Elon Musk - CEO of Tesla Motors and SpaceX

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

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SAL KHAN: So first
of all, I just want

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to thank Elon for
coming-- hungry.

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You didn't even have dinner.

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And we didn't even
feed you properly.

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ELON MUSK: No, sorry
to be a bit late.

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I just came from the
Tesla factory in Fremont.

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SAL KHAN: Yes.

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Was something wrong?

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ELON MUSK: There's
always something.

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SAL KHAN: Did you have to like--

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ELON MUSK: At any given point,
there's always something wrong.

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SAL KHAN: Yes.

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ELON MUSK: Because there's
just too many things going on.

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So one of the trickiest
things about a car

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is that there's thousands
of individual components--

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there are thousands
of unique components--

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and even if one of
those things is missing,

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you can't make cars.

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So today's fiasco
was-- I kid you

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not-- we were missing
a $3 USB cable.

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OK.

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So we could not
complete cars, because--

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SAL KHAN: So the whole
line was stopped?

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ELON MUSK: Yeah.

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So essentially, because it's
part of the wiring harness.

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So you can't put the interior
in without this cable.

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And so we could either
make a whole bunch

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of cars minus the
interior, which

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means that you've got to
stack them up in the yard.

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SAL KHAN: The resale
value would be no good.

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ELON MUSK: Well, it can be
done, but if then things go out

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of sequence, and it's
way more inefficient--

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you don't have a
moving production line.

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Then you have to send
people out to hundreds

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of cars that are sitting
in the storage yard.

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And so this happens to be a
particularly pernicious cable.

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It's kind of routed under the
carpet, in a difficult place.

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And it's literally $3.

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And so we basically had to send
people throughout the Bay Area

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to go and buy USB cables.

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SAL KHAN: Like,
literally, Radio Shack?

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ELON MUSK: Like Fry's.

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SAL KHAN: Oh, Fry's.

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That's better.

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ELON MUSK: You're going to have
a hard time getting a USB cable

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right now at Fry's, because
we bought every one of them.

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SAL KHAN: That's good.

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ELON MUSK: And so we're
able to continue production.

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And I don't want to
belabor the anecdote,

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but essentially the
supplier is in China.

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And we had plan A and
plan B. And plan A

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was like the normal
supply chain process.

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But what the supplier
did was instead

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of sending our parts
in their own package,

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they grouped it
together with a bunch

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of other stuff for
other companies

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and sent that all via some
extremely slow boat from China

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to LA.

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And when it got to LA, the
other stuff didn't pass customs.

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And so they wouldn't let
our stuff through, because--

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SAL KHAN: They put it like
a barrel fruit or something.

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ELON MUSK: I don't
what they put it,

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but something that
customs didn't like.

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And the paperwork wasn't
in order or whatever.

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So it got stuck there
for like a couple weeks.

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And then we had plan B.
So we called and said,

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look you've got to air
freight some of these cables--

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cause they're just
little cables-- to us.

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And we talked to
their US subsidiary

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and ordered from
the US subsidiary,

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who then communicated to China.

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But then because this was
another batch of parts,

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so it was kind of
double the order,

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it exceeded the credit
limit that we had.

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So it bounced off the credit
limit, so they didn't ship it.

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SAL KHAN: Fascinating.

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So someone's losing
their job now.

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This is-- no, I'm kidding.

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You shouldn't fire anyone.

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ELON MUSK: I mean,
it's pretty farcical.

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And, anyway, so, it's
coming like tonight

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at 11:00 PM or something.

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SAL KHAN: Wow.

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And these things are
happening like all the time?

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This was an unusual
circumstance?

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ELON MUSK: Yeah.

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That's like one example, but
there's many things like that.

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SAL KHAN: I guess, I
mean, that's actually

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a really good
example, because that

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leads into what I've
always been fascinated

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by a lot of what you're doing.

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Well, I'll start with,
how did you get into this?

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ELON MUSK: Into cars?

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SAL KHAN: Into cars.

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Into taking over NASA.

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Well, not taking over NASA--
being a contractor for NASA.

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ELON MUSK: Just for the record,
we are not taking over NASA.

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SAL KHAN: You're not
taking over NASA.

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They are an independent
organization.

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But you are becoming a major
provider of services for NASA.

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Obviously, kind of internet
payments and payments

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generally.

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I mean these are three
completely different spaces.

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I think a lot of people would
not take someone seriously,

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if they had a business
plan in one of these.

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ELON MUSK: Right.

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Sorry to eat.

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SAL KHAN: Oh, yeah,
take your time.

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What was your-- did
you always think

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you were going to be doing
this or-- when did it

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dawn on you that you
would try to revolutionize

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three industries?

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ELON MUSK: Well, when
I was in college--

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I didn't actually
expect to do it.

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So it was not like this is some
long-fulfilled expectation.

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But when I was in
college, I thought

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about what were the
areas that would most

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effect the future of
humanity, in my opinion.

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And the three areas were the
internet, sustainable energy,

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and space exploration,
particularly

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if humanity becomes a
multi-planet species.

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You know, there's kind of like
a pretty substantial bifurcation

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in our future, if we're
either out there among stars

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on multiple planets,
or if we're confined

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to Earth until some obviously
eventual extinction.

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Not Not that I'm pessimistic
about live on Earth.

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I mean, things are
likely to be good.

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More likely to be
good by far than bad.

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SAL KHAN: Yellowstone's
due for an explosion

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every several hundred thousand--
Shandra knows about that.

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It's been 700,000,

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ELON MUSK: Right.

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Right.

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Yeah.

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SAL KHAN: Super volcano for
those of you who don't know.

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It would envelop, but well--

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ELON MUSK: Yeah.
Exactly.

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I know exactly what
you're talking about.

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So--

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SAL KHAN: We read
the same books.

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I can tell.

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ELON MUSK: Absolutely.

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I mean something bad
is bound to happen

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if you give it enough time.

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And civilization has been around
for such a very short period

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of time that these time
scales seem like very long,

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but on an evolutionary time
scale, they're very short.

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A million years on an
evolutionary time scale

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is really not very much.

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And Earth's been around
for four and a half

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billion years, so that's a
very tiny, tiny amount of time,

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really.

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But for us that
would be-- can you

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can imagine if human
civilization continued

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at anything remotely like the
current pace of technology ad

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advancement for a million years?

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Where would we be?

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I think we're either extinct
or on a lot of planets.

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SAL KHAN: Yes.

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We should--

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ELON MUSK: Those
are the two options.

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SAL KHAN: But given
that-- I mean,

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one, that's kind
of as epic as one

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can think about
things, literally.

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How did you make that concrete?

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How does that turn into
SpaceX, Tesla and Paypal?

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ELON MUSK: Well, so I
thought about these things

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kind of in the abstract.

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Not from the expectation
that I would actually

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have careers in those arenas.

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But, I wanted to be involved
in at least one of them.

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And at first I
thought the best bet

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was going to be electric cars.

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And so the area
that I was studying

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was advanced capacitors.

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So essentially capacitors
that have an engine density

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exceeding that of batteries.

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Because they have
a very high power

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density, but a low
energy density.

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Maybe you have lecture to
that effect, I don't know.

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SAL KHAN: Oh, yes, no.

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We should do that.

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We'll get to it later.

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ELON MUSK: Exactly.

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So obviously, if you could
make a capacitor that

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had anywhere near the
energy density of a battery

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with this incredibly
high power density

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and this quasi-infinite
cycle and calendar life, then

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you'd have an awesome
solution for energy storage

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and mobile applications.

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So I was going to
try to work on that

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and try to leverage the
equipment that was developed

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for advanced chip
making and photonics

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to create ultra-precise
capacitors

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at the molecular level.

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SAL KHAN: And this
was when you were

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going to go into grad school?

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You had a brief
stint at Stanford?

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ELON MUSK: That's right.

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SAL KHAN: At a PhD
in applied physics?

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ELON MUSK: Applied
physics, material science.

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SAL KHAN: Right.

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So even then you were
thinking of trying

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to do something in the space?

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ELON MUSK: Actually, this was
d to work on energy storage

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solutions for electric cars.

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And I'd actually
worked at a company

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in Silicon Valley called
Pinnacle Research, which

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did advanced capacitors.

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There were electrolytic
capacitors.

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And they actually
were pretty good.

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They had like the energy density
of a lead-acid battery, which

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for a capacitor,
that's a big deal.

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But they used ruthenium
tantalum oxide.

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And I think at the
time, there was

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maybe like one or
two tons of ruthenium

00:08:24.410 --> 00:08:25.890
mined per year in the world.

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So it's not a scalable solution.

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But I thought there could be
some solid-state solution,

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like just using
chip-making equipment.

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That was going to
be the basic idea.

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But it was one of those
things where I wasn't sure

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if success was one
of possible outcomes.

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It's difficult to bound that
problem exactly and say, OK--

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SAL KHAN: So you're
saying, I felt

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like this was a destined
failure is another way

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to parse that sentence.

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But anyway, sorry.

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ELON MUSK: No.

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I didn't think it would
fail, but I wasn't sure

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that success was a possibility.

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SAL KHAN: OK.

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Yes.

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ELON MUSK: And
generally you want

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to embark on something--
it's desirable to figure out

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if success is at least
one of the possibilities.

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SAL KHAN: Right, exactly.

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ELON MUSK: Because
for sure failure

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is one of the possibilities.

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But, ideally, you want
to try to bracket it

00:09:16.345 --> 00:09:22.240
and say success is in
the envelope of outcomes.

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And I wasn't quite sure
if that was the case.

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I think success on an academic
level would have been quite

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likely, because you can
publish some useless paper--

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and most papers are
pretty useless--

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SAL KHAN: We have a
few-- don't take offense.

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ELON MUSK: I mean, how many
PhD papers are actually

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used by someone ever?

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SAL KHAN: That's a good point.

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ELON MUSK: Percentagewise
it's not good.

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And so it could have been
one of those outcomes

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where you add some leaves
to the tree of knowledge.

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And that leaf is, nope,
it's not possible.

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And there goes seven
years of my life.

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So that was one path.

00:10:06.270 --> 00:10:07.520
And I was prepared to do that.

00:10:07.520 --> 00:10:09.707
But then the
internet came along.

00:10:09.707 --> 00:10:11.290
And it was like, oh,
OK, the Internet,

00:10:11.290 --> 00:10:13.460
I'm pretty sure success
is one of the outcomes,

00:10:13.460 --> 00:10:17.150
and it seemed like I
could either do a PhD

00:10:17.150 --> 00:10:18.790
and watch the
Internet happen, or I

00:10:18.790 --> 00:10:23.490
could participate and help
build in some fashion.

00:10:23.490 --> 00:10:26.420
Like, I was just concerned with
the idea of watching it happen.

00:10:26.420 --> 00:10:30.110
So I decided to
put things on hold

00:10:30.110 --> 00:10:32.940
and start an Internet company.

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And we worked on internet
publishing software,

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maps and directions, yellow
pages, those kind of things.

00:10:41.200 --> 00:10:46.760
And we had as investors and
customers the media companies.

00:10:46.760 --> 00:10:49.060
So like the New York Times
Company, Knight Ridder.

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SAL KHAN: And this is
just at the early stages.

00:10:51.018 --> 00:10:52.056
I mean this was like--

00:10:52.056 --> 00:10:52.680
ELON MUSK: '95.

00:10:52.680 --> 00:10:52.890
SAL KHAN: '95.

00:10:52.890 --> 00:10:55.030
So it's really early stages,
so it's really out the gate.

00:10:55.030 --> 00:10:55.696
ELON MUSK: Yeah.

00:10:55.696 --> 00:10:57.910
Absolutely.

00:10:57.910 --> 00:11:02.140
And so then we-- the reason we
worked with the media companies

00:11:02.140 --> 00:11:03.640
was because we
needed to have money.

00:11:03.640 --> 00:11:05.871
There was no advertising
money in '95.

00:11:05.871 --> 00:11:07.870
In fact, the idea of
advertising on the internet

00:11:07.870 --> 00:11:11.230
seemed like a ridiculous
idea to people.

00:11:11.230 --> 00:11:12.915
Obviously, not so
ridiculous anymore.

