user|> And even if it is an illusion, why is this illusion so compelling?<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah. Why does the solution exist? On what plane does the solution exist? And sometimes I wonder is either perhaps everything's conscious or nothing's conscious. One of the two.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Like the former, everything conscious just seems more fun.<|end|> <|assistant|> It does seem more fun, yes. But we're composed of atoms and those atoms are composed of quarks and leptons and those quarks and leptons have been around since the beginning of the universe.<|end|>
<s><|user|> The beginning of the universe.‚'<|end|> <|assistant|> What seems to be the beginning of the universe.<|end|>
<s><|user|> The first time we talked, you said, which is surreal to think that this discussion was happening is becoming a reality. I asked you what question would you ask an AGI system once you create it? And you said, 'What's outside the simulation,‚' is the question. Good question. But it seems like with Grok you started literally the system's goal is to be able to answer such questions and to ask such questions.<|end|> <|assistant|> Where are the aliens?<|end|>
<s><|user|> Where are the aliens?<|end|> <|assistant|> that's one of the foam paradox question. A lot of people have asked me if I've seen any evidence of aliens and I haven't, which is kind of concerning. I think I'd probably prefer to at least have seen some archeological evidence of aliens. To the best of my knowledge, I'm not aware of any evidence surveillance. If They're out there, They're very subtle. We might just be the only consciousness, at least in the galaxy. And if you look at say the history of Earth, to believe the archeological record Earth is about four and a half billion years old. Civilization as measured from the first writing is only about 5,000 years old. We have to give some credit there to the ancient Sumerians who aren't around anymore. I think it was an archaic pre-form was the first actual symbolic representation, but only about 5,000 years ago. I think that's a good date for when we say civilization started. that's 1000000th of Earth's existence. So civilization has been around. it's really a flash in the pan so far. And why did it take so long? Four and a half billion years, for the vast majority of the time, there was no life. And then there was archaic bacteria for a very long time. And then you had mitochondria get captured, multicellular life, differentiation into plants and animals, life moving from the oceans to land, mammals, higher brain functions. And the sun is expanding slowly but I'll heat the earth up at some point in the future, boil the oceans and earth will become like Venus, where life as we know it is impossible. So if we do not become multiplanetary and ultimately solar system, annihilation of all life on earth is a certainty. A certainty. And it could be as little as on the galactic timescale, half a billion years, long time by human standards, but that's only 10% longer than earth has been around at all. So if life had taken 10% longer to evolve on earth, it wouldn't exist at all.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Glad a deadline coming up, you better hurry. But that said, as you said, humans intelligent life on earth developed a lot of cool stuff very quickly. So it seems like becoming a multiplanetary is almost inevitable. Unless we destroy-<|end|> <|assistant|> We need to do it. I suspect that if we are able to go out there and explore other star systems that we‚... there's a good chance we find a whole bunch of long dead one planet civilizations that never made it past their home planet.<|end|>
<s><|user|> that's so sad. Also fascinating.<|end|> <|assistant|> I mean there are various explanations for paradox and one is They're these great vultures which civilizations don't pass through. And one of those great vultures is do you become a multi-plan civilization or not? And if you don't, it's simply a matter of time before something happens on your planet, either natural or manmade that causes us to die out. Like the dinosaurs, where are they now? They didn't have spaceships.<|end|>
<s><|user|> I think the more likely thing is because just to empathize with the aliens that they found us and They're protecting us and letting us be.<|end|> <|assistant|> I hope so. Nice aliens.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Just like the tribes in the Amazon, the uncontacted tribes or protecting them. that's what-<|end|> <|assistant|> That would be a nice explanation.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Or you could have, what was it? I think Andre Kappelhoff said, 'it's like the ants and the Amazon asking where's everybody?‚'<|end|> <|assistant|> Well, they do run into a lot of other ants.<|end|>
<s><|user|> that's true.<|end|> <|assistant|> These ant wars.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Sounds like a good TV show.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah. They literally have these big wars between various ants.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Yeah. Maybe I'm just dismissing all the different diversity of ants.<|end|> <|assistant|> Listen to that Werner Herzog talking about the jungle. it's really hilarious. Have you heard it?<|end|>
<s><|user|> No, I have not. But Werner Herzog is a way.<|end|> <|assistant|> You should play it as an interlude in the‚... it's on YouTube. it's awesome.<|end|>
