In 2007 Interview, Elon Musk Predicted Everything!

Summary

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Episode Overview

Title: In 2007 Interview, Elon Musk Predicted Everything!
Podcast: Elon Musk Thinking
Host: Astronaut Man
Date: April 25, 2026

This episode revives a 2007 interview with Elon Musk, then CEO of SpaceX and Chairman of Tesla Motors. In it, Musk explains his core philosophies, early predictions about private spaceflight and electric vehicles, and his vision for humanity’s future both on Earth and beyond. The host draws out Musk’s motivations, critiques of the status quo, and hopes for technological progress—many of which have become reality since.

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Main Themes

• Elon Musk’s personal mission: Using technology and entrepreneurship to benefit humanity and address global challenges.
• Private space exploration: How and why SpaceX would eventually replace roles previously filled by NASA.
• Making life multi-planetary: The rationale for targeting Mars, not the Moon, for human civilization.
• Transformative innovation in transportation: The launch of Tesla, diffusion of electric vehicles, and the fight against fossil fuel dependency.
• Entrepreneurship for impact: Musk’s unusual emphasis on ventures with lasting significance rather than personal profit.

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Detailed Breakdown & Key Insights

Elon Musk’s Early Journey (00:32–01:11)

• Musk discusses leaving Stanford after two days to start Zip2, its $307 million acquisition, and his subsequent founding of PayPal, later sold to eBay.
• Musk identifies three impact zones from his college graduation:
  1. The Internet
  2. Space exploration
  3. Transition to a solar-powered economy

  “The three were the Internet, space exploration, and then changing the economy from a mine and burn hydrocarbon based economy to one which is solar electric.” — Elon Musk (01:11)

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SpaceX’s Mission and NASA’s Role (01:37–02:48)

• Musk clarifies SpaceX is not a rival but a service provider to NASA. Post-shuttle retirement in 2010, SpaceX would transport astronauts and cargo to the International Space Station.
• The Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spaceship are described as the backbone of this new era.
• Notable quote:

  “NASA is a customer of ours...when the Shuttle retires in 2010. So starting in 2011, SpaceX's rocket will replace the space shuttle in servicing the space station with astronauts and cargo transportation.” — Elon Musk (02:05)

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Why Mars? Why Not the Moon? (03:16–05:38)

• Musk laments the technological and political stagnation of space progress post-Apollo, emphasizing missed opportunities.
• He argues for Mars over the Moon as Earth’s next “civilizational” outpost:

  “The moon is kind of like the Arctic. It's just a very barren place, very little resources. It's small. It's not really a place that we could establish another human civilization.” — Elon Musk (05:15)

• On leadership:

  “I do think it’s very important the President set the priority and determine the goal that we as a nation will aspire to.” — Elon Musk (04:45)

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Competition in Space: SpaceX vs. Others (05:52–07:59)

• When asked about rivals (Bezos, Branson, Boeing, ESA, etc.), Musk claims no “serious competition” exists in the race for orbital flight:

  “We have no serious competition. ... If you mean chasing and has a serious chance of catching, then I think none that I’m aware of.” — Elon Musk (06:33, 06:45)

• He explains Virgin Galactic’s challenge is “much smaller” (suborbital flight), while SpaceX tackles the vastly harder “Mach 25” regime of orbital flight.

  “To do what Branson is doing, you need say, about nine units of energy. To do what we’re doing, you need 625 units of energy.” — Elon Musk (07:31)

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Big Goals: Life Beyond Earth (09:14–09:49)

• Musk articulates his “holy grail” for SpaceX:

  “The long term ultimate objective, the holy grail, is we would like to help make life multi-planetary.” — Elon Musk (09:18)

• He sees Mars as the singular viable other planet, aspiring first for interplanetary duality.

