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When you work for very intelligent and driven people, they tend to be disgusted with incompetence or in my case lack of drive, which is the same thing, I notice

When you work for very intelligent and driven people, they tend to be disgusted with incompetence or in my case lack of drive, which is the same thing, I noticed. It is completely counter to what they are. This happened to me when I did not have the same passion as one of my supervisors (as a remote contractor working for other clients as well) and did not want to put the same level of care/hours and extremism as this person had. The intelligence part was debatable but he has his skills etc but I know he was certainly obsessed with moving forward as fast as possible and was a standout in his company because of it. You cannot blame him for his drive as in the end it brings results and its who he is from the core. But of course, I disliked him and still do. Regardless, so what. He still is doing well I'm sure. Elon is probably the most amazing human being to ever have lived in terms of intellect/drive/passion/ability etc that I've heard maybe besides Ghengis Khan so of course he is going to be so much more like that to absolutely repel others not inline with his pace and vision. He could be no other way.

hnaccy 8y ago
Napoleon?
xevb3k 8y ago
What evidence can you provide that Elon is highly intelligent and skilled? Really appears to have quite mediocre ability to me. Has focused on some quite interesting problems, but mostly his ability seems like PR/marketing.
- coralreef 8y ago
  Cofounded PayPal...started a reusable rocket company in SpaceX. Brought electric cars to the mainstream with Tesla...was in a PhD physics program at Stanford and dropped out. Like, those results don't qualify to you as someone who is intelligent and skilled?
  - xevb3k 8y ago
    Not “most amazing human being to ever have lived” as the parent poster suggested, no. I guess this isn’t the place to suggest it, but really in success like PayPal there is a large element of luck at play. He maybe reasonably smart, but the way some people treat him like the most amazing person who has ever lived is ridiculous.
    - confiscate 8y ago
      sure "most amazing" is debatable but that's not what you said. You said he is mediocre. What made you say he is mediocre?
      - xevb3k 8y ago
        Hyperloop? I don’t see this (or any of his other ideas) as coming from someone with an abnormal level of intelligence. He may have the ability to hire people who can execute well on ideas (though I also think that Tesla’s achievement are over-hyped). He may have good business sense, and the ability to raise money. But I don’t see him as having an amazing intellect... so I’d be interested in evidence that shows that...
        confiscate 8y ago
        Nice! So you look at Elon's entire history of ideas, and the one thing that caught your eye first was Hyperloop? Why did you name the Hyperloop? Is Elon working on a Hyperloop company? Those things you mentioned "hire people who execute well on ideas", "good business sense", "ability to raise money". Those are medicore skills? We don't know each other in person, but from online-chatting with you, you sound like you have good intelligence. Can you do any of those?
        xevb3k 8y ago
        Hyperloop is a mediocre (well, actually bad) idea. It indicates that Elon is not some genius level engineer. I think you underestimate the degree to which luck plays a role in the development of companies.
- confiscate 8y ago
  what made you decide Elon has medicore ability? Because I am curious how one would arrive at that conclusion.
  - akvadrako 8y ago
    I don't know if he's super smart of mediocre and I think it's hard to judge from afar. But he does seem to make some bad decisions, like: - The Boring Company - betting on self-driving tech - getting kicked out of Paypal - sleeping on his factory floor - trying to run 3-4 companies at once - SolarCity - claiming he wants to overengineer the tolerances on his cars - an iPad instead of a dashboard Basically, I just see a lot of his decisions are not well thought out. His main skill seems to be getting people to give him money.
- confiscate 8y ago
  You said "What evidence can you provide that Elon is highly intelligent and skilled?" You sound like a 100% rational person who looks at only hard evidence, instead of making rash assumptions based on emotions. What evidence can you provide that Elon is mediocre?
  - xevb3k 8y ago
    You’ve posted this same question/comment, 3 times in this thread (and I’ve answered it below). You seem to be taking this somewhat personally. I find it worrying that “Elon is a hyper-intelligent Superman” seems so closely tied up with individual identity in some cases... I guess creating hero’s sometimes makes the universe easier to deal with. But it has an overall negative effect on SV culture.
    - confiscate 8y ago
      No you seem to be the one taking this personally. The topics you mentioned "superman" "alien" "individual identity" "hero" "universe"... seems like you are off on a tangent? I have no idea what you are talking about. Even if you ignore all his other achievements, the man sent his car to Mars. And people are still sitting there going "meh, not impressed. Hyperloop. Average intelligence. Medicore". THAT attitude has an overall negative effect on SV culture.
      - xevb3k 8y ago
        Large teams of people did those things not a single individual.
        late2part 8y ago
        “if you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that“ - B. Obama
        xevb3k 8y ago
        It was unfortunately phrased (allowing opposing parties to misrepresent the statement). But I think it’s a reasonably accurate statement. Companies, and other forms of progress, don’t come from individual effort alone. This is particularly true of science based startups, and the way modern companies are formed and developed (which relies on lots or hiring, lots of external funding, not profit driven).
jcranmer 8y ago
> When you work for very intelligent and driven people, they tend to be disgusted with incompetence. When you work for jerks, you mean. As a society, we tend to tolerate jerks who get results, but let's not hide the fact that those people are still jerks, and that behavior should be seen as something to avoid rather than emulate.
- taneq 8y ago
  I've been on both sides of this coin. If someone's very driven and puts everything into their work, they're hard to work with because they set an unreasonable bar for everyone. And likewise, for that person, if feels like everyone else is slacking and you're being held back.
  - sebringj 8y ago
    Yes, exactly. The only difference is the visual. Imagine an impossible coin that looks like a pin on one side and when flipped, a large platter on the other where the surface area of a coin's side equals experience in perspective. Then it reverses financially so you have the money and empathy going at opposite sides like oil and water.
sebringj 8y ago
I read this again for some reason. I was the "idiot" in this scenario, not the "genius". Please understand my ego is very minimal but I wrote this in such a way the first sentence could be misconstrued if someone stopped there.