<s><|user|> I love him so much.<|end|> <|assistant|> He's great.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Was he the director of happy people life and the Taiga? I think also-<|end|> <|assistant|> He did that bear documentary. I did this thing about penguins.<|end|>
<s><|user|> The psycho analysis of a penguin.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah. The penguins headed for mountains that are 70 miles away and penguin is just headed for dom, basically.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Well, he had a cynical take. He could be just a brave explorer and there'll be great stories told about him amongst the penguin population for many centuries to come. What were we talking about? Okay.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah. So aliens, I mean, I don't know. Look, I think the smart move is just this is the first time in the history of earth that it's been possible for life to extend beyond earth. That window is open. Now it may be open for a long time or it may be open for a short time and it may be open now and then never open again. So I think the smart move here is to make life multiplanetary while it's possible to do so. We don't want to be one of those lame one planet civilizations that just dies out.<|end|>
<s><|user|> No, those are lame.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah. Lame. Self-respecting, civilization would be one planet.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Oh<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah<|end|>
<s><|user|> there's not going to be a Wikipedia entry for one of those. Do SpaceX have an official policy for when we meet aliens?<|end|> <|assistant|> No.<|end|>
<s><|user|> That seems irresponsible.<|end|> <|assistant|> I mean, look, if I see the slightest indication that there are aliens, I will immediately post on X platform anything I know.<|end|>
<s><|user|> It could be the most liked reposted post of all time.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah. I mean, look, we have more satellites up there right now than everyone else combined. So we know if we've got a maneuver around something and we don't have to maneuver around anything.<|end|>
<s><|user|> If we go to the big questions once again, you said you're with Einstein, that you believe in the goddess Spinoza.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yes.<|end|>
<s><|user|> So that's that view that God is like the universe and reveals himself through the laws of physics or as Einstein said, 'Through the lawful harmony of the world.‚'<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah. I would agree that God of the simulator or whatever the supreme beings reveal themselves through the physics, they have creatives of this existence and incumbent upon us to try to understand more about this one creation.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Who created this thing? Who's running this thing? Embodying it into a singular question with a sexy word on top of it is focusing the mind to understand. It does seem like there's a, again, it could be an illusion. It seems like there's a purpose that there's an underlying master plan of some kind, and it seems like.<|end|> <|assistant|> There may not be a master plan in the sense. So maybe an interesting answer to the question of determinism versus free will is that if we are in a simulation, the reason that these higher beings would hold a simulation is to see what happens. So they don't know what happens otherwise they wouldn't hold the simulation. So when humans create a simulation, so it's SpaceX and Tesla, we create simulations all the time. Especially for the rocket, you have to run a lot of simulations to understand what's going to happen because you can't really test the rocket until it goes to space and you want it to work. So you have to simulate subsonic, transonic, supersonic, hypersonic, ascend, and then coming back, super high heating and orbital dynamics. All this has got to be simulated because you don't get very many kicks at the can. But we run the simulations to see what happens, not if we knew what happens, we wouldn't run the simulation. So whoever created this existence, They're running it because they don't know what's going to happen, not because they do.<|end|>
<s><|user|> So maybe we both played Diablo. Maybe Diablo was created to see if Druid, your character, could defeat Uber Lilith at the end. They didn't know.<|end|> <|assistant|> Well, the funny thing is Uber Lilith, her title is Hatred Incarnate. And right now, I guess you can ask the Diablo team, but it's almost impossible to defeat Hatred in the eternal realm.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Yeah. you've streamed yourself dominating Tier 100 Nightmare Dungeon. And still-<|end|> <|assistant|> I can cruise through Tier 100 Nightmare Dungeon like a stroll in the park.<|end|>
<s><|user|> And still you're defeated by Hatred?<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah. I guess maybe the second hardest boss is Duriel. Duriel can even scratch the paint. So I killed Duriel so many times and every other boss in the game, all of them kill him so many times, it's easy. But Uber Lilith, otherwise known as Hatred Incarnate, especially if you're Duriel and you have no ability to go to be vulnerable, there are these random death waves that come at you. Really I am 52, so my reflex is not what they used to be, but I have a lifetime of playing video games. At one point, I was maybe one of the best quake players in the world. I actually won money in what I think was the first paid eSports tournament in the US. We were doing four person quake tournaments and I was the second best person on the team and the actual best person that‚... We were actually winning, we would've come first, except the best person on the team. His computer crashed halfway through the game. So we came second, but I got money for it and everything. So basically I got skills, albeit no spring chicken these days. And to be totally frank, it's driving me crazy to beat Lilith as a Druid, basically trying to beat Hatred Incarnate in the eternal realm.<|end|>
