← Back to context

Comment by adventured

8 hours ago

There's no reason to think the brilliant minds at SpaceX are supportive of focusing their mission in any manner-what-so-ever on datacenters in space. You can't call on their genius as the supportive argument accordingly.

I disagree, I think the idea of a cabal of reactionary comrades inside SpaceX is activist fantasy. I think SpaceX only does what it does with full committment of its people: mind, body, spirit.

  • I think there's a scenario where that's true: one where the head of your company is collaborative and deferential to expertise.

    There's another scenario, though: one where the head of your company is a bull in a China shop, whose successes have come almost exclusively through a Barnum-esque scheme of cascading bravado and marketing genius without much expertise, but a marvelous ability to sell any idea purely via unearned gravitas.

    The former is less sexy: I've compiled loads of talented people, and we're going to solve very hard problems, even some that seem impossible.

    The latter is very sexy: I'm a genius and we're going to accomplish the impossible in one year via sheer force of my grand will. And even if it doesn't actually happen, I'll sell you on the next vision.

    • It seems like you’re ascribing to Elon some kind of magic, where you feel he’s breaking the rules of what should be allowed in order to achieve success. Is it impossible you simply don’t understand how what he does works?