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Elon Musk Thinking
Latest Interview of Elon Musk, speaks to Germanys farright party AfD chief Alice Weidel!!!
01:13:45
Latest Interview of Elon Musk, speaks to Germanys farright party AFD chief Alice Weidel!!! #ElonMusk #AFD #AliceWeidel Follow me on X https://x.com/Astronautman627?t=RFQEunSF2NwRkCOBc6PkkQ&s=09
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- [00:00]
Alice Beadle
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- [01:31]
Elon Musk
Welcome Alice, thank you for joining Spaces and I look forward to this discussion. And perhaps we could start by outlining if you could outline what AFD's platform is. What are the the main things you're aiming for? Where does Germany need change? And just to educate people who have never heard of AFD or ifd. If it could be German and a lot of people, especially in America have never heard of afd, so perhaps this would be very helpful.
- [02:07]
Alice Beadle
Okay, thank you very much Elon for having me and to give this opportunity to to openly speak about different matters. Let me just. Can you hear me?
- [02:21]
Elon Musk
I can, yes.
- [02:23]
Alice Beadle
Perfect. Perfect. To start with who we are, the AFD is the alternative for Germany. It is a relatively new party founded 11 years ago during the course of the Euro problems. So unfortunately I have to start when I shed some light on our party with the quite negative circumstances in Germany. Our country is a great country with highly motivated people, but our country has been governed not in a proper way within the last 20, 25 years. We had the Angela Merkel administration for 16 years and then the so called traffic light coalition that imploded last year and now we are heading elections. In my point of view, Angela Merkel, the first Green Chancellor, she ruined basically our country. She enforced without asking the people, she enforced to open our borders for illegal immigration. In 2015, she wrecked and destroyed our backbone in terms of obnoxious energy policy. For the foreign listeners here in this audience, Germany is the only industrial country, the only industrial country that unplugged the nuclear power plant. So the aim of Angela Merkel was to, to enforce just solar and wind energy. And you don't need to be very smart to encounter that you cannot run a industrial country with just wind and solar because you don't have any energy and electricity when the sun doesn't shine and when the wind doesn't blow. And this is a major problem.
- [04:57]
Elon Musk
Yeah, I mean, obviously I'm a big fan of solar energy, but clearly if a country is at a very high latitude, then the amount of solar power in the winter is going to be substantially reduced. And then of course there's a significant difference in the day, night cycle of energy usage. So a lot of power can be done with solar and with large scale grid energy batteries, but it must be supplemented with other forms of power because there's not a lot of sunshine in the middle of winter in Germany. So the solution obviously must be a multifaceted solution where there is certainly renewables, but also there does need to be some form of some amount of fossil fuel energy and especially nuclear. I think nuclear is very much underrated. I think it was a tragic for Germany to shut down the nuclear power plants. In fact, they're very well designed and I think that the right move is in fact to increase the amount of nuclear power substantially in Germany. This would be, this would be great.
- [06:12]
Alice Beadle
Yes, absolutely. So that was the reason why I wanted to shed some light on the current situation. So in order to form an opinion what our parties stand for, because this is exactly what you said we stand for a energy, energy supply diversification. We cannot run a industrial country like Germany with a strong, still strong manufacturing base. To tell you the truth, our manufacturing production, it peaked in 2018 and it plummeted since then due to high energy costs. And you cannot run a country like that. So therefore we, we say, look, we need to be technology open and we need to reinforce again nuclear power plants because nuclear energy supply is, is carbon free. Right. So therefore we would also. Yeah, we would also Reduce our carbon footprint, which is obnoxiously very, very high. And this is the entire irony about it. So our governments, like the Angela Merca government and the so called ridiculous traffic light coalition, they enforced a green policy upon our country that doesn't work. Yeah, and yeah, and we would like to go back to technology openness here.
- [07:42]
Elon Musk
Yeah, I think that makes a lot of sense. I mean my recommendation, and I've said this publicly before, is that Germany should not merely reopen the nuclear power plants, but substantially increase the power generation in the same space. Meaning without increasing the size of the nuclear power plant in any meaningful way, without increasing the amount of land area that it uses, you can dramatically increase the power output of a nuclear power station. Because the, the actual core part of the power station is extremely tiny. People don't quite realize just how small the center core of a nuclear power plant is. It's like amazingly tiny. And so you can actually in the same land area, no increased land area dramatically increase the amount of nuclear power that any given nuclear power station is producing. You do need a water source for, for the, to run the, the steam turbines. But, but, but really far more power output is possible than, than people realize. And I, I think that the sensible solution is, you know, renewables, but with, with a lot of nuclear. And then you know, to supplement where that there's, there has to be some amount of hydrocarbon power generation to supplement where. Yes, yeah, just it just needs to be sensible.
- [09:04]
Alice Beadle
Yeah, absolutely. But do you know what. So just, just, just let me do just like one more example. Because like, like, like wind turbines, wind energy in comparison to nuclear power supply is highly inefficient also in terms of land use. So for instance, I give one example just to shed some light on it. If you were to replace one nuclear power plant, let's say like one like M Slant nuclear power plant here in Germany with an annual electricity production of 10 billion kilowatt per hour. With modern wind turbines with a production of just 8 million kilowatt per hour per year, you would need 1250 wind turbines just to, just to replace this one power plant. And with a rotor diameter of 70 meters and the minimum distance from large wind farms, you end up around with like 100 square kilometers. For example, this corresponds to half of the city, major city of Stuttgart. Right. So this, this entire thing. And just to, just to, just to stress the fact again, you don't need to be very smart just to do your calculation.
- [10:36]
Elon Musk
Yes, but our energy, the crazy thing is a bunch of these energy questions. You do not need to be like a world leading physicist. It's very basic math, like high school, less than high school level math. I'd say middle school math even. It's very straightforward. Not. Not complicated.
