Building a Giant Space Gun
Summary
A founder's persistence in solving "impossible" problems can convert skeptics into believers—when one co-founder built a simulation proving the 15-km space gun only needed 4.5 km, the other realized belief in the system mattered more than being right about the physics.
Key Takeaways
- Turn objections into collaborative problem-solving by asking skeptics to validate their concerns with data. When the founder demanded a simulation instead of accepting dismissal, it shifted the conversation from opinion to evidence.
- Persistent founders who research solutions to "impossible" problems build credibility. Coming back repeatedly with expert validation ("I talked to this professor") gradually erodes skepticism better than arguments alone.
- Belief in a system's feasibility can matter more than being technically correct. The co-founder's realization—"you believe the system more than I do now"—shows conviction spreads faster than physics papers.
- De-risk ambitious ideas through iterative validation with experts and simulations. Each constraint the founder solved (barrel alignment, gas pressure, length) made the 15-km gun seem progressively more viable.
- Assign tasks based on capability, not hierarchy. When one founder said "I'm not a coder," the other stepped in—this mutual accountability accelerated validation instead of stalling on disagreements.
Related topics
Transcript Excerpt
We're going to make a giant 15-km long space gun and we're going to shoot stuff into space. To most people that just sounds like, "No, you're not. >> [laughter] >> That's insane, right?" >> I've known Mike for something like 15 years, and when he came with the space gun idea, I basically like, "Oh, you got to align the barrel. That's going to be impossible. You got to do this. This is hard. This is hard. This is hard." But, to his credit, he basically just kept coming back with, "Oh, I talked to this professor so-and-so and they said they showed me this paper where they did this, that, and the other." And like, "Oh, we can solve that problem this way." We went back and forth. And the last objection that I had was that the system was going to have to be too long. It was going to be hundreds…