Saying "Musk cultists are the worst" was out of line. Otherwise what GP said was correct.
If it helps, I don't think you're a cultist, I'm sure you aren't a stupid person either, but you have this totally backwards. I don't presume to know how that happened, other than that it's something that happens to everyone from time to time, myself included. This is a sincere, no judgement invitation to reconsider your position and realign with reality. People who care about free speech don't respond to criticism with left-field accusations - that's a diversionary tactic. People who make serious buyout offers aren't trying to insert weed jokes in there.
Have you noticed how FSD is always one year off? And now out of left field, there's a robot coming that's one year off? Isn't it weird that, if this technology is in development, it had to be demoed by a dude in a suit? It's pretty obvious to me that FSD is way, way more than a year off, if Tesla ever achieves it at all, and that this robot is a last-minute fiction to cover up some weakness or perceived weakness of Tesla's position.
Musk's basic tactic is a gish gallop. He's just throwing out so much vaguely futurist nonsense that some of it will strike you as brilliant. But it's the illusion of brilliance. There was a time when I found it compelling, too. The world is messed up, and at first glance, he looks like the only one who's proposing solutions that are sufficiently bold to tackle the problems.
But they're hollow and meaningless. He never delivers. What he does deliver is nothing like what was promised.
"People who care about free speech don't respond to criticism with left-field accusations - that's a diversionary tactic. People who make serious buyout offers aren't trying to insert weed jokes in there."
You didn't actually backup much of anything you forward as argument points.
The gish gallop you point to is his trolling, having fun - but that doesn't mean he's not serious or genuine otherwise.
I doubt you've actually balanced out or thoroughly thought through your arguments either.
Before Tesla became the scale it did, at its beginnings, you probably would have called his intentions with Tesla "vaguely futurist nonsense" - same with SpaceX's reusable rockets - "that's absurd, no one's done it before - it's impossible!"
So I wonder if you should brainstorm and/or analyze the positives regarding Elon and his companies and then see how that balances out your conclusions.
> You didn't actually backup much of anything you forward as argument points.
I assumed that, being someone familiar with Musk, you'd be aware of his promises around FSD etc. Most of my post is interpretation of his actions, rather than claims. I can't really "substantiate" my interpretation, I am the source there. So I'm not entirely sure what you're asking me to do here; I am happy to provide more sources, I just don't really know what you're asking.
The gish gallop is not limited to trolling. Having Tesla, SpaceX, and Neuralink is part of it. Making an offer to buy Twitter is part of it - regardless of how trollish it is, signing a deal to buy a company is not "merely trolling", some rude but inconsequential behavior. It's not that the gish gallop is a thin coating of candy over a yummy chocolate core of great ideas. There's no substance there.
When I first heard about Musk I thought he was pretty cool and that he was making important things happen. But when I learned more about him, and started to scrutinize his actions, it became apparent that none of what he says means anything, and everything he does serves to enhance his power and prestige rather than building a future for humanity.
My opinion is a considered one. I don't think there's anything else I need to say on that matter.
> Don't you think someone guiding the development of companies like SpaceX, Tesla, and others, would invest more time into those - rather than say first doing a thorough background check first on a private investigator he newly hired?
If you’re going to hire private investigators to dig up dirt on people who criticize you so that you can smear them to the public, you have a responsibility to be thorough, lest you defame them. It’s not as though Musk has to hire private investigators to smear his critics. If he’s too busy to meet the basic minimum responsibilities of human decency, he could just not hire private investigators to smear his critics.
So Musk was "too busy" to tell someone "do a background check on this guy" (who was a convicted felon, so not difficult), but not too busy to repeat his claims in emails to Buzzfeed etc.
I'm not perfect, but at least I haven't tried to ruin someone by spreading lies about them to millions of Twitter followers.
How can you at all claim Musk has any shred of integrity when he double and triple downed on trying to ruin someone's career? What he did was textbook cancelling, but for some reason it's okay because it was Musk. He never came out and apologized for being wrong, hiring an investigator to violate someone's privacy or the subsequent smear campaigns he ran. He literally ran his own ideological mob at this guy, and yet you think it's the people attacking him for it that are wrong.
> Oh, thank you arbiter of truth - however can we be so good as you to never make a mistake in our life?
Ok got it. So Musk was an idiot, and made a really stupid mistake.
Since you admit that this was all a really stupid mistake, and Musk apparently committed this stupid mistake, then it is reasonable to think that Musk attempting to buy twitter was also a really stupid mistake.
Other people were claiming that it is completely impossible for Musk to do something so stupid as to try to make a mistake by buying twitter, and then attempting to back out.
But, you should agree that those people are wrong, and apparently, yes, Musk can make very stupid decisions sometimes, like in the cave diving incident.
