Expose yourself to as many smart people as possible. Read a lot of books.1015
Books
(Since there are so many links in this section, you may prefer a digital version. Go to ElonMuskBook.org to get a digital version of this chapter.)
Fiction
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
This is in fact a book of philosophy, disguised as a silly humor book. If you read it from the standpoint of “Wow, this is an interesting book of philosophy,” it is quite insightful. It hits this point: The answer is easy once you can properly formulate the question.1016
It also makes fun of bureaucracy. Earth essentially gets destroyed by a sort of clerical error. Aliens decide they need an interstellar highway and Earth is in the way. They post the fact that Earth needs to get destroyed for this interstellar highway, but of course, it’s posted on an alien bulletin board that no one on Earth can access.1017
The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien
I know it's cliché, but The Lord of the Rings is my favorite series ever.1018
Foundation series by Isaac Asimov
I recommend reading the Foundation series. It’s about how there’s likely to be another dark age, which my guess is there will be at some point. I’m not predicting that we’re about to enter a dark age, but that there’s some probability we will, particularly if there’s a third world war. We want to make sure that there’s enough of us as a seed of human civilization somewhere else to bring civilization back and perhaps shorten the length of a dark age.
It’s unlikely we’ll never have another world war. There probably will be at some point. I’m not predicting this, but given enough time it will be likely because this has been our pattern in the past.1019
Dune series by Frank Herbert
The Dune series by Herbert is brilliant. He advocates placing limits on machine intelligence.1020
Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein
I like Stranger in a Strange Land, although it kind of goes off the rails at the end.1021
The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress by Robert A. Heinlein
The Machine Stops by E. M. Forster
An old story by E. M. Forster, worth reading.1022
A Game of Thrones by George R. R. Martin
In my opinion, the best books in recent years are by Iain Banks and George Martin.1023
Culture series by Iain M. Banks
Compelling picture of a grand, semiutopian galactic future. Hopefully it’s not too optimistic about the outcome of AI.1024
Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett
Have recently come to appreciate the awesome, absurdist humor of Waiting for Godot. We so often wait, without knowing why, when, or where.1025
Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
It’s a counterpoint to communism and useful as such, but should be tempered with kindness.1026
The Fault in Our Stars by John Green
I must admit to liking The Fault in Our Stars. Sad, romantic, and beautifully named.1027
Sciences
If the Universe Is Teeming with Aliens…Where Is Everybody? by Stephen Webb
Read it when it came out. Great book.1028
The Big Picture: On the Origins of Life, Meaning, and the Universe by Sean Carroll
Highly recommend anything by Sean Carroll.1029
The Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe: How to Know What’s Really Real in a World Increasingly Full of Fake by Steven Novella
The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins
Most people don’t realize that the origin of the word meme is from this book by Richard Dawkins.1030
Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Climate Change by Naomi Oreskes
The same people who tried to deny smoking deaths are denying climate change.1031
What We Owe the Future by William MacAskill
This is a close match for my philosophy.1032
Rocket Science and Engineering
Liftoff: Early Days of SpaceX by Eric Berger
This book is accurate.1033
Ignition!: An Informal History of Liquid Rocket Propellants by John Drury Clark
One of my favorite books for learning space travel.1034
Modern Engineering for Design of Liquid Propellant Rocket Engines by Dieter K. Huzel
Structures: Or Why Things Don’t Fall Down by J. E. Gordon
A good book on structural design. It is really, really good if you want a primer on structural design.1035
History
Learn the lessons of history so we do not repeat the mistakes of the past.
