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Elon Musk is kind of obnoxious. He lies (or "exaggerates"). But what Tesla has done is insane. It's happened so quickly, and that's leaving aside the rockets. T

by slibhb 5y ago

Elon Musk is kind of obnoxious. He lies (or "exaggerates"). But what Tesla has done is insane. It's happened so quickly, and that's leaving aside the rockets. The hard evidence that we can build new things, that we can progress and build a future that's better than the present is so important. If it takes a flawed man to show us that, I'll take it. If you hate Elon Musk, consider probing your mind deeply to figure out why. It may just be that you're an Ayn Rand villain.

jimnotgym 5y ago
I may be seen as a villain to Ayn Rand disciples, mainly because I may point out I have seen people do amazing things without becoming billionaires at consumers expense.
- nvggyjc 5y ago
  At consumer's expense? Nobody is forced to buy a Tesla, people do it because they like having a car more than money. You can argue that Tesla in particular is successful off the back of the taxpayer; are you advocating against government incentives for electric vehicles?
  - nullc 5y ago
    We're forced to share the road with them. Because Teslas are glass cannons with easily damaged body panels and a closed repair network that has extraordinary prices, their presence on the roads has a real impact on all of us. Who knows what costs we'll be exposed to as their somewhat suicidal 'self driving' functionality becomes exposed to more of the buysers they sold it to on the back of improbable promises (such as "your car will eventually pay for itself by acting as an antonymous taxi").
- slibhb 5y ago
  I'm not an Ayn Rand disciple. But she had a point about certain people and how they view the world. Musk is rich on paper but the stocks are massively overvalued for various reasons. The idea that "billionaires are evil people who exploit innocent laborers" is false and it comes from a place of resentment.
  - cguess 5y ago
    She did talk about how certain people view the world. She also advocated for that world view, and then died on welfare (the irony). And yes, billionaires absolutely build their wealth on the backs of others. There's simply no way to become a billionaire without exploiting a system and taking advantage of others in some way. It may be legal, but legality took a sharp turn away from morality a long long time ago.
    - slibhb 5y ago
      I don't agree with Ayn Rand that welfare is bad. I also don't agree that charity is bad. I agree with her that some very smart people are completely consumed by resentment. > And yes, billionaires absolutely build their wealth on the backs of others. There's simply no way to become a billionaire without exploiting a system and taking advantage of others in some way. It may be legal, but legality took a sharp turn away from morality a long long time ago. You're just resentful of people who have accomplished more than you. What's stopping Bob, who makes less money than you toiling in a factory, from saying the exactly same thing about you? You're an exploiter, it's how you earn a living without getting your hands dirty.
- beepbooptheory 5y ago
  The everyday work of the normal laborer is more worthy of admiration and support than anything that happens in a board room, on the golf course, or in whatever internal email chain that decides these things. It's not amazing to be an investor and make big decisions that shape lives and the flow of money, that is simply what you can do when you are in that position. The worker who can live within the turmoil the former creates, and still find love and happiness, not to mention keep the lights on and take out the trash, are the true heroes of humanity.
  - sillysaurusx 5y ago
    Unless they refuse to get vaccinated. It may seem like an off-topic point, but I recently had a big wake-up call with the kinds of people you mention. The flip side of your flowery description is that they're often short-sighted, vicious people who can get worked up into a frenzy with little warning, or reason. Sometimes they want to for no reason. You're trying to describe the nobility of people with no skills (valued by society). But imagine if the entire world were populated by them. Would you really want to live in it? And if not, can they be called heroes of humanity?
    - beepbooptheory 5y ago
      Beyond a few pretty questionable assumptions at work here (that the labor market is an effective decider of what skills are valuable to society full stop; that someone's labor dictates what skills they have; that what someone has to offer the labor market could correlate at all to something like character), I would simply reflect on whatever thought process has brought you to the situation where someone simply says, in so many words, that "the meek shall inherit the earth", and your first impulse is to say "no, in fact, they are shortsighted and viscious people who get whipped into frenzies for often no reason". I dont even think Rand would follow you there; I can't really think of any corollary to that sentiment other than fascist rhetoric. To know nothing of a group of people but how much they make at work, and to go that far in painting a picture of them... Its shocking! Haha I'm sure you mean well, and are genuinely reflecting, but this is not a good look at all to anybody but the most rightwing people. What amounts Idiocracy lore is not a suitable or humane thing to ground political beliefs on.
