What Billionaire Tech CEOs Get Wrong About The Future, with Adam Becker

[StraumliBlight]

He did pivot to things like tunneling, and he still has some weirdo transportation related ideas like a tunnel under Las Vegas that Teslas can drive through--except that they have to have drivers, and they don't move many passengers.

The Vegas Loop is going autonomous next year.

https://twitter.com/boringcompany/status/1989812392004653457

https://twitter.com/boringcompany/status/1979313990603047137

[Blackstar]

The Vegas Loop is going autonomous next year.

I'm sure that will fix everything.

[freddo411]

What Billionaire Tech CEOs Get Wrong About The Future, with Adam Becker

Here is a concise, evidence-based breakdown of notable **logical fallacies**, **implicit assumptions**, and **factual inaccuracies or significant exaggerations** present in the StarTalk episode description (and likely reflected in the episode itself):

### Logical Fallacies & Rhetorical Weaknesses
1. **Straw-man fallacy** 
   Portrays “tech bro” predictions as uniformly believing in effortless space empires, literal immortality by 2030, and magical AGI that ignores physics. Very few serious figures (even Musk, Thiel, Altman, Kurzweil) make claims that cartoonish.

2. **Guilt by association / poisoning the well** 
   All billionaire-backed futurism is lumped together and dismissed as “tech-bro promises,” implying it’s all equally delusional or dangerous simply because some promoters are wealthy or overconfident.

3. **Appeal to authority while dismissing opposing authorities** 
   The guest “cross-checked with experts” (presumably only skeptical ones) and highlights being “stonewalled by CEOs” as if refusal to be interviewed proves the CEOs are hiding falsehoods.

4. **False dichotomy** 
   Presents only two options: either you accept the most extreme transhumanist timelines or you agree that physics makes everything impossible. Ignores the broad middle ground of gradual but transformative progress.

### Implicit Assumptions (Often Unstated or Underexamined)
1. Science-fiction authors primarily intend their works as warnings rather than inspirations or thought experiments (e.g., Star Trek as cautionary tale rather than aspirational).
2. Any optimism about radical life extension or AGI must be rooted in ignorance of basic physics.
3. Concentration of wealth and power in tech is uniquely dangerous compared to historical concentrations in governments, militaries, or older industries.
4. Scientific experts are largely unified against ambitious timelines for Mars settlement, AGI, longevity escape velocity, etc. (In reality, expert opinion is highly divided.)

### Factual Errors or Major Exaggerations in the Description
1. “Moore’s Law has already hit physical and economic limits” 
   Moore’s Law (transistor density ~doubling every ~2 years) has dramatically slowed, but integrated circuit performance and cost-per-transistor are still improving (2025: 2 nm nodes shipping, 1.4 nm and sub-1 nm on roadmaps). The trend continues, just at a slower pace and with new architectures (Chiplets, 3D stacking, new materials).

2. “Elon Musk’s dream of a million-person colony by 2050” 
   Musk has said “a self-sustaining city of 1 million people by 2050 is possible” in optimistic interviews, but SpaceX’s public planning documents and Starship manifests aim for ~1 million tons to Mars by 2050, which could theoretically support hundreds of thousands, not necessarily a million residents that soon. The description presents the most aggressive possible interpretation as settled fact.

3. “AGI won’t magically fix global warming” 
   True, but framed as if leading AGI researchers claim it will “magically” solve climate change overnight. Most serious voices (OpenAI, DeepMind, Anthropic) say AGI could accelerate solutions (materials science, fusion, carbon capture), not that it’s an instant magic wand.

4. “The Martian got key dangers wrong” 
   The novel/film explicitly acknowledges radiation and perchlorates but deliberately downplays them for storytelling reasons (Weir has said this openly). Claiming the book “got it wrong” ignores that it’s fiction making deliberate trade-offs, not a NASA white paper.

5. Intelligence as “a single number fated to grow exponentially” 
   Oversimplifies the singularity debate. Almost no serious researcher claims intelligence is a single scalar; the caricature is aimed at 1990s–2000s Kurzweil, not current thinking.

### Summary
The episode description (and presumably the discussion) is heavily weighted toward skepticism and contains several straw-man portrayals, outdated or selectively presented technical claims, and a framing that treats the most extreme fringe of transhumanist optimism as representative of the entire field. While legitimate critiques of over-optimism exist, the summary repeatedly exaggerates or misstates the actual positions and technical trends it criticizes.