00:11:12.915 --> 00:11:16.337
But, at the time, it seemed like
a very unlikely proposition.

00:11:16.337 --> 00:11:18.420
And a lot of the media
companies weren't even sure

00:11:18.420 --> 00:11:19.949
that they should be online.

00:11:19.949 --> 00:11:21.240
Like, what's the point of that?

00:11:21.240 --> 00:11:22.600
SAL KHAN: And did you all
think that PayPal was just

00:11:22.600 --> 00:11:25.089
going to be a simple,
little internet way to--

00:11:25.089 --> 00:11:26.630
or did you think it
was going to turn

00:11:26.630 --> 00:11:29.030
into the major kind of
transaction processing engine

00:11:29.030 --> 00:11:30.292
that it is right now?

00:11:30.292 --> 00:11:32.250
ELON MUSK: I didn't expect
PayPal's growth rate

00:11:32.250 --> 00:11:34.402
to be what it was.

00:11:34.402 --> 00:11:36.110
And that actually
created major problems.

00:11:36.110 --> 00:11:40.050
So we started Paypal
on University Avenue.

00:11:40.050 --> 00:11:43.440
After the first month or so
of the website being active,

00:11:43.440 --> 00:11:44.630
we 100,000 customers.

00:11:44.630 --> 00:11:45.338
SAL KHAN: Really?

00:11:45.338 --> 00:11:45.980
That fast.

00:11:45.980 --> 00:11:47.229
Wow, I didn't realize it was--

00:11:47.229 --> 00:11:48.680
ELON MUSK: Yeah, it was nutty.

00:11:48.680 --> 00:11:49.450
SAL KHAN: And how did it start?

00:11:49.450 --> 00:11:51.180
How did people just
even know to use it?

00:11:51.180 --> 00:11:54.240
I mean, obviously, both buyer
and seller have to be involved.

00:11:54.240 --> 00:11:55.260
ELON MUSK: Yeah.

00:11:55.260 --> 00:11:59.690
Well, we started off first
by offering people $20

00:11:59.690 --> 00:12:01.630
if they opened an account.

00:12:01.630 --> 00:12:04.540
And $20 if they referred anyone.

00:12:04.540 --> 00:12:07.170
And then we dropped it to $10.

00:12:07.170 --> 00:12:08.610
And we dropped it to $5.

00:12:08.610 --> 00:12:10.740
As the network got
bigger and bigger,

00:12:10.740 --> 00:12:16.070
the value of the network itself
exceeded any sort of carrot

00:12:16.070 --> 00:12:16.960
that we could offer.

00:12:16.960 --> 00:12:17.390
SAL KHAN: So much
money did you all

00:12:17.390 --> 00:12:20.240
spend with that kind of
$5, $10, $20 incentive

00:12:20.240 --> 00:12:21.950
to get that critical mass going?

00:12:21.950 --> 00:12:23.283
ELON MUSK: It was a fair amount.

00:12:23.283 --> 00:12:25.526
I think it was probably
$60 or $70 million.

00:12:25.526 --> 00:12:26.442
SAL KHAN: Oh, wow, OK.

00:12:26.442 --> 00:12:27.890
So it was substantial.

00:12:27.890 --> 00:12:28.390
OK.

00:12:28.390 --> 00:12:29.850
So we're not talking
peanuts here.

00:12:29.850 --> 00:12:31.825
ELON MUSK: It depends
on your relative scale.

00:12:34.430 --> 00:12:35.655
It's a peanut to Google.

00:12:35.655 --> 00:12:37.030
SAL KHAN: Yeah,
no, that's right.

00:12:37.030 --> 00:12:37.571
That's right.

00:12:37.571 --> 00:12:39.790
ELON MUSK: Here's a peanut.

00:12:39.790 --> 00:12:41.650
I mean, Google's
got $50 billion.

00:12:41.650 --> 00:12:44.720
Apple's got $150 billion,
some crazy amount of money.

00:12:44.720 --> 00:12:45.550
That's just cash.

00:12:45.550 --> 00:12:47.200
SAL KHAN: Yeah.

00:12:47.200 --> 00:12:49.030
So it's not an
outlandish-- I didn't

00:12:49.030 --> 00:12:50.334
realize that was so core.

00:12:50.334 --> 00:12:52.750
ELON MUSK: Like 1% of Google's
cash would be $500 million.

00:12:52.750 --> 00:12:55.274
So, you know, that's 0.1%
percent of Google's cash.

00:12:55.274 --> 00:12:56.190
SAL KHAN: That's true.

00:12:56.190 --> 00:12:57.140
You're right,
that's inexpensive.

00:12:57.140 --> 00:12:57.681
It's nothing.

00:12:57.681 --> 00:13:00.380
ELON MUSK: Relative to them,
it's pretty inexpensive.

00:13:00.380 --> 00:13:02.870
SAL KHAN: That's right.

00:13:02.870 --> 00:13:05.349
ELON MUSK: And then we
did a bunch of things

00:13:05.349 --> 00:13:06.390
to decrease the friction.

00:13:09.700 --> 00:13:12.660
It's just like bacteria
in a Petri dish.

00:13:12.660 --> 00:13:21.140
So what you want to do is try
to have one customer generate

00:13:21.140 --> 00:13:22.430
like two customers.

00:13:22.430 --> 00:13:22.930
OK?

00:13:22.930 --> 00:13:23.630
Or something like that.

00:13:23.630 --> 00:13:25.170
Maybe three customers, ideally.

00:13:25.170 --> 00:13:29.490
And then you want that
to happen really fast.

00:13:29.490 --> 00:13:32.000
And you could
probably model it just

00:13:32.000 --> 00:13:34.310
like bacteria growth
in a Petri dish.

00:13:34.310 --> 00:13:37.144
And then it'll just
expand very quickly

00:13:37.144 --> 00:13:38.810
until it hits the
side of the Petri dish

00:13:38.810 --> 00:13:41.980
and then it slows down.

00:13:41.980 --> 00:13:43.730
SAL KHAN: And then
after Paypal, then I

00:13:43.730 --> 00:13:45.530
mean-- to some
degree, especially us

00:13:45.530 --> 00:13:47.780
in Silicon Valley, we kind
of understand the Internet.

00:13:47.780 --> 00:13:49.260
We know people.

00:13:49.260 --> 00:13:52.370
PayPal's obviously of the
scale that is noteworthy,

00:13:52.370 --> 00:13:57.830
but then SpaceX just seems
really, you know-- well,

00:13:57.830 --> 00:14:00.740
one, how did you decide that
I'm definitely going to do that?

00:14:00.740 --> 00:14:03.250
And then like what's the
first thing that you do?

00:14:03.250 --> 00:14:05.130
How do you even go
out-- I don't even

00:14:05.130 --> 00:14:09.070
know how to start trying
to make a rocket company.

00:14:09.070 --> 00:14:11.465
ELON MUSK: Well,
neither did I really.

00:14:11.465 --> 00:14:13.340
And in fact, the first
three launches failed.

00:14:13.340 --> 00:14:17.070
So it's not as though
it was like spot on.

00:14:17.070 --> 00:14:18.830
It's like, did not
hit the bull's eye.

00:14:18.830 --> 00:14:20.070
But

00:14:20.070 --> 00:14:20.490
SAL KHAN: But even
getting to the point where

00:14:20.490 --> 00:14:21.531
you're launching rockets.

00:14:21.531 --> 00:14:24.825
I don't even how
do you get there?

00:14:24.825 --> 00:14:25.825
One, how did you decide?

00:14:25.825 --> 00:14:27.170
And then what did
you do on day one?

00:14:27.170 --> 00:14:27.955
Like, who did you call?

00:14:27.955 --> 00:14:28.870
Did you write a plan?

00:14:28.870 --> 00:14:31.040
Did you start-- I
don't even know.

00:14:31.040 --> 00:14:34.200
ELON MUSK: Actually,
the origin of SpaceX

00:14:34.200 --> 00:14:37.990
is that I was
trying to figure out

00:14:37.990 --> 00:14:41.650
why we'd not sent
any people to Mars.

00:14:41.650 --> 00:14:45.510
Because the obvious
next step after Apollo

00:14:45.510 --> 00:14:47.810
was to send people to Mars.

00:14:47.810 --> 00:14:50.730
But what in fact happened
was that we sent a few people

00:14:50.730 --> 00:14:52.760
to the moon and then
we didn't send anyone

00:14:52.760 --> 00:14:55.870
after that to the moon
or Mars or anything.

00:14:55.870 --> 00:14:59.420
But if you'd asked people
in 1969, what would 2013

00:14:59.420 --> 00:15:01.060
look like, they would
have said, there

00:15:01.060 --> 00:15:02.730
will be a base on the moon.

00:15:02.730 --> 00:15:04.700
We would have least sent
some people to Mars.

00:15:04.700 --> 00:15:06.408
And maybe there'd even
be a base on Mars.

00:15:06.408 --> 00:15:08.200
There'd be like
orbiting space hotels.

00:15:08.200 --> 00:15:11.130
And there'd be all this
awesome stuff in space.

00:15:11.130 --> 00:15:12.910
And that's what people expected.

00:15:12.910 --> 00:15:15.920
And if you said, well, actually,
the United States in 2013

00:15:15.920 --> 00:15:18.465
will not be able to
send anyone to orbit.

00:15:18.465 --> 00:15:19.840
But I'll tell you
what will exist

00:15:19.840 --> 00:15:22.330
is that there'll be this
device in your pocket

00:15:22.330 --> 00:15:24.980
that's like the size of--
smaller than a deck of cards

00:15:24.980 --> 00:15:26.950
that has access to all
the world's information,

00:15:26.950 --> 00:15:29.060
and you can talk to any
one on planet Earth.

00:15:29.060 --> 00:15:32.049
And even if you're like in some
remote village somewhere so

00:15:32.049 --> 00:15:34.590
long as there's something called
the Internet-- they wouldn't

00:15:34.590 --> 00:15:36.830
know what that
means, of course--

00:15:36.830 --> 00:15:39.590
then you would you be able
to communicate with anyone

00:15:39.590 --> 00:15:43.251
instantly and have access to
all of humanity's knowledge.

00:15:43.251 --> 00:15:44.750
They would have
said, like bullshit.

00:15:44.750 --> 00:15:47.242
There's no way that
that's going to be true.

00:15:47.242 --> 00:15:47.908
SAL KHAN: Right.

00:15:47.908 --> 00:15:48.490
Right.

00:15:48.490 --> 00:15:49.990
ELON MUSK: And yet
we all have that.

00:15:49.990 --> 00:15:51.810
And space is not happening.

00:15:51.810 --> 00:15:54.690
So I was trying to figure out
like what was the deal here.

00:15:54.690 --> 00:15:56.371
And this was 2001.

00:15:56.371 --> 00:15:58.120
And it was just a
friend of mine asked me,

00:15:58.120 --> 00:15:59.940
what am I going to
do after Paypal.

00:15:59.940 --> 00:16:01.700
And I said, well, you know,
I've always been interested

00:16:01.700 --> 00:16:02.740
in space, but I don't
think there's anything

00:16:02.740 --> 00:16:04.070
that an individual
could do in space,

00:16:04.070 --> 00:16:06.236
because it's the province
of government, and usually

00:16:06.236 --> 00:16:07.530
a large government.

00:16:07.530 --> 00:16:09.049
But, I am curious
as to when we're

00:16:09.049 --> 00:16:10.340
going to send some one to Mars.

00:16:10.340 --> 00:16:11.840
So I went to the
NASA website to try

00:16:11.840 --> 00:16:14.180
to figure out where is the
place that tells you that.

00:16:14.180 --> 00:16:16.360
And I couldn't find that.

00:16:16.360 --> 00:16:18.960
So I was like, either I'm bad
at looking at the website,

00:16:18.960 --> 00:16:20.750
or they have a terrible
website, because surely there

00:16:20.750 --> 00:16:21.430
must be a date.

00:16:21.430 --> 00:16:22.200
SAL KHAN: That
should be a big date.

00:16:22.200 --> 00:16:23.400
ELON MUSK: Yeah.

00:16:23.400 --> 00:16:25.700
This should be on
the front page.