- [11:02]
Alice Beadle
Yes, absolutely. And then during, during the crisis, like during the war.
- [11:10]
Elon Musk
Sorry, please go ahead.
- [11:12]
Alice Beadle
Yeah, so during the war of Ukraine, so our, our. Our gas supply was just destroyed and that actually shed some light on our severe dependence on Russian gas. And do you know what, what the government decided in this crisis when the energy prices skyrocked after we were cut off of. Of. Of of cheap energy supply from Russia, they switched off the last nuclear power plant to even more create a shortage of energy. So either you must be very stupid or you just hate your own country, isn't it?
- [12:02]
Elon Musk
I think it's mostly the very stupid category. At least I'd like to think so.
- [12:05]
Alice Beadle
Very stupid.
- [12:06]
Elon Musk
I mean there's an old saying that like one should never ascribe to malice that which can easily be explained by incompetence.
- [12:14]
Alice Beadle
Yes, you're perfectly right now.
- [12:16]
Elon Musk
But yes. Actually when I saw that Germany was turning off the power plants after being cut off from gas supplies from Russia, I thought this is the crazy. This is one of the craziest things I've ever seen. Just when Germany most needs electricity, Germany is shutting down one of the best sources of electricity which is nuclear power. Crazy.
- [12:39]
Alice Beadle
And completely carbon free.
- [12:41]
Elon Musk
Yeah, crazy. Crazy.
- [12:43]
Alice Beadle
It's crazy.
- [12:44]
Elon Musk
So I guess to summarize the two main things that AFD is aiming for in terms of change is a sensible energy policy and sensible immigration policy.
- [13:06]
Alice Beadle
Yes, exactly. But actually even more so we would like so if I may continue a little bit because now it's a, it's a. Ellen, it's a complete new situation for me that, that I just can have a normal conversation and I'm not interrupted or negatively framed how that has been in the media, the case in the last 10 years, which is completely ridiculous. So what we, what we also stand for since we are a conservative libertarian party, so at least we see says like this. But we are extremely negatively framed as a so called extremist party by the mainstream media. So we just say look, we need to reduce bureaucracy. We need to free our, our firms, our companies, the individuals of the subnious bureaucratic conditions here. Do you know like how long it takes, how many days it takes to get a business permit in Germany?
- [14:18]
Elon Musk
Just as it turns out I do. Because we built.
- [14:21]
Alice Beadle
Oh yeah, the big plan.
- [14:23]
Elon Musk
We built a gigantic car factory, you know, just near Berlin. So we had Many, many challenges. I mean, this is to be clear, like, we actually had a lot of support, a lot of local support, a lot of local support from. From, like the local government, from the national government. And despite all that support, just the sheer number of rules that the people in the government are required to follow is completely crazy. And we had to. I think it was 25,000 pages was our permit, and it had to be all printed on paper.
- [15:02]
Alice Beadle
25,000?
- [15:04]
Elon Musk
Yes. I think maybe more than that in the end. 25,000. And then there has to be many, many copies made. So it literally was a truck of paper. Because we're like, surely we can make this electronic. You know, shouldn't. Isn't that better for the. Everyone.
- [15:20]
Alice Beadle
Not possible. You need to have that on paper.
- [15:23]
Elon Musk
And they say, no, it has to be paper. I'm like, this is crazy. This is only a few years ago. It's not the distant past. I mean, it's like we're, you know, we're well into the. We're, you know, a quarter of the way through the 21st century. It's like, guys, let's just 45,000 actual printed pages. And then I believe every page needed to be stamped with a physical stamp. I mean, honestly, it's going to really tire somebody out to do so much stamping. Yeah. You know, they're going to get some sort of repetitive stress injury. Yeah, they're going to get a repetitive stress injury from having to stamp so many. Just send them to the hospital or something. I mean, that's. That's too much. Yeah. So I'm not trying to blame the sort of individuals who are doing this then, because they are just following the rules. So we have to change the rules. And there needs to be, I think, in my view, for all countries, but especially countries that have enjoyed prosperity for a long time, it is extremely important to have what I call sort of garbage collection of rules, which is to reexamine the rules and regulations and make sure that they are clearly a net good. And if there's any doubt about them being a net good, we should eliminate them, because otherwise we get to this point where everything is illegal. And so it's just absolutely crazy.
- [16:52]
Alice Beadle
Absolutely, absolutely. And it's not only about bureaucracy, it's also about taxes. Germany has the highest taxes. Yes. Of all OECD countries. So. So the normal German employee, he works half of. More than half of a year for the state. You have to imagine that, Right. Like. Like with taxes plus Social Security. So more than half of the year you work for this Dysfunctioning state because like the state does not provide the vital, the vital provisions for the people here. So he doesn't provide for security. So we have like, like skyrocketing criminal rights here.
- [17:42]
Elon Musk
Right.
- [17:44]
Alice Beadle
He doesn't care about education. So we have this same insane wokish leftish socialist agenda in our educational system. So the young people, they don't learn anything in school, in university etc, so they just learn about gender studies.
- [18:07]
Elon Musk
Are you serious?
- [18:08]
Alice Beadle
And they just. Yeah. No.
- [18:12]
Elon Musk
Really? I was under the impression that Germany had a, had a pretty good education system that, that was quite rigorous with you know, the gymnasium and all that sort of stuff. At least it used to at one point. So. But it sounds like this has, I don't know, the woke mind virus has infected Germany quite badly.
