6 ms·

This guy is the worst. His writing and beliefs are like the worst parts of Silicon Valley distilled into one human being.

by a2tech 5y ago

inglor_cz 5y ago
This is a very generic statement. What would you single out as concrete examples?
- rvense 5y ago
  In the fine article, he says that freedom and democracy are at odds. This rather bizarre conception of freedom is, I'm sure, the same thought that propelled him to f(o)und that well-know force for liberation of the common man, Palantir Technologies. (There is, obviously, no real freedom for anyone without participation in the distribution of power, i.e. democracy.)
  - jmeister 5y ago
    Did you want the Supreme Court to intervene in the democratically passed abortion law in TX?
    - rvense 5y ago
      انا لست امركي
  - inglor_cz 5y ago
    Non-democratic states indeed tend to be non-free. But I think it is legitimate to think about extent of democracy vs. intrusion to personal lives. It is probably fine to prevent someone from polluting water sources by a democratic vote. It would be an overreach to prevent someone from grilling steaks on his porch because his neighbours are vegetarians and do not like the smell of meat. Zoning of residential areas is somewhere in between. Not too long ago, there was a case in Switzerland where a British person was denied citizenship by the initiative of her neighbors, because she complained too much about various topics (bells ringing too loudly etc.) https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/woman-annoying-swiss-citizenship-passport-switzerland-nancy-holten-gipf-oberfrick-aargau-a7712836.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/woman-annoyi... Is it legitimate to take opinions of your neighbors into account when deciding your citizenship application? It is certainly more democratic than not doing so, but at the same time, it might degenerate into a popularity contest.
    - rvense 5y ago
      I never said democracy was easy. I just said it was necessary.
    - native_samples 5y ago
      The woman in question was Dutch, not British (the article says that in the first sentence). But really, she had lived in Switzerland for decades. Her children are Swiss, etc.
  - thinkski 5y ago
    Thomas Jefferson had similar thoughts, a “tyranny of the majority”. Say 1 in 100 people are doctors. People are tired of paying doctors and want care for free. They put it to a vote. 99 vote to force doctors to work for free. Democracy triumphs, but at what cost? This is partly why America was founded as a republic, not a pure democracy.
    - rvense 5y ago
      99 people forcing one person (or one thousand people) into slave labour does not satisfy my definition of democracy. Of course those that are more affected by an issue should have more of a say in it. Of course democracy must be founded on basic, inviolable rights. That's the whole point.
      - least 5y ago
        > ...does not satisfy my definition of democracy. You can't just ignore the negative aspects of a system because it doesn't suit your sensibilities. Can you do the same for a system of government you're diametrically opposed to? > Of course those that are more affected by an issue should have more of a say in it. So you're fine with the electoral college then, right? > Of course democracy must be founded on basic, inviolable rights. That's the whole point. Not really. Democracy is simply a system to decide on policies that govern a group of people and there is little inherent value in it itself. It can be used to oppress just as easily as it can protect the rights of individuals living in the system. It's dependent on the voting population. Critics of democracy simply argue that it is too easy to oppress when you give individuals direct access to the power to do so.
        rvense 5y ago
        > You can't just ignore the negative aspects of a system because it doesn't suit your sensibilities. What I said was, if a system of government allows one group of people to turn another group of people into slaves, then it isn't a democracy. By my definition, a democracy does not allow slavery, because a democracy must treat all citizens equally. > Democracy is simply a system to decide on policies that govern a group of people To me it's more than that. It's a principle of governance. Not just the how of the system, but the why. > So you're fine with the electoral college then, right? You mean the American system for electing presidents? I don't know exactly, I am half a world away. I will say that from here that country looks pretty bad all in all, but the fact that a single person holds so much power seems a lot more problematic than how that person is picked - although it would be interesting to see what would happen if they somehow managed to find a good one. As far as I know that's never happened.
  - jokethrowaway 5y ago
