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Why is there only one Elon Musk?

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Re: Why is there only one Elon Musk?

#111

Post by jechen »

pdubs wrote: post #33
jechen wrote: post #12

I think it's important to keep in mind that Elon Musk got to where he is today (especially financially) because of a consumer web service he helped found. I'm sure (perhaps on the more optimistic end) that more entrepreneurs would jump on his bandwagon if they had ready/easier access to the amount of capital Musk had at his disposal to invest in his "cool sci-fi shit" ventures.

Paypal was pretty revolutionary for its time. Not quite "cool sci-fi shit", but close, in perspective.

Its initial concept of beaming money with Palm Pilots certainly was. What it eventually pivoted and grew into was less so, but I do agree that PayPal played an important role in the evolution of web technologies.

My point remains that we shouldn't be so quick to judge the altruistic intentions of entrepreneurs based on their first ventures; it may be a means to a more noble end. I'm sure many, if not most, aspire to contribute more to society beyond photo sharing apps. In fact, PayPal was voted one of the worst companies when it debuted, so I'm willing to give everyone the benefit of doubt.

Re: Why is there only one Elon Musk?

#112

Post by jessriedel »

rayiner wrote: post #87
jessriedel wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another way to say this is that the process of becoming a billionaire selects for intelligence, but it actually seems to select strongly against a great technical training and nerdy dreams. (Maybe I'm wrong about that?) Would be really interesting to know how many billionaires have STEM PhD's after controlling for their general intelligence.

A disproportionate share of billionaires are engineers. Of course part of that is because the petro-chemical industry mints a lot of billionaires. E.g. Charles and David Koch both have bachelors and masters degrees (mechanical and chemical engineering) from MIT.

> A disproportionate share of billionaires are engineers.

Thanks, do you have a cite for this? My intuition is still that a much higher fraction of billionaires are business/management types than the general population of people at their intelligence level.

Re: Why is there only one Elon Musk?

#113

Post by jlgreco »

vanderZwan wrote: post #78
travisp wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But, relationships are very personal and private. It is very difficult to know enough details about the people involved and their relationship with one another to draw any real conclusions from the simple failure of a relationship.

> But, relationships are very personal and private. I'm not going to disagree on this being a private issue, but if we're talking about why billionaires do not share Elon Musk's personality , doesn't it make perfect sense to discuss things like this?

A failed marriage is not exactly rare. You may as well attempt to "discuss" the fact that he married in the first place.

Re: Why is there only one Elon Musk?

#114

Post by resu_nimda »

ohwp wrote: post #100
resu_nimda wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So I guess you didn't read the full article before blasting off...he specifically pointed out self-driving cars, as well as numerous other non-Musk sci-fi initiatives. His point is less about a dearth of cool sci-fi shit than a lack of extremely wealthy individuals wielding their fortunes to aggressively push these things. Edit: And not just "a space company." A space company, an electric car company, a renewable ene…

Like Richard Branson?

Yeah, ok, I get that the article did say there is "only one" Elon Musk, but pointing out the small handful of individuals in a similar space doesn't seem like a very solid refutation of the points made.

And with the possible exception of Branson, none of them are close to doing as big of things, with as much success, and as much inspirational flair and passion, as Musk.

Re: Why is there only one Elon Musk?

#116

Post by [deleted] »

danso wrote: post #97

This is one of the more annoyingly shortsighted posts I've read on HN in a long while. It reflects the attitude of someone too spoonfed by blockbuster movie culture: if shit ain't being blown up, then who cares? When Norman Borlaug died a few years back, there were a lot of people who thought, "Who?" And when they learned that this farm-raised Iowan is credited with saving a billion human lives, they said, "Well why…

[deleted]

Re: Why is there only one Elon Musk?

#117

Post by qzxt »

Ixiaus wrote: post #77
qzxt wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think people who hype on and on about his personal life are just grasping at straws to mask their own insecurities. As someone who grew up not spending that cliched ooey gooey version of "family time" that we always see on television and someone who has been married once, I'm fairly sure it's a lot more complicated than "oh always working, and doesn't care about his family? --insert underhanded "I'm better than you…

This sentiment, exactly - although I will say our family lives are probably pretty rare. My father was/is a successful lawyer and my mom had her own thing going for quite some time as a painter so I rarely ever "saw them". Whenever it was important though they were there, present, non-judgemental, and loving. He does have too much hero worship going on - the example in the article of Bill Gates proves this. Bill is m…

Yeah, it is fairly rare. I think it's because , to some degree,people try really hard to make families conform to a certain idea of family life, so you get a lot of noise like "can you have it all?" - what exactly does that even mean? - or many a fodder for Dr Phil specials. Really the best thing my parents did was treat us like people who had their own lives, not some dogs that were supposed to be domesticated and bred.

Indeed. As far as we can tell, Gates is quite the family man. The reality maybe opposite, or it may be in line with what we see. Either way these are people with lives that don't or shouldn't fall into any static schema that we formulate in our heads. I think everyone has a little TMZ in them. While we like to look at the Hollywood and People magazine set and decry them for being trashy, we do the exact same thing; we just have our own celebrities that we pester.

Re: Why is there only one Elon Musk?

#118

Post by noonespecial »

edw519 wrote: post #30

This post reminds me of that old joke: Husband: I am the head of the household! I determine our family's position on all of the major economic, political, and social issues of the day! Wife: I decide the little things, like where we'll live, what we'll eat, and where the kids go to school. As much as I admire the dreams and accomplishments of Elon Musk, I have trouble getting past the idea that he failed to maintain…

Here's an interesting question: Suppose there's a guy who by sacrificing his family life (I mean really rotten here, messy divorce, kids hate him etc) could bring us electric cars, private space travel, and other "good for the many"s. Would you want him to? Would you be that guy?

Re: Why is there only one Elon Musk?

#119

Post by barredo »

pdenya wrote: post #96
barredo wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A good marriage can be way more complicated than putting rockets into space.

To be fair a lot more people have figured out how to have a good marriage than how to put rockets into space.

Yes, but a lot more of people marry than try to put rockets into space!

Also, it's not like Elon its doing all the math and engineering, he has people that does that for him, which is the hardest thing in the putting-rockets-into-space business

Re: Why is there only one Elon Musk?

#120

Post by jlgreco »

jessriedel wrote: post #107
rgbrenner wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SpaceX Blue Orgin Scaled Composites/Virgin Galactic Armadillo Aerospace Bigelow Aerospace Stratolaunch Systems I think that counts as "several"

Thanks very much for the info. Bigelow Aerospace and Stratolaunch Systems are excellent examples. Bigelow is especially interesting because from what I've googled he doesn't seem to have any sort of technical background. On the other hand, I don't believe John Carmack is a billionaire, and in any case Armadillo Aerospace has only had a few million invested in it. (Whether or not these guys are billionaires is very im…

Was Musk actually a billionaire? My impression is that he got a few hundred million from Paypal but never corrects anybody when they overestimate how much he got. He nearly bankrupt himself with SpaceX and Tesla apparently.
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