Elon Musk Biographer Says Billionaire Has World’s Lowest IQ Among Tycoons, Sparks Firestorm with Scathing Accusations

   

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In a stunning escalation of public criticism against one of the world’s most powerful and polarizing figures, attorney and journalist Seth Abramson, the author of an upcoming unauthorized biography of Elon Musk, has openly declared that Musk may possess the lowest IQ of any billionaire alive today. Abramson, who has chronicled Musk’s career and behavior in a detailed narrative set to publish later this year, took to X (formerly Twitter) with an explosive series of posts that directly challenge not only Musk’s self-constructed image as a genius innovator but also the credibility of the cult-like fandom that surrounds him.

Abramson’s attack wasn’t veiled in implication—it was a direct and forceful repudiation of what he sees as a manufactured persona. “As an Elon Musk biographer, I would peg his IQ as between 100 and 110,” Abramson wrote on Thursday, sharply undercutting the widespread internet mythos that places Musk’s IQ somewhere near the genius level, often above 150, without any proof.

“There’s zero evidence in his biography of anything higher,” he emphasized, making it abundantly clear that his judgment was based on exhaustive research and not ideological disdain. The comment immediately sparked a digital wildfire, especially among Musk’s most ardent followers and MAGA-aligned online spaces where Musk is revered not only as a business magnate but as a cultural and political symbol.

Abramson elaborated in a continuous barrage of posts across Thursday night and Friday morning, delivering what many have described as a brutal dismantling of Musk’s reputation, point by point, across every major venture he’s been associated with. First came Zip2, the project often credited as Musk’s entrepreneurial breakthrough.

According to Abramson, Musk’s role in the company was exaggerated and his contributions overstated. “He was sued for stealing the idea for Zip2,” he noted, claiming that investors ultimately forced Musk out of leadership as they saw him as inexperienced and technically incompetent.

Musk, desperate to impress backers, reportedly faked a supercomputer by building a large shell around a basic desktop computer to create the illusion of technical sophistication. Investors bought in, but only after Musk agreed to relinquish control to more qualified personnel. The code he had written was described as a chaotic mess, prompting professional developers to rebuild much of it from scratch.

 

The same pattern, Abramson alleges, played out at X.com, the digital payments company Musk launched with the proceeds from Zip2’s sale to Compaq in 1999. Though Musk is often credited with founding PayPal, the truth is more nuanced. X.com merged with Confinity, the company that actually developed PayPal.

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Musk was installed as CEO but was removed within six months due to what insiders described as reckless decisions and poor management. Yet Musk retained a significant financial stake and ultimately benefitted immensely when PayPal was sold to eBay.

Tesla, the crown jewel in Musk’s empire, is not immune from Abramson’s criticism. Musk didn’t found the company—he invested in it after its initial development—and according to Abramson, he quickly began making decisions that nearly led to its collapse. Musk’s lobbying of the Obama administration is what, Abramson suggests, saved Tesla and brought it billions in government contracts, not some unique brilliance or engineering prowess.

“The Russians laughed him out of Moscow” when he sought to buy rockets, he wrote, implying that many of Musk’s supposed technical accomplishments were either opportunistic investments or the product of aggressive public relations campaigns rather than individual genius.

Neuralink, The Boring Company, and Twitter (now X) were all similarly lambasted. Abramson described Neuralink as being under multiple ethical investigations, with Musk playing no scientific role in the research. The Boring Company, meanwhile, is derided as “a failure that has done no more than produce an illegal flamethrower for fun.”

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On Twitter/X, Abramson was even more vicious, arguing that Musk has “run the platform into the ground” and will be studied in business schools for centuries as a case study in how to destroy a product with reckless mismanagement.

Abramson’s broader thesis is that Musk’s image as a visionary thinker is entirely fabricated. “Everything he’s said about Twitter/X was a lie,” he said, asserting that the businessman’s tactics amounted to little more than buying influence, manipulating media narratives, and monetizing public attention through sensationalism and controversy.

He attacked the idea that throwing money at ventures or buying out competitors constituted intelligence. “It does not take intelligence to throw money around and buy a company or buy a politician. Anyone would/could,” Abramson stated, striking at the heart of Musk’s brand as a disruptor.

In perhaps his most damning assessment, Abramson argued that American culture is uniquely susceptible to conflating wealth with intelligence. “It is also a particularly American disease to confuse wealth with intelligence and corporations with those who own them,” he wrote. Abroad, such conversations would seem ridiculous, as the notion that Musk has any meaningful intellectual achievements is, in Abramson’s view, unsubstantiated.

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He added that Musk’s supporters are clinging to a myth that serves more to reinforce their own identities than to reflect reality. “If you assign intelligence to just spending money, you’re in a cult,” he proclaimed. “If you attach intelligence to simply owning a successful company whose work on a day-to-day basis you have nothing to do with and who you are considerably more of a hindrance to than a help to, you’re in a cult.”

Perhaps anticipating backlash, Abramson clarified that he does not view IQ as an especially valuable measure of intelligence in a broader sense, but noted that the term had been weaponized by Musk’s fans to paint him as a genius. “Though none of you have any proof whatsoever of any IQ test the man’s ever taken,” he noted, implying that the entire mythos rests on shaky assumptions and internet hearsay.

The reaction to Abramson’s post has been swift and explosive. Critics accused him of jealousy, ideological bias, and professional pettiness. Others lauded him for having the courage to break from a cultural norm that elevates billionaires to the status of demi-gods.

Tech industry insiders and analysts have begun weighing in, with some acknowledging that while Musk’s marketing and financial instincts are unmatched, his technical competence is often overstated or misunderstood. The illusion of a lone genius, they argue, is far more palatable to the public than the reality of team-based innovation and venture capitalism.

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Musk has yet to respond directly to the accusations, though his recent posts on X suggest he remains focused on AI, space travel, and his usual blend of political trolling and meme-sharing.

As Abramson’s biography nears publication, it is likely that his claims will be scrutinized and debated even further. But one thing is already clear: his allegations have punctured the narrative bubble that Musk and his admirers have carefully crafted over decades.

Whether that bubble deflates, pops, or holds its shape under pressure will depend on how much the public truly values narrative over nuance, and spectacle over substance.

In the eyes of Seth Abramson, Elon Musk is not a genius, but a mirror reflecting America’s obsession with wealth as a substitute for intellect. And the sharper that mirror becomes, the harder it may be for Musk’s most loyal supporters to look into it and still see a visionary staring back.