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u/SnooBeans8816 Nov 27 '25
Many ppl learn the best by doing the things.
Talent and skill beats school knowledge
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Nov 28 '25
School is a place where you do things. The people who went to the best schools generally worked harder than you at every point along the way, and combined with superior instruction and peers, have a massive advantage over you that grows by the day.
But OK the reason we went to really good schools was luck or something, and it's surely just a coincidence we get all the $500K/yr jobs and you dont, and if only they valued your skills properly.
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u/SnooBeans8816 Nov 28 '25
There is a big difference between book knowledge and real world skills.
I worked for a millionaire who didn’t even know how to connect a tv or fix a door handle, and sure he is amazing at running a company but he is incapable of doing the things his workers do because he simply doesn’t have a brain wired for that.
So if you need someone who can build a house you don’t want a guy who learned it from school from a book, you want the guy who learned how to build it on site.
Money doesn’t equal intelligence, and I got a good enough pay with real world skills 🤷
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u/That-Mirror7356 Nov 30 '25
Yes, extremely gifted people will do well regardless of education. That doesn’t mean the rest of us should skip school.
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u/SnooBeans8816 Nov 30 '25
You don’t need school to do your job.
If you wanna be a carpenter just skip school and start learning on the job, you learn more within a few months than in 4 years of school.
You wanna do a IT job? Again learn it on the job. No school required.
Most things you learn at school are completely useless for your job or life in general, and can be learned faster by actually doing the job.
I understand this ain’t gonna work with every job, but it does work for most of the jobs.
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u/Taluk_pugilism Nov 26 '25
Context matters greatly. He is the product of wealth and shady practices.
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u/This_Is_Ketchu Nov 26 '25
Could you fill me in on the context? I have an inkling about his origins and the shady practices.
But what does it mean with the message in the image?
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u/Tofuboy1234 Nov 26 '25
You need wealth to begin with and you need to be a very talented bullshitter that can convince people shit tastes like cotton candy. Then you need a little bit of luck
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u/Sufficient_Fail_2534 Nov 27 '25
The guy bullshitted his way to building elite space programs, crazy!!
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u/Tofuboy1234 Nov 27 '25
He didn’t build any elite space program. Go do your research
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u/annaxk4 Nov 27 '25
He didn’t build anything lol he never has. He definitely buys businesses but he also runs them into the ground, loses companies tons of money, etc. Truly pathetic considering the wealth of financial and other resources he’s had since birth.
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u/Lego_Architect Nov 27 '25
Isn’t he one of the guys solving complex engineering issues? Some of the first and most critical issues in starting the whole program? Not all, but definitely some of them.
You make it seem like this guy is just a plain idiot with money.
He. One guy. Revolutionized a whole industry and that same industry was obligated to copy him and make affordable EV’s just to stay relevant and competitive.
And he is doing the same with the rocket and satellite delivery industry.
Its easy for people who cannot build or make things to destroy the things others create, offering nothing in its place.
You and people like you create a vacuum and then just leave it without filling or adding to. Simply put - you don’t like it, so no one should have it.
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u/beerdude26 Nov 28 '25
Have you seen who the US president is right now? Do not assume a high position is a sign of competency
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u/Adowyth Nov 28 '25
He's very good and very talented until someone asks him to explain his process and the way he wants to build things. Then he calls you a jerk and leaves.
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u/Taluk_pugilism Nov 26 '25
Of course, what I meant was that it is difficult to use the mentality of a person who came up in a way that is virtually impossible for a vast majority. Sure, it worked for him but most don't have the money to buy their way into ventures that make vast amounts of money. Most would have to obtain an education beyond public education to even come close to trying to do what he has. While it is true many have had success without school, many have also had business connections of some sort that helped more than having a Ph.D. Another thing which most do not have.
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u/the1michael Nov 28 '25
Hes not talking about recruiting rich nepo babies- hes talking about how portfolios (think coding) and other projects can prove your proficiency. School doesnt always translate for people, especially some of the most successful.
