Neuralink 'Participant 1' says his life has changed

For someone with a supreme lack of judgement he sure does own a lot of billion dollar companies. I strive to have the same lack of judgement that he has.

I hope not, I'd rather have fewer narcissistic sociopaths in the world. He only cares about himself and what people think of him. Nothing he does is to benefit other people. He's not Iron Man, he's Lex Luthor.

I guess people have always idolized the creeps of the world, though.

Caligula was pretty successful too. Maybe money and power aren't the magical trump card you think they are.

It will never cease to amaze me how some people think they can know somebody the've never met as well as you think you do. I attribute it to projection.

It is entirely possible that parent poster is simply basing their judgment of Elon on his Nazi salu---er, public behavior.

This guy tweets all day and the press talks about every little thing he ever does, there are hundreds of videos of him on youtube, dozens of his employees and ex-employees telling stories about him on the net. How much more do you think you are going to learn if you actually talk to him?

Pretty sure there's a correlation between intelligence + sociopathy and money.

I would argue a lot of Musk haters are not getting a representative sample of his behavior, but rather only the most outrageous things he says and does, which tend to be the things that penetrate their bubble.

I don’t hate him. I think he’s a sad, small man who makes himself feel big by being a bully and faking technical experience and knowledge. I think his fans confuse being in the right place at the right time in possession significant capital as genius. I think he is an incredibly toxic public figure. I think farming outrage and feeding trolls is bad for everyone. I think Nazi salutes are bad. I think that lying is bad. I think abandoning children is bad. I think buddying up with fascists is bad.

So sure maybe I miss out on his generous acts but honestly he does enough bad that I don’t particularly care about any good he does. He’s only doing it for himself anyway.

I read this Musk biography a few years ago: https://www.amazon.com/Elon-Musk-SpaceX-Fantastic-Future/dp/...

I don't think he's short of technical skill. I think he is a genius, and I think he's sincere in his desire to make humanity multiplanetary.

I recommend reading the biography to get the facts that aren't penetrating your bubble.

I think Musk is going kind of insane due to ketamine abuse, bipolar disorder, and/or whatever caused his father to go insane around his current age.

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/PaL38q9a4e8Bzsh3S/elon-musk-...

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2025/03/ketamine-...

>the kneecaping of public transit projects

Is this the thing about California high-speed rail? I looked into that when it came up on HN the other day, and concluded that Musk had basically nothing to do with the failure of that project. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43299460

So -- Do you have actual solid evidence to defend this "kneecaping of public transit projects" claim? Or shall I assume that the rest of your claims are also liable to be based on half-truths and internet rumors?

Because from my POV there appears to be no end of BS floating around the internet about Musk: https://www.snopes.com/collections/musk-rumors-collection/

In any case, I'm not "defending" Musk in the sense of saying he's a good person. I'm just saying people should try to see him accurately. If you judge people negatively for giving you any information that challenges your worldview, I'd say you're basically admitting that your worldview isn't likely to be very accurate. You can persuade yourself of anything you like, if you're selective in the evidence you admit.

You keep saying I’m in a bubble. I read the Vance bio, and the Isaacson one. I came away with very different opinions of him. At least the Isaacson book didn’t leave me with the taste of boots in my mouth.

> in the right place at the right time in possession significant capital as genius

1. he created the capital he had

2. he is not the only person with capital

3. the opportunities he saw, no one else did

When someone wins the lottery 3 times in a row, it is no longer credible to call it "luck". He's simply a genius.

> Nothing he does is to benefit other people

The only way Elon makes money is through people voluntarily giving it to him in exchange for what he creates.

Is the “nazi salute”, still a thing? It seems like accusations involving it are increasingly used as a tool to delegitimize, because cmon.. you can’t agree with him, but that wasn’t a nazi salute.

That, and billions of government contracts and subsidies.

The government contracts were simply being paid for a service, like you paying a taxi for a ride. Not a gift in any way, shape, or form.

The subsidies were EV subsidies, which were available for all electric cars.

When I was a wee laddie, my dad bought a Herb Alpert album. I liked the music, and decided I was going to play the trumpet. I took lessons and practiced for 5 years. Making a recording and playing it back, forced me to accept that I had no talent whatsoever for trumpet playing. But I did learn how great a trumpet play Herb Alpert was. His control and tone and musicality is stunning. I could never hope to play like that, but I could enjoy his music and bought all of his albums.

Sometimes I'll play one of his songs to a friend, and gush a bit on how good Alpert played. My friends would invariably look at me in puzzlement. They simply didn't know enough about the trumpet to see the skill and virtuoso genius in his playing.

I've never heard another trumpet player play the instrument that well.