Elon-isms
Recently watched an excellent Interview (link at the end) of @Elon Musk by @Lex Friedman. And as Lex rightly pointed out in his opening remarks, Elon is someone who has given hope back to humanity in a bunch of different ways. Even more so in these tough times. I also noticed that, Elon has a few key ideas that he often talks about in most of these enriching conversations. Attempting to take a quick look at some of them in here.
Orders of Magnitude
Simply means, in powers of 10. An order of magnitude is 10X times and two orders of magnitude is 100X and so on… Elon says, a new product or service has to be much better, by orders of magnitude for the consumer to switch from incumbents or its not enough incentive to switch.
On Balance
All things considered. Most things in life are neither completely good nor bad. There are shades of gray to almost everything. One needs to decide how much gray one is okay with to take action or make decisions. Musk’s individual carbon emissions might be higher than most ordinary individuals but his contribution to sustainable energy future more than offsets for this on balance.
Eating Glass and Staring Into the Abyss
This is how he says, a friend of his describes starting a company feels like. Elon’s advice was, “If you need inspiring words don’t do it.”
Thinking in the Limits
This is about looking at the extremes. From the atom to the universe lets say. Do things behave or work out differently in very small numbers or very large ones? Also, things like when a product is manufactured in large numbers does it cost less due to economies of scale etc. Interestingly, he said a Govt. is a corporation in the limit with a monopoly on violence.
Money 💰💵
Elon surely is uniquely qualified than most of us to talk about money being the richest man and all that. Also because of his work with PayPal. Money is not valuable in and of itself. It serves as a means to allocate labor. Its an entry in a database, with mainframes that run COBOL and central banks having editing permissions to the DB.
Area under the curve
Area under the Curve = ∫ab f(x)dx Elon’s life and work is classic example of the utility optimization function going full throttle. If one can create a product or service that brings happiness or improves the quality of life of a large number of people in some small way or has a huge positive impact on a small number of people, its success is highly probable.
Rate of Innovation
In the long run, the survival and then growth of a company is determined primarily by its rate of innovation. This is important even for our individual careers, the degree to which we stay relevant is determined by the extent of our learning, unlearning and relearning.
Fundamental Breakthrough or Holy Grail
Elon is known to correctly identify and relentlessly pursue fundamental breakthroughs in his chosen areas. When it comes creating a self-sustaining civilization on mars, the key was to have fully and rapidly reusable rockets. When it comes to autonomous cars it was solving for computer vision and so on. Link to the interview
You want to be rich and anonymous, not poor and famous.
~Naval Ravikant
Everything is a process.
It Depends
A long time ago.
Wait!
Actually, not so long ago! When I was in 7th Std and my sister was in 2nd we would have what we then called deep discussions.
In fact, along with our dad, we even had a group (not on what’s app, we just called ourselves that), called Smriti
We grew up in a village with no access to electricity, let alone a TV or internet so we spent time reading and talking to real (not virtual) people.
During those deep discussions whenever my sis asked me a question, more often than not, my answer would almost always start with a phrase, yes you guessed it right, it depends.
I think this story elucidates the the point I am trying to make, much better than I ever could.
I’ve been thinking about this again off late. It was triggered by a conversation with a good friend. Who seemed to think of it as an act of escapism or a copout.
I on the contrary, feel that its a mere acknowledgement of the complexity of the nature of truth, our existence and its meaning of perception & perspective and various other subjective, messy topics.
Or
Its a humble admittance of my own ignorance.
Or
More optimistically, its my genuine belief.
Because, I THINK and have to come to believe it more with each passing day. That, there is no such thing as absolute truth or atleast not until you know it yourself.
What is true, depends on you and truth, no matter how profound or enticing, when its not yours (experential) still remains untruth. Thats also why most people have a hard time believing, let alone relating to the hard things that happen to other people in their lives but have vivid recollection of whatever happened to them in their own lives decades ago and continue to view the world from that same lens shaped by their one experience.
I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel. ~Maya Angelou
Take any question, and try to think through it and come up with a convincing answer and you’ll see what I mean.
