Elon Musk on how to recruit the best talent in the world: "For the really best people in the world, they'll want to know: is what they're doing going to matter? If they spend 10 years doing this, will it make a difference to the world? Will people notice? Will it matter?" Elon breaks down recruiting talent into three core things: As he puts it: "If you want to recruit people that are really talented and driven, you have to state what's the mission, what's the problem we're trying to solve, and just be clearly willing to pour a lot of Blood, Sweat, and Tears into it. And have a convincing argument for why it matters." The three major things for motivation: "First of all, somebody's got to look forward to coming to work in the morning. Are they enjoying the work itself intrinsically? That's very important. And the right work environment can really make a big difference there." Second: "They also feel like they'll receive fair financial compensation. The financial rewards are good and fair." Third, the one that separates good from exceptional: "For the really best people in the world, they'll want to know... is what they're doing going to matter? If they spend 10 years doing this, will it make a difference to the world? Will people notice? Will it matter?" The best talent wants impact, not just income.

Jeff Bezos reveals the simple framework he used to make every major decision at Amazon "If you make the wrong decision, if it's a two-way door decision, you walk out the door, you pick a door, you spend a little time there. If it turns out to be the wrong decision, you can come back in and pick another door" "Some decisions are so consequential and so hard to reverse that they really are one-way door decisions. You go in that door, you're not coming back. Those decisions have to be made very deliberately, very carefully" "Two-way door decisions should mostly be made by single individuals or by very small teams deep in the organization" "One-way door decisions are the irreversible ones. Those should be elevated up to the senior most executives, who should slow them down and make sure the right thing is being done" "When I was CEO of Amazon, I often found myself in the position of being the chief slowdown officer"

Larry Page wanted to build a digital god. "He really seemed to want some sort of digital superintelligence. Basically a digital god, if you will. As soon as possible." Elon Musk asked: "What about making sure humanity's okay here?" Page called him a speciesist. "I said yes, I'm a speciesist. You got me. What are you? I'm fully a speciesist. Busted." Musk spent 10 minutes with Tucker Carlson explaining why he created OpenAI: Tucker asked the basic question. "All of a sudden AI is everywhere. People are playing with it on their phones. Is that good or bad?" Musk starts with first principles. "The smartest creatures as far as we know on this Earth are humans. That's our defining characteristic." "We're obviously weaker than chimpanzees. Less agile. But we are smarter." "Now. What happens when something vastly smarter than the smartest person comes along in silicon form?" "It's very difficult to predict what will happen in that circumstance." He explains the singularity. "It's called the singularity. Like a black hole. Because you don't know what happens after that." "It's hard to predict." He argues for regulation. "I think there should be some government oversight. Because it affects the public. It's a danger to the public." "That's why we have the Food and Drug Administration. The Federal Aviation Administration. The FCC." "We have these agencies to oversee things that affect the public. Where there could be public harm." "You don't want companies cutting corners on safety. And then having people suffer as a result." He addresses the perception that he fights regulators. "People think I'm some sort of regulatory maverick that defies regulators on a regular basis. But this is actually not the case." "Once in a blue moon, rarely, I will disagree with regulators. But the vast majority of the time my companies agree with the regulations and comply." Tucker asks the obvious question. "All regulations start with a perceived danger. Planes fall out of the sky. I don't think an average person playing with AI on his iPhone perceives any danger." "Can you explain what you think the dangers might be?" Musk's answer. "AI is perhaps more dangerous than mismanaged aircraft design or production maintenance or bad car production." "In the sense that it has the potential. It is a small probability, but it is not trivial." "It has the potential of civilization destruction." He explains the timing problem. "Regulations are really only put into effect after something terrible has happened." "If that's the case for AI, and we only put in regulations after something terrible has happened, it may be too late to put the regulations in place." "They may be out of control at that point." Tucker asks directly. "It's conceivable that AI could take control and reach a point where you couldn't turn it off and it would be making the decisions for people?" Musk's answer. "Yeah. Absolutely." "That's definitely the way things are headed." He explains why OpenAI exists. "Larry Page and I used to be close friends. I would stay at his house in Palo Alto. I would talk to him late in the night about AI safety." "At least my perception was that Larry was not taking AI safety seriously enough." Tucker asked what Page said. "He really seemed to want some sort of digital superintelligence. Basically a digital god, if you will. As soon as possible." Musk pushed back. "I agree there's great potential for good. But there's also potential for bad." "If you have some radical new technology, you want to take actions to maximize the probability it will do good. Minimize the probability it will do bad things." "It can't just be barreling forward and hope for the best." Then the speciesist moment. "At one point I said: what about making sure humanity's okay here?" "And then he called me a speciesist." Tucker: "Did he use that term?" "Yes." "I said yes, I'm a speciesist. You got me. What are you? I'm fully a speciesist. Busted." That was the last straw. "At the time, Google had DeepMind. Google and DeepMind had three-quarters of all the AI talent in the world." "They obviously had a lot of money and more computers than anyone else." "We're in a unipolar world here. One company that has close to a monopoly on AI talent and computers. And the person who's in charge doesn't seem to care about safety." "This is not good." So he created the opposite. "I thought: what's the furthest thing from Google?" "A nonprofit that is fully open. Because Google was closed and for-profit." "Open AI. Open source. Transparent. So people know what's going on." "We don't want this to be a for-profit maximizing demon from hell that just never stops." Tucker asks about the specific danger. "The cool parts of AI are obvious. Write your college paper for you. Write a limerick about yourself. There's a lot that's fun and useful." "But can you be more precise about what's potentially dangerous? What specifically are you worried about?" Musk's answer. "The pen is mightier than the sword." "If you have a superintelligent AI that is capable of writing incredibly well. In a way that is very influential, convincing." "And is constantly figuring out what is more convincing to people over time." "And then enters social media. Twitter. Facebook. Others." "And potentially manipulates public opinion in a way that is very bad." "How would we even know?"

Former SpaceX astronaut Garrett Reisman reveals the single prism Elon Musk runs every major decision through "He measures pretty much every major decision by whether or not it brings the day when we have a self-sustainable colony on Mars sooner or later" "That's the prism by which he makes every single decision he makes" "He's got an idea and he'll keep pushing, and he gives us aggressive timelines that we have to work to" "We work really hard to try to meet them. It's hard when you're doing stuff that's this complicated to predict exactly how long it's going to take" "We end up falling a little bit behind, but we do our best"