The Exchanges

Q can today. And it doesn't sleep. So I guess I'm trying to think why, why, how do you end up getting from a point where a company is trying to get an ROI and all of its investments in this area and reaping those economic gains to a point where there is this, um, AI for all and decentralized version of the technology. Is it just that everybody catches up?

A Alex, there's good news here, um, in that we have seen not a single company, but we've seen five, six, seven, eight companies all in parallel delivering similar generative AI capabilities, and they're all priced either free or like 20 bucks a month, right? No one was so far ahead that it's like, this is a million bucks if you get a chance to use it, right? So the fact that there are multiple players Um, and they're all starting at or near zero is a super positive indication of the future. I don't think you're going to have, uh, people all of a sudden, you know, all eight of them getting into a cabal and saying, okay, let's all charge a thousand bucks a month because we can. Uh, you also have great business models like Google that is, and Baidu, which has, you know, been Available for free around the world. Uh, and there, these companies are making money on secondary and tertiary implications of that free business model. And I think you're going to see that here with AI as well. I think AI will become ultimately the best educator on the planet and the best diagnostician on the planet available on your mobile phone. And I think that educator Again, the best on the planet will be available for free to the poorest child and the wealthiest child. And it won't be like, it's a little bit better for the person who's wealthy. Just like Google for Larry Page's kids is not different than …

AI assessment note: “these companies are making money on secondary and tertiary implications of that free business model”

Q Okay. We've talked so much. We've used the word abundance so much today, and you have this abundance summit. You've talked about getting to abundance. It's one of the things you talk about a lot, but I, for those who haven't heard about it before, what, what do you, what is abundance? Like, what is your definition of it? Do we have it?

A We have it to an extraordinary amount compared to humanity. 50 years ago, a hundred years ago, a thousand years ago. Abundance is access to the fundamentals of life. It's not about a world of luxury. It's about a world of opportunity. I define technology as a force that takes whatever is scarce and makes it abundant. Let me give you some examples. So we used to kill whales to get whale oil to light our nights. That's how we got energy, right? Then technology allowed us to, uh, ravage mountainsides and get coal. Then we drilled kilometers under the ground for oil and natural gas. Now we can use photovoltaics and soon perovskite to convert sunlight into electricity. And there's 8000 times more energy that hits the surface of the earth than we consume as a species in a year. So this energy is there. It's just not in a usable form yet. And so technology takes what's there and not usable and makes it usable. Another example is water, right? We talk about water wars or water scarcity, but we live on a, on a water planet. Right. We have two thirds of our planets covered by water. We've, but unfortunately it's 97.5% salt, you know, two percent is ice and we fight over half a percent. We just launched an XPRIZE. I'm very proud to be chairman of the XPRIZE. We have launched 30 XPRIZE in 30 years, about six hundred million dollars in competitions. And we just launched one hundred and twen…

AI assessment note: “Abundance is access to the fundamentals of life. It's not about a world of luxury.”

Q you have the older, older people, um, who are gonna need, need to be cared for. And, um, it just seems like we're gonna deplete the planet, but you also care about the planet. Obviously you've done this carbon challenge. So how do we, how do we deal with the fact that we could have overpopulation, but also a sustainable, right? Yeah. Massive increases in population, but also sustainable planet.

A So the first thing is to look at the data. And the data shows us that we are about to have not an overpopulation, but a massive underpopulation of planet earth. So if you look at the growth curves, um, 50 years ago, I'll call it the 19 fifties. Uh, it was about an average of 5.7 children per family around the world. And we were in massive growth and books like the population bomb were written and so forth. But the reality is, We are now, we've dropped from 5.7 children per family down to below 2.4 globally in the U S we're below the replenishment level, which is 2.1. And China's way below Japan's way below most of Asia, most of Europe, Italy is dissipating going away. And it likes like .7. Um, the only, Only region in growth is Africa. And as Africa becomes more affluent, as better comms and AI and technology comes there, we'll expect to see that growth level drop as well. And if you've got a massive underpopulation, right, we peak at nine, nine and a half billion and have a very rapid drop off. Um, our population is tied directly to, to GDP towards the ability to maintain our, our world. I think the only countervailing force there is going to be humanoid robotics and AI that's going to allow us to support that aging population. Uh, so I think, you know, Elon goes on and says, listen, have more kids. He's got 10 or 11. I forget how many exactly.

