BBC Interview
Questions on ElonsFAQ asked in this interview (4)
Transcript
0:00BBC InterviewerElon Musk, what's the vision here? What are you trying to do to the car industry?
0:05Elon MuskWell, I'm trying to accelerate the advent of sustainable transport. So try to get, try to get the car industry to move towards electrification faster than they would otherwise move.
0:15Elon MuskSo the fundamental value, long term value that I see for Tesla is serving as a catalyst to accelerate the transition to sustainable transport.
0:25BBC InterviewerWhy electric cars? Why is that important?
0:29Elon MuskWell, electric cars are zero emission at the car level, so they're not producing CO2 or nitrous oxide or sulfur oxides or any of the sort of the noxious gases that any kind of combustion engine car would produce.
0:48Elon MuskAnd so if we can have sustainable energy production and combine that with electric cars, we have a long term sustainable future.
0:57BBC InterviewerAnd how's that going? I mean, you've made a deal of progress, but do you see us all having electric cars in 10 years time or is it going to be always a minority pursuit?
1:09Elon MuskNo, I think all transport, with the exception of rockets, will go fully electric. So that's why, I mean, I see the value of Tesla as an accelerant, as a catalyst in that transition.
1:24Elon MuskI think Tesla, maybe when one looks back on it from an historical perspective, it might accelerate that transition by a decade, maybe, maybe more.
1:34BBC InterviewerNow this is a great car, it's an exciting drive, but at the moment it's just for the rich, isn't it? Is this really going to mean anything for the mass market?
1:45Elon MuskYeah, I mean the Tesla strategy from the beginning has been to start off with a low volume, high priced car. That was the sports car that we first did in partnership with Lotus.
1:56Elon MuskAnd then we have the Model S which is kind of a mid priced, mid volume car. And actually when you look at the price of the Model S inclusive of the cost of petrol, it actually is a lot more competitive than you'd think.
2:10BBC InterviewerI'm not going to be able to afford one of these and nobody I know is.
2:14Elon MuskWell, I think it's certainly not a low priced car. I'm just saying that if you were to lease or finance the car and compare the lease or finance cost with a much lower cost of operation of an electric car, your monthly cost of transport is a lot more competitive than it may seem at first glance, just looking at the price of the car.
2:38BBC InterviewerBut are you on the road to producing a model that far more people?
2:43Elon MuskYes. So the Model 3, that's the third part of our strategy, which is produce a high volume, low cost car and we expect to be in production with that at the end of Next year.
2:56BBC InterviewerIs that all on schedule? And what are the ambitions for that car? Is that the one that will really make this revolution that you've been talking about happen?
3:04Elon MuskNo question. In order to have a substantial effect on, on transportation, we have to make the cars affordable. So I think the Model 3 is extremely important as part of that strategy.
3:18Elon MuskUnless there's an affordable car, we will, as you alluded to earlier, only have a small impact on the world. So we need to make a car that most people can afford in order to have a really substantial impact.
3:32BBC InterviewerHow important is it for you that people's lives are changed in this way? Obviously it's important for this business because you've lost a lot of money so far. You need to have a mass market car.
3:42BBC InterviewerBut is it important for you as a thinker that people have electric cars, that that sustainable vision comes true?
3:51Elon MuskYeah, absolutely. Like I said, the whole point of Tesla is to accelerate the transition to sustainable transport. If we could have made an affordable car right off the bat, we definitely would have.
4:01Elon MuskIt's just that it takes time to refine the technology. When you think of any new technology, it takes multiple versions and economies of scale in order to make the technology accessible to the general public.
4:13Elon MuskYou can look at, say, cell phones. In the early days of cell phones, they were very big and heavy and very expensive. But with successive design iterations and scaling up the production, we've brought it to the point where for $100, you can buy basically a supercomputer in your pocket.
4:34BBC InterviewerHow soon will most people have an electric car? Is this a very long term vision or is it going to happen soon?
4:41Elon MuskWell, I think it's going to happen sooner than people think. I mean, the typical curve of new technology adoption is like an S curve. So it starts off quite slow.
4:54Elon MuskAnd generally people tend to predict to base their predictions on a straight line as opposed to a curve fit. But when you have an S curve of adoption, if you make a straight line extrapolation at the beginning of that S curve, it's always going to underestimate the actual adoption rate.
5:18Elon MuskBut if you look at, say, what Tesla's doing every year, we are doubling our total cumulative production. So at the beginning of last year, we had 50,000 cars in total on the roads worldwide.
5:34Elon MuskAnd then last year we produced another 50,000 cars. So the total fleet of Tesla vehicles doubled last year. It will approximately double again this year.
