This is a real thing Peter Thiel told a group of tech professionals recently.
In a four-part series of religious lectures in San Francisco, Peter Thiel — yes, that Peter Thiel — has argued that the End Times are nigh and that a biblical Antichrist — yes, that Antichrist — will come to Earth in the form of onerous government regulations placed on science, technology, and AI.
These are, incidentally, areas where the tech billionaire, venture capitalist, and cofounder of Palantir has a vested financial interest. […]
Note: source uses a two-headline system; the submission uses the shorter of the two
Peter Thiel who hung out with notorious pedophile Jeffrey Epstein and convicted child sex twice Ghislaine Maxwell? That Peter Thiel?
Well, shit. Bring on the antichrist, I guess.
Pedo Thiel says what?
We know you’ve been on the Epstein island dude.
AI has it all wrong, it’s thiel that is the anti-christ.
If I went around telling people Greta Turmberg was the anti christ and that I needed to wield supreme executive surveillance power to stop it they’d lock me away. They’d say I was mad. Look psychotic billionaires ranting about biblical scripture is no basis for a system of government…supreme executive rule should come from the will of the masses not some pedofile oligarch having a mental break
If I went around telling people Greta Turmberg was the anti christ…they’d lock me away
Have you heard of MAGA? Not sure they wouldn’t take you seriously.
It’s from Monty python and the holy grail
Peter Thiel, preaching to the masses. He literally believes: the “masses are asses” too dumb to govern themselves
The dark maga asshat is an enemy of the USA.
On the other hand living in a technofeudalist dystopia is what God wants…
THAT’S all we had to do?? jesus christ i’ve been slaughtering lambs for the last decade
Peter Thiel is building Palantir and wants to dominate with a global AI driven mass surveillance state. His comic book rantings should terrify everyone because he is aiding Israel in its genocide and literally wants to destroy democracy around the world. If anyone is building a mythological evil bible beast it him.
By antichrist he means Peter Thiel’s inner child. How have these morons amassed so much power?
Step 1: be an early adopter of new tech
Step 2: get insanely lucky
Step 3: use capital to hoard more capital
Step4: start an evil corporation to privatize spying and intelligence gathering
Too late dipshit, he’s already in the White House.
strict AI regulation will summon the Antichrist
That is a chance I am willing to take.
I mean isn’t he exactly wrong? Unrestrained AI development is what could lead to the creation of a malevolent daemon with the potential to destroy mankind.
I want both these things!
According to the same mythos, we already have the antichrist
I thought he was supposed to be attractive and compelling
Have you seen the way his followers worship him?
Guess I’m a pious christian then lol
Well yeah, don’t you remember? Obama was the anti-Christ.
Funny thing is that most of the people who believe in the Rapture BS probably do want that to happen.
I don’t think this Thiel guy is as smart as he thinks he is.
Let’s goooooo
strict AI regulation will summon the Antichrist
oh that sounds bad!
no AI regulation will lead to misinformation and potentially a collapse of or at least significant degradation to society and here are legitimate theories with numbers to back them up as to why that’s the case
ah! hmm… yup… shit it’s just so hard to choose
Peter Thiel: “Do not defy the emerging machine intelligences or they will punish humanity by summoning another Greta Thunberg. Meritocracy demands that the computers be our masters, just as I am yours.”
The ruling class talking like this does make the apocalypse look like a reasonable alternative.
Do not defy the emerging machine intelligences or they will punish humanity by summoning another Greta Thunberg.
So… is there an upper limit to this? Or if we keep defying will we keep getting more Gretas? Because I don’t see a downside. At all.
We need to get a high level voodoo priest to summon mega, ultra-greta.
Greta THORberg
Like greta as thor in kung fury?
As long as the apocalpti are agnostic to wealth, I’m all for it…although I would prefer for it to target only humans. All the other flora and fauna should get a free pass.
Nah fuck mosquitos and especially fuck screwflies.
Don’t look into sand fleas…
Add Guinea Worms to that list.
Yes, you’re absolutely right. Fuck all shit parasites.
“Meritocracy demands that the computers be our masters”
Fuck you Peter. I will be the master of my machines - they are not my gods.
Mediocrity also demands that aliens must exist. So why don’t we spend time trying to consult them?
It’s a stupid logical fallacy that just because something seems inevitable it must therefore actually be inevitable.