The Lessons of History by Will and Ariel Durant1036
The Story of Civilization by Will and Ariel Durant
The Story of Civilization will keep you occupied for a long time. The Age of Napoleon by Will and Ariel Durant is an amazing book.1037 The Life of Greece is incredible.1038
The Iliad by Homer (Penguin Classics edition)
Something that’s really good as an audiobook is the Penguin edition of The Iliad. The Iliad was meant to be a spoken poem so obviously lends itself very well to being an audiobook and Penguin did a great job of narration. It’s quite engaging.1039
The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon
Read Gibbon’s famous book about the decline and fall of the Roman Empire and how they had advanced technology in terms of roads, aqueduct plumbing, and so forth and then they basically forgot about it.1040
Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman by Robert K. Massie
An amazingly expansive and compelling portrait of an incredible woman. Highly recommended. Yeah, I know what you’re probably thinking…did she really f* a horse?1041
Storm of Steel by Ernst Jünger
I was fascinated by Jünger’s famous book Storm of Steel, which was published roughly a hundred years ago, about Jünger’s experiences in the first world war. For some reason I’m fascinated by war and history in general. I thought Jünger’s book was an excellent firsthand account of World War I. A lesson taken from this book is we don’t ever want to do that again.1042
Not Much of an Engineer by Sir Stanley Hooker
On War by Carl von Clausewitz
There should be a chapter saying, “If you have a decisive technology advantage, you can actually win with minimal casualties.”1043
The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy by Adam Tooze
The Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World: From Marathon to Waterloo by Edward Shepherd Creasy
Insightful analysis, ensconced in eloquent prose.1044
The Art of War by Sun Tzu
An interesting book I’ve read many times.1045
Benjamin Franklin by Walter Isaacson
Great biography of Ben Franklin by Isaacson. Highly recommended.1046
Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar by Simon Sebag Montefiore
Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar was one of the few books that was so dark I had to stop reading. If only they’d listened to Lenin’s last wish, much tragedy may have been averted.1047
American Caesar by William Manchester
Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson
Explore/Create: My Life in Pursuit of New Frontiers, Hidden Worlds, and the Creative Spark by Richard Garriott
Explore/Create is a chronicle of wonder, and the many wondrous things the future may hold. Richard and I have long shared a passion for space. Perhaps one day our kids will create and play games on a new world!1048
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
Autobiographies are really helpful.1049
Britannica Concise Encyclopedia
Read through the condensed version of the Encyclopedia Britannica; I’d recommend that.1050
Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides’s Trap?—A Critical Examination of Historical Patterns Leading to War Between Great Powers by Graham Allison
Well, it’s worth reading that book on the difficult-to-pronounce Thucydides’s trap. I love war history. I like inside out and backward. There’s hardly a battle I haven’t read about. And trying to figure out what really was the cause of victory in any particular case as opposed to what one side or another claims is the reason. Both the victory and what caused the war.1051
Man’s Search for Meaning by Victor E. Frankl
AI and Machine Learning
Life 3.0: Being Human in the Age of Artificial Intelligence by Max Tegmark
A compelling guide to the challenges and choices in our quest for a great future of life, intelligence, and consciousness—on Earth and beyond.1052
Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies by Nick Bostrom
Worth reading Superintelligence by Bostrom. We need to be super careful with AI. It’s potentially more dangerous than nukes.1053
Human Compatible: Artificial Intelligence and the Problem of Control by Stuart Russell
Worth reading Human Compatible by Stuart Russell (he’s great!) about future AI risks and solutions.1054
Our Final Invention: Artificial Intelligence and the End of the Human Era by James Barrat
Our Final Invention is also worth reading.1055
Deep Learning by Ian Goodfellow, Yoshua Bengio, and Aaron Courville
Written by three experts in the field, Deep Learning is the only comprehensive book on the subject.1056
Business and Economics
Screw Business as Usual: Turning Capitalism into a Force for Good by Richard Branson
I liked Screw Business as Usual a lot. This approach should be taken to heart by all, as it really is a smart move.1057
Masters of Doom: How Two Guys Created an Empire and Transformed Pop Culture by David Kushner
Masters of Doom is a great book.1058
The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith
Adam Smith for the win, obviously.1059
Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future by Peter Thiel
Peter Thiel has built multiple breakthrough companies, and Zero to One shows how.1060
What’s Our Problem?: A Self-Help Book for Societies by Tim Urban
Lying by Sam Harris
I read Lying by my friend Sam Harris. Excellent cover art and lots of good reasons not to lie!1061
The Parasitic Mind: How Infectious Ideas Are Killing Common Sense by Gad Saad
The Parasitic Mind is great. He’s got a book on happiness as well, which is also quite good. I’m a big fan of Gad Saad.1062
A Woman Makes a Plan: Advice for a Lifetime of Adventure, Beauty, and Success by Maye Musk
My mom wrote a book. ♥️1063