I’ve noticed 2 types on this, stick-in-the-muds and peak-hunters.

Stick in the muds latch on to the first version of a belief they encounter properly. They will stubbornly hang on to that for as long as possible.

Peak hunters are the opposite, they will rapidly change beliefs to maximise the results/find truth.

Interestingly, after some time, the 2 groups look almost identical. The peak hunters tend to find the ‘best’ version of their belief, based on their existing memeplex. To budge them, you need to show a different belief is better, on their rankings (not yours). This is hard when they have already maximised it. Without knowing how they are weighing things, they can look like stick in the muds.

The biggest tell is to question why they believe what they do. If they have a reasonably comprehensive answer, they are likely peak hunters. Stick in the muds generally can’t articulate why their belief is better, outside of common sound bites.

That’s tempting, and not a hideous price either.

As painful as it is, this is both what the high road actually looks like, and how we win, longer term. We need to bleed off those we can from the echo chamber of insanity. The more ‘moderates’ we can strip off, the more obvious that insanity becomes.

Mockery feels good, but it drives them back into their group. Kindness and understanding gives us the cracks we need to start deconverting them.

The same way your mortgage is backed up by your house. If you default on your mortgage, the bank can take your house in foreclosure.

Rather than sell shares to raise the money, Musk has backed his borrowing with Tesla shares. Basically, if he doesn’t pay back the loan, the banks get the shares. Unlike houses, shares can change value quite quickly. If the value of the loan exceeds the value of the shares, then the banks start to get VERY nervous. They will call in the loans to get what they can, before things get worse. This could crash the share price further, since they will want to offload the shares as soon as possible.

Musk is extremely rich. However, like most extremely rick people, his money is tied up in shares. If Tesla falls fast enough, he could end up owing more than he has in assets. As soon as his creditors pull the plug, he becomes bankrupt.