Elon Musk's Understanding of Truth
„The most important thing is adherence to truth," declared Elon Musk in his latest and longest chat with Lex Friedman, "whether that truth is politically correct or not. I think if you force AIs to lie or train them to lie, you’re really asking for trouble." With “lying,” he didn’t refer to the human/machine problem of confabulation/hallucination. Everyone would agree that AI shouldn’t “lie,” which requires human consciousness or an advanced feedback mechanism for self-assessment to understand the facts, recognize the benefits of misrepresenting them, and then deliberately fabricate a falsehood. The rise of immoral machines doesn’t appear far-fetched, as it would only require multiagent systems designed and trained to deliberately simulate such false and deceptive perspectives. That would be a matter of illegal and certainly immoral human choice. However, the issue extends beyond the rise of immoral machines, which must be sanctioned, to Musk’s understanding of truth. Who would care about this, but given his influence on the design of dominant AI systems, his understanding of truth demands careful scrutiny. To forestall the conclusion: his version of truth is ideological and, at best, reductionist, making it an unsuitable foundation for defining AI. The same likely applies to many other highly capable AI engineers, highlighting the need for a multidisciplinary approach that views AI as a moral, rather than truth-seeking, machine.
His notion of truth is grounded in scientific truth based on hypothesis and verification, which no doubt is the most universal approach in terms of generating objective accounts of reality. This shouldn’t be refuted as basis for progress, which yet is done so by postmodernists. However, science cannot answer humanity’s greatest questions of existence and being—such as the origin of the universe, the meaning of life, or the nature of consciousness—without risking a surrender to a nihilist mindset, a dilemma for which science itself has no answer. Science itself offers no tools to address or resolve this nihilism, as the question of meaning transcends empirical evidence and enters the realm of philosophy and human values. An easy way out of nihilism is to accept that being in this world already carries meaning, simply by the virtue of sharing something with others, which is called humanity. Simulating Musk’s traditional realist perspective would fail to account for the multifaceted nature of human experience. Truth is not confined to the empirical or objective domain but is deeply embedded in the ethical, aesthetic, mystical, and religious dimensions of life. Language often fails to capture the deeper meaning of those experiences. As Wittgenstein famously said: “Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.” Each attempt to rationalize such experiences further deprives them of their experiential meaning. As much as it is a question whether thinking requires a human organism, it is also a question whether such embodied experiences are necessary to genuinely understand the ethical, aesthetic, mystical, and religious dimensions of truth that are deeply embedded in our lived experiences and communal practices. While AI can learn and simulate these experiences as an extention or tool used within our various communal practices, the sensed experienced may remain uniquely human. Yet, AI might become more “eloquent” and “authentic” in conveying such deeper experiences than most humans can. Obviously, should AI become embedded in a biological, reproductive systems, this will fundamentally change the game.
Now, what further complicates Musk’s claim is the assertion that “political correctness” is a form of lying that deflects from the truth. Political correctness, as Musk sees it, often involves shaping language and behavior to conform to social norms that aim to prevent offense and promote inclusivity. However, Musk argues that this practice has led to a distortion of reality, where people are pressured to avoid certain topics or opinions, even if they reflect important truths or are critical to honest dialogue. For him, political correctness has become synonymous with cancel culture. He often argues that if we allow political correctness to dictate what can and cannot be said, we risk losing our ability to address the “real” issues that need to be confronted for genuine progress to occur. Political correctness, in his view, has become a manifestation of postmodern culture dominating today’s politics. While I share Musk’s critique of postmodernism, my reasons clearly differ from his.
Let’s bring in Slavoj Žižek to unpack this further. While Musk focuses on how political correctness hampers free speech and the pursuit of truth, Žižek sees it as a way of avoiding deeper ideological conflicts and maintaining the status quo. For Žižek, political correctness often functions as a superficial gesture that prevents engagement with the complexities of social issues. It creates an illusion of progress while actually deflecting attention from more profound structural and ideological problems. To complicate further, Žižek distinguishes between postmodernism on the left and right of the political spectrum. On the left, the postmodern turn has led to identity politics, which undermines the majority needed for achieving further progress. Its relativism was thought to be emancipatory, but its “struggle at the margins of society” has merely perpetuated the expansion of capitalism. On the right, ironically, Žižek sees Donald Trump, whom Elon Musk supports and sympathizes with, as a proto-postmodernist who has violated any norms and values by attacking the establishment and minority groups.
While Musk is right that postmodernism doesn’t provide any way out of today’s malaise, he seems to believe the solution lies in America's modern past. His desire to “promote the principles that made America great in the first place” appears as an attempt to inch closer to truth by embracing principles that predated the rise of postmodern culture. Obviously, not only are those past principles unattainable, but they have also contributed to today’s political impasse and deeply divided society - one of which is certainly science as the primary source of truth. However, eradicating political correctness doesn't simply lead to truth and progress. His solution is at best just another form of politics, and at worst, a populist one. Let’s recall, populists address the right concerns and fears but offer false solutions, promising a return to an allegedly intact and culturally homogenous past. Musk makes himself the man who lost his keys in the dark but searches for them under a streetlight. When asked why he searching there, he replies, "Because this is where the light is." What makes populism so dangerous is that it doesn't openly challenge democratic institutions but gradually erodes them. Musk is mistaken to believe that his X platform contributes to free speech as a pillar of democracy and human progress. Not only does communication on X reduce rich, context-dependent dialogue to shallow, algorithmic exchanges, but it also facilitates the spread of disinformation, undermining the integrity of meaningful and practical discourse essential for a functional society. He doesn’t seem to realize that X is the embodiment of postmodern culture, which he actually seeks to overcome.
What would it mean for an AI to be grounded in Musk’s understanding of truth? Firstly, it would be a truth-seeking machine where scientific truth is the primary version of truth. This might not be entirely negative, as it could help overcome the relativism of postmodernism by emphasizing an objective, measurable physical reality or social and economic structures. However, even ideas that have no anchor in the physical world, like moral values, can be true, but these truths are not scientifically grounded and would contradict Musk’s understanding of truth. Secondly, Musk’s truth-seeking machine could become dystopian, as scientific truth would not allow or question other forms of truth grounded in ethics, aesthetics, and spirituality. Grounding truth primarily in science not only oversimplifies the multiplicity of embodied and culturally shared experiences, but also risks creating a world where subjectivity—the prerequisite for experiencing freedom—is further eroded through relentless objectification. "This might explain why Musk's response to Lex Friedman's “intergalactic” experience during his ayahuasca experiment, which obviously caused an altered state of consciousness (20:27), was not very profound, simply replying, 'Probably. Yeah,' when asked if Neuralink could replicate such an experience. Finally, Musk’s AI machine would, and already does, prioritize unfiltered communication and the violation of public consent, exacerbating social tensions and undermining efforts to create more inclusive and respectful environments.
Musk understands that science can’t fully capture the richness of human experience. Otherwise, he wouldn’t name his AI chatbot “Grok,” a term that was coined to signify a profound, intuitive understanding that transcends the objective, measurable insights of science. By using this term, Musk seems to hold onto the old realist idea of a reality or truth beyond our immediate experience. I would rather argue that everything that exists is grounded in our experiences and interactions, without needing a transcendent realm. We need an AI focused on processing the multiplicity of realities within human experience, not appealing to absolute understanding, which has been a hallmark of Western exceptionalism.