    Democracy is granting power to the majority to rule on the minority. By definition. Democracy will never create a free society, but neither will dictatorship. Democratic societies tend to be more free than dictatorship, but that's not always the case. If there was an enlightened and rich dictator, he could decide to make weed legal, impose zero taxes, grant freedom of speech. Compared to most of the western world, where weed is mostly illegal, taxation is imposed forcefully and freedom of speech is disappearing - that would be a freer society. The real way to have a freer society is to decentralise power away. It's not about granting 60 millions people an infinitesimal choice for an outcome shared by everyone. It's about each individual having a different outcome.
    - zoolily 5y ago
      Decentralization transfers powers to local elites, who are more likely to be interested in interfering with you or your group specifically compared to a more or less uncaring larger government. In the US, states weren't bound by the Bill of Rights until the 14th amendment, giving them more power to restrict liberties than the federal government. After reconstruction, SCOTUS issued decisions restoring much of the pre-war order, using the 14th amendment mainly to find new powers for corporations.
    - rvense 5y ago
      > Democracy is granting power to the majority to rule on the minority. By definition. It really isn't. Maybe "Western-style, representative democracy" implies that. But democracy in general, to me, is any system where people rule themselves. I'm not really big on voting, for one. > If there was an enlightened and rich dictator, he would become a horrible authoritarian within six months, no matter how good his original intentions were. > The real way to have a freer society is to decentralise power away. I fully agree! The world needs more food co-ops and worker-owned businesses.
RustyConsul 5y ago
Written in short form and taken at face value, I can see why you may have this reaction to his writing. Read the sovereign individual, basically his thoughts in long form. Thiel even writes the pre-face to the book. His main arguments are that politics divides, democracy favors the 51% at the expense of the 49%. He is for smaller government, less political divides, and the abandonment of the welfare state that creates a government dependent population with incredible waste. His ideas are not all that radical, considering debt spending by world governments is currently unsustainable. People are largely irrational & bias. The thing about morality is everyone thinks they have the answers leading the government to be this odd form of paternalism where seemingly simple statements like "No drugs" are taken to this extreme that lead to more societal harm than good.
- chmsky00 5y ago
  He wrote how the masses need babysitters. Even if that’s so, my problem is he thinks he should be one of the babysitters. That’s what elected officials are for. All I owe Peter Thiel is letting him live his life. If he wants to co-opt the agency of others without consent, I don’t even owe him that. Workers build the world. Thiel is not the smartest man in the world. There are engineers and scientists doing useful work while he grifts off government corruption he claims to hate. When he’s participating in the management of the real human mess that enables him, he’ll have earned his place. Right now he’s a lazy nobody who has convinced people he’s worth a number that means something special. The only number that applies to Thiel is he’s 1 of 7 billion+. Nothing more.
  - GaryTang 5y ago
    Thinking people need babysitters is quite the opposite of Thiel’s position. Much of his philosophy is based on the book, “The Sovereign Individual” which advocates for limited babysitters and more empowerment of the individual via hands-off governance.
    - chmsky00 5y ago
      He should probably remove the writings online where he literally posted exactly as I claimed. It’s almost as if he’s the sort of person who will take whatever position fits his immediate need. If Thiel was a genius he’d be more than another rich businessman. I am close friends with an engineer that worked on a power transform system for the LHC. He’s a moron. Given humans had to rely on innate intuition of acceptable effort for survival early on; quantity of food, etc, before formal language, I’m leaning into the idea human language are a cognitive boondoggle forced on us by tribal warlords. Most humans have the same cognitive capability as Thiel, but none of the relative network access, or political burden. So many old ways are now seen as illegal and manipulative of people too ignorant to falsify them. Thiel is no god and political corruption is everywhere. I see no reason to believe he’s special. Print out all his dollars as official currency and they all have some words on them claiming they’re property of the US Government. Thiel’s power is reliant on big government.

