Elon Musk Sure Made Lots of Predictions at Davos

Humanoid robots, space travel, the science of aging—Musk was willing to weigh in on all of it at this week's World Economic Forum. But his predictions rarely work out the way he says they will.

Elon Musk, the richest man on Earth, is very good at making money. His track record of predicting the future is less stellar.

Through the years, Musk has made several outlandish forecasts—about self-driving cars, about space exploration, about brain chips, about robotics—that have not panned out. The Tesla CEO and former steward of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency seems at least a bit self-aware. During a surprise appearance and his debut at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland on Thursday, he concluded with something like a mission statement: “Generally, for quality of life, it’s better to err on the side of being an optimist and wrong than a ...