<s><|user|> As a Druid.<|end|> <|assistant|> As a Druid. This is really vexing, let me tell you.<|end|>
<s><|user|> I mean, the challenge is part of the fun. I have seen directly, you're actually a world-class, incredible video game player. And I think Diablo, so you're just picking up a new game and you're figuring out its fundamentals. You're also with the Paragon Board and the build are not somebody like me who perfectly follows whatever they suggest on the internet. You're also an innovator there, which is hilarious to watch. it's like a mad scientist just trying to figure out the Paragon Board and the build. Is there some interesting insights there about if somebody's starting as a druid, do you have advice?<|end|> <|assistant|> I would not recommend playing a druid in the eternal realm. Right now I think the most powerful character in the seasonal realm is the Sorcerer with the lightning balls. The smokes have huge balls in the seasonal.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Yeah, that's what they say.<|end|> <|assistant|> So have huge balls. They do huge balls of lightning.<|end|>
<s><|user|> I'll take you word for it.<|end|> <|assistant|> In the seasonal realm, it's pretty easy to beat Uber Lilith because you get these vapor powers that out amplify your damage and increase your defense and whatnot. So really quite easy to defeat Hatred seasonally, but to defeat Hatred eternally very difficult, almost impossible. it's very impossible. It seems like a metaphor for life.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Yeah. I like the idea that Elon Musk, because I was playing Diablo yesterday and I saw Level 100 Druid just run by, I will never die and then run back the other way. And this metaphor, it's hilarious that you, Elon Musk is restlessly, fighting Hatred in this demonic realm.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yes.<|end|>
<s><|user|> it's hilarious. I mean it's pretty hilarious.<|end|> <|assistant|> No, it's absurd. Really, it's exercise and absurdity and it makes me want to pull my hair out.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Yeah. What do you get from video games in general, for you personally?<|end|> <|assistant|> I don't know. It calms my mind. I mean, killing the demons in a video game calms the demons in my mind. If you play a tough video game, you can get into a state of flow, which is very enjoyable. Admittedly, it needs to be not too easy, not too hard, kind of in the Goldilocks zone, and I guess you generally want to feel like you're progressing in the game. A good video, and there's also beautiful art, engaging storylines, and it's like an amazing puzzle to solve, I think. So it's like solving the puzzle.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Elden Ring the greatest game of all time. I still haven't played it, but to you-<|end|> <|assistant|> Elden Ring is definitely a candidate for best game ever. Top five for sure.<|end|>
<s><|user|> I think I've been scared how hard it is or how hard I hear it is, but it's beautiful.<|end|> <|assistant|> Elden Ring, feels like it's designed by an alien.<|end|>
<s><|user|> it's a theme to this discussion. In what way?<|end|> <|assistant|> it's so unusual. it's incredibly creative, and the art is stunning. I recommend playing it on a big resolution, high dynamic raised TV even. It doesn't need to be a monitor. Just the art is incredible. it's so beautiful and it's so unusual, and each of those top bus battles is unique. it's a unique puzzle to solve. Each one's different and the strategy you use to solve one battle is different from another battle.<|end|>
<s><|user|> That said, you said Druid, an internal against Uber Lilith is the hardest boss battle you've ever‚...<|end|> <|assistant|> Correct. That is currently the, and I've played a lot of video games because that's my primary recreational activity. And yes, beating Hatred in the internal realm is the hardest bus battle in life. And in the video game. I'm not sure it's possible, but I do make progress. So then I'm like, ‚' Okay. I'm making progress. Maybe if I just tweak that paragon board a little more, I can do it could.‚' Just dodge a few more waves, I could do it.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Well, the simulation is created for the purpose of figuring out if it can be done, and you're just a cog in the machine of the simulation.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah, it might be. I have a feeling that at least I think-<|end|>