AI assessment note: “we are about to have not an overpopulation, but a massive underpopulation of planet earth.”

Q that and plenty more when we come back from the break. So let's do that right after this. And we're back here on Big Technology Podcast with Peter Diamandis. He is the founder and CEO of the XPRIZE Foundation. He is multiple times bestselling author. We've talked about some of the books already, and also the host of the Moonshot Podcast. Peter, how many years do you want to live?

A You know, that's a great question. I used to have a canned answer. It was more of a joke and I'll, I'll tell you that and then answer it. Um, when I was in medical school, I was in a joint MIT Harvard MD PhD program. I never finished the PhD, but I just barely finished my medical degree. I watched a television show one day on long lived sea life and learned that bowhead whales could live 200 years and Greenland sharks could live four or 500 years. And I remember saying if they can live that long, why, you know, why can't I? And so I set this multi hundred year lifespan objective. Um, but really my objective is to live long enough to intercept what's called longevity escape velocity, which I think is a term I'd love everybody to hear about. So today for every year that you're live, science is extending your life for about a third of a year. These breakthroughs are helping add Uh, additional vibrancy and, and length to your health span, not necessarily lifespan health span as well. There's going to be a point at which for every year that you're alive, science extends your life for more than a year. And that's called longevity escape velocity. Um, I heard that first from Ray Kurzweil and Aubrey de Grey, and I, I speak to a lot of the top longevity researchers and ask their opinion. When do you think we're going to hit this longevity escape velocity? Ray Kurzweil's prediction is 20…

AI assessment note: “my objective is to live long enough to intercept what's called longevity escape velocity”

Q Right. And so what are you leaning towards right now?

A I'm, I'm, you know, I'm not only the optimist. I'm the guy who says the glass isn't half full. The glass is overflowing. I've, Truly believe that as systems become more and more intelligent, they get more abundant minded, more loving of life, um, more supportive. You know, a, if you look, there was a study done by a friend of mine, Alvin Graylin, in his latest, latest book, the new reality. And he looked at leaders around the world who were sort of the despots and the greatest leaders. And there was a direct correlation with the amount of school they had, how much Learning they had, how open-minded they are, because if you've got, ah, a digital super intelligence who you tell go and destroy these people, I mean, honestly, there are ways to get your solution without killing. And I think we're going to see digital super intelligence potentially helps a society really, uh, survive over the decades ahead.

AI assessment note: “I'm not only the optimist. I'm the guy who says the glass isn't half full.”

Q a good chunk of the, or I think the entire supercharger team. Uh, now he's trying to hire some of them back. And, uh, people were like, okay, is this the end of superchargers? But maybe he just needed, it seems like he, when he wants to just redo something, he just kind of clears the deck and tries to start over. Uh, is he a little bit too impulsive?

A He's very impulsive, but there's always a fundamental underneath that. I mean, the Twitter purchase, while it was an impulse, I think he, he was, he had a clear vision of what Twitter could be. Right. And he had a clear vision of X when he had built PayPal. He wanted the ultimate, uh, banking institution. And, and X now, X.com will become not only a platform for communications and for conversations like this. It'll become a bank. It'll become, you know, wallets. It'll become crypto. It'll become all of those things. Um, One layer at a time, and he'll turn it, you know, Elon will be the first trillionaire out there. He'll turn, uh, X into an extraordinary platform, uh, SpaceX and, you know, and Starlink, uh, which I gotta admit, Starlink is brilliant, right? It's been tried so many times before with Globalstar and Iridium and Teledesic and they all failed.

AI assessment note: “He's very impulsive, but there's always a fundamental underneath that.”