00:16:25.700 --> 00:16:27.470
And then I discovered
actually that NASA

00:16:27.470 --> 00:16:31.170
had no plans to send people
to Mars, or even really back

00:16:31.170 --> 00:16:32.890
to the moon.

00:16:32.890 --> 00:16:35.020
So this was really
was disappointing.

00:16:35.020 --> 00:16:42.380
I thought well, maybe this is
a question of national will.

00:16:42.380 --> 00:16:47.690
Like do we to get people
excited about space again?

00:16:47.690 --> 00:16:49.600
And try to get NASA
a bigger budget,

00:16:49.600 --> 00:16:52.990
and then we would
send people to Mars.

00:16:52.990 --> 00:16:59.780
And so I started
researching the area,

00:16:59.780 --> 00:17:02.710
becoming more familiar with
space, reading lots of books.

00:17:02.710 --> 00:17:07.560
And I came up with this idea
to do so-called Mars oasis,

00:17:07.560 --> 00:17:11.324
which was to send a small
greenhouse with seeds

00:17:11.324 --> 00:17:14.710
in dehydrated gel that upon
landing, you hydrate the gel.

00:17:14.710 --> 00:17:16.849
You have green plants
on a red background.

00:17:16.849 --> 00:17:21.140
The public responses to
precedents and superlatives.

00:17:21.140 --> 00:17:23.319
So it would be the
first life on Mars.

00:17:23.319 --> 00:17:25.240
The furthest that
life's ever traveled.

00:17:25.240 --> 00:17:27.156
And you'd have this money
shot of green plants

00:17:27.156 --> 00:17:28.970
on a red background.

00:17:28.970 --> 00:17:32.370
So that seemed like it would
get people pretty excited.

00:17:34.880 --> 00:17:36.840
So I started getting into this.

00:17:36.840 --> 00:17:39.190
And trying to
figure out, OK, well

00:17:39.190 --> 00:17:42.860
can I afford to
build a spacecraft?

00:17:42.860 --> 00:17:45.599
Because I had some money
as a result of PayPal,

00:17:45.599 --> 00:17:47.140
but it had to fit
within that budget.

00:17:47.140 --> 00:17:51.771
And I figured we had to do two
missions, because if we only

00:17:51.771 --> 00:17:53.270
did one and it
failed, then it might

00:17:53.270 --> 00:17:54.640
have like the opposite effect.

00:17:54.640 --> 00:17:57.660
SAL KHAN: But you were willing
to bet the farm, so to speak,

00:17:57.660 --> 00:17:58.474
on this?

00:17:58.474 --> 00:17:59.140
ELON MUSK: Yeah.

00:17:59.140 --> 00:18:04.375
Well, I figured I was willing to
spend half the money that I got

00:18:04.375 --> 00:18:08.052
from PayPal with no
expectation of return.

00:18:08.052 --> 00:18:09.760
Because I thought this
was just something

00:18:09.760 --> 00:18:13.649
that was pretty
important and yeah,

00:18:13.649 --> 00:18:15.440
it seemed like I could
spend half the money

00:18:15.440 --> 00:18:19.212
I made on PayPal on this, and
if that got NASA a bigger budget

00:18:19.212 --> 00:18:20.795
and resulted in us
going to Mars, that

00:18:20.795 --> 00:18:22.087
would be a pretty good outcome.

00:18:22.087 --> 00:18:24.628
SAL KHAN: And when your friends
or your family came up to you

00:18:24.628 --> 00:18:27.190
and said, look there's
nations that can't do this.

00:18:27.190 --> 00:18:29.820
You're a guy, I mean you
have some resources, what

00:18:29.820 --> 00:18:32.080
did you say or do or think?

00:18:32.080 --> 00:18:37.500
ELON MUSK: Well, so I had
a lot of friends of mine

00:18:37.500 --> 00:18:39.624
try to talk me out of
starting a rocket company,

00:18:39.624 --> 00:18:41.040
because they thought
it was crazy.

00:18:41.040 --> 00:18:42.780
And one friend of
mine made me watch

00:18:42.780 --> 00:18:44.110
a video of rockets blowing up.

00:18:46.940 --> 00:18:48.414
And there were
just lots of people

00:18:48.414 --> 00:18:50.080
that thought it was
a really crazy idea.

00:18:50.080 --> 00:18:51.040
And there was some
people that had

00:18:51.040 --> 00:18:53.320
tried to start rocket
companies, not succeeded.

00:18:53.320 --> 00:18:55.927
And they tried to
talk me out of it.

00:18:55.927 --> 00:18:58.260
But the thing is that-- their
premise for talking me out

00:18:58.260 --> 00:18:59.780
of it was, well, we
think you're going

00:18:59.780 --> 00:19:01.196
to lose the money
that you invest.

00:19:01.196 --> 00:19:04.260
I was like, well, that
was my expectation anyway,

00:19:04.260 --> 00:19:07.500
so I don't really mind if I
lose-- you I mean, I mind,

00:19:07.500 --> 00:19:11.320
but I mean it's not like
I was trying to figure out

00:19:11.320 --> 00:19:13.170
the rank-ordered best
way to invest money

00:19:13.170 --> 00:19:17.340
and on that basis chose space.

00:19:17.340 --> 00:19:19.935
It's not like that's--
I thought, wow--

00:19:19.935 --> 00:19:22.310
SAL KHAN: You weren't looking
at like money-market bonds,

00:19:22.310 --> 00:19:23.870
AAA bonds, rocket company.

00:19:23.870 --> 00:19:24.620
You weren't like--

00:19:24.620 --> 00:19:26.036
ELON MUSK: I could
do real estate.

00:19:26.036 --> 00:19:29.230
I could invest in shoe making.

00:19:29.230 --> 00:19:30.600
Anything.

00:19:30.600 --> 00:19:33.880
And, whoa, space
is the highest ROI.

00:19:33.880 --> 00:19:37.520
That is not what-- it
wasn't the premise.

00:19:37.520 --> 00:19:39.020
I just thought that
it was important

00:19:39.020 --> 00:19:40.770
that humanity
expand beyond Earth,

00:19:40.770 --> 00:19:43.255
and we weren't doing
that, so maybe there

00:19:43.255 --> 00:19:46.810
was something I could
do to spur that on.

00:19:46.810 --> 00:19:51.610
And then I was able to compress
the costs of the spacecraft

00:19:51.610 --> 00:19:54.425
and everything down to a
relatively manageable number.

00:19:54.425 --> 00:19:56.770
And I got stuck on the rocket.

00:19:56.770 --> 00:19:58.850
The US rockets were
way too expensive.

00:19:58.850 --> 00:20:01.460
I ended up going to Russia--
I flew to Russia three times

00:20:01.460 --> 00:20:04.390
to negotiate a
purchase of an ICBM.

00:20:04.390 --> 00:20:06.080
I tried to buy
two of the biggest

00:20:06.080 --> 00:20:10.710
ICBMs in the Russian
fleet in 2001 and 2002.

00:20:10.710 --> 00:20:12.210
And I actually
negotiated a price.

00:20:12.210 --> 00:20:14.085
SAL KHAN: I'll just let
that statement stand.

00:20:14.085 --> 00:20:19.413
I'm not even going
to-- Well, actually,

00:20:19.413 --> 00:20:22.820
I have to-- like
who did you call?

00:20:22.820 --> 00:20:25.500
ELON MUSK: You open
the yellow pages.

00:20:25.500 --> 00:20:27.030
Go to ICBMs.

00:20:27.030 --> 00:20:27.730
Oh!

00:20:27.730 --> 00:20:29.500
SAL KHAN: How does
this-- I don't

00:20:29.500 --> 00:20:30.565
want to get too much
in to it but I'm

00:20:30.565 --> 00:20:32.231
curious about this
one particular thing.

00:20:32.231 --> 00:20:34.724
You decide at some point
you need to buy an ICBM?

00:20:34.724 --> 00:20:35.390
ELON MUSK: Yeah.

00:20:35.390 --> 00:20:37.890
Well, actually at first I tried
to buy just a normal launch

00:20:37.890 --> 00:20:38.930
program that they use
to launch satellites,

00:20:38.930 --> 00:20:40.220
but those are too expensive.

00:20:40.220 --> 00:20:40.890
SAL KHAN: I see.

00:20:40.890 --> 00:20:42.580
I see.

00:20:42.580 --> 00:20:45.580
ELON MUSK: The Boeing Delta
II would have cost $65 million

00:20:45.580 --> 00:20:48.404
each, so two would
have been $130 million.

00:20:48.404 --> 00:20:50.570
And then I was like, woah,
OK, that breaks my budget

00:20:50.570 --> 00:20:51.100
right there.

00:20:54.500 --> 00:20:56.150
And I tried to
negotiate with them.

00:20:56.150 --> 00:20:57.460
And that was not-- I
did not make progress.

00:20:57.460 --> 00:20:59.085
SAL KHAN: How much
does an ICBM go for?

00:20:59.085 --> 00:21:01.690
I'm curious what's the
market rate for one of those?

00:21:01.690 --> 00:21:02.399
ELON MUSK: Well--

00:21:02.399 --> 00:21:04.023
SAL KHAN: This is
right after the fall,

00:21:04.023 --> 00:21:05.010
it might have gone up.

00:21:05.010 --> 00:21:07.210
ELON MUSK: Yeah, it's
gone up a lot since then.

00:21:07.210 --> 00:21:11.652
But in 2001, it would've
been about $10 million each.

00:21:11.652 --> 00:21:13.110
So two would have
been $20 million.

00:21:13.110 --> 00:21:18.420
And then I thought I could
get the rest of the mission

00:21:18.420 --> 00:21:20.620
down to also around $10
million per, so we'd

00:21:20.620 --> 00:21:24.300
have a dual mission with
like two identical launches,

00:21:24.300 --> 00:21:29.740
two identical spacecraft
for roughly $40 million.

00:21:29.740 --> 00:21:32.870
And so I thought,
OK, I can do that.

00:21:32.870 --> 00:21:34.370
SAL KHAN: But you
must have had some

00:21:34.370 --> 00:21:37.404
like rocket scientists
advising you at this point?

00:21:37.404 --> 00:21:38.820
This sounds like
you were serious.

00:21:38.820 --> 00:21:39.600
I mean you were--

00:21:39.600 --> 00:21:40.630
ELON MUSK: Yeah.

00:21:40.630 --> 00:21:45.890
I engaged a bunch of
consultants and started

00:21:45.890 --> 00:21:50.210
to get familiar with
the space industry.

00:21:50.210 --> 00:21:52.330
But then after the
third trip to Russia,

00:21:52.330 --> 00:21:53.930
I came to realize
that I was actually

00:21:53.930 --> 00:21:58.410
wrong about my first premise,
that there was a lack of will.

00:21:58.410 --> 00:22:01.030
In fact, I think that there's
a tremendous amount of will

00:22:01.030 --> 00:22:03.914
in the United States
for space exploration.

00:22:03.914 --> 00:22:05.580
Because the United
States is essentially

00:22:05.580 --> 00:22:06.832
a nation of explorers.

00:22:06.832 --> 00:22:08.790
I mean, it's a distillation
of the human spirit

00:22:08.790 --> 00:22:10.090
of exploration.

00:22:10.090 --> 00:22:12.455
So of course it was
quite silly of me

00:22:12.455 --> 00:22:16.170
to think that people
lacked motivation.

00:22:16.170 --> 00:22:17.850
But what people
don't want to think

00:22:17.850 --> 00:22:20.614
is that, OK, sending
people to Mars

00:22:20.614 --> 00:22:22.280
is going to be so
expensive that they'll

00:22:22.280 --> 00:22:24.072
have to give up health
care or something.

00:22:24.072 --> 00:22:25.280
They're not going to do that.

00:22:25.280 --> 00:22:28.750
So it's got to be
that going to Mars

00:22:28.750 --> 00:22:33.770
is not going to cause
some meaningful drop

00:22:33.770 --> 00:22:35.550
in their standard of living.

00:22:35.550 --> 00:22:38.250
So if it's like maybe
a quarter of a percent

00:22:38.250 --> 00:22:39.777
or half a percent
of GDP-- something

00:22:39.777 --> 00:22:40.735
like that is palatable.