5:45BBC InterviewerMeanwhile, Detroit, the traditional motor makers seem to have woken up. Is it not true that the likes of BMW are eventually more likely to bring electric vehicles to the masses than Tesla?
5:59Elon MuskWell, I say more power to them if they, I mean, I would certainly encourage their actions on electric vehicles. And for all manufacturers, I hope they produce as many electric vehicles as soon as possible.
6:11Elon MuskThat's the, the right thing for the world.
6:13BBC InterviewerWhat do you think their record has been like so far? Has Detroit and the traditional motor industry been caught napping?
6:22Elon MuskWell, they didn't really believe in electric cars. They didn't think that it was technologically possible to create a compelling electric car. And they felt that even if someone did create an electric car with long range and high performance, that people wouldn't want to buy it because they have some deep love of gasoline and that it's vital to be able to refuel in five minutes.
6:47Elon MuskSo with Tesla, we were able to disprove those axiomatic errors. So with the Tesla Roadster, we're able to show that you can in fact create a very fast, attractive, high performance, great handling electric car.
7:06Elon MuskAnd that if you made such a car with long range and if you make such a car, people would buy it. So with the Tesla Roadster, in fact, that's really what got General Motors to do the Chevy Volt and Nissan to do the Leaf.
7:23Elon MuskSo we announced the Tesla Roadster in mid-2007 and Bob Lutz, he's told the story many times, took our press release to his engineers and said, if a little company in California can do this, why can't we?
7:38Elon MuskAnd that's what got General Motors to do their electric vehicle program, which in turn encouraged the other manufacturers to do electric vehicle programs as well. But those programs for the most part have been, or really I'd say almost entirely, with exception of maybe the Leaf, have been of quite low volume and more inclined towards satisfying regulators.
8:12Elon MuskBut now I think we are seeing a change because people are seeing that Tesla is able to sell quite a few electric cars in a normal car segment, in the premium sedan segment.
8:27Elon MuskIn fact, we were the best selling car in our segments in the United States last year. So more than, you know, more than Mercedes or BMW or Audi in our segment.
8:41BBC InterviewerThe technology industry generally suddenly seems incredibly enthusiastic about getting into the motor industry. We've obviously had Google with its self driving car. Do you see that continuing? And do you see Apple building a car and that maybe being a threat to you?
9:00Elon MuskWell, I think I would encourage more participation by whoever it is to create electric vehicles. It's quite hard to do, but I think companies like Apple will probably make a compelling electric car.
9:19Elon MuskIt seems like the obvious thing to
9:20BBC Interviewerdo are you betting that that's going to happen? Have you heard anything?
9:25Elon MuskWell, it's pretty hard to hide something if you hire over a thousand engineers to do it. So you think Apple is serious about it? Yeah, I do. This is an open secret.
9:38BBC InterviewerAnd will that be a threat to you or will that just expand the industry?
9:44Elon MuskI think it's, I mean, I think it will expand the industry. Certainly Tesla would aspire to still make the most compelling electric vehicles and that would be our goal, while at the same time trying to help other companies make electric cars as well.
10:00Elon MuskSo for example, last year we open sourced all of our patents so anyone can use any of our patents for free.
10:06BBC InterviewerYou've also been a leader in autonomous driving in this road to the self driving car. How far do you think that's going to go?
10:14Elon MuskI mean, I think the two biggest revolutions in transport are electrification and autonomy. Those are the, and it's, those are the two biggest innovations since the moving production line and they're both happening at about the same time.
10:30Elon MuskI think autonomy is extremely important and I think important in the long term. Nobody will buy a car unless it is autonomous. It will be like having a manually operated elevator or something like that.
10:44Elon MuskIt's a strange anachronism.
10:46BBC InterviewerIn 10 years time, what will I be driving or will I be driving at all? Will I just be pressing a button on an app? A car will drive up and take me where I want it.
10:56Elon MuskYeah, you will only drive if you want to drive. It'll be like owning a car that is not self driving in the long term will be like owning a horse.
11:09Elon MuskYou would own it for, and you would use it for sentimental reasons, but not for, you know, not for daily use, really. Unlikely.
11:19BBC InterviewerNow you've taken a lot of interest in artificial intelligence. This is becoming an artificially intelligent car.
11:27Elon MuskWell, it's narrowly narrow artificial intelligence.
11:31BBC InterviewerYou've also expressed concern about where that's heading. Is that because you've looked at what that car can do and thought what happens if it develops a mind of its own?
11:40BBC InterviewerWhy, why are you worried?
