Coronavirus

[AlanSubie4Life]

Seeing Musk on Twitter today

He REALLY wants that stock grant, and apparently he is concerned about how a delay in reopening the factory might affect that. Though I thought it was nearly a sure thing at this point...I’m going with this poorly researched theory.

Just trying to come up with a rational explanation for why he is derping so hard the last few weeks. He has just been so obviously wrong, over and over again.

Derp...derpity derp derp.

Does he realize this is not a “choice” we have to make? We can open the economy AND eliminate the virus. I am not sure why he just wants to give up.

It’s like a competition to be dumber than Trump.

 

[Cherry Wine]

He REALLY wants that stock grant, and apparently he is concerned about how a delay in reopening the factory might affect that. Though I thought it was nearly a sure thing at this point...I’m going with this poorly researched theory.

Just trying to come up with a rational explanation for why he is derping so hard the last few weeks. He has just been so obviously wrong, over and over again.

He's an obviously brilliant guy, but I can't help but wonder if he's drunk a little too much of his own Kool-aid.

 

[Singer3000]

He's an obviously brilliant guy, but I can't help but wonder if he's drunk a little too much of his own Kool-aid.

Not to make this the Elon Musk Says Stupid Stuff thread. But every time I look back to Twitter it just gets worse.

Validating the views of “Melissa A” and highlighting them to 33 million people...

“The scariest thing about this pandemic is not the virus itself, it’s seeing American so easily bow down & give up their blood bought freedom to corrupt politicians who promise them safety”.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Not to make this the Elon Musk Says Stupid Stuff thread. But every time I look back to Twitter it just gets worse

Yeah, I kind of feel like this exceeds the normal bounds for Elon. It's like he really believes that this is all overblown! I think EVERYONE wants the economy to re-open as soon as possible. But framing it in this "either-or" way is just irresponsible, and shows a deep misunderstanding of what we are capable of accomplishing, if we actually try.

He has a huge following, and pointing people to terrible science and playing up conspiracy theories is just inexcusable in this context.

I'm glad to see I've brought out the disagrees with my prior post. I'm a big fan of Elon. But he's really, really off in the weeds here. It really makes me wonder. I hope very much he keeps himself safe and his arrogance doesn't open him up to an unnecessary infection. He's in a high-risk group.

 

[azaz]

Musk is a complete clown with this behavior and is doing real damage to Tesla’s brand

 

[SO16]

Musk is a complete clown with this behavior and is doing real damage to Tesla’s brand

I’ll bet he’s gained more supporters than he has lost.

I am most concerned about the healthcare system being overwhelmed. But if it can handle the load, then I’m fine with people going out again. My family treats everyone as if they are infected anyway. Sure, our chances go up but we still have the choice to stay home.

He has also already gone through this at GF Shanghai so he probably figures he can make Fremont safer than a grocery store anyway. The real difference though is that Asian countries are much more likely to wear masks and that’s the best weapon for this virus.

 

[wdolson]

Musk is a complete clown with this behavior and is doing real damage to Tesla’s brand

Not a single person on this planet is great at everything. Elon is a world class genius in some areas. His strength is diving deep into the Physics of something and engineering something new from basic principles. This is combined with an extremely creative imagination that was encouraged by a childhood reading science fiction.

He is possibly one of the most gifted industrialists of our era. But while he probably has a bit more knowledge of Biology than the average joe six pack because he understands how science works, he is far from an expert in Biology and Biology is different from Physics in some very key ways. Except for Quantum Mechanics and the cutting edge of the unknown, Physics is extremely predictable. If you understand what is going on, doing X will always result in Y.

Biology is far less predictable. You can make predictions that most of a population of some critter will be affected by some drug, pathogen, or poison, there will usually be some that have a different reaction. Infect 100 people with COVID and you will have 100 different results. Some will be similar, but if you monitor everything going on in each person, each person will probably have a slightly different reaction.

Elon is cherry picking his data because he doesn't really have much patience for things that aren't completely determinate. I understand he wants to get the factories running again and there probably are some ways to do at least some production with proper precautions, but opening up the country now is foolish.

I think we'll be finding out how foolish in a few weeks with some governors opening their states back up.

 

[sixela]

You would benefit from reading a little bit about the hemoglobin oxygen physiology.

The important "silent" part of early Covid-19 lung involvement is hypoxemia, and that is not identified by the oximeter.

Uhm -- I thought pulse oximeters measured the oxygen saturation of your blood (granted, it measures the peripheral oxygen saturation rather than the arterial one), and hypoxemia was directly related to that. I thought hypoxia, on the other hand, when it was not being used indiscriminately --but it is often-- was about the level of oxygen in your tissues, which is not that easy to measure.

[I did assume that "hypoxia" as used earlier in this thread was uses indisciminately, BTW.]

Having lost a friend to something that destroyed his lungs a year ago (first through sarcoidosis, then to an inflammatory response tha proved fatal, given the damage done by sarcoidosis earlier -- given the state of his lungs mechanical ventilation would have been futile), how badly he was doing was readily apparent using a pulse oximeter.

Any suggestions on what to read, if I have time to read a lmittle bit? (That's not sarcasm, that's a real question).

 

[Bad Horse]

He's just a huckster wanting a Payday, don't care how many dislikes I get, dude has lost it and any form of respect I have for him. Dude is the definition of a sellout.