- [18:33]
Alice Beadle
Yeah, yeah. So you have the, the international standard of PISA testing. Right. So the PISA survey, right. So Germany like a couple of years ago was okay, scored okay these scores, okay. But now, so we, so we just plummeted because, because the survey showed that young people are not able to properly do math or speak or write German. And in some like in some states here in Germany you have to imagine they just abolished the writing grades in terms to get the language grade. Right. So you don't need to write German properly anymore because our entire educational system has been deteriorating. And that is also the, the reason for instance, why young people, they vote for, for us now because they want to have a proper education and they want to have back a proper educational system that, that, that provides the young people with, with capabilities. And that is also the reason why I. So my personal opinion is that we have to go back to a merit based system. Right? So we need to go back to a merit based incentive system and to go away from all this socialist gender things being in our educational system.
- [20:12]
Elon Musk
Right?
- [20:12]
Alice Beadle
The families and the parents, they have the responsibility of their children and the schools and the university, they have a responsibility to give good education and not all this vogue, socialist, nonsensical gender stuff.
- [20:29]
Elon Musk
Sure. No, absolutely. I mean the whole point of going to school is to learn useful skills that help you in life, help you be productive and understand the world. And otherwise it's not a school, it's just a propaganda institution.
- [20:49]
Alice Beadle
True.
- [20:50]
Elon Musk
Yeah. So, okay, well, I mean that makes a lot of sense. So let's see.
- [20:57]
Alice Beadle
Yeah, so maybe I can just go on because I was just giving an example of the educational system where the state fails. Because our state, the government collected in the last year a record high of income tax. So they collected like around like above 1 trillion right of euros. So it is a record high tax. But the state, they cannot, they cannot handle taxpayers money. So what do they do? So they just throw the money out of the window for immigration in our social system, for instance. So since 2015, just to give you some numbers and also the audience to have an idea what's going on here in Germany. So we had an influx of, of almost 7 million people. 7 million people. But these are the officially counted. So 7 million people.
- [22:10]
Elon Musk
Wow.
- [22:10]
Alice Beadle
Okay, 7 million people of influx since 2015 officially counted. And then because the people, they just, just another funny numbers. Our state allows people to throw away their passports before they cross our borders that are not protected and controlled. So 57%, almost 60% of the people coming into our country through an open border, they throw away their papers. Why do they do that? Because once entered our country, our funny country, with this funny immigration policy, they cannot be deported anymore. So that's the reason why. So our state, our government, like the Angela Merkel government and the last one, they proclaimed a policy that everyone can choose to cross our border, to immigrate into our Social Security system and cannot be deported afterwards because they threw away their passports. I mean, like, how insane is that?
- [23:21]
Elon Musk
Well, it is very insane, but that's exactly what's happened in the US So I mean clearly there's a sort of, I don't know, sort of a far left agenda that's being pushed throughout western civilization. Any place they can go. Because the exact same thing was done in the US where and now they, instead of calling people illegal immigrants, they call them undocumented. And the reason they're undocumented is because they threw away their passport, just like you're talking about. In fact, on the Mexican side of the border in the US there's a giant pile of discarded passports and driver's licenses. Like a huge pile because it's actually worse to come in with a passport than to come in with nothing. And then just like in Germany, the democrat government then gives massive amounts of money and support to what they call undocumented. But, but then, but if they're undocumented, we actually have no idea if they are a murderer rapist. We have no idea because they have no documents so we can't actually tell. And so as a result there's been, there's been a massive influx of, of criminals into the US because, and frankly, I mean, I'm wondering what's taking criminals so long to come here. I mean this is a, I mean America is a target rich Environment. It's, it's, you know, in America, it's so easy to steal things in these wealthy neighborhoods. It's like the only thing that is going to slow down how much you can steal is if your back hurts from carrying out all the goods. You know, it's like, because you're just like, you're not a robber. You're just a moving company. So, you know, like, it seems like all the world's criminals just come to America on that basis because it's a. Such an. It's much easier to be a career criminal in America than it is in, in other countries where there's not that much to steal. So, you know, so we've seen a massive increase in crime in, in the U.S. yeah.
- [25:25]
Alice Beadle
Yeah. May I, may I ask a question on that? So I read, I read that, for instance, in California, by the way, I'm very sorry what's happening there. It's terrible. It's really terrible to see. And yeah, it's terrible. But in the case of California that they just lifted the, the, the prosecution of theft because you have so many cases of theft. Is it true?
- [25:57]
Elon Musk
Yes. The de facto situation in California is that theft is almost never prosecuted. It's maybe 1 or 2, maybe 1% of the time is theft prosecuted. And even when it is prosecuted, the criminals are let out on bail immediately. So basically, theft is legal in California. It's crazy.
- [26:24]
Alice Beadle
It's crazy.
- [26:25]
Elon Musk
Yeah. Now, there was recently a referendum in California to, to make, to make crime, to, to make stealing illegal again, which was, and actually that was a very popular. And it passed so because it, it was actually literally legal to steal anything under $1,000, which means people could just walk into a store at $1,000 at a time and take out anything they want. And if this, if the storekeeper stopped them, the storekeeper would be arrested. So this is literally like the Joker and Batman. It's like the, the criminals, you know, are in charge and that the honest citizens are arrested. It's just completely insane. Now, like I said, the people in California did vote overwhelmingly to make theft illegal again. But astonishingly, the governor of California, Governor Newsom, he was against the making theft illegal, which is. Doesn't make any sense. Yeah, well, no, but what they're going to do is, even though it is technically illegal again, the sort of far left will refuse to enforce it. So. Because you really need two things for something to work, for laws to work, you need both the law and you need enforcement of the law. And if you don't have, if you have. So I mean this is something that George Soros really figured out. I mean he's sort of brilliant guy, but honestly very, you know, anti human in my opinion is that you don't actually need to change the law, you just need to stop enforcement of the law. And that does the trick. But I think there is somewhat of a reawakening in the US And I think even in California people are tired of this and they want change. And I think that's, that's really, if you say like what people are wondering like why did, why, why did Donald Trump win? And it wasn't just a small victory in the US elections this year. You know, President Trump won the Electoral College. He also won the popular vote majority of the, of the people. And the House is Republican and the Senate is Republican. What this says is the American people are demanding change. They're being very clear. And my recommendation for the people in Germany is to do the same. If you are unhappy with the situation, you must vote for change. And that is why I'm really strongly recommending that people vote for AfD. That's my strong recommendation. And I think this is simply the sensible move. I think Alice Beadle is a very reasonable person and hopefully people can tell just from this conversation nothing outrageous is being proposed, just common sense. In fact, as I've said publicly, I think only AfD can save Germany. And I just want to be very clear about that. Only AfD can save Germany, end of story. And people really need to get behind AFD and otherwise things are going to get very, very much worse in Germany.
