Through thorns to the stars: Ilona Mask turned 47 years

June 28 marks the 47th birthday of one of the most outstanding entrepreneurs and inventors of recent decades, Elon Musk.

Фото: Depositphotos

Musk became the first person in the world to launch a car into space, and, contrary to NASA's beliefs, proved that after-use blocks of rockets can be planted back to Earth and then reused, which significantly reduced the cost of space flights.

Who is he, this unique man of our time, bringing closer and creating the future? What lives, dreams and what is Ilon Musk afraid of?

He is the founder of the company. PayPal; founder, co-owner and chief engineer of the company SpaceX, CEO Tesla; board member SolarCity. In the ranking of billionaires magazine Forbesin 2017, his fortune is estimated at $ 21 billion.

Besides the fact that he works all the time and manages to read the book a day, he does not have supernormal abilities - he is an ordinary person who had a difficult childhood and a lot of sorrows and failures.

Difficult childhood

Looking at a successful, self-confident man in photographs and presentations of new developments of his multi-billion dollar companies, it is hard to believe that Mask there was a difficult childhood. After the divorce of his parents, Ilon lived for some time with his father, a very cruel man.

“I am well versed in engineering because I inherited it from my father,” says Musk. - What was difficult for others was easy for me. For a while I thought that everything was so obvious that everyone should know about it. ”

But Father Mask had another side that turned out to be very important. Musk does not say what it was manifested in, but calls him "a terrible person."

“My father didn't beat me. Only when I was very young, ”he added.

Mask did not want to continue the topic about his father, and even burst into tears while talking about him.

As an adult, Musk moved his father, his father's wife and their children to Malibu. I bought them a house, cars and a boat. But his father, says Ilon, has not changed, and Ilon had to end the relationship.

“In my experience, nothing can be done. Nothing. Nothing. It's a pity. I tried everything. Threats, rewards, appealed to the mind, emotions, tried to do everything to change his father for the better, but could not, he only became worse, ”said Mask.

At school, Ilon also encountered problems: “For a very long time, I was the smallest and youngest child in the classroom, because my birthday was literally on the last day before which I was accepted to school, 28 June. School gangs literally hunted me. ”

Mask put down his books and began to learn how to fight back - karate, judo, wrestling. This physical education, combined with the growth spurt, gave him 180 centimeters of height by 16 years, instilled confidence in him and taught him to give back.

When he had a fight with the biggest bully in the school and knocked him out with one blow, Musk noticed that he never ran out anymore.

Mask has many projects of various directions, all of them are united by his futuristic view of life.

SpaceX and space colonization

The most vivid and recognizable of them, of course, is SpaceX. For the second year in a row, this company has been included in the list of the best companies for employment, according to Glassdoor. Vice President of HR SpaceX Brian bielde told about all the intricacies of employment to the company and why people like working with Ilon Mask.

First of all in SpaceX looking for talented candidates who have a passion for their work and dedication. The organization is trying to recruit people who are better than those already working in the state.

The best way for personnel officers SpaceX To determine whether a candidate can perform the required tasks is to test his skills in practice. If the company is looking for a world-class welder, then they are asked to cook something at the interview. A similar test is carried out not only for engineers, but also for candidates for any position where this is possible.

How to work with Ilon Mask

Bielde considers Mask a model leader. Not every employee works for Ilona directly, but he actually helps every employee. Ilona Mask's job is to enable the company to move towards the chosen goal without unnecessary red tape and every day employees can make maximum progress.

Bielde noted that Musk is a rare example of a leader who really cares about his company and its purpose. It is not surprising that the site Glassdoor He was ranked eighth on the list of top executives in the United States.

Tesla and the example of democracy Mask-head

Another famous project around the world Mask is the production of electric cars. Tesla. They have already conquered motorists almost all over the Earth, and now they have gone into space.

However, the affairs of this company are not as rosy as investors would like, therefore the Mask is there deprived of salary for whole 10 years. Yes, yes, you read right. The inspirer and the person of the project does all the work, not knowing whether he will receive money for it.

