Meaningful Returns

The two scariest moments of my life have happened in a car. Once I was driving and fell asleep at the wheel, ran off the road, woke up, overcorrected, spun around in the middle of a highway, and ended up on the other side without a scratch on my truck or my body. I was 19. The other was when I was learning to drive, and in the backseat of a driver’s ed car being driven by a 14-year old classmate who, for some reason I still have not yet figured out, turned to look behind her while preparing to make a left-hand turn. At that moment I was convinced there was nothing our instructor could do to save us from a fiery head-on collision.

Today Tesla released this video, which shows one of its cars driving all around by itself. Safely. And of course I’ve read about self-driving cars, and I can’t wait for the day when they’re everywhere, but this was the first time I had actually seen it. It’s mind boggling.  You should absolutely watch it. Like, there’s a chance my son could fall asleep at the wheel on purpose with no fear of crashing because a car is actually the best place to take a nap.

This is one of those cases where I’m reminded of why investing in the stock market for long periods of time is the best way to grow wealth. The world is full of companies trying to do formerly impossible things really, really well, and lots of times they fail miserably, but sometimes they succeed spectacularly. (This is why most people should invest in broad-based index funds, because picking the losers and winners in advance is nearly impossible.)