Why do traditional automakers believe electric vehicles lack scalable viability, and how did Tesla achieve breakthroughs with first principles thinking?

这个问题很有意思，其实核心就一句话：传统车厂是用“类比”思维，而特斯拉是用“第一性原理”思维。

我试着用大白话给你解释一下。

传统车厂的“类-比-思-维”

你想想，在特斯拉出来之前，传统车厂是怎么看电动车的？

他们会拿电动车和自己最熟悉的燃油车做“类比”：

“发动机”太贵了：他们一看，哦，电动车不用发动机，改用电池和电机。然后他们就去找供应商采购电池，一问价格，“天呐，一组电池的成本比我一整台燃油车的成本还高！” 结论：这玩意儿没法大规模量产，成本降不下来，卖不掉。
“加油站”没有：他们又想，我的燃油车到处都有加油站，几分钟加满油跑几百公里。你电动车呢？充电又慢，充电桩又没几个，谁会买一个出远门就得提心吊胆的车？结论：基础设施跟不上，是小众市场。
我们玩不转：他们自己的工厂、供应链、工程师，全是围绕着发动机、变速箱、排气系统这些复杂机械件建立的。要搞电动车，等于要把自己上百年的家当和经验都扔掉大半，去搞一个自己不擅长的“电子产品”。风险太高，不划算。

你看，他们的逻辑就是：用现有的条件、现有的供应链、现有的市场模式，去套一个新东西。他们看到的是各种障碍和高昂的成本，觉得这事儿在经济上行不通。这就像一个习惯了用砖瓦盖房子的建筑队，看到有人要用一整块玻璃盖房子，第一反应是“这玻璃又贵又易碎，怎么可能盖得起来？”

特斯拉的“第-一-性-原-理”

马斯克的“第一性原理”思维方式正好相反。他不是去问“现在市场上的电池多少钱一组？”，而是去问：

“构成一块电池最基础的原材料是什么？”

他会把问题拆解到最核心的本质：

电池成本的本质：一块电池，无非就是一些碳、镍、锂、铝等金属和化学材料。他去伦敦金属交易所查这些原材料的价格，发现把这些原材料组合起来的成本，其实远远低于当时松下、LG等电池厂商报给他的成品价格。差价在哪？在别人的技术、生产、管理和利润里。
- 他的结论：既然原材料没那么贵，那高昂的成本就是可以被优化的。我自己建厂（后来的超级工厂Gigafactory），自己研究配方，自己设计生产线，就能把成本打到“地板价”。他没有接受“电池就是很贵”这个市场现状，而是从物理和化学本质上认为“电池可以变得很便宜”。
车子性能的本质：传统车厂觉得电动车是慢吞吞的“环保代步车”。马斯克从物理学原理出发：电动机的特性就是扭矩瞬间爆发，没有变速箱的迟滞，结构简单高效。
- 他的结论：从物理原理上看，电动车天生就应该比燃油车快！所以他先做了超跑Roadster，一炮打响，彻底颠覆了“电动车=老头乐”的印象。他让大家知道，电动车不是一种妥协，而是一种性能上的超越。
充电便利性的本质：用户担心的不是“充电”，而是“不能方便地长途旅行”。
- 他的结论：既然没人建充电网络，那我自己建！为了让我的车能卖出去，我必须解决这个问题。于是他投入巨资自建了“超级充电站”网络。在别人看来这是烧钱的疯狂举动，但在他看来，这是让产品成立的必要条件。

总结一下：

传统车厂看到的是一个由昂贵零件（电池）、不完善的配套（充电桩）和不符合现有生产体系组成的“缝合怪”，结论是“不可行”。

特斯拉则是把一切打碎，回到最基本的物理和经济单元，然后重新推导和构建。他发现：

电池的原材料成本很低。
电动机的物理特性决定了车可以很快。
长途出行的核心需求可以通过自建网络来满足。

所以，传统车厂是在一个旧的框架里想问题，被各种“现状”束缚住了。而特斯拉是直接无视了那个旧框架，自己从零开始建立了一个全新的框架。这就像别人都在想怎么把马车造得更快，而他直接去想怎么造汽车。这就是思维方式上的降维打击。 This is an interesting question, and the core of it can be summarized in one sentence: Traditional car manufacturers use "analogy thinking," while Tesla uses "first principles thinking."