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Motivations and Entrepreneurial Philosophy (10:01–11:43)

• Musk rejects “beach life” for ceaseless, meaningful work:

  “That would be torture. If I had to do that every day, that would really be pretty awful for me.” — Elon Musk (10:19)

• He famously quotes a friend on startups:

  “A startup business is like eating glass and staring into the abyss.” — Musk (10:43)

• The main driver:

  “For me it's always about, does what I'm doing matter? If we are successful, does it matter to the world?” — Elon Musk (11:00)

• Musk stresses that benefiting humanity is integral to any venture he undertakes.

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Tesla and the Future of Electric Transportation (12:18–15:49)

• Tesla’s first product: the high-performance Roadster, “faster than any Porsche in production ... twice the energy efficiency of a Prius.” (12:36)
• Why launch with a sports car? Entry as a “high unit cost, low unit volume” product is necessary for new technology to reach mass market.

  “The right place to enter is high unit cost, low unit volume.” — Elon Musk (13:09)

• Roadmap:
  • Model 1: Roadster (2007)
  • Model 2: $49,000 four-door sedan
  • Model 3: “around a $30,000 price point.” (13:50)
• The real mission: catalyzing the industry, not just selling cars.

  “We have a very important environmental problem ... and the only way to really get around that, in my view, is really with an electric vehicle ... pair that up with a zero emission power generation method such as solar power.” — Elon Musk (14:13)

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Tesla’s Market Approach & Industry Impact (15:04–17:56)

• Pure electric—no hybrids—and a customer experience modeled on “somewhere between like a Starbucks and an Apple Store.” (16:30)
• Tesla will serve as a proof point to convince the skeptical auto industry.

  “If we were to sell the company to one of the big car companies, I think it would really slow things down.” — Elon Musk (17:53)

• Musk is chairman and principal funder, but his day job is running SpaceX (18:07–18:59).

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Elon Musk's Personal Habits and Management Style (18:59–19:58)

• Musk describes being a “not an early morning person,” typically arriving to the office around 9:00–9:30 AM and working late—no fixed hours.
• He shares a cubicle at SpaceX, working directly among his colleagues.

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Legacy and Hopes for the Future (19:48–20:23)

• Musk sums up his intended legacy:

  “What I'd like to do is help solve some important problems ... help build the Internet ... impact... transitioning away from oil ... and helping make humanity a multi planet species.” (19:58)

• He shrugs off titles, focusing instead on tangible impact.

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Memorable Quotes & Moments

| Timestamp | Speaker | Quote | |-----------|---------|-------| | 01:11 | Musk | "The three were the Internet, space exploration, and then changing the economy from a mine and burn hydrocarbon based economy to one which is solar electric." | | 02:05 | Musk | "NASA is a customer of ours...when the Shuttle retires in 2010. So starting in 2011, SpaceX's rocket will replace the space shuttle..." | | 05:15 | Musk | "I do think we should rather go. I think we should rather be focused on Mars... It's not really a place that we could establish another human civilization." | | 07:31 | Musk | "To do what Branson is doing, you need say, about nine units of energy. To do what we're doing, you need 625 units of energy." | | 09:18 | Musk | "The long term ultimate objective, the holy grail, is we would like to help make life multi-planetary." | | 10:43 | Musk | "A startup business is like eating glass and staring into the abyss." | | 13:09 | Musk | "The right place to enter is high unit cost, low unit volume." | | 14:13 | Musk | "We have a very important environmental problem that needs to be addressed ... the only way to really get around that, in my view, is really with an electric vehicle ..." | | 19:58 | Musk | "What I'd like to do is help solve some important problems ... help build the Internet ... impact...transitioning away from oil ... and helping make humanity a multi planet species." |

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Notable Segments & Timestamps

• [01:11] — Musk’s Three Areas of Impact
• [02:05] — How SpaceX Will Serve NASA
• [05:15] — Argument for Mars Over the Moon
• [07:31] — Energy, Orbital vs. Suborbital Flight
• [09:18] — Life as a Multi-Planetary Species
• [10:43] — On Startup Hardships
• [13:09] — Tesla’s Entry Strategy
• [14:13] — Electric Vehicles as Essential for Addressing Global Warming
• [19:58] — Defining a Legacy

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Tone and Personalities

• Musk is characteristically analytical, candid, and measured—mixing humor with a focus on impact.
• The host, Astronaut Man, is friendly and occasionally playful (“Did we really go to the moon?”) but consistently steers the conversation to Musk’s big ideas and contemporary relevance.