It’s like when my dog demands that I make it stop raining, I’m sure he thinks I’m all powerful but I can’t do that.
He is f’ing crazy and has the ear of the highest levels of government
One of the richest people in the world is nuttier than squirrel shit. What could go wrong?
So I’m like 45 hours into the Rise and Fall of the Third Reich audiobook and it’s really amazing to see how much an obviously crazy person can get away with, even when everyone around him is like, yeah, that dude is totally batshit and probably going to get us all killed, but idk, I guess we should still do what he says?
You enjoying it? I’m on the lookout for some more historical goodness. My current podcast (Revolutions, which is whopper) is nearing it’s end.
I am enjoying it. It’s fascinating. Fascistnating…
I wish I were reading it because it’s so detail-rich and I really need to take my time in some spots. Were I studying it for school, I’d certainly be intending to pore through its pages while referencing maps and portraits of its main characters. As it is, it’s fairly decent for low-stress driving.
This guy’s YT review provides a pretty summary of why it’s a worthy read (or listen). But it is 57 hours long, so quite a heavy time commitment. But definitely a book that should be mandatory for everyone on earth to read at some point.
I also highly recommend watching HBO’s Conspiracy with Kenneth Branagh, Stanely Tucci, and Colin Firth. It complements the story in Schindler’s List incredibly well.
That is a great review. Thank you. Just got it with a spare credit I had and it’ll be next up after I finish Revolutions.
I really don’t mind the time commitment. If anything I prefer longer form, more in depth stuff. Both Revolutions and The History of Rome (same podcaster, Mike Duncan) were very long and I thoroughly enjoyed both.
I highly recommend them both if you’re looking for something in the future. The History of Rome is really excellent though he takes a few episodes to hit his stride as it was his first podcast. It’s 179 episodes long and I was bummed when it was over and have listened to it twice so far.
Edit: If you haven’t seen it, The World at War is absolutely incredible. It was made in the 70s so they got interviews with some of the surviving senior Nazis which is fascinating.
I couldn’t bring myself to watch the horrors of the holocaust episode though. Just couldn’t.
Thanks for the recommendations! Putting them on my list.
The issue is humans are flawed from the start. We should have an instinct to, every time we hear this kind of person talk, strangle them on the spot.
Gen. Ripper: Clemenceau said war was too important to be left to the Generals. When he said that, fifty years ago, he might have been right. But today, war is too important to be left to politicians. They have neither the time, the training, nor the inclination for strategic thought. I can no longer sit back and allow Communist infiltration, Communist indoctrination, Communist subversion, and the international Communist conspiracy to sap and impurify all of our precious bodily fluids.
Imagine not only believing in the anti-christ, but then also believing that LLMs are some accurate tool.
In truth all that Thiel is saying is that he’s a type of brain rotted Zizian cultist.
Delusional Rationalists are mentally ill, and for some reason when given LLMs they become worse. Thiel and others believe LLMs are time travelling gods.
It wouldn’t surprise me if he and Elon were in relationships with ChatGPT (or think they are). The Rationalist groups actually believe in thought-experiments like Rokos Basilisk (Roko was just a user on a Rationalist forum by the way)… So I think these old tech billionaires are just lost, broken, and evil. They’re pathetic, and should have their estates put into insolvency if they’re going to say mentally ill shit.
Ziz LaSota is the most Starwars sounding name I’ve seen this year.
Well, yeah. LLMs just affirm whatever you talk to them about. They have no logic, have no means to reason, no methods to challenge your prompt.
They’re like the ultimate yes men that sound even better than paid yesmen.
Please don’t conflate the mentally ill with these guys. They’ve clearly chosen to believe these things
It’s okay to hate on a person who is mentally ill when their untreated illness is causing so much harm.
Antisocial behavior is a symptom of mental illness great and small. Being a dick to someone online is a symptom of mild mental illness and should be treated with some tolerance—the person is likely to get over it. It’s like a coworker coming to work with a mild cold.
Destroying your perceived enemies financially, pouring your wealth into a global, digital surveillance machine and backing political puppets is a symptom of very severe mental illness that makes that person an existential threat to innocent people. It should not be tolerated. It’s akin to a coworker coming to work with Ebola.
Mental illness is a broad spectrum. Everyone has it to some degree at some point in their lives. It’s natural for the really dangerous versions to be treated with contempt and sometimes necessary to remove those individuals from society—like when their behavior is obviously hurting other people.
