
Elon Musk on First Principles - npostolovski
http://blog.microlancer.com/elon-musks-greatest-weapon-laymans-guide-first-principles/
======
aridiculous
Reasoning from first principles is ahistorical, and that is why it so rarely
works in the real world. Political and social constructs inherited through
time (like, say, the law) will butt heads against a "pure" new solution. You
need the resources (and determination, will, etc) to overpower colossal
systems we've arrived at through the progression of history.

If you're going to hit homeruns like Musk, I think you must "reinvent the
wheel" like he does. But he has resources to fight those battles, and you --
probably -- don't. When he didn't have those significant resources, like when
he started Paypal from first principles, he had an entire cultural shift as
his economic lever: he was only able to compete in the online banking and
credit card industry because it was an Internet wild west.

I'm not sure that reasoning from first principles is the right first step for
someone with no assets now that the internet has legal and corporate oversight
swimming through it. But what do I know :P

~~~
coffeemug
_Reasoning from first principles is ahistorical, and that is why it so rarely
works in the real world._

No. Reasoning from first principles is _hard_ , and that is why it so rarely
works in the real world. It's not enough to be contrarian, you have to be
contrarian _and_ right, and that's really, really, really hard. Most people
reason from first principles, come up with a bunch of bad ideas, and then
blame it on inertia and establishment. 99% of the time, the reality is that
they're being contrarian and wrong, they just can't accept the latter part.

Consider chess. I know the first principles with 100% certainty, but that
doesn't help me predict an outcome of a game. I can barely even analyze a
single move to any serious degree, let alone two moves ahead. It's because I'm
a _bad_ chess player, and most people are bad at reasoning from first
principles. Elon Musk is one of may be five people in the world who can
actually pull it off.

Learning to blame failures on my own ineptitude rather than on the
establishment has gotten me an epsilon closer to Musk's awesomeness. I'm still
lightyears away, though.

~~~
sillysaurus2
_It 's because I'm a bad chess player, and most people are bad at reasoning
from first principles. Elon Musk is one of may be five people in the world who
can actually pull it off._

Hero worship is mistaken. The reason you're bad at chess is because you
believe you're bad at chess, so you don't practice. Similarly, most people
don't believe they can be Musk, so they don't even try.

~~~
nbouscal
Spot on. Some research to back you up:
[http://alumni.stanford.edu/get/page/magazine/article/?articl...](http://alumni.stanford.edu/get/page/magazine/article/?article_id=32124)

~~~
mkingston
Do you know what the article means by: "why some become Muhammad Ali and
others Mike Tyson"?

I _think_ it's contrasting the success of Ali with the (inferred) lack thereof
of Tyson. Maybe? But that doesn't make any sense to me; the first paragraph of
Tyson's Wikipedia page will tell you why.

Unless it's talking about social success. In which case it seems out of
context of the article.

~~~
nbouscal
I know very little about boxing, so I'm really not sure. My thought would be
that though both were successful, perhaps Ali was an underdog who became
successful where Tyson started successful but hit a plateau? I have no idea
whether or not that maps to reality, that's just pattern matching. The other
possibility is that the author of the article knows the same amount about
boxing as I do, and chose an unfortunate analogy.

------
swalsh
A few years ago i went to this talk where the founder of Kiva Systems
(automated warehouse systems) was giving a talk. He was mentioning how he came
up with the idea, and it was actually quite a structured approach. He altered
the parameters to the theoretical maximum (what if the warehouse was an
infinite size) what would the solution be? What he eventually came up with is
the system they have today.

Structural thinking, the way Musk talks about is really useful. It is not
intuitive to move the shelves instead of the warehouse picker, and thinking by
analogy probably wouldn't have lead to that moment of inspiration.

~~~
kiskis
that kiva system is very cool, here is a tedx video about it, and some words
about the theoretical min-max parameters mentioned.

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=szU2-1infqc](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=szU2-1infqc)

------
xzephyr
The so-called reason by analogy is just gradient descent to approach local
optima in optmization. The "by first principle" is just providing an
approximate (ideally convex) model and solve it analytically for global
optima. The problem is generally very hard (#P hard), both for formulating the
problem and solving it. Global optimum of course in theory is better, but the
quality of your objective function and constraints could easily offset this
advantage. If you can come up with a simple linear programming problem for the
battery example - that's great, but most likely you won't due to the prescence
of competitor, market and policy constraint.

~~~
possibilistic
I love this explanation. Do you happen to blog about optimization topics?

