Latest / UK Column Radio / Elon’s Flying Car is Theatre | Jerm Warfare Weekly Banter

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Elon’s Flying Car is Theatre | Jerm Warfare Weekly Banter · UK Column Radio

0:03
Speaker 1: Thank you.
0:30
Speaker 2: My name is Jerm. This is Jerm Warfare, the battle
0:33
Speaker 2: of ideas. Everybody that I know lives for the weekend
0:36
Speaker 2: and I don't.
0:40
Speaker 1: It's just us because they hit their jobs.
0:44
Speaker 3: That's a very existential problem, isn't it?
0:48
Speaker 2: You shouldn't separate your life like that into work and non-work.
0:54
Speaker 2: Everything should be integrated because that's a more enjoyable experience.
1:00
Speaker 1: Ideally, everybody should have the opportunity to find something that
1:06
Speaker 1: actually inspires them and motivates them. But for a lot
1:12
Speaker 1: of people, if not most, these days, work is a
1:16
Speaker 1: means to an end and they have no passion for it,
1:19
Speaker 1: no real interest in it. And so inevitably, they're living
1:23
Speaker 1: for evenings and weekends.
1:25
Speaker 2: That's interesting because what you're kind of echoing inadvertently is
1:30
Speaker 2: what Yuval Harari has argued, that people need to become
1:34
Speaker 2: useless eaters and not work.
1:41
Speaker 1: I think that's... I think... Karl Marx also, by the way,
1:50
Speaker 1: argued that. Quite possibly.
1:53
Speaker 3: Look....
1:55
Speaker 1: That is where, of course, the AI crowd want us
1:59
Speaker 1: to go. But my question is, what are people going
2:04
Speaker 1: to occupy their time with? I think we got an
2:11
Speaker 1: insight to that 2020, 2023 with most people sitting in
2:20
Speaker 1: front of the TV and watching Netflix.
2:24
Speaker 2: Well, you just created a segue there for me. So
2:28
Speaker 2: I don't know if you guys know about this. My
2:30
Speaker 2: assumption is you might or you might not. Either way,
2:32
Speaker 2: I'm just going to quickly play this little clip because
2:34
Speaker 2: it's quite relevant.
2:42
Speaker 3: Four, three, two, one.
3:08
Speaker 1: Well, it worked.
3:11
Speaker 3: Flying cars are real.
3:14
Speaker 4: Yeah.
3:15
Speaker 5: Well, a friend of mine, Peter Thiel, once said that
3:18
Speaker 5: the future promised us flying cars, but instead we got
3:21
Speaker 5: 140 characters. Well, not anymore. It takes the fun meter
3:24
Speaker 5: to 11 hours. I mean, I've seen a lot of things,
3:32
Speaker 5: but I've never seen that before.
3:35
Speaker 3: Tony Hawk would be proud.
3:36
Speaker 2: We call that the kickflip.
3:37
Speaker 5: Like, this goes fast. Well, I said less than once. Okay,
3:53
Speaker 5: let's do the last one.
4:03
Speaker 2: Okay, so that happened just a few days ago or
4:05
Speaker 2: a few nights ago. Elon Musk, as you saw there,
4:09
Speaker 2: promoting something fairly incredible on the face of it. That's
4:17
Speaker 2: exactly where I'm going. Okay, so there's a weird dichotomy
4:21
Speaker 2: going on here. So if you look online, there's a
4:23
Speaker 2: huge amount of talk around this whole Tesla thing. He's
4:28
Speaker 2: using SpaceX technology to create some variation of a quote-unquote
4:33
Speaker 2: flying car.
4:35
Speaker 3: I want to slow down. No, he isn't. What, are
4:39
Speaker 3: you saying it's AI?
4:41
Speaker 1: I'm not saying it's AI. I'm saying all the windows
4:44
Speaker 1: were blacked out because there's nothing in there other than gear.
4:47
Speaker 1: There's no room for people.
4:48
Speaker 3: There's no one in there.
4:49
Speaker 1: It's complete fraud. And he's not creating a flying car.
4:52
Speaker 1: That might be a good demonstration of vector thrust, but
4:54
Speaker 1: it's not.
4:56
Speaker 3: It's a marketing gimmick.
4:58
Speaker 4: Hang on just for the benefit of the people who
5:01
Speaker 4: are listening and not watching because I think that a
5:03
Speaker 4: lot of them just describe what it is we have
5:05
Speaker 4: been watching I mean I know what I think I'm
5:07
Speaker 4: looking at but.
5:09
Speaker 2: Well Elon uh uh uh presented uh I don't even
5:14
Speaker 2: know how you describe it. Uh, quote unquote, quote flying car.
5:18
Speaker 2: He had a tester that went up a ramp that
5:20
Speaker 2: defied gravity, went upside down and then fell and then
5:24
Speaker 2: land on the ground using thrusters. Uh, and then, and
5:27
Speaker 2: then it drove and, and kind of flew, jumped, it
5:30
Speaker 2: flew over a series of vehicles and landed on the
5:33
Speaker 2: other side of them using the same thrusters. Uh, and, um,
5:37
Speaker 2: and everybody's going crazy for this. Now, I'm from Africa,
5:41
Speaker 2: and I don't like to drive girly cars. I like
5:45
Speaker 2: to drive vehicles that are on the ground and that
5:47
Speaker 2: can go over rocks and actually do something with it.
5:51
Speaker 2: I don't understand what this desire for acceleration and speed
5:55
Speaker 2: and lift is all about.
5:57
Speaker 3: It's technocratic.
6:00
Speaker 1: Well, the left bit, I agree with you, but acceleration
6:03
Speaker 1: and speed I'm quite happy with, so don't take that
6:06
Speaker 1: away from me.
6:08
Speaker 3: Well, you can't go fast anyway.
6:09
Speaker 1: I mean, you can't.
6:11
Speaker 2: What are you going to do? You're going to get
6:11
Speaker 2: stuck in traffic. What, you're going to jump over the
6:13
Speaker 2: other cars?
6:14
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay. Didn't used to be like that, though.
6:20
Speaker 2: But the whole thing is that it's all about technological progress.
6:23
Speaker 3: Now, what progress is this?
6:25
Speaker 2: I'm sure that there are perhaps downstream technological advances that
6:30
Speaker 2: come from stuff like this, but I'm trying to figure
6:33
Speaker 2: out the whole thing, the narrative here. Firstly, it's done
6:38
Speaker 2: at night, right? So I'm all about sunshine. Um, so this,
6:42
Speaker 2: this adds to the sort of the magic trick, um,
6:45
Speaker 2: appeal of, of, of what he's doing. And I'm not
6:47
Speaker 2: trying to, cause I don't want to sound like one
6:49
Speaker 2: of those, one of those grumpy old farts is just
6:52
Speaker 2: moaning about what clearly is fairly advanced, but I just
6:55
Speaker 2: don't see the, the real world application.