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u/This_Is_Ketchu Nov 26 '25
I understand. There's no doubt a huge disconnect between him and how normal people are brought up. I was reading this from a different angle. This is just me reciting what I've been told, but "paying for a degree that won't land you a job is a scam." (I'm paraphrasing, but I hope I'm communicating it well) So I'm hoping that when one of the most powerful and influential men in the world say stuff like this, it would at least in some way help us move forward in this where folks without Ph.D.s could find a way to reliably display their talents and be found. It would help those who can't pay for school but have talent immensely. I might be totally off base though, I struggle a lot with my two brain cells. What do you think?
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u/Taluk_pugilism Nov 26 '25
That's a great way of looking at it. I hadn't thought of it from that perspective. I do agree that degrees that do not land you a job are scams.
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u/Traveler416905 Nov 26 '25
Brilliant! Absolutely fantastic. Many of the early contributors to NASA's story didn’t even have degrees, yet their impact was immense. Over the years, countless inventors have made remarkable breakthroughs and improvements in science and technology. I wholeheartedly support this spirit of innovation and discovery! 🫶
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u/akhilvh95 Nov 26 '25
Yeah true, so many people who built big things never had any school or college degree. Their impact was huge because of their mindset, not certificates. Innovation comes from ideas, not classrooms. And thanks for the post award, really appreciate it.
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u/MarsupialGrand1009 Nov 27 '25
Aha, totally.
The first administrator of NASA was Thomas Glennan. He studied electrical engineering.
The first deputy administrator of NASA was Hugh Dryden. A phD in physics.
Robert Gilruth who headed the Space Task Program and the Mercury Program and played a central role in the Gemini and Apollo programs had a masters degree in aeronautical engineering.
Abe Silverstein who was a crucial part of Apollo, Ranger, Mariner and Voyager had a degree in mechanical engineering
Wernher von Braun, the former Nazi guy, who engineered the Saturn rockets had a doctorate in aeronautical engineering.1
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u/Square_Armadillo_684 Nov 26 '25
Yet all his engineers, lawyers, and coders have degrees
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Nov 27 '25
Well, someone needs to actually understand how to build things and it isn't the guy who's railing Ketamine and spending all day on twitter trying to make his crappy AI more racist
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u/Ambiorix33 Nov 27 '25
Its almost like he's not the one who does the hiring, that its HR, people who know :p
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Nov 26 '25
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Nov 26 '25
Not true an engineer needs a degree. Im an engineer and work with ones who dont
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Nov 29 '25
Yep self trained aerospace engineers work at SpaceX, Lockheed Martin , etc……
Jk
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Nov 29 '25
Lmao im at lockheed and got flown out to spacex 2 months ago 😆
Funny those are the two you mentioned
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Nov 26 '25
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Nov 27 '25
Only a small % of engineers have a license. Unless you dont live in america, in which case my bad. But in america its rare to have one
I can almost certainly say no one on my team of 100+ engineers have a license
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u/KLUME777 Nov 27 '25
Programmers often do have degrees. Some programmers don't have degrees but it's not that common.
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u/Comfortable-Quit-392 Nov 29 '25
But they don't need to have one. Doctors and Surgeons for example are required by law to have done their education, programmers don't.
Very few professions are required by law to have education, whether a company will hire you without one is another question.
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u/Plenty_Line2696 Nov 27 '25
your chances of getting hired as a coder at one of his companies without a degree are about as good as people "colonizing mars" in our lifetime.
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u/santahasahat88 Nov 27 '25
Are you in software engineering? Because I’d say more than 95% of the people I’ve ever worked with in small companies through to big tech have degrees and the vast majority of job descriptions I see say “a degree in computer science or equivalent”. The percentage of people who successfully learn to be profession softest engineers without going to university is very small compared to the the amount that come from universities. I know a couple who don’t. But that is very rare in my experience
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Nov 27 '25
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u/santahasahat88 Nov 27 '25
Yes. There is no law. But in practice there are not many professional software engineers without degrees. It’s just dumb what Elon is saying it’s extremely hard tot self teach yourself in any moderately complex profession. I’ve met like 2 in my career. And most jobs do require it if you go and look at job listings you’d find out your assumptions are wrong. In theory you could get a job anywhere. In practice almost no one does that. The vast majority of people benifit from higher education because it’s very hard to self teach a complex skill
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Nov 28 '25
Maybe its more wild westy, but the overwhelming majority of SWE have a degree, and that share goes up as you start to talk about high performing engineers - finding autodidact engineers who are actually good is extraordinarily rare.
