0:00

You know, a book that talked

0:02

about Fauci and I, you know, having an evil

0:04

plot. The fact that that could sell

0:07

so well, that was kind of shocking.

0:10

Are you a dink monster or do you focus on like

0:12

spin? What do you go for? You have to dink.

0:15

If you don't dink, you're not going

0:17

to be very good. A

0:20

woman came up yelling at me about

0:22

how I was tracking her. I looked

0:25

at her and I thought, gosh, I really don't need to

0:27

track you. I'm sorry.

0:30

I'm sorry.

0:35

This is What Now? With

0:37

Trevor Noah.

0:49

This episode is brought to you by the podcast Tools &

0:51

Weapons with Brad Smith. You know,

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2:00

Bill Gates today. I should say happy Bill

2:02

Gates day everybody. I feel like Christiana

2:05

is gonna be a little conflicted on the one hand Because

2:08

you're Nigerian you have to be happy for Bill Gates

2:10

because he's a billionaire and

2:12

I feel like that's full on Nigerian swag Yeah,

2:14

but then on the other hand, I feel like you're a socialist Yeah

2:17

My two selves are in big conflict

2:19

right now and the socialist is like

2:21

bill Why don't he give me all your money so

2:24

I can just give you it. I'm not gonna tell

2:26

you how I'm gonna distribute it Just

2:28

give it to me. You know, it's funny. I actually

2:30

thought of this the other day I was thinking do we actually

2:33

want things as people in life or Do

2:36

we merely want access to things to experience

2:38

them so that we no longer want them and and

2:40

the reason I say this is because Every billionaire

2:44

I've met you know in life

2:46

will in some way and I mean look obviously there's a generalization

2:49

There are some who don't feel this way but many

2:51

many many many billionaires will say

2:53

to you Money isn't everything

2:56

and I'm gonna give it all away and They

2:58

genuinely don't seem to like care much for

3:01

the quote-unquote money anymore But

3:03

I realize it's because they have access

3:05

to everything like no one actually wants money People

3:08

just want the access that money brings

3:10

you don't you don't want money you want a car and

3:12

then you need the money To get no, I want

3:15

the money. Yeah, but what does the money get you? What

3:17

does the money get you? I just I just like looking

3:19

at money. I like That's

3:23

The difference between between you and me I don't actually

3:26

like money No, if somebody promised me

3:28

access not money access

3:30

for the rest of my life. I would take

3:32

it So if you said to me I can

3:34

fly anywhere I'd like to fly when I would like

3:36

to fly I would take that if you said to me

3:38

I can eat the food That I would like to eat

3:41

anytime. I would take that. I do not need the

3:43

money I need the access that the money brings

3:45

I disagree because

3:46

you have fame fame gives you

3:48

access There are a lot

3:50

of famous people who are broke who would actually

3:52

rather have the money than the fame But you have

3:54

both you have the fame and the money. So,

3:57

okay, if I gave you a billion dollars, ah,

3:59

Amy Okay, I'm manifesting it. I'll

4:02

take it and now I put you on a desert island.

4:04

What is the point of this money? Oh my god, I'm

4:06

away from humanity and have a billion dollars.

4:09

You've just created the What's

4:14

the point I don't have to see

4:16

any people and I'm a billionaire Oh my gosh,

4:18

actually, I want to ask some of the team Emmanuel. So

4:20

what would you what would you take in life? Full

4:22

access or full money. I

4:24

like your idea of full access if I

4:26

can have some fancy cocktails some

4:29

vacation I'm good. I'm

4:31

not really into materialism.

4:33

I maybe took in too much

4:36

of Marie Kondo's teachings Like

4:39

just whisper to your socks. Thank you

4:41

so much, babe, and then you put it away Give

4:44

things away and just have like one chair

4:47

a laptop and a bed

4:49

and that's it That's all you need but I also like

4:51

to go to tropical islands and drink the killer

4:53

So in my

4:54

world you will get that access Ben I feel

4:56

like you you just you're looking at me like this

4:58

is the craziest idea axis just doesn't

5:01

buy you a house It doesn't put nobody on a table.

5:03

But it's gonna be on it was right last week. You

5:05

need a wife. No Silliness

5:09

guys I don't want to get into a nightclub

5:12

Trevor. I want to eat dinner in my house. Oh,

5:14

man, you know, thank you bed I'm gonna try

5:16

and phrase this in a way that that doesn't sound demeaning

5:19

at all because I love you all as my friends In

5:21

different ways, but as my friend Joseph

5:24

Opio from Uganda would say open

5:26

your mind Ah open

5:28

your mind guys you're taking

5:30

for granted that money is merely

5:33

a representation of access That's

5:35

all it is. Right? If

5:38

you have access to a house as in you

5:40

can use it as much as you want whenever you want

5:42

Then for all intents and purposes you have

5:44

a house. Here's how I know this I know

5:47

many people who have rich parents

5:49

and those people have houses that

5:52

their parents own But then they get to live in them. So

5:54

they'll be like, oh my dad's house in

5:56

Aspen or they'll even say our they'll be Like our place

5:59

in Aspen or our place

6:01

in the Bahamas. But those people

6:03

don't have a place. Their parents have a place. They

6:06

have access to the place. These people don't

6:08

have money. Trevor, you're just describing

6:10

trust fund, baby. That's all you're

6:12

describing. People with access,

6:15

they don't have the thing. That's a trust fund, baby.