6:59
Speaker 3: There isn't one. It's completely pointless.
7:04
Speaker 4: Um, and, and it, you didn't need a segue cause
7:06
Speaker 4: this is directly related to your weekend question. Um, I
7:14
Speaker 4: think I would.
7:14
Speaker 3: Take issue with you where you say that.
7:19
Speaker 4: Everything in life should be integrated because I think no
7:22
Speaker 4: matter how worthy your employment or whatever it is that
7:29
Speaker 4: you do do during working hours, I think it is
7:33
Speaker 4: not healthy. either for the individual or the family or
7:39
Speaker 4: the friends around them, that person is completely engaged in
7:43
Speaker 4: that whole time mentally. I think you do need to
7:46
Speaker 4: separate yourself. And actually, I think that there is benefit
7:51
Speaker 4: both sides. If you are focused on one thing that
7:55
Speaker 4: might be described as work, then to step back from
7:59
Speaker 4: that at the right intervals, I think is healthy because
8:05
Speaker 4: it It enables you to see things in a different
8:08
Speaker 4: way and to refresh, recharge, all that sort of stuff.
8:12
Speaker 4: But really, I think where I was going with that,
8:14
Speaker 4: especially when you started talking about Yuval Harari, is the
8:18
Speaker 4: idea of what are we for? And my belief certainly
8:23
Speaker 4: is that we're here to be useful. And Elon Musk
8:27
Speaker 4: is not useful. And these silly little cars are not
8:30
Speaker 4: useful anymore. So I think it's totally related to the
8:35
Speaker 4: idea of what work actually is. And Mike's point about
8:40
Speaker 4: the majority of people hating their jobs is because we
8:44
Speaker 4: have come to see work as being doing stuff for
8:49
Speaker 4: other people, doing stuff for other people that we wouldn't
8:51
Speaker 4: otherwise choose to do ourselves because it doesn't really make
8:53
Speaker 4: that much sense to us. And therefore, you're working in
8:56
Speaker 4: a factory producing a sort of prototype model flying car.
9:02
Speaker 4: I mean, what for? What on earth is that really
9:06
Speaker 4: doing for humanity? And I absolutely don't even buy the
9:11
Speaker 4: idea that it's sort of inspiring people either. I think
9:15
Speaker 4: it's just, it's completely ludicrous. And it's no different from
9:22
Speaker 4: It's just, you know, look over here and forget about
9:24
Speaker 4: everything else. Whereas if, going back to your point about integration,
9:30
Speaker 4: if in actual fact we did live a life that,
9:34
Speaker 4: of course, we used to live years ago where it
9:37
Speaker 4: was really just about survival and the betterment of your circumstances,
9:44
Speaker 4: then I don't think we'd have this sort of mental
9:48
Speaker 4: distinction about survival difference between work and sort of other stuff,
9:54
Speaker 4: work and play or work and leisure or where you
9:57
Speaker 4: derive satisfaction and whatnot. And this, what Musk is presenting
10:03
Speaker 4: is the sort of the epitome of it. He's showing
10:05
Speaker 4: something that nobody, no one looking at that will ever
10:10
Speaker 4: come close to being able to do it. Whereas if
10:14
Speaker 4: he'd shown us around his garden and explained how he'd
10:19
Speaker 4: managed to produce food for his family for the next
10:22
Speaker 4: few years because he'd set up this, that and the other, yeah, okay,
10:26
Speaker 4: then maybe I would be interested. But there's absolutely no
10:29
Speaker 4: practical benefit to what he's.
10:34
Speaker 3: Putting out there, I would say.
10:37
Speaker 2: And I said technocratic earlier because I think it is.
10:41
Speaker 2: You'll notice he dropped in his friend Peter Thiel in
10:45
Speaker 2: the comment, who is, as we know, part of Palantir
10:50
Speaker 2: and sort of the global surveillance infrastructure that Catherine Austin
10:54
Speaker 2: Fitz talks about. But it is technocratic in the sense
10:59
Speaker 2: also that what he's presenting is something that nobody wants.
11:03
Speaker 3: It is going up and faster.
11:05
Speaker 2: And that's the exact opposite of what we should be
11:08
Speaker 2: doing if we want to exist in the now.
11:12
Speaker 1: Well, I mean, you may not see the purpose of it,
11:16
Speaker 1: but maybe we should look at Terminator for an idea
11:22
Speaker 1: of where that's going.
11:25
Speaker 3: Exactly.
11:25
Speaker 1: And the robot killing machines that were flying around in
11:29
Speaker 1: the vision of the future that was in that film.
11:32
Speaker 1: I think that's, you know, he is attaching this technology
11:37
Speaker 1: to a car in order to make it palatable for
11:41
Speaker 1: you and me. It's not palatable for you and me,
11:44
Speaker 1: but for the average man in the street, let's put
11:46
Speaker 1: it that way. We should not forget that SpaceX and
11:50
Speaker 1: everything that Musk does is actually about, I mean, it
11:54
Speaker 1: is without question now about warfare and so-called defense.
12:01
Speaker 2: Yes, and DARPA will absolutely be involved at some point,
12:05
Speaker 2: if not already.
12:06
Speaker 1: I think we're past that, Jerem. I think these things
12:10
Speaker 1: are not government-driven anymore. These things are corporate-driven, and the
12:15
Speaker 1: ideas are sold to the nations. There's a big furore
12:21
Speaker 1: going on at the moment about whether Ukraine has access
12:25
Speaker 1: to Starlink or not, and what the Rubio was saying
12:32
Speaker 1: was well they've never not had access to Starlink it's
12:35
Speaker 1: I can't remember the name of the of the so-called
12:38
Speaker 1: militarized version of it um which is using all the
12:41
Speaker 1: same satellites and all the same hardware so so you
12:44
Speaker 1: know it's just it's just semantics at the end of
12:46
Speaker 1: the day so so he.
12:49
Speaker 2: Did you know that South Africa doesn't have a um
12:51
Speaker 2: Starlink and it's because Elon Musk uh he won't he
12:55
Speaker 2: won't allow Starlink to open in South Africa unless uh
12:58
Speaker 2: his company has got majority shareholder um ownership of the company.
13:03
Speaker 2: So there's a big sort of legal battle going on.
13:07
Speaker 2: I'm not quite sure where that fits in, but I
13:10
Speaker 2: thought that, you know, it's a bit of interesting trivia.
13:14
Speaker 3: I mean, Starfield is what it's called. Yes, thank you.
13:18
Speaker 3: But it's a joke.
