What Elon Musk and Sam Altman Said About Each Other

(Mr. Musk wrote back: “Thanks Sam!”)

In the “On With Kara Swisher” podcast, in March 2023:

“He’s a jerk, whatever else you want to say about him — he has a style that is not a style that I’d want to have for myself. But I think he does really care, and he is feeling very stressed about what the future’s going to look like for humanity.”

In the “In Good Company” podcast, in September:

“Elon was definitely a talent magnet and attention magnet, for sure, and also just like has some real superpowers that were super helpful to us in those early days, aside from all of those things.”

What Mr. Musk and Mr. Altman said about A.I. in joint appearances:

In a conversation at Vanity Fair’s New Establishment, in October 2015:

Mr. Altman: “The happy vision of the future is humans and A.I. in a symbiotic relationship, distributed A.I., sort of empowers a lot of individuals, not this single A.I. that kind of governs everything we all do that’s a million times smarter than any other entity.

Mr. Musk: “I agree with what Sam said. We are effectively already a human machine collective symbiot, like a giant cyborg.”

In an interview Mr. Altman conducted with Mr. Musk, in September 2016:

Mr. Altman: “Speaking of really important problems — A.I. — you have been outspoken about A.I. Could you talk about what you think the positive future for A.I. looks like and how we get there?”

Mr. Musk: “So I think we must have democratization of A.I. technology, make it widely available, and that’s the reason that obviously you, me, and the rest of the team, created OpenAI was to help with the, help spread out A.I. technology so it doesn’t get concentrated in the hands of a few.”

Cade Metz contributed reporting.