00:22:43.340 --> 00:22:46.150
Anyways, so I thought,
OK, it's not really

00:22:46.150 --> 00:22:47.730
going to maybe
matter that much if I

00:22:47.730 --> 00:22:54.250
do this mission, because what
really matters is having a way.

00:22:54.250 --> 00:22:57.980
So I was wrong-- I thought
there wasn't enough will,

00:22:57.980 --> 00:22:59.740
but there actually
was plenty of will,

00:22:59.740 --> 00:23:01.930
if people thought
there was a way.

00:23:01.930 --> 00:23:05.860
So then I said, OK, well,
I need to work on the way.

00:23:05.860 --> 00:23:08.370
How hard is it really
to make a rocket?

00:23:08.370 --> 00:23:10.920
Historically, all rockets have
been expensive, so therefore,

00:23:10.920 --> 00:23:13.200
in the future, all
rockets will be expensive.

00:23:13.200 --> 00:23:15.040
But actually that's not true.

00:23:15.040 --> 00:23:16.740
If you say, what is
a rocket made of.

00:23:16.740 --> 00:23:22.071
And say, OK, it's made of
aluminum, titanium, copper,

00:23:22.071 --> 00:23:25.270
carbon fiber, if you want
to go that direction.

00:23:25.270 --> 00:23:28.510
And you can break down and
say, what is the raw material

00:23:28.510 --> 00:23:29.720
cost of all these components.

00:23:29.720 --> 00:23:32.520
And if you have them
stacked on the floor

00:23:32.520 --> 00:23:35.730
and could wave a magic wand so
that the cost of rearranging

00:23:35.730 --> 00:23:39.220
the atoms was zero, then what
would the cost of the rocket

00:23:39.220 --> 00:23:39.829
be.

00:23:39.829 --> 00:23:41.620
And I was like, wow,
OK, it's really small.

00:23:41.620 --> 00:23:45.080
It's like 2% of
what a rocket costs.

00:23:45.080 --> 00:23:47.795
So clearly it would be in
how the atoms are arranged.

00:23:50.367 --> 00:23:51.950
So you've got to
figure out to OK, how

00:23:51.950 --> 00:23:56.980
can we get the atoms
in the right shape

00:23:56.980 --> 00:23:59.530
much more efficiently.

00:23:59.530 --> 00:24:04.500
And so I had a series
of meetings on Saturdays

00:24:04.500 --> 00:24:06.430
with people some
of whom were still

00:24:06.430 --> 00:24:08.350
working at the big
aerospace companies,

00:24:08.350 --> 00:24:10.550
just to try to figure out
is the some catch here

00:24:10.550 --> 00:24:11.935
that I'm not appreciating.

00:24:11.935 --> 00:24:13.270
And I couldn't figure it out.

00:24:13.270 --> 00:24:14.728
There doesn't seem
to be any catch.

00:24:14.728 --> 00:24:16.410
So I started SpaceX.

00:24:16.410 --> 00:24:18.790
SAL KHAN: And you
ended up-- you had

00:24:18.790 --> 00:24:21.249
some failures, but obviously
some huge successes.

00:24:21.249 --> 00:24:23.790
What was the cost that you were
able to build this rocket for

00:24:23.790 --> 00:24:27.330
relative to what they were
being built for before?

00:24:27.330 --> 00:24:28.560
ELON MUSK: So let's see.

00:24:28.560 --> 00:24:31.587
For the Falcon 1, which is
the first rocket we built.

00:24:31.587 --> 00:24:33.420
And the first three
flights did not make it.

00:24:33.420 --> 00:24:38.150
In fact, we got
progressively further.

00:24:38.150 --> 00:24:43.569
But like the first rocket
came in and landed maybe

00:24:43.569 --> 00:24:45.360
a couple hundred yards
away from the launch

00:24:45.360 --> 00:24:50.110
site, and tiny fragments.

00:24:50.110 --> 00:24:54.790
So, yeah, anyway,
that rocketed ended up

00:24:54.790 --> 00:25:00.280
costing around $6
million compared

00:25:00.280 --> 00:25:02.610
to other rockets in
that class, which

00:25:02.610 --> 00:25:04.717
were about to $25 million.

00:25:04.717 --> 00:25:05.300
SAL KHAN: Wow.

00:25:05.300 --> 00:25:06.157
So significant?

00:25:06.157 --> 00:25:07.490
ELON MUSK: Yeah, like a quarter.

00:25:11.080 --> 00:25:13.710
But there's an even
better step beyond that

00:25:13.710 --> 00:25:16.650
which is to make
rockets reusable.

00:25:16.650 --> 00:25:21.230
Right now that is around what
our comparison price is--

00:25:21.230 --> 00:25:23.650
excluding the refurbished ICBMs.

00:25:23.650 --> 00:25:26.460
So, if you say building
a rocket from new,

00:25:26.460 --> 00:25:28.050
how does the SpaceX
rocket compare

00:25:28.050 --> 00:25:30.234
to a rocket from
Boeing or Lockheed?

00:25:30.234 --> 00:25:31.650
It's about a quarter
of the price.

00:25:34.340 --> 00:25:37.390
However, if we make
it reusable, then it

00:25:37.390 --> 00:25:39.670
can be two orders of
magnitude cheaper.

00:25:39.670 --> 00:25:41.420
SAL KHAN: Two orders
of magnitude cheaper.

00:25:41.420 --> 00:25:42.680
A 100th of the price?

00:25:42.680 --> 00:25:43.680
ELON MUSK: That's right.

00:25:45.590 --> 00:25:46.210
For you.

00:25:46.210 --> 00:25:48.480
SAL KHAN: Only today.

00:25:48.480 --> 00:25:49.480
Memorial day sale.

00:25:52.670 --> 00:25:55.910
And I've seen some-- you all are
doing these vertical landings,

00:25:55.910 --> 00:25:59.789
like literally out of like
the 1950s Sci-Fi movies.

00:25:59.789 --> 00:26:01.330
And that's what
you're talking about?

00:26:01.330 --> 00:26:02.520
ELON MUSK: Yeah.

00:26:02.520 --> 00:26:04.270
Essentially, the rocket
needs to come back

00:26:04.270 --> 00:26:06.665
and land at the launch site,
and then reload propellant

00:26:06.665 --> 00:26:08.113
and take off again.

00:26:08.113 --> 00:26:10.060
Like an airplane
in its reusability.

00:26:10.060 --> 00:26:12.060
SAL KHAN: How far do you
think we are from that?

00:26:12.060 --> 00:26:13.960
When do you think--
your best guess,

00:26:13.960 --> 00:26:15.790
when we'll actually
see that happening?

00:26:15.790 --> 00:26:17.750
ELON MUSK: Well, I'm hopeful
we can do it next year.

00:26:17.750 --> 00:26:18.280
SAL KHAN: Oh, OK.

00:26:18.280 --> 00:26:18.780
Yeah.

00:26:18.780 --> 00:26:21.290
That's-- we've got some
ambitious stuff at Khan Academy

00:26:21.290 --> 00:26:22.820
for the next year, too.

00:26:22.820 --> 00:26:24.190
So we can compare.

00:26:24.190 --> 00:26:27.078
We're redesigning the site.

00:26:27.078 --> 00:26:27.786
ELON MUSK: Right.

00:26:30.252 --> 00:26:31.960
We've been working on
it for a long time.

00:26:31.960 --> 00:26:35.230
I should say, SpaceX has
been around for 11 years,

00:26:35.230 --> 00:26:37.220
and thus far we have not
recovered any rockets.

00:26:37.220 --> 00:26:40.190
We recovered the
spacecraft from orbit.

00:26:40.190 --> 00:26:42.540
So that was great.

00:26:42.540 --> 00:26:45.360
But none of our attempts to
recover the rocket stages

00:26:45.360 --> 00:26:46.780
have been successful.

00:26:46.780 --> 00:26:49.060
The rocket stages have
always blown up essentially

00:26:49.060 --> 00:26:50.720
on reentry.

00:26:50.720 --> 00:26:55.095
Now, we think we've figured
out why that was the case.

00:26:55.095 --> 00:26:58.200
And it's a tricky thing, because
Earth's gravity is really

00:26:58.200 --> 00:26:59.740
quite strong.

00:26:59.740 --> 00:27:04.920
And with an advanced rocket,
you can do maybe 2% to 3%

00:27:04.920 --> 00:27:08.800
of your lift-off mass
to orbit, typically.

00:27:08.800 --> 00:27:13.690
And then reusability
subtracts 2% to 3%

00:27:13.690 --> 00:27:16.220
So then you've got like
nothing to orbit or negative.

00:27:16.220 --> 00:27:20.630
And that's obviously
not helpful.

00:27:20.630 --> 00:27:25.440
And so the trick is to
try to shift that from

00:27:25.440 --> 00:27:29.280
say 2%, 3% in an
expendable configuration

00:27:29.280 --> 00:27:34.190
to make the rocket mass
efficiency, engine efficiency,

00:27:34.190 --> 00:27:37.390
and so forth, so much better
that it moves to maybe around

00:27:37.390 --> 00:27:40.280
3.5% to 4% in expendable
configuration.

00:27:40.280 --> 00:27:43.060
And then try to get clever
about the reusability elements

00:27:43.060 --> 00:27:47.290
and try to drop that to
around the 1.5% to 2% level.

00:27:47.290 --> 00:27:49.989
So you have a net payload
to orbit of about 2%.

00:27:49.989 --> 00:27:52.530
SAL KHAN: But you're doing it
at one, two orders of magnitude

00:27:52.530 --> 00:27:53.170
cheaper.

00:27:53.170 --> 00:27:53.836
ELON MUSK: Yeah.

00:27:53.836 --> 00:27:57.660
Absolutely, because our Falcon
9 rocket cost about $60 million.

00:27:57.660 --> 00:28:01.970
But the propellant
cost-- which is mostly

00:28:01.970 --> 00:28:05.780
oxygen-- it's two-thirds
oxygen, one-third fuel--

00:28:05.780 --> 00:28:07.260
is only about $200,000.

00:28:07.260 --> 00:28:08.170
SAL KHAN: Wow.

00:28:08.170 --> 00:28:11.140
ELON MUSK: And it's
much like a 747.

00:28:11.140 --> 00:28:15.810
It costs about as much
to refuel our rocket

00:28:15.810 --> 00:28:20.210
as it does to refuel a
747 within-- well, pretty

00:28:20.210 --> 00:28:21.036
close, essentially.

00:28:21.036 --> 00:28:22.910
SAL KHAN: So assuming
you all are successful,

00:28:22.910 --> 00:28:24.493
and you all have
proven yourself to be

00:28:24.493 --> 00:28:26.950
successful on these audacious
things in the past, I mean,

00:28:26.950 --> 00:28:27.500
what happens?

00:28:27.500 --> 00:28:30.200
I mean that seems like it's--
what happens in the next 5,

00:28:30.200 --> 00:28:32.575
10 years in the space industry,
if you all are successful

00:28:32.575 --> 00:28:33.630
there?

00:28:33.630 --> 00:28:35.020
I mean do we get to Mars?

00:28:35.020 --> 00:28:38.570
Do we have kind of market
forces, commercialization

00:28:38.570 --> 00:28:41.210
of space starting to happen?

00:28:41.210 --> 00:28:43.474
ELON MUSK: Yeah.

00:28:43.474 --> 00:28:45.380
Let's see.

00:28:45.380 --> 00:28:47.650
Well, the first
step is that we need

00:28:47.650 --> 00:28:50.110
to earn enough money to
keep going as a company.

00:28:50.110 --> 00:28:52.490
So we have to make sure that
we're launching satellites.

00:28:55.510 --> 00:29:00.970
Commercial satellites like
broadcast communications,

00:29:00.970 --> 00:29:06.410
mapping, government satellites
that do scientific missions.

00:29:06.410 --> 00:29:09.050
Earth-based or
space-based missions.

00:29:09.050 --> 00:29:09.715
GPS satellites.

00:29:09.715 --> 00:29:11.270
That kind of thing.

00:29:11.270 --> 00:29:13.239
And then also servicing
the space station.

00:29:13.239 --> 00:29:15.280
Transferring cargo to and
from the space station,

00:29:15.280 --> 00:29:16.880
which we've done a few times.

