Human suffering x human flourishing

Lex Fridman(01:10:13) And suffering. It’s really complicated to consider that some amount of human suffering is necessary for human flourishing.

Elon Musk(01:10:22) Is it possible to appreciate the highs without knowing the lows?

Lex Fridman(01:10:29) And that all is summarized there in a single statement from God. Okay.

Elon Musk(01:10:34) No highs, no lows, who knows?

There is a reason for hate

Elon Musk(01:09:49) Yeah. Actually I was towing a friend of mine saying, “Would you really want there to be no hate in the world? Really none?” I wonder why hate evolved. I’m not saying we should have…

Elon Musk(01:10:00) I wonder why hate evolved. I’m not saying we should amplify hate, of course, I think we should try to minimize it, but none at all. There might be a reason for hate.

Anti sterile and ossified

Happiness is bad

Elon Musk(01:07:30) Exactly. Is it better to live in a world where everyone is happy all the time, even if that happiness is artificial? It’s good question. This is what I mean. Do you wish for world peace and happiness all the time? Are you sure? Because that might be a society that is essentially sterile and ossified that never changes, that is ultimately doomed.

Elon Musk(01:03:09) Yeah. I mean, it did prompt me to think about just hate in general, which is you want to be careful of one of those things where you wish for something that sounds good, but if you get it’s actually a dystopian situation. So if you wish for world peace sounds good, but how’d it enforced and at what cost eternal peace? It might actually be worse to have eternal peace because of what that would entail. The suppression of everyone, it might be the suppression of progress. It might be an ossified society that never changes. What I’m saying is that there is an argument that if you wish for no war, you should be careful what you wish for because what’s required in order for there to be no war might be worse than a little war.