This guy is the worst. His writing and beliefs are like the worst parts of Silicon Valley distilled into one human being.

by a2tech 5y ago

This guy is the worst. His writing and beliefs are like the worst parts of Silicon Valley distilled into one human being.

inglor_cz 5y ago

This is a very generic statement. What would you single out as concrete examples?

rvense 5y ago
In the fine article, he says that freedom and democracy are at odds. This rather bizarre conception of freedom is, I'm sure, the same thought that propelled him to f(o)und that well-know force for liberation of the common man, Palantir Technologies. (There is, obviously, no real freedom for anyone without participation in the distribution of power, i.e. democracy.)
- jmeister 5y ago
  Did you want the Supreme Court to intervene in the democratically passed abortion law in TX?
  - rvense 5y ago
    انا لست امركي
- inglor_cz 5y ago
  Non-democratic states indeed tend to be non-free. But I think it is legitimate to think about extent of democracy vs. intrusion to personal lives. It is probably fine to prevent someone from polluting water sources by a democratic vote. It would be an overreach to prevent someone from grilling steaks on his porch because his neighbours are vegetarians and do not like the smell of meat. Zoning of residential areas is somewhere in between. Not too long ago, there was a case in Switzerland where a British person was denied citizenship by the initiative of her neighbors, because she complained too much about various topics (bells ringing too loudly etc.) https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/woman-annoying-swiss-citizenship-passport-switzerland-nancy-holten-gipf-oberfrick-aargau-a7712836.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/woman-annoyi... Is it legitimate to take opinions of your neighbors into account when deciding your citizenship application? It is certainly more democratic than not doing so, but at the same time, it might degenerate into a popularity contest.
  - rvense 5y ago
    I never said democracy was easy. I just said it was necessary.
  - native_samples 5y ago
    The woman in question was Dutch, not British (the article says that in the first sentence). But really, she had lived in Switzerland for decades. Her children are Swiss, etc.
- thinkski 5y ago
  Thomas Jefferson had similar thoughts, a “tyranny of the majority”. Say 1 in 100 people are doctors. People are tired of paying doctors and want care for free. They put it to a vote. 99 vote to force doctors to work for free. Democracy triumphs, but at what cost? This is partly why America was founded as a republic, not a pure democracy.
  - rvense 5y ago
    99 people forcing one person (or one thousand people) into slave labour does not satisfy my definition of democracy. Of course those that are more affected by an issue should have more of a say in it. Of course democracy must be founded on basic, inviolable rights. That's the whole point.
    - least 5y ago
      > ...does not satisfy my definition of democracy. You can't just ignore the negative aspects of a system because it doesn't suit your sensibilities. Can you do the same for a system of government you're diametrically opposed to? > Of course those that are more affected by an issue should have more of a say in it. So you're fine with the electoral college then, right? > Of course democracy must be founded on basic, inviolable rights. That's the whole point. Not really. Democracy is simply a system to decide on policies that govern a group of people and there is little inherent value in it itself. It can be used to oppress just as easily as it can protect the rights of individuals living in the system. It's dependent on the voting population. Critics of democracy simply argue that it is too easy to oppress when you give individuals direct access to the power to do so.
      - rvense 5y ago
        > You can't just ignore the negative aspects of a system because it doesn't suit your sensibilities. What I said was, if a system of government allows one group of people to turn another group of people into slaves, then it isn't a democracy. By my definition, a democracy does not allow slavery, because a democracy must treat all citizens equally. > Democracy is simply a system to decide on policies that govern a group of people To me it's more than that. It's a principle of governance. Not just the how of the system, but the why. > So you're fine with the electoral college then, right? You mean the American system for electing presidents? I don't know exactly, I am half a world away. I will say that from here that country looks pretty bad all in all, but the fact that a single person holds so much power seems a lot more problematic than how that person is picked - although it would be interesting to see what would happen if they somehow managed to find a good one. As far as I know that's never happened.
- jokethrowaway 5y ago
  Democracy is granting power to the majority to rule on the minority. By definition. Democracy will never create a free society, but neither will dictatorship. Democratic societies tend to be more free than dictatorship, but that's not always the case. If there was an enlightened and rich dictator, he could decide to make weed legal, impose zero taxes, grant freedom of speech. Compared to most of the western world, where weed is mostly illegal, taxation is imposed forcefully and freedom of speech is disappearing - that would be a freer society. The real way to have a freer society is to decentralise power away. It's not about granting 60 millions people an infinitesimal choice for an outcome shared by everyone. It's about each individual having a different outcome.
  - zoolily 5y ago
    Decentralization transfers powers to local elites, who are more likely to be interested in interfering with you or your group specifically compared to a more or less uncaring larger government. In the US, states weren't bound by the Bill of Rights until the 14th amendment, giving them more power to restrict liberties than the federal government. After reconstruction, SCOTUS issued decisions restoring much of the pre-war order, using the 14th amendment mainly to find new powers for corporations.
  - rvense 5y ago
    > Democracy is granting power to the majority to rule on the minority. By definition. It really isn't. Maybe "Western-style, representative democracy" implies that. But democracy in general, to me, is any system where people rule themselves. I'm not really big on voting, for one. > If there was an enlightened and rich dictator, he would become a horrible authoritarian within six months, no matter how good his original intentions were. > The real way to have a freer society is to decentralise power away. I fully agree! The world needs more food co-ops and worker-owned businesses.