Let me try to explain it in plain language.

Traditional Car Manufacturers' "Analogy Thinking"

Think about it, before Tesla came along, how did traditional car manufacturers view electric vehicles?

They would "analogize" electric vehicles with internal combustion engine (ICE) cars, which they were most familiar with:

The "engine" is too expensive: They'd look and say, "Oh, electric cars don't use engines; they use batteries and motors." Then they'd go to suppliers to source batteries, and upon asking for prices, they'd exclaim, "My goodness, the cost of one battery pack is higher than the cost of an entire ICE car!" Conclusion: This thing can't be mass-produced, costs won't come down, and it won't sell.
No "gas stations": They'd also think, "My ICE car has gas stations everywhere; I can fill up in minutes and drive hundreds of kilometers. What about your electric car? Charging is slow, and there are few charging stations. Who would buy a car that makes you anxious about long-distance travel?" Conclusion: Infrastructure can't keep up; it's a niche market.
We can't make it work: Their own factories, supply chains, and engineers are all built around complex mechanical parts like engines, transmissions, and exhaust systems. To get into electric vehicles would mean discarding most of their century-old assets and experience to pursue an "electronic product" they're not good at. Risk is too high, not cost-effective.

You see, their logic was: applying existing conditions, existing supply chains, and existing market models to a new thing. They saw various obstacles and high costs, concluding that it wasn't economically viable. It's like a construction team accustomed to building with bricks and mortar, seeing someone wanting to build a house with a single sheet of glass, their first reaction is, "This glass is expensive and fragile, how could it possibly be built?"

Tesla's "First Principles Thinking"

Elon Musk's "first principles thinking" is exactly the opposite. He didn't ask, "How much does a battery pack cost on the market right now?" Instead, he asked:

"What are the most fundamental raw materials that make up a battery?"

He would break down the problem to its core essence:

The essence of battery cost: A battery is nothing more than some carbon, nickel, lithium, aluminum, and other metals and chemical materials. He checked the prices of these raw materials on the London Metal Exchange and found that the cost of combining these raw materials was actually far below the finished product prices quoted to him by battery manufacturers like Panasonic and LG at the time. Where was the price difference? It was in others' technology, production, management, and profit.
- His conclusion: Since the raw materials aren't that expensive, then the high cost can be optimized. If I build my own factories (later Gigafactories), research my own formulas, and design my own production lines, I can drive the cost down to "rock bottom." He didn't accept the market reality that "batteries are expensive," but rather, from a physical and chemical essence, believed that "batteries can become very cheap."
The essence of car performance: Traditional car manufacturers thought electric cars were slow "eco-friendly commuter vehicles." Musk started from the principles of physics: the characteristic of an electric motor is instant torque delivery, no transmission lag, and a simple, efficient structure.
- His conclusion: From a physics perspective, electric cars are inherently faster than ICE cars! So he first built the Roadster supercar, which was an instant hit, completely overturning the impression that "electric cars = golf carts." He showed everyone that electric cars are not a compromise, but a performance superiority.
The essence of charging convenience: Users weren't worried about "charging," but about "not being able to travel long distances conveniently."
- His conclusion: Since no one else is building a charging network, I'll build it myself! To sell my cars, I must solve this problem. So he invested heavily to build his own "Supercharger" network. To others, this was a crazy money-burning move, but to him, it was a necessary condition for the product to succeed.

To summarize:

Traditional car manufacturers saw a "Frankenstein's monster" composed of expensive parts (batteries), incomplete infrastructure (charging stations), and a mismatch with existing production systems, concluding it was "not feasible."

Tesla, on the other hand, broke everything down, returned to the most basic physical and economic units, and then re-derived and rebuilt. He found:

The raw material cost of batteries is very low.
The physical characteristics of electric motors dictate that cars can be very fast.
The core need for long-distance travel can be met by building one's own network.

So, traditional car manufacturers were thinking within an old framework, constrained by various "status quos." Tesla directly ignored that old framework and built a completely new one from scratch. It's like others were thinking about how to make horse-drawn carriages faster, while he directly thought about how to build cars. This is a paradigm shift in thinking.