6:17

You're saying it's better to be Bill Gates' son than

6:19

to be Bill Gates? No, I'm not saying better. I'm not

6:21

saying better. I feel like Emmanuel understands me. I

6:24

think Barry even understands me. I'm not

6:26

saying I would choose to be Bill Gates' son. I'm

6:28

saying that when it comes

6:30

to billionaires, the thing that they

6:33

come to understand is that the

6:35

true thing that their billions give them

6:38

is access.

6:39

Guys, Trevor's the richest person on this call.

6:41

This man that's saying he wants access has

6:44

so much money. Okay,

6:47

he could buy all of us for

6:49

the next 50 years. I'm not fighting any

6:51

of this. I'm not fighting any of

6:53

this. But I think it's not really about the money. It's

6:55

about feeling like

6:57

a sense of achievement or that

7:00

you've earned something. I don't

7:02

think it's about the access of it. For me, it's about

7:04

going, okay, I'm building

7:06

something and I'm doing something. And it's not necessarily

7:08

about, oh, my car's that nice. It isn't. But

7:11

it feels like it's a sense of self-worth

7:14

that I don't think just getting access ever gives you.

7:16

So you think the money contributes to that sense

7:18

of self-worth? Not the spending of it, but

7:21

the having of it a lot more than access does.

7:23

No, this is an interesting point. I hear you. I

7:26

think it's a lot about the worth

7:28

that you get from work. Yeah. And

7:31

I think if I just had access to everything, it would give

7:33

me no moral compass of going what

7:36

is the right way to be. Access

7:39

breeds entitlement. Earning

7:41

money breeds a work ethic. And

7:43

that's why I'm a working mum. Like part

7:46

of not being completely stay at

7:48

home, I'm just like, you know what, even if I'm not

7:50

bringing that much to this household, this

7:52

little part of this house is for me. That

7:55

value is a huge amount. That gives you a huge

7:58

amount of self-worth

7:58

and self-esteem.

7:59

to be like, this is my little piece of the world.

8:02

That's why I admire women who can stay at home with

8:04

children or men who stay at home with their kids. Because

8:06

I know you're losing a big part of

8:08

your identity, which is earning.

8:10

That's the truth or contributing to society in

8:12

some way and getting money in return.

8:15

That's really beautiful. Thank you. You've given me you've given

8:17

me an additional perspective in understanding

8:20

how brainwashed you are. So

8:27

let me put it this way. Let me put it this way. The

8:29

thing that I find interesting about people like

8:32

Bill Gates is this is like, at

8:34

some point, many of these

8:36

rich people start to get bored of

8:38

the quote unquote money. And then they start

8:41

looking just for challenges like so for many people,

8:43

the only challenge in life is money. You go I want

8:46

money, I want money, I need to get money, I'm going to get money, I'm going

8:48

to get a job, I'm going to do these things, I'm going to get money. And

8:50

what I've noticed is the people who have

8:52

all the money at some point, stop

8:54

trying to make money per se. They

8:56

just try and like play a game of deals and

8:58

they try and like make things happen in the world.

9:01

Like Bill Gates is somebody, do you know how much

9:03

of the game you have to have finished to say that your

9:05

next challenge is that you're going to fight like malaria

9:08

as a concept? Just think about it. What like

9:10

think of our like goals and ambitions in life.

9:13

And then this guy goes, yeah, I'm going to fight against

9:16

malaria. That's that's my goal. Well,

9:18

that's why I find him like fascinating as a

9:20

human being, because his second act

9:23

with the foundation is something

9:25

that most people can't accomplish in their entire

9:27

lives. Like you made Microsoft.

9:29

Yes. And then you made this foundation that just

9:32

like gets rid of diseases. Like

9:34

it's that to me is just like that's

9:36

fascinating about that type of the

9:38

psychology behind that type of human being because he

9:40

could have just been like, okay, I'm done. I made Microsoft

9:43

the most significant technology

9:45

company in modern times. And

9:48

he was like, No, I'm actually going to build

9:50

the most significant foundation in

9:53

modern times. And he had no experience

9:56

in foundations. You know, I

9:58

think part of the reason

9:59

There

10:00

are so many conspiracies around Bill Gates Is

10:04

exactly because of what you just said his action

10:06

doesn't make sense and we are extremely

10:10

extremely skeptical and suspicious

10:13

of actions that do not make sense because if

10:15

Bill Gates Just carried on

10:17

trying to make as mine I mean actively

10:20

like he's like I'm running Microsoft and I'm gonna

10:22

try and make it to 200 billion 300 everyone will

10:24

be like Yeah, I mean he's doing what he's doing. That's what

10:26

you do. You make that money But then Bill

10:28

Gates goes I'm gonna try and eradicate

10:31

disease and people are like guys kind of

10:33

he's trying to put microchips in our heads Bill

10:35

Gates kept telling people hey, we're not

10:38

ready for a pandemic and then when the pandemic

10:40

happened I thought people would go. Oh, man.

10:42

Thank you. Bill. You warned us. No people were like ha

10:46

you planned it all along How did you know

10:48

it was coming? Sneaky

10:50

sneaky man. Well played.