 

[jerry33]

the american public would have to be pretty stupid at this point to buy any of this garbage. We are back to disinfectant levels of idiocy again.

About half are.

 

[jerry33]

Why did the hospital let that moron flaunt their protocols ?
It will be interesting to watch if he gets infected and then infects the white house.

Every cloud has a silver lining.

 

[jerry33]

Not sure if it was mentioned here yet but Ford canceled the Lincoln based on the Rivian platform and blamed it on the virus.

Ford and Lincoln cancel Rivian-powered electric vehicle due to the pandemic


Note that doesn't mean Ford is canceling any Ford EVs, just the one that was going to be branded a Lincoln.

They also put the electric Mustang on hold.

 

[jerry33]

First, if you are outside and are able to stay more than 6 ft away from everyone not in your household you are safe without a mask.

Mostly safe much of the time, not even remotely totally safe. You are certainly better off with a mask anytime there will be non-family members within vision range. The easiest way to show this is to stand downwind of a person smoking. You will be able to smell the smoke far further than two metres. You can't smell the virus, but it acts the same way.

 

[davepsilon]

In other news about unhinged lunatics:

Elon Musk on Twitter

Also, an actual ML model here.,.might be popular amongst the crowd here:

COVID-19 Projections | United States

For the US they estimate a cumulative number of infections of 9 million as of today, which seems about right.

They have state-by-state breakdowns as well.

COVID-19 Projections Using Machine Learning

Has the right feel: 80-120K deaths by end of May with best guess of 100k.

You can see how much tighter NYS is in terms of outcomes due to their high incidence of the disease. The partial herd immunity limits future explosions, probably regardless of what they do (not sure what measures they are modeling for NYS - would be nice to be able to play with them).

Looks reasonable, this website has really fleshed out in a month. Passes the smell test in Europe -COVID-19 Projections | Italy This should be the standard model, IMHE is junk for the drawdown phase. Machine learning is so frequently misapplied I was not expecting it to be a good model based on advertising ML. It’s not the fact that it is ML that makes it good. The modeler has picked the right things to model - that’s what makes it good.

The second wave that shows up in the US curve and most state’s uncertainty ranges is a nice touch for a best effort guess but is probably very sensitive to assumptions built into the model. If this nails the drawdown it could still be off in that new phase, either way bigger or smaller

 

[jhm]

Why did the hospital let that moron flaunt their protocols ?
It will be interesting to watch if he gets infected and then infects the white house.

Speaker Pelosi could be a step or two closer to the Presidency.

 

[jhm]

The thing that is most worrisome about Musk buying into the "reopen" ideology is that it is obviously self-serving. He so desperately wants to reopen Fremont that it is blinding him to a systems view of the plain facts. Does this betray a view that Tesla might not survive a longer shut down? His tunnel vision on display on Twitter does not project confidence.

What would give me more confidence would be for Musk to focus on engineering more automation into the production lines so that they can run on one-tenth the staffing levels. That is a vision that can pay off whether the Covid-19 situation drags on for years or magically disappears. In the end, Musk tells us, only the pace of innovation matters. Now is his moment to demonstrate this rather than complaining about the political situation.

 

[dfwatt]

He REALLY wants that stock grant, and apparently he is concerned about how a delay in reopening the factory might affect that. Derp...derpity derp derp.

Does he realize this is not a “choice” we have to make? We can open the economy AND eliminate the virus.

It’s like a competition to be dumber than Trump.

I think Trump wins that one hands down. In fact he's retired the award for the dumbest chief executive. From now on they're going to call that yearly award the Donald J Trump Clorox Award.

 

[traxila]

Perhaps Musk feels that climate change is actually the most immediate existential threat to civilization, with COVID a distant and inconsequential competitor, and delaying action on climate change mitigation by thrusting the world into a economic depression is disastrous.

Not saying I agree. Just trying to figure out his thought process.

 

[Doggydogworld]

They also put the electric Mustang on hold.

When did they do that? Recent articles say Ford engineers are applying the finishing touches from home and still plan to ship on time. Obviously if Michigan lockdowns continue another 3-4 months that won't be possible, but I haven't seen any Ford announcements yet.

 

[canoemore]

Perhaps Musk feels that climate change is actually the most immediate existential threat to civilization, with COVID a distant and inconsequential competitor, and delaying action on climate change mitigation by thrusting the world into a economic depression is disastrous.

Not saying I agree. Just trying to figure out his thought process.

I certainly think it's reasonable to take a position re: coronavirus mitigation measures that differs from "lock down everything until there are no new cases". I'm an evolutionary biologist. My wife is a disease ecologist. We both recognize the complexity and uncertainty of the current situation. Other countries have demonstrated that a competent response centered on transmission-mitigation and intelligence gathering from mass-testing can reduce the spread of the virus and permit safe, phased restarting of local economies.

Perhaps that's all Elon is trying to convey, but if it is, he is being very, very bad at communicating his position. Instead, his message on Twitter is literally identical to those printed on signs by the people yelling about "muh freedom" and brandishing AR-15s at state capitols around the country.

It is not helpful, it does not account for the complexity or nuance of the situation, and it does not reflect the evidence-based, first principles thinking that makes him such a great visionary and leader at both Tesla and SpaceX.