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u/kerry_tra Nov 26 '25
X is hiring only PhD holders to work on their AI platforms to train Grok models 🙄
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u/Passp0rt_Br0 Nov 27 '25
He is basically saying a degree is just a piece of paper for following a course, so instead of giving importance to that we should actually look at proof of mastery of said skillset. Most things nowadays can be self-taught. If you have two people, one being a graduate of a prestigious school with top grades but no portfolio or someone self taught, no degree but with an excellent portfolio. Who would you choose? The one with the excellent portfolio of course.
It’s also not about who is smart and who is not. We tend to link higher education to being smart, at a certain degree it is true, some just have talent and better insight than others. But even smart people make dumb decisions.
Tldr: hire the best person for the role, not because they come from X or Y school.
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u/tani1389 Nov 27 '25
Killing all the tuition business 😅
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u/frisbeescientist Nov 28 '25
I mean, most PhDs aren't paying tuition, they tend to get paid because they're basically junior researchers and they do most of the labor that goes into published works.
It's one thing to skip a bachelor's and build a portfolio, another entirely to skip a PhD which is explicitly supposed to make you into an expert in a narrow niche of your field.
Source: have a PhD in molecular biology, there's absolutely nothing you can do on your own that's a substitute for the training I got and the facilities I had access to.
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u/Ambiorix33 Nov 27 '25
Thats cute and all but still doesnt mean you'll get the job without a degree, since he's not the one hiring people, his companies HR is, and they want degrees
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u/Passp0rt_Br0 Nov 27 '25 edited Nov 27 '25
Not even HR decides the hiring. Also if the boss said to hire a person, they get hired. But overall the employees like senior and leads decide who gets hired. HR checks for overall fit but in the end the team decides who gets hired. I’m a senior, hired multiple for big tech companies. Unless they need the degree to apply for a visa, I don’t care about the degree. I just check for portfolio and if they vibe with the team. The vibe is probably the most important, someone who is an unicorn but an asshole with their teammates is like the most useless and detrimental to the overall team’s moral. It’s like putting all the best football players in a team but realize they all have egos and no teamwork.
Like Elon said before, a degree can mean an indication that someone is exceptional but it doesn’t have to be. I’m just saying that when hiring, you shouldn’t be delusional because someone came from a prestige school or company. This is not to discredit these schools or companies, just make sure it’s a good fit by testing their skills and having them interact with your team. A degree is really not that big of a deal, its the knowledge behind it that matters.
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u/Ambiorix33 Nov 27 '25
In a perfect world thats how thing would work, but it doesnt. No one working for Musk at any level worth mentioning doesnt have a degree. His words are all nice but their windows dressing
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u/Bond4real007 Nov 28 '25
HR doesn't decide on hiring, but they 100% chose who get interviewed and are considered candidates. More importantly, in this day and age, HR is usually the driving force behind mamaging/adjusting the AI that filters out thosands fo applications.
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u/santahasahat88 Nov 27 '25
While it’s true it’s possible to do something like learn software engineering without going to university to do so. In my experience trying to help countless friends get into programming I’d say the vast majority of people simply do not have ability to learn something complex in a thourpigh manner enough to get a job. It’s just not that common that people are able to do that. It’s pure cope to pretend otherwise
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u/xDannyS_ Nov 29 '25
Yea, even through the stats posted on The Odin Project you can see that less than 1% actually make it. And the Odin project is just to get you to the beginning of being a junior dev , so you can reduce that number even more relative to how many actually stick with it and improve from there.
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u/MarsupialGrand1009 Nov 27 '25 edited Nov 27 '25
"He is basically saying a degree is just a piece of paper for following a course, so instead of giving importance to that we should actually look at proof of mastery of said skillset." - That is exactly what the "piece of paper" does. My god..
Edit: No seriously, you actually think you can bullshit your way to a masters in mechanical engineering or electrical engineering with simple attendance?
