Elon Musk: Limbic System, Cerebral Cortex, and a Tertiary Layer of Digital Super-Intelligence
00:00:00.000 | Ultimately, we currently operate on two layers.
00:00:04.160 | We have a limbic, primitive brain layer, which is where all of our impulses are coming from.
00:00:11.960 | It's sort of like we've got a monkey brain with a computer stuck on it.
00:00:17.040 | That's the human brain.
00:00:18.480 | A lot of our impulses and everything are driven by the monkey brain.
00:00:22.640 | The computer, the cortex, is constantly trying to make the monkey brain happy.
00:00:27.280 | It's not the cortex that's steering the monkey brain, it's the monkey brain steering the
00:00:30.960 | cortex.
00:00:31.960 | But the cortex is the part that tells the story of the whole thing.
00:00:37.320 | So we convince ourselves it's more interesting than just the monkey brain.
00:00:42.360 | Cortex is what we call human intelligence.
00:00:45.440 | That's like the advanced computer relative to other creatures.
00:00:48.680 | Other creatures do not have either...
00:00:52.720 | They don't have the computer, or they have a very weak computer relative to humans.
00:01:00.040 | But it sort of seems like surely the really smart thing should control the dumb thing,
00:01:06.960 | but actually the dumb thing controls the smart thing.
00:01:10.640 | So do you think some of the same kind of machine learning methods, whether that's natural language
00:01:15.000 | processing applications, are going to be applied for the communication between the machine
00:01:20.740 | and the brain to learn how to do certain things like movement of the body, how to process
00:01:27.360 | visual stimuli and so on?
00:01:29.480 | Do you see the value of using machine learning to understand the language of the two-way
00:01:35.800 | communication with the brain?
00:01:37.320 | Sure.
00:01:38.320 | Yeah, absolutely.
00:01:39.320 | I mean, we're a neural net, and AI is basically a neural net.
00:01:44.960 | So it's like digital neural net will interface with biological neural net and hopefully bring
00:01:51.200 | us along for the ride.
00:01:52.920 | But the vast majority of our intelligence will be digital.
00:02:00.800 | Think of the difference in intelligence between your cortex and your limbic system is gigantic.
00:02:08.440 | Your limbic system really has no comprehension of what the hell the cortex is doing.
00:02:15.680 | It's just literally hungry, or tired, or angry, or sexy, or something.
00:02:25.520 | And then that communicates that impulse to the cortex and tells the cortex to go satisfy
00:02:31.480 | that.
00:02:32.480 | So then a great deal of, like a massive amount of thinking, like truly stupendous amount
00:02:38.640 | of thinking has gone into sex without purpose, without procreation, which is actually quite
00:02:49.200 | a silly action in the absence of procreation.
00:02:53.960 | It's a bit silly.
00:02:54.960 | So why are you doing it?
00:02:57.120 | Because it makes the limbic system happy.
00:02:58.400 | That's why.
00:02:59.400 | That's why.
00:03:00.460 | But it's pretty absurd, really.
00:03:03.880 | Well the whole of existence is pretty absurd in some kind of sense.
00:03:07.480 | Yeah.
00:03:08.480 | But I mean, this is a lot of computation has gone into how can I do more of that with procreation
00:03:15.160 | not even being a factor.
00:03:17.240 | This is, I think, a very important area of research by NSFW.
00:03:20.320 | An agency that should receive a lot of funding, especially after this conversation.
00:03:26.640 | I propose the formation of a new agency.
00:03:30.760 | Oh boy.
00:03:34.880 | But people generally like the fact that they have a limbic system and a cortex.
00:03:38.120 | I haven't met anyone who wants to delete either one of them.
00:03:40.360 | They're like, okay, I'll keep them both.
00:03:42.400 | That's cool.
00:03:43.400 | The limbic system is kind of fun.
00:03:44.400 | It does.
00:03:45.400 | That's what the fun is.
00:03:46.400 | Absolutely.
00:03:47.400 | And then people generally don't want to lose their cortex either.
00:03:51.080 | So they like having the cortex and the limbic system.
00:03:55.120 | And then there's a tertiary layer which will be digital superintelligence.
00:03:58.880 | And I think there's room for optimism given that the cortex is very intelligent and the
00:04:06.680 | limbic system is not.
00:04:07.680 | And yet they work together well.
00:04:10.160 | Perhaps there can be a tertiary layer where digital superintelligence lies.
00:04:14.720 | And that will be vastly more intelligent than the cortex.
00:04:17.760 | But still coexist peacefully and in a benign manner with the cortex and limbic system.
00:04:22.800 | Thank you.
00:04:23.320 | [end]
00:04:25.320 | 1
00:04:26.320 | 1
00:04:27.320 | 2
00:04:28.320 | 3
00:04:29.320 | 4
00:04:30.320 | 5
00:04:31.320 | 6
00:04:32.320 | 7
00:04:33.320 | 8
00:04:34.320 | 9
00:04:35.320 | 10
00:04:36.320 | 11
00:04:37.320 | 12
00:04:38.320 | 13
00:04:39.320 | 14
00:04:40.320 | 15
00:04:41.320 | 16
00:04:42.320 | 17