- [29:48]
Alice Beadle
Yes, because you rightly said there is a difference of making a law and then enforcing it. So now we have the situation in Germany where you have, on the one hand you have the AfD and on the other hand was so called Uni Party. Right. The Uni Party consisting of all the others because they stick together and no matter what they say, they're not able to implement, to enforce the promises they're doing in every election, especially the Angela Merkel party. Do you know that the Chancellor candidates or so my, so my running mate of the Chris Democratic Party that it's wrongly labeled for instance by the economists as a center right party. So in my opinion it's a leftist Green party. But anyway, Angela Merkel was the first Green Chancellor we had here. So what he did is that he by the way, just talking about interference. So I just look it up here. He called your interest so your interests in German politics pushy and presumptuous.
- [31:06]
Elon Musk
Yeah, what did he say about George Soros?
- [31:09]
Alice Beadle
Yeah, yeah, exactly. And Bill Gates.
- [31:12]
Elon Musk
Yeah, Bill Gates.
- [31:13]
Alice Beadle
That was not a problem.
- [31:14]
Elon Musk
Yeah.
- [31:15]
Alice Beadle
When Bill Gates actually tried to sell his MRNA vaccination and not mentioning all the huge side effects on people's health and no one takes responsibility about that and the entire bluff and scam of wearing a mask. Right. So it's unbelievable. And also that candidate, also Chris Democrats like Friedrich Mertz, he warned the world about the consequences of voting for Donald Trump in October last year.
- [31:51]
Elon Musk
Right.
- [31:52]
Alice Beadle
So, so so far for like foreign interferences. Right. So it's unbelievable. It's really unbelievable. Like how Donald Trump was treated by German media and German politicians during his election campaign was unbelievable. And I mentioned that before in a Bloomberg interview. It created, for me, it created physical pain to see that, how he was disparaged, like, and his entire family. So. Yeah. So I feel very sorry for these people. Just like. Yeah. Saying negative things and. Yeah. Now while we, While we talk, 150 bureaucrats of the European Union are watching us, our conversation to enforce this ridiculous Digital Services Act. That is nothing, nothing else than a censorship on free speech. But free speech, right, it's. And you said it. Free speech is a precondition of democracy if you are not able to form a proper opinion and exchange opinions and ideas. And a democracy should be a competition of the best ideas, right?
- [33:16]
Elon Musk
Absolutely. Yes, exactly. Without freedom of speech, people are obviously not able to say what they want to say, and then they cannot make an informed vote. So if people are simply fed propaganda and have no access to what's really going on, then they can make an informed vote and then you don't have a real democracy. So that's why I say free speech is the bedrock of democracy. There must be free speech in order for people to make an informed vote. So that's essential. And you can sort of actually quite easy to tell who the bad guys are. It's like, who wants to shut down freedom of speech? They are the bad guys. It's very clear.
- [34:02]
Alice Beadle
Yes. And do you know what, what, what, what Adolf Hitler did, the first thing he switched off free speech.
- [34:14]
Elon Musk
Yes.
- [34:14]
Alice Beadle
So he controls the media. And, and without that, he would have never been successful.
- [34:22]
Elon Musk
Yes, exactly.
- [34:23]
Alice Beadle
Never been successful.
- [34:25]
Elon Musk
Yes.
- [34:26]
Alice Beadle
This is what you do.
- [34:27]
Elon Musk
Yeah, no, exactly. It's that that was one of, one of the first things he did was, was to control the media and imposed extreme censorship. And really what he was trying to do was shut down any pro Semitic media. Anything pro Semitic or any defense of the Jewish people was shut down. That's that, so that's, that's so we have to like, you know, very few. For those who want censorship, I think they should be careful what they ask for because once you institute censorship, it's only a matter of time before that censorship is turned on you and eventually they will censor you. And that's the danger because people love to censor things they don't agree with, but they don't realize that one day that censorship is going to be turned on.
- [35:22]
Alice Beadle
Absolutely.
- [35:24]
Elon Musk
So I mean, I mean you mentioned of course, you know, Hitler and whatnot. Now there's a lot of the media wants to portray AFD as far right as somehow associated with Nazism or something like that. Perhaps you could address that concern because you know, people when they hear of sort of right wing in Germany, they, you know, naturally have a bit of a negative reaction.
- [35:55]
Alice Beadle
Yes, thank you, thank you for the question. First of all, I would like to, since I'm a economist, I would like to shed some light on the idea, when we talk about Hitler, on the idea of the National Socialists. Back then during the Third Reich, the National Socialist, as the word says, there were socialists. Yeah, yeah.
- [36:27]
Elon Musk
They nationalized industries like crazy.
