Code Conference (2016)

Interviewers: Kara Swisher and Walt Mossberg, on stage at the Code Conference (Recode).
Format: Live on-stage interview.
Date: June 1, 2016.
Trust tier: excerpts (partial verification). Recode put out only the full video; no host or network ever published an article-form transcript. So the source is a set of verbatim excerpts pulled from reputable outlets that quoted Elon Musk directly. The source as a whole is not verified, but each excerpt can be cited through the article that carried it.
Quotes: each links to the outlet that printed it, not to the video. The ACS Information Age article has the simulation and AI lines. Alternet has the cyborg and neural-interface lines, the SpaceX lines, several Mars lines, and “Either…or civilization will cease to exist”, which Information Age words slightly differently. Time has the precise Mars-timing line, and Recode (its 2016 article now lives on Vox) the Mars-governance lines.

Summary

This is the most intellectually revealing of Elon Musk’s 2016 interviews that we have, and it is where the idea he is now most associated with outside his companies makes its public debut: the simulation argument. Asked about it on stage, he runs the whole case, from Pong to photorealistic games to the conclusion that the odds we live in base reality are one in billions. Then, as usual, he flips it into an argument for hope rather than despair. The conversation lands three months before the September 2016 Y Combinator interview, and it is the earliest source we have for several of his signature lines.

The interview turns on four subjects. The first is metaphysics: the simulation argument, stated start to finish, with the hopeful twist that being inside a simulation is the good outcome, since the alternative is a civilization that stops advancing. The second is AI, where he gives a compact restatement of his existential-risk worry: not all AI futures are benign. The third is the human, and here, for the first time in the sources we have, he says we’re already a cyborg. Your phone and computer are superpowers, he argues, and with a high-bandwidth link to your digital self you are no longer a house cat next to AI. That is the bandwidth thesis in early form, and the neural-interface case for it, months before Neuralink. The fourth is Mars. He makes a (since-missed) timing call of a crewed launch around 2024 and arrival in 2025. He also lays out an unusual governance vision: Mars should run on direct democracy, because corruption is substantially diminished with no representatives in between.

Key quotes

The simulation argument

He opens by admitting how far the obsession had gone — to the point of a hot-tub ban:

“I’ve had so many simulation discussions, it’s crazy.” ↗

“In fact it got to the point where basically every conversation was the AI/simulation conversation, and my brother and I finally agreed that we would ban such conversations if we were ever in a hot tub.” ↗

The argument itself is an extrapolation from the rate of progress in video games — Pong to photorealism in forty years:

“Forty years ago we had Pong, like two rectangles and a dot, and that was what games were.” ↗

“Now, 40 years later we have photorealistic 3D simulations with millions of people playing simultaneously and it’s getting better every year. And soon we’ll have virtual reality and augmented reality.” ↗

The only premise he needs is any continued improvement:

“If you assume any rate of improvement at all, then the games will become indistinguishable from reality.” ↗

From which the conclusion follows — billions of devices each running indistinguishable simulations:

“So given that we’re clearly on a trajectory to have games that are indistinguishable from reality and those games could be played on any set top box or on a PC or whatever, and there would probably be billions of such set top boxes and computers, it would seem to follow that the odds that we’re in base reality is one in billions.” ↗

Asked directly, he does not hedge:

“No. There’s a one in billions chance that this is base reality.” ↗

And then the turn that makes the argument his own — being simulated is the hopeful reading, because the alternative is civilizational collapse:

“We should hope that’s true because otherwise if civilization stops advancing, that could be due to some calamitous event that erases civilization, so maybe we should be hopeful this is a simulation.” ↗

“Either we’re going to create simulations that are indistinguishable from reality or civilization will cease to exist.” ↗

AI — not all futures are benign

A compact 2016 statement of the existential-risk worry that he had been voicing for years:

“I am concerned at certain directions that AI could take that would be not good for the future.” ↗

“I think it would be fair to say that not all AI futures are benign.” ↗

“We’re already a cyborg”

The earliest statement we have of his already-a-cyborg thesis, with the phone and computer cast as a power amplifier:

“We’re already a cyborg.” ↗

“You basically have superpowers with your computer and your phone. You have more power than the president had 20 years ago.” ↗

And the bandwidth argument for why a neural interface matters — without it, a human is outmatched by AI the way a pet is outmatched by a person:

“If we can figure out how to establish a high bandwidth neural interface with your digital self effectively, then you’re no longer a house cat.” ↗

Mars — timing and a direct democracy

His 2016 timing call (since missed) — crewed launch mid-decade:

“We should be able to launch people [to Mars] in 2025.” ↗

The more precise version of the same call, as Time recorded it:

“If things go according to plan, we should be able to launch people probably in 2024 with arrival in 2025.” ↗

His governance vision for a Mars colony — direct, not representative, democracy:

“The form of government on Mars would be a direct democracy, not representative.” ↗

“I think most likely the form of government on Mars will be direct democracy.” ↗

“people voting directly on issues” ↗

The reason he gives — fewer middlemen, less capture:

“because the potential of corruption is substantially diminished in a direct versus a representative democracy.” ↗

SpaceX — maximize the only revenue there is

On the near-term business logic of SpaceX — there is no Mars money yet, so wring everything out of Earth:

“Right now we’re trying to maximize Earth-based revenue. There’s only earth-based revenue, so we’ve got to maximize it as it relates to rockets and spacecraft.” ↗

And the analogy he uses for building demand ahead of a market — the transcontinental railroad to an empty California:

“Space X is like the Union Pacific. Everyone thought 'Union Pacific, What a stupid idea. There’s nobody living in California. Well, now there’s a lot of people living in California.” ↗

Connections (pages touched)

Simulation hypothesis — created here: the Pong-to-photorealism argument, the one in billions conclusion, and the hopeful reading.
Mars colonization — created here: the 2016 timing call and the direct democracy vision, with its anti-corruption reasoning.
Elon Musk — gained a “Code Conference 2016: the simulation, and the cyborg” section.
AI existential risk — added the 2016 not all AI futures are benign remark, the earliest first-person AI-risk line we have.
Merging with AI — added the first we’re already a cyborg statement (June 2016), which predates both the YC 2016 and the 2024 versions.
Human–AI symbiosis — added the house cat and high-bandwidth-neural-interface argument, the earliest bandwidth argument we have.
SpaceX — gained the maximize Earth-based revenue logic and the Union Pacific analogy.