Elon Musk is no stranger to making headlines with his comments. But he might have just recorded one of his most quotable interviews ever.
In a 2.5-hour candid interview with comedian Joe Rogan for "The Joe Rogan Experience", Musk talks about why we're likely living in a simulation, how flamethrowers are "a terrible idea", smokes a joint, calls The Boring Company a "hobby", and issues a stark warning against our use of coal and artificial intelligence.
And that's just scratching the surface of the unwieldy but incredibly entertaining interview, which you can watch in full below.
Musk's Matrix-style simulation hypothesis comes from the fact that the Universe has been around 13.8 billion years, and in that vast period of time he says it's statistically likely a civilisation has figured out how to make a fully believable simulation. Once that happens, it would only be a matter of time before they set up their own fake multiverses.
"The argument for the simulation is quite strong, because … if you assume any rate of improvement at all then games will be indistinguishable from reality, or civilization will end," says Musk around the 43-minute mark.
"One of those two things will occur. Therefore, we are most likely in a simulation, because we exist."
If this is the case, the so-called "base reality" that's simulation our reality would probably be pretty boring, he says.
This isn't the first time he's shared this idea - back in 2016 at Recode's annual Code Conference he said:
"Given that we're clearly on a trajectory to have games that are indistinguishable from reality, and those games could be played on any set-top box or on a PC or whatever, and there would probably be billions of such computers or set-top boxes, it would seem to follow that the odds that we're in base reality is one in billions."
Although it's pretty out there to imagine us all living in a giant, advanced computer game, physicists are also intrigued with the idea and it's been shown that, theoretically at least, it's a possibility.
Musk also reiterated his grave concerns about artificial intelligence in the interview - which is something he has talked publicly about many times. But he still feels the risks aren't being taken seriously.
One are we don't pay nearly enough attention to, he says, is the merging of humans and technology, which is already happening at an alarming rate.
"You're already a cyborg," he tells Rogan.
"That phone is an extension of yourself. It's just that the data rate, the communication between you and the cybernetic extension of yourself that is your phone or computer is slow."
His most serious warning he reserved for our unrelenting burning of fossil fuels.
"We should not do this," he said, referring to removing fossil fuels from the ground and transferring it into the atmosphere.
"We know that sustainable energy is the end point. So why are we doing this experiment? It's an insane experiment. It's the dumbest experiment in human history."
But he admits he's still hoping for the best for humanity.
"I'd rather be optimistic and wrong than pessimistic and right," he explains.
After sipping whiskey during the interview, Musk takes a puff of a joint at one point, which he says he doesn't so often as he doesn't like to have his productivity hindered.
"It's like a cup of coffee in reverse," says Musk. "I like to get things done. I like to be useful."
Watch the whole interview above or on Joe Rogan's YouTube channel to get some fascinating insight into Musk's mind, and the future of Tesla and SpaceX.
Whether you love him or hate him, you can't deny Musk has an interesting point of view.