00:29:16.880 --> 00:29:20.320
And then taking people to
and from the space station.

00:29:20.320 --> 00:29:26.750
So we've got to service the
sort of Earth-based needs

00:29:26.750 --> 00:29:29.980
to launch satellites
and that pays the bills.

00:29:29.980 --> 00:29:34.360
But in doing that keep
improving the technology

00:29:34.360 --> 00:29:39.320
to a point where we can
make full reusability work.

00:29:39.320 --> 00:29:42.890
And we have sufficient
scale and sophistication

00:29:42.890 --> 00:29:45.297
to be able to take
people to Mars.

00:29:45.297 --> 00:29:45.880
SAL KHAN: Wow.

00:29:45.880 --> 00:29:47.671
So you think this is
going to be a reality?

00:29:47.671 --> 00:29:49.430
What's your best
guess of when we're

00:29:49.430 --> 00:29:51.105
going to have someone on Mars?

00:29:51.105 --> 00:29:52.949
ELON MUSK: I think
probably about 12 years.

00:29:52.949 --> 00:29:53.990
SAL KHAN: That's nothing.

00:29:53.990 --> 00:29:56.760
And you think it'll
be a round trip?

00:29:56.760 --> 00:29:59.870
It won't just be some type
of permanent colony on Mars?

00:29:59.870 --> 00:30:01.786
ELON MUSK: I think it's
probably a round trip.

00:30:03.980 --> 00:30:05.040
It's not for sure.

00:30:05.040 --> 00:30:07.576
SAL KHAN: I could talk about
this for-- people know, I'm--

00:30:07.576 --> 00:30:09.450
ELON MUSK: Aspirational
it'd be a round trip.

00:30:09.450 --> 00:30:12.550
SAL KHAN: This is mind blowing.

00:30:12.550 --> 00:30:13.600
And then on Tesla.

00:30:13.600 --> 00:30:16.845
I mean Tesla's obviously,
from my vantage,

00:30:16.845 --> 00:30:18.960
it's a huge success.

00:30:18.960 --> 00:30:23.032
What do you think in that
industry-- well, one,

00:30:23.032 --> 00:30:24.490
I'll ask kind of
the same question.

00:30:24.490 --> 00:30:26.390
What did you think--
this is something

00:30:26.390 --> 00:30:29.500
that GM and Toyota and these
massive multi-billion dollar

00:30:29.500 --> 00:30:31.570
organizations have been trying.

00:30:31.570 --> 00:30:34.230
What gave you the
confidence to pursue it?

00:30:34.230 --> 00:30:36.984
And now that it seems to
be a huge success, where

00:30:36.984 --> 00:30:38.400
do you think this
industry's going

00:30:38.400 --> 00:30:40.565
to be the next 5, 10 years?

00:30:40.565 --> 00:30:41.190
ELON MUSK: Yes.

00:30:41.190 --> 00:30:44.450
So with Tesla, the goal
is try to accelerate

00:30:44.450 --> 00:30:47.460
the advent of
sustainable transport.

00:30:47.460 --> 00:30:50.220
I think it would happen
anyway, just out of necessity.

00:30:50.220 --> 00:30:53.660
But because we have an
un-priced externality

00:30:53.660 --> 00:30:55.860
in the cost of gasoline.

00:30:55.860 --> 00:30:59.110
We weren't pricing in the
environmental effects of CO2

00:30:59.110 --> 00:31:01.910
in the oceans and atmosphere.

00:31:01.910 --> 00:31:05.780
That's causing the normal
market forces to not function

00:31:05.780 --> 00:31:06.710
properly.

00:31:06.710 --> 00:31:09.380
And so the goal
of Tesla is to try

00:31:09.380 --> 00:31:13.500
to act as a catalyst
to accelerate

00:31:13.500 --> 00:31:14.700
those sort of normal forces.

00:31:14.700 --> 00:31:18.610
The normal sort of market
reaction that would occur.

00:31:18.610 --> 00:31:21.960
We're trying to have a
catalytic effect on that.

00:31:21.960 --> 00:31:26.240
And try to make it happen,
I don't know, maybe 10 years

00:31:26.240 --> 00:31:29.020
sooner than it would
otherwise occur.

00:31:29.020 --> 00:31:30.370
That's the goal of Tesla.

00:31:30.370 --> 00:31:33.910
So that's the reason we're
making electric cars and not

00:31:33.910 --> 00:31:35.120
any other kind of car.

00:31:35.120 --> 00:31:40.460
And we also supply powertrains
to Toyota and to Mercedes

00:31:40.460 --> 00:31:43.340
and maybe to other car
companies in the future

00:31:43.340 --> 00:31:49.370
to accelerate their production
of electric vehicles.

00:31:49.370 --> 00:31:51.180
So that's the goal there.

00:31:51.180 --> 00:31:53.060
And so far, it's
working out pretty well.

00:31:53.060 --> 00:31:55.393
SAL KHAN: I mean, I just saw
a news report earlier today

00:31:55.393 --> 00:31:57.836
that you all sold more
Model S's than-- you all

00:31:57.836 --> 00:31:59.770
are leading that
segment of the industry.

00:31:59.770 --> 00:32:05.400
The Mercedes S class, the BMW
7 Series, or the Lexus LS400,

00:32:05.400 --> 00:32:06.990
or whatever it is.

00:32:06.990 --> 00:32:11.530
ELON MUSK: Yeah, actually,
that seems to be the case.

00:32:11.530 --> 00:32:13.870
I didn't realize they sold
so few cars in that segment.

00:32:16.179 --> 00:32:17.720
Because we don't
sell that many cars.

00:32:17.720 --> 00:32:19.817
We sell 5,000 a
quarter, or 12,000--

00:32:19.817 --> 00:32:22.150
SAL KHAN: Well, out here they
seem like you know every--

00:32:22.150 --> 00:32:26.660
ELON MUSK: Well, this
is our home team.

00:32:26.660 --> 00:32:29.816
So it's-- we better sell
a lot in the Bay Area.

00:32:29.816 --> 00:32:31.720
Because otherwise we're like--

00:32:31.720 --> 00:32:34.710
SAL KHAN: And, well,
I mean, similar thing.

00:32:34.710 --> 00:32:35.870
How did you start?

00:32:35.870 --> 00:32:37.078
What gave you the confidence?

00:32:37.078 --> 00:32:38.700
And do you see
yourselves as kind

00:32:38.700 --> 00:32:42.260
of a major automotive,
mainstream brand in 5,10 years,

00:32:42.260 --> 00:32:45.520
all the way down to competing
with the Honda Accords

00:32:45.520 --> 00:32:47.520
and Civics?

00:32:47.520 --> 00:32:49.040
ELON MUSK: I mean, yeah.

00:32:49.040 --> 00:32:53.950
Our goal-- it's not to
become a brand big brand

00:32:53.950 --> 00:32:59.300
or to compete with
Honda Civics, rather

00:32:59.300 --> 00:33:01.760
to advance the cause
of electric vehicles.

00:33:01.760 --> 00:33:05.320
And so we're just
going to keep making

00:33:05.320 --> 00:33:08.740
more and more electric cars and
driving the price point down

00:33:08.740 --> 00:33:13.840
until the industry is
very firmly electric.

00:33:13.840 --> 00:33:15.977
Like maybe half of
all cars made are

00:33:15.977 --> 00:33:17.310
electric or something like that.

00:33:17.310 --> 00:33:18.550
Which is not to
say that we expect

00:33:18.550 --> 00:33:19.591
to make half of all cars.

00:33:19.591 --> 00:33:22.940
We want to just have that
catalytic effect until

00:33:22.940 --> 00:33:23.910
at least that occurs.

00:33:23.910 --> 00:33:27.000
And I think the point at
which we're approaching half

00:33:27.000 --> 00:33:28.660
of all new cars
made are electric,

00:33:28.660 --> 00:33:31.500
then I think I would consider
that to be the victory

00:33:31.500 --> 00:33:33.970
condition.

00:33:33.970 --> 00:33:38.760
And so the faster we can
bring that day, the better.

00:33:38.760 --> 00:33:42.570
SAL KHAN: When would be your
guess when that happens?

00:33:42.570 --> 00:33:44.370
ELON MUSK: Well, I
made a bet with someone

00:33:44.370 --> 00:33:47.940
about three years ago that it
would be sooner than 20 years.

00:33:47.940 --> 00:33:49.630
So it's 17 years from now.

00:33:49.630 --> 00:33:54.510
But that's conservative.

00:33:54.510 --> 00:34:02.547
I think it's probably
maybe 13 or 14 years.

00:34:02.547 --> 00:34:03.130
SAL KHAN: Wow.

00:34:03.130 --> 00:34:05.610
Right when we're going to Mars.

00:34:05.610 --> 00:34:06.890
ELON MUSK: Right.

00:34:06.890 --> 00:34:10.500
SAL KHAN: It'll
be exciting times.

00:34:10.500 --> 00:34:12.380
ELON MUSK: True.

00:34:12.380 --> 00:34:12.880
Exactly.

00:34:12.880 --> 00:34:13.540
I was just thinking about that.

00:34:13.540 --> 00:34:15.956
It was like, oh, those time
frames are kind of coincident.

00:34:20.810 --> 00:34:23.130
The nature of new
technology adoption

00:34:23.130 --> 00:34:24.737
is it tends to
follow an S-curve.

00:34:24.737 --> 00:34:26.820
So what usually happens
is people under-predict it

00:34:26.820 --> 00:34:27.690
in in the beginning,
because people

00:34:27.690 --> 00:34:29.650
tend to extrapolate
in a straight line.

00:34:29.650 --> 00:34:32.739
And then they'll over-predict
it at the midpoint,

00:34:32.739 --> 00:34:34.500
because there's late adopters.

00:34:34.500 --> 00:34:37.130
And then it'll
actually take longer

00:34:37.130 --> 00:34:39.013
than people think
at the mid-point,

00:34:39.013 --> 00:34:41.179
but much shorter than people
think at the beginning.

00:34:44.079 --> 00:34:47.400
But I'm pretty excited
about how things are going.

00:34:47.400 --> 00:34:51.350
And, in fact, I think that the
pace of technology improvement

00:34:51.350 --> 00:34:55.510
in electric energy
storage is really

00:34:55.510 --> 00:34:57.917
moving faster than
anyone thinks.

00:34:57.917 --> 00:34:58.500
SAL KHAN: Wow.

00:34:58.500 --> 00:35:00.410
I got one more-- how
are we doing on time?

00:35:00.410 --> 00:35:01.617
Where's Ester?

00:35:01.617 --> 00:35:02.200
Oh, 9 o'clock.

00:35:02.200 --> 00:35:03.070
So how much time do you have?

00:35:03.070 --> 00:35:03.780
I want to make sure
we don't go over.

00:35:03.780 --> 00:35:05.863
ELON MUSK: Well, I guess
maybe another 15 minutes.

00:35:05.863 --> 00:35:06.499
SAL KHAN: OK.

00:35:06.499 --> 00:35:08.040
So I'll finish with
one last question

00:35:08.040 --> 00:35:09.280
and then we'll open it up.

00:35:09.280 --> 00:35:11.490
What advice do you have
for us at Khan Academy?

00:35:11.490 --> 00:35:12.490
ELON MUSK: I don't know.

00:35:12.490 --> 00:35:14.115
You guys seem to be
doing really great.

00:35:14.115 --> 00:35:16.327
So I was wondering if
you had advice for me.

00:35:16.327 --> 00:35:17.285
SAL KHAN: Oh, no, well.

00:35:20.120 --> 00:35:21.430
ELON MUSK: Yeah.

00:35:21.430 --> 00:35:24.920
It seems like you're doing
an amazing job of-- really

00:35:24.920 --> 00:35:25.844
super leveraged.

00:35:25.844 --> 00:35:27.635
I mean, obviously, a
small team, and you're

00:35:27.635 --> 00:35:28.600
having a dramatic effect--

00:35:28.600 --> 00:35:30.891
SAL KHAN: Yeah, half these
people don't even work here.

00:35:30.891 --> 00:35:32.930
There just like-- so
it's like it's even--

00:35:32.930 --> 00:35:33.638
ELON MUSK: Right.