In 2017, Ilon Mask earned his post as the head of his own company Tesla almost 100 million dollars, of which, however, the salary directly amounted to just 46 thousand dollars, and the rest fell on various bonuses.

At the same time, the manufacturer of electric vehicles for the past year showed a loss of 671 million dollars, so the members of the board of directors of the company Tesla voted in favor of depriving Mask of salary in his own company. The guaranteed salary for the position of the manager was eventually decided to be replaced with bonuses that would be tied to the achievement of certain financial indicators.

Board of Directors has developed a new development plan. Tesladesigned for ten years. Ilon Mask will monitor its implementation, for which, if successful, he will receive 12 awards in the amount of 1% of the value of the company's shares. For the first one, the Mask must be capitalized. Tesla to 100 billion dollars, and to get all the benefits, he will have to increase the value of the company to 650 billion dollars.

Фото: Depositphotos

Future generation training

Ilon Musk is the father of five boys and is very responsible about the kind of education they receive.

At first, he gave them to the Mirmanskaya private school for gifted children, but the quality of education and, most importantly, the approach to learning did not satisfy him. After a long search for Musk in 2014, he decided to build own school Ad Astra (translated from Latin - "to the stars"), which quickly gained a reputation as "the most closed in the world." The school is located in Southern California and very little is known about it.

Maximum closeness

The school Ilona Mask has no official website, phone number and pages in social networks. Teachers and parents of students sign a confidentiality agreement. Musk himself spoke about the school only once - in the 2015 year, and then very general things, which in general boiled down to the fact that such an institution exists.

Non-class system

At school there is no division into classes - all children are trained together, according to Ilon himself, “as on a conveyor belt”. Estimates they do not put. This is believed to traumatize the psyche and develop distorted values.

The interests of the child above all

“Some like math, others like languages ​​or music. It is much more logical to base the curriculum on what is interesting for the child at the moment, rather than forcing him to go through a pre-written program, ”says Musk. He is convinced that the sons like this approach, they go to school with pleasure and always look forward to the end of the holidays.

Children are taught to solve problems, not to use tools.

Ilon explains this principle as follows: “We need to fix a broken engine. With the standard approach, they first explain what a screwdriver and wrench are and why they are needed. I believe that it is much more efficient to give the child an engine and ask him to disassemble - then he will understand why he needs tools. ”

Ethics and morality

At school, Ilona Musk pays a lot of attention to ethics and morals. Children are asked to speculate on how they would act in a particular situation. For example, this: in a small town on the lake there is a factory, which provides the majority of its inhabitants with work. But this factory pollutes the environment and spoils the water in the lake. If you close it, people will lose their jobs. If left - it will cause irreparable harm to nature.

What is the “architect of the future” afraid of?

Ilon Musk, developing modern technologies, still fears that there is a risk that this development will go in the wrong direction. Most of all the concerns are, in his opinion, artificial intelligence.

To protect him from Mask founded OpenAI and Neuralink. Openai - uhthen a non-profit organization whose goal is to minimize the dangers of artificial intelligence, and Neuralink working on how to incorporate technology into our brains to create a neurocomputer interface.

If these ideas seem contradictory, think again. Neuralink allow our brains to keep up with the development of artificial intelligence. Machines cannot outwit us if we have all that machines have, plus all that we have. At least, if you assume that what we have is actually an advantage.

The task that Musk encountered in OpenAIis twofold. Firstly, it’s hard to build something smarter than you, because it’s smarter than you. Add to this the fact that artificial intelligence does not feel remorse, morality, emotions - and humanity will be in complete shit.

Another problem is that OpenAI - non-profit organization competing with Deepmind googlewhich has more resources. Musk says he invested in DeepMind with the intention of watching the development of artificial intelligence Google.

"IN Facebook, Google and Amazon - and of course, Apple Lossless Audio CODEC (ALAC),but she cares about personal data — more data about you than you can recall, ”he says.

“There is a risk of concentration of force. Therefore, if general artificial intelligence represents an extreme level of power, who should control it? Few people in Googlewho essentially don’t care? ”fears Musk.

He believes that "the struggle for the superiority of artificial intelligence at the national level is likely to be the cause of the Third World War."

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