10:52

Well, well played

10:54

You just want to put those microchips in

10:57

our arms, which by the way, I'd love to know what

10:59

do people actually think the microchips do I've

11:02

never gotten to the bottom of this because I've asked

11:04

some people who are conspiracy theorists and they say Bill

11:06

Gates is trying to put microchips in us. I have some

11:08

friends by the way I don't know if you have Christiana like friends

11:11

in back home in Africa who because I have some

11:13

African friends who believe this they go Bill Gates is

11:15

here putting microchips inside

11:18

us and then I'm like, okay, but explain

11:20

this to me What

11:21

if the microchip do is

11:23

it controlling your mind? Is it

11:25

tracking you because I mean if Bill Gates wanted

11:27

to track you I think he could just use your

11:29

phone Which you keep on you all the time. They

11:31

haven't thought that far along. I only

11:34

know conspiracy theorists That's

11:36

probably a problem Would you

11:38

really want to be a billionaire? If I

11:40

say no, I'm lying if I say yes,

11:42

I look awful. So no comment I

11:45

like this. I like this one Ben

11:48

what about you? Would you be a billionaire

11:51

in an absolute heartbeat? I

11:54

mean Wow in the heart Wow, what do you

11:56

mean? I now see why the NHS is failing

11:58

in England. Look at this

12:00

Huh

12:01

our British compatriots are supposed to be the ones

12:03

who are pushing for a more equal society You

12:05

guys are both like Emmanuel. Would you want to be a

12:07

billionaire?

12:08

Oh dark is the money Where

12:11

did it come from if it's kind of like

12:13

Bill Gates were like he invented something that revolutionized

12:16

the world Helped me get online when I

12:18

was younger and talked to strangers that were much older

12:20

than me who I shouldn't have been talking to Thanks

12:22

for that. And that's fine. But if

12:24

it's like coming from dark places,

12:27

I don't want to part of that So I'll just stay

12:29

poor so clean money. You'd be a billionaire.

12:32

Yeah, sure And

12:33

then everyone can come on the yacht

12:35

with me and Rihanna I'm

12:37

really surprised. I'm really surprised. Okay

12:40

Trevor, would you be a billionaire? You probably already

12:42

are but would you be a billionaire? No, I've

12:45

and I'm not even lying when I say this I just so

12:49

I Think money in life at some point there's

12:51

diminishing marginal utility at some

12:53

point. The money is just the

12:55

money It's like what are you doing? Yeah, and so in

12:58

my life I've realized Yes,

13:00

I definitely need money because I'm not

13:02

crazy the world works a certain way But

13:05

the thing I'm searching for in life now is

13:07

access and being able to make an impact

13:09

in my own little world And that's why I wanted

13:11

to chat to Bill Gates, you know, how do you have

13:14

a billion or many billions

13:16

and not just think about yourself How

13:19

do you have billions and think about curing

13:21

diseases that don't affect you? I don't

13:23

think Bill Gates has ever had malaria or ever struggles

13:25

with it, you know

13:27

No, yeah, he's gonna be popping in soon. It's

13:29

gonna be it's gonna be a fun chance. Let's see

13:38

Forever oh the man the mr.

13:40

Legend William Henry Gates the

13:42

third but the streets calling Bill Gates

13:47

Yeah, I still think back to that incredible

13:49

tennis match we did together on the eve

13:51

of the pandemic It was phenomenal.

13:54

It really was we had we had four people

13:56

out there and the crowd loved you and we'll

13:59

have to do it again We really should.

14:01

I was chatting to Roger about it the other day and I was saying it was

14:04

the one... I still try and practice the tennis

14:06

just in case the day comes because of how

14:08

scary that was. You still play a

14:10

lot, don't you? I play a lot of tennis. Yeah, it's

14:13

my biggest hobby. Oh, okay. So that's your

14:15

like, switch off, just do your own thing, have a good

14:18

time. Yeah, a mix of tennis and pickleball.

14:21

If ever there was something that showed me that

14:23

humans are always prone to conflict,

14:26

tennis versus pickleball. No religion,

14:29

no race, no socio-economic

14:31

anything. Tennis players

14:34

hate pickleball players and they're coming for their

14:36

sculpts. And it's actually fascinating to see.

14:39

So which side? You're just on both sides,

14:41

you don't mind. Yeah, pickleball was actually

14:43

invented here in Seattle. So

14:45

I've been playing for 50 years

14:48

and I love both sports. So

14:50

it is funny to watch the fight over

14:53

the court space and

14:55

which one is better. They're both amazing. Which

14:57

one would you back yourself in? If you had to play one sport

15:00

against aliens to save the world, would you go

15:02

with tennis or pickleball? Well, I'm relatively

15:04

better at pickleball because I've been playing

15:07

so long compared to

15:09

other people. But both sports are amazing.

15:12

Are you a dink master or

15:14

do you focus on like spin? What do you go for?

15:16

You have to dink. If you don't dink, you're

15:19

not going to be very good. You have to have

15:21

this third shot. And it is

15:23

kind of a subtle game. You have long rallies

15:26

because you get into that dink, dink, dink thing.

15:29

Yeah, yeah. This

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17:18

So

17:19

there are a few people I have an opportunity to

17:21

speak to that elicit more,

17:23

I would say diverse

17:26

responses than you do. If

17:28

I say to somebody I'm speaking to, let's say a musician,

17:30

an actor, a scientist, and anybody,

17:33

everyone sort of has one line of questioning or

17:35

one idea. They go, oh, I love their music. I love what they do.