Karellen 5y ago
> Elon Musk is kind of obnoxious. He lies (or "exaggerates"). > If you hate Elon Musk, consider probing your mind deeply to figure out why. I'm not a hater, but I can understand why others are. Like you said, he's obnoxious. And he lies. Which should be enough justification by itself. But he's also really fucking rich, which is a teeth-grindingly annoying combination. I really admire what he's done for the Electric Vehicle industry, and the rocket industry, (and the satellite broadband industry) and I absolutely cannot wait for Starship to fly to orbit. That's gonna be amazing. He can execute on a vision like almost no-one else. But he's a dick - I can't deny that. And for people who don't really care about EVs, or rockets, or satellite broadband (i.e. non-nerds), the "being a dick" part is what's going to stand out the most.
- slibhb 5y ago
  Lots of celebrities are gigantic douchebags and no one cares. Why do people care with Elon? Why does he have a parade of haters not just criticizing his attitude but also claiming that his work isn't valuable? It's not because "they don't care about EVs or rockets," it's something deeper and uglier.
  - tayo42 5y ago
    Celebrities with bad personalities have consequences for it all the time. Elon isn't getting special treatment.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - wbsss4412 5y ago
    > Lots of celebrities are gigantic douchebags and no one cares. Tons of people care, an entire industry of celebrity gossip lives off of it. Elon has just as much of a cult following as he has haters, the fact that you can’t see how perfectly this mirrors wider celebrity culture suggests that you are either very out of touch with pop culture, or are a part of the Elon cult.
    - 5y ago
syshum 5y ago
- memish 5y ago
  That's part of it, but I think it's more envy driven. He took his winnings at Paypal and bet it all to transform 2 industries. While most of us would have retired, blew it on a mansion and binge watch Game of Thrones in our private theater. Where would we be with electric cars and space right now if he had spent the past 20 years sailing on a yacht collecting supermodels? He could have done that instead. He shows what's possible and it exposes our inadequacies and sloth. If you're insecure, he is constantly touching a nerve with success after success, his massive fanbase and ever presence in the news.
  - cguess 5y ago
    Remember when he called that diver in Thailand a pedophile because the diver (one of the most experienced cave divers in the world) called his idea dumb as shit? That's why I don't like him (well, one of the many many reasons, but a big one).
    - memish 5y ago
      I didn't like that either, but put it in context. It's 1 of 17,000 tweets. There aren't many users with that many tweets who haven't lost their cool and called someone else a name. It's one of the most common things you see on twitter. Not excusing it, just saying it's worth looking at in context and importantly it's not something he's repeated.
      - jamespo 5y ago
        He double downed on it when a simple apology would have sufficed. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9853387/Elon-Musk-refused-apologize-calling-diver-pedo-make-look-cowardly.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9853387/Elon-Musk-r...
      - syshum 5y ago
jjulius 5y ago
>If you hate Elon Musk, consider probing your mind deeply to figure out why. So, I'm going to reply to your comment but really, this is relevant to most of this thread (and nearly every thread about him), because I'm just tired of these conversations. Yes, by many measures, he has been incredibly successful at both running businesses and amassing wealth. There are a lot of metrics that you could cite that support that assertion. At the same time, by many measures, you could successfully - and easily - argue that he's a pretty shitty person. And guess what? Both are true. I don't know what my ultimate point here is besides saying that yeah - some people think he's awesome, some people think he's shitty, and neither view is technically incorrect. Move on.
- slibhb 5y ago
  "On one hand you have the rockets, and cars, and all that. On the other hand you have his flippant, obnoxious attitude. Yeah, it's about even." So absurd that anyone takes that argument seriously.
  - jjulius 5y ago