<s><|user|> it's doable.<|end|> <|assistant|> it's doable. Yes.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Well, that's the human spirit right there to believe.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah. I mean, it did prompt me to think about just hate in general, which is you want to be careful of one of those things where you wish for something that sounds good, but if you get it's actually a dystopian situation. So if you wish for world peace sounds good, but how'd it enforced and at what cost eternal peace? It might actually be worse to have eternal peace because of what that would entail. The suppression of everyone, it might be the suppression of progress. It might be an ossified society that never changes. What I'm saying is that there is an argument that if you wish for no war, you should be careful what you wish for because what's required in order for there to be no war might be worse than a little war.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Yeah. The things we'll consider to be flaws of human civilization might be a necessary components for whatever optimal looks like. I mean this, do you worry about AI, AGI enabling a dystopian state of this nature, whether it's 1984 with surveillance and fear or brave new world with pleasure and what is it? Lots of sex, but no deep human experience.<|end|> <|assistant|> there's actually a real drug called Soma.<|end|>
<s><|user|> There is?<|end|> <|assistant|> Yes.<|end|>
<s><|user|> I'm going to take notes.<|end|> <|assistant|> Does Gong know about it? No. He probably will go to Brave New World. We got to ask it.<|end|>
<s><|user|> What would be the question?<|end|> <|assistant|> Tell us about the drug called Soma.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Tell us about the drug called Soma. it's going to go to Brave New World, I think.<|end|> <|assistant|> Well, there's a real drug as well.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Searching for Soma drug information. Oh boy. Soma, the wonder drug‚... By the way, I'm in fun mode.<|end|> <|assistant|> Okay, fun. Yeah. So it's talking about the real drug.<|end|>
<s><|user|> it's a muscle relaxant that's been around since the 1950s. it's used to treat muscle pain and discomfort, and it does this by altering the activity between neurons and the spinal cord. Now, Soma isn't just a pain reliever, it's also a bit of a sedative. It can make you feel a bit drowsy. So it's not something to take if you're planning on operating, having machinery or trying to solve complex math equations. And it goes on and on. In conclusion, Soma is a drug that can be helpful for those dealing with muscle pain, but it's not without its risks. that's pretty good. Wait a minute.<|end|> <|assistant|> that's the real drug it's talking about.<|end|>
<s><|user|> it's the real drug. And of course the fun is always use it responsibly in accordance with the advice of a healthcare professional. And remember, in the end, the universe is probably just a giant computer simulation, so don't take anything too seriously. I love it.<|end|> <|assistant|> I love it. Yeah.<|end|>
<s><|user|> It also really nicely includes the tweets, posts on X that are relevant to this, which is really cool. That integrates everything together. The interface is one of the really cool things here.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah. Seems done a great job. You could say no, I mean, Soma from Brave New World, because it thinks you mean, you mean Soma, the real drug. No, I mean Soma from Brave Beer World.<|end|>
<s><|user|> it's going to be like, 'Oops, I'm really sorry.‚' I'm really surprised it went to the real drug first. My apologies. I was thinking of the muscle relaxer. Soma for brand New World is a different beast altogether. Now this Huxley dystopian, Soma is a drug that plays a central role in the society depicted in the book. it's a mood altering hallucinogenic drug that's used to keep the population docile and content in the novel. To use Soma in Brave New World raises some interesting questions about the nature of happiness and the role of drugs in society, man.<|end|> <|assistant|> Exactly. Is it better to live in a world where everyone is happy all the time, even if that happiness is artificial? it's good question. This is what I mean. Do you wish for world peace and happiness all the time? Are you sure? Because that might be a society that is essentially sterile and ossified that never changes, that is ultimately doomed.<|end|>
<s><|user|> This kind of tension between doctors and the light-<|end|> <|assistant|> This is really a very good summary. It really gets to the point. This is not simply regurgitating a brave new world. it's actually getting to the salient element of Soma as a drug. Do you actually want to be in a situation where everyone is happy all the time, even though it's artificial? Or is it better to confront the challenges of life and experience the full range of human emotions, even if it means experiencing pain and suffering? For<|end|>
<s><|user|> Those listening, by the way, Elon just read directly from Grok, which is a really nice kind of insightful, philosophical analysis of the tension here. Interesting.<|end|> <|assistant|> It pretty much nails it. In conclusion, Soma from Brave New World is fictional drug that's used to explore some deep philosophical questions about the nature of happiness and the role of drugs in society. it's a powerful symbol of the dangers of using drugs to escape from reality and the importance of confronting the challenges of life head on. Nailed it. And the crazy thing is we do have a real drug called Soma, which is like the drug in the book. And I'm like, 'They must've named it Probably.‚' Some of the real drug is quite effective on back pain.<|end|>
<s><|user|> So you know about this drug. it's fascinating<|end|> <|assistant|> I've taken it because I had a squashed disc in my C5-C6.<|end|>