17:38

I know this from them. I know that from them. When

17:40

you say you're speaking to Bill Gates, I

17:42

have one or two friends who go,

17:44

oh my God, ask him about being a billionaire. Ask

17:47

him for money. We need some money. You

17:49

have one or two friends who go, I want to know

17:51

about malaria. I want to know what he's tracking

17:54

with mosquitoes. Are we getting closer? You talk

17:56

to other people, they go, let's talk about AI. Let's

17:58

talk about the future of computers and technology. And

18:00

then some people have random questions like, what's

18:03

his favorite computer right now? So maybe

18:06

let's start with this. How

18:08

does Bill Gates see Bill Gates? Because

18:10

you've had so many evolutions of who you are over

18:12

time. What do you see yourself

18:14

as primarily right now? Yeah,

18:17

so I had a long period from

18:19

about age 18 to 40 where

18:21

I was very monomaniacal.

18:24

That is, Microsoft

18:27

was everything. Once I dropped out,

18:30

I didn't let myself focus

18:32

on much else. Then

18:34

I was lucky enough that as other people

18:36

took over Microsoft, I

18:39

got to go and read and

18:42

learn about all the health challenges, why children

18:44

die. And that led

18:46

to the Gates Foundation being my full-time

18:49

work. So innovation

18:52

ties all those worlds together. And

18:55

today I'm involved in all of the Microsoft

18:57

with the AI work, the health stuff where

18:59

we continue to make amazing progress on

19:02

reducing childhood death. And now people

19:04

are realizing more than ever that if

19:07

we don't innovate to get rid of emissions,

19:10

we're going to be in deep trouble.

19:12

You know, I loved computers growing up. I

19:15

was on the hardware side. I didn't really have access to software.

19:18

I couldn't really program with the PCs that I could get

19:20

my hands on. But I loved hardware. My

19:23

favorite day was when the PCI slot

19:25

was invented. I remember

19:27

that being a defining moment for me. This changes

19:30

everything. And I would

19:32

love to know, for you, what

19:34

was the defining moment in your childhood that

19:36

steered you towards a career in technology?

19:39

Because people forget that when you were doing

19:41

this, this wasn't obvious. What was

19:43

the moment when Bill Gates went, this

19:45

is the thing that I'm going to dedicate my

19:47

mind, my life, my passion to? Yeah,

19:51

I was 13 when I did

19:53

very well on some math exams. And

19:56

so people were thinking, okay, he's good at math.

19:59

Like how well? Like really well. And

20:04

then a computer showed up

20:07

and people were having a very hard

20:09

time

20:10

figuring out what to do with it. So

20:13

people kept kind of egging me on saying,

20:15

Oh, you're really good at math. Why don't you come

20:17

down here? And so

20:19

I was part of the group that played around

20:21

with it. One of the teachers

20:24

made a mistake on the computer and lost $200.

20:28

So no teacher ever touched that

20:30

computer ever again. And,

20:33

uh, well, do you, do you remember what the mistake

20:36

was? Yeah, it was an infinite loop and it

20:38

was a time sharing computer where you actually

20:40

had to pay for the compute time and

20:42

he didn't hit the stop command.

20:45

He thought, why isn't the program doing

20:47

anything? But he had written what's called

20:49

an infinite loop. So

20:52

Paul Allen and I and a few others

20:54

kind of took over that computer room and lavished

20:59

our time on figuring out what

21:01

was going on. You ever make a mistake

21:03

that cost the school $200 or were you far beyond that?

21:07

Well, I understood to avoid an

21:11

infinite loop. We went around trying

21:13

to get pre computer time

21:15

offering up our services because computers

21:17

were very, very expensive back

21:19

then. Right. Right. We offered to

21:22

write all sorts of boring software

21:24

just so we could have access to computers.

21:28

So,

21:29

you know, you, you were there at the very beginning.

21:31

You were there at time when it was all

21:34

mystery and all opportunity. And I mean,

21:36

many would argue there's still as much mystery and as much

21:39

opportunity, but there's no denying

21:41

computers, technology, all of this is just, it's, it's

21:43

our lives now as somebody who

21:45

has been at the forefront and continues to look

21:47

at technology. How do you perceive

21:49

the role of technology in shaping human

21:52

morality? Because, you know, it's

21:54

one thing to think about what it can do, but do

21:56

you ever think about how technology

21:59

can. human morality and if it should.

22:02

Yeah, that's been interesting because until

22:05

social networking came along, I

22:08

always thought of computing

22:10

as helping us be more

22:12

moral and achieve our highest values

22:14

because you could go out and see

22:17

the lawsuit and read what was there.

22:19

You could go out and learn

22:21

the facts about inequity

22:23

or government budgets. And

22:25

you know when we made a word processor we thought

22:28

okay this allows anybody to

22:30

express themselves. It's like they have a big

22:32

typesetting machine. We never

22:35

thought oh they can do really rude

22:37

documents. It was just about

22:40

empowerment and productivity.

22:42

And then the idea with social

22:45

networks that you could kind of cluster around

22:48

crazy ideas or hate and

22:52

that outrage you know would

22:54

sort of get people to click more.

22:56

That was a huge disappointment

22:58

to me that the invention, the

23:01

digital revolution, had

23:03

kind of this negative side

23:06

that it played to some human weaknesses.