    The funny thing about life is that everyone places different levels of importance on things. You might think that innovation in EVs and space exploration far outweigh how someone treats other individuals, whereas others might place far greater importance in treating others with respect and equality over innovation in EVs and space exploration. And you know what? That's OK. :)
    - slibhb 5y ago
      The question I'm asking, that you keep dodging, is: what is the reason for putting more importance on someone's attitude rather than the 2 million cars they've sold and the rocket ships they've invented? You hint that Elon Musk treats other people badly. Has he raped anyone? Murdered anyone? Waged any wars? Are there abuse allegations? No, he's a troll on twitter.
      - jjulius 5y ago
jfk13 5y ago
> Elon Musk is kind of obnoxious. He lies (or "exaggerates"). But what Tesla has done is insane. It's happened so quickly, and that's leaving aside the rockets. The hard evidence that we can build new things, that we can progress and build a future that's better than the present is so important. If it takes a flawed man to show us that, I'll take it. Or in other words, the end justifies the means? Not all of us share that philosphy.
- slibhb 5y ago
  Nowhere in my post did I make that argument. If Elon used slave labor to run his factories, I wouldn't defend it. However, "being a troll, exaggerating, and sometimes lying" are not mortal sins.
  - Loughla 5y ago
    Again, not sins to you. Your values dictate that being a troll, exaggerating, and lying are okay. To others, those things are in fact enough to say that Elon Musk is a shithead. It's as if there are gradients of human behavior, and not everyone is always a cartoony villain or Dudley Do-right all the time.
    - slibhb 5y ago
      They are sins to me, they aren't mortal sins. Read slowly and take your time please.
      - Jcowell 5y ago
        Reading it slower or faster wouldn’t fix this since colloquial English would allow it to be read either way.
        slibhb 5y ago
        Bullshit. I wrote: > However, "being a troll, exaggerating, and sometimes lying" are not mortal sins. Mortal sins are serious sins, venial sins are less serious sins. "Colloquial" doesn't mean you get to delete words you find inconvenient or don't understand.
the_only_law 5y ago
> It may just be that you're an Ayn Rand villain. Something, something terrorists and freedom fighters.
ashtonkem 5y ago
All I see with Tesla is how government policy can successfully change markets. Tesla exists not because of Musk’s genius[0], but because of tax credits and carbon offset credits that allowed Tesla to be profitable early. Without Musk, someone else would’ve pulled it off, without the policy Musk would have done something else. 0 - Again, Musk didn’t found tesla, he did a hostile takeover and has tried to rewrite history with him as the founder.
- slibhb 5y ago
  > Without Musk, someone else would’ve pulled it off, without the policy Musk would have done something else. You can use this argument to say that no one deserves credit for doing anything. Seems like a dead-end way of thinking about the world to me.
  - HWR_14 5y ago
    I give credit to lots of people for what they do without thinking only they are the only ones who could do it.
  - ashtonkem 5y ago
    What a wildly uncharitable interpretation of my post. “Dead-end”? Come now. All I see in this “we wouldn’t have EVs without Musk!” discussion is a rehash of the old “great man of history” theory, something that’s generally been discredited in the historical fields. The whims and decisions of individual actors matters, yes, but they also act in a context that molds and constrains them. The specific circumstance that made Musk and Tesla took both his initiative, and a specific cultural and policy environment to support his actions. We overweight the former. First, one must acknowledge that Tesla would’ve died on the vine without the policies I mentioned above. They finally turned a profit excluding emissions credits in Q1 2021. A feat, yes, but also one that was wholly dependent on public policy to survive and grow. You can give credit to Musk for recognizing the opportunity here, but he didn’t make it. Second, there’s really nothing to suggest that nobody else would have taken this path if Musk had not, albeit a bit later perhaps. History is full of “great men” who discover and create, but dig under the surface and one will find dozens of uncredited inventors who were either a close second, or less lucky in marketing. Heck, there is no real reason to believe that Musk was even critical for Tesla; remember that he took it over, and we have no idea where it might have gone absent his involvement.
jasonwatkinspdx 5y ago
If Ayn Rand called me a villain I'd beam with pride. I don't think we in any way need to lionize the mythology of John Galt like figures to make progress and build a future better than the present.
- prionassembly 5y ago
  Ayn Rand's heroes are overwrought and improbable, but her villains are nothing to emulate either.