13:20
Speaker 4: You look at that map of where Starlink is available
13:27
Speaker 4: and look at the gaps on Russia, Belarus, North Korea, Actually,
13:31
Speaker 4: I think Venezuela has now been instated or reinstated. Cuba
13:37
Speaker 4: and Iran, I think. Although Iran did have... Iran was...
13:43
Speaker 4: I can't remember what did happen there. I'm pretty sure
13:46
Speaker 4: it's available to Iran, but the Iranian government.
13:49
Speaker 1: Has blocked it.
13:50
Speaker 3: That's what it was.
13:51
Speaker 1: That's right.
13:51
Speaker 3: Yes, that's right. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, who's in charge? But,
13:58
Speaker 3: I mean, going back to the car.
14:01
Speaker 2: Thing, there are just so many weird sort of philosophical
14:04
Speaker 2: aspects to it. Maybe I'm overlooking it. But, I mean, again,
14:09
Speaker 2: I said earlier, it's done at night, which is typically
14:11
Speaker 2: David Copperfield illusion theater. You know, you're standing and you're watching.
14:16
Speaker 2: It has no person driving it. So that's another weird thing.
14:20
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, exactly. This is it.
14:22
Speaker 4: I just, honestly, the lack of soul and imagination, it's
14:26
Speaker 4: so sterile, it's so boring. You know, where's the Dukes
14:31
Speaker 4: of Hazzard element to it?
14:33
Speaker 3: Or, I mean, okay, the first time.
14:36
Speaker 4: But honestly, there's nothing there, is there?
14:40
Speaker 3: There's no thrill.
14:42
Speaker 4: I remember the thrill the first time I ever took
14:45
Speaker 4: off in my Peugeot 205 crossing a very small humpback
14:50
Speaker 4: bridge in Northumberland.
14:50
Speaker 3: I mean, it was absolutely thrilling. It really was.
14:53
Speaker 4: You absolutely didn't know whether the wheels were going to
14:56
Speaker 4: stay on. But watching Elon Musk, it's just boring. It
15:02
Speaker 4: is boring. Again, really, what does anyone get out of it?
15:07
Speaker 4: Because they did do it, didn't they? Which is the
15:10
Speaker 4: Bond film where they have the car roll crossing that
15:15
Speaker 4: bit of water in Florida? Because they did do that. Yeah,
15:19
Speaker 4: it was Live and Let Die. Live and Let Die, yeah.
15:21
Speaker 4: What do you mean?
15:22
Speaker 3: You mean they actually did that? Yeah, they actually did it.
15:25
Speaker 3: That stunt they actually did. Wow. Yeah.
15:28
Speaker 4: So, you know, this is why it's just such a
15:31
Speaker 4: poor comparison. You know, honestly, what does he think he's doing?
15:35
Speaker 4: Trying to dazzle a world that has seen people actually
15:40
Speaker 4: do stuff. It shouldn't work. People should not be looking
15:44
Speaker 4: at that thinking, wow. If he got in the car
15:48
Speaker 4: and did some of the jumping, yeah, okay, that would
15:51
Speaker 4: be good.
15:51
Speaker 3: But he's not.
15:53
Speaker 1: But the whole frontier. They actually did the running across
15:56
Speaker 1: the backs of the alligators, by the way. Did they really? Yeah,
16:00
Speaker 1: they did.
16:00
Speaker 5: What?
16:00
Speaker 1: Okay.
16:02
Speaker 3: That's a great study.
16:03
Speaker 1: The guy that owned the alligator farm, he dressed up
16:05
Speaker 1: as 007 and ran across. Yeah, it came close to disaster,
16:09
Speaker 1: but they did it.
16:14
Speaker 3: Well, there you go. I mean, those were the days. Yes.
16:18
Speaker 1: They wouldn't do that anymore. It'd be some rubbish CGI.
16:22
Speaker 1: And the other question is, was that CGI? We've no
16:25
Speaker 1: real way of knowing, do we? I don't think it was, but,
16:30
Speaker 1: you know, we've no way of actually knowing whether it
16:32
Speaker 1: was CGI.
16:33
Speaker 2: I'll tell you what, if you go onto X and
16:35
Speaker 2: you try and find any cell phone footage of it,
16:38
Speaker 2: it's almost impossible to find.
16:39
Speaker 3: It's all official footage. I would imagine.
16:41
Speaker 4: Yes.
16:41
Speaker 3: Yeah.
16:42
Speaker 2: There are one or two clips, they say, filmed with
16:45
Speaker 2: an iPhone, this or whatever, but it looks quite professional. But,
16:48
Speaker 2: I mean, you've got all these hundreds of people there
16:51
Speaker 2: with phones, and there are no videos that I can find. Hmm.
16:56
Speaker 4: Hmm.
16:59
Speaker 3: But I don't want.
17:00
Speaker 2: To suggest that there aren't any. I might just be
17:03
Speaker 2: looking in the wrong place, but I haven't found any.
17:06
Speaker 2: But there's another weird philosophical element here. I mean, I
17:09
Speaker 2: keep thinking of the sort of technocratic angle because we
17:14
Speaker 2: speak all the time on this show about looking inward
17:18
Speaker 2: and improving and creating a better world starting with ourselves.
17:23
Speaker 2: This is looking outward. There's no human element. It's just
17:27
Speaker 2: watching a machine do its own thing using technology. And
17:32
Speaker 2: you just now in the audience, you are now the
17:35
Speaker 2: useless eater.
17:37
Speaker 1: But why does that surprise you?
17:38
Speaker 2: No, it doesn't surprise me. It's just more confirmation.
17:41
Speaker 1: That's the agenda that's being sold to us since at
17:45
Speaker 1: least 2020, probably further back than that, but, you know.
17:50
Speaker 1: We were told during COVID, sit on your sofa, watch Netflix.
17:55
Speaker 1: You're not allowed to go out. You're not allowed to
17:56
Speaker 1: do anything. You're not allowed to be a human being.
17:59
Speaker 1: Just be there and consume. And that is the direction
18:05
Speaker 1: of travel, that we become nothing but consumers. And as
18:09
Speaker 1: AI and robotics are rolled out, their intention is, whether
18:13
Speaker 1: they achieve this or not is another question, but their
18:15
Speaker 1: intention is that consumers productivity becomes a function of the
18:20
Speaker 1: AI and the robotics economy becomes a function of those.
18:26
Speaker 1: And therefore, there's free money for you and me to
18:29
Speaker 1: sit at home and do nothing in our 15-minute city.
18:32
Speaker 2: I wonder what Elon has actually done to benefit people
18:37
Speaker 2: as a whole. He argues from this sort of humanitarian.
18:43
Speaker 3: I can't think of anything.
18:45
Speaker 1: Because remember what these people are. They are transhumanist. They
18:48
Speaker 1: want to see the end of the human race in
18:51
Speaker 1: favor of some kind of silicon-based intelligence.