23:09

But until social networking

23:11

I always thought hey we're the empowerment

23:14

people. We're tools for the mind so

23:16

people can be more creative. And of course that's still

23:18

there in a fantastic

23:20

way but also now this fear

23:23

of what does it mean of letting

23:25

people cluster into their own groups and be

23:27

polarized. You know even the craziest

23:30

ideas people create

23:32

a community that yeah we all believe

23:34

this insane thing. You

23:38

know there's two parts to this for me.

23:40

In speaking to

23:43

the creators of this technology it feels

23:45

like most inventors and most

23:47

technologists are truly

23:50

trying to make the world a better place. I've

23:52

met not one who goes I'm trying

23:55

to burn the world down. And yet

23:57

it seems like that blind

24:00

ambition or that blind optimism becomes

24:02

a blind spot that sort of, you know, completely

24:05

obscures what the technology can be used

24:07

for. Do you think that's changing? Have

24:09

you seen that changing? When you even think about technology, do

24:11

you spend more time now thinking about the

24:14

potential side effect, the collateral damage,

24:16

as opposed to just what it can do positively? Absolutely.

24:19

You know, this idea of does the good

24:21

outweigh the bad and how do you minimize

24:23

the bad

24:24

is a huge challenge. However,

24:27

society, you can't depend on

24:30

the nerdy people

24:31

like myself to

24:34

understand what the

24:37

impacts are going to be and

24:39

to shape those, you know, and set the rules

24:41

around them. So now we

24:43

see this with AI, where again,

24:46

fantastic positive potential,

24:49

but people, at least

24:51

this time trying to anticipate,

24:53

okay, where will there be downsides and

24:56

can we minimize that? We

24:58

never did solve the social networking

25:00

problem. That's still out there. And

25:03

when you take the pandemic plus social

25:06

networking, what came out of

25:08

that, including some stuff

25:10

focused on me was completely

25:13

stunning, you know, a wild combination.

25:16

Has it changed your appetite

25:18

or your ability to do what you do? Because

25:21

you went from being Bill

25:23

Gates, the well-known

25:26

billionaire in the world, who's, you know, technology,

25:28

and then he's okay, he's doing things. He's trying

25:30

to help cure malaria. And I mean, this is how

25:33

I knew you, you know, you'd read the

25:35

stories. You'd see Bill Gates traveling around Africa,

25:37

helping, et cetera. And then all of

25:39

a sudden it became Bill Gates has

25:41

microchips inside the vaccine that

25:43

he's using to track you. I can't

25:46

help but imagine that that would

25:48

affect my ability. You know, if people said

25:50

all of those things about me and it started swelling

25:52

the way it did, there's a part of me that would

25:55

go, all right, I'm just going to go live by myself

25:57

and with my friends and do the

25:59

effect. at all? Well,

26:01

I was out on the street in Seattle and one came

26:04

up and yelling at me about,

26:06

you know, how I was tracking her and

26:09

I looked at her and I thought, gosh, I really don't

26:11

need to track you. I'm sorry. Let

26:16

me take the the chip out

26:18

of you. So

26:21

it's kind of funny in a way and most of people

26:23

I'm around know to laugh

26:26

about these things. The fact

26:28

that, you

26:28

know, a book that talked about Fauci

26:30

and I, you

26:31

know, having an evil plot and actually,

26:34

you know, killing millions of

26:37

children with vaccines. The fact that that could

26:39

sell so well, you know, was

26:41

just another surprise to me about

26:44

human nature and how

26:46

having an over simplistic explanation

26:49

of what was going on or the motivation. That

26:52

was kind of shocking. I haven't, you know,

26:54

withdrawn in any way. It's just

26:57

there, you know, you just you do have

26:59

to laugh about it. Right. But has it affected

27:01

your work in any way? Do you find any

27:04

resistance in some of the places you travel to now

27:06

where people say we've heard of you and we

27:08

don't like what you stand for, even though that's not what

27:10

you stand for? The attitude

27:13

towards me is not that key, but the

27:15

attitude towards vaccines has

27:17

been damaged a lot and

27:20

getting kids to take things like the measles

27:22

vaccine is super important in many

27:24

countries. You know, that's the difference

27:26

between life and death. So the

27:29

skepticism about vaccines

27:32

or medicine is very high

27:34

and that's making our health work a

27:36

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28:54

I often wonder about

28:58

messaging and storytelling and how important

29:00

it is to the implementation of any idea or getting anything

29:03

out there. You know, I wasn't around

29:05

for the very beginning of the computer, but

29:08

I'll never forget when my mom brought a Pentium, it

29:12

was a 386 or a 286 home. She

29:16

didn't know what it was, but she had a Pentium.

29:18

And she was like, I'm gonna get you a Pentium. And I was

29:21

like, I'm gonna get you a Pentium. And she was like, I'm gonna get

29:23

you a Pentium. And she brought it home. She didn't know what

29:25

it did. Some man had given it to her from an office that was being

29:27

cleared out. And she put

29:29

this in our bedroom and she said,

29:32

this is the future, learn how to use

29:34

it. And I said, what does it do? And she

29:37

said, your guess is as good as mine. It looks like a

29:39

TV that's connected to a typewriter. And

29:41

she said, go for it. But what I found

29:43

interesting was she didn't have apprehension.

29:46

I found people around me were intrigued. They

29:48

were excited. They wanted to know what it could do, where

29:50

it could take us, et cetera. And I

29:52

wonder if, because you were there at the Genesis,

29:55

is there a different storytelling

29:57

that happened around computers that isn't happening

29:59

around health?

