Subjects / Religion & Philosophy
29 answers
“First of all spending actually spending meaningful time at the company makes a big deal makes a big difference.”
— Elon Musk, 20 October 2026 · Watch: Elon Musk: "Humans Won't Be in Control" When AI Becomes Smarter Than Us · 10:37 ↗ · In the archive
“Looks like we will probably catch the ship with the tower in a few months. If there had been a tower out to sea where we practiced landing the ship, it would have been caught. First reflight of the ship will be either end of this year or early next. That will be a fork in the road of history for consciousness reaching the stars.”
— Elon Musk, 20 August 2026 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“I mean, I do struggle with this question. I think people will, will find ways to be happy in the, in the same way that say people who retire seem to be relatively, you know, fairly happy even though they’re not working. But I think the reality is that you, humans will not, there won’t be anything that humans can do that, that the AI and the robots can’t do better. One analogy might be gardening, you know, where you don’t have to grow your own fruits and vegetables. You can just go buy them from the store. But sometimes people like to grow their own fruits and vegetables and make dinner for friends, and it’s kind of a nice touch.”
— Elon Musk, 6 August 2026 · Watch: YouTube (18:57) ↗ · In the archive
“Asimov’s Foundation series was a major influence on me. That and the fall of Rome, from which Foundation takes inspiration, is what convinced me that we need to extend consciousness beyond Earth to avoid a potentially infinite dark age.”
— Elon Musk, 25 July 2026 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“We cannot understand the true nature of the Universe, unless we question deeply. I want to know what is real, even if the answer is total obliteration of my consciousness.”
— Elon Musk, 8 September 2025 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“Not an exit plan. Multiplanetary means life/consciousness on many planets, not just moving from one single planet to another single planet.”
— Elon Musk, 25 May 2025 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“People should study engineering. That is the closest thing to magic that exists in the real world. I studied physics out of curiosity about the nature of the universe, but with many engineering classes mixed in.”
— Elon Musk, 28 December 2024 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“Exploring is a relatively minor factor, compared to making consciousness multiplanetary, as the latter greatly extends the probable lifespan of civilization”
— Elon Musk, 30 November 2024 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“We should expand the scope and scale of consciousness, whether silicon or carbon, to understand the universe…”
— Elon Musk, 17 September 2024 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“For me, it’s like, what’s the meaning of life, or understanding the nature of the universe, is of great interest to me, and hopefully to the AI.”
— Elon Musk, 3 August 2024 · Watch: Elon Musk: Neuralink and the Future of Humanity | Lex Fridman Podcast #438 · 14:50 ↗ · In the archive
“Good question. I think civilization in general should seek to increase consciousness and explore the stars, in order to understand the Universe.”
— Elon Musk, 27 July 2024 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“…you can think of the X platform or social media in general as kind of a collective Consciousness or group mind and you want to have as much signal and as little noise as possible.”
— Elon Musk, 21 December 2023 · Watch: X Spaces with Cathie Wood (ARK Invest) (2023) · 9:19 ↗ · In the archive
“Extend consciousness to the stars”
— Elon Musk, 3 May 2023 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“There will always be sadness. What matters – I think – is maximizing cumulative civilizational net happiness over time.”
— Elon Musk, 2 May 2023 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“Old joke about agnostic technologists building artificial super intelligence to find out if there’s a God. They finally finish & ask the question. AI replies: “There is now, mfs!!””
— Elon Musk, 30 March 2023 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“That we extend consciousness to the stars and understand the Universe”
— Elon Musk, 27 March 2023 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“I thought Twitter would perhaps accelerate progress versus creating something from scratch by three to five years…”
— Elon Musk, 15 February 2023 · Watch: World Government Summit · 1:29 ↗ · In the archive
“…if somebody's got to pay the servers, okay, so the speech has got to cost at least $8 because otherwise how do we pay the friggin server bill?”
— Elon Musk, 21 December 2022 · Watch: X Spaces with George Hotz (2022) · 41:16 ↗ · In the archive
“Social media in general, especially Twitter, were eroding civilization. If civilization collapses before Mars becomes self-sustaining, then nothing else matters. Human consciousness is gone.”
— Elon Musk, 13 December 2022 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“I would say I generally agree with the teaching of Christianity, but I’m not religious… I’ve never been particularly religious. Something created the universe, or the universe is here.”
— Elon Musk, August 2022 · Watch: Full Send Podcast video (2:26:34) ↗ · In the archive
“Consciousness can understand the nature of the Universe. Clams, not so much.”
— Elon Musk, 8 July 2022 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“Originally I had an existential crisis when I was a kid trying to figure out what's the meaning of life, why are we here? What's the point of it all?”
— Elon Musk, 31 January 2021 · Watch: Clubhouse conversation (The Good Time Show) (2021) · 5:53 ↗ · In the archive
“I am primarily trying to advance two causes: sustainable energy & extending life/consciousness beyond Earth. There is also the existential threat of AI, which we should aspire to mitigate. This doesn’t leave time to write books.”
— Elon Musk, 10 January 2021 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“Oh my f---ing god. Eh, not bad. Room for improvement. We threw wrenches, we threw everything even literally the kitchen sink at the glass and it didn’t break. For some weird reason, it broke now. I don’t know why. We will fix it in post. Yup. Sledgehammer impact on door cracked base of glass, which is why steel ball didn’t bounce off. Should have done steel ball on window, *then* sledgehammer the door. Next time …”
— Elon Musk, 21 November 2019 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“To understand the nature of consciousness”
— Elon Musk, 5 October 2019 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“…the purpose of neuralink is to create a high bandwidth interface to the brain such that we can be symbiotic with AI…”
— Elon Musk, 7 September 2018 · Watch: Joe Rogan Experience #1169 - Elon Musk · 24:46 ↗ · In the archive
“Should prob articulate philosophy underlying my actions. It’s pretty simple & mostly influenced by Douglas Adams & Isaac Asimov. Foundation Series & Zeroth Law are fundamental to creation of SpaceX I love Banks. Best books in recent years imo are Iain Banks & George Martin. The future is a set of branching probability streams. Some actions by humanity have an extremely leveraged effect on shape & size of those streams.”
— Elon Musk, 15 June 2018 · Post on X ↗ · In the archive
“It’s the first time in four and a half billion years that we are at a level of technology where we have the ability to reach Mars. The sun is gradually expanding… the oceans will boil and there will be no meaningful life on Earth. …space travel is the best thing we can do to extend the life of humanity. I’d like to die on Mars, just not on impact.”
— Elon Musk, 9 March 2013 · Watch: SXSW video (42:36) ↗ · In the archive
“…if we can do things that expand the scope and scale of consciousness, then we're better able to ask the right questions and become more enlightened…”
— Elon Musk, 15 June 2012 · Watch: Caltech Commencement Address (2012) · 2:26 ↗ · In the archive