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Summary

This episode showcases a prescient Elon Musk on the cusp of reshaping two industries—spaceflight and automotives. His 2007 predictions about the privatization of space travel, mass market electric vehicles, and humanity’s drive to Mars have proven to be both visionary and catalytic. Musk’s repeated insistence on undertaking projects of lasting benefit to humanity, as well as his warnings about global warming and fossil fuels, foreshadow the next decades of innovation and disruption. The episode is a must-listen for anyone interested in where Musk’s ideas originated, and how far they’ve come.

Transcript

[A]

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[B]

Thank you so much for being with us here at Wired Science.

[C]

Well, thank you for having me.

[B]

I need to first lay a little bit of a foundation here. Two days into your physics program at Stanford University, you quit school to start a company called Zip to a media company, right? Which you sold a few years later for a paltry $307 million. Then four years later, eBay buys PayPal, is that correct? A company that you established or helped to establish is one of the few others, yeah. And now you've taken those two enormous successes and you've set your ambition on space. How did you go from online payment systems to building a spaceship essentially?

[C]

Well, when I graduated from college, there were three areas that I thought would be most impactful to the future of humanity. The three were the Internet, space exploration, and then changing the economy from a mine and burn hydrocarbon based economy to one which is solar electric, which I think is going to be the primary but not exclusive means of energy and transportation.

[B]

Have we screwed it up so badly here on this planet that our only hope is to build a new civilization out there?

[C]

No, not at all. Actually, I'm quite optimistic about the future of humanity on Earth.

[B]

You are?

[C]

Yeah, absolutely.

[B]

So what is the benefit to humanity then to inhabit Mars, which is really what is an ambition of yours?

[C]

Well, I think if you consider two paths. One where we're forever confined to Earth and the other where we're a spacefaring civilization out exploring the stars. I think the latter is far more exciting and will result in a richer and more diverse human experience.

[B]

How can you do that better than NASA?

[C]

Well, you know, NASA is a customer of ours, so there's a confusion in the public mind that perhaps a company like SpaceX is competing with NASA, but in fact NASA is a customer of ours, so we're actually providing services to NASA launch services and when the Shuttle retires in 2010. So starting in 2011, SpaceX's rocket will replace the space shuttle in servicing the space station with astronauts and cargo transportation.

[B]

The name of your rocket ship is called the Falcon Explorer. Is that it.

[C]

Well, the Falcon 9. The Falcon 9 is the rocket and then the space. The spaceship is. Dragon.

[B]

Dragon, yeah.

[C]

So the Falcon 9 rocket lifts the Dragon spaceship, and this dragon spaceship is what goes to the space station and then returns to Earth.

[B]

So it transports the Falcon as almost cargo then.

[C]

So the Falcon 9 is kind of like the semi or something like that. The Falcon 9 booster rocket takes the Dragon spaceship to space and drops it off. Then it goes to the space station, docks with the space station, transfers astronauts or resupply, you know, cargo, whatever the case may be, and then the Dragon spacecraft returns to Earth.

[B]

Reading some of the speeches that you have given in your career and how old you mean like you're practically 23 years? You're 23 years old?

[C]

I'm actually 12.

[B]

You're 12. I was going to say you look terrific. But you have said that we got lost along the way with our space program. What did you mean by that?

[C]

Right. I think, I think that was in some of my congressional testimony. I gave a few speeches to Congress. Well, what I mean by that is in 1969, we were able to go to the moon and here we are over three decades later, and we can barely get to low Earth orbit. And I think by any measure that is a step backwards.