29:59

Like what story were you telling people about

30:02

computers that they were so willing to jump in

30:04

to I mean something that's completely foreign Yeah,

30:07

the story was

30:08

very much about

30:09

Empowerment there was some

30:11

apprehension when computers were just

30:14

off there

30:15

being used by The government

30:17

and big corporations when

30:20

you got hobbyists Able

30:22

to assemble them and talk

30:24

about all the details Then

30:27

it felt like a bottom-up movement

30:29

that we the people Controlled

30:32

that computer and we were

30:34

going to use it to catch the

30:36

big company or to pursue

30:38

our Creativity and so it

30:40

really was a positive story You

30:43

know, I'd say Steve Jobs myself and

30:45

a few other people were actually

30:47

kind of evangelistic where we'd say, you

30:50

know Try this thing out tools

30:52

for the mind and It

30:54

was very generational that

30:57

young people were willing to be confused

30:59

and tried the thing out and Very

31:02

few older people got involved in

31:04

our industry was very very

31:07

young and Just incredibly

31:09

fast moving but it didn't have this.

31:12

Oh, this will be a tool for holocaust

31:14

denial or in a weird

31:17

Impacts and the idea that it would directly be

31:20

used for political

31:22

Influence, you know one country trying

31:24

to undermine another that

31:26

did not occur to us You

31:28

could say in this stage. We were kind of naive

31:31

if you could go back in time and

31:34

Do it all again knowing what you know

31:37

now What are some of the

31:39

changes you would make? What are some of the failsafes you

31:41

would put in would you continue to invent

31:43

the home computer as we know it? You know,

31:45

what what would Bill Gates do differently knowing

31:47

what he knows now. I I do

31:49

it all again Wait

31:53

wait even Windows millennium really boo.

31:55

Okay, we had a few products that

31:58

weren't perfect

31:59

gave us a hard time that you should wait till the third

32:02

version of our product because then, you know,

32:04

we'd get it pretty right. So yes, you

32:07

know, there are some detours

32:09

along the way. But even to

32:11

this day, you

32:12

know, how we should have shaped social networking.

32:15

You know, I think if you let people connect

32:18

and get together

32:20

and then you have this feed

32:22

that, you

32:23

know, you're trying to

32:24

keep people engaged. It

32:26

does speak to a human weakness that

32:29

it's more interesting

32:31

to hear something outrageous about

32:33

the person you don't like than it is

32:36

to be educated. They don't know their side kind

32:38

of has a point. And here's why they're

32:40

so exercised and pushing us in this

32:43

direction. And, you know,

32:45

I'm hopeful the next generation can take

32:48

that and curb how

32:50

difficult that is, but we still don't have a solution

32:52

to that problem, even as, you

32:54

know, now we have a that in a

32:56

way could supercharge some of that.

32:59

The sentence you just said is key to

33:01

me. You said trying to get people

33:03

engaged. So I find any

33:06

product or any service or any

33:08

technology that is designed,

33:11

you can often trace its floor back to the motivation.

33:13

You know, if you say we want as many

33:15

people to be engaged in this thing as possible,

33:18

there's a good chance that that is going to

33:20

override it being a good product or override

33:23

it being a healthy product, etc, etc. Let's

33:25

use snacks as an example. People

33:27

want somebody to eat as many snacks as possible.

33:30

You try and make the chip as tasty and as

33:32

addictive and as crunchy as possible because

33:34

you forgo everything. You don't design a fail

33:36

safe into a potato chip to stop people

33:38

from overindulging. And so

33:41

I wonder if it lies in the motivation.

33:44

If you think about it, let's say a computer, a PC,

33:47

once the PC was bought, that was it. You know, it was

33:49

like this is the tool the same as a car. You

33:51

know, they're not trying to get you to buy or use

33:54

the car as much as possible. It's like the

33:56

purchase is the purpose. And as we move

33:58

into like a service age. It feels

34:00

like we're becoming greedy

34:03

is the right word. You know what I mean? But we're saying

34:05

try and get people to do this as much as

34:07

possible at all costs. Stream endlessly,

34:10

eat endlessly, post endlessly,

34:12

consume endlessly.

34:14

And I wonder if that's something

34:16

that you've noticed on your side, you know,

34:19

because you weren't really creating things that needed to be

34:21

consumed, but rather things that needed to be used.

34:24

Yeah. In the early days, it was so neutral

34:26

that, okay, here's a word processor.

34:29

Here's a spreadsheet. And

34:31

of course, okay, video games were

34:33

the thing that,

34:35

yes,

34:35

you would stay up too late, but then

34:38

we hoped

34:39

your parents or, you know,

34:41

the fact you had to go make money the next day

34:44

that some level of a discipline would come in.

34:48

But the internet was really going

34:50

to enlighten people. It was going to make

34:52

people more capable

34:55

of

34:55

helping even with say political

34:58

decisions. And of course we did

35:00

see some of that, but the

35:03

idea that the overconsumption of,

35:05

okay, I really hate those other

35:07

people. Oh, here's somebody who can insult

35:10

that politician I don't like better than anyone.

35:12

I'm going to click on this. The

35:15

content that says, no, you know, we're one

35:17

country, we got to work together is kind of like, ah,

35:20

what a boring thing that is. Well,

35:22

yeah, it doesn't connect with anything. Yeah. Yeah.