00:35:33.638 --> 00:35:35.730
So it's, I think very
impressive thing you're

00:35:35.730 --> 00:35:41.775
doing to spread knowledge
and understanding

00:35:41.775 --> 00:35:42.650
throughout the world.

00:35:42.650 --> 00:35:45.310
SAL KHAN: The universe
soon, if you hold up

00:35:45.310 --> 00:35:48.730
your end of the bargain.

00:35:48.730 --> 00:35:51.177
ELON MUSK: It's
actually kind of funny.

00:35:51.177 --> 00:35:52.510
If you think, what is education?

00:35:52.510 --> 00:35:54.730
Like you're basically
downloading data and algorithms

00:35:54.730 --> 00:35:56.030
into your brain.

00:35:56.030 --> 00:36:01.610
And it's actually amazingly
bad in conventional education.

00:36:01.610 --> 00:36:04.870
Because like it shouldn't
be like this huge chore.

00:36:04.870 --> 00:36:06.600
So you're making
it way, way better.

00:36:10.320 --> 00:36:12.930
But I think a lot of
things that I would say,

00:36:12.930 --> 00:36:16.480
you've probably heard 100 times.

00:36:16.480 --> 00:36:19.120
And, in fact, are if not doing.

00:36:19.120 --> 00:36:23.140
The more you can
game-ify the process

00:36:23.140 --> 00:36:25.870
of learning, the better.

00:36:25.870 --> 00:36:27.500
For my kids, I do
not have to encourage

00:36:27.500 --> 00:36:28.630
them to play video games.

00:36:28.630 --> 00:36:32.227
I have to like pry them from
their hands, like crack.

00:36:32.227 --> 00:36:32.810
SAL KHAN: Yes.

00:36:32.810 --> 00:36:35.465
ELON MUSK: It's like,
drop that crack needle.

00:36:35.465 --> 00:36:37.590
SAL KHAN: You have that
problem at your house, too.

00:36:37.590 --> 00:36:38.830
The crack is addictive.

00:36:41.620 --> 00:36:46.850
ELON MUSK: So to the degree that
you can make somehow learning

00:36:46.850 --> 00:36:50.140
like a game, then it's better.

00:36:50.140 --> 00:36:52.080
And I think, unfortunately,
a lot of education

00:36:52.080 --> 00:36:54.200
is very vaudevillian.

00:36:54.200 --> 00:36:57.305
You've got someone
standing up there kind

00:36:57.305 --> 00:36:59.070
of lecturing at people.

00:36:59.070 --> 00:37:01.440
And they've done the same
lecture 20 years in a row,

00:37:01.440 --> 00:37:03.130
and they're not very
excited about it.

00:37:03.130 --> 00:37:07.010
And that lack of enthusiasm
is conveyed to the students.

00:37:07.010 --> 00:37:08.764
They're not very
excited about it.

00:37:08.764 --> 00:37:10.180
They don't know
why they're there.

00:37:10.180 --> 00:37:11.638
Like why are we
letting this stuff.

00:37:11.638 --> 00:37:12.900
We don't even know why.

00:37:12.900 --> 00:37:14.733
In fact, I think a lot
of things that people

00:37:14.733 --> 00:37:17.090
learn that probably there's
no point in learning them.

00:37:17.090 --> 00:37:19.210
Because they never use
them in the future.

00:37:19.210 --> 00:37:21.710
SAL KHAN: Because who's going
to launch a rocket into space?

00:37:21.710 --> 00:37:24.670
I mean, that's just like--
exactly, that never happens.

00:37:24.670 --> 00:37:26.380
ELON MUSK: Well,
you have to say--

00:37:26.380 --> 00:37:28.010
people don't stand
back and say, well,

00:37:28.010 --> 00:37:30.834
why are we teaching
people these things.

00:37:30.834 --> 00:37:32.250
And we should tell
them, probably,

00:37:32.250 --> 00:37:33.750
why we're teaching these things.

00:37:33.750 --> 00:37:35.400
Because a lot of kids are
probably just in school,

00:37:35.400 --> 00:37:37.108
probably puzzled as
to why they're there.

00:37:40.690 --> 00:37:43.150
I think if you can
explain the why of things,

00:37:43.150 --> 00:37:44.780
then that makes
a huge difference

00:37:44.780 --> 00:37:46.280
to people's motivation.

00:37:46.280 --> 00:37:48.260
Then they understand purpose.

00:37:51.010 --> 00:37:53.220
So I think that's
pretty important.

00:37:53.220 --> 00:37:54.542
And just make it entertaining.

00:37:54.542 --> 00:37:56.625
But I think just in general
conventional education

00:37:56.625 --> 00:37:57.916
should be massively overhauled.

00:37:57.916 --> 00:38:01.630
And I'm sure you pretty
much agree with that.

00:38:01.630 --> 00:38:04.050
I mean the analogy
I sometimes use

00:38:04.050 --> 00:38:07.980
is, have you seen like
Batman, the Chris Nolan

00:38:07.980 --> 00:38:09.210
movie, the recent one.

00:38:09.210 --> 00:38:12.100
And it's pretty
freaking awesome.

00:38:12.100 --> 00:38:15.450
And you've got incredible
special effects, great script,

00:38:15.450 --> 00:38:21.090
multiple takes, amazing
actors, and great sound,

00:38:21.090 --> 00:38:24.330
and it's very engaging.

00:38:24.330 --> 00:38:27.257
But if you were to
instead say, OK--

00:38:27.257 --> 00:38:29.840
even if you had the same script,
so at least it's same script.

00:38:29.840 --> 00:38:31.530
And you said, OK,
now that script,

00:38:31.530 --> 00:38:33.470
instead of having
movies, we're going

00:38:33.470 --> 00:38:37.570
to have that script performed
by the local town troop.

00:38:37.570 --> 00:38:39.822
OK, and so in every
small town in America,

00:38:39.822 --> 00:38:41.280
if movies didn't
exist, they'd have

00:38:41.280 --> 00:38:44.540
to recreate The Dark Night.

00:38:44.540 --> 00:38:50.352
With like home-sewn costumes and
like jumping across the stage.

00:38:50.352 --> 00:38:52.310
And not really getting
their lines quite right.

00:38:52.310 --> 00:38:56.900
And not really looking like
the people in the movie.

00:38:56.900 --> 00:38:58.040
And no special effects.

00:38:58.040 --> 00:38:59.842
And I mean that would suck.

00:39:02.740 --> 00:39:03.980
It would be terrible.

00:39:03.980 --> 00:39:06.010
SAL KHAN: That's right.

00:39:06.010 --> 00:39:06.630
Very--

00:39:06.630 --> 00:39:07.796
ELON MUSK: That's education.

00:39:09.556 --> 00:39:12.270
SAL KHAN: So with that-- and
I apologize to all of you

00:39:12.270 --> 00:39:14.000
guys for hogging up all of the
time, because, obviously, I

00:39:14.000 --> 00:39:15.583
could talk for hours
about this stuff.

00:39:15.583 --> 00:39:17.240
But we do have time,
probably 5 or 10

00:39:17.240 --> 00:39:19.720
minutes for a
handful of questions.

00:39:19.720 --> 00:39:22.226
If none of you all have
any, I have about nine more.

00:39:22.226 --> 00:39:23.450
But, yes.

00:39:23.450 --> 00:39:26.050
SPEAKER 1: So I noticed-- I
picked up two kind of themes

00:39:26.050 --> 00:39:27.350
from what you were discussing.

00:39:27.350 --> 00:39:30.557
One was somewhat
audacious goals.

00:39:30.557 --> 00:39:32.890
And the other was I don't
think I heard you use the word

00:39:32.890 --> 00:39:36.760
profit in anything
that you spoke about.

00:39:36.760 --> 00:39:41.110
You seem to be-- each thing is
pointed at like re-invigorating

00:39:41.110 --> 00:39:44.770
an industry or bringing
back space missions.

00:39:44.770 --> 00:39:47.400
How much of your
success do you attribute

00:39:47.400 --> 00:39:52.130
to having really
audacious goals or versus

00:39:52.130 --> 00:39:56.470
just not being focused on
the short term, money coming

00:39:56.470 --> 00:39:59.370
in, or I don't know, investors?

00:39:59.370 --> 00:40:01.140
ELON MUSK:
Unfortunately, one does

00:40:01.140 --> 00:40:04.170
have to be focused on the
short time and money coming

00:40:04.170 --> 00:40:06.600
in when creating a company,
because otherwise the company

00:40:06.600 --> 00:40:08.100
will die.

00:40:08.100 --> 00:40:11.520
So I think that a
lot of times people

00:40:11.520 --> 00:40:15.580
think like creating
company is going to be fun.

00:40:15.580 --> 00:40:17.400
I would say it's
really not that fun.

00:40:17.400 --> 00:40:19.010
I mean there are periods of fun.

00:40:19.010 --> 00:40:23.290
And there are periods
where it's just awful.

00:40:23.290 --> 00:40:26.269
And, particularly, if you're
the CEO of the company,

00:40:26.269 --> 00:40:28.310
you actually have a
distillation of all the worst

00:40:28.310 --> 00:40:31.347
problems in the company.

00:40:31.347 --> 00:40:32.930
There's no point in
spending your time

00:40:32.930 --> 00:40:34.660
on things that are going right.

00:40:34.660 --> 00:40:36.270
So you're only
spending your time

00:40:36.270 --> 00:40:37.832
on things that are going wrong.

00:40:37.832 --> 00:40:39.540
And there are things
that are going wrong

00:40:39.540 --> 00:40:42.000
that other people
can't take care of.

00:40:42.000 --> 00:40:44.110
So you have like
the worst-- you have

00:40:44.110 --> 00:40:46.856
a filter for the crappest
problems in the company.

00:40:46.856 --> 00:40:48.820
The most pernicious
and painful problem.

00:40:51.350 --> 00:40:57.290
So I think you have to feel
quite compelled to do it.

00:40:57.290 --> 00:40:59.230
And have a fairly
high pain threshold.

00:40:59.230 --> 00:41:01.270
There's a friend
of mine who says,

00:41:01.270 --> 00:41:03.560
starting a company is like
starting into the abyss

00:41:03.560 --> 00:41:06.950
and eating glass.

00:41:06.950 --> 00:41:10.365
And there's some truth to that.

00:41:10.365 --> 00:41:11.810
The staring into
the abyss part is

00:41:11.810 --> 00:41:13.518
that you're going to
be constantly facing

00:41:13.518 --> 00:41:17.590
the extermination
of the company.

00:41:17.590 --> 00:41:19.532
Because most start ups fail.

00:41:19.532 --> 00:41:25.830
It's like 90% percent-- it
could be 99% of start ups fail.

00:41:25.830 --> 00:41:28.340
So that's the staring
into the abyss part.

00:41:28.340 --> 00:41:32.160
You're constantly saying, OK,
if I don't get this right,

00:41:32.160 --> 00:41:37.190
the company will die, which
can be quite stressful.

00:41:37.190 --> 00:41:41.630
And then the eating
glass part is

00:41:41.630 --> 00:41:44.744
you've got to work
on the problems

00:41:44.744 --> 00:41:46.160
that the company
needs you to work

00:41:46.160 --> 00:41:48.560
on and not the problems
you want to work on.

00:41:48.560 --> 00:41:53.860
And so you end up working
on problems that you really

00:41:53.860 --> 00:41:55.620
wish you weren't working on.

00:41:55.620 --> 00:41:59.140
And so that's the
eating glass part.

00:41:59.140 --> 00:42:00.590
And that goes on
for a long time.

00:42:00.590 --> 00:42:03.360
SPEAKER 1: So how do you keep
your focus on the big picture

00:42:03.360 --> 00:42:05.155
when you're
constantly faced with,

00:42:05.155 --> 00:42:06.780
we could be out of
business in a month?

00:42:09.650 --> 00:42:12.100
ELON MUSK: Well, it's just
a very small percentage

00:42:12.100 --> 00:42:14.650
of mental energy is
on the big picture.

00:42:14.650 --> 00:42:18.674
Like you know where you're
generally heading for

00:42:18.674 --> 00:42:20.090
and the actual
path is going to be

00:42:20.090 --> 00:42:24.240
some sort of zigzaggy
thing in that direction.