18:55
Speaker 3: Which is uploaded to the Matrix.
18:58
Speaker 1: Well, they would eventually upload themselves to this silicon infrastructure somehow.
19:04
Speaker 4: Hmm. I think I look forward more to the video
19:08
Speaker 4: of him having his head cut open and having that
19:11
Speaker 4: stupid Neuralink thing.
19:12
Speaker 3: Put in his brain. That might be better.
19:16
Speaker 2: I remember when I was in the UK, Charles, you
19:19
Speaker 2: and I were driving and you were telling me about
19:22
Speaker 2: one day driving down Africa. towards south africa and that
19:28
Speaker 2: sounds so much better than watching a car flip and
19:31
Speaker 2: turn and jump over trucks you know the actual real
19:35
Speaker 2: the real world experience of wheels on the ground and
19:39
Speaker 2: seeing the scenery and the beauty of the world around
19:41
Speaker 2: you and just life absolutely in the daytime in.
19:45
Speaker 4: The daytime yeah although yes yes definitely more sensible to
19:49
Speaker 4: do in the daytime What I mean is.
19:51
Speaker 2: Is that his, his, his show was, his whole theater
19:54
Speaker 2: was at night because of the spectacle. Yeah.
19:58
Speaker 4: Yeah.
19:58
Speaker 3: No, well, that's it.
19:59
Speaker 4: And that's, you know, again, it's just another, it's another
20:02
Speaker 4: sad part of the reality. I mean, as I say,
20:05
Speaker 4: I really don't think this is any different from the
20:08
Speaker 4: job that sort of, well, I don't know if it's
20:11
Speaker 4: still a thing, but Saturday evenings, I think that you
20:14
Speaker 4: just have sort of game shows on television. Okay, maybe
20:19
Speaker 4: mildly entertaining at times, but ultimately utterly pointless and a
20:22
Speaker 4: complete waste of your life to participate or watch. And yet, yeah,
20:28
Speaker 4: This is basically the same thing because it's separate and
20:33
Speaker 4: it's unattainable and meaningless. So what if a car without
20:42
Speaker 4: anyone in it can go up a ramp and come
20:45
Speaker 4: back down without smashing into a thousand pieces?
20:47
Speaker 3: Doesn't... Absolutely.
20:50
Speaker 4: I take Mike's point. This is about proving a concept
20:55
Speaker 4: for completely separate purposes. But for people to sit there
20:59
Speaker 4: sort of grinning like idiots thinking, oh, well, you know,
21:01
Speaker 4: this is great.
21:03
Speaker 3: Because what? Because you're going to go out and buy one?
21:04
Speaker 3: I don't think so. Well, the deposit.
21:09
Speaker 2: on one of those is 250,000 US dollars. And that's
21:13
Speaker 2: only gonna come out in 2028.
21:15
Speaker 3: That's just the deposit.
21:17
Speaker 2: Now, meanwhile, I have a Chinese car and I love
21:20
Speaker 2: Chinese cars because they're entering the market at much lower
21:24
Speaker 2: barriers to entry.
21:26
Speaker 3: They're doing the exact opposite.
21:28
Speaker 2: So BYD, Chery, GWM are coming in at great, great,
21:32
Speaker 2: great price points with vehicles that actually make a difference to.
21:35
Speaker 3: Your daily life.
21:37
Speaker 2: Not a car that jumps over your house.
21:42
Speaker 3: Yeah, for now.
21:43
Speaker 4: It'd be interesting to see where their prices go in
21:46
Speaker 4: five years once they've established themselves.
21:48
Speaker 3: And again, what's the point? What do you want to do?
21:50
Speaker 2: If you're going to boost your car, what, over an intersection?
21:55
Speaker 2: I just don't understand the real-world application. And you can
21:58
Speaker 2: only do it once because those tanks need to get refilled.
22:01
Speaker 2: The whole thing doesn't make any sense. But people are
22:06
Speaker 2: going crazy for it. This is the term bread and circuses.
22:12
Speaker 2: What people are going crazy for us?
22:14
Speaker 3: Well, Ben Shapiro, et cetera, et cetera, and all the
22:17
Speaker 3: sort of big names.
22:18
Speaker 1: Thank you. All the people that are getting paid, you mean?
22:23
Speaker 5: Yeah.
22:23
Speaker 1: All the influencers.
22:26
Speaker 2: And ultimately, this is about pushing, I think, share price
22:30
Speaker 2: for Tesla and SpaceX up and, you know, doing, again,
22:34
Speaker 2: it's clever marketing.
22:36
Speaker 1: There's that, and it is clever marketing because they are
22:40
Speaker 1: giving a demonstration without giving a demonstration, if you know
22:43
Speaker 1: what I mean. They're not overtly explaining what the technology
22:47
Speaker 1: is for. And they might find some one or two
22:52
Speaker 1: suckers to buy it for whatever. But I mean, who's
22:57
Speaker 1: going to be allowed to use it on the roads?
22:59
Speaker 1: It's not going to be something that's ever going to
23:00
Speaker 1: be allowed to be used. What's funny is how....
23:06
Speaker 2: What's funny is online, they're now trying to grill BYD
23:10
Speaker 2: because BYD have got a car that is beautiful, but
23:14
Speaker 2: it does a little hop, just a little hop. But
23:16
Speaker 2: I think that's just for things in the road, right?
23:20
Speaker 2: And they're going, oh, well, this is what the Chinese
23:22
Speaker 2: can do. Accepting the difference is that BYD has a
23:25
Speaker 2: real-world vehicle that you can buy and use daily. This Tesla,
23:31
Speaker 2: you can't. So, again, even in that instance, if you
23:36
Speaker 2: wanted to.
23:36
Speaker 1: Quite honestly, I'm not massively excited by anything that BYD
23:40
Speaker 1: is selling either. I think it's... Well, yeah, I mean,
23:44
Speaker 1: it's electric.
23:45
Speaker 3: It's electric, so... Yeah, exactly.
23:46
Speaker 2: It's a bad start. Particularly if you're down here where
23:51
Speaker 2: I live. I mean, having electric is just pointless. I
23:55
Speaker 2: much prefer ice anyway. It's nice to be able.
23:57
Speaker 3: To hear that.
23:57
Speaker 1: And don't even think about getting onto the new Jaguar.
24:00
Speaker 1: Let's not talk about that because we'll end up in
24:05
Speaker 1: tears very quickly.
24:06
Speaker 2: I had a friend... We had some friends over this
24:08
Speaker 2: weekend and he.
