First Principles Thinking [Elon Musk]

<p>Listen to the Lex Fridman podcast (25mins in): <a href="https://lexfridman.com/elon-musk-3/">https://lexfridman.com/elon-musk-3/</a> </p><p><a href="https://www.swyx.io/first-principles-approach"><strong>How I Approach First Principles Thinking via Logic and Epistemology</strong></a></p><p><strong>Transcript</strong></p><p>So what's your source of belief in situations like this when the engineering problem is so difficult, there's a lot of experts, many of whom you admire, who have failed in the past. Yes. And a lot of people, you know, a lot of experts, maybe journalists, all the kinds of, you know, the public in general have a lot of doubt about whether it's possible and you yourself know that even if it's a, non-normal set, not empty set of success, it's still unlikely or very difficult. Like where do you go to both personally, intellectually as an engineer, as a team, like for source of strength needed to sort of persevere through this and to keep going with the project, take it to completion. </p><p><strong>2 </strong></p><p>00:24:49</p><p>I suppose the strength. Hmm. I just really not how I think about things. I mean, for me, it's simply this, this is something that is important to get done, and we, we should just keep doing it or die trying, and I, I don't need, I source of strength. So </p><p><strong>0 </strong></p><p>00:25:07</p><p>Quitting is not even like, I'm </p><p><strong>2 </strong></p><p>00:25:10</p><p>Just not, it's not in my nature. Okay. And I, I don't care about optimism or pessimism, fuck that. We're going to get it done. Gotta to get it done. </p><p><strong>0 </strong></p><p>00:25:23</p><p>Can you then zoom back in to specific problems with Starship or any engineering problems you work on? Can you try to introspect your particular biologic when you're in that network, your thinking process, and describe how you think through problems, the different engineering and design problems. Is there like a systematic process you've spoken about first principles thinking kind of, </p><p><st