35:25

And you don't, you're not outraged. And

35:27

you know, kind of my group knows better than

35:30

that. You know, humanity's always

35:32

had this us versus

35:34

them. And as we got wealthier, the idea

35:36

that we couldn't go beyond our

35:38

family to our clan, to our nation,

35:40

to all of humanity, you know, that was

35:42

supposed to be the progression. But

35:45

this has this a little bit retrograde,

35:48

you know, down to, hey, we're the people who believe,

35:50

you know, in QAnon.

35:53

So when you look at something like AI

35:55

today, obviously you are in rooms

35:58

where you're having conversations. that the rest

36:00

of us aren't. But even in the

36:02

basic conversations I've had with people who create

36:05

AI, work in AI, and then consume AI, this

36:08

seems to be the world

36:10

of extreme optimism. Anything is possible,

36:12

this is amazing. And then there's also a

36:15

really strong slither of fear

36:18

and doubt. People saying, we don't really know how

36:20

it works, we don't really know why it works, and

36:22

so we don't know what it'll go on to do. Where

36:24

do you stand in all of this?

36:27

Well, in the near term, the

36:29

productivity gain you get from AI

36:32

is very exciting. If you're programming,

36:34

it will suggest filling things in,

36:37

or

36:37

it'll help you create tasks.

36:39

It's taking away part of the drug

36:42

work. A doctor who has to fill out

36:44

paperwork, if the software

36:46

listens in, it can help write

36:49

the letters. And I think we will

36:51

begin to understand better why it works

36:53

so well, some of the time, and why

36:56

it seems so stupid at

36:58

other times. The big concern

37:00

is about the generations yet to come, when

37:03

it gets way smarter than

37:05

it is right now. And

37:08

if a person with malintent was

37:10

using that, say for a cyber attack,

37:12

or to make a deep fake that

37:15

makes a politician look like they're doing

37:18

something awful, or even one

37:20

of your relatives saying, okay, I've been kidnapped.

37:23

So this time, at least, we're considering

37:26

the negatives at the same time as

37:28

the positives. Sometimes I actually think we

37:31

go overboard looking at those negatives, because

37:34

the idea of a personal tutor for every

37:36

student, or medical

37:38

doctor type advice for people in Africa,

37:41

it's fulfilling such a basic

37:43

need. So the positives really

37:46

going to be pretty

37:48

amazing just in the next few

37:50

years.

37:51

I don't know if you've ever had this thought. I

37:54

find myself, obviously I've been

37:56

playing with every type of AI that

37:58

comes out, all the large language models.

39:59

It

40:00

is stunning. You know, the fact you can say,

40:03

write this like a pirate or write the

40:06

pledge of allegiance the way Trump would write

40:08

it. I mean, it is so fluent.

40:10

Let me ask you this.

40:13

Every single industry is looking at how

40:15

AI can help improve what it does. There are two

40:17

parts that if we don't address

40:20

could lead to mass disruptions. And I mean,

40:22

you see this in Africa in a different way. In

40:24

any new technology emerges, it

40:27

is bound to displace people who have

40:29

certain jobs. What we

40:31

do know is on the other side of that curve,

40:33

there is a possibility that more jobs will be created.

40:36

Now you literally saw this firsthand with the

40:38

computer. The computer displaced

40:40

what so many people were doing as their jobs. And

40:43

yet because of the computer, millions

40:45

and millions more people have jobs.

40:48

So with the AI, have

40:51

you seen a solution? Have you seen

40:53

any innovative bridges where people are

40:55

thinking of how to minimize that

40:57

gap? And do you think about the

41:00

ramifications of this technology that could

41:02

take jobs away? And if that gap is

41:04

long enough or big enough, what happens

41:06

in that? You know, we've seen when young men don't have

41:08

jobs, they become radicalized, they become violent,

41:11

they join extreme groups anyway in the world. It

41:13

doesn't matter what it is. Have you found a solution

41:15

to this? Do you think we're thinking hard enough about

41:17

this?

41:18

Well, if you zoom out, you

41:20

know, the purpose of life is not just to

41:23

do jobs. So if you eventually get

41:25

a society where you only have

41:27

to work three days a week or something, that's

41:29

probably okay. If the machines

41:32

can make all the food and the stuff and

41:34

we don't have to work as hard. There

41:37

are displacements. And

41:39

if they come slow enough, they're generational. So

41:42

you could have had a grandfather who thought the only real

41:45

job was being on a farm and then a father

41:48

who did some farm work and some other work.

41:50

And now this generation, only 2% of

41:53

Americans are involved

41:55

in farming in any way. And

41:57

that's okay, even though grandpa

41:59

would think. oh, that's awful. You're not getting

42:01

your hands dirty. So

42:04

if it proceeds at a reasonable

42:06

pace and the government helps those people

42:09

who have to learn new things,

42:12

then it's all good. It's the aging

42:14

society. It's okay because the

42:17

software makes things more productive.

42:20

But eventually, if you free

42:22

up human labor, you can help elder

42:24

people better, have small class sizes.

42:27

The demand for labor to do

42:29

good things is still there if

42:32

you match the skills to it.

42:34

And then if you ever get beyond that, okay, you

42:37

have a lot of leisure time and we'll have to

42:39

figure out what to do with it.

42:41

Yeah, I think that's the ultimate challenge.