~~~
NamTaf
If you're asking waht I think you're asking, then what you're then looking for
is called 'numerical analysis'. Specifically, the grandparent was describing
this [1]. Here is an OCW link for a good primer in to various introductory
numerical analysis processes for Engineering [2].

[1]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gradient_descent](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gradient_descent)

[2]: [http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/mechanical-
engineering/2-993j-int...](http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/mechanical-
engineering/2-993j-introduction-to-numerical-analysis-for-
engineering-13-002j-spring-2005/)

~~~
xzephyr
Numerical Analysis is too broad for this topic. The precise category should
be:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_optimization](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_optimization)

The hierarchy of topics in this area:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Mathematical_optimizat...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Mathematical_optimization)

This is also why Google is paying millions of dollars for a quantum computer.
Being able to solve complex optimization problems efficiently almost partially
translates to access to higher intelligence.

[http://googleresearch.blogspot.com/2013/05/launching-
quantum...](http://googleresearch.blogspot.com/2013/05/launching-quantum-
artificial.html)

------
thangalin
"Reasoning from first principles: What’s the least information I need to
collect from the user to make the app functional?"

Functional web apps do not need any user information.

People should be able to use the app without having to submit any contact
details. An account is created for them automatically, and, presuming they
like the app, they can provide contact details later.

Similarly, most apps do not require passwords at all. E-mail authentication
provides a better security layer than forcing users to pick yet another
(insecure) password.

The algorithm for using the site becomes:

1\. System creates an account with a unique account ID if the user has no site
cookie.

2\. User, upon being impressed, provides e-mail and name.

3\. User can sign in later using their e-mail address.

4\. User receives an e-mail with a login link to click.

Most users these days will already have their e-mail application open (be it
Outlook, GMail, etc.), so leveraging all the work that has gone into making
e-mail secure is a win.

~~~
Aqueous
This works if the ultimate goal is to sign them up for a free account. But
what if the goal is to convert them to a paid account after a certain trial
period? A user can just clear their cache or cookies and use it free
indefinitely.

~~~
thangalin
In freemium models, _some_ features are free. People should be able to _use_
the app without submitting contact details. I did not state that _all_
features had to be free. Enough features should be available that users can
quickly understand premium account benefits. Deciding what features to make
free vs. premium can be a difficult business decision.

Then, unlock premium features for registered (paying) accounts. (Trial periods
require superfluous tracking code that offers little business value, if any.)

See: [http://www.forbes.com/sites/brettnelson/2013/07/23/the-
freem...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/brettnelson/2013/07/23/the-freemium-
model-top-flaws-and-potent-fixes/)

~~~
stinkytaco
For the life of me I can't find the link right now, but it was from Pat and
Bingo Card Creator. He requires an account for troubleshooting and support
purposes. The vast majority of support is from first time/free users and when
they did not create an account, support was a headache at best and impossible
at worst. Perhaps there were other solutions for him, but if you can get
people to create an account and it makes your life easier, why not?

~~~
thangalin
A/B testing could determine whether my hypothesis is correct, which is: more
people will use and share a site if an account is not required to use its
minimal functionality (think pastebin, jsfiddle, and Wikipedia) because
account creation is a barrier to usage.

Thought-experiment. Imagine two _nearly_ identical websites: one requires
registration and the other does not. What site will people be more likely to
use?

There were other solutions to the troubleshooting problem. For example, only
registered accounts can contact for support. Note that there are three types
of accounts: an unregistered account (free), a registered account (also free),
and a premium account (paid).

~~~
stinkytaco
Sure, but one really has to ask themselves whether it's worth that trouble.

I'm certainly not saying you are wrong, but looking at a product like Bingo
Card Creator -- something that's really only worth keeping up if the work is
minimal and the profit's fairly steady -- I doubt I'd go to the trouble.

And as someone who works for a public service institution, the "only
registered accounts can contact support" is a nice sentiment, but rarely works
in practice. What ends up happening is that people didn't read that particular
piece of fine print and now their pissed that you won't help them and you'll
_never_ make that conversion to a paid account. Obviously Pat tried it your
way and made the determination that it would be better for his product’s
future to limit engagement.

You're working on the assumption that engagement and conversion of the maximum
number of people is the sole goal. Perhaps there are other considerations that
creator has.