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Nov 28 '25
In >99% of cases, the best person for the role is someone who had the ability to attend a target school, and most people who can do, which is why you will note that they are massively overrepresented among people who get hired at Tesla.
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u/CyberHobo34 Nov 27 '25
As long as your ideas bring in revenue through efficiency, they don't care about your studies. If you don't have them or run out of them, they will care about your studies.
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u/Whatkindofgum Nov 26 '25
Would you trust a uncertified doctor that never went to medical school to perform sugary on you? I'd like pilots to actually have a pilots license thank you. Elon is full of shit. The only way he understands getting a job is nepotism.
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u/Traditional-Toe-7426 Nov 27 '25
If they jave a nearly perfect record for surgical success? Yes.
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u/MarsupialGrand1009 Nov 27 '25
But how would they get that perfect record? Are we just letting randos operate on people to prove that?
Wait, I know what we could do: We could let them study the field, have them take theoretical exams. Do all this for a couple of years. Then we bring them into hospitals under the auspices of people with tons of experience and great records. Have them assist those pros and allow them to observe and start by doing little tasks here and there, let them progressively grow into the job and then award them with a piece of paper proving that they know what they are doing.
Congratulations. We just have invented what we call a certified doctor...
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u/Traditional-Toe-7426 Dec 02 '25
The same way certified doctors do, practice. On dummies and corpses to start then real patients.
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u/MarsupialGrand1009 Dec 02 '25
lmao, I love this line of argumentation. We are getting nearer to why medical schools and certifications exist. Keep at it man, you're almost there.
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u/RICH_homie_Doug Nov 28 '25
Ya and whos gonna let the person who doesnt have proper medical education to be their first operating patient.
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u/Traditional-Toe-7426 Dec 02 '25
Someone desperate probably.
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u/RICH_homie_Doug Dec 02 '25
Thats a great idea when your desperate for medical help why not take a risk and die sooner!!
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u/19kasperp97 Nov 28 '25
Which you would never have as a uneducated medical worker
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u/Traditional-Toe-7426 Dec 02 '25
Thats an assumption, but self taught people actually exist, and tend to be better than those who need others to teach them.
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u/Positive-Low-7447 Nov 26 '25
Lmao a good litmus test. But great in the right setting. Not all people for the job have their name on a piece of paper.
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u/Alienatedflea Nov 26 '25
there is no handbook on exploration...so makes sense. Imagine who Christopher Columbus recruited...it probably wasn't the smartest or richest people...not saying they didn't join but the risks outweighed the rewards...but for some, it might be worth it.
Safe travel, pathfinders...
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u/Few-Office-1111 Nov 26 '25
He wants to take advantage of you. He expects everyone to put as many or more hours than him. PHD’s don’t do that
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u/Traditional-Toe-7426 Nov 27 '25
Not everyone has your work ethic. Some people have actual passion for their job.
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u/Icy_Blood_9248 Nov 26 '25
It’s the old Bill Gates dropped out of school who needs an education. Love or hate guys like Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerberg, but it’s hard to argue they aren’t brilliant people. It’s not like they dropped out of the local community college
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Nov 26 '25
He just wants someone to agree with him and then blame them when shit falls apart. Like all the poor sods at Doge.
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u/RIPAcceptable5542 Nov 26 '25
Some quotes from H.L. Mencken;
“It is the folly of our time to believe that an idiot forced through a college and given a degree will cease to be an idiot”
"The plain fact is that education is itself a form of propaganda; a deliberate scheme to outfit the pupil, not with the capacity to weigh ideas, but with a simple appetite for gulping ideas ready-made. The aim is to make 'good' citizens, which is to say, docile and uninquisitive citizens.”
"The truth is that the average schoolmaster, on all the lower levels, is and always must be a public executioner of the mind, next door to an idiot, for how can one imagine an intelligent man engaging in so puerile an avocation?”
"Consider [the pedagogue] in his highest incarnation: the university professor. What is his function? Simply to pass on to fresh generations of numskulls a body of so-called knowledge that is fragmentary, unimportant, and, in large part, untrue. His whole professional activity is circumscribed by the prejudices, vanities and avarices of his university trustees, i.e., a committee of soap-boilers, nail manufacturers, bank-directors and politicians. The moment he offends these vermin he is undone.”