These are some questions I can’t help but start the answer with it depends.
Is there God?
If yes, is he/she/it human or in some other form? Or formless? Or just energy? Or Light Is there one supreme god or are there many? I could go on with this, but I guess you see the point.
Are you happy?
Who is the greatest tennis player (or Boxer or Investor or Scientist) of all time?
It seems like a settled one but it depends on how you measure, isn’t it? Some say Rod Laver, others like to go with Roger Federer. But, how do you decide by the number of Grandslam wins? Titles? Matches? Weeks as number one?
What about the times in which they played? The quality of opponents? The role of tech? Global and geo-political situations?
While we imagine or expect most things in life to be binary, either black or white, the truth is that often, they are fifty (or a million shades) of gray.
Thanks for reading, what do you think? Do you agree? Disagree? Have a different thought?
Try out some of the questions that lend itself well to this thought experiment and share your comments.
Jordan Peterson on thinking for yourself and faith in the redeeming power of truth
What a beautiful line by Ruskin Bond
You are always selling, whether you know it or not!
When the facts change, I change my mind - what do you do, sir?
~John Maynard Keynes
If you are persistent, you will get it. If you are consistent, you will keep it.
~Harvey MacKay
The amount of effort, physical, mental and even emotional, to feed a sleepy kid early in the morning 🌅 while rushing to 🏫 is herculean to say the least 🙏😜
What is 🤑?
I do think about this from time to time.
Although, I don’t think I have an answer, I certainly think it’s a question worth pondering together.
Is it a means to an end? If yes, to what end?
Is it the ultimate aim of life? The pinnacle of human aspiration is to make more money?
Is it freedom? Financial or otherwise?
Is it just a piece of paper with some numbers and symbols?
Is it power?
Elon talks about money in a few different ways:
- As a means of labour allocation
- As an entry in a database
- As a mechanism for information transfer etc.
Naval speaks of money as a form of leverage along with capital and code. Although he regards code as superior.
Interestingly, he was also wise enough to state:
Money won’t solve all your problems, but it will solve all your money problems.
Also, can money buy you time?
The answer is YES & NO
Yes, in the sense that you can rent other people’s time for a price. That’s where the means of labour allocation comes from!
No in the sense that , not all the wealth in the 🌍 can buy someone a moment in time once it’s gone.
How do you think and feel about money?
Do you rever it above all else? Or treat it with measured indifference or fall somewhere in between?
Happy Guru Purnima 🙏
गुरु ब्रम्हा गुरु विष्णू गुरुः देवो महेश्वरा गुरु शाक्षात परब्रम्हा तस्मै श्री गुरुवे नमः
The word ‘Guru’ is from Sanskrit, where ‘Gu’ means darkness and ‘Ru’ means dispeller.
The darkness here means the ignorance of illusion(maya) and only a realized master’s blessings can elevate such a soul to the supreme knowledge of self and god.
It is said that the guru appears when the shishya is ready. I do not know if I was or will ever be ready. However, I (completely and unconditionally) trust the guru’s appearance in their infinite compassion and wisdom to mean that I am ready.
Kabir Das, the great saint, mystic and poet of the 15th century placed Guru even above God in his Doha.
गुरु गोविन्द दोऊ खड़े, काके लागू पाय|
बलिहारी गुरु आपने, गोविन्द दियो बताय|
If Guru and Govind, are present before me, to whom shall I bow down first? Glory to the Guru since he showed me Govind.
India is the land of the Guru-Shishya parampara, where the teachers and students share a special and unique bond. Guru Purnima is a celebration of that bond.
It is also known as Vyasa Purnima in remembrance and gratitude to the greatest of sages Veda Vyasa, who wrote the Mahabharata and the Puranas and classified the Vedas into four categories.
On this auspicious day of Guru Purnima let us live in gratitude to all those who imparted knowledge in all aspects of life especially those who have blessed and guided us on our spiritual journey of self discovery, our parents, our teachers, mentors and colleagues.
I have been blessed with one such spiritual master who has been an embodiment of compassion, unconditional love, courage and an unshakable faith in god under the most difficult situations with a remarkable ability to treat one and all equally at all times.
