Oh he’s a nerd for sure, just one whose ego outsizes his nerdyness by far.

He’s considered an average self-taught programmer by skill, but started fairly early because of his interest in computers. There’s also no way he started SpaceX purely for profit, he had to actually be very interested in space because it was a money pit for a looong time.

I think he went from wanting to make the world a better, more efficient place via tech in the 90s and early 00s, to having a savior complex where he thinks he’s the smartest man to ever have existed, and only he can save the entire world. His goals required him to make a lot of money, and the very same money completely changed him.

That’s not to say he wasn’t always an asshole with a superiority complex, it’s just that there quite likely was more to him than just the pursuit of money and power… But having plenty of both silenced any actual human part of his personality.