From hero to zero, Elon Musk’s troubled trajectory is a dizzying pinball run from highs to self-defeating failures. Though the latest outcry about him cutting off Ukraine’s Starlink service in Crimea to aid the Russians does not appear to be true. It was already deactivated there, and he refused the Ukrainians’ emergency request to activate it so they could carry out the attack, for fear of it leading to a nuclear war.
A new biography attempts to pin down what has forged his oddball character and extraordinary talent. Born 28 June 1971 Pretoria, South Africa with no birth time but a rectified one by Starkman of 8.42 pm, he was a headstrong child brought up in an ‘abusive, friendless childhood’ who read science fiction novels and superhero comics and bossed his younger siblings and cousins around. His parents split when he was nine and he elected to live with his wealthy father, an electromechanical engineer, which he later regretted. His interest in computers started when he was 10 and aged 12 he sold his first video game.
Recently Musk has lurched rightwards, embracing conspiracy theories, railing against restrictions, fouled up Twitter, been accused of sexual misdeeds and had his array of multiple children exposed. His biographer thinks he may be going the way of his father who has apparently moved into paranoia, conspiracism and overt racism.
Elon Musk, like Julian Assange born a few days later, is a Sun Cancer square an innovative and rebellious Uranus. He has a creative though can-be-neurotic Saturn opposition Neptune (Jupiter) and a contrary, inordinately stubborn Mars in Aquarius conjunct his North Node. Sakoian & Acker presciently remark in their handbook published in the 1970s that 1971 when there was a long station of Mars in Aquarius was a year when “many souls came into the world who will spearhead a new way of life.” Such a Mars is reformist, deaf to advice, has to learn through their own mistakes and can throw out the old order before having a suitable replacement organized. So it can be destructive as well as constructive.
If Starkman’s rectified time is sound then Elon Musk‘s ornery Mars North Node is conjunct his Ascendant for a full-on assertive/aggressive approach. His Cancer Sun is in the flamboyant, attention-seeking and children-focused 5th; his Jupiter Neptune of visionary dreams and success is in his career 10th; and his Pluto and Uranus are in his 8th giving him access to his deeper unconscious with potentially positive and potentially negative outcomes – inspired but mentally balanced on a fine edge.
Neither of his parents were easy temperaments. Father Errol, 25 May 1946 (net sources) was a Sun Gemini with an dominating Mars Pluto in Leo. His mother Maye, 19 April 1948, was a Sun Aries/Taurus with Saturn, Pluto and Mars in Leo. Both parents sparked off his Mars which would fuel his anger and defiance.
On his Harmonics – his get-it-together 5th is creative. His leaving-a-legacy-for-history 17H is confident, lucky and notable. But so is his self-defeating, highs and lows 10th harmonic which suggests that wild overconfidence and lawlessness could be the undoing of him.
Add On: There is also a birthtime from his biography of 7.30am which puts his contrary, angry Mars in Aquarius in his 8th house of business finances and unconscious drives with Jupiter Neptune in his 5th house of children and romance – which could also fit. Whichever birth time is accurate or neither – he is in trouble come 2026/27 with SA Pluto square his Mars and tr Saturn Neptune in Aries square his Sun. That is around the time Twitter is in real trouble. See post 26 April 2022.