[freddo411]

Years ago, when Musk was talking about boring a tunnel through some part of Los Angeles, I was working with a guy who was a transportation expert. He studied how to move people and freight from one place to the other. He just rolled his eyes at the news and said that Musk didn't understand even the most basics about underground transportation. You're limited by the access and egress points, and you cannot increase the throughput because of them.

Wut?

Limited access and egress ... you mean like a freeway, which provides high speed transportation?   Or like a train that  some people gush over so much?

That argument seems ridiculous on its face.   Are we supposed to nod our heads at such nonsense because of some "transportation expert"?
   

[Blackstar]

Limited access and egress ... you mean like a freeway, which provides high speed transportation?
   

Freeways have multiple on and off-ramps. Tunnels do not.

[HVM]

Limited access and egress ... you mean like a freeway, which provides high speed transportation?
   

Freeways have multiple on and off-ramps. Tunnels do not.

Yes, as can see here only straight tube, and only open in the ends.

[RobW]

Freeways have multiple on and off-ramps. Tunnels do not.

I don't think single-entry, single-exit configurations are a fixed property of tunnels. Most existing tunnels are like that because they are just a short extension of a very short stretch of freeway through an inconvenient hill, or under a river. What Musk proposes with Boring Company is to move the entire freeway, multiple on and off ramps included, underground. Whether or not that is feasible comes down to how cheaply the tunnels can be dug.
 
I don't see evidence of the kind of cost breakthrough needed for Boring Company's vision to be feasible. I hope they get there, partly because it solves a problem but honestly, mostly for the 'cool factor'. But, if they solve the cost, I don't think the geometry you mention will be an inherent blocker.

[Blackstar]

Yes, as can see here only straight tube, and only open in the ends.

You're not making the point you think you are.

[Blackstar]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/podcasts/impromptu/the-scifi-writer-who-predicted-the-future/

[Toast]

I personally think IQ levels and education have gone down since the 1960's.

You can think that all you want, but it's factually incorrect. IQ scores have been measurably and consistently increasing over time.

High school drop out rates, especially in big cities are high.

Again, that might be your perception, but it's disconnected from reality. High school drop out rates are at all-time lows across all demographics.

Education system not pushing for the highest standards and grade accordingly.

I agree with you here, I have family and friends that work in education and they're all sounding alarm bells over how they effectively aren't allowed to give bad grades or fail students. But I don't see this as the fault of either the students or the teachers, it's an administrative failure driven by a series of poorly thought out bureaucratic policies.

There was a study by Pew Research I think that said poverty could easily be eliminated by not dropping out of high school, at least get a trade skill after high school, girls don't get pregnant, and don't get married and start a family until the first 3 are completed.  Money comes in from skills, family can buy a home, and proceed from there without having to get on a government dole.  Seems simple, but it takes discipline which is sorely lacking in todays world.

This is the "Success Sequence" that is often trumpeted by a certain side of the political spectrum and its pundits. The exact details change a bit from source to source (for example, most replace your "at least get a trade skill after high school" with "get a full time job after high school"), but the gist is the same. A full discussion of why it's utterly incorrect isn't appropriate for this forum (or at the very least, this part of the forum), but in brief this is mistaking correlation for causation--Turns out being born into poverty dramatically impacts high school graduation rates as well as your ability to pay for trade school or college (who could've guessed!).

Before I retired we had two construction job openings at my company.  We had 200 people put in for them.  First was a drug test.  That eliminated about half of the applicants.  Next was a credit report.  That eliminated some more.  (We didn't want creditors dunning money and having us to take it out of their checks).  Next was police record.  More eliminated.  Next was driving record, sense they would be driving company vehicles.  We ended up with 5 people out of 200 to interview.  The two we hired were college grads for construction jobs.  40 years ago, we could pick from a much larger group with only a high school degree.

I'm not surprised your candidate pool is smaller and you shouldn't have been either--40 years ago were you doing drug testing and pulling credit reports, police records, and driving records for every applicant to a construction job? I'm gonna go out on a limb and say you weren't. But hey, even if we ignore that it's not all that surprising--you're just underestimating how much of a change we've seen in educational attainment. Back in 1985, the share of the adult population with a high school diploma or less was 64%, and the share with at least four years of college education was only 19%. Today the share with a high school diploma or less has plummeted to 36%, and they're now outnumbered by those with four or more years of college, which has more than doubled to 39%.

