Elon Musk’s name almost all the time comes up whenever we talk about anything related to Artificial intelligence. His brainchild, xAI, is changing the chatbot game by competing with already famous ChatGPT and Bard.
We have to talk about how much he is connected with this new technology and how it will change his and our lives forever. Even Musk is worried about the threats that AI poses to humanity. We will talk about these topics and more. So buckle up. Let’s start from the very beginning.
I operate on the physics approach to analysis. You boil things down to the first principles or fundamental truths in a particular area, and then you reason up from there.
Who is Elon Reeve Musk?
Elon Musk, the 52-year-old entrepreneur, has secured the top spot on various Forbes lists, including being the wealthiest person according to the Forbes 400 (2023) and The Richest Person In Every State (2023) rankings. Additionally, he holds the second position on the Billionaires (2023) list. Musk is no stranger to success, having co-founded six influential companies.
Notably, he’s the driving force behind Tesla, where he maintains ownership of about 21% of the company. Interestingly, Musk’s SpaceX, founded in 2002, has seen a meteoric rise, reaching a staggering worth of nearly $150 billion after a substantial $750 million tender offer in June 2023.
Chanuka Nadun Perera
His tunneling startup, the Boring Company, also made headlines by raising $675 million in April 2022 at a valuation of $5.7 billion. Musk’s diverse ventures also extend to social media, as he successfully acquired Twitter for $44 billion in April 2022. Despite some legal hurdles, the deal concluded in October 2022, with Musk now owning an estimated 74% of the company, which is rebranded as X.
Beyond business, Musk’s personal details, including his residence in Austin, Texas, and his single marital status with 11 children, add a human touch to his remarkable achievements. His educational background includes a Bachelor of Arts/Science from the University of Pennsylvania.
As the founder, chairman, CEO, and CTO of SpaceX, angel investor, CEO, product architect, and former chairman of Tesla, Inc., owner, chairman, and CTO of X Corp., founder of the Boring Company and xAI, co-founder of Neuralink and OpenAI, and president of the Musk Foundation, Elon Musk’s influence extends far and wide.
According to Forbes, as of December 2023, Musk’s net worth is estimated to be $244 billion, primarily derived from his ownership stakes in Tesla and SpaceX.
Elon Musk AI & Furure
In 2012, Elon Musk had a serious chat with DeepMind co-founder Demis Hassabis, and it wasn’t about rocket launches or electric cars but about the potential dangers of artificial intelligence (AI).
Musk, always dreaming of colonizing Mars to escape Earth’s threats, got a reality check – Hassabis was skeptical about involving AI in the plan. Interestingly, Musk didn’t just nod and move on; he invested in Hassabis’ AI venture.
Unfortunately, Google took DeepMind. Then he focused on OpenAI, but that didn’t work either. So Musk started his own AI endeavor called xAI and even his own AI chatbot called Grok.
Musk had mixed feelings, from expressing worries in a chat with a Tesla shareholder to advocating for a regulatory watchdog for AI development.
Musk, a self-proclaimed AI critic, doesn’t ever back down when he gets a chance to be critical of other peoples’ AI systems, but he is okay with his new AI projects going forward. Elon Musk even signed an open letter urging AI Labs to slow down artificial intelligence developments. After a little time, he started his own AI company.
Samuel Mangold-Lenett points this out, highlighting Musk’s double game of expressing concern while driving full speed ahead with his AI ventures.
But even experts like Christopher Alexander weigh in with this, clarifying the situation a little bit more, and the current AI generation isn’t what’s keeping Musk up at night, the next-gen AI that’s inching closer to human-like intelligence.
Chanuka Nadun Perera
Even with all of these issues back and forth, others see AI as Mars’ ticket to success. Remember we talked about AI-powered robot chemists who can generate oxygen supplies faster than human chemists could? Yeah, that is one of the reasons people now believe in the Mars mission.
