You mean the guy who's infamous for lying? The guy who claimed his car was fully self driving more than a decade before it is? The guy who tweeted "funding secured" and facing multiple fraud charges?
But yes, he’s overly optimistic with timelines. He says so himself.
The tenth time, you should have the good sense to realize that they're full of shit and either a habitual liar or utterly incompetent.
>> Random HN commentator : utterly incompetent
I want what you’re smoking
That, or he’s just a straight up liar who knows the things he says are never going to happen.
Which would you rather it be?
If you are doing something that has been done before, hire a realist. Your project will ship on time and within budget. If you are doing something that hasn't been done before, you need an optimist. Partly because the realists run for the hills -- they know the odds and the odds are bad -- but also because their hedging behavior will turn your small chance of success into zero chance of success. On these projects, optimism doesn't guarantee success, but pessimism/realism does guarantee failure.
So no, I am not scandalized to find that the world's biggest innovator (I hate his politics, but this is simply the truth) is systematically biased towards optimism. It's not surprising, it is inevitable.
They were optimistic and yet they found a way to be optimistic without claiming anything untruthful.
Clément Ader, on the other hand, claimed that his innovation flew, and was ridiculed when he couldn't proof it.
One look at their works and it's clear who influenced modern planes, and who didn't.