24:10
Speaker 2: He was telling me that he got himself a classic
24:13
Speaker 2: Porsche 911. Now, there's a car that goes back to
24:16
Speaker 2: the 80s, 90s. It doesn't have anything in the front
24:20
Speaker 2: other than, I think, a CD player. It's got no
24:23
Speaker 2: screen or anything. And all you do is you get
24:25
Speaker 2: in and you turn the ignition and you just hear
24:29
Speaker 2: the sound of the engine. That still is great if
24:33
Speaker 2: you like an on-road vehicle. I personally prefer an off-road vehicle,
24:36
Speaker 2: but that is still at least a car. I remember
24:40
Speaker 2: with a mutual friend of ours whose name I won't mention,
24:43
Speaker 2: and he was at the UK Column event. And he
24:49
Speaker 2: refuses to buy any modern cars. He says, because what
24:53
Speaker 2: is going on? They're losing the feel, the actual feel
24:57
Speaker 2: of what it is just to drive a vehicle, a
24:59
Speaker 2: nice car, because you like to have that power under
25:03
Speaker 2: your foot. You don't want a fake sound to mimic
25:07
Speaker 2: the engine, for example, which is what electric cars do.
25:10
Speaker 2: You want the sound of the internal combustion. There's nothing
25:14
Speaker 2: wrong with that. It doesn't need to jump and fly
25:18
Speaker 2: and everything. You just want to feel the ground under
25:21
Speaker 2: your feet, so to speak.
25:26
Speaker 3: At least I do.
25:29
Speaker 1: I think everybody knows my views on this. Nothing more
25:36
Speaker 1: modern and 2015 is is probably that's probably about as
25:40
Speaker 1: modern as you want because after that they started bringing
25:44
Speaker 1: in all the uh electric steering and uh lane assist
25:50
Speaker 1: and all the other stupid technologies that nag the hell
25:54
Speaker 1: out of you the whole time uh.
25:56
Speaker 2: Have you ever have you ever have you ever driven
25:58
Speaker 2: when the power steering has actually malfunctioned and turned off
26:01
Speaker 2: you you can't turn that that steering wheel.
26:05
Speaker 1: That wasn't my concern. My concern was that if lane
26:09
Speaker 1: assist is on, that car will quite happily steer you
26:14
Speaker 1: into hazards if you try to swerve to avoid something.
26:18
Speaker 1: Or even if it's switched on on a country road,
26:22
Speaker 1: it becomes extremely hazardous because it will fight you as
26:26
Speaker 1: you attempt to go around corners and this kind of thing.
26:29
Speaker 1: Because it assumes you don't know how to get around
26:31
Speaker 1: a corner on a country road. But, you know, these
26:40
Speaker 1: driver aides that are there not only to nag you,
26:44
Speaker 1: to tell you to take a cup of coffee because
26:46
Speaker 1: you might be getting tired, or more recently now we've
26:49
Speaker 1: got the EU requiring cars to have cameras, scanners, whatever
26:55
Speaker 1: you want to call them, watching people's faces so that
26:59
Speaker 1: if the car thinks that you're in any way distracted
27:01
Speaker 1: from the road, it will start nagging you about that
27:05
Speaker 1: as well. You know, this is all about making the
27:10
Speaker 1: process of driving more and more unpleasant and taking away
27:16
Speaker 1: more and more requirement for you to be an active
27:19
Speaker 1: participant in that process. And of course, not so far
27:24
Speaker 1: down the road are the autonomous cars and you won't
27:27
Speaker 1: be in the driving seat at all at that point.
27:30
Speaker 2: Mike, that's not very new. I've had that for years.
27:33
Speaker 2: I call it My wife. Yeah, I think you need
27:38
Speaker 2: to be careful there, Charm. I think you definitely need
27:41
Speaker 2: to be careful. She's definitely my lane assist for you.
27:50
Speaker 2: stay stay in this lane no change lane what are
27:53
Speaker 2: you doing go past that car yeah okay.
27:55
Speaker 1: Okay okay that's one thing but does she actually grab
27:58
Speaker 1: the wheel and turn it for you that that's that's
28:00
Speaker 1: the bit i'm talking about.
28:01
Speaker 3: No no no when.
28:02
Speaker 1: The car is actually grabbing the wheel and turning it
28:04
Speaker 1: for you that that's when things start getting very unnerving.
28:09
Speaker 2: Um yeah i have that in my car but i've
28:11
Speaker 2: turned all of that stuff off i hate it it's
28:13
Speaker 2: i think it can actually cause an accident.
28:16
Speaker 1: That's what i'm.
28:16
Speaker 4: Saying I saw years ago, there was this sort of outrage.
28:27
Speaker 3: I think it was being sold in America. It was
28:30
Speaker 3: a bottle opener.
28:30
Speaker 4: So, you know, for beer bottles, presumably the influence was
28:35
Speaker 4: meant to be for beer bottles. And it was a
28:38
Speaker 4: seatbelt clip. So you would just have it in the,
28:43
Speaker 4: you know, if you were driving. it would be the
28:46
Speaker 4: clip in the seatbelt in the passenger seat, and it
28:48
Speaker 4: was a bottle opener. So I think the sort of, well, obviously,
28:53
Speaker 4: presumably confected outrage was that this was encouraging drink driving.
28:58
Speaker 4: But in fact, now, having had to drive cars that
29:01
Speaker 4: have beeping things, I understand exactly why you would create
29:05
Speaker 4: such a thing. And it's to stop the passenger seat beeping.
29:08
Speaker 4: If you put something on, if there's not a person there...
29:11
Speaker 4: but you put something on it and it decides that
29:13
Speaker 4: it is actually a person, but they're not wearing a seatbelt.
29:17
Speaker 4: And so, therefore, you then have to put the seatbelt
29:19
Speaker 4: in the passenger seat. You could get one of those
29:22
Speaker 4: little clips.
29:22
Speaker 3: I've got one.
29:23
Speaker 4: Yeah, well, that's what this is, except it has the
29:27
Speaker 4: double benefit of being able to open a bottle of beer,
29:31
Speaker 4: which you can drink as you drive.
29:33
Speaker 2: My car's got a bottle opener, by the way. My
29:36
Speaker 2: car's actually got a bottle opener at the back. but
29:38
Speaker 2: that's because everything still comes in glass bottles.
29:42
Speaker 3: So literally, when you open the back door, it has
29:45
Speaker 3: a little bottle opener that's on the car.
29:49
Speaker 4: But that's good. That shows they're paying attention to their market.
29:51
Speaker 4: Because we don't, no one, I mean, well, okay, beer
29:55
Speaker 4: does come in plastic, sorry, glass bottles here. But by
29:58
Speaker 4: and large now, nothing's recycled. You know, all your breweries
30:02
Speaker 4: and Coca-Cola and whatnot, they all still reuse bottles.
30:06
Speaker 3: Bottles.
