Elon Musk is a twat

[SerendipityJane]

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/sep/07/elon-musk-women-testosterone

He IS a twat.

Still changed the world for the better.

Note you don't seem to have anything to say about the free electricity BTW?

Not really, the asteroid belt is incredibly rich with untapped resources that will utterly change all life on earth once we can viabily mine them. I know a couple of scientists that work in this field and honestly, it should be a bigger priority.

I don't think women would have ever built the Apollo rocket - the single greatest achievement of humanity.

Equally I don't think women would have built the atomic bomb, the single worst achievement.

Ah well.

So anyone who managed to get their hands on a Tesla 6 years ago and is still running it can charge it for free

The rest of the late adopter plebs can pay. If they can afford a Tesla.

Sorry, haven't rtft, so apologies if it's been offered already:

Elon Musk is a poo-head. And a doofus.

Yeah, I said it.

This is full of absolute garbage.

it's objectively good because whilst humanity remains a single planet species the likelihood we are made, or make ourselves extinct is quite high.

The resources required to build and fly rockets is nothing compared to, for example eating meat, burning wood or even selling coke in plastic bottles.

Having cheap space flight enables a staggering amount of human advancement that you just don't get any other way.

Minerals, research, zero G production lines - a huge amount.

Is now a good time to suggest you watch the film hidden figures?

Yes they are all driving their Teslas for free.

As for the new ones - a Model 3, the best selling UK car about 3 years running, costs £35k as a base model. For a car that drives itself, costs a tenth of a petrol car to drive, is one of the safest cars ever built, for occupants and pedestrians - and literally anticipates accidents, and actively avoids them and stops the car. It's a staggering achievement for absolutely bugger all

I really am not sure you know what you are talking about

Anyway, if you'll excuse me I'll talk to the low T folk as they are more on my wavelength

I know exactly who worked on the Apollo programme and before. There were plenty of women involved, in both Apollo and Manhattan - I am saying that I don't believe women would have started the projects and that that is a very two edged sword.

if you don;t have anything more to say than "I really am not sure you know what you are talking about" - then it is on you to tell us more

all the things I mentioned - are true. They are not opinions - it's facts that the Moon has hydrogen isotopes we need to mine. It's true the asteroid belt has huge amounts of metals and water for terraforming Mars, it's true that we need zero G factories to produce some nano materials at scale

You might not know it, or be interested in it.

It's still true.

"The resources required to build and fly rockets is nothing compared to, for example eating meat, burning wood"

If you want me to take you seriously you need to back up fatuous statements like this.

I'm finding it hard to believe you are a scientist or technologist when you post such things.

I assume you mean the wood burnt by the whole of humanity uses more resources than the fuel to fly a space x rocket (never mind its construction and end of life disposal).

But that would be a false equivalence and an odd argument to make.

I’m sure he knows what things are socially unacceptable to say. He probably doesn’t stop because the explanation of why doesn’t make any logical sense to him. (Extrapolating a little here from my own experiences with autistic people.)

And honestly, society needs people who are willing to say some* socially unacceptable things, because while they can be tremendously wrong, they can also be the only ones willing to point out when the emperor has no clothes.

*Short of advocating violence, et cetera.

Whats that thing where people cherry pick which part of the argument to reply to because they have no clue how to respond to the other points?

Ah cherry picking. thats it.

Building and flying rockets is insignificant next any one of a hundred other human activities. Try again. Also try covering the other points made.

How can you not see that it has/is?

I know exactly what is and is not socially acceptable. I still say unacceptable things and reveal init. I could blame my own autism, but given I don't think it's a flaw, in fact an asset, I won't.

I won't comply, I won't fit in, I won't say what everyone else is saying to have an easy time. No, I don't have many friends. But the ones I have do seem to like me.

Myopic horizons.

Most people come with caveats.

Anyway, he's likely going to be a trillionaire soon. I daresay it'll make him very happy.

OK fine, but just because I quite enjoy arguing with techbros. I'll do it with sources and everything.

