14 books that inspired Elon Musk

1. "The Lord of the Rings", John R. R. Tolkien

Elon Musk was not popular in school. how writes The New Yorker, Elon loved brighten up the loneliness reading fantasy and science fiction. These books, including "The Lord of the Rings", to shape the future outlook mask. "The heroes of the books that I read, always considered it his duty to save the world", - said Elon Musk in the same material of The New Yorker.

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2. "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" by Douglas Adams

Musk admitted that in 12-14 years suffering an existential crisis and buried in books of Nietzsche, Schopenhauer and other philosophers in search of the meaning of life. Did not help. Later Elon came across "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" and the answer to the "Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and everything else" - number 42. Musk then realized that if you can properly formulate a question, and the answer would be easy to give. "The better we learn the universe, the more we understand what questions to ask," - summed up his impression of the book, Elon Musk in

interview Fresh Dialogues.

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3. "Benjamin Franklin. Biography, "Walter Isaacson

Benjamin Franklin - one of the heroes of Elon Musk. "Franklin is quite steep" - something like Musk speaks about one of the founding fathers of America interview Foundation. Franklin was not only a politician, but also an entrepreneur to start a business, an inventor. Not surprisingly, the biography of a man attracted Diversifying mask.

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4. "Einstein. His life and his universe, "Walter Isaacson

In the same interview, Musk says another biography written by Walter Isaacson - biography Albert Einstein. The book describes how one man using his intelligence and ambition to change the world and learn to read the thoughts of the Creator.

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5. "Constructions, or why do not break things," James Gordon

Elon Musk - hungry for new knowledge taught. Book by American scientist James Gordon helped him learn the basics of structural design, when he hit on the idea of ​​creating SpaceX. IN interview KCRW Musk said that "designs, or why do not break things" - an excellent guide for those who are going to engage in the design and technical developments.

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6. Ignition!: An Informal History of Liquid Rocket Propellants, John Bates Clark

«Ignition! - an excellent book about the rocket, John Clark is really funny, "- He said Elon Musk in an interview. John Bates Clark - American chemist involved in the development of rocket fuel in the 60's and 70's. The book tells about the history of rocketry, includes a description of the technical experiments and their results, says the involvement of politicians in space science. The paper edition of the book is hard to find, but online version in the original language available to everyone.

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7. "Artificial Intelligence. Stages. Threats. Strategy, "Nick Bostrom

Elon Musk, SpaceX as the creator and the Tesla, can observe the development of technologies with the bird's-eye view. He sees progress and negative sides. In August 2014 Musk I wrote in Twitter: «I advise you to read the book of Nick Bostrom. We must be extremely careful with artificial intelligence. It can be more dangerous than nuclear weapons. " Swedish philosopher in his book argues that civilization is waiting for, if artificial Intelligence win the human mind.

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8. "From zero to one. How to create a startup that will change the future ", Peter Thiel and Blake Masters

In the early 2000s, rival Elon Musk, has launched the Paying X.com system was Peter Thiel - co-founder of PayPal. Till now the company is thriving, and the businessman became a billionaire investor. Elon Musk is well said about the book of former competitor. In a brief review it He stated"Peter Thiel launched many breakthrough projects. "From zero to one" he tells how he did it. "

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9. Howard Hughes: His Life and Madness, Donald Barlett and James Steele

Howard Hughes - filmmaker and aviation pioneer, who set several world records airspeed and confused mental health by the end of life. His biography is also interested in the mask, what he I mentioned in an interview with CNN. This is not surprising, because Elon Musk, like Howard Hughes, - personality, succeeded in several areas, and seek to open up new horizons.

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10. Merchants of Doubt, Naomi Orestes and Erik Conway

Researchers Naomi Orestes and Erik Conway claimed in his book that the stakeholders - politicians and businessmen - concealed facts relating to health. Elon Musk I wrote in Twitter: «I advise reading for Merchants of Doubt. The same people who yesterday denied the harm of smoking, today deny climate changes of the planet. "

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11. Trilogy "Fund" ( "Base", "Academy"), Isaac Asimov

Part of the interest Elon Musk to space was called science fiction, read in childhood. Thus, in interview The Guardian Musk declared his love for the trilogy "Fund": "It's the lessons of history, which is expected cyclical development of civilizations. You can track the development of Babylon, Egypt, Rome, China. We are now at the peak of the cyclic curve, I would hope that it will. But maybe not. Events can occur which lead to the reduction of this curve. Right now, humanity is for the first 4.5 billion years to break out of their planet. And we need to act now, while the window is open. It is not necessary to hope that it will last very long. "

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12. "Moon - Harsh Mistress" by Robert A. Heinlein

Dystopia novel, which tells about the events in the near future. Criminal and political prisoners were exiled from Earth in the artificial city under the moon's surface. Rebel group Revolutionary waging war against the rulers of the earth. Elon Musk considers this novel is the best work of Robert Heinlein.

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13. The cycle of "Culture", Iain Banks

Books series "Culture" tells the story of a semi-anarchist future where humanoids coexist, aliens and artificial intelligence. At the end of 2014 Musk I wrote in Twitter: «I read the" culture ". It's a compelling picture of a great, almost utopian galactic future. I hope everything goes not too optimistic for artificial intelligence. "

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14. "The latest invention of mankind," James Barratt

This article has already been mentioned several times negative attitude SpaceX founder of artificial intelligence. Not surprisingly, "The latest invention of mankind" as included in the list of must-Reed Elon Musk.

In his book, James Barratt is studying potential future of artificial intelligence, identifies the advantages and shortcomings of its development and indicates a serious danger to human AI, which hold back Google, Apple and IBM.

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