Elon Musk predicts that white-collar workers will be the first to be eliminated, with robot doctors surpassing humans within three years. This is not science fiction, but a reallocation of capital. This article dissects the logic behind this “supersonic tsunami” and analyzes how much time we have left to adapt as elites become redundant.
(Previous note: Musk’s comment on “Trump’s nationwide spending spree”: in the future, there will be no poverty, so no need to save money)
(Additional background: 2025 is approaching its end; none of Musk’s bold claims have come true yet)

Table of Contents

• The Reversal of Value Systems: Why is your MacBook more dangerous than a hammer?
• Energy and Hardware: The real bottleneck and power centers in the AI era
• Refutation and Reflection: Don’t use “human warmth” as an excuse to escape reality
• Conclusion: Choose to be a participant, not a survivor

I have seen countless “Next Big Things,” some are fleeting bubbles, others quietly reshape our lives. But this time, even I feel a chill down my spine.

Elon Musk’s recent deep conversation with futurist Peter Diamandis is less a technological forecast and more a “warning of expulsion” to humanity of the old era. He no longer talks about incremental change but uses a highly visual term: “Supersonic Tsunami.”

Imagine a tsunami rushing in at supersonic speed—people standing on the shore barely have time to feel the water rising before they are overwhelmed. That is the core message Musk wants to convey: we are experiencing a Singularity, and most people still think it’s just another wave of technological progress.

This dialogue reveals six realities that are about to overturn our cognition: from the existential confusion accompanying universal high income, the collapse of the white-collar class, the comprehensive takeover by robot doctors, the shift to space-based energy strategies to satisfy AI appetites, the transformation of higher education into mere social venues, and the urgency of energy storage for power grids.

As a long-term analyst tracking capital flows, I must say Musk’s timeline is perhaps as optimistic as ever—he claims robot doctors in three years, but we might see it in six—yet his “Vector” is absolutely precise. He is telling us: the rules of the old world are collapsing, and the ticket to the new world is running out of time to seize.

Today, we won’t discuss technical details. Instead, let’s explore the underlying logic behind this upheaval and why your anxiety might still be insufficient.

The Reversal of Value Systems: Why is your MacBook more dangerous than a hammer?

Over the past century, human society has built a stable hierarchy of values: moving away from physical labor, into offices; putting down shovels, picking up mice. We are taught that those who process information are more valuable than those who handle atoms. However, Musk’s perspective directly shatters this myth: white-collar workers will be the first victims of this AI revolution.

This sounds counterintuitive, but from a “First Principles” perspective, the logic is impeccable. AI’s essence is the extreme optimization of information processing. For a brain made of chips, tasks like drafting legal contracts, analyzing financial reports, or coding are just “bit” movements—free of physical friction, with near-zero replication costs.

Conversely, getting a robot to walk into your confusing bathroom, navigate through dirty clothes on the floor, and accurately fix a leaking faucet involves high-difficulty physical interactions with “atoms.” The physical world is full of chaos and unpredictability, which is AI’s current Achilles’ heel.

We are facing a rare “value inversion” in human history. The “office jobs” we once regarded as golden rice bowls are essentially low-efficiency biological computers. Musk uses a vivid metaphor: just as the advent of spreadsheets instantly eliminated the need for human calculators wielding slide rules, AI now is that super Excel, and most white-collar workers are those with slide rules.

When “sitting in front of a computer and typing” becomes the easiest skill to automate, our higher education system (Point 5) becomes painfully awkward. University degrees once served as tickets into the white-collar class; now they may become expensive “social entry passes.” If you still rely on degrees for security, you might be investing in an asset that’s about to become worthless.

Energy and Hardware: The real bottleneck and power centers in the AI era

If software is the soul of AI, then energy is its sustenance. Wall Street’s hottest discussion has shifted from “which AI model is the strongest” to “who has enough electricity.” Musk mentioned a critical overlooked data point: the average utilization rate of the US power grid is only half of its peak. This means, through large-scale battery storage, we can double the output of existing grids without building new power plants.

This is not just a technical issue; it’s a geopolitical and economic one. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), by 2030, the world’s data centers’ electricity demand will double from 460 TWh in 2024 to over 1,000 TWh. AI’s insatiable appetite for power explains why Musk sees space exploration as not only a means of colonizing Mars but also a way to move high-energy-consuming computing centers into orbit, harnessing the endless solar energy there.

A profound investment insight emerges: future hegemony will belong not only to the companies developing the most advanced algorithms but also to those controlling “Joules” and “Storage.”

As the marginal cost of AI models approaches zero, competition will revert to the physical layer. Who can provide the most stable power at the lowest cost? Who can deliver supplies into orbit the fastest? This is no longer a virtual bubble but a tangible infrastructure war. Musk is very accurate: between Earth’s energy transition and space energy development, there is a huge arbitrage space, and this will be the birthplace of the next generation of super enterprises.

Refutation and Reflection: Don’t use “human warmth” as an excuse to escape reality

When discussing AI replacing humans, the most common rebuttal I hear is: “Robots cannot replace human warmth,” “Healthcare and law require human judgment.” Many professionals hide behind this “humanity’s moat,” believing Musk’s claim that “robot surgeons will surpass humans within three years” is alarmist.

This view is not only naive but dangerous. It confuses “the essence of service” with “emotional added value.”

First, let’s look at data. Human doctors get tired, shake hands, and have emotional fluctuations. According to Musk’s “Recursive Multiplicable Triple Exponential” logic—where AI software, dedicated chips, and mechanical dexterity exponentially accelerate—Optimus robots will evolve far faster than biological evolution. When robot surgery precision reaches 10 times that of humans, and error rates drop to 1%, insurance companies and regulators will be the first to push for robot surgeries. Why? Because capital doesn’t care about “warmth,” it cares about “risk” and “compensation rates.”

Furthermore, opponents often cite UBI experiments, like Finland or Stockton, which show that UBI does not reduce work motivation and even improves mental health. Critics argue that Musk’s predicted “social unrest” and “loss of meaning” are overblown. But this rebuttal commits a serious “scale fallacy.”

Existing UBI experiments are conducted under the premise that “work still exists,” and the money is an extra buffer. Musk describes a world where “work disappears entirely.” When you are no longer needed, and society no longer relies on your labor to function, the existential dread is not something that can be alleviated by a few thousand dollars a month. It’s not about money; it’s a philosophical crisis about how humans, as social animals, define self-worth in a “post-labor era.”

Therefore, if you think that “human touch” or “creativity” alone can keep you safe in the AI tsunami, it’s like holding a paper umbrella against a nuclear blast—powerless and tragic.

Conclusion: Choose to be a participant, not a survivor

Musk’s timeline is known for being “imprecise,” and he may have overestimated the time to reach the endpoint (perhaps ten years instead of three), but his description of the future is rarely wrong. We are facing a dual future: on one hand, material abundance; on the other, spiritual and purpose-driven scarcity.

The most terrifying aspect of this “supersonic tsunami” is not its destructive power but its irreversibility. When the marginal cost of AI intelligence drops to zero, the old social contract—“learn skills, exchange for work, earn wages, buy a life”—will be completely broken.

At this turning point, your task is not to panic but to recalibrate your coordinates. Stop investing in skills that only process information; instead, seek those that connect to the physical world or can harness and guide AI. As Musk concludes, he chooses not to slow down but to fully participate. Surfing the wave might be our only option.