[Eric Hedman]

I personally think IQ levels and education have gone down since the 1960's.

You can think that all you want, but it's factually incorrect. IQ scores have been measurably and consistently increasing over time.

[/quote]
Actually there is a new study that shows IQs are on a decline.  There are several articles online about this and here is one:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeltnietzel/2023/03/23/american-iq-test-scores-show-recent-declines-according-to-new-study/
I remember reading a study a few years ago that said IQs peaked around 1990 and have been declining since.  Who knows, you can find a study showing the exact opposite to almost anything.

[thespacecow]

So for me, I don't blindly accept what any CEO says, because they have vested interests in specific outcomes, and they will use the power of their position to influence their potential customers and their competitors.

Right, and people on this show doesn't have an agenda? You do know Adam Becker wrote an anti-tech billionaire book and he's on this show to promote his book?

[thespacecow]

I finally got some time to listen to this dumpster fire, as expected it's full of non sense. Here's some examples:

9:59 The two things that primarily protect us from radiation here on Earth are the Earth's magnetic field and the thick atmosphere that Earth has. Mars doesn't have either of those things.

Wrong. Top 2 things protects us from radiation is: 1. The planet itself, blocks out half the radiation; 2. Atmosphere

Mars has 1, and a weak 2 which is less effective but the effect is not zero.

10:16 The thing that I tell people is the movie The Martian is science fiction. One of the things that's science fiction about it is, if Mark Wattney really had to do all the stuff that he did in that movie, he'd come home and he'd be dead of cancer in a couple of years because he had too much radiation exposure hanging out on Mars.

Wrong again. Mark Wattney only spent about 1.5 years on Mars, even if he has minimal radiation protection, the dose would only increase cancer risk by a few percent, likely still below NASA's career limit. And if the habitat and rover provides enough protection, the risk would be even lower, probably below US radiation worker annual limit.

10:28 What about the ISS? If Scott Kelly could stay up there for a year. One of the twins, one stayed on Earth and one. Why couldn't you just extend that for whatever time necessary to go to Mars? Even if it's not to live there, if it's just to go there and dig a hole and come back.

Right, so there's a couple of things. First of all, on the ISS, they're still in the Earth's magnetic field. They still have a bunch of the shielding.

Actually according to this NASA presentation, dose rate on ISS is similar to Mars surface:

"Mars Surface
Protection from Mars atmosphere
Protection from planetary shielding
Total Dose rate similar to ISS"

14:52 But yeah, this idea of the singularity, that we're going to get to this point where technology in general and AI in particular gets faster and faster and smarter and smarter until it gains godlike powers, it's a science fiction story.

Nope, first of all this is a poor description of technological singularity, but more importantly the idea of singularity did not come from science fiction, it came from science. It was reported that John von Neumann first came up with this idea, and later mathematician I.J. Good wrote about intelligence explosion in a peer-reviewed paper.

Ironic two supposed physicists didn't know about this.

24:13 None of the tech bros have a degree in physics the way you do.

Wrong, Elon Musk has a degree in physics from University of Pennsylvania.

24:24 I mean, they believe that AGI, I mean, Alman has said that AGI is going to solve every problem including like global warming which is crazy.

Why is it crazy?

Well because.

If it's smarter than you, and you can't solve it why is it crazy to think it could solve it?

Well, first of all, the artificial intelligence systems that they're building now are just drawing more and more and more energy. If you did build one that could solve global warming, and you turned it on and said, "How do you solve global warming?" I'm pretty sure the first thing it would do is say, "Well, you shouldn't have built me."

Yeah. You turn me off. Turn me off.

Facepalm, this is so dumb. First of all, even if you turn off the AI data centers, global warming is still going to continue since humanity has other reasons for needing energy, that's not going to be changed by turning off AI.

Secondly, humanity is using like 0.01% of the solar energy reaching Earth surface, if the AI has half a brain cell it would say let's build more clean energy sources like solar power. Why assume the only way to reduce carbon emission is to reduce energy consumption, that's degrowth mentality.

And of course there's even more solar power in space, so the next step would be expanding to space, which these guys later claim is just billionaires wanting to escape Earth, totally oblivious to the fact that expanding to space answered their question here.