It's nice to work from first principles, but once the product is on the
ground, you really have to revisit your own goals for the product to make a
determination what will work best.

------
codex
It's funny that the example given is of Musk reasoning to how batteries can be
much cheaper than they are. And yet Tesla buys their raw batteries from third
party manufacturers just like almost all other EV manufacturers. So I'm a bit
confused as to the value of this particular example. Furthermore, batteries
still do not cost anywhere close to what Musk predicts. Perhaps that's because
he completely ignores manufacturing costs in his analysis. The price of a
sewing needle costs a lot more than the cost of the raw materials.

------
ChuckMcM
I'm a big fan of reasoning from first principles, but in practice it tends to
work out more like 'total honesty' does with your spouse. Which is to say, not
always all that great.

I tend to be a reasoned sort of guy, this doesn't mean I don't say stupid
things, I do, but when called on those things I can tell you how I reasoned to
them and you can help me see the error in my reasoning. When someone can't
reason from such a basis, and they are insisting on some plan or assertion
based on their 'gut' I find it very hard to accept that as acceptable. When
they won't even talk about how one _might_ reason to the point, I find it
unacceptable.

Some people are very invested in being "right" and letting them know they may
not be right is taken as an attack on their person rather than their
reasoning. One of the smartest guys I met at Google had this issue. You could
do ok with the Socratic Method (asking questions that might lead them to
understand where they were mistaken) but even that was dangerous if done in a
group context (since the audience could figure out they were wrong before they
could come up with a rationale). When someone works with me to explain their
reasoning I really appreciate and respect them for that.

~~~
redmaverick
>> _When someone can 't reason from such a basis, and they are insisting on
some plan or assertion based on their 'gut' I find it very hard to accept that
as acceptable. When they won't even talk about how one might reason to the
point, I find it unacceptable._

Not all people rely on linear and logical problem solving abilities. People
who are creative tend towards "gut/intuition/instinct". Take for example
Magnus Carlsen, who is the highest rated chess player of all time. He does not
calculate logically which move to play next. Using his vast experience, he
knows intuitively the best possible move to make next. Likewise there are
chess grandmasters who are more methodical and calculating.

“The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful
servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten
the gift.”

― Albert Einstein

~~~
Radim
Occult drivel. Where on earth did you read that about Magnus Carlsen?

To say good chess players (not to say grandmasters, let alone world champions)
don't calculate moves borders on insulting.

~~~
redmaverick
According to Kasparov, Carlsen has a knack for sensing the potential energy in
each move, even if its ultimate effect is too far away for anyone — even a
computer — to calculate. In the grand-master commentary room, where chess’s
clerisy gather to analyze play, the experts did not even consider several of
Carlsen’s moves during his game with Kramnik until they saw them and realized
they were perfect. “It’s hard to explain,” Carlsen says. “Sometimes a move
just feels right.”

~~~
Radim
Now, that concept I'm familiar with. In fact, I think that's a rather common
feeling, not even exclusive to chess or pros.

Intuition (whatever that is) plays a great role, _especially_ at the top
level.

~~~
Double_Cast
_" Noobs use approximately 95% calculation and 5% intuition, whereas a grand
master has a ratio closer to 40% calculation and 60% intuition." _

I vaguely paraphrased this from a paperback chess guide of mine (hopefully
more credible than the internet). According to my guide, grand masters can
effortlessly memorize the positions of realistic matches. But for "nonsensical
chess matches" where the positions were randomly generated, the masters were
just as bad at recall as the noobs. From this data, my guide inferred that
masters rely on recalling attack-patterns from their experience more than
brute-force calculation. Similar to how a tourney-strength player has openings
memorized by heart, I imagine that a master recognizes common middle-game
patterns like the back of his hand.

~~~
tunesmith
I think we're talking about two different uses of the word "intuition".

One is basically to grok. To understand so deeply that you don't have to do
the calculations anymore - you can just "feel" the truth, based off of the
prior work you did.

The other use of intuition is _isn 't_ necessarily connected to prior
calculation or heavy effort. Whether it's a rule-of-thumb, a gut feeling, a
flash of insight or a lateral leap.

Reasoning from first principles isn't a good counterbalance to the first
definition, and that's because the person doing the intuiting has already
internalized those first principles.

But it is an effective counterbalance to the latter, for various reasons
already discussed.