[B]

Is that for a lack of leadership or technology.

[C]

I think we made the wrong technological choices. And I think there was also a lack of will at the, at the highest levels of government to take the next step and go, well, at least go, at least stay on the moon and perhaps build a base there and then go beyond the moon to Mars. And if you look at the, the news articles in the late 60s, early 70s, the expectation was that, that by now in the 21st century, we would have a moon base and probably even a Mars base. And I think if you'd asked anyone at that point in time whether we would be unable to go to the moon and have. No, not have been to Mars, I think they would. They would think you're crazy.

[B]

Do we need leadership in that realm? Do we need a John F. Kennedy who sets a goal for us when he said one day a man will walk on the moon? Do we need that kind of leadership for this technology to move forward in that big step?

[C]

I do think it's very important the President set the priority and determine the goal that we as a nation will aspire to. And, you know, George Bush has his pluses and minuses, but at least one plus is that he has helped us to steer the space program in a direction that more or less makes sense. You know, the only thing I would sort of argue with is that I don't think we should be going back to the moon. I think we should be focused on Mars. I think we saw the.

[B]

You think that's a mistake, focusing on the moon?

[C]

I do think we should rather go. I think we should rather be focused on Mars. You know, the moon is kind of like. It's kind of like the Arctic. It's just a very barren place, very little resources. It's small. It's not really a place that we could establish another human civilization.

[B]

There's a feeling of been there, done that too. With the moon?

[C]

Yeah, I think we saw that movie in the 60s. You know, the remake's never as good.

[B]

Did we really go to the moon?

[C]

Yes, we did.

[B]

Just wanted to check.

[C]

The government is incapable of suppressing a conspiracy of that nature.

[B]

Of that nature.

[C]

Okay, good.

[B]

This ambition to explore space.

[C]

Absolutely.

[B]

As an entrepreneur, there's quite a bit of competition out there. There's Jeff Bezos with Blue Origin. There's Richard Branson with his Virgin Galactic. And I'm not talking about NASA either. There's Paul Allen. There's the European Space Agency in Boeing and Lockheed Martin. The Chinese, the Russians. Let's just throw all of them into this.

[C]

Everyone's doing it.

[B]

Competitive field. How is SpaceX different? How do you think you'll sort of surpass them?

[C]

Well, you know, you've listed a wide range of entities there, and I think the differences are really different depending upon which one you're referring to.

[B]

Well, let me ask you this question. Who is your competition?

[C]

We have no serious competition.

[B]

None?

[C]

Not presently.

[B]

Who's chasing you?

[C]

Well, if you mean chasing and have and has a serious chance of catching, then I think none that I'm aware of.

[B]

Branson guy's kind of a hack then.

[C]

Well, what Branson's doing, by the way, I'm a great admirer of Branson, is really a much smaller technological challenge. So the aircraft would be suborbital, so it would go to about Mach 3. Our craft is orbital. It goes to Mach 25, so 25 times the speed of sound. But that doesn't describe the whole scale of difficulty because the energy required to get those velocities scales as the square of the velocity. So to do what Branson is doing, you need say, about nine units of energy. To do what we're doing, you need 625 units of energy. The difference is monumental. And then when you re enter, you have to burn off all that energy. So that doubles the problem really. So what Branson is doing from a technological standpoint is building something that can cross the English Channel. What we're building is something that can circumnavigate the globe. It's a very different scale of technological difficulty. I still think what he's doing is great. And by the way, I bought a ticket on his effort.

[B]

You did?

[C]

Yeah, yeah. So I still think it's great, but it's not, it's not in the same league technologically.

[B]

So you're not particularly worried?

[C]

Certainly not about. No, certainly not about that, no. The things that worry me, are we going to make a mistake? The things that can really hurt SpaceX are, I mean, our own foolishness, our own errors can hurt us, but none of the competition that I'm aware of.

[B]

So generally you're worried about what's in front of you, not the other guy. In fact, you probably don't think about them in terms of how they criticize you or what they think about you.