RustyConsul 5y ago

Written in short form and taken at face value, I can see why you may have this reaction to his writing. Read the sovereign individual, basically his thoughts in long form. Thiel even writes the pre-face to the book. His main arguments are that politics divides, democracy favors the 51% at the expense of the 49%. He is for smaller government, less political divides, and the abandonment of the welfare state that creates a government dependent population with incredible waste. His ideas are not all that radical, considering debt spending by world governments is currently unsustainable. People are largely irrational & bias. The thing about morality is everyone thinks they have the answers leading the government to be this odd form of paternalism where seemingly simple statements like "No drugs" are taken to this extreme that lead to more societal harm than good.

chmsky00 5y ago
He wrote how the masses need babysitters. Even if that’s so, my problem is he thinks he should be one of the babysitters. That’s what elected officials are for. All I owe Peter Thiel is letting him live his life. If he wants to co-opt the agency of others without consent, I don’t even owe him that. Workers build the world. Thiel is not the smartest man in the world. There are engineers and scientists doing useful work while he grifts off government corruption he claims to hate. When he’s participating in the management of the real human mess that enables him, he’ll have earned his place. Right now he’s a lazy nobody who has convinced people he’s worth a number that means something special. The only number that applies to Thiel is he’s 1 of 7 billion+. Nothing more.
- GaryTang 5y ago
  Thinking people need babysitters is quite the opposite of Thiel’s position. Much of his philosophy is based on the book, “The Sovereign Individual” which advocates for limited babysitters and more empowerment of the individual via hands-off governance.
  - chmsky00 5y ago
    He should probably remove the writings online where he literally posted exactly as I claimed. It’s almost as if he’s the sort of person who will take whatever position fits his immediate need. If Thiel was a genius he’d be more than another rich businessman. I am close friends with an engineer that worked on a power transform system for the LHC. He’s a moron. Given humans had to rely on innate intuition of acceptable effort for survival early on; quantity of food, etc, before formal language, I’m leaning into the idea human language are a cognitive boondoggle forced on us by tribal warlords. Most humans have the same cognitive capability as Thiel, but none of the relative network access, or political burden. So many old ways are now seen as illegal and manipulative of people too ignorant to falsify them. Thiel is no god and political corruption is everywhere. I see no reason to believe he’s special. Print out all his dollars as official currency and they all have some words on them claiming they’re property of the US Government. Thiel’s power is reliant on big government.