------
dgmdoug
I think the most dangerous thing here is the branding of research as something
new, that Musk has invented. I worked in academic and industrial research for
a number of years, and any work that was worth it's salt typically went back
to first principles to make its point.

The problem with this is that it's hard and time it's time consuming to do
this. Most companies and people don't have the time to go back to first
principles for every product they build, and it would not be financially
viable to do so if they did. So we compartmentalise and we make assumptions
about the outcome based on prior knowledge to assess the risk of the project.

Software development is illustrative of this point. Let's say you are
developing a beautiful front end for your product. You use a toolkit, based
upon an existing language, which eventually will get interpreted/compiled down
through multiple existing systems and run on the processor of your computer.

If I wanted to go back to first principles and make the whole thing faster, do
I optimise my code the language, the compiler, the browser, the os stack, the
hardware stack, CPU assembly? No, as I'd no longer be a front end developer.

Research is hard, expensive, and by it's nature, high risk. If Musk can sit on
his pile of money and do it, great for him, but for most, going back to first
principles for everything is not a viable option.

------
codex
Reasoning from first principles is a symbolic approach. Reasoning by analogy
is the intuitive approach. Both have their place. Intuitive thinking works
especially well on fuzzy problems with incomplete and/or conflicting data,
where a statistical approach is likely best. Reasoning from first principles
is indeed hard, but the reason it's so little used is because it often doesn't
produce real world results.

------
bsdetector
_technical innovations that many thought impossible, like producing battery
packs more cheaply than ever before._

Really? Many people thought that cheaper battery packs were actually
impossible?

Maybe the rest of the article says something important, but when the second
sentence is tripe like that I'm not going to stick around to find out.

~~~
eruditely
What he said isn't even that big of a deal, the issue is more with you than
with him. You actually just said that even if something important could be
understood you will let your pettiness get in the way.

------
pencilcheck
Reasoning from analogy is the wrong way of saying what people have in mind
when they provide examples to explain what it is. To me, it sound more like
reasoning form what already works. In most examples I have seen, it is mostly
about solving a problem using existing solutions/packages available and add
your own flavor to it. That's why the "analogy" thinking because that's how
the idea is presented, people pitch the idea using other's solutions. But what
Elon Musk is different from others is that his thinking is stemming from
scientific research more than you think it is. It is asking about the right
question by digging deep into the core of the problem until you cannot dig any
further. For example, in Elon Musk's example of battery, you first start with
a goal: how to build an electric cars that is cost effective. You break the
goals down into smaller problems, and you could recognize that battery is the
biggest contributing factor in providing the solution to this goal, then you
ask, why is the cost of battery so high yet it yield so little? Then you break
the problem down into further smaller problems such as the cost for each
component that comprised the battery, then you keep reasoning from there until
you can find a ground where you can start reasoning back up. Personally I
think the name "First principle" is also misleading since it is not mainly
about principles, but more about asking the right questions.

------
krmmalik
I'm someone that has thought like this for most of my life, the biggest
problem I have however is persuading others to do the same. Take for example a
client, I'm helping them with improving their email marketing. I ask them do
they really need a huge disclaimer at the end of each email? They dont budge.

Or say - I'm working on a mobile app and try to persuade my co-founder that we
should consider doing things one way and then his response "but xyz company is
doing it this way. so should we".

------
diminoten
This reminds me of the S/N Meyers-Briggs definitions (Sensing vs.
Intuition)[0].

Sensing is about analogy; we go with what exists, what I can
upvote/pin/like/snap, and I improve upon it. I iterate until I've created
something that we know already exists but in an improved way. We take what
exists

Intuition is about what this article calls "first principals"; we notice the
trends, the underlying reasons why we upvote/pin/like/snap and try to create
something that satisfies that need. Or we find a new need and try to fill it.
Doesn't matter.

So Elon Musk is saying something entirely[1] un-new[2] - that N types work
better in entrepreneuring than S types. Common theory, no clue if it holds
water.

[0] - [http://www.myersbriggs.org/my-mbti-personality-type/mbti-
bas...](http://www.myersbriggs.org/my-mbti-personality-type/mbti-
basics/sensing-or-intuition.asp)

[1] -
[http://www.keirsey.com/4temps/inventor.asp](http://www.keirsey.com/4temps/inventor.asp)

[2] - [http://www.businessinsider.com/myer-briggs-personality-
style...](http://www.businessinsider.com/myer-briggs-personality-styles-and-
entrepreneurship-2010-11)

------
6ren
1\. reasoning from first principles is a really cool, powerful and awfully
difficult. Most importantly, it forces you to consider what the question
actually _is_ (see Douglas Adams).

2\. the BOM cost is an interesting perspective, but is a terrible example of
the above, because it doesn't go back to what the problem really is (energy),
and also excludes every solution except batteries made of the same materials,
and therefore likely based on the same principles.

3\. the analogy to BOM for software is information (what do we know? what do
we want?). While this is closer to true first principles than BOM, it assumes
the problem statement, and thus precludes reconceptualization - changing the
specification, changing the requirements, changing the context.

BTW describing a startup as the " _x_ of _y_ " is a way to communicate it
succinctly, and not necessarily what it really is. It's ad copy.

------
samolang
Reminds of a quote (falsely?) attributed to Henry Ford.

“If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.”

------
j45
Musk's thoughts are a great read -- thanks for sharing this.

Much innovation lies at the intersection of a mindset existing in
possibilities, fuelled by creativity and ignoring what has, or hasn't been
done before and really cut to the root of why people desire something or have
a particular need.

------
011011100
Did you really have to come up with a name for it: "reasoning from first
principles"? Does it not bother anyone else that this is just "thinking"? I
mean, if you can deal with the cost of re-engineering the battery, then why
not? Is this not common sense?