11:41Elon MuskWe don't need to be concerned about the cars. The car. This is, I mean car. A car is not deep AI, it's a, it's a narrow use case. You know, we're not trying to build sentience into the car.
11:55Elon MuskIt's just trying to look at the lines on the road and steer correctly. And I would consider that to be essentially a solved problem. It's just a question of refining the details of the technology and bringing that to market and then improving the nines of reliability.
12:16Elon MuskSo in order to have a self driving car, you really have to have many nines of reliability. So it's 99.9999%. Something like that is how good it needs to be.
12:29Elon MuskOr let's say to first approximation, you'd want a self driving car to be an order of magnitude safer than a human driven car. And if you're like, OK, it's 10 times safer, then it's like there's no more doubt, there's no more debate about which one is safer.
12:51Elon MuskBut it's still a narrow use case. The cars are not going to develop consciousness or decide that they want to take over the world or something like that. I think we really need to be more concerned about.
13:07Elon MuskDeep AI.
13:09BBC InterviewerAnd why do we need to be concerned about that?
13:12Elon MuskWell, I mean, because there are, I think, scenarios where if there's some vast intelligence that either develops a will of its own or is subject to the will of a small number of people, then we could have an undesirable future.
13:41Elon MuskIf you want to read a real scary one, I'd say Harlan Ellison's I have no Mouth and I Must Scream. We'll give you nightmares.
13:52BBC InterviewerYou read a lot of science fiction. Is it giving you nightmares? At the moment?
13:55Elon MuskIt has given me nightmares, yeah.
13:58BBC InterviewerAnd are you genuinely, when you, you've been one of the prime movers about AI. I interviewed Stephen Hawking last year.
14:04Elon MuskRight.
14:05BBC InterviewerHad similar concerns. Is that a, a short term concern or is it something way off that we don't need to worry about for a long time?
14:13Elon MuskIt's going to come faster than anyone appreciates. I think it's. With each passing year, the sophistication of computer intelligence is growing dramatically. I mean, I really think we're on an exponential improvement path of artificial intelligence.
14:31Elon MuskAnd the number of smart humans that are developing AI is also increasing dramatically. I mean, if you look at the attendance at the AI conferences, they're doubling every year.
14:43Elon MuskThey're getting full. I have a young cousin of mine who's graduating from Berkeley in computer science and physics and I asked him, well, how many of the smart students are studying AI in computer science?
15:02Elon MuskAnd the answer is all of them.
15:05BBC InterviewerNow, you're in three extraordinary industries. You're in electric cars, you're in rockets, and you're in solar energy. What unites you, what unites those three interests?
15:19Elon MuskWell, what I'm trying to do is to minimize future existential threats or take whatever action I can to ensure the future is good. I didn't expect these companies to succeed.
15:36Elon MuskI thought they would most likely fail, particularly Tesla and SpaceX. I thought solar City had a higher probability of success but in the beginning I thought SpaceX and Tesla maybe had a 10% chance of success.
15:49Elon MuskAnd so I'm quite surprised really to see that we're alive. Great. I wasn't expecting that.
15:59BBC InterviewerAnd are you now more confident that each of them will be a success?
16:04Elon MuskI do feel it's though they've reached a level of progress that makes it unlikely that they will unlikely that they will die in the near term. Both Tesla and SpaceX have a lot of customers, sort of really earned the trust of a large number of customers and these are really solid organizations or like really I think thoughtful end customers for the car.
16:34Elon MuskAnd I think whenever your customers really want you to succeed, then you will succeed.
16:43BBC InterviewerFinally. You're obviously a very competitive person. You're competing with the likes of Jeff Bezos in Jeff who? In Rocket, you're competing with Detroit in the motor industry, you're competing with regulators.
16:59BBC InterviewerWhen it comes to SolarCity, what drives you? Is it just I am right and they're all wrong?
17:08Elon MuskWell no, I mean I actually really take the position that I'm always to some degree wrong and the aspiration is to be less wrong. We're always to some degree wrong.
17:19Elon MuskIt doesn't matter who you are. And I think trying to minimize the wrong headedness over time is, I believe in that philosophy.
17:37Elon MuskI think there's some things that are important for the future. Sustainable energy, obviously, sustainable transportation, ultimately becoming a multi planet species and traveling out there among the stars. I think those are great things.
17:53Elon MuskThose are things that make me like the future or be inspired about the future. Whereas if those things don't happen the future I think looks quite dim.
18:07Elon MuskAnd I just feel quite fortunate that we've made the progress that we have on those fronts and we'll aspire to make more progress in the future.