Jonathan Bartlett

Elon Musk sees technology as taking over the human world and we’d best consider our options. Ma points out that humans build computers but no computer has ever built a human: For Musk, technology is not a tool to promote humanity. Rather, technology will take humanity’s place of leadership in the world. Humans will have a choice to integrate with our technological masters or be left behind as a relic of evolutionary history, just one more living fossil roaming the landscape. It is interesting how the theory of evolution contributes to this idea of a technological singularity (an endpoint of human history as we know it). Ma, while impressed with technology, is more impressed with humans. He points out that Read More ›

Are Tesla’s robot taxis a phantom fleet? What’s behind Elon Musk’s sudden wild taxi adventure? Self-driving car entrepreneur Elon Musk is nothing, if not ambitious. Earlier this week, he promised to have a million robot taxis on the road by next year, taking dead aim at Uber and Lyft. But responses have changed in recent years from Wow! To “Oh. Really?” What’s going on?: “I’m actually quite amazed that Elon even made the suggestion. Not only is the car not ready for autonomous driving, the company has not even started work on the ride-hailing software needed to support it. Additionally, the numbers presented at the conference show a complete lack of understanding of even the basics of what it costs Read More ›