28:43 Some of them I think genuinely believe it. The idea that the future has to be elsewhere, I think some of it is just from this sense that they have that things are bad here on Earth and that trying to solve problems here on Earth would be complicated and messy and difficult and that somehow going to space would give them a fresh start,

Nobody in the space community claims expanding to space is an escape, that's just a strawman.

Also ignores the fact that Elon's other company - Tesla - is literally helping Earth and reducing carbon emissions.

33:02 Is is this a misconception of the science, the misconception of science fiction?

Yeah. I mean, I think a lot of the ideas, right? And this this goes back to like why are they like trying to go somewhere else? I think they just get these ideas from science fiction and they just take it way too literally. They don't read it well, right?

Like my favorite science fiction, the science fiction I grew up with was Star Trek, right? And the thing about Star Trek is, yeah, okay, they're on the Starship Enterprise. They're out there, you know, exploring strange new worlds, new life, new civilizations, all that jazz, right?

So their example of Science Fiction is a TV show, instead of classic books like Foundation (which has a lot of influence on Elon Musk), just goes to show how shallow these guys are.

To be fair, they later mentioned cyberpunk and Ursula Le Guin, but their understanding of SF is limited to dystopian books and  SF as social allegory. That is not the whole of SF, not by any means. It completely ignores utopian SF like Culture series (also has big influence on Elon Musk), or SF asking what-if questions and projecting science/technology to the future.

BTW this is also why the Torment Nexus tweet is dumb, that's not what a lot of SF is about.

36:02 And I think that what you said is exactly right, except you also have to add in, they think that the fact that they succeeded in business which a lot of that's just luck is proof of their-

And government contracts.

Right, and government contracts, exactly.

And subsidies, yeah. For the car business as well as the the rocket business.

Wrong, SpaceX has virtual no government subsidy, they got $0 subsidy from federal government, and only ~$3M subsidy from local government.

And their government contracts are won by competition and lower cost. They saved tens of billions of dollars for taxpayers, the government contracts are a benefit to the government and taxpayers, not a handout.

38:26 Oh yeah, totally. I mean Elon Musk tweeted that science fiction shouldn't remain fiction forever. Okay, I sort of understand like what he means, but which science fiction, right? Like Bladeunner is a dystopia, right? And then he comes out and says that the the Cybert truck, that ugly piece of crap, looks like something that Bladeunner would drive, which Bladeunner is not the name of any character in Bladeunner, but we can put that aside.

First of all, in the movie "Blade Runner" is the name given to replicant hunters, so "something that Bladerunner would drive" is a totally valid sentence based on the film canon.

Secondly, here Elon Musk is simply commenting on the aesthetic of the movie, goes without saying he's not endorsing anything else in the movie. This is no different from people can admiring the engieering in Russia hardware such as RD-170 without endorsing the Soviet regime.

And when Elon Musk said "science fiction shouldn't remain fiction forever", he was replying to a tweet about Starship launching 3 times per day, it should be obvious to anyone what science fiction he wants to make real, it has nothing to do with dystopia like Bladerunner.

43:47 They want to put Dyson spheres around every single star in the observable universe and like collect all of that energy. And that's, that's not going to happen, man.

There would be a Kardashian scale five, I think, where you control all the energy output of all stars in the known universe. But doesn't the Borg have some similar energy?

Yeah, exactly.
...

Speaking as a scientist, I kind of like what science brings society. Yeah. And shouldn't that be enough? Why why does everyone go to science fiction?

Oh the irony is too much. First of all Borg has nothing to do with building Dyson spheres and collecting energy. But more importantly, both Dyson sphere and Kardashian scale come from Science, not science fiction!

Dyson sphere was conceived by physicist Freeman Dyson in his 1960 paper. Kardashian scale was introduced by Soviet astronomer Nikolai Kardashev in his 1964 paper. Both papers are peer-reviewed, in fact Dyson's paper was published in the journal Science.

And both speculated that humanity may one day build Dyson sphere and achieve Kardashian II scale in their paper.

So Mr. Tyson and Mr. Becker: instead of complaining about people don't think science enough, maybe reflect on your betrayal of our rich scientific heritage.

45:38 The problem isn't science fiction. The problem isn't science. The problem is like critical reading comprehension skills, right? Like and and money.

