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The immediate problem I’m having with this Musk bio (on page 7 of 615) is that (1) he’s a sociopathic serial liar, (2) Isaacson seems disinterested in seriously investigating whether anything he says is true. Like, “wow, his childhood sounds unbelievably difficult. …SHOULD I believe this???”

There’s an opening anecdote about Musk attending a wilderness survival camp where “every few years, one of the kids would die.” Musk grew up white and rich in South Africa. You’re telling me white rich kids in SA were routinely dying and the camp stayed open? Seems… unbelievable.

Another omission: in the chapters on Musk’s college experience, Isaacson adopts Elon’s line that he graduated in 1995 and moved to CA to start a PhD program at Stanford. Musk graduated in ‘97. There have been multiple lawsuits and depositions surrounding these claims. twitter.com/capitolhunte...

This seems like one of those things a biographer ought to nail down: Did you drop out of college, lie to investors about your degree, then get the university to paper over the matter once you were a major donor? Or did you graduate in 95 and just, uh, get the degree two years later?

I’ve read the endnote, but note the whole bio. The story he accepts from musk strikes me as far-fetched. Musk claims penn and Stanford worked out a pretty ornate ex-post transfer credit scheme. This would’ve been back when Musk was no one special. (1/2)

I did my grad work at penn. I don’t have any horror stories, but I can confidently say that they administratively do zero favors for you when you are no one special. Penn would’ve wanted the additional tuition dollars from the transfer student.

enjoying your threaded review btw. makes a lot of points i didn't have the space or the mandate to put in my review but would have liked to if i could. and some i hadn't thought of.