[C]

I don't think, actually, I don't think there's much criticism. I mean, Boeing and Lockheed, of course they would criticize, but I don't think any of the entrepreneurial guys would criticize what we're doing. And it's certainly possible. I think what Jeff Bezos is working on could ultimately. I mean, he does have aspirations to get to orbit and beyond. It's just that what they're doing right now is suborbital and at the sort of lower technology level. What I think about at SpaceX is really entirely what are we doing to ensure that our rocket is going to be successful and that we are truly optimizing the cost and ensuring high reliability? I mean, that's just a very, very difficult problem. There's a reason why there's an idiomatic expression about rocket science being hard. It really is really hard.

[B]

So rocket science really is rocket science?

[C]

Yeah, it looks hard and it's harder than it looks.

[B]

What's the big goal here? What's the long term plan?

[C]

Well, the long term ultimate objective, the holy grail, is we would like to help make life multi planetary. That's really what we'd like to do.

[B]

So establish societies on as many planets as possible.

[C]

Well, yeah, I think there's only one possibility, but yeah, I mean even if we can just go from one planet to two, I think that's a pretty big step.

[B]

And you'll start with, well, Mars.

[C]

Mars is the only viable planet.

[B]

Viable planet. So multi planetary life.

[C]

Yeah. Help make Life, multi, planetary. I think that's an important thing.

[B]

I don't think your goal's big enough.

[C]

Ha.

[B]

Yeah, it's ambitious.

[C]

Well, like I said, we don't expect you to do it single handedly, but we certainly would like to help make it happen.

[B]

It's fair to say you've made a fortune.

[C]

Yeah, I think so. By any reasonable standard.

[B]

Yeah. And you know, those who work in science probably understand your trajectory, but there are those who are watching who would think if I made that money, I'd sit on a beach, I'd drink beer and I would just watch the sunset. Kind of like a Corona beer commercial. Have you ever thought about that as a career option?

[C]

You know, I find that really pretty boring, so that would be torture. If I had to do that every day, that would really be pretty awful for me.

[B]

Is there something about startup businesses that, that, that really fuels your desire to work?

[C]

Well, I guess I really need to be preoccupied with something and if I'm just sort of sitting there relaxing, I can only do that for a very short period of time and then it becomes unbearable. Although startups definitely have their highs and lows. There's a friend of mine who has a good phrase. You know, a startup business is like eating glass and staring into the abyss.

[B]

What is the criteria that you establish for yourself or a startup mean?

[C]

Why one business over another?

[B]

Yeah.

[C]

Well, for me it's always about, does this, does what I'm doing matter? If we are successful, does it matter to the world? And so there are easier ways to make money than starting a rocket company or say a car company or even when I started an Internet company, because when I started the first Internet company, nobody had made any money and it wasn't clear that anyone would make any money. It was simply from the perspective of the Internet being a very important thing and something that needed to be built and so I wanted to help build it.

[B]

Well, you touch upon something that's interesting is that there is a, that benefiting humanity is a very integral part of your criteria, no matter what you're starting up.

[C]

Yes, absolutely.

[B]

Really? Not everybody has that as a prime interest.

[C]

I think that's, that's probably relatively unusual, although there are many people that I know in Silicon Valley for whom that is a significant motivation.

[B]

You said in your endeavor here to explore space that we are committed to failing in a new way, if nothing else. What did you mean by that? Just, just, just how it sounds?

[C]

Well, I mean, we're, I mean we're committed to succeed, really, but if we do fail. I would hope that we at least add to the body of knowledge such that those who follow may make fewer mistakes.

[B]

Now, if Mars were not enough, you

[C]

are busy here on Earth, the world is not enough. That's right. For you.

[B]

Where, where have you no limits, my friend? Here on Earth you are establishing a presence certainly with Tesla Motors. Tell us a little bit about that. This is your electric car company, correct?