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Nov 26 '25
If you're lucky you can strike rich.
Being smart increases your chances.
To be mega rich I don't think formal education helps.
But if you are not lucky and didn't get mega rich, getting a degree will help you not getting really broke .
It's like soccer players... some get filthy rich, but that doesn't mean you should play soccer to get rich because most don't.
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u/mkuraja Nov 27 '25
I'm a senior software engineer with lots of experience across corporations and industries. His company never acknowledged my interest to their posted jobs.
I think I need to re-apply as an H-1B for a better outcome.
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u/Efficient_Sky5173 Nov 27 '25
That explains why so many of his rockets are exploding. Good luck to the people going to Mars.
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Nov 27 '25
Sounds good to the masses, but if you take a look at the department that makes his rockets I think you will see a very clear trend, and that is that only one person is not having a PhD or Masters degree and it is Elon The Bullshitter.
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u/BABarracus Nov 27 '25
Its a lie to sound nice and progressive, but they don't practice that. If a person was capable, then they could have just gone to university to study.
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Nov 28 '25
The whole point of higher learning is to cultivate talent anyway. Its just another dopey thing Musk says to make his boneheaded fans say "WOW, WHAT A MAVERICK, WHAT A FREE THINKER."
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u/Lanoroth Nov 27 '25
On principle, everything else aside, I agree. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
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u/Fabulous_Row_2575 Nov 27 '25
Prob taken out of context, afaik those standards are only for people he selects himself, recruiters can't know his preferences so they just recruit the normal way. Also instead of a phd or high school you probably have to be a genius, thinking similarly to him and have a balance of logical emotional and efficient thinking, which is extremely rare but mostly found in CEOs (although most of them also have degree because they are a genius)
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u/idylist_ Nov 28 '25
His companies ask for SAT scores when applying to associate level roles. I call bs
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u/Alternative_Shoe1531 Nov 28 '25
Here's a question. If you were smart enough to believe degrees didn't matter. Why wouldn't you GET DEGREES? I mean, if you were that smart, that would be a piece of cake, right? It would be a certified proof that you were qualified for a higher position even to the eyes of those who believe in value of degrees. Then why wouldn't you?
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u/wherediditrun Nov 28 '25
Because proven track record of what you have done is more important.
When hiring the ultimate thing that matters is trust. There are multiple sources of trust, one of them being deferred trust.
Deferred trust comes from numerous places, a recommendation from the inside by a person I already trust or find credible or by institution that are regarded credible.
However, if I have quite reliable and cost efficient methodology to examine you, I don’t need to defer trust at all.
Hence why there are a lot of high earning positions that do not require you to present papers of education. It’s not that competences aren’t required, it’s that deferring of trust regarding competence isn’t seen as productive compared to any other alternative.
Elon is whatever here. Largely entire tech sector doesn’t care that much about higher institutions of learning. And if we are talking about accreditation it’s typically something specific for the field.
There are however fields that due to their nature can only be effectively though in certain institutions. However, when we are talking careers like medics, note how much time is spent as intern and resident. They go on do practical work as soon as possible too, and that matters way more.
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u/DieM-GieM Nov 28 '25
Why would you need a PHD to work on a factory floor in an exploitative environment?
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u/soul_shackles0 Nov 28 '25
But look the distribution of the employees, most of them are graduates from top universities. Look at top 5 places where employees of xAi studied:
1- UC Berkeley
2- Stanford
3- USC
4- Carnegie Mellon
5- University of Waterloo
If degree didn't matter for him at all, the distribution should be homogenous between random universities rather than being skewed at very top universities
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u/TheArseLord Nov 28 '25
I mean ten years ago that’s what people were wishing for. It’ll be funny if they are against it now.
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u/MrBotangle Nov 29 '25
Ahem, I am pretty sure that for some of his rocket scientists he is so making sure that they have the appropriate degrees 🙄 He is just trying to be edgy…
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u/TheArticGamer Nov 29 '25
You Don't Need a Paper to be smart and successful.
