Elon Musk’s ex, Grimes, says the world needs more ‘philosopher-kings’ like Lee Kuan Yew

SINGAPORE: The singer Grimes, who is perhaps best known as the former partner of Tesla and SpaceX founder Elon Musk, touched on several topics in an interview with TIME, including, surprisingly, the kind of leadership needed in the world.

She held up the example of Singapore’s founding Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, saying, “I don’t know. I feel like we have a lot of generals and not a lot of philosopher-kings, which would be the ideal situation.

“Just like Lee Kuan Yew types. I just want people to come out here and throw everything at the kids and throw everything at education. You don’t need to be on either side to do things like that.”

The 36-year-old singer was honoured earlier this month at the TIME100 AI Impact Awards in Dubai. The report notes that while other artists have taken a step back from AI, she has welcomed the technology with open arms — and even released an AI tool that lets others sing through her voice.

This stance has hardly made her popular with others, though Grimes has emphasized the need for guardrails to prevent harm from the technology.

Andrew Chow, who interviewed Grimes for TIME, asked her regarding a recent tweet, where she wrote, “I feel like I was tricked by people pretending to be into critical thought and consequentialism, who are acting like power-hungry warlords.”

In her reply, she underlined how divided the world has become and said there are issues that people can unite over, such as education and health.

“Isn’t leadership about uniting everybody?” she added before mentioning Lee Kuan Yew.

The Canada-born Grimes, whose real name is Claire Elise Boucher, shares three children with Mr Musk. The two were together from 2018 to 2023.

Their once-amicable relationship appears to have gone sour, with legal troubles over parental rights and Grimes becoming increasingly critical of Mr Musk’s antics.

However, one thing they still have in common is admiration for Mr Lee. In a tweet last July, Mr Musk praised Lee Kuan Yew and described him as “brilliant”. He reposted a blog by newsletter writer George Mack, who wrote about Mr Lee’s role in developing Changi Airport.

He also previously called Mr Lee a “genius” for providing air-conditioning in public service buildings to enhance productivity in Singapore’s tropical climate, according to a piece in Business Insider.

The featured photo of Grimes above at the TIME100 AI Impact Awards in Dubai is from the singer’s IG account. /TISG

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