by slibhb 5y ago

jimnotgym 5y ago

I may be seen as a villain to Ayn Rand disciples, mainly because I may point out I have seen people do amazing things without becoming billionaires at consumers expense.

nvggyjc 5y ago
At consumer's expense? Nobody is forced to buy a Tesla, people do it because they like having a car more than money. You can argue that Tesla in particular is successful off the back of the taxpayer; are you advocating against government incentives for electric vehicles?
- nullc 5y ago
  We're forced to share the road with them. Because Teslas are glass cannons with easily damaged body panels and a closed repair network that has extraordinary prices, their presence on the roads has a real impact on all of us. Who knows what costs we'll be exposed to as their somewhat suicidal 'self driving' functionality becomes exposed to more of the buysers they sold it to on the back of improbable promises (such as "your car will eventually pay for itself by acting as an antonymous taxi").
slibhb 5y ago
I'm not an Ayn Rand disciple. But she had a point about certain people and how they view the world. Musk is rich on paper but the stocks are massively overvalued for various reasons. The idea that "billionaires are evil people who exploit innocent laborers" is false and it comes from a place of resentment.
- cguess 5y ago
  She did talk about how certain people view the world. She also advocated for that world view, and then died on welfare (the irony). And yes, billionaires absolutely build their wealth on the backs of others. There's simply no way to become a billionaire without exploiting a system and taking advantage of others in some way. It may be legal, but legality took a sharp turn away from morality a long long time ago.
  - slibhb 5y ago
    I don't agree with Ayn Rand that welfare is bad. I also don't agree that charity is bad. I agree with her that some very smart people are completely consumed by resentment. > And yes, billionaires absolutely build their wealth on the backs of others. There's simply no way to become a billionaire without exploiting a system and taking advantage of others in some way. It may be legal, but legality took a sharp turn away from morality a long long time ago. You're just resentful of people who have accomplished more than you. What's stopping Bob, who makes less money than you toiling in a factory, from saying the exactly same thing about you? You're an exploiter, it's how you earn a living without getting your hands dirty.
beepbooptheory 5y ago
The everyday work of the normal laborer is more worthy of admiration and support than anything that happens in a board room, on the golf course, or in whatever internal email chain that decides these things. It's not amazing to be an investor and make big decisions that shape lives and the flow of money, that is simply what you can do when you are in that position. The worker who can live within the turmoil the former creates, and still find love and happiness, not to mention keep the lights on and take out the trash, are the true heroes of humanity.
- sillysaurusx 5y ago
  Unless they refuse to get vaccinated. It may seem like an off-topic point, but I recently had a big wake-up call with the kinds of people you mention. The flip side of your flowery description is that they're often short-sighted, vicious people who can get worked up into a frenzy with little warning, or reason. Sometimes they want to for no reason. You're trying to describe the nobility of people with no skills (valued by society). But imagine if the entire world were populated by them. Would you really want to live in it? And if not, can they be called heroes of humanity?
  - beepbooptheory 5y ago
    Beyond a few pretty questionable assumptions at work here (that the labor market is an effective decider of what skills are valuable to society full stop; that someone's labor dictates what skills they have; that what someone has to offer the labor market could correlate at all to something like character), I would simply reflect on whatever thought process has brought you to the situation where someone simply says, in so many words, that "the meek shall inherit the earth", and your first impulse is to say "no, in fact, they are shortsighted and viscious people who get whipped into frenzies for often no reason". I dont even think Rand would follow you there; I can't really think of any corollary to that sentiment other than fascist rhetoric. To know nothing of a group of people but how much they make at work, and to go that far in painting a picture of them... Its shocking! Haha I'm sure you mean well, and are genuinely reflecting, but this is not a good look at all to anybody but the most rightwing people. What amounts Idiocracy lore is not a suitable or humane thing to ground political beliefs on.

