Humans are the only species that can capture and manifest intelligent ideas. That has allowed us to rule all species. The greatest idea that man came up with, by far, is to compound knowledge - generation to generation. We built schools to teach systems that worked, libraries to harness the intellect of 1000 brains and our system worked really well for hundreds of years. Then we built the internet.
Those systems fail in the metaverse, ruled by an intelligence far superior to us. As Elon would say, ‘the percentage of human intelligence on earth keeps rapidly decreasing.’ We’re facing the AI threat, climate cancer, and institutional failure, all at the same time. The world is not being torn apart by different sets of beliefs. The world is co-existing in multiple centuries at the same time: thousand-year-old ideas coexisting with Bored Apes.
There are cultures that celebrate authoritarianism, inequality, and institutional corruption; and those that cherish the unbundling of nation-states, separation of state and money, and individual sovereignty. We’ll never solve complex issues by lecturing others on their beliefs. We’ll solve them by showing progress and what brought that progress - the software of the smartest brains - ideas that changed the world.
With intellectual Software, we explore how people think. The more we study how genius works in others, the better we will be at understanding how it works in ourselves.
This is Day 1.
Here are my ideas on education - they’ll evolve over time
No segregation based on age. Everyone learns at their own pace and explores their own pathways.
Basements in the cloud. Niche ideas = Niche communities = Deep Networks
Learn the software of the likes of Elon Musk. SpaceX, Tesla, and Neuralink are physical manifestations of what went inside his hardware. We’ve all got the same hardware
Lifelong learning - those that don’t will be left behind. We cannot let that happen.
I’d love to hear your counter-arguments and suggestions at ak41783@gmail.com
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Issue 1
We study Elon Musk. To be honest, think of this as part 1 of a long, unending series in which we study Elon. There are far too many things about him to cover in 1 issue and there will be far too many cool things he’ll do in the coming decades. He’s just getting started.
Each of these gives a unique insight into how he thinks - on how he navigates the everflowing stream of ideas, captures the best of them, and builds SpaceX, Tesla, and Neuralink.
One thing that I did notice after listening to many hours of his interviews is his listening skills are underrated. He barely misses a question and at times reminds the host that he’s yet to answer a previous question. Rare trait. But he’s a rare human being.
Let’s go.
When he had to choose between his Ph.D. and building an internet business
I was working on energy storage technologies for electric vehicles. And that's what I was going to pursue at Stanford - to improve the energy density for electric vehicles. It was clear the internet was happening back in 1994-95. And I wasn't sure if what I worked on in the Ph.D. would actually be useful. I was really concerned that the Ph.D. could be academically useful, but not practically useful. It could result in adding some leaf to the tree of knowledge. But then is it going to be a good enough thing to actually be used in an electric vehicle? I wasn't sure. I was uncertain as to whether success was one of the possible outcomes. I thought maybe it was, but it wasn't sure and then I thought, if I watch the internet get built while I'm doing this, that would be really frustrating.
And electric vehicle technology, energy storage technology, there'll be some sort of natural progression in that. And I could come back to it later. But the internet was taking off and that was the moment to really do something although, in 1995, it wasn't obvious that you could actually make any money on the internet.
Previously, people had communicated effectively by osmosis. And with the internet, anyone who had a connection, anywhere in the world would have access to all the world's information, just like sort of a nervous system. So humanity was effectively becoming a superorganism, and qualitatively different than what it had been before. I wanted to be part of that.
On changing public opinion
I was thinking, is there some way to reignite the dream of Apollo? And I thought it was maybe a question of will. Like we'd lost the will to explore it. But my original premise was wrong. We'd not lost the will to explore. But people did not think there was a way. And if they don't think there's a way then they'll give up. So that what if we can send a small greenhouse to the surface of Mars? And people tend to respond to precedents and superlatives. This would be the first life on Mars, as far as we know and maybe that would get people excited about sending people to Mars. If you're trying to convince the public to do something, you have to say, okay, how's this going to read? And what message are we going to try to convey? What will people respond to? What would I respond to if I was an objective member of the public?
On his obsession with little details
Really pay attention to the little details, the nuances of design and shape and form and function, and just the way it looks in different lights. You can train yourself to pay attention to the tiny details. Although it this is a very much double-edged sword because then you see all the little details. And then little things drive you crazy. Most people don't consciously see the small details, but they do subconsciously see them like you know the overall impression. And you know if something is appealing or not, even though you may not be able to point out exactly why. And it's the summation of these many small details. Essentially bring the subconscious awareness into conscious awareness. Try to find the details like why do I not like this?
Building the Union Pacific railroad for space
Just getting that transport thing I think will then open up a tremendous number of opportunities for people. Having the Union Pacific Railroad to California resulted in a system of other companies figuring out what they are going to get there and when you get there then that the opportunities for entrepreneurs are tremendous. That ranges everything you can imagine, like the first Italian restaurant or an iron refinery. And then there probably will be things that are just unique to Mars. But we got to get the Union Pacific Railroad there in order to get get the entrepreneurs that then create a fertile environment for other companies. I think there would just be a lot of super exciting things that are hard to predict, just like when they're building here in the Pacific. Nobody would have predicted Silicon Valley and Hollywood, that California would be the most populous state in the country. That sounds crazy.
Direct Democracy and Word limits and sunset periods in our laws
When the United States was formed, it was impossible to have a direct democracy. Sending a letter took weeks. So there was no way that people could vote directly on issues. You had to have representatives. A martian civilization would aim for direct democracy. And we should limit the number of words in a law. If you can't write the law in 1000 words, then it probably shouldn't be there. And I think laws also have an infinite lifespan unless they're given some sort of sunset period. If it's not good enough to be renewed, then it goes away. It should be easier to remove a law than to put a new one in place. Because over time the body of law just gets bigger and bigger and bigger. How do you avoid that? And you have inertia associated with the laws. And so maybe it would take 60% to create laws but only 40% to remove a law.
Language is a failure to communicate
Let's say you've got some complex idea that you're trying to convey to somebody else. How do you do that? Well, your brain spends a lot of effort, compressing complex concepts into words. And there's a lot of information loss that occurs when compressing a complex concept into words. And then you say those words, those words are then interpreted, then they're decompressed by the person who is listening, and they will, at best get a very incomplete understanding of what you're trying to convey. It's very difficult to convey complex concepts with precision because you've got compression-decompression, you may not even have heard all the words correctly. And so communication is difficult. What we have here is a failure to communicate.
Every issue is an open discussion. Eagerly waiting for your thoughts in my inbox :)
If you liked this, please share this post with a fellow thinker and help rebuild the human colossus. The next issue comes on 26th Sept - We go deeper into Elon.
- Abhishek