[C]

Right.

[B]

This is no hybrid car you could buy on a car lot. This thing goes from 0 to 60 in 4 seconds.

[C]

EAS yes, absolutely. 0, 16 under 4 seconds. It's faster, better acceleration than any Porsche currently in production and any Ferrari except the Enzo. And it's twice the energy efficiency of a Prius. So you really have the model high ground and you get to leave the Ferrari guy in your dust. It's hard to beat.

[B]

Let me ask the obvious. Well, and you don't look like one of those guys who's trying too hard in a Ferrari.

[C]

Absolutely, yeah. You don't look like a jerk, you know,

[B]

in a bright banana yellow Lamborghini or Ferrari.

[C]

There's something I should point out about Tesla, which is Tesla, the first car is a sports car, not because we think the world likes for a sports car, but because it is the right entry point for the market. If you have a new technology, the right place to enter is high unit cost, low unit volume. Just as when a new cell phone comes out or a new laptop or some new thing, it tends to be expensive at first because they're figuring out all the issues and it takes time to optimize and then over time that that technology will become cheaper and cheaper. And so the Model 2 of Tesla, and maybe I'm leaping ahead here, but Model 2 of Tesla is a $49,000 four door, five passenger sedan. And that's, that's going to be obviously a much broader market segment that they can make use of that car. And the Model 3 is intended to be around a $30,000 price point. And so that's, that's really affordable by almost everyone who can buy a new car. So the idea is to drive to mass market as rapidly as possible, but only at the pace at which the technology matures.

[B]

Is Henry Ford someone you admire?

[C]

Well, I think Henry Ford made some very important contributions to business and moving manufacturing line and that sort of thing. So I think he's certainly worthy of admiration. He was a bit of an odd duck, but you know, certainly. But the interest in Tesla is not from the perspective of, you know, the world needs another car company. It's more from the perspective of we have a very important environmental problem that needs to be addressed, which is driven by the burning of fossil fuels and the increasing CO2 concentration in the atmosphere and global climate change, which I think is going to be one of the most significant issues of the 21st century. And the only way to really get around that, in my view, is really with an electric vehicle. And then you need to pair that up with a zero emission power generation method such as solar power. I think solar power is going to be a really big deal.

[B]

Tesla is not a hybrid car.

[C]

Tesla is pure electric.

[B]

Pure electric. So help connect the dots for me. Why aren't we seeing Tesla cars on the car lots then? What's keeping them?

[C]

We haven't made them yet, so we're just finishing up the development right now.

[B]

And anybody can buy this?

[C]

Yes.

[B]

How will you?

[C]

Actually, we've almost sold out of 2007 production. So if somebody does want to buy next year's model, they better act quickly.

[B]

One of the primary complaints about hybrid vehicles, vehicles is they're not fast enough. You seem to overcome this.

[C]

You won't have any trouble with this. In fact, really, there's something uniquely better about electric vehicles, which is that the torque response is immediate. So if you want to pass someone, I mean, you just. The response of the car is very immediate. It's just, it's more fun to drive an electric car than it is to drive a gasoline car.

[B]

You know, I was going to say that Tesla, the car, the name of the car company is no coincidence, is it? Explain a little bit about that.

[C]

Right. The company's named after Nikola Tesla, who was an inventor. He was originally from the sort of the area of Yugoslavia and Europe, but he moved to America when he was young and was an inventor of the AC induction motor. Invented a lot of the principles of magnetism. So he was a great man, a great inventor, and so the company's named in honor of him.

[B]

So these cars, the Tesla Roadster, the first issue of the Tesla Roadster available in 2007. Yes, in the spring, the summer. How do you get on the waiting list?

[C]

Well, you buy the car, you basically put down a deposit and we've actually.

[B]

Can you do that through the web?