~~~
adwn
Reasoning by analogy is also "thinking". What's wrong with giving different
names to different ways of approaching a problem?

~~~
011011100
Because it formalizes thought and encourages people to use templates rather
than actually thinking about it themselves. If you're "solving problems" by
always referring to your sheet of "problem solving approaches", then you're
doing it wrong. You might still be successful in solving a problem, but you've
effectively turned yourself into a robot.

~~~
drone
Anyone operating in a template-driven manner is not reasoning by first
principles. I'm not sure what legs your argument has, we might as well say
that speaking an existing language like English, French, or German makes us
robots by forcing us to communicate within a well-defined and rigorous
communication structure.

The fallacy of an individual with regards to reasoning is not a function of
the fact that methods of reasoning are identified - they are failures of the
individual to effectively apply their own creativity. Don't blame the
linguistic constructs.

~~~
011011100
"Anyone operating in a template-driven manner is not reasoning by first
principles."

I'm saying that when you want to solve a problem, you don't use a checklist of
which "reasoning from first principles" is an item. "reasoning from first
principles" would be the template. It's an approach that someone spoonfed you.
There is no contradiction here because we're speaking about the type of
approach, not the particular sequence of steps you use to arrive at the
solution. Of course you can be creative with these steps once you know the
type of approach you're taking.

"I'm not sure what legs your argument has, we might as well say that speaking
an existing language like English, French, or German makes us robots by
forcing us to communicate within a well-defined and rigorous communication
structure."

Natural language is well-defined and rigorous? That's not true.

"The fallacy of an individual with regards to reasoning is not a function of
the fact that methods of reasoning are identified"

I don't care that it's labeled, per se, as long as people are discouraged to
act like I mentioned. If the act of identifying and labeling thought patterns
promotes laziness, then I am justified in being against it. But anyway, that's
an empirical claim and you haven't provided any real reason for why you think
it's false.

------
tempestn
There's a great example of this kind of thinking on the homepage right now:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6736001](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6736001).
The last sentence in the article:

“But first, this problem needed someone like Jorge,” he said. “An obstetrician
would have tried to improve the forceps or the vacuum extractor, but
obstructed labor needed a mechanic. And 10 years ago, this would not have been
possible. Without YouTube, he never would have seen the video.”

------
DigitalJack
"Problem: Creating a website that allows customers to buy a new car at a low
price and have it home delivered, sparing them the pain of a stressful
dealership visit and price negotiation."

That's not a problem. That's a solution.

------
saraid216
A similar theme, but on game design, can be found here:

[http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1013804/MUD-Messrs-Bartle-
and-T...](http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1013804/MUD-Messrs-Bartle-and-Trubshaw)

------
cbhl
I have this habit of highlighting text as I read, and on this website, I find
that the text is gray and the highlight is a very similar shade of gray.

Does this bother anyone else?

~~~
Elrac
Yes! I came here to opine that in an ideal world somebody would slap the site
designer for his lousy color choice.

All the more ironic that this is a developer trying to tell us about
innovative and creative thinking.