00:42:24.240 --> 00:42:26.820
You're trying not to deviate
too far from the path

00:42:26.820 --> 00:42:28.479
that you want to
be on, but you're

00:42:28.479 --> 00:42:30.020
going to have to
that to some degree.

00:42:33.140 --> 00:42:35.990
But I don't want to diminish
the-- I think the profit

00:42:35.990 --> 00:42:39.480
motive is a good one, if
the rules of an industry

00:42:39.480 --> 00:42:40.375
are properly set up.

00:42:40.375 --> 00:42:42.500
So there's nothing
fundamentally wrong with profit.

00:42:42.500 --> 00:42:45.130
In fact, profit just
means that people

00:42:45.130 --> 00:42:47.350
are paying you more
for whatever you're

00:42:47.350 --> 00:42:50.990
doing than you're
spending to create it.

00:42:50.990 --> 00:42:53.430
That's a good thing.

00:42:53.430 --> 00:42:56.610
And if that's not the case,
then you'll be out of business.

00:42:56.610 --> 00:42:58.846
And rightfully so.

00:42:58.846 --> 00:43:02.720
Because you're not
adding enough value.

00:43:02.720 --> 00:43:05.400
Now there are cases,
of course, where people

00:43:05.400 --> 00:43:09.040
will do bad things in
order to achieve profit,

00:43:09.040 --> 00:43:12.910
but that's actually
quite unusual.

00:43:12.910 --> 00:43:16.200
Because usually the rules
are set up mostly correctly.

00:43:16.200 --> 00:43:17.950
Like not completely,
but mostly correctly.

00:43:20.580 --> 00:43:22.900
SAL KHAN: I think we have
time for one more question.

00:43:22.900 --> 00:43:23.500
Joel.

00:43:23.500 --> 00:43:24.670
JOEL: Yeah, I have
an important one.

00:43:24.670 --> 00:43:25.670
SAL KHAN: OK, very good.

00:43:25.670 --> 00:43:26.260
Yes, please.

00:43:26.260 --> 00:43:27.110
SPEAKER 3: No.

00:43:27.110 --> 00:43:29.660
JOEL: OK, so few months
ago, you teased Hyperloop,

00:43:29.660 --> 00:43:32.000
and we haven't heard
anything since.

00:43:32.000 --> 00:43:34.144
So, first of all, a
few of us engineers

00:43:34.144 --> 00:43:35.560
were talking about
it, and I think

00:43:35.560 --> 00:43:37.720
we have a few ideas,
if you need help.

00:43:37.720 --> 00:43:41.210
But, if you feel
comfortable, maybe you

00:43:41.210 --> 00:43:43.200
could tell us a little bit more.

00:43:43.200 --> 00:43:45.920
ELON MUSK: I was reading about
the California high-speed rail,

00:43:45.920 --> 00:43:49.010
and it was quite depressing.

00:43:49.010 --> 00:43:52.830
Because California
taxpayers are going

00:43:52.830 --> 00:43:58.410
to be on the hook to build the
most expensive high-speed rail

00:43:58.410 --> 00:44:00.425
per mile in the world--
and the slowest.

00:44:03.445 --> 00:44:05.731
Those are not the
superlatives you want.

00:44:08.500 --> 00:44:10.420
And, it's like, damn,
we're in California,

00:44:10.420 --> 00:44:11.670
we make super high-tech stuff.

00:44:11.670 --> 00:44:14.059
Why are we going
to be spending--

00:44:14.059 --> 00:44:15.850
now the estimates are
around $100 billion--

00:44:15.850 --> 00:44:21.881
for something that will take
two hours to go from LA to San

00:44:21.881 --> 00:44:22.380
Francisco?

00:44:22.380 --> 00:44:24.110
I'm like, OK, well,
I can get on a plane

00:44:24.110 --> 00:44:26.231
and do that it 45 minutes.

00:44:26.231 --> 00:44:28.440
It doesn't make much sense.

00:44:28.440 --> 00:44:32.530
And isn't there some better
way to do it than that.

00:44:32.530 --> 00:44:37.760
So if you just say,
OK, well what would

00:44:37.760 --> 00:44:41.204
you ideally want in a
transportation system?

00:44:41.204 --> 00:44:42.870
You'd say, OK, well
you'd want something

00:44:42.870 --> 00:44:46.220
that relative to existing
modes of transportation

00:44:46.220 --> 00:44:50.870
is faster-- let's say twice
as fast-- costs half as much

00:44:50.870 --> 00:44:57.012
per ticket, can't crash, is
immune to weather, and is--

00:44:57.012 --> 00:44:58.970
you can make the whole
thing like self-powering

00:44:58.970 --> 00:45:00.740
with like solar panels
or something like that.

00:45:00.740 --> 00:45:01.460
That would be pretty--

00:45:01.460 --> 00:45:02.918
SAL KHAN: That
would be great, yes.

00:45:02.918 --> 00:45:04.940
ELON MUSK: --a good outcome.

00:45:04.940 --> 00:45:07.922
And so what would do that?

00:45:07.922 --> 00:45:10.380
And what's the fastest way
short of inventing teleportation

00:45:10.380 --> 00:45:12.906
that you could do
something like that?

00:45:12.906 --> 00:45:16.330
And some of the elements of that
solution are fairly obvious,

00:45:16.330 --> 00:45:19.490
and some of them
are not so obvious.

00:45:19.490 --> 00:45:21.789
And then the
details-- the devil's

00:45:21.789 --> 00:45:23.580
in the details of
actually making something

00:45:23.580 --> 00:45:25.440
like that work.

00:45:25.440 --> 00:45:27.690
But I came to the
conclusion that there

00:45:27.690 --> 00:45:30.340
is something like
that that could work.

00:45:30.340 --> 00:45:32.870
And would be practical.

00:45:32.870 --> 00:45:36.170
SAL KHAN: Is this around
the evacuated tubes?

00:45:36.170 --> 00:45:38.260
The vacuum tubes?

00:45:38.260 --> 00:45:39.460
Like the old bank--

00:45:39.460 --> 00:45:41.320
ELON MUSK: It's
something like that.

00:45:41.320 --> 00:45:44.660
SAL KHAN: But you haven't been
more public with what this is?

00:45:44.660 --> 00:45:45.330
ELON MUSK: No.

00:45:45.330 --> 00:45:47.820
Although I did say that
once Tesla was profitable

00:45:47.820 --> 00:45:51.080
that I would talk more about it.

00:45:51.080 --> 00:45:53.480
But, we haven't done
our earnings call yet.

00:45:53.480 --> 00:45:58.730
So I think I'll probably do
it after the earnings call.

00:45:58.730 --> 00:46:01.445
And the thing is I'm
kind of strung out

00:46:01.445 --> 00:46:02.820
on things that
I'm already doing.

00:46:02.820 --> 00:46:07.546
So adding another thing--
it's like doesn't-- it's a lot

00:46:07.546 --> 00:46:08.920
SAL KHAN: Learning
the guitar You

00:46:08.920 --> 00:46:10.892
could pick up all
sorts of things.

00:46:10.892 --> 00:46:11.600
ELON MUSK: Right.

00:46:11.600 --> 00:46:13.460
I tried learning the violin.

00:46:13.460 --> 00:46:16.430
That's, by the way, a
hard thing to learn.

00:46:16.430 --> 00:46:17.620
SAL KHAN: Yeah.

00:46:17.620 --> 00:46:19.644
Launching rockets,
electric cars,

00:46:19.644 --> 00:46:20.935
revolutionizing transportation.

00:46:20.935 --> 00:46:21.960
Yeah, it's easy.

00:46:21.960 --> 00:46:23.751
ELON MUSK: I cannot
play the violin at all.

00:46:23.751 --> 00:46:25.770
Very horrible.

00:46:25.770 --> 00:46:27.490
If you think about
the future, you

00:46:27.490 --> 00:46:29.240
want a future that's
better than the past,

00:46:29.240 --> 00:46:32.500
and so if we had something
like the Hyperloop,

00:46:32.500 --> 00:46:33.880
I think that would be like cool.

00:46:33.880 --> 00:46:37.130
You'd look forward to
the day that was working.

00:46:37.130 --> 00:46:41.300
And if something like
that, even if it was only

00:46:41.300 --> 00:46:46.150
in one place-- from LA to San
Francisco, or New York to DC

00:46:46.150 --> 00:46:50.079
or something like that--
then it would be cool enough

00:46:50.079 --> 00:46:51.870
that it would be like
a tourist attraction.

00:46:51.870 --> 00:46:53.900
It would be like a
ride or something.

00:46:53.900 --> 00:46:57.220
So even if some of the initial
assumptions didn't work out,

00:46:57.220 --> 00:47:00.590
the economics didn't work
out quite as one expected,

00:47:00.590 --> 00:47:02.090
it would be cool
enough that like,

00:47:02.090 --> 00:47:05.045
I want to journey to that place
just to ride on that thing.

00:47:05.045 --> 00:47:07.380
That would be pretty cool.

00:47:07.380 --> 00:47:11.419
And so that's I think how-- if
you come with a new technology,

00:47:11.419 --> 00:47:12.460
it should feel like that.

00:47:12.460 --> 00:47:15.184
You should really-- if you
told it to an objective person,

00:47:15.184 --> 00:47:16.600
would they look
forward to the day

00:47:16.600 --> 00:47:18.680
that that thing
became available.

00:47:18.680 --> 00:47:22.930
And it would be pretty exciting
to do something like that.

00:47:22.930 --> 00:47:23.870
Or an aircraft.

00:47:23.870 --> 00:47:25.370
Like I thought it was
really disappointing when

00:47:25.370 --> 00:47:27.119
the Concorde was taking
out of commission,

00:47:27.119 --> 00:47:31.880
and there was no supersonic
transport available.

00:47:31.880 --> 00:47:33.990
And of course the 787
has had some issues.

00:47:37.900 --> 00:47:40.400
But the thing is, the 787
even in the best case scenario

00:47:40.400 --> 00:47:44.164
is only a slightly better
version of the 777.

00:47:44.164 --> 00:47:46.950
And it's like, OK,
not that exciting.

00:47:46.950 --> 00:47:49.994
SAL KHAN: So this is something
that you are working on?

00:47:49.994 --> 00:47:51.660
ELON MUSK: I wouldn't
say working on it.

00:47:51.660 --> 00:47:54.160
SAL KHAN: And one day in the
not-too-far future-- or there's

00:47:54.160 --> 00:47:57.094
some plans or consultants
involved or something?

00:47:57.094 --> 00:47:58.560
SPEAKER 4: You called Russia.

00:47:58.560 --> 00:48:00.862
SAL KHAN: You made some
phone calls to Russia.

00:48:00.862 --> 00:48:04.050
ELON MUSK: No, every now and
then, it's percolating away.

00:48:04.050 --> 00:48:05.900
I'm not actually
thinking about it.

00:48:05.900 --> 00:48:08.358
But then they'll be some new
element of that I'll think of.

00:48:08.358 --> 00:48:09.800
Oh, this would make it better.

00:48:09.800 --> 00:48:11.710
SAL KHAN: Fascinating.

00:48:11.710 --> 00:48:14.650
Well, I think I'm
speaking for everyone.

00:48:14.650 --> 00:48:17.990
This is like the most
epic possible conversation

00:48:17.990 --> 00:48:20.132
one could have over about
the course of an hour.

00:48:20.132 --> 00:48:22.590
And I think all of us would
love to chat with you for hours

00:48:22.590 --> 00:48:24.022
on end, but thank you so much.

00:48:24.022 --> 00:48:25.480
I know you have a
lot of free time,

00:48:25.480 --> 00:48:28.420
so it probably wasn't that big
of a deal for you to come here.

00:48:28.420 --> 00:48:29.650
But, it was a huge honor.

00:48:29.650 --> 00:48:31.280
And I think it's
inspired all of us

00:48:31.280 --> 00:48:33.554
to go out and change the
world and the universe.

00:48:33.554 --> 00:48:34.220
ELON MUSK: Cool.

00:48:34.220 --> 00:48:34.710
All right.

00:48:34.710 --> 00:48:35.960
SAL KHAN: Thank you very much.