Elon Musk’s AI Ventures – Meet Grok xAI’s New Chatbot
Elon Musk initiated an AI Startup called xAI. Musk is strategically planning to intertwine xAI with the X(previously known as Twitter). Recently, this AI startup announced a chatbot named Grok. This chatbot is currently undergoing tests with a select group of users in the United States, utilizing data from Musk’s social platform X.
Grok programmed to respond with a touch of humor and rebellion as mentioned in the announcement. It’s not all going according to Musk’s plans. Even X had to change their privacy policy for Artificial Intelligence taking user data for training.
Personally, the most impressive part to me was Grok has outperformed ChatGPT 3.5 in different academic benchmarks and has its sights set on challenging advanced AI models like GPT-4.
Notably, Grok-1, the Language Model (LLM) fueling this chatbot, has showcased superior performance in benchmarks, including a real-life scenario where it aced the 2023 Hungarian national high school finals in mathematics. If you read the ‘Artificial Intelligence (AI) Singularity‘ article, you know why this is so important.
Access to the Grok AI assistant comes at a cost, as it’s incorporated into X Premium+ subscriptions at a monthly fee of $16. However, at the moment, this is limited to a select user base in the United States, and access is granted to verified X users in the region.
If you want, you can join the waitlist. xAI’s Grok is set to be available as a standalone app as well. At the same time, he will enhance the X platform with Artificial intelligence as well. But did you know there is a huge possibility it could go bankrupt as well?
Is X at risk of facing bankruptcy with Elon Musk at the helm?
In April, during an interview about his acquisition of X, Elon Musk dropped some hints that now, in hindsight, seem rather telling. He spoke about advertising, referencing Disney and Apple advertising on Twitter as indicators of its effectiveness.
Fast forward seven months and the scenario has dramatically changed. Both Disney and Apple have ceased advertising on X due to a controversy flagged by Media Matters for America involving ads next to pro-Nazi posts.
Musk’s response has been fiery; he told departing advertisers to “Go [expletive] yourself” and even named Disney’s CEO, Bob Iger, in an interview.
The possibility of bankruptcy threatens large for X, with Musk acknowledging that a prolonged advertiser boycott could be the breaking point for the company, which relies heavily on advertising revenue, constituting around 90% of its income.
Musk faces financial challenges, including substantial loan payments of about $13 billion and the potential need to inject more of his own money or renegotiate with banks.
So things are not looking good at X. To be honest, I don’t think they will go bankrupt, but they will definitely face some monetary challenges. We will see how Musk gonna face this issue.
Elon Musk: AI’s Future – No Jobs Needed, Everything Handled by AI
Elon Musk recently shared his understanding of the future of AI. It’s not what you think. According to him, AI could remove the needing to do jobs. Musk actively participated in an AI Safety Summit in Britain, engaging with industry leaders and joining discussions with U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.
Musk said body AI is “the most disruptive force in history” and predicted its exponential growth, surpassing human intelligence.
Musk anticipates a future where jobs become unnecessary, with AI handling everything—an idea echoed by figures like Jamie Dimon and Ray Dalio. Addressing the challenges of AI-driven job displacement, Musk proposed an intriguing solution: a “universal high income” facilitated by AI.
He envisions this concept as an equalizer, rejecting the notion of universal basic income and highlighting increased income levels accessible to all through AI technology.
Despite acknowledging AI’s positive potential, Musk offers cautionary notes, expressing concerns about individuals finding meaning without traditional careers and emphasizing the need to be wary of the “magic genie problem.”
The recent agreement between 28 countries and the EU recognizing the necessity for international cooperation in AI safety aligns with Musk’s acknowledgment.
We recently talked about this issue a little bit more. Especially with the ongoing writers’ protest, there are already afraid people who are about to lose their jobs to AI.
Chanuka Nadun Perera
My personal opinion would be you don’t have to worry about that much if you could enhance your work and adapt AI tech to your work. There is nothing to be worried about. You certainly don’t have to be a Luddite to go all against AI tech. It’s here to stay whether we like it or not. What do you think about this matter?