42:44

I keep thinking to myself, the conversations

42:46

we're having around AI lie

42:49

right now, predominantly in, oh, which jobs

42:51

and which jobs do we give people? I keep

42:53

saying to my friends or anyone I speak

42:56

to is I go, what is

42:58

the purpose of a job though? Do

43:00

we still need it? Will we still need it? And

43:02

when society goes through a revolution

43:05

that eliminates many of the jobs that we've

43:07

considered our purpose, what becomes

43:10

our new purpose as people? Are we all

43:12

poets now? Are we all? I

43:15

really wonder what it is. I actually would like to go back to

43:17

what you said though about grandpa and farming.

43:20

What does Bill Gates know about farming that

43:22

nobody else does? Because the last

43:24

I checked, and I don't know if, please correct me if this is not

43:26

true, you are now the largest single

43:29

land owner in the United States of America.

43:32

And I'd love to know why. Why

43:34

would a man who's built his entire

43:36

empire on this ephemeral thing

43:39

that's in a cloud, why would

43:41

you think there's any importance in land

43:43

and agriculture? What are you seeing that we don't?

43:46

Yeah, it's amazing how diversified

43:48

the ownership is. I own about

43:50

one four thousandth of

43:53

the farmland, you know, so there's basically

43:55

no big

43:57

individual land. Okay. Okay. I

43:59

own a lot. You know, it's maybe 10% my

44:02

assets their decision to buy this

44:04

land was made by

44:06

people who help manage my money So

44:08

that we get a good return so that the foundation

44:12

Can buy more vaccines and

44:14

they saw that if we could invest

44:16

in Land and improving the productivity

44:18

of that land that you know, it would

44:21

have a good return So I was

44:23

kind of shocked

44:24

to see the headline saying I owned

44:27

the most Again, I guess it goes back to

44:29

our conversation It is brilliant framing because now

44:31

when you say, you know one four

44:33

thousandth own and then you're like, oh wait Wait,

44:36

wait, so now to say you're the single largest,

44:38

you know, it's like saying oh, you're the tallest child in

44:40

kindergarten It's like alright, we're not exactly measuring

44:44

But yeah Before

44:46

I let you go I'd love to know

44:48

Bill Gates

44:50

what now

44:52

we've been through a pandemic

44:55

we've Started a new journey

44:57

in technology AI. Where does it take

44:59

us? What does it mean? You know, you've been on a personal

45:01

journey, you know going through a very public divorce and

45:04

you know Your public life being out there

45:06

for everyone to scrutinize What now

45:08

for you? What are you looking forward to? Where

45:10

are you going and and what do you hope the next few years

45:12

of your life will be about? Well,

45:15

I'm super lucky, you

45:16

know all the work I do whether it's AI Innovation

45:20

and taking that so everybody can have a great

45:22

doctor a great personal tutor Health

45:25

work we do where you know, we still

45:27

have five million children die a year That's

45:29

down from ten million when we got started,

45:32

but it's still awful. So

45:34

things like malaria. We need to Get

45:36

rid of and then in climate we have

45:39

to avoid that, you know making our

45:41

lives work So I my work is super

45:43

fun My three children

45:45

are all doing well great to see

45:47

the world through their eyes You

45:50

know my ex-wife Melinda and I continue to

45:52

work at the foundation, which is very fulfilling.

45:55

I'm the luckiest person alive I hope

45:58

people see that the world's improving There's a lot

46:00

of despair out there. You know, if

46:02

we innovate in the right ways, something like climate

46:05

will not be an existential

46:09

problem. So I'm a little bit spreading the good news

46:11

while trying to drive the innovation

46:13

in all those three areas.

46:16

Yeah, sometimes I feel like it's a difficult

46:18

needle to thread. It's contradictory because on

46:21

the one hand, you have to draw people's attention

46:23

to all the things that are going wrong.

46:26

But on the other hand, you have to tell people that the world is

46:28

in a better place than it has ever been. And

46:31

it means, you know, there's a cognitive dissonance we have to

46:33

hold both of these truths at the same time.

46:35

Yeah, no, that is a paradox

46:37

that, hey, five million children are dying,

46:40

feel bad. By the way, you know,

46:42

at the turn of the century, it was double

46:45

that. And even with climate, you know, it's

46:47

definitely a glass half full. We're not

46:49

going as fast as we want because the

46:51

pandemic came. But you

46:54

know, a lot of brilliant people are being

46:56

funded and coming up with breakthrough

46:58

ideas. So a little bit,

47:01

people are overly negative right

47:03

now, I would say they

47:05

should see the hope because humans

47:07

are so inventive. Well,

47:11

I'll say this, it's always wonderful speaking to you.

47:14

And if I see any new conspiracy theories

47:16

about you, I will pass them on, but

47:18

also tell people they're not true. But

47:20

I pass them on first so that we have fun with them. And

47:23

then we go from there.

47:24

Trevor

47:36

Noah is produced

47:39

by Sponsored by Studios in partnership

47:41

with Day Zero Productions, Fullwell 73

47:43

and Audistice Pineapple Street Studios.

47:46

The show is executive produced by Trevor Noah, Ben Winston,

47:49

Jenna Weiss-Furman and Barry Finkel,

47:51

produced by Emmanuel Hapsis and

47:54

Marina Henke. Music mixing

47:56

and mastering by Hannes Brown.

47:59

Thank you so much for listening. Join

48:02

me next Thursday for another episode of

48:04

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This episode is brought to you by the podcast Tools

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