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by MangoToupe 289 days ago
> I think this also explains how dismissive you are of experts who have actually worked with Musk and don't seem to share your low opinion of his expertise in certain areas.

It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.

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I think there's also something of a "gell-mann amnesia" effect going on here. I could buy him being a manufacturing genius or whatever for a while because I know nothing about car or rocket manufacturing. But as soon as he bought twitter, I realized he was an absolute moron who had never built or successfully software himself in his life (or perhaps his brain had simply severely atrophied since his time at PayPal to the point he should be aware), but wanted to sling buzzwords as if he were a coder.

2 comments

> But as soon as he bought twitter, I realized he was an absolute moron who had never built or successfully software himself in his life

So making one bad investment, whatever his reasons, means he's a moron?

> but wanted to sling buzzwords as if he were a coder.

Yes, he has a habit of trying to build excitement around his endeavours, and part of that is intentionally projecting an image of technical competence because that's his "brand".

I would agree that software is not one of his strong suits, probably because it was never a specific interest of his, unlike electric vehicles and rockets. Is it your opinion that Musk is not aware of his lack of technical competence with software, or are you saying that his lack of technical competence in this domain combined with the fact that he intentionally tried to project competence means he's also not competent in those other domains?

I think it is more that he fires people who criticize him. That happened when he bought Twitter, so I'm not surprised people are cautious.

Good use of Gell-Mann Amnesia too. I have started using it as a litmus test of sorts. When I encounter a new source I'll go look for something I have domain expertise in. If it seems accurate enough, I'll tend to trust domains I don't have expertise in. If it is inaccurate, I just don't trust them. Actually this is also a strategy I suggest people use with chatbots, as sometimes small details can be critical while other times they are inconsequential. Since the chatbots are not great at nuances this tends to be a good check, but the difficulty is ensuring you prompt as naively as you would in a subject you're less knowledgeable in.