One question they discussed at dinner was what would be safer: a small number of AI systems that were controlled by big corporations or a large number of independent systems? They concluded that a large number of competing systems, providing checks and balances on each other, was better.

While other entrepreneurs struggled to develop a worldview, he developed a cosmic view.

At almost every encounter, he maniacally hammered home the message: “A fully reusable rocket is the difference between being a single-planet civilization and being a multiplanet one.”

“That’s just the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard,” he said at a couple of meetings. That was a line that Steve Jobs used often. So did Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos. Their brutal honesty could be unnerving, even offensive. It could constrict rather than encourage honest dialogue. But it was also effective, at times, in creating what Jobs called a team

He found it surprising—and frightening—that technological progress was not inevitable. It could stop. It could even backslide.

Musk flipped from being an apostle of automation to a new mission he pursued with similar zeal: find any part of the line where there was a holdup and see if de-automation would make it go faster.

“Elon understands personalities very well, but as a study, not as an emotion.”

“To have a base on Mars would be incredibly difficult, and people will probably die along the way, just as happened in the settling of the United States. But it will be incredibly inspiring, and we must have inspiring things in the world.” Life cannot be merely about solving problems, he felt. It also had to be about pursuing great dreams. “That’s

“He’s willing to just throw his entire being at his mission, and that’s what he expects in return,” he says.