AI, robots, Bitcoin, and the colonization of Mars. You may not have truly grasped these popular narratives of the 2020s.

"Elon, you no longer believe in colonizing Mars."

Before the 2024 presidential election, for a while, Kamala Harris's poll numbers soared, surpassing Donald Trump, who was supported by Elon Musk and Peter Thiel.

On the phone, Peter Thiel disheartenedly told his good friend Musk that if Kamala Harris were elected again in this election, he would leave the United States.

"Immigrate to New Zealand, Costa Rica, or move to his own floating city project."

In short, hide.

On the other end of the phone, Musk said, "No, Peter, you don't understand. There's nowhere else for us to go but the United States."

Thiel pondered for a moment and said, "You're right. The floating city project isn't immune to toxic politics."

Half an hour after hanging up the phone, the philosophically-minded Thiel suddenly realized, "Elon, I can't believe it. You no longer believe in colonizing Mars!"

What Thiel was thinking was:

If the floating city isn't an alternative to the United States, then neither is colonizing Mars.

The implicit view in Musk's words was:

If neither 10 million electric vehicles, nor Starlink, nor brain-computer interfaces and artificial intelligence can change the dismal political situation in the United States, then flying to Mars doesn't make any political sense either.

The toxic zero-sum politics and ubiquitous regulations on Earth will follow the tech optimists all the way to Mars.

In a later podcast, Thiel retold this exchange with a different story:

After parting ways with the current government over the deficit issue, Musk returned to his main tech mission. On the phone, he excitedly told Thiel, "Do you know? In 10 years, there will be 10 billion humanoid robots that can perform human tasks."

Thiel said:

"Then you shouldn't be too worried about the U.S. deficit problem because 10 billion robots will greatly boost productivity. With high economic growth, problems like the deficit, debt, and political polarization will naturally be resolved."

Musk thought for a moment and said, "You're right, but I'm still worried about the deficit problem."

Thiel said, "So, you don't really believe the story of 10 billion humanoid robots, do you?"

The phone call between these two good friends ended in silence once again.

01 Technological Progress: Grand Narratives and Even Grander Ones

For today's tech optimists, most conversations about technological change get bogged down in extreme details:

Has today's artificial intelligence reached the AGI level? Do large models already have an IQ of 135?

But these debates never make it into the mainstream media narrative and can't win the public's recognition of technological progress:

The Luddites' arguments are gradually gaining the upper hand. Large models are replacing programmers and office workers, and the so - called good jobs in people's eyes are being gradually destroyed. But where is the high growth promised by AI? How can the efficiency of the government, which accounts for 40% of GDP expenditure, be rapidly improved through artificial intelligence and robots?

In other words, if 10 billion humanoid robots and Grok with an IQ of 135 can't boost GDP growth by more than 10%, then the ever - growing U.S. national debt with a 4% interest rate will keep the United States in the deficit trap forever.

In an era where technological progress is hyped up, according to tech optimists, the whole of humanity will soon enter the UBI era:

Thanks to limitless productivity growth, everyone will receive a share of the tech dividend, a universal basic income of several thousand dollars a month. Geopolitical power comparisons or the deficit problem will be even less of an issue.

But in fact, the mainstream narrative today only focuses on artificial intelligence and Bitcoin, which just proves the limitations of the technological progress narrative:

Beyond the digital - level internet, digital currency, and artificial intelligence, there has been no technological progress in the larger physical world that can make people feel a change in their living standards:

Planes are getting slower, the century - old subway in New York City is in a shambles, airport security checks take longer, college tuition is more expensive while wages are lower, and the deficit problem and inefficient public sectors are ever - present.

In the physical world, the physical speed of all transportation is slowing down: the Concorde supersonic airliner was retired in 2003, and due to the low - tech airport security checks and longer flight times, you can't even quickly get through all the security checks to travel from one city to another today.

This technological stagnation is constantly costing humanity, but our smart screens and devices are distracting:

Douyin and Xiaohongshu can divert our attention. So when you're on the century - old shabby subway and staring at your iPhone, you'll think it's a really cool new thing and won't be distracted by the fact that the subway is old and dilapidated.

In the past 30 years, only the internet and AI have made one - sided progress, while almost all atomic - level technologies outside the internet have shown little improvement. The economic growth stagnation caused by technological stagnation is precisely the core reason why the United States can't get out of the deficit quagmire today.

From this perspective, landing on Mars, Starlink, self - driving cars, 10 billion humanoid robots, or an AI super - platform like Palantir, although they seem like science fiction, in a way:

"The narrative isn't grand enough."