- [36:29]
Alice Beadle
Yes, absolutely. He was a communist and he considered himself as a socialist. So what they did, they, they, they, yeah, they state funded, then the, the private companies and then they asked for, for taxes, huge taxes. And then also. Wait a second, I need to ask the word now. Yeah, nationalize the entire industry. Yeah, you said that before. And, and the biggest success, the biggest success after that terrible era in our history was to label Adolf Hitler as right and conservative. He was exactly the opposite. He wasn't a conservative, he wasn't a libertarian. He was a communist socialist guy. So full stop, no more comment on that. And we are exactly the opposite. We are libertarian conservative party. And see, look at this. During like now like during the discussion of this terrible Hamas attack on Israel. So only the leftish Palestinians, they criticize the policies here. So you have a deeply vested anti Semitism within the leftist movement. And it was always that case why? And Adolf Hitler, he also played with that. He played with the envy of people. Jewish people have been highly educated, very cultivated and they were successful. There were worthy people back in Germany then. And then he enforced the envy of the population against these people. And it was a socialist measure taken against them. Look at Stalin, look at the Soviet Union under Stalin, the very same thing. So he was nothing else, an anti semitic socialist. And we are exactly the opposite. We are a libertarian conservative party. We are wrongly framed the entire time. And we would like to free the people of the state. I want to have independently thinking people, self confident people. I would like to have a state that is minimized, minimized to his functions and letting the people having their freedom of speech, freedom of wealth. Also like generating wealth with these obnoxiously high taxes. The state erodes the backbone of wealth. Right. So the people are not able to accumulate wealth that make them independent from the state.
- [39:35]
Elon Musk
Right.
- [39:36]
Alice Beadle
So I would like to have independently thinking, well educated people who have the freedom to form their own opinion. I want to have strong leaders in Germany. I don't want to have stupid, weak leaders as we had in the last couple of years, because these people cannot think straightly. And they're a big danger. Look at the war in Ukraine now. They're a big danger to our national security and to actually to the entire European security. This is also my hope in Donald Trump and in you, in your administration that you end that terrible war, this worthless dying of young people every day, like as fast as you can. Because the Europeans, they cannot. They actually given up on everything, like on a good military, on a good negotiation power. They completely depend on the US in the sense of, oh, the USA need to do the entire job. We don't need to do anything. We just escalate the entire conflict against Russia. It's very dangerous what's going on here and only you can basically stop it.
- [41:00]
Elon Musk
Yeah, I mean, I think President Trump is going to solve that conflict, I think, very quickly. As you point out, it's now been in somewhat of a stalemate for a few years. And all that's happened over the past few years is hundreds of thousands of people dying, but for no gains. And the longer this conflict goes on, the more Ukraine weakens relative to Russia. I mean, Ukraine is a much smaller country. It simply cannot afford the losses relative to Russia. Russia has, it's just, you know, the longer the strikes on, the worse it is for Ukraine. And then you've got all these poor, you know, men dying for nothing. Why. So I hope this can be, this terrible conflict can be resolved quickly and I think it will be under President Trump.
- [41:57]
Alice Beadle
Yeah, it will be great, actually, because this is our now really like that the people here, like, like many people are anxious and they're anxious for a very good reason, I think, because this conflict, conflict has a potential to escalate big time towards a nuclear exchange. And here the European governments have no measure. They have no strategy, they have no red line, no storyline of their foreign and security policy. Towards Russia, towards Ukraine. Yeah. They have no strategy to end that and they don't have the military power. Right. So they understand the budget to NATO.
- [42:42]
Elon Musk
Right.
- [42:43]
Alice Beadle
For actually for decades, like for, for a very long time. Like the average, for instance, of Germany, because The share of GDP is supposed to be 2%. So Germany on average, I think was just like slightly above 1%. So Germany didn't contribute. But Germany is also not prudent of the defendants of our own country. So this is the second thing. So we are completely dependent on the U.S. but I think, and I've listened to this very interesting speech of JD Vance, he said he doesn't want to, he doesn't want to have client states. Right? Yeah. So he wants to have independent states that also form their own independent opinion on things. Right?
- [43:43]
Elon Musk
Yes.
- [43:44]
Alice Beadle
So you, for instance, in your companies, you don't want to be surrounded by yes. People and by mediocre people. Right. So me neither.
- [43:53]
Elon Musk
Right.
- [43:54]
Alice Beadle
I try, yeah. So I try to also, I try to, to, to, to have the best people in my team. And these best people, they have the task to criticize me every day. And I don't want to have yes sayers. Right. Because you cannot learn. So you have no mistake.
- [44:16]
Elon Musk
Correct? Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.
- [44:24]
Alice Beadle
People. No, but it's so, but it's so important. Yeah, yes.
- [44:32]
Elon Musk
No, absolutely. I mean, for say, my companies like SpaceX and Tesla, if, you know, if we are constantly looking for critical feedback because if we make a mistake, then the rockets blow up and the cars don't work. So, you know, physics is very unforgiving. You know, there's, you know, I say, like, really, physics is the law and everything else is a recommendation. Because I've seen people break every kind of law, but I haven't seen them break physics. And so if you don't get the design of the rocket and the opposite operation of the rocket exactly right, and if even one thing is wrong, the rocket explodes. So, you know, that's why I'm a strong believer in seeking critical feedback. And in fact, I think critical feedback should be viewed as a gift.
- [45:18]
Alice Beadle
Yes.
- [45:20]
Elon Musk
Yes, yes, yes.
- [45:25]
Alice Beadle
But just to continue on that topic, so if you don't have that feedback loop, so your, your rocket may explode. Right. But here, in this critical phase of this terrible war in, in the Ukraine, many people may die due to the stupid policies that many people have died.
- [45:53]
Elon Musk
Yeah, indeed. Yeah. So, well, I mean, let's touch on some, some maybe potential what people may view as hot button issues. Like what are, what are your views.
- [46:05]
Alice Beadle
On Israel oh, very complicated.
- [46:08]
Elon Musk
The more we have.