hnaccy 8y ago

Napoleon?

xevb3k 8y ago

What evidence can you provide that Elon is highly intelligent and skilled? Really appears to have quite mediocre ability to me. Has focused on some quite interesting problems, but mostly his ability seems like PR/marketing.

coralreef 8y ago
Cofounded PayPal...started a reusable rocket company in SpaceX. Brought electric cars to the mainstream with Tesla...was in a PhD physics program at Stanford and dropped out. Like, those results don't qualify to you as someone who is intelligent and skilled?
- xevb3k 8y ago
  Not “most amazing human being to ever have lived” as the parent poster suggested, no. I guess this isn’t the place to suggest it, but really in success like PayPal there is a large element of luck at play. He maybe reasonably smart, but the way some people treat him like the most amazing person who has ever lived is ridiculous.
  - confiscate 8y ago
    sure "most amazing" is debatable but that's not what you said. You said he is mediocre. What made you say he is mediocre?
    - xevb3k 8y ago
      Hyperloop? I don’t see this (or any of his other ideas) as coming from someone with an abnormal level of intelligence. He may have the ability to hire people who can execute well on ideas (though I also think that Tesla’s achievement are over-hyped). He may have good business sense, and the ability to raise money. But I don’t see him as having an amazing intellect... so I’d be interested in evidence that shows that...
      - confiscate 8y ago
        Nice! So you look at Elon's entire history of ideas, and the one thing that caught your eye first was Hyperloop? Why did you name the Hyperloop? Is Elon working on a Hyperloop company? Those things you mentioned "hire people who execute well on ideas", "good business sense", "ability to raise money". Those are medicore skills? We don't know each other in person, but from online-chatting with you, you sound like you have good intelligence. Can you do any of those?
        xevb3k 8y ago
        Hyperloop is a mediocre (well, actually bad) idea. It indicates that Elon is not some genius level engineer. I think you underestimate the degree to which luck plays a role in the development of companies.
confiscate 8y ago
what made you decide Elon has medicore ability? Because I am curious how one would arrive at that conclusion.
- akvadrako 8y ago
  I don't know if he's super smart of mediocre and I think it's hard to judge from afar. But he does seem to make some bad decisions, like: - The Boring Company - betting on self-driving tech - getting kicked out of Paypal - sleeping on his factory floor - trying to run 3-4 companies at once - SolarCity - claiming he wants to overengineer the tolerances on his cars - an iPad instead of a dashboard Basically, I just see a lot of his decisions are not well thought out. His main skill seems to be getting people to give him money.
confiscate 8y ago
You said "What evidence can you provide that Elon is highly intelligent and skilled?" You sound like a 100% rational person who looks at only hard evidence, instead of making rash assumptions based on emotions. What evidence can you provide that Elon is mediocre?
- xevb3k 8y ago
  You’ve posted this same question/comment, 3 times in this thread (and I’ve answered it below). You seem to be taking this somewhat personally. I find it worrying that “Elon is a hyper-intelligent Superman” seems so closely tied up with individual identity in some cases... I guess creating hero’s sometimes makes the universe easier to deal with. But it has an overall negative effect on SV culture.
  - confiscate 8y ago
    No you seem to be the one taking this personally. The topics you mentioned "superman" "alien" "individual identity" "hero" "universe"... seems like you are off on a tangent? I have no idea what you are talking about. Even if you ignore all his other achievements, the man sent his car to Mars. And people are still sitting there going "meh, not impressed. Hyperloop. Average intelligence. Medicore". THAT attitude has an overall negative effect on SV culture.
    - xevb3k 8y ago
      Large teams of people did those things not a single individual.
      - late2part 8y ago
        “if you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that“ - B. Obama
        xevb3k 8y ago
        It was unfortunately phrased (allowing opposing parties to misrepresent the statement). But I think it’s a reasonably accurate statement. Companies, and other forms of progress, don’t come from individual effort alone. This is particularly true of science based startups, and the way modern companies are formed and developed (which relies on lots or hiring, lots of external funding, not profit driven).

jcranmer 8y ago

> When you work for very intelligent and driven people, they tend to be disgusted with incompetence. When you work for jerks, you mean. As a society, we tend to tolerate jerks who get results, but let's not hide the fact that those people are still jerks, and that behavior should be seen as something to avoid rather than emulate.

taneq 8y ago
I've been on both sides of this coin. If someone's very driven and puts everything into their work, they're hard to work with because they set an unreasonable bar for everyone. And likewise, for that person, if feels like everyone else is slacking and you're being held back.
- sebringj 8y ago
  Yes, exactly. The only difference is the visual. Imagine an impossible coin that looks like a pin on one side and when flipped, a large platter on the other where the surface area of a coin's side equals experience in perspective. Then it reverses financially so you have the money and empathy going at opposite sides like oil and water.

sebringj 8y ago

I read this again for some reason. I was the "idiot" in this scenario, not the "genius". Please understand my ego is very minimal but I wrote this in such a way the first sentence could be misconstrued if someone stopped there.