In brief
- Elon Musk predicts AI will surpass the combined intelligence of humanity within about five years.
- He says humans are unlikely to remain in control of AI within the next decade, even as the technology creates unprecedented abundance.
- Musk wants leading AI developers to regularly review each other's frontier models for safety risks before release.
Artificial intelligence could surpass the combined intelligence of humanity within about five years, and humans are unlikely to remain in control of the technology within a decade, according to Elon Musk.
Speaking with The Economist editor-in-chief Zanny Minton Beddoes on Thursday, the xAI founder said AI is on track to outperform humans at nearly every intellectual task.
"There really won't be anything that AI can't do better than humans, apart from being human, perhaps,” Musk said. “The most likely outcome is an age of amazing abundance where anyone can have anything they can think of. This may sound preposterous, but here we are in 2026. Let's see where we stand in 2036."
The discussion is the latest instance where Musk said he believes that AI will lead to an "age of abundance" that will bring both comfort and an existential crisis for humanity. However, Musk said he still believes advanced AI poses existential risks, but no longer sees a realistic path to slowing its development.
“I can't see any way to really stop this incredible momentum of AI and robots,” he said. “At times I think, well, perhaps even if there was a stop button, we probably shouldn't press it, because the most likely outcome is incredible abundance for all."
Instead, Musk proposed that the world's leading AI companies begin holding regular meetings to discuss safety and security concerns. He also suggested giving competing AI labs limited early access to one another's frontier models so they can identify dangerous capabilities before public release. If a company failed to address serious risks, he said, governments could then intervene.
While he proposed that leading AI developers work together, Musk also took time to criticize longtime rival Sam Altman and OpenAI's evolution from a nonprofit organization into a for-profit company, saying it had strayed from its original mission.
"Well, I'm not a fan of Sam Altman because you started a nonprofit that was meant to be an open-source AI company, owned by the world, and it somehow got turned into an $800 billion for-profit company with closed source,” he said.
In May, a California jury rejected Musk's $150 billion lawsuit against OpenAI, CEO Sam Altman, and co-founder Greg Brockman, finding the defendants not liable on claims that they abandoned the organization's nonprofit mission by shifting toward a commercial structure. The verdict ended one of Musk's highest-profile legal challenges against the ChatGPT developer.
Musk also suggested Anthropic exists because co-founder Dario Amodei and his team no longer trusted OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, arguing they otherwise would have remained at OpenAI.
"I think Dario is a very principled person. He cares about the future of the world, and I think everyone I've met at Anthropic so far has been well-intentioned. No one has set off my evil detector,” he said. “The road to hell is mostly paved with bad intentions. There are a few well-intentioned paving stones in there, so we don't want to be complacent.”
While Musk praised Amodei’s leadership of Anthropic, critics including Sam Altman have accused the company of fear-based marketing to sell its Claude AI products.
Despite his disagreements with OpenAI leadership, he said rival AI companies should be willing to cooperate on safety.
"At the end of the day, if we have to talk, we'll talk," Musk said. "Set aside our personal differences for the good of the world."