<s><|user|> So it takes the physical pain away. But Soma here-<|end|> <|assistant|> It doesn't completely, it reduces the amount of pain you feel, but at the expense of mental acuity, it dells your mind. Just like the drug in the book.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Just like the drug in the book, and hence the trade off. The thing that seems like utopia could be a dystopia after all.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah. Actually I was towing a friend of mine saying, 'Would you really want there to be no hate in the world? Really none?‚' I wonder why hate evolved. I'm not saying we should have‚... I wonder why hate evolved. I'm not saying we should amplify hate, of course, I think we should try to minimize it, but none at all. There might be a reason for hate.<|end|>
<s><|user|> And suffering. it's really complicated to consider that some amount of human suffering is necessary for human flourishing.<|end|> <|assistant|> Is it possible to appreciate the highs without knowing the lows?<|end|>
<s><|user|> And that all is summarized there in a single statement from God. Okay.<|end|> <|assistant|> No highs, no lows, who knows?<|end|>
<s><|user|> It seems that training LLMs efficiently is a big focus for xAI. First of all, what's the limit of what's possible in terms of efficiency? there's this terminology of useful productivity per watt. What have you learned from pushing the limits of that?<|end|> <|assistant|> Well, I think it's helpful, the tools of physics are very powerful and can be applied I think to really any arena in life. it's really just critical thinking. For something important you need to reason with from first principles and think about things in the limit one direction or the other. So in the limit, even at the Kardashev scale, meaning even if you harness the entire power of the sun, you'll still care about useful compute per watt. that's where I think, probably where things are headed from the standpoint of AI is that we have a silicon shortage now that will transition to a voltage transformer shortage in about a year. Ironically, transformers for transformers. You need transformers to run transformers.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Somebody has a sense of humor in this thing.<|end|> <|assistant|> I think, yes, fate loves irony, ironic humor, an ironically funny outcome seems to be often what fate wants.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Humor is all you need. I think spice is all you need somebody<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah. But yeah, so we have silicon shortage today, a voltage step down transformer shortage probably in about a year, and then just electricity shortages in general in about two years. I gave a speech for the world gathering of utility companies, electricity companies, and I said, look, you really need to prepare for traveling of electricity demand because all transport is going to go electric with the ironic exception of rockets, and heating will also go electric. So energy usage right now is roughly one third, very rough terms, one third electricity, one third transport, one third heating. And so in order for everything to go sustainable, to go electric, you need to triple electricity output. So I encourage the utilities to build more power of plants and also to probably have, well, not probably, they should definitely buy more batteries because the grid currently is sized for realtime load, which is kind of crazy because that means you've got to size for whatever the peak electricity demand is, the worst second or the worst day of the year, or you can have a brown out or blackout. We had that crazy blackout for several days in Austin because there's almost no buffering of energy in the grid. If you've got a hydropower plant you can buffer energy, but otherwise it's all real time. So with batteries, you can produce energy at night and use it during the day so you can buffer. So I expect that there will be very heavy usage of batteries in the future because the peak to trough ratio for power plants is anywhere from two to five, so its lowest point to highest point.<|end|>
<s><|user|> So batteries necessary to balance it out, but the demand, as you're saying, is going to grow, grow, grow, grow.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yeah.<|end|>
<s><|user|> And part of that is the compute?<|end|> <|assistant|> Yes. Yes. I mean, electrification of transport and electric heating will be much bigger than AI, at least-<|end|>
<s><|user|> In the short term.<|end|> <|assistant|> In the short term. But even for AI, you really have a growing demand for electricity, for electric vehicles, and a growing demand for electricity to run the computers for AI. And so this is obviously, can lead to electricity shortage.<|end|>
<s><|user|> How difficult is the problem of, in this particular case, maximizing the useful productivity per watt for training and that's, this seems to be really where the big problem we're facing that needs to be solved, is how to use the power efficiently. What you've learned so far about applying this physics first principle of reasoning in this domain, how difficult is this problem?<|end|> <|assistant|> It will get solved. it's the question of how long it takes to solve it. So at various points, there's some kind of limiting factor to progress and with regard to AI, I'm saying right now the limiting factor is silicon chips and that will, we're going to then have more chips than we can actually plug in and turn on probably in about a year. The initial constraint being literally voltage step down transformers because you've got power coming in at 300,000 volts and it's got to step all the way down eventually to around 0.7 volts. So it's a very big amount of, the voltage step down is gigantic and the industry is not used to rapid growth.<|end|>
