Is Elon Musk a fraud?

[Kyriakos]

It'd be nice if we get back to discussing Musk
So let me help: he recently posted that his Tesla engineers should construct Tesla parts with accuracy of "10 microns", to avoid the parts looking unaligned.
10 microns= 1/100 of a millimeter, by the way.
He doesn't care that heat makes metal expand either, but such accuracy would already have been impossible for car parts.

 

[raystuttgart]

show of unbiased reasonableness

When did I ever claim to be unbiased?
I am very much biased ... everybody is.

... is just that: a show ...

No, it is just an opinion. If you like it or not is a different story.
But generally all of us put up a show to explain their opinion.

------

But what you are currently trying to do is just the following:
You are discreding my opinion or trying to cancel it out as a "show" ... just because you do not like what I do.

You may admit it or not ... but it is really a sad pattern these days.
People dislike the message so they discredit the messenger ...

 

[raystuttgart]

It'd be nice if we get back to discussing Musk

Agreed.

Although I personally already said all I had to say about him - and also what I had to say about some other posts I read here.
I agree that he may not be a nice person but still I do not agree that he is a fraud - thus I also do not agree with the way he is discredited in public.

But please go on with "Musk bashing".

 

[Kyriakos]

Agreed.

Although I personally already said all I had to say about him - and also what I had to say about some other posts I read here.
I agree that he may not be a nice person but still I do not agree that he is a fraud - thus I also do not agree with the way he is discredited in public.

So please go on with "Musk bashing".

Well, what do you say to his micron posting? ^^ A grave problem with Musk is that before the Twitter fiasco made people actually bother to look into his history, he was presenting himself as a science/stem guy, when he has no degree in it (iirc only some dubious "history of science" degree, which isn't a science degree).

 

[raystuttgart]

.. when he has no degree in it ...

Did he ever claim that he did?
Not to my knowledge.

And him not having any higher degree of education making him stupid?
Do you think that e.g. people having worked 10 years+ in practical engineering know less about technology than people fresh from university?

 

[Kyriakos]

Did he ever claim that he did?
Not to my knowledge.

I know he was claiming that he could give advice to his engineers on maters of physics. Which, tbh, sounds like the opposite of a believable statement

 

[raystuttgart]

I know he was claiming that he could give advice to his engineers on maters of physics. Which, tbh, sounds like the opposite of a believable statement

I have seen 50 year old mechanics having worked in their field right after school (starting to work with 18 years) that still could teach doctors a lot about phyiscs and engineering.
Not valuing experience and practical knowledge is actually very presumptious and arrogant ... and usually only done by people that just know the theory.

But sorry for using such critical words as "presumptious" and "arrogant" ...
Did not mean to attack or insult anybody personally ... just before somebody starts to interpret me again.

 

[Kyriakos]

I have seen 50 year old mechanics having worked in their field right after school (starting to work with 18 years) that still could teach doctors a lot about phyiscs and engineering.
Not valuing experience and practical knowledge is actually very presumptious and arrogant ... and usually only done by people that just know the theory.

But sorry for "using" such critical words as "presumptious" and "arrogant" ...
Did not mean to attack or insult anybody personally ... just before somebody starts to interpret me again.

Sure, but I don't see what reason one might have for thinking Musk actually has such an ability Would it not be a faith-based view? We should at least require some proof when it comes to scientific insight.

Some months back, Musk had a phase where he was pretending to teach kids about science, and mumbling stuff about how important it is to go to the first principles. Well, duh, it is important. In what way would real science teachers not be aware of it and Musk would be needed to teach?

 

[raystuttgart]

Would it not be a faith-based view?

I just did not like your argumentation:
He has no higher academic title and thus he cannot know what he talks about ...

Also not truly sure what you are trying to prove ... there are endless ways of being smart.
You can be smart in natural science, smart in business, smart related to people, smart ...

I would simply be careful when trying to label somebody as stupid without actually knowing him.
Also not really sure why people try to achieve by declaring him stupid or whatever ... as it will not make him less powerful or successful.

 

[Kyriakos]

It's not just that, though
It's that nothing he says seems to allude to any insight worth sharing. It's actually pretty impressive...

 

[raystuttgart]

It's that nothing he says seems to allude to any insight worth sharing.

I have seen talks of him where he sounded truly boring and stupid.
But I have seen other talks of him that were actually quite interesting.

e.g. in this talk at TED he said both stupid things but also interesting things.
There are simply more shades than white and black ... but only if you are willing to see the grey as well.

If you just always expect to see the bad things in people ... then that is exactly what you will find.
But that is just a too simple and destructive view ... that does not really help anybody.

 

[Kyriakos]

I want to try the talk, but you should at least say where (in your view) he was not talking trash, and actually had something intelligent to mention. Can't look for that in an almost hour long video

 

[raystuttgart]

I want to try the talk, but you should at least say where (in your view) he was not talking trash, and actually had something intelligent to mention. Can't look for that in an almost hour long video

Well, I am not trying to "interpret" him ... as I do not like to be "interpreted" myself. I think people should inform themselves about what to believe.
Make up your own mind ... if that is however too tedious for you ... then well ... maybe it is easier to just believe what others tell you ... whatever their interest may be.

 

[Kyriakos]

Reminded me of that person in The Little Prince, who thought that it was a great idea to order others, even if it meant ordering them to do what they already wanted to do.

Indeed, I don't feel like listening to one hour of Musk when my view of him is that he has nothing interesting to say. Like that Spinal Tap song went: "I know, for I told me so".

 

[raystuttgart]

Your choice.
It is still strange to hear people claim to be well informed ... and in the next sentence they say: "I will not inform myself, because I already know what I want to think and hearing other views is boring and tedious" ...

 

[Kyriakos]

Sure. Package it more appealingly next time. 1 hour is something you give to someone who likes the person talking in the video.

 

[raystuttgart]

Package it more appealingly next time.

It is not my job to make things convenient for you - but as I said it is your choice ... you may watch, read and believe whatever makes you most happy.
Cancelling out information that may contradict your already made opinion because it is not convenient enough is also a way of staying in the bubble.
But maybe there is more grey to this man than you want to admit and seeing him also as a human being with many shades might make it harder and less fun to keep bashing.

 

[Gorbles]

Cancelling out information that may contradict your already made opinion because it is not convenient enough is also a way of staying in the bubble.

This has to be a bit

 

[Narz]

If someone presents themselves as a successful businessperson, and immediately runs a company they bought into the ground, they are not a successful businessperson.

I'm not a fan of Musk but you can't judge a person by their worst failure.

If Jeff Bezos went crazy like Kayne West and lost half his money he's still a successful businessman.

 

[Gorbles]

I'm not a fan of Musk but you can't judge a person by their worst failure.

You can't?

Okay. I'm not, if that helps.

Twitter's just a very easy and obvious example that presents multiple failures within that single takeover (that he was playing chicken with originally because he likes to play with markets - and has done this with more than Twitter).