Elon Musk Confronts a Fateful Tweet and an ‘Excruciating’ Year

Post by sudhirj » Fri, Aug 17, 2018, 8:04 AM UTC

Animats wrote: post #11

"Then he got in a Tesla Model S and drove himself to the airport. En route, Mr. Musk typed his fateful message." Don't text while driving. This going private thing is a strange idea. Sell Tesla to the Saudi sovereign wealth fund? The one dedicated to keeping oil a viable industry? Does he want Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud as a boss? That makes no sense. Softbank might make sense. Part of Musk's problem seems to be "O…

Post by jvzr » Fri, Aug 17, 2018, 8:06 AM UTC

dm3 wrote: post #40

_bxg1 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Name another billionaire, other than maybe Bill Gates, who's presently doing anything good, at all.

I think this list of philanthropists[1] contains quite a few billionaires. That counts as "doing good" in my book. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_philanthropists

Post by batteryhorse » Fri, Aug 17, 2018, 8:12 AM UTC

jerkstate wrote: post #59

tomhoward wrote: post #37

But, he added, “if you have anyone who can do a better job, please let me know. They can have the job. Is there someone who can do the job better? They can have the reins right now.” I think this hits at the crux of the issue around the performance/behaviour of Musk and other leaders of hugely ambitious companies. And I think it highlights the importance of thinking about what kinds of people it will take to lead the…

On one hand, fuck the short seller bad news pushers. On the other hand, there are rules, Walter. Like you say, there's nobody like him, nobody effectively pursuing the same goals, and we truly do need him, so I hope he gets out of this relatively unscathed. On the other hand, you can't just lie about material stuff like this and be trusted to lead a company.

Post by batteryhorse » Fri, Aug 17, 2018, 8:14 AM UTC

bumholio wrote: post #78

njarboe wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Automobiles cause over 1,000,000 deaths globally per year. Not to mention the number of human hours used to drive. Elimination of the need for people to drive and reducing auto deaths by, say 95%, I think would be world-changing. What ratio of lives saved to extra deaths while creating self-driving tech would you accept?

You know the answer to that: zero. In the court of public opinion, existing risks are internalized and heavily discounted while new risks are always perceived as gargantuan no matter how small. It's basic human psychology, it's why some people prefer to drive long distances instead of flying, and why a flu pandemic is conducive to mass hysteria, while the obesity and diabetes prevalence, orders of magnitude more dead…

Post by kaolti » Fri, Aug 17, 2018, 8:18 AM UTC

puranjay wrote: post #57

tomhoward wrote: post #37

But, he added, “if you have anyone who can do a better job, please let me know. They can have the job. Is there someone who can do the job better? They can have the reins right now.” I think this hits at the crux of the issue around the performance/behaviour of Musk and other leaders of hugely ambitious companies. And I think it highlights the importance of thinking about what kinds of people it will take to lead the…

I've long resigned to the fact that there will always be ambitious assholes in the world. The best we can hope for is to corral the assholes in the right space. An asshole leading a tech/space company is far better than an asshole leading an oil company or running a country.