<s><|user|> Okay. Let's talk about the competition here. you've shown concern about Google and Microsoft with OpenAI developing AGI. How can you help ensure with xAI and Tesla AI work that it doesn't become a competitive race to AGI, but that is a collaborative development of safe AGI?<|end|> <|assistant|> Well, I mean I've been pushing for some kind of regulatory oversight for a long time. I've been somewhat of a Cassandra on the subject for over a decade. I think we want to be very careful in how we develop AI. it's a great power and with great power comes great responsibility. I think it would be wise for us to have at least an objective third party who can be like a referee that can go in and understand what the various leading players are doing with AI, and even if there's no enforcement ability, they can at least voice concerns publicly. Jeff Hinton, for example, left Google and he voiced strong concerns, but now he's not at Google anymore, so who's going to voice the concerns? So I think there's, Tesla gets a lot of regulatory oversight on the automotive front. We're subject to, I think over a hundred regulatory agencies domestically and internationally. it's a lot. You could fill this room with the all regulations that Tesla has to adhere to for automotive. Same is true for rockets and for, currently, the limiting factor for SpaceX for Starship launch is regulatory approval. The FAA has actually given their approval, but we're waiting for fish and wildlife to finish their analysis and give their approval. that's why I posted I want to buy a fish license on, which also refers to the Monte Python sketch. Why do you need a license for your fish? I don't know. But according to the rules, I'm told you need some sort of fish license or something. We effectively need a fish license to launch a rocket. And I'm like, wait a second. How did the fish come into this picture? I mean, some of the things I feel like are so absurd that I want to do a comedy sketch and flash at the bottom. This is all real. This is actually what happened. One of the things that was a bit of a challenge at one point is that they were worried about a rocket hitting a shark. And the ocean's very big, and how often do you see sharks? Not that often. As a percentage of ocean surface area, sharks basically are zero. And so then we said, well, how will we calculate the probability of killing a shark? And They're like, well, we can't give you that information because They're worried about shark fin hunters going and hunting sharks and I said, well, how are we supposed to, we're on the horns of a dilemma then. They said, well, there's another part of fish and wildlife that can do this analysis. I'm like, well, why don't you give them the data? We don't trust them. Excuse me? They're literally in your department. Again, this is actually what happened. And then can you do an NDA or something? Eventually they managed to solve the internal quandary, and indeed the probability of us hitting a shark is essentially zero. Then there's another organization that I didn't realize existed until a few months ago that cares about whether we would potentially hit a whale in international waters. Now, again, you look the surface, look at the Pacific and say what percentage of the Pacific consists of whale? I could give you a big picture and point out all the whales in this picture. I'm like, I don't see any whales. it's basically 0%, and if our rocket does hit a whale, which is extremely unlikely beyond all belief, fate had it, that's a whale has some seriously bad luck, least lucky whale ever.<|end|>
<s><|user|> I mean this is quite absurd, the bureaucracy of this, however it emerged.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yes. Well, I mean one of the things that's pretty wild is for launching out of Vanderberg in California, we had to, they were worried about seal procreation, whether the seals would be dismayed by the sonic booms. Now, there've been a lot of rockets launched out of Vandenberg and the seal population has steadily increased. So if anything, rocket booms are an aphrodisiac, based on the evidence, if you were to correlate rocket launches with seal population. Nonetheless, we were forced to kidnap a seal, strap it to a board, put headphones on the seal and play sonic boom sounds to it to see if it would be distressed. This is an actual thing that happened. This is actually real. I have pictures.<|end|>
<s><|user|> I would love to see this. Yeah. Sorry. there's a seal with headphones.<|end|> <|assistant|> Yes, it's a seal with headphones strapped to a board. Okay. Now the amazing part is how calm the seal was because if I was a seal, I'd be like, this is the end. They're definitely going to eat me. How old the seal, when seal goes back to other seal friends, how's he going to explain that?<|end|>
<s><|user|> They're never going to believe them.<|end|> <|assistant|> Never going to believe him. that's why, I'm like sort of like it's getting kidnapped by aliens and getting anal probed. You come back and say, I swear to God, I got kidnapped by aliens and they stuck anal probe in my butt and people are like, no, they didn't. that's ridiculous. His seal buddies are never going to believe him that he got strapped to aboard and they put headphones on his ears and then let him go. Twice, by the way, we had to do it twice.<|end|>
<s><|user|> They let him go twice.<|end|> <|assistant|> We had to capture-<|end|>