Comment by tachyonbeam | Hacker News Reader

Comment by tachyonbeam | Hacker News Reader

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People with amphetamine habits typically look very skinny and unhealthy because amphetamines suppress appetite. Same for cocaine, ritalin and all other dopaminergic stimulants. They can also have facial scabs because of obsessive picking/scratching, and tend to be very twitchy and hyper. He doesn't come off that way at all during interviews.

My personal experience leads me to believe that there is no way Elon Musk could have been dosing stimulants for the last 10-20 years and look as good and as relatively calm as he does. You build a tolerance very quickly, and any edge that you thought the stimulants were giving you will fade away fast. Then, if you increase the dose, your life will spiral off the rails as you become more manic, impulsive and irrational (eg: gambling, sex, spending sprees, irritability, violence, paranoia). Just Google John McAfee if you want to see what this can look like.

IMO Elon Musk just has lucky genetics and doesn't need much sleep, always has high energy. There are people who are fortunate to be born like that.

I know - quite literally - at least a dozen people who take amphetamines daily and display few or none of the visible descriptions you list above. None of us know what EM ingests.

Sporadic, restricted use of amphetamine tends to retain full effect over the long-term. With regular use, the subtle change in perception it causes tends to persist longer than the physical stimulation. The appetite issue can sometimes be addressed simply by actively choosing to eat more.

I do think that, in the long run, it at best averages out between the unavoidable highs and lows. Some people benefit from being able to time when those periods happen. Probably net loss in many cases. Still, the behaviour you're describing represents the end stages of escalating use and loss of control where they have fallen into dependency and/or addiction. That's not inevitable. Some people do seem to be able to self-regulate their use of strong stimulants.

But you're right. It's clear some people are just innately more driven. In the worst case they're like Elon Musk, always flitting around, perpetually alternating between chipper and enraged, and always with coffee in hand and at most four hours of sleep the night before. I find such people infuriating, but that is probably just envy.

^^ Agreed.

> IMO Elon Musk just has lucky genetics and doesn't need much sleep, always has high energy.

I remember him explaining that 6 hours was just a sweet spot (not the highest energy spot), that he would have more energy with more sleep but it wouldn't be enough to compensate for the lack of hours available in a day. Or something to this effect.

>My personal experience leads me to believe that there is no way Elon Musk could have been dosing stimulants for the last 10-20 years and look as good and as relatively calm as he does.

Looks can be deceiving :P Years ago Elon was balding hard and now he has a full head of hair.

the man is overweight

Nah he's just bulking. It's all muscle under there.

I dunno what his schedule is. Maybe he just seems busier than he actually is.

There's no way you can run all these companies, be an international celebrity, and not be busy.

Your reasoning might hold for an average user but not for a billionaire like Musk. He'll obviously have very smart people research and design a cycle for him that mitigates the usual side effects. With calorie intake monitoring, vitamins and anything you can remotely think of. A guy like Musk will also react more controlled with regard to amphetamines.

Whether he actually uses amphetamines I have no idea. But I'd not be surprised to learn that he has his own RC lab.

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