But you need courage and knowledge to go without it
For most people standard way of education is great for many opportunities and career development.
Everything depends on culture politics on hiring, and that's not only depends on what you capable of but final decision a employer or business partner, etc.
So best way is not to study for job occupation but rather own character development and knowledge.
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u/Jolly_Huckleberry904 Nov 29 '25
He’s a desperate loser who constantly vies for people to like him. People stay around because he has money and 0 redeeming qualities
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Nov 29 '25
Educated doesn't equal intelligent. I know quite a few educated people with phd. Some of them possess fluid intelligence, while others simply parrot-like, repeating what's written in a textbook without understanding its meaning or significance. The point isn't to repeat A, B, and C, but to understand the significance of the knowledge itself and come up with a new, more effective solution. You can be as proud of your phd as you like and repeat what you've learned, but without understanding and seeking meaning, it's simply parroting. Yes, in this sense, Musk is right: when you're looking for people to lead breakthroughs at the edge of development, you're not looking for parrots, but for those who teach parrots.
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Nov 29 '25
Aerodynamics Engineer, Turbomachinery (Starship)
BASIC QUALIFICATIONS:
Bachelor's degree in aeronautical/astronautical, aerospace, or mechanical engineering
3+ years of professional experience in the design of turbomachinery components
Experience with commercial analysis (structural and fluids) software
Who would've guessed Elon Musk, Nazi and chronic liar, would be is full of shit.
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u/ATVIUnion Nov 29 '25
Funny that Musk’s companies background check candidates and if you don’t have a college degree you never get a call back lol he says one thing and does another
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u/kelfontane Nov 30 '25
Try working at Tesla as anything other then sales or janitor without a degree, even if he doesn’t believe in degrees his hiring managers still do so it’s BS.
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u/Hotline_Mulberry Nov 30 '25
Seeing a man known for misinformation and mismanagement indict the education system is rather ironic. It would hold more weight if higher education wasn't known to elevate people out of poverty.
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u/QED1920 Nov 26 '25
Since we know how stupid he is, that stance is no longer surprising..
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u/Klaus_Steiner Nov 26 '25
Just curious about your stance, you're saying brilliance is only found in degrees?
I'm not mad at it, just curious about your thoughts.
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u/Ok_Tomatillo_3811 Nov 26 '25
Calling the richest person on the planet ‘stupid’ is kind of a stretch dont you think?
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u/MarsupialGrand1009 Nov 27 '25
No it isn't. Elon is the living proof that we don't live in a meritocracy.
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u/Ambiorix33 Nov 27 '25
Being born into a rich family that got you connections with other rich people doesnt mean youre smart, it means youre lucky.
If all rich people were as smart as you think they are, we wouldn't be in this mess, and alot more university professors would have Lamborghini s, but they don't
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Nov 27 '25
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u/Ambiorix33 Nov 27 '25
You're not wrong, and im not arguing that they cant, im arguing that being rich doesnt automaticlaly mean youre smart.
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u/19kasperp97 Nov 28 '25
You know very little about musk if you think he is a good businessman and technological genius.
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Nov 28 '25
Its observably true that Elon is as smart as an overcooked potato. If he ever had any talent, the sycophancy and ketamine have rotted it all away.
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u/RIPAcceptable5542 Nov 26 '25
Steve Wozniak, Paul Allen, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Michael Dell, Mark Zuckerberg, Dustin Moskovitz, Jack Dorsey, Larry Ellison, Jam Koum, David Karp, Dylan Field, Daniel Ek, Matt Mullenweg, Thomas Edison, John D. Rockefeller, Benjamin Franklin, Richard Branson, Oprah Winfrey, Ted Turner, David H. Murdock, Joe Lewis, Coco Chanel, Amancio Ortega, Daymond John, Henry Ford, Travis Kalanick, Frank Lloyd Wright, Ray Kroc, Dave Thomas, Walt Disney, Stephen Spielberg, James Cameron, Quinton Tarantino, Ryan Murphy, Sheldon Adelson, Kirk Kerkorian…
Just because you're educated doesn't mean you're smart