Elon Musk and the Question of Overconfidence

I don't see the point in that article. As far as I can tell this is just another person trying really hard to come up with a way to justify critiquing Musk.

Peter Thiel would classify Elon as a Definite Optimist in that he picks a better future and then builds it. However, most of our leadership and talking heads these days are Indefinite in that they can't being themselves to believe in any particular vision of the future.

This guy is just trying to pretend that Elon's confidence is somehow unjustified. How can confidence in a certain future not be overconfidence, right? It doesn't matter that Elon is clearly right, certainty in vision is always "overconfidence" to the Indefinite.

I guess the real question is what is success? If you do not think climate change is a big problem or do not have a disproportionate fear of asteroids, then most of Elon Musk's work seem to be tilting at windmills.

Personally, I do not think we are going to get anywhere in space travel without space elevator tech, funding for which may actually be reduced if Spacex shows initial success but fails later. And certainly the reports of work culture at these companies are damaging to individuals and society at large.

Extreme efforts in any one direction always have this as a drawback. A more daoist or pragmatic approach to life and its problems would be more efficient.