Thank you Ma for your blessings, guidance and protection at all times.
Padapranams 🙏🙏🙏
Smart phone is the new stupidity box.
Truth when its not yours still remains untruth.
If Investing were a Game of Cricket
On an mundane weekend while I was flipping through TV channels I chanced upon some old cricket highlights followed by more business media noise. That’s when a quirky thought crossed my mind.
As I pursued this rabbit hole even further, I could see some parallels between the game of cricket and the world of Investing. This is by no means a perfectly rational analogy but a mere fun exercise in trying to recognize patterns and seek order in a world full of chaos and replete with randomness.
On the basis of ones time horizons the participants in the game of cricket or in the craft of investing can be split into three categories. Long (Test), medium (ODI) and short term (T20).
Just as there are three formats in the game of cricket, three types of men and women flock the world of investing.
Test Cricketers and Value Investors
These are folks who are a purists delight and epitomize excellence in their respective domains. They focus invariably on the process and believe that the results take care of themselves. Patience and perseverance are necessary ingredients in the making of a successful test cricket or value investing career. While the former credits his performance to technical proficiency and deliberate practice in the formative years the latter attribute their massive wealth creation to rigorous fundamental analysis and fortitude to go against the herd when required.
Both are perpetual learning machines and humble to a fault. Of course, there are exceptions to this rule. Every now and then you come across individuals who are cocky as hell and believe they know it all. Only to realize soon, how gravely wrong they were. Maybe there’s a reason why test cricket made Sir Don the game’s greatest and the value way made Warren one of history’s richest ever.
T20 Superstars and Day Traders (Dreamers)
This is the risk of the realm of the adrenaline junkies and the get rich quick seers of short cuts. Higher risk and lower room for error writ large in this unguarded adventure. While the former is all about sheer power and thrives on glitz & glamour, the latter counts on margin money to make them rich. While most aspiring T20 greats have their careers cut short by wrong technique and lack of discipline the speculators lose their shirt and throw-in the towel. Both are sore losers and blame the game and the markets for the disaster they brought upon themselves.
Heard of the likes of Lasith Malinga and Jesse Livermore? One lost his career while the other lost his fortune and tragically succumbed to suicide. Though on balance T20 has done more good to the game than trading has done to man’s mission for wealth creation.
Then comes the third category, which possibly includes some of us or so we hope.
The Moderates on the Middle Path
These are people who don’t fall into either of the extremes. While the players hang around for 8 hours to get a result, the investors (if you can call them that) pull the trigger sometime between three months to three years. These are people who are neither play with fire nor are boring to the bone. Both the length of the game and the investing horizon is temperamentally palatable for most people. But then the preferred duration for a game of cricket and the turn-around time for stocks are hitting new lows with each passing day.
Remember Michael Bevan? He was a quintessential ODIer. In investing, if you have held stocks, now’s the time to hold up a mirror:)
Forth and Final – The Rarest Breed
Then there is the rarest crop that harvests not too often in the history of any human endeavor. These are the true masters of the game endowed with an abundance of god-given talent coupled with an incredible work ethic which makes them truly great. Our very own Virat Kohli and Rakesh Jhunjhunwala are active specimens of this finest breed.
Everything makes sense on the time scale of eternity.
The missing piece in the myth of Icarus
We all know about the story of where Icarus’s father advised him not too fly too high as soon would then melt his wings of wax.
Because of his arrogance Icarus did fly too high, and he did die.
But the story is not over yet.
Icarus’s dad also told him not to fly too low or his weight would sink him in the sea.
This story is mostly used to instruct us to stop being arrogant but there are also times when one ought not to be too humble.
The greater danger for most of us lies not in setting our aim too high and falling short; but in setting our aim too low, and achieving our mark.
~Michelangelo
Freedom is not worth having if it does not include the freedom to make mistakes.
~Mahatma Gandhi.
To discover ones role in god’s creation and to work to fulfill it is indeed a blissful existence.
I think most people are good at more things than the world gives them opportunity to do.
~Ethan Hawke