Karellen 5y ago

> Elon Musk is kind of obnoxious. He lies (or "exaggerates"). > If you hate Elon Musk, consider probing your mind deeply to figure out why. I'm not a hater, but I can understand why others are. Like you said, he's obnoxious. And he lies. Which should be enough justification by itself. But he's also really fucking rich, which is a teeth-grindingly annoying combination. I really admire what he's done for the Electric Vehicle industry, and the rocket industry, (and the satellite broadband industry) and I absolutely cannot wait for Starship to fly to orbit. That's gonna be amazing. He can execute on a vision like almost no-one else. But he's a dick - I can't deny that. And for people who don't really care about EVs, or rockets, or satellite broadband (i.e. non-nerds), the "being a dick" part is what's going to stand out the most.

slibhb 5y ago
Lots of celebrities are gigantic douchebags and no one cares. Why do people care with Elon? Why does he have a parade of haters not just criticizing his attitude but also claiming that his work isn't valuable? It's not because "they don't care about EVs or rockets," it's something deeper and uglier.
- tayo42 5y ago
  Celebrities with bad personalities have consequences for it all the time. Elon isn't getting special treatment.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- wbsss4412 5y ago
  > Lots of celebrities are gigantic douchebags and no one cares. Tons of people care, an entire industry of celebrity gossip lives off of it. Elon has just as much of a cult following as he has haters, the fact that you can’t see how perfectly this mirrors wider celebrity culture suggests that you are either very out of touch with pop culture, or are a part of the Elon cult.
  - 5y ago

syshum 5y ago

memish 5y ago
That's part of it, but I think it's more envy driven. He took his winnings at Paypal and bet it all to transform 2 industries. While most of us would have retired, blew it on a mansion and binge watch Game of Thrones in our private theater. Where would we be with electric cars and space right now if he had spent the past 20 years sailing on a yacht collecting supermodels? He could have done that instead. He shows what's possible and it exposes our inadequacies and sloth. If you're insecure, he is constantly touching a nerve with success after success, his massive fanbase and ever presence in the news.
- cguess 5y ago
  Remember when he called that diver in Thailand a pedophile because the diver (one of the most experienced cave divers in the world) called his idea dumb as shit? That's why I don't like him (well, one of the many many reasons, but a big one).
  - memish 5y ago
    I didn't like that either, but put it in context. It's 1 of 17,000 tweets. There aren't many users with that many tweets who haven't lost their cool and called someone else a name. It's one of the most common things you see on twitter. Not excusing it, just saying it's worth looking at in context and importantly it's not something he's repeated.
    - jamespo 5y ago
      He double downed on it when a simple apology would have sufficed. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9853387/Elon-Musk-refused-apologize-calling-diver-pedo-make-look-cowardly.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9853387/Elon-Musk-r...
    - syshum 5y ago

jjulius 5y ago

>If you hate Elon Musk, consider probing your mind deeply to figure out why. So, I'm going to reply to your comment but really, this is relevant to most of this thread (and nearly every thread about him), because I'm just tired of these conversations. Yes, by many measures, he has been incredibly successful at both running businesses and amassing wealth. There are a lot of metrics that you could cite that support that assertion. At the same time, by many measures, you could successfully - and easily - argue that he's a pretty shitty person. And guess what? Both are true. I don't know what my ultimate point here is besides saying that yeah - some people think he's awesome, some people think he's shitty, and neither view is technically incorrect. Move on.

