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Comment by confiscate | Hacker News Reader

You said "What evidence can you provide that Elon is highly intelligent and skilled?"

You sound like a 100% rational person who looks at only hard evidence, instead of making rash assumptions based on emotions.

What evidence can you provide that Elon is mediocre?

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You’ve posted this same question/comment, 3 times in this thread (and I’ve answered it below). You seem to be taking this somewhat personally.

I find it worrying that “Elon is a hyper-intelligent Superman” seems so closely tied up with individual identity in some cases... I guess creating hero’s sometimes makes the universe easier to deal with. But it has an overall negative effect on SV culture.

No you seem to be the one taking this personally. The topics you mentioned "superman" "alien" "individual identity" "hero" "universe"... seems like you are off on a tangent? I have no idea what you are talking about.

Even if you ignore all his other achievements, the man sent his car to Mars. And people are still sitting there going "meh, not impressed. Hyperloop. Average intelligence. Medicore".

THAT attitude has an overall negative effect on SV culture.

Large teams of people did those things not a single individual.

1. You literally just said "He may have the ability to hire people who can execute well". He hired those large teams of people.

2. I never said he alone takes all the credit. I would never say that. All I am saying is, maybe Elon is not mediocre?

Maybe give the guy a break? The guy worked his ass off and ended up flying his car to Mars. Is asking you to admit "Elon is not medicore" too much to ask? At what point do we say "hey, may be we have been too hard on Elon. Maybe all this negativity about his intelligence being mediocre is a little too much?"

Mediocre means average, at least this is the way I mean it. I’m sure there are many things I could use to criticize him, but I don’t think I have.

I just not really agree that he’s super-intelligent or a genius. Most of it seems like PR and marketing..

“if you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that“ - B. Obama

It was unfortunately phrased (allowing opposing parties to misrepresent the statement). But I think it’s a reasonably accurate statement. Companies, and other forms of progress, don’t come from individual effort alone. This is particularly true of science based startups, and the way modern companies are formed and developed (which relies on lots or hiring, lots of external funding, not profit driven).

"it was unfortunately phrased"? Why don't you just own up to it. You phrased the statement, "it" did not phrase itself.

You said several times Elon has "mediocre intelligence". I asked you questions about it, and you repeatedly clarified and doubled down on that statement multiple times. I don't see where the misrepresentation is. It seemed we are both pretty clear on each other's position, no?

Now you are saying others are "misrepresenting the statement"? Come on. What part did I misrepresent?

All those factors of company success you mentioned, like hiring, getting external funding, are all things Elon was responsible for. You literally just listed those exact things as things Elon is good at.

Maybe give Elon a break? Is that too much to ask?

You appear to have misunderstood which comment I’m replying to. My parent comment is a reply to the following quote by Barack Obama: “if you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that“.

If you take the time to google that quote, you’ll find it’s been used in opposition campaigns. I guess to suggest Obama is anti-business.

His phrasing, allowed his comment to be misrepresented, which is unfortunate.

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