[C]

Yeah, we'll have, by the way, customer centers all around the country. So we'll have one in la, one in Bay Area, Chicago, Miami, New York and eventually nationwide customer centers where somebody does want to see the car in person, take a test drive or see the car being worked on. I mean, we have this idea for the way that the cars are serviced, that it should be a really pleasant experience. So we have somewhere between like a Starbucks and an Apple Store. So you go in and you'd see the car's being worked on behind a glass partition.

[B]

That would be your car you're watching.

[C]

Yeah. Or somebody else's stand. But it's really clean. It's really clean. Present bright. There'd be sort of a coffee bar available. You know, just a. We really want to have a very pleasant experience that you don't typically get if you go into a dealership.

[B]

Have you heard from Toyota, have you heard from General Motors and Ford saying, is the company for sale?

[C]

Nobody's actually made a formal offer, but the interest. You know, I think one of the, one of the biggest values that Tesla can provide is serving as an example to the rest of the auto industry. Because right now the auto industry, you know, the big car companies believe that a viable electric vehicle is not possible and B, even if it was, people wouldn't buy it. So we need to show that neither of those are true, that the technology works, that people want to buy it. And, and that will be the most effective way of, of really driving change in the, in the oil industry is by serving as an example in that manner. And if we were to sell the company to one of, one of the big car companies, I think it would really slow things down.

[B]

Mm, you think so?

[C]

Absolutely. Mm.

[B]

You're very busy, enterprising, the part of your company that will explore space. You're very busy with this car company. Where do you find time to be CEO of two companies that size?

[C]

Well, I should correct you that I'm CEO of, of Space X and I'm chairman CEO of SpaceX and that is really my day job. So I spend 80% of my time on Space X.

[B]

Okay.

[C]

I am the chairman and the principal owner of Tesla Motors, but I do not run it on a daily basis.

[B]

You don't run that on a daily basis?

[C]

No.

[B]

Well, that was really the question was how do you do, how do you run those two large enterprises on a daily basis? Is it a couple of phone calls to the Tesla folks? How's it going? I'm busy with outer space right now. You guys got that covered?

[C]

I spent about, I spent about two, two to three days a month on Tesla related business and almost all the rest of the time is on SpaceX. So SpaceX is very much my, my day to day job and then I provide product guidance, strategic guidance and, and obviously funding for, for Tesla Like Steve Jobs. Right. So he runs Apple on a daily basis, but he also, you know, has oversight over Pixar. It's kind of like that.

[B]

And in your day to day, and this is one of those silly lifestyle questions, but how early do you get up in the morning and where do you go to work physically? Is it an office?

[C]

Yeah, I go to work at SpaceX.

[B]

How early do you get up in the morning?

[C]

You know, I'm not an early morning person.

[B]

So for young engineers and for inventors and creators, they can sleep until 10 or 11.

[C]

We have no fixed hours at SpaceX. And I mean my personally I tend to get up around 7:30 or 8 and be in the office around 9 o'. Clock, 9:30. But then I tend to stay until about 8pm okay.

[B]

College students across America are saying oh brats. I thought he was going to say like noon. But then you go into an office and you sit in a separate office away from those who are working or do you sit with them?

[C]

No, I just have a cubicle at SpaceX.

[B]

You have a cubicle?

[C]

Yeah.

[B]

And are you surrounded by your colleagues there?

[C]

Absolutely.

[B]

What is your hope in terms of the impact you will leave on culture, this civilization, this world, global civilization? What is it that you hope to leave here?

[C]

Well, I think what I'd like to do is help solve some important problems. So I think in a small way helped build the Internet. And then with respect to the global warming problem, the transition from away from oil and other hydrocarbons to something which is clean and sustainable, I hope to have an impact there. And then with respect to space, I hope to have an impact in helping make humanity a multi planet species.

[B]

Elon Musk, thank you so much for being with us at Wire Science. Let me get it straight. CEO of SpaceX and chairman of Tesla Motors.

[C]

Yeah, I got other titles, but that's about right. I think that you're doing pretty good.

[B]

You've done very well. Thanks for listening. See you in the next episode.