slibhb 5y ago
"On one hand you have the rockets, and cars, and all that. On the other hand you have his flippant, obnoxious attitude. Yeah, it's about even." So absurd that anyone takes that argument seriously.
- jjulius 5y ago
  The funny thing about life is that everyone places different levels of importance on things. You might think that innovation in EVs and space exploration far outweigh how someone treats other individuals, whereas others might place far greater importance in treating others with respect and equality over innovation in EVs and space exploration. And you know what? That's OK. :)
  - slibhb 5y ago
    The question I'm asking, that you keep dodging, is: what is the reason for putting more importance on someone's attitude rather than the 2 million cars they've sold and the rocket ships they've invented? You hint that Elon Musk treats other people badly. Has he raped anyone? Murdered anyone? Waged any wars? Are there abuse allegations? No, he's a troll on twitter.
    - jjulius 5y ago

jfk13 5y ago

> Elon Musk is kind of obnoxious. He lies (or "exaggerates"). But what Tesla has done is insane. It's happened so quickly, and that's leaving aside the rockets. The hard evidence that we can build new things, that we can progress and build a future that's better than the present is so important. If it takes a flawed man to show us that, I'll take it. Or in other words, the end justifies the means? Not all of us share that philosphy.

slibhb 5y ago
Nowhere in my post did I make that argument. If Elon used slave labor to run his factories, I wouldn't defend it. However, "being a troll, exaggerating, and sometimes lying" are not mortal sins.
- Loughla 5y ago
  Again, not sins to you. Your values dictate that being a troll, exaggerating, and lying are okay. To others, those things are in fact enough to say that Elon Musk is a shithead. It's as if there are gradients of human behavior, and not everyone is always a cartoony villain or Dudley Do-right all the time.
  - slibhb 5y ago
    They are sins to me, they aren't mortal sins. Read slowly and take your time please.
    - Jcowell 5y ago
      Reading it slower or faster wouldn’t fix this since colloquial English would allow it to be read either way.
      - slibhb 5y ago
        Bullshit. I wrote: > However, "being a troll, exaggerating, and sometimes lying" are not mortal sins. Mortal sins are serious sins, venial sins are less serious sins. "Colloquial" doesn't mean you get to delete words you find inconvenient or don't understand.

the_only_law 5y ago

> It may just be that you're an Ayn Rand villain. Something, something terrorists and freedom fighters.

ashtonkem 5y ago

All I see with Tesla is how government policy can successfully change markets. Tesla exists not because of Musk’s genius[0], but because of tax credits and carbon offset credits that allowed Tesla to be profitable early. Without Musk, someone else would’ve pulled it off, without the policy Musk would have done something else. 0 - Again, Musk didn’t found tesla, he did a hostile takeover and has tried to rewrite history with him as the founder.

slibhb 5y ago
> Without Musk, someone else would’ve pulled it off, without the policy Musk would have done something else. You can use this argument to say that no one deserves credit for doing anything. Seems like a dead-end way of thinking about the world to me.
- HWR_14 5y ago
  I give credit to lots of people for what they do without thinking only they are the only ones who could do it.
- ashtonkem 5y ago
  What a wildly uncharitable interpretation of my post. “Dead-end”? Come now. All I see in this “we wouldn’t have EVs without Musk!” discussion is a rehash of the old “great man of history” theory, something that’s generally been discredited in the historical fields. The whims and decisions of individual actors matters, yes, but they also act in a context that molds and constrains them. The specific circumstance that made Musk and Tesla took both his initiative, and a specific cultural and policy environment to support his actions. We overweight the former. First, one must acknowledge that Tesla would’ve died on the vine without the policies I mentioned above. They finally turned a profit excluding emissions credits in Q1 2021. A feat, yes, but also one that was wholly dependent on public policy to survive and grow. You can give credit to Musk for recognizing the opportunity here, but he didn’t make it. Second, there’s really nothing to suggest that nobody else would have taken this path if Musk had not, albeit a bit later perhaps. History is full of “great men” who discover and create, but dig under the surface and one will find dozens of uncredited inventors who were either a close second, or less lucky in marketing. Heck, there is no real reason to believe that Musk was even critical for Tesla; remember that he took it over, and we have no idea where it might have gone absent his involvement.

jasonwatkinspdx 5y ago

If Ayn Rand called me a villain I'd beam with pride. I don't think we in any way need to lionize the mythology of John Galt like figures to make progress and build a future better than the present.

prionassembly 5y ago
Ayn Rand's heroes are overwrought and improbable, but her villains are nothing to emulate either.