00:48:35.960 --> 00:48:41.069
[APPLAUSE]


German and Italian Empires in 1914

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.820 --> 00:00:03.990
As we've already talked
about, as we exit the 1800s

00:00:03.990 --> 00:00:07.640
and we get into the early 1900s
and we approach World War I,

00:00:07.640 --> 00:00:09.610
the various powers
of Europe were really

00:00:09.610 --> 00:00:10.697
on this race for empire.

00:00:10.697 --> 00:00:12.155
It was a part of
national prestige.

00:00:12.155 --> 00:00:15.160
And it helped build
national wealth.

00:00:15.160 --> 00:00:18.350
But of the major powers,
Germany and Italy

00:00:18.350 --> 00:00:20.847
were relatively new
as unified states.

00:00:20.847 --> 00:00:23.180
The British Empire-- they had
been building their empire

00:00:23.180 --> 00:00:24.710
for hundreds of years.

00:00:24.710 --> 00:00:26.415
The Germans, on the
other hand, even

00:00:26.415 --> 00:00:28.790
though they have a very old
culture going back hundreds--

00:00:28.790 --> 00:00:32.130
or you could argue thousands--
of years, as a unified state,

00:00:32.130 --> 00:00:35.030
they only existed since 1871.

00:00:35.030 --> 00:00:37.020
And that's only after
the Franco-Prussian War,

00:00:37.020 --> 00:00:40.740
which allowed the Prussians
to unify all of Germany.

00:00:40.740 --> 00:00:45.355
And the Italians only became
fully unified in 1870, also due

00:00:45.355 --> 00:00:46.990
to the Franco-Prussian War.

00:00:46.990 --> 00:00:49.210
Because the French had
to focus on the Germans,

00:00:49.210 --> 00:00:50.830
had to focus on
the Prussians, they

00:00:50.830 --> 00:00:52.740
couldn't protect the
Papal States anymore.

00:00:52.740 --> 00:00:56.860
And so that allowed the Italians
to unify it under their a rule.

00:00:56.860 --> 00:01:00.250
So by the time we get to 1914,
the beginning of World War

00:01:00.250 --> 00:01:03.560
I, these two powers, they were
also on their race for empire.

00:01:03.560 --> 00:01:06.859
But they were only about
43 or 44 years old.

00:01:06.859 --> 00:01:08.400
And so they hadn't
been able to build

00:01:08.400 --> 00:01:10.920
as extensive of an
empire as France

00:01:10.920 --> 00:01:14.840
and, especially, as extensive
of an empire as Great Britain.

00:01:14.840 --> 00:01:19.920
But this map right
over here shows how far

00:01:19.920 --> 00:01:22.280
their actual empires did extend.

00:01:22.280 --> 00:01:26.500
Italy had control
of Libya, Eritrea,

00:01:26.500 --> 00:01:30.310
and parts of what's
today Somalia.

00:01:30.310 --> 00:01:32.950
And Germany had
control-- it also

00:01:32.950 --> 00:01:36.530
had holdings in Africa,
possessions in Africa.

00:01:36.530 --> 00:01:38.650
Togoland, which is
modern-day Togo;

00:01:38.650 --> 00:01:42.140
Cameroon, which makes
up-- modern-day Cameroon

00:01:42.140 --> 00:01:45.040
is part of German
Southwest Africa.

00:01:45.040 --> 00:01:46.800
That's now known as Namibia.

00:01:46.800 --> 00:01:51.690
German East Africa, which is now
Tanzania, Rwanda, and Burundi.

00:01:51.690 --> 00:01:55.790
And Germany also had holdings in
the Pacific and even in China.

00:01:55.790 --> 00:01:59.030
These are the Pacific Islands
that Germany had possession of.

00:01:59.030 --> 00:02:00.510
It had German New Guinea.

00:02:00.510 --> 00:02:05.380
And it even had control
of the town of Tsingtao.

00:02:05.380 --> 00:02:08.560
And that actually is culturally
interesting for those

00:02:08.560 --> 00:02:11.560
of you watching
this video in 2013.

00:02:11.560 --> 00:02:15.090
Tsingtao is now a very
popular Chinese brand of beer.

00:02:15.090 --> 00:02:17.250
One of the more-- I
think it's the number

00:02:17.250 --> 00:02:20.820
two in the market Chinese beer.

00:02:20.820 --> 00:02:22.750
And it's associated with China.

00:02:22.750 --> 00:02:26.780
But it was actually started
by German settlers in Tsingtao

00:02:26.780 --> 00:02:28.520
in 1903.

00:02:28.520 --> 00:02:30.930
So actually its roots
are with the Germans,

00:02:30.930 --> 00:02:34.210
who obviously have a long
tradition of producing beers.

00:02:34.210 --> 00:02:36.490
And so Tsingtao-- you could
argue it's a Chinese beer.

00:02:36.490 --> 00:02:38.090
It's produced in China.

00:02:38.090 --> 00:02:43.524
But it had its roots in
German imperial rule.


Japan in World War I

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.770 --> 00:00:03.690
Japan was not a major
actor in World War I,

00:00:03.690 --> 00:00:05.780
but it did play a role.

00:00:05.780 --> 00:00:08.650
Right as war broke
out in August of 1914,

00:00:08.650 --> 00:00:10.580
the Japanese were
interested in taking

00:00:10.580 --> 00:00:12.480
control of German possessions.

00:00:12.480 --> 00:00:14.710
And they were already
allies with the British,

00:00:14.710 --> 00:00:16.490
so they communicated
with the British,

00:00:16.490 --> 00:00:18.760
and they came to an
agreement that if Japan

00:00:18.760 --> 00:00:21.570
were to attack German
possessions in the Pacific

00:00:21.570 --> 00:00:24.950
and in China, then Japan
could take control of them.

00:00:24.950 --> 00:00:26.480
And so Japan
proceeded to do this.

00:00:26.480 --> 00:00:30.490
In particular, it took a siege
of Tsingtao, which we already

00:00:30.490 --> 00:00:32.130
talked about, was a
German possession.

00:00:32.130 --> 00:00:35.440
These are Japanese boats
landing there, Japanese troops.

00:00:35.440 --> 00:00:38.120
And this was actually of
technological significance.

00:00:38.120 --> 00:00:39.760
It was the first
time that you had

00:00:39.760 --> 00:00:43.630
a naval-based aerial assault.

00:00:43.630 --> 00:00:46.310
This wasn't really using what
we would consider aircraft

00:00:46.310 --> 00:00:48.470
carriers, although they
did carry the aircraft.

00:00:48.470 --> 00:00:50.230
But they would place
them into the water,

00:00:50.230 --> 00:00:52.930
and then the aircraft would
take off from the water

00:00:52.930 --> 00:00:56.170
as they tried to take the town
of Tsingtao, which they were

00:00:56.170 --> 00:00:59.910
eventually able to do
by the end of 1914.

00:00:59.910 --> 00:01:01.860
On top of that, they
were able to take control

00:01:01.860 --> 00:01:04.530
of many of Germany's
other possessions

00:01:04.530 --> 00:01:08.750
in the Pacific, specifically
the Pacific Islands.

00:01:08.750 --> 00:01:12.140
And on top of that, Japan
did send some aspects,

00:01:12.140 --> 00:01:15.660
or some parts of its navy, to
help protect Allied fleets as

00:01:15.660 --> 00:01:17.430
far away as the Mediterranean.

00:01:17.430 --> 00:01:19.970
So Japan did play a role here.

00:01:19.970 --> 00:01:22.550
The other interesting
historical note,

00:01:22.550 --> 00:01:25.980
because of Japan's
involvement in World War I,

00:01:25.980 --> 00:01:27.890
is what came out of
the negotiations.

00:01:27.890 --> 00:01:29.770
First of all, by being
involved, it kind of

00:01:29.770 --> 00:01:32.884
put Japan at the
seat of major powers.

00:01:32.884 --> 00:01:34.300
And as we'll see,
in World War II,

00:01:34.300 --> 00:01:36.990
Japan ends up being one of the
major players in World War II,

00:01:36.990 --> 00:01:40.670
and it's essentially going on
the other side by that point.

00:01:40.670 --> 00:01:42.780
But because of its
help of the Allies,

00:01:42.780 --> 00:01:45.530
Japan does have a seat at
the table at the Paris Peace

00:01:45.530 --> 00:01:46.304
Conference.

00:01:46.304 --> 00:01:48.470
And as they are negotiating
the Treaty of Versailles

00:01:48.470 --> 00:01:50.270
and coming up with
the League of Nations,

00:01:50.270 --> 00:01:53.660
Japan is eager to kind of
have an equal footing with all

00:01:53.660 --> 00:01:55.400
of the other European powers.

00:01:55.400 --> 00:01:59.410
And so it attempts to place this
in the charter for the League

00:01:59.410 --> 00:02:02.300
of Nations. "The equality of
nations being a basic principle

00:02:02.300 --> 00:02:05.850
of the League of Nations, the
High Contracting Parties agree

00:02:05.850 --> 00:02:10.940
to accord as soon as possible to
all alien nationals of states,

00:02:10.940 --> 00:02:14.490
members of the League, equal
and just treatment in every

00:02:14.490 --> 00:02:17.970
respect"-- let me
underline that--

00:02:17.970 --> 00:02:21.490
"equal and just treatment
in every respect,

00:02:21.490 --> 00:02:24.890
making no distinction
either in law or in fact,

00:02:24.890 --> 00:02:27.399
on account of their
race or nationality."

00:02:27.399 --> 00:02:28.940
Essentially the
Japanese were saying,

00:02:28.940 --> 00:02:32.260
hey, look, you Europeans,
you guys have to view us

00:02:32.260 --> 00:02:35.100
and-- based on the way this
is phrased-- other people

00:02:35.100 --> 00:02:37.470
as equals.

00:02:37.470 --> 00:02:40.410
Just to get a sense of what
the world was like then,

00:02:40.410 --> 00:02:41.525
this was not passed.

00:02:41.525 --> 00:02:42.900
Even though the
League of Nations

00:02:42.900 --> 00:02:45.170
was the product of these
very idealistic thoughts

00:02:45.170 --> 00:02:48.750
by Woodrow Wilson, it
did not get passed.

00:02:48.750 --> 00:02:52.400
Obviously the British, they
had subjugated many people

00:02:52.400 --> 00:02:53.470
in their empires.

00:02:53.470 --> 00:02:55.366
Woodrow Wilson was
afraid that if this

00:02:55.366 --> 00:02:57.240
were to be included in
the League of Nations,

00:02:57.240 --> 00:03:00.260
it would have trouble
passing-- getting

00:03:00.260 --> 00:03:01.860
ratified in the
segregated South.

00:03:01.860 --> 00:03:03.820
We now know later that
the League of Nations

00:03:03.820 --> 00:03:06.740
wasn't ratified anyway.

00:03:06.740 --> 00:03:09.690
And so this essentially
does not happen.

00:03:09.690 --> 00:03:11.407
And even the
Japanese themselves,

00:03:11.407 --> 00:03:13.240
they were eager for
equality for themselves.

00:03:13.240 --> 00:03:16.100
But as we'll see as we
enter into World War II,

00:03:16.100 --> 00:03:19.140
they themselves had a
sense of racial superiority

00:03:19.140 --> 00:03:22.330
and they subjugated
many of the other people

00:03:22.330 --> 00:03:26.130
in Asia, especially the
Chinese and the Koreans.

00:03:26.130 --> 00:03:28.940
This is an interesting quote
from the Chinese delegation.

00:03:28.940 --> 00:03:30.820
"We are not too
proud to fight but we

00:03:30.820 --> 00:03:34.230
are too proud to accept a
place of admitted inferiority

00:03:34.230 --> 00:03:36.980
in dealing with one or more
of the associated nations.

00:03:36.980 --> 00:03:39.740
We want nothing but
simple justice."

00:03:39.740 --> 00:03:41.620
So it tells you how
different the world was.

00:03:41.620 --> 00:03:44.480
This is not even 100 years ago.

00:03:44.480 --> 00:03:46.810
And the real relevance
of World War I for Japan

00:03:46.810 --> 00:03:52.530
was it elevated it to becoming
one of the powers of the world.