- [46:09]
Alice Beadle
No, no, really like the more, the more I read about the Middle east and the situation in Israel, the more complicated it gets. And to be honest, I wanted to ask you about a potential solution because to be honest, like in my humble opinion, I don't see as a solution. So maybe, maybe Israel have to find some alliances with the Sunni states, maybe if possible. And yeah, to be honest, from my point of view, like from my perspective, it's a very complicated situation. And I don't, you know, I'm not this person, I'm not the politician. If you ask a question that I do this, blah, blah, blah.
- [47:05]
Elon Musk
Sure.
- [47:05]
Alice Beadle
I really say what I think to, to do honest politics and to be honest, I don't know very like to be very frank, I don't know how to solve the conflict at this point in time and I hope maybe you have an answer on that. Sorry for, for, for being dissatisfactory, but it's so complicated and I want to give prudent answer. And in case of Israel, I don't know how to resolve this conflict, to be honest.
- [47:40]
Elon Musk
Well, I guess maybe another way to say it is do you unequivocally support the existence of the State of Israel?
- [47:46]
Alice Beadle
Yes, of course.
- [47:48]
Elon Musk
Okay. That's what people want to know. Asking questions that maybe seem very obvious but you know.
- [47:57]
Alice Beadle
Oh yeah, oh yes, now I see a weather's question. No, absolutely. So we need to protect the existence of Israel and we need to protect not only the existence of the State of Israel, but I also think that Benjamin Netanyahu have made many mistakes in the past, to be honest. But we also need to take our responsibility as a German nation state to protect Jewish live Jewish people in our country who are exposed right now to, to, to Muslim crime. Right. So they are not safe here anymore. So you, I don't know if you, if you saw some videos here of the streets of Berlin. I'm right now in my office in Berlin, but like with all these demonstrations of the Palestinians here, well, a Jew could not walk through the street anymore. Right. And we have, have a, a huge potential of anti Semitic crime against the Jewish people. And to be very frank, to be very Frank here the AfD is the only protector and I'm saying that like very frankly the alternative, the AFD is the only, can only be the only protector of the Jewish people within here in Germany because the UNI Party, all other parties, they did exactly the opposite. They let like millions of people in, they let, do, let them do crimes on our Streets like the crime rate are skyrocketing and so the Jewish people, they leave our country. When I, when I talk to my Jewish friends who live in Germany and in Switzerland and in France and in Austria, they were very afraid after the hamas attack on 7 October, because they were there are. They were afraid that they would likely to be attacked by, by Palestinians, by Hamas supporters or by the antifa or by the leftish terrorists, I don't know. But they were very afraid, very sensitive from going on the streets. And we, we step up for these people, even though the opposite. In the mainstream media, the opposite is claimed. Yes, but this is, this is, this is not true. It's just a, it's just a lie about our party.
- [50:55]
Elon Musk
Yes, I think that's, that's what I wanted to just make it clear that, that the AfD is being massively misrepresented, especially in the Western media. So. Yeah, and you know, and obviously I very much support the state of Israel, but I mean, I also believe that we want to be mindful and have empathy for, you know, civilians who are dying as well. You know, when I've had conversations with Prime Minister Netanyahu and, and I think we largely agreed, I mean, there's three steps which is like, there's no choice but to eliminate those who wish to eliminate the state of Israel, you know, Hamas, essentially. And then the second step is to fix the education so that Palestinians are not trained from when they are children to hate and want the death of Israel. So you've got to fix the education system. And then the third thing, which is also very important is to make the Palestinian areas prosperous. The third step is very important. And this is maybe the hardest step, which is. But you have to have that third step. You have to bring prosperity, you have to help rebuild and you have to bring prosperity. And I've had this conversation with many people in Israel. I said that third step is essential. And they've asked me, well, when has this worked? And I'm like, well, I'll give you a very big example. After World War I, the Treaty of Versailles was extremely unfair to Germany and it created a massive amount of resentment. And the treat of Versailles laid the foundation with its extreme reparations for, laid the foundation for World War II. Without the treaty of Versailles, Hitler would not have succeeded. Yes. And so, and then, but if you look at so, so then the lesson was learned. So then after World War II, when Germany and Japan were defeated, the US actually helped rebuild Japan and Germany providing financial support to rebuild Japan And Germany, and now Japan and Germany are allies. And this is a very important and fundamental lesson of history.
- [53:30]
Alice Beadle
Yes, you're absolutely right. When, after the Hamas attack, I just opened Google Maps to have a look. Okay, what is the geographic situation there? And when you see the Gaza stripe, right, It's a Gaza stripe which is just locked, locked in with no resources and not even water supplies. So there can be cut off a water supply and other supplies just like instantaneously. And this construction also, like, like just having a look, like, from. From a geographic perspective. You don't need to be very smart that this is. This is not going to work out. And to make this area wealthy with. With specific measure being taken. It's a very vital first step.
- [54:38]
Elon Musk
Yeah, I think it's essential. And it requires overriding the natural human instinct for reciprocity, which is that, you know, it's basically an eye for an eye, you know, but the problem with that, an eye for an eye, is that if you keep doing that, an eye for an eye, as the saying goes, an eye for an eye makes everyone blind. That's why I think there's great wisdom to forgiveness. You know, you need both strength and forgiveness. But this is the only way to stop the, the endless cycle of violence.
- [55:13]
Alice Beadle
It's a very nice, nice sentence. Like the eye for an eye makes. Makes everyone blind.
- [55:21]
Elon Musk
Yeah, exactly. So, yeah, so hopefully that, that, that can be the future. That's the best future I can think of. I think any. There's not some other future that's. That works.
- [55:40]
Alice Beadle
So how about. May I ask you another question? Because we just jumped topics. What is your point of view? So we stopped that. Your administration will end the war in Ukraine very swiftly, but what is your perspective on the instruments and measures that could be taken? So would you like to talk about it? Can you talk about it a little bit? So what we could expect.