Relying solely on the one - sided progress of artificial intelligence, we may not be able to solve these fatal problems.

02 What AI Is More Like

Today's AI is more like the internet in 1999.

In 1999, socially speaking, everyone knew that the future of the internet would be huge, but in terms of business models, all internet business models at that time had failed. It took a full 15 - 20 years for the internet to truly become a huge business form.

The so - called FAANG companies all emerged after 2014, and at that time, people thought that AI would change everything in a year and a half.

Today, the internet is a huge achievement.

But to what extent has the internet changed people's living standards?

This is actually a hard question to answer:

In the United States, the internet has given rise to companies worth trillions of dollars in total. Even in the Chinese capital market, it accounts for 15% of the total market value of Chinese companies.

Obviously, life without the internet would be worse than it is today.

But the internet still seems to have a long way to go before it completely changes people's lives.

There aren't many grand narratives happening in the world today, which means that when a real grand narrative does occur, people may not even know how to handle it.

Bitcoin could be traded in 2011, but it remained stagnant for 10 - 11 years without a large - scale re - pricing.

AI seems to be the same: it may increase GDP growth by a few percentage points each year and give rise to some trillion - dollar companies, but that's about it.

Everything else remains quiet.

Today's people live in a world where grand narratives have never come true, so when Bitcoin and large models appear, people don't even know how to price these things.

The internet was once a grand narrative, and a large model passing the Turing test is another grand narrative, as significant as the internet.

But apart from these three things, there have been almost no major technological changes in the past 30 years: technological progress used to mean not only computers but also rockets, supersonic airplanes, innovative drugs, the green revolution in agriculture, and underwater cities.

But except for computers, almost no other technological progress has occurred.

The world is gently moving towards that good night.

03 Underlying Factors of Stagnation

There are many reasons for the overall stagnation of technological innovation.

For example, our society's risk appetite has decreased, the social atmosphere has become more feminine, the education system has worsened, we're running out of ideas, and most of the easy - to - achieve ideas have been discovered, the low - hanging fruits have been picked.

But more importantly, today's people are afraid to dream big because the opposite of realizing a dream is the destruction of civilization.

For instance, the secret nuclear explosion research in Los Alamos in 1945 and the early thermonuclear weapons in the 1950s took some time to truly increase their penetration rate, but this delayed effect ultimately allowed more and more countries to acquire nuclear weapons.

Through technology control, in a stagnant world, today's physical scientists can't do much and have to engage in some DEI - related activities to save face, but at least they won't create weapons that can destroy the world.

We've lived in this world for 50 years, and many things have been stagnant. But if our world were still accelerating, with all these supersonic and hypersonic airplanes, hypersonic weapons, modular nuclear reactors, and tactical nuclear weapons, we might not be sitting here today; the whole world would have been destroyed long ago.

Today's humanity is in a branch of the multiverse, a universe with technological stagnation. This universe has protective elements that prevent human destruction, but on all other fronts, this technological stagnation has also seriously damaged our society.

And Iron Man Musk's wavering and eventual disillusionment between Bitcoin, Mars, and artificial intelligence are just a reflection of this parallel universe:

If rapid technological progress may bring destruction, then the gentle good night brought about by technological stagnation may bring more Malthusian traps today.

Is this a good thing or a bad thing?

The previous generation of elites made a difficult choice between avoiding destruction by nuclear war and technological stagnation leading to civilizational decline.

The choice to restart technological progress has fallen on Musk's generation.

04 Conclusion

Today's tech optimists are getting lost in micro - narratives, while the public opinion field of grand narratives is being intentionally or unintentionally ignored.

Can AI solve the deficit problem? How will robot technology change geopolitical power comparisons?

If the so - called rapid technological innovation doesn't change the answers to these questions, then these innovations aren't as important as the Silicon Valley mouthpieces claim.

This is also the reason why Musk, who has been involved in politics since 2024, has become more and more disillusioned in several conversations:

These seemingly far - fetched, grand - narrative technological changes may not actually have the huge impact described by tech giants, and may even be too small to solve a 3% deficit rate.

The problem may be that today's people don't dream big enough, and the narrative isn't grand enough:

Restarting technological innovation means taking huge risks, and today's people, lacking big dreams, are gradually moving towards that gentle good night.

This article is from the WeChat official account "Jinduan Research Institute", written by Mu Zhi, and published by 36Kr with permission.