30:07
Speaker 4: That's died a death. As somebody pointed out the other
30:10
Speaker 4: day in In the 1960s, we had an enormous fleet
30:15
Speaker 4: of electric vehicles, and they were milk floats. They all worked,
30:20
Speaker 4: and they delivered bottles that were then collected. Also, the
30:24
Speaker 4: other point made on the community element was that seeing
30:29
Speaker 4: milk outside somebody's house later in the day was an
30:34
Speaker 4: indicator of whether there might have been a problem at
30:37
Speaker 4: that house, somebody not coming out to take their milk in.
30:41
Speaker 4: All of that lost, done away with all the milk floats,
30:44
Speaker 4: electric milk floats, done away with the ability to reuse bottles.
30:47
Speaker 4: And yes, I know that it's intensive in water and this,
30:51
Speaker 4: that and the other.
30:51
Speaker 3: But I mean, there's... Yeah. Anyway, it's just another... I
30:56
Speaker 3: would much rather drink out of a glass bottle than plastic,
30:59
Speaker 3: for sure. Well, yes. Okay, yeah.
31:01
Speaker 5: Of course.
31:01
Speaker 3: I don't think plastic is particularly healthy. No.
31:04
Speaker 4: And the you know, the waste element. But anyway, we're
31:08
Speaker 4: straying slightly, although, of course, if you do use plastic properly,
31:10
Speaker 4: you can reuse it and reuse it. Anyway, and get
31:14
Speaker 4: oil back from it.
31:15
Speaker 2: But just in case anybody's wondering why my car's got
31:18
Speaker 2: a bottle opener, it's an off-road vehicle.
31:19
Speaker 1: That's why.
31:21
Speaker 2: I don't think a standard road car will have a
31:23
Speaker 2: bottle opener on it. But it is a nice little detail.
31:29
Speaker 2: And by the way, I mean, I don't know if
31:31
Speaker 2: you guys have driven in a Tesla.
31:33
Speaker 3: I have. It's rubbish.
31:35
Speaker 2: I mean, it's basically like a tin can. There's nothing
31:37
Speaker 2: in it. It's completely sterile. You're basically sitting in a
31:42
Speaker 2: seat in a tube because they want as minimal anything
31:46
Speaker 2: as possible. It's part of the design. And there are
31:49
Speaker 2: no buttons or levers or anything. The only way to
31:53
Speaker 2: really operate anything is from the screen.
31:55
Speaker 3: It's terrible.
31:56
Speaker 2: Very, very, very kind of anti-touch, anti-human, anti-feel, anti-experience. It's
32:03
Speaker 2: meant to be, I guess, futuristic, but I don't like it. No,
32:07
Speaker 2: it's not meant to be futuristic.
32:09
Speaker 1: It's just meant to be, as you say, anti-human. There's
32:15
Speaker 1: lots of futuristic stuff, which is still tactile and still requires...
32:24
Speaker 1: you know, still inspires the senses, but no, that is
32:29
Speaker 1: not one of them.
32:30
Speaker 2: Can I just say, Charles, I don't know if I'm
32:33
Speaker 2: supposed to say this, so I'll remove this if you
32:35
Speaker 2: want me to, but your car, that is the most
32:39
Speaker 2: tactile car I think I've ever been in. I've never
32:42
Speaker 2: unlocked and locked a door that way.
32:44
Speaker 3: Right. Have you not? Right, okay. That was the best moment.
32:51
Speaker 2: For those that don't know, just explain how you unlock
32:54
Speaker 2: and lock your door.
32:56
Speaker 3: I mean, I.
32:57
Speaker 4: Don't think it should really come as a surprise to people. Well, yeah, sorry, yeah,
33:01
Speaker 4: that bit. Yeah, sorry, with you. Okay, that is quite funny. Yeah,
33:05
Speaker 4: it doesn't have central locking, so therefore it doesn't do
33:07
Speaker 4: a beep, you know, click, click.
33:09
Speaker 3: Lock, whatever you call it. So you have to use
33:11
Speaker 3: the key.
33:12
Speaker 4: But the locking mechanism on the driver's door has broken.
33:16
Speaker 4: So in order to lock, you have to go in
33:20
Speaker 4: and out through the passenger door and lean across and
33:24
Speaker 4: lock the door. But actually, the thing is that really locking...
33:27
Speaker 4: I mean, it's a really interesting psychological one. I do
33:30
Speaker 4: consider that locking cars... is one of the most pointless
33:35
Speaker 4: things because either somebody is just determined that they will
33:40
Speaker 4: get into that car and therefore... If it comes to it,
33:43
Speaker 4: they'll smash a window or they're skilled at getting into
33:47
Speaker 4: cars and therefore it doesn't matter really whether it's locked
33:51
Speaker 4: or not. I know there is some opportunistic, you know,
33:55
Speaker 4: just trying the door handle. It does happen, but I
33:58
Speaker 4: think quite infrequently. So it's just, I think it's perverse
34:02
Speaker 4: that we lock car doors.
34:05
Speaker 1: Can I just say, this is another example of the
34:08
Speaker 1: perversion of modern cars, right? Because my car is a
34:14
Speaker 1: 2015 car. It has keyless entry, and you don't have
34:19
Speaker 1: to plug. There's no key to push into a keyhole
34:24
Speaker 1: to start the car. You hit the start button, and
34:26
Speaker 1: it's based on the key fob being on the inside
34:29
Speaker 1: of the car, right? So... Let's just say I have
34:33
Speaker 1: the key fob in my pocket and I go to
34:36
Speaker 1: the filling station and fill it up with fuel and
34:38
Speaker 1: there's people in the car. As I walk away from
34:42
Speaker 1: the car to go and pay for the fuel, the
34:45
Speaker 1: car will lock. And then 30 seconds later, the alarm
34:49
Speaker 1: will go off, even though there's people in the car
34:51
Speaker 1: because it's so bloody stupid. It can't work out that
34:54
Speaker 1: actually there are people in the car. It's so annoying.
34:58
Speaker 3: It's just one of these things. Do you mean what
35:00
Speaker 3: this is? Sorry, because you've got the key.
35:02
Speaker 4: Because I've got the key fob in my pocket and.
35:04
Speaker 3: It has detected that I've walked away from the car.
35:07
Speaker 1: It locks the car. And then because there are people
35:10
Speaker 1: in the car, the alarm then goes off.
35:14
Speaker 3: I've got exactly the same problem.
35:15
Speaker 1: It's just the most stupid thing.
35:17
Speaker 3: Well, there you go.
35:17
Speaker 4: So, I mean, you know, laugh all you like at
35:19
Speaker 4: having to lean across from the passenger side, but at least,
35:22
Speaker 4: you know.
35:23
Speaker 3: Well, I'm laughing.
35:24
Speaker 2: I'm laughing because it actually is so much more fun
35:28
Speaker 2: and more memorable than whatever it is that Tesla is presenting.
