1. "Please put in bold letters my quote that what people experience in the cars is the result of a large number of extremely talented engineers working very hard. Please give me the least credit."
https://cleantechnica.com/2020/08/15/tesla-autopilot-innovat...
3. "Thanks Ashok! Ashok was the first person to join the Tesla AI/Autopilot team and ultimately rose to lead all AI/Autopilot software. Without him and our awesome team, we would just be another car company looking for an autonomy supplier that doesn’t exist."
https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1799650788848841069
4. "The SpaceX team is solving some of the hardest engineering problems in the history of humanity. I think the team is succeeding because, in a lot of ways, we’ve got the smartest and most dedicated team of humans that has ever existed. I’m incredibly proud to work with such a team. I’d like to thank the team for their incredible hard work..."
https://x.com/XFreeze/status/208475... (widely circulated clip)
1. Ashok Elluswamy (Tesla VP of AI Software): "Elon Musk has been the key driver of AI and autonomy at Tesla. He has always pushed us to achieve great things, even when such ideas were seemingly impossible at the time. ... Elon is critical for Tesla’s success in AI. It is his combination of deep technical understanding, insane perseverance and relentless hard work that have positioned Tesla to be a leader in real-world AI. If not for Elon’s ambition, Tesla might have dwindled to become just another car company."
https://x.com/aelluswamy (original note)
2. Jim Cantrell (early SpaceX): "He is by far the single smartest person that I have ever worked with … period. … He has a real applied mind. He literally sucks the knowledge and experience out of people that he is around."
https://www.forbes.com/sites/quora/2014/07/16/how-did-elon-m...
3. Garrett Reisman (former NASA astronaut / SpaceX): "What’s really remarkable to me is the breadth of his knowledge. I’ve met a lot of super smart people, but they’re usually super smart on one thing. … He’s able to have conversations with our top engineers about the most arcane aspects of software. Then he’ll turn to our manufacturing engineers and have discussions about some really esoteric welding process for some crazy alloy. … He’s the most driven person I’ve ever met."
https://x.com/ElonClipsX/status/1791814792988020850
4. Jensen Huang (NVIDIA CEO): "Elon is just an extraordinary engineer, and I love working with him. We’ve built some amazing computers together. … Elon is singular in this understanding of engineering and construction and large systems, and marshalling resources. It’s unbelievable."
https://www.pcgamer.com/software/ai/as-far-as-i-know-theres-...
5. Ashok Elluswamy again: "He is really smart in the sense that he can predict the future very early. He works really hard. Easily 80-90 hours per week. I feel fortunate to work for him. He is not afraid of taking risks."
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/technology/social/tesla-...
Your source for his intelligence is that his employees glaze him? Surely one of the smartest people in the world has written or published something groundbreaking, right? Surely his sole intellectual contribution isn't shitposting on Twitter?
Jensen Huang: "Elon is an extraordinary engineer. He is singular in his understanding of engineering and construction and large systems and marshaling resources."
John Carmack: "Elon is definitely an engineer. He is deeply involved with technical decisions at SpaceX and Tesla. He doesn’t write code or do CAD today, but he is perfectly capable of doing so."
Tom Mueller: "Elon is a super smart guy and he learns from talking to people. He’s so sharp, he just picks it up. He is leading the development of the SpaceX engines, particularly Raptor."
Eric Berger: "Elon is the chief engineer in name and reality."
Andrej Karpathy: "Elon has an incredible ability to reason from first principles. It’s very rare."
Robert Zubrin: "Elon Musk is a brilliant engineer with an extraordinary ability to cut through nonsense. When I met him it was apparent to me that although he had a scientific mind and he understood scientific principles, he did not know anything about rockets. Nothing. That was in 2001, by 2007 he knew everything about rockets – he really knew everything, in detail. You have to put some serious study in to know as much about rockets as he knows now. This doesn't come just from hanging out with people."
Yann LeCun: "He’s a very smart guy and I’m in awe of some of his projects."
Garrett Reisman: "He’s obviously skilled at all different functions, but certainly what really drives him and where his passion really is, is his role as Chief Engineer. That’s the part of the job that really plays to his strengths."
Josh Boehm: "Elon is both the Chief Executive Officer and Chief Technology Officer of SpaceX, so of course he does more than just some very technical work. He is integrally involved in the actual design and engineering of the rocket, and at least touches every other aspect of the business. Elon is an engineer at heart, and that’s where and how he works best."
Kevin Watson: "Elon is brilliant. He’s involved in just about everything. He understands everything. If he asks you a question, you learn very quickly not to go give him a gut reaction. He wants answers that get down to the fundamental laws of physics. One thing he understands really well is the physics of the rockets. He understands that like nobody else. The stuff I have seen him do in his head is crazy. He can get in discussions about flying a satellite and whether we can make the right orbit and deliver Dragon at the same time and solve all these equations in real time. It’s amazing to watch the amount of knowledge he has accumulated over the years."
- Rocket Design
- Battery Chemistry
- Frontier level AI research
There's no way he's just a guy with a bunch of money paying smart people to do things.