- [56:19]
Elon Musk
Well, to be clear, I mean, this is up to President Trump. You know, he is the commander in chief, and so it's really, you know, up to him. So I don't want to speak for him. So. But I, you know, I just, I do think that there is a path here to a resolution and. But it does require strong leadership in the United States in order to get this done.
- [56:53]
Alice Beadle
Yeah.
- [56:54]
Elon Musk
So, yeah, but I'm confident that it can be done. Okay. And I do think it's possible to have peace in the Middle east as well. These are possible. So. And I think that would be a great future for the world. So.
- [57:12]
Alice Beadle
Yeah, yeah, no, great. So it's Absolutely fair. So, so very, very fine with me. Yes.
- [57:27]
Elon Musk
Well, let's see. Are there any other topics we should discuss or if you have any questions for me or anything you think.
- [57:34]
Alice Beadle
Yes, people might want to know?
- [57:35]
Elon Musk
Absolutely, sure.
- [57:36]
Alice Beadle
Because, because, because I want to ask and many people are interested in that. So why do you believe that flying to Mars and populate Mars is your top priority topic? The SpaceX? And when do you think, when will you be ready to have a human expedition to, to Mars? If you, if you allow, if I may ask this question because everyone is interested. So these are great projects, right?
- [58:16]
Elon Musk
Yeah, well, I mean, I think at a very high level, I think sort of like what, what set of actions are going to lead to the long term prosperity of civilization? You know, the sort of a growth in the scale and scope of consciousness. You know, the, to the best of our knowledge there are, we are the only place with life or certainly the only place with life that is intelligent in some form. A lot of people think, oh, there must be aliens, but I've not seen any evidence of aliens. And if the archaeological records are correct, Earth is one half billion years old. But civilization as measured from the first writing is only about 5,000 years old, which is about one millionth of Earth's existence. So all of human civilization is a tiny flash in the pan so far. And so we have to say, well, what steps can we take to ensure the long term survival of life as we know it, of consciousness? And if we are a multi planet species, the probable lifespan of consciousness is dramatically greater than if we are a single planet species. This is not to say that I think that there's, that Earth is about to die or anything like that, but there is some risk, you know, if there is, if there is a global thermonuclear war or some extreme natural event like a giant, you know, meteor that hits the Earth that causes a mass extinction event? I mean if we look at the fossil record, there are at least five extreme mass extinction events that would have just basically extinction events that would have destroyed all of humanity completely. There's five of them at least. And so I think if we, we should take this opportunity today because for the first time in the four and a half billion year history of Earth it is possible to extend life and to extend consciousness beyond Earth. And, and that window of opportunity may be open for a short time, or it may be open for a long time, but just, just in case it is, it is open for a short time, we must take advantage of this window.
- [60:39]
Alice Beadle
What is your Time frame for a, for an expedition like for the first, first human expedition?
- [60:51]
Elon Musk
Well, yeah, so to be, to be clear that what matters is not so much the sort of flags and footprints, but the establishment of a self sustaining city on Mars where the critical threshold is where the city can grow independent of Earth. Meaning if the resupply shifts from Earth stop coming for any reason that the Mars colony does not die out. If we are able to reach that point, then we have passed one of the very important and fundamental Fermi great filters. There's this idea of why don't we see evidence of intelligence, life. There's this idea that there are these various great filters that these civilizations never pass and one of those great filters is never going beyond your home planet. So if we can pass the Fermi great filter of being a single planet species, and to be clear, if we are a single planet species, it is just a matter of time before we are annihilated. One can argue about how long it will take, but eventually there will be something that happens that annihilates civilization. It might be very far in the future, but we simply know from, from the fossil record as I mentioned, that there have been at least five mass natural extinction events. And I think there's added risk for humans that we could destroy ourselves because the dinosaurs did not have thermonuclear weapons. So they also didn't have spaceships. So we've got the risk of thermonuclear war that could destroy everyone. But we also have spaceships that can make life multi planetary. And so the, to answer your question more directly, I think we can send uncrewed starships to Mars in approximately two years. So Earth and Mars are, are to be. Earth and Mars align for, for planetary transfer roughly every, every two years. Every 26 months.
- [63:05]
Alice Beadle
Two years.
- [63:06]
Elon Musk
Ah, two years, yes. So the Earth obviously takes a year to go around the sun. Mars takes approximately two years. And obviously one cannot go to Mars when it is on the other side of the sun from Earth. So we have to wait for when Mars is in roughly the same quadrant of the solar system as Earth, and that occurs for about six months every two years. And the optimal transfer window is typically just a few months. So for a few months every two years or every 26 months, you can transfer to Mars. So there's currently a Mars transfer window, which means that the next one is in two years from now, and then there'll be another one two years after that. So for the one in two years, I think we can send uncrewed starships to land on Mars, to, you know, to test that we, the landing systems are working properly. We want to make sure that we don't, you know, add, add more craters to Mars.
- [64:15]
Alice Beadle
Yeah.
- [64:19]
Elon Musk
Yeah. The crater count increment must be zero. And so we, once we prove that it is safe to land, then if like, if all the ships we send in about two years land safely and we think we understand the issues, then in principle that in about four years you could send the first people and then the number of ships can expand exponentially from that point. I mean, as a rough order of magnitude, my guess is that we need to transport about a million tons of cargo to Mars to make it self sustaining. You know, when things are very uncertain. I think if you can even guess to within one order of magnitude, you're doing quite well. So I suspect probably 100,000 tons is maybe not enough. And hopefully we don't need 10 million tons. So therefore my guess is hopefully a million tons is enough to make a million people or more. So that's really what matters. The critical threshold from the standpoint of a fundamental branching of the future of civilization is that point of reaching on Mars where Mars can grow by itself. Even if resupply ships from Earth stop coming at that point, the future of civilization branches and to a good branch and the probable lifespan of civilization is dramatically greater. And my guess is that there will be cases where the future Martians actually come and help and rescue Earth when there is an emergency. Just as America has helped to rescue the rest of the world in World War I and 2 and the Cold War. And where would the world be if not for America helping out in those three circumstances? So I think that there's a good chance Mars helps save Earth at some point in the future, maybe many times. And then once we have a civilization on Mars, we can expand to the rest of the solar system, to the larger asteroids like Ceres, maybe to the moons of Jupiter and Saturn and beyond, at least through the rest of the solar system. And then, you know, and then we go from being hopefully a multi planet civilization to at some point a multi stellar civilization and we're out there among the stars and, and then we can try to find out what is the nature of the universe. You know, perhaps, perhaps when we go to and visit these faraway star systems, we will discover the remains of long dead alien civilizations. I think that would be incredibly interesting. But for sure it will greatly improve our understanding of the nature of the universe. Dramatically.