35:35
Speaker 3: Eat that, Elon. This is how you live. This is
35:39
Speaker 3: real living.
35:41
Speaker 2: And it's so much more fun because you've got stories
35:42
Speaker 2: to tell and you can laugh. and that's part of
35:45
Speaker 2: the real world application, you know, of, of, um, of
35:48
Speaker 2: what I was talking about at the beginning where I just, it, the, the, the, the,
35:55
Speaker 2: the dichotomy is so blatant for me, you know, this, this,
36:00
Speaker 2: the real world experience and the textile response and the,
36:03
Speaker 2: the experience versus some clinical white metal tube.
36:08
Speaker 3: That's got thrusters.
36:09
Speaker 4: Yeah.
36:11
Speaker 3: Yeah.
36:13
Speaker 2: No, no.
36:13
Speaker 3: I mean, I do agree.
36:15
Speaker 4: I'm sure I would have told this before, but I'll
36:17
Speaker 4: tell it again because it amuses me. When I was
36:20
Speaker 4: in the police, in fact, it was a decision that
36:23
Speaker 4: was reversed, but the constabulary had a fleet of electric
36:32
Speaker 4: vehicles foisted upon it. This was the the age of
36:35
Speaker 4: the police and crime commissioner, and one of them was
36:37
Speaker 4: sort of flexing his green muscles or credentials and so
36:41
Speaker 4: bought a job lot of electric vehicles, which was funny
36:46
Speaker 4: for several reasons, one of which was that they didn't
36:48
Speaker 4: charge quickly enough in the winter. So therefore, everyone just
36:51
Speaker 4: had to use all the combustion engine vehicles because obviously,
36:55
Speaker 4: Policing happens around the clock and there was no sort
36:58
Speaker 4: of overnight charging thing.
37:00
Speaker 3: So that was a classic.
37:01
Speaker 4: But for me, a special experience was coming back, having
37:06
Speaker 4: had to accompany a stabbing victim down to Bristol, coming
37:10
Speaker 4: back late at night in an electric car, because that
37:15
Speaker 4: was the only one that we'd had when we'd gone out.
37:18
Speaker 4: And just as we were coming down the slip road
37:23
Speaker 4: onto the M5, the car went into eco mode because
37:28
Speaker 4: it didn't have enough battery. And we had to go
37:30
Speaker 4: the whole way up the M5 up to Gloucester at
37:34
Speaker 4: 35 miles an hour, which of course is against the law,
37:38
Speaker 4: but that was all we could do. And again, another
37:41
Speaker 4: brilliant thing is whatever it was, you could only chart
37:43
Speaker 4: for some, I don't know why, but for whatever reason,
37:46
Speaker 4: we had to actually get back to Gloucester a police
37:49
Speaker 4: place to recharge the thing, which, of course, takes absolutely hours.
37:54
Speaker 3: So, yeah, I mean, brilliant. You know, well done, guys.
37:57
Speaker 3: Really good.
37:57
Speaker 2: I mean, what you're pointing to actually is a very
38:00
Speaker 2: interesting problem with technology and all the progress that's supposedly happening.
38:07
Speaker 2: I'll tell you an example. Today, when you get a
38:11
Speaker 2: new car, you talk about the maintenance plan and how
38:13
Speaker 2: long it can go for before you upgrade. When I
38:17
Speaker 2: was a kid, and probably even more so when my
38:20
Speaker 2: folks were younger, very much younger, they didn't talk about
38:24
Speaker 2: buying a car to sell it. It was a long-term
38:28
Speaker 2: thing because they were made to last. They're not made
38:31
Speaker 2: to last now. Even the material. I mean, I remember
38:36
Speaker 2: when I was very young, my father had a car
38:38
Speaker 2: that had, I think, a metal bumper. I don't know
38:42
Speaker 2: of any car now that's got a metal bumper. It's
38:43
Speaker 2: just all plastic.
38:44
Speaker 3: Yeah. That is a very good point, in fact.
38:49
Speaker 4: One tends to think of secondhand cars, even less than
38:54
Speaker 4: 10 years old, having significant wear on the steering wheel,
38:58
Speaker 4: around the steering wheel, on the upholstery and whatnot.
39:00
Speaker 3: Whereas I don't remember.
39:03
Speaker 4: You think of going back to your Porsche 911, cars
39:06
Speaker 4: of that era or older, the materials they were made
39:09
Speaker 4: of just didn't degrade in the same way. I don't
39:11
Speaker 4: think people really had to replace steering wheels or anything
39:15
Speaker 4: like that.
39:17
Speaker 2: Going back to your example of driving down Africa towards
39:21
Speaker 2: South Africa, you would probably want to use a classic
39:25
Speaker 2: vehicle because you know that it it has fewer, uh, technological, um, uh,
39:32
Speaker 2: mechanisms and therefore more reliable. You would want to use
39:35
Speaker 2: like an old Toyota Hilux or something. You wouldn't want
39:37
Speaker 2: to use something new.
39:39
Speaker 4: Right.
39:40
Speaker 3: You would not.
39:40
Speaker 1: I'm not sure reliability is the main issue. I think,
39:42
Speaker 1: I think it's, uh, more likely to be, uh, whether
39:45
Speaker 1: you can drive into the, into a local, uh, If
39:50
Speaker 1: there is such a thing, a local repair shop and
39:53
Speaker 1: get something done. You know, if a leaf spring breaks
39:57
Speaker 1: on a Land Rover, you probably get that fixed. If
40:01
Speaker 1: some kind of hydraulic suspension or pneumatic suspension breaks, you're
40:07
Speaker 1: probably stuffed.
40:10
Speaker 2: Yeah, but also remember, with the older cars, you've got
40:12
Speaker 2: more control. it's basically an engine that's taking you forward
40:17
Speaker 2: in the simplest terms. I mean, now with all the
40:20
Speaker 2: new cars, there's so much technology that's trying to make
40:23
Speaker 2: everything more complicated for the purposes of quote-unquote safety that
40:28
Speaker 2: you sometimes just simply cannot get to where you want
40:30
Speaker 2: to get to. And also you have the issue, Mike,
40:34
Speaker 2: as you just pointed out, probably most people don't know
40:36
Speaker 2: what to do if there's a problem.
40:39
Speaker 5: Yeah.
40:40
Speaker 4: I mean, that would be an interesting challenge, wouldn't it?
40:41
Speaker 4: Because am I not right? I don't know if it's
40:45
Speaker 4: called Tesla, but one of the vehicles that Elon Musk
40:48
Speaker 4: claims to have made is some kind of off-road thing,
40:51
Speaker 4: isn't it?
40:51
Speaker 3: Is that right? Well, that's the hybrid truck, isn't it?
40:55
Speaker 1: Which everybody laughs at.
40:57
Speaker 3: Okay.
40:57
Speaker 5: All right.
