Elon Musk's Cultural Dissonance Regarding Religion and AI - His Interview with the Economist

The Economist's Editor-in-Chief Zanny Minton Beddoes interviewed the world's richest man. So much could be said about it, but I'll limit myself to one observation about its beginning and its end.

At the start, Elon Musk calmly acknowledges that AI could mean an apocalyptic future for mankind — but says he's fairly confident the more probable outcome is that AI and robotics deliver unprecedented, widespread prosperity. Risk acknowledged, reward embraced.

At the end, he's defending his prediction that Britain — a place he admits he hasn't visited in years — is headed for civil war because it lets in people from other cultures, primarily Muslims, whose beliefs will create a rupture. Risk acknowledged, reward forgotten.

Notice the accounting. For his own disruptive creation, Musk holds danger and promise in the same hand and bets on promise. For the disruption of unfamiliar beliefs, he can no longer find the promise at all.

Which is odd, because the promise is the modern world's founding wager. The First Amendment may be the most brilliant social invention in history. (Yes, that's the US, not Britain — but Musk claims it as his creed; free speech absolutism was his stated reason for buying Twitter.) Put simply, it commits a nation to welcoming ideas that others find offensive — on the bet that the collision of beliefs produces more progress than protection from them ever could.

Musk is clear-eyed that welcoming AI means welcoming an intelligence that may reject us, oppose us, or synthesize with our own to create unprecedented progress. He seems unable to see that welcoming foreign religions, philosophies, and perspectives is the same wager — one that may applaud us, boo us, or synthesize with our own beliefs to create unprecedented progress. It's a wager the West has been winning for centuries.

In this sense, AI isn't a break from history. It's the newest entrant in a long series of disruptive arrivals — democracy, thousands of religions including atheism, philosophies, lifestyles, ideas — that collided to create the modern world.

The modern world is nothing if not a belief in the benefit of welcoming — of making ourselves vulnerable to — what is foreign, new, and possibly disruptive. The entanglement of risk and reward is something intrinsic to progress. 

https://www.economist.com/insider/the-insider/an-interview-with-elon-musk

Elon Drops from 4X Wealthier Than Second Richest Person to Just 3X

As of 24 July 2026 ... Elon Musk has lost as much as the second richest man in the world and still has roughly $750 billion.
He's dropped from more than one trillion dollars in net worth to $725 billion. Larry Page - cofounder of Google / Alphabet and second richest man in the world - is now worth $262 billion. Per Forbes.

data:
https://www.forbes.com/real-time-billionaires/#38ff1823d788

Nvidia vs. Tesla - A Striking Contrast Between Two Stocks

This is a stunning contrast between a meme stock that remains disconnected from underlying reality and one of the most remarkable companies of this century that is positioned in a way that investors don't quite yet believe. One a stock that credulous investors are buying at a premium and another that skeptical investors are hesitant to buy at an remarkably reasonable price.

Tesla:
Margin Deterioration: Operating margin plummeted to 1.4% from 4.1%.
Valuation Disconnect: Trailing P/E sits at an extreme 345x multiplier.
Capital Strain: Free cash flow reversed into a $1.09 billion burn.
Market Headwinds: Facing intense EV price wars and autonomous competition.

Nvidia:
Profit Powerhouse: Operating margins actually exceed 65%.
Cheaper Valuation: Forward P/E is highly reasonable at 22.7x.
Insatiable Demand: Customers are immediately purchasing all available AI chips.

Just focus on the margins alone.
Tesla profit margins of 1.4%.
Nvidia profit margins of 65%.

Irrational exuberance contrasted with rational skepticism.

*******

And the morning after I posted this on 22 July, Tesla is down more than 13%, its P/E ratio closer to 300.

And to be fair, Nvidia stock price is down 2.5% this morning as well. 

Fainting Spells

She seems entirely too perky. 

How do you suggest that we slow her down?

Do you know any good fainting spells?

You Think

It is not just that you think differently from other people. You think differently from everyone. And as if that is not enough, you think differently WITH each person.

Think about that.

Band Evolution

They started out as a punk band but then the guitarist learned 3 new chords so now they're a pop rock band. If he does that two more times, though, they'll have to bill themselves as prog rock.

(I know. I know. Maybe only 4 people will get this and only two of them who will find it entertaining. Kind of like the audience for a prog rock band.)

Donald Trump Paid $6 Million in Damages Today to E. Jean Carroll

Somehow this fact and the fact that Trump is the only president in the 250 years of this country to have never beat another man in the general election seem related.

Per Mother Jones, if only women had voted in the 2016 election, Hillary Clinton would have won 45 states (plus Washington, D.C.) for a total of 458 electoral votes. If only men had voted, Donald Trump would have won 35 states for a total of 350 electoral votes.

You American voting boys. You really need to up your game.

AI Representation

Lindsay Graham dead.
Mitch McConnell brain dead.

Makes you wonder how long before districts will be perpetually represented by the AI avatar of a politician who once was an actual human. Like Disney's Hall of Presidents but avatars actually sitting in congress.

The Limit of Institutional Imagination

What invention is to products and technology, entrepreneurship is to institutions. 

One of the limits to an entrepreneurial economy will be our institutional imagination. By definition, institutions can do what no individual can. This suggests that the imagination of an individual is not enough. We need something that - like the capability of institutions - emerges out of the interaction of individuals rather than is a story told by or curated by some charismatic leader.

Hacking Consciousness Is Easier Than Hacking Voting Machines

Our perceptions are more subject to manipulation than our votes.

Voting machines are physically protected by strict security protocols and lack internet connection. By contrast, human minds are constantly connected to open information streams.

The Fifth of July!

Happy Fifth of July!
The first day of the next 250 years.