- [67:16]
Alice Beadle
Absolutely, yes.
- [67:18]
Elon Musk
So, and things that the time scales are just remarkable to think about. Physics suggests that the Universe is about 13.8 billion years old. And I mean even the elements in our body that aren't hydrogen, any heavier elements had to be formed in the center of a star. And so a large part of our body was actually formed in the center of a star and that star exploded and then the elements recondensed ultimately billions of years later to form Earth and humans. So but, so when you think about these timescales, they were really remarkable to think about. And, but a civilization that lasted a million years. So our civilization, you know, like, so I think a good metric for saying what when does a civilization start? I think is maybe writing. You know, that's if you're going to pick anything, I'd pick that that's only 5,000 years ago. So, so for civilizations like let's say last an incremental million years, that, that's an enormous amount of time for as compared to the length of human civilization. But it's very small compared to the age of the universe. You'd have to go three digits past the decimal point of 13.8 million years just to increment 1 million years. So, so I think we, we may find when we go out there and explore these star systems that, that there were alien civilizations, maybe they lasted for millions of years, much longer than we've lasted. And I think any civilization that can last a million years is going to be in the hall of fame. This is an incredibly long time. So anyway, and I think as you know, for humanity, we don't want to be one of those lame one planet civilizations. Like you know, any self respecting civilization should have at least two planets. So that's, that's what we should aim for.
- [69:22]
Alice Beadle
Wow. If you. So, so you just said that the, the human body comprises of elements of an exploded and then re reordered elements. Right. So do you, do you think that this coincidentally happened or do you believe in God? I'm just curious because, because, because many people say okay, this cannot have been a coincidence. That cannot write. So. So it just could have been God. So do you believe in God?
- [70:05]
Elon Musk
Well, I'm open to believing in things proportionate to the information that I receive. So, so I mean I, I guess I have sort of a physics view of reality which is, you know, you know, I guess I'm trying to, I try, I'm trying to understand the universe as much as possible to understand what's going on. I'm certainly open to the idea of God. And if you say like, well where did the universe come from? How is it created? What. I suppose there would be some entity that you could call God. I don't know, but that's a separate question from, say, is there some entity that is observing our daily actions and rendering a moral verdict on what we do from day to day? That doesn't appear to be the case because at least there's some very evil things that happen in the world. And if, if, if there's someone observing us on a moral basis continually, then it, it does seem odd that some very evil things are allowed to occur. But, but maybe that is the case. I, I don't know. I, I just, I try to form my opinions based on what I learn and as I learn more, I aspire to change my views to.
- [71:30]
Alice Beadle
Yeah, same here. To be honest, I'm still on a search. I don't know what to believe. So it's called maybe a Agnostic. And Yeah, but it's very interesting to see how the world and also the universe evolved. And yeah, it was, it was incredibly interesting to listen to your visions and. Yeah, it's, it's quite a vision for, for, for every one of us.
- [72:07]
Elon Musk
Yeah. I would say that what I have is a philosophy of curiosity. So I'm, I'm curious about the nature of the universe and I, I would say I subscribe to the Douglas Adams school of philosophy that was described in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. You know, and in that book, the Earth was sort of a giant computer that was trying to answer the question, what is the meaning of life? And then it comes back with 40, 42, and they're like, what does 42 mean? And it's. Well, it's actually the, the answer is the easy part and the question is the hard part. So, you know, that was actually quite an illuminating thing for me because I had sort of an existential crisis when I was, I don't know, 12 or 13 about the meaning of life. And, you know, I read, I read many the religious texts and the books on philosophy. You know, I was like reading shop in our initiation and whatnot, which is a bit depressing if you're to read as a child. But, you know, why? Well, they're a bit negative at times. You know, it's actually, it makes more sense reading it as an adult. But then I read the Hitchhike's Guide to the Galaxy, which is really a book in philosophy in the form of humor. And I think it kind of really, that I thought was very insightful that we should basically try to understand the nature of the universe and, in fact, understand even what questions to ask about the answer that is the universe. And so that led me to conclude that we should aspire to expand the scope and scale of consciousness so that we're better able to know what questions to ask about the nature, about the answer that is the universe. So we should just seem to take the set of actions that lead to a greater understanding of the universe.
- [74:13]
Alice Beadle
Wonderful. Actually, these are. These are perfect last words, to be honest, for a conversation. Because. Because. Because I don't know right now, like, what to. What to continue. Because. No, really, because these words are so beautiful. So I would just, like, screw it up. And it was wonderful. It was very. It was wonderful talking to you and. And listening to your views of mankind and also to. To. To have an idea of your vision. It's very visionary and. Yeah. Well, thank you so much.
- [74:54]
Elon Musk
Well, it's been a pleasure speaking, and I hope people listen to this conversation and find it helpful. All right, thanks, everyone.
- [75:05]
Alice Beadle
Thank you. Thank you, Elon. Bye.
- [75:12]
Elon Musk
Thanks.