...

46:08 I'm just all about guard rails. And I also believe that $2 billion is all you get to have.

So economically illiterate as well, and advocating for government nationalization of every tech company.

47:33 And we found that out under FDR and back in the day where basically you got to a certain amount of money and they were like, "Yeah, we're going to take 90% of that, okay? and we're going to take it and we're going to do stuff because you wouldn't have been able to get that much money without all the things that we want to now support with the money that we helped you make.

Do what stuff? Building boondoggles like SLS?

[Lee Jay]

Secondly, humanity is using like 0.01% of the solar energy reaching Earth surface, if the AI has half a brain cell it would say let's build more clean energy sources like solar power. Why assume the only way to reduce carbon emission is to reduce energy consumption, that's degrowth mentality.

It's NOT "degrowth mentality", it's "energy efficiency mentality".  It's entirely possible to VASTLY reduce energy consumption and not stop doing things.  Most people just have no idea how staggeringly inefficient we are right now.  The worst of the worst in a single person in a conventional car (the most common situation) which has an end-to-end efficiency of under 0.5%.

[thespacecow]

TL;DR: This episode completely failed to show that tech billionaires got anything wrong about the future, what it does show is what is wrong with our science communicators:
1. Hubris: thinking just because they have a PhD, they know more than anyone else.
2. Lack of academic rigor: Doesn't do their homework, shows a remarkable lack of understanding of both science and science fiction
3. Anti-tech, degrowth, Luddite mentality
4. Instead of making science politically neutral, trying to veer into politics with no understanding of basic economics.

[thespacecow]

Secondly, humanity is using like 0.01% of the solar energy reaching Earth surface, if the AI has half a brain cell it would say let's build more clean energy sources like solar power. Why assume the only way to reduce carbon emission is to reduce energy consumption, that's degrowth mentality.

It's NOT "degrowth mentality", it's "energy efficiency mentality".  It's entirely possible to VASTLY reduce energy consumption and not stop doing things.  Most people just have no idea how staggeringly inefficient we are right now.  The worst of the worst in a single person in a conventional car (the most common situation) which has an end-to-end efficiency of under 0.5%.

It's degrowth mentality because he literally said we should turn off AI instead of making it more efficient.

Your example is also degrowth mentality, because you're trading away the freedom and convenience of a car for some energy we can easily get by building more energy infrastructure. Why should I make this trade when there're so much carbon free energy out there? And why should I make this trade when China is build energy like crazy?

This mentality not only hurt individual consumers, which cause backlash against the efforts to reduce carbon emissions; it also hurts national security. While the west is futilely trying to cut energy usage, China is building more and more energy production.

https://twitter.com/JessePeltan/status/1999965387115450849

[Lee Jay]

Secondly, humanity is using like 0.01% of the solar energy reaching Earth surface, if the AI has half a brain cell it would say let's build more clean energy sources like solar power. Why assume the only way to reduce carbon emission is to reduce energy consumption, that's degrowth mentality.

It's NOT "degrowth mentality", it's "energy efficiency mentality".  It's entirely possible to VASTLY reduce energy consumption and not stop doing things.  Most people just have no idea how staggeringly inefficient we are right now.  The worst of the worst in a single person in a conventional car (the most common situation) which has an end-to-end efficiency of under 0.5%.

It's degrowth mentality because he literally said we should turn off AI instead of making it more efficient.

Your example is also degrowth mentality, because you're trading away the freedom and convenience of a car for some energy we can easily get by building more energy infrastructure.

No.  I still have the freedom and convenience of a car, just using 1/50th the energy.

[HVM]

Yes, as can see here only straight tube, and only open in the ends.

You're not making the point you think you are.

Yeah I do, here's the actual Loop plan. There are more stations than similar distance of a highway has on/off-ramps.

[spacenut]

40 years ago, yes, we were doing drug testing, and pulling police records.  Applicants had to work with gas which is dangerous, no alcohol or drugs in system.  Police driving records were pulled as applicants had to drive company vehicles.  Now, it wasn't as big a problem back then PERIOD. 

[Blackstar]

Yeah I do, here's the actual Loop plan. There are more stations than similar distance of a highway has on/off-ramps.

Nope. Cars and trains are different. Count the number of passengers per hour that can be carried by either.

And seriously, you want to defend the Vegas tunnel?