99.9% of all species that ever existed are extinct. https://www.amnh.org/exhibitions/dinosaurs-ancient-fossils/extinction/mass-extinction

Humans are like all other animals. Eventually we will go extinct. Trying to avoid that on a population level is as fruitless as trying to avoid death on an individual level, and in my opinion (this is the non scientific bit) just as narcissistic.

So that's why the first para is pointless, before you even get to whether humans could viable survive on Mars.

Here's some info about Apollo (for readers, not you, you know this already)

https://www.quora.com/How-much-fuel-does-it-take-to-launch-a-rocket-into-orbit-How-long-would-that-fuel-last-if-the-rocket-remained-in-orbit?top_ans=1477743684300655

203,000 gallons of kerosene and 318,000 gallons of liquid oxygen. This is approx. 6, 896, 316, 116, 393.501 calories according to this (https://www.convertunits.com/from/gallon+[U.S.]+of+kerosene/to/calories#google_vignette)

1 gramme of wood contains 4 calories of energy. So this is approx 2,240,790,291 kg wood.

According to Quora the average weight of a tree is 1000 to 6000 kg (https://www.quora.com/How-much-does-a-tree-weigh#:~:text=The%20mass%20(not%20the%20weight,tons%2C%201000%E2%80%936000%20kg.) Let's take 3500kg for this.

The equivalent energy to the kerosene needed to launch apollo is 640,225 trees.

Assuming this as a guide you need 1100 to 2500 trees per hectare.
https://defrafarming.blog.gov.uk/sustainable-farming-incentive-pilot-guidance-plant-trees-to-extend-existing-woodland/

Taking the middle for the calculation again, the amount of trees needed to provide the energy would need 356 hectares, or 3.5km sq of trees.

For reference, the US have estimated the average person uses 640lb (290kg) of wood per year. America is a high user of resources so this is generous.

https://apps.fs.usda.gov/forest-atlas/benefits-wood-products.html#:~:text=With%20more%20than%20313%20million,each%20side%2C%20every%20single%20day.

The energy needed to launch apollo is equivalent to the wood needed for 7.7 million Americans.

3.5 km2 of trees/ wood for 7.7 million people seems quite resource intensive therefore I also think your second para is not accurate.

Having cheap space flight enables a staggering amount of human advancement that you just don't get any other way.
Having cheaper space flight might enable human advancement you don't get any other way is a more realistic way of putting it. Assuming we don't all die from climate change before those benefits are theoretically realised.

This para is your opinion. It's OK for people to disagree. Even if they are "low T"

Never the same after the second album.

Given that we've reached a stage where we need satellites launched, if not further space exploration, then the paradigm shift to much more reuse bringing down costs both monetary and in terms of resources used does seem like an 'objective good'.
And the west would have been up shit creek after the outbreak of war between russia and Ukrainian without SpaceX.

Electric cars are going to be a dead end. I think he believes they will develop tech to overcome their limitations, but in the end transporting around a lot of people is always going to be resource heavy. He has too much faith in tech solutions.

Human behaviour is also probably not Elon's strong point.

That doesn't make him stupid though.

Are you saying we need more pro-dictatorship billionaires to advocate for the rich and powerful while putting down women and those who want a fairer, more equal society..?

Musk is a deliberate shit stirrer. When he posts something controversial I'd be inclined to believe there's a 50/50 chance he believes it versus he's winding people up because he thinks it's funny. Right up to the point where he says he has autism, there's a pretty decent chance he's joking.

I think there is a lot to criticise about Musk but he's done significant good too. And anyone saying he isn't clever is coming from a very similar place to the people who say JKR is a bad writer.

Fair dos. I didn't take that from "cheaper space flights are objectively good". Especially not in the context of colonising space to avoid extinction.

I saw Germaine Greer years ago talking about why this idea you could destroy one planet and just colonise another was a very male outlook. It resonated with me at the time and even more so today. Imagine if he put half as much time and money into how to remove forever chemicals from the environment for example.

Humans are architects of our own destruction really. Not helped by capitalist blinkers.