40:58
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah.
41:00
Speaker 4: But so there we go. Is it possible to drive
41:02
Speaker 4: that from... Cape Town to Lagos or to... No, probably not.
41:08
Speaker 3: Exactly.
41:09
Speaker 4: And if not, why not? So it would be doubly
41:12
Speaker 4: laughable if Musk himself is South African. Could you even
41:16
Speaker 4: drive that thing around South Africa?
41:18
Speaker 3: Probably not.
41:19
Speaker 1: No.
41:19
Speaker 2: I will say, though, I'm going to get shot at
41:23
Speaker 2: for saying this, but I have driven my wife's Jimny
41:27
Speaker 2: from here basically to the Kalahari Desert and it was incredible.
41:31
Speaker 3: It's such a small vehicle and... Brilliant for off-road.
41:35
Speaker 5: Brilliant.
41:36
Speaker 4: I absolutely would not shoot you for saying that. I
41:38
Speaker 4: used to have a, I had a Toyota RAV4, one
41:41
Speaker 4: of the small old ones. Absolutely brilliant because it went
41:45
Speaker 4: over anything because it was so light. And I found
41:49
Speaker 4: it fascinating because for work, I was always given Land
41:52
Speaker 4: Rover Defenders and they were just, they were heavy and cumbersome.
41:56
Speaker 4: And I'm afraid to say for Land Rover lovers, they
41:59
Speaker 4: did not work. But the Toyota, yeah, it just skipped
42:04
Speaker 4: over everything. It was absolutely brilliant. So no, I'm right
42:07
Speaker 4: with you. I'd take the Jimny as well.
42:10
Speaker 2: In 2023, we went to the Kalahadi, which is a
42:17
Speaker 2: huge game reserve in the Kalahari Desert, just between South Africa,
42:22
Speaker 2: Namibia and Botswana. And it's sort of like the Kruger
42:26
Speaker 2: National Park, but on a slightly... shall we say, more
42:31
Speaker 2: dangerous level because it doesn't have fences around most of the.
42:36
Speaker 3: Camps.
42:37
Speaker 2: And it doesn't have tall roads. So you kind of
42:39
Speaker 2: need a 4x4 vehicle when you go there. And so
42:43
Speaker 2: there are a lot of dunes there because it's just
42:45
Speaker 2: mostly desert. And there was a Hilux, a Toyota Hilux
42:49
Speaker 2: that got stuck. And we, in our Jimny, had to
42:53
Speaker 2: go and help them. It's a terrible advertisement for Toyota. Yeah,
42:59
Speaker 2: that's not so good. But that was their own fault.
43:03
Speaker 2: It wasn't the highlight's fault, to be fair. Yeah, it
43:06
Speaker 2: was the driver's fault. Yeah, they went up a sand
43:09
Speaker 2: dune in a way that you're not supposed to. But Mike,
43:15
Speaker 2: I know that you don't really know what we're talking about.
43:17
Speaker 2: You're not familiar with Ofra.
43:19
Speaker 3: With rural life.
43:20
Speaker 1: Yeah. Not in the same sense. That is true. To
43:32
Speaker 1: be honest, I don't know what a Jimny is.
43:35
Speaker 3: Jimny is good.
43:36
Speaker 2: It's a very good vehicle. It's just very small. And
43:39
Speaker 2: there's rubbish on the road.
43:40
Speaker 3: Remind me who makes it. It's not Suzuki. It is Suzuki. Okay.
43:44
Speaker 4: It's the little Suzuki thing. They've rehabilitated it in the West.
43:49
Speaker 4: I think you see them now. Isn't it the Jimny?
43:52
Speaker 4: I'm pretty sure it is. They've sort of revamped it
43:55
Speaker 4: in the United Kingdom anyway.
43:57
Speaker 3: It looks okay. It's a great vehicle.
43:59
Speaker 2: I mean, it's cheap and it uses petrol and it's
44:02
Speaker 2: light and it's got a short wheelbase and it's got
44:04
Speaker 2: low range if you want to go off-road. So it's
44:08
Speaker 2: a very good vehicle. But driving it, it's about as
44:10
Speaker 2: comfortable as driving a rock. It's not very nice on
44:15
Speaker 2: the road. And you can't really do more than 100
44:18
Speaker 2: kilometers an hour on a downhill with the wind behind you.
44:20
Speaker 3: I don't know what that is in miles. Are you
44:22
Speaker 3: guys working miles? I don't know what the conversion is.
44:25
Speaker 4: 60.
44:25
Speaker 2: There you go. Yeah, it's fast enough. But yeah, you're
44:29
Speaker 2: not going to go faster than that, really. Maybe at
44:32
Speaker 2: a push, like if you put a lot of weight
44:34
Speaker 2: inside the vehicle.
44:35
Speaker 3: Yeah, and perhaps you could take off. Yes, it needs thrusters.
44:42
Speaker 3: Of course it does. And pitch black.
44:46
Speaker 2: But I mean, it's such a cheap vehicle. And the
44:48
Speaker 2: point that I'm making is that it's so much more fun. Yeah,
44:51
Speaker 2: we're having a good laugh about something so silly, but
44:56
Speaker 2: it's the exact opposite to the opening, which is about...
45:00
Speaker 2: This amazing vehicle that can go upside down and land
45:03
Speaker 2: with thrusters.
45:04
Speaker 3: I don't want that.
45:05
Speaker 2: I just want to go into the desert or into nature, whatever.
45:10
Speaker 2: I just want to go away for the weekend. I
45:12
Speaker 2: don't want to fly over stuff. I want to drive
45:15
Speaker 2: over it. And that's my Luddite issue with it. Well,
45:24
Speaker 2: I don't think there's a problem with that.
45:26
Speaker 3: I really don't.
45:29
Speaker 4: And I think it's a pity that most people perceive
45:32
Speaker 4: Luddite to be a negative way of looking at things.
45:37
Speaker 3: I don't think it is. I don't think it has
45:41
Speaker 3: to be anyway. I'm just looking at the time.
45:44
Speaker 2: I know that we have to truncate these recordings temporarily. Mike,
45:49
Speaker 2: let's have a final comment from you.
45:52
Speaker 3: Going back to Elon.
45:55
Speaker 1: Going back to Elon. I'd rather not go back to Elon.
45:59
Speaker 1: I'm just looking for a way to round the conversation.
46:05
Speaker 4: Well, that's pretty good, isn't it? Rather not go back
46:08
Speaker 4: to Elon. I think we can all agree on that one.
46:10
Speaker 5: All right.
46:10
Speaker 3: Okay.
46:11
Speaker 5: All right.
46:11
Speaker 2: There's the ending. Rather not go back to Elon. All right, guys.
46:17
Speaker 2: It's been a pleasure. I'll catch up with you next week.