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Scott Alexander’s review of a 2015 biography of Elon Musk. Elon Musk, to me, is one of the world’s most confusing people. He’s simultaneously both one of the smartest people in the world, creating billions of dollars of value in companies like Tesla and SpaceX, and one of the dumbest, in burning billions on Twitter. Scott’s review I think is a good explanation of what’s up with Musk.
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Notes -
On twitter I have seen the likes of Cernovich and others claim Elon is among the smartest people on earth, if not the smartest. He's smart, no doubt, but to be among the smartest would put him in the company of Fields Medalists, math Olympiad and Putnam winners, math and physics doctorates, etc. Possible but very improbable, imho. He's smart but not that smart. He benefited from luck and good business savvy and intuition about markets, all necessary ingredients for business success. The Twitter Blue verification system did not stop spam, as I and others correctly predicted (when scammers can make $1000s in a day , how is $8 a deterrent). Maybe he was not smart enough to see that, or he did not care.
I'm a Putnam winner, and I don't think it's all that rarefied a category. I certainly don't dismiss out of hand the idea that Elon might be smarter than me. I'm probably better than him at math/programming, but I devoted my life to it and Elon didn't. If he'd had a different set of obsessions, maybe he'd have topped some other category instead of "richest man on Earth". (Heck, I wonder how many pro gaming champions might have been Elon - or a Fields Medalist - with a slightly different set of priorities...)
I am not sure about that. I suspect there are intangible character traits that are probably hardwired to become as driven as someone like Elon. He often comes across as monomaniacal in his world view. That's an extreme type of personality that most people are not comfortable with, let alone can even begin to transform themselves into.
They could be driven, but that drive might mean 25,000 hours of Counter Strike experience.
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I read somewhere that the median score is zero and this among people who are self-selected to take it, so we're already talking people with solid math aptitude .it's pretty rare. going by that alone, if i were going to wager, you are smarter than him, for what it's worth. The Putman is very g-loaded, being a billionaire is less so (even though there is some correlation with IQ). Even if Elon understood physics well enough to solve equations even at a master's level ,that is still not as uncommon as a top Putnam score.
you take the Putnam in college; you don't have a lifetime to devote to it.
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