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Re: undefined

#41

Post by wat10000 »

luckydonkey wrote: post #17
davidw wrote: post #8

The current iteration of Silicon Valley is just sad to see. I remember the sort of techno-libertarianism from the 90ies, and... while I didn't always agree, it seemed at least kind of idealistic. Also unrealistic, but it didn't seem to come from a place of cruelty or a thirst for power. Quite the contrary, they didn't seem very good at getting the government on their side back then. Now they have money and power and…

> Now they have money and power and use both in pretty obscene ways, like starving children in Africa to death by yanking the aid that was keeping them alive away. It’s because there’s lot of corruption in places receiving aid, look it up. Fixing problems is not as simple as giving someone money, there needs to be lots of accountability, which is often missing. There are fake NGOs and non-profits which essentially tr…

Is corruption so evil that it's worth killing a huge number of people to reduce it? Aid being diverted to people who don't need it is a real problem, but solving it by cutting off the aid is rather extreme.

As far as the debt goes, the amounts involved are inconsequential. You're going to cause all those deaths to delay sovereign default or hyperinflation by a few hours.

Re: undefined

#42

Post by jmdeon »

luckydonkey wrote: post #17
davidw wrote: post #8

The current iteration of Silicon Valley is just sad to see. I remember the sort of techno-libertarianism from the 90ies, and... while I didn't always agree, it seemed at least kind of idealistic. Also unrealistic, but it didn't seem to come from a place of cruelty or a thirst for power. Quite the contrary, they didn't seem very good at getting the government on their side back then. Now they have money and power and…

> Now they have money and power and use both in pretty obscene ways, like starving children in Africa to death by yanking the aid that was keeping them alive away. It’s because there’s lot of corruption in places receiving aid, look it up. Fixing problems is not as simple as giving someone money, there needs to be lots of accountability, which is often missing. There are fake NGOs and non-profits which essentially tr…

> Fixing problems is not as simple as giving someone money

I've heard the exact opposite. Usually it's the strings attached that end up being perfect for the corrupt to grab onto and manipulate.

Re: undefined

#43

Post by torben-friis »

lacker wrote: post #6

Personally, I'm not religious. But 20% of Americans believe that the Bible is the literal word of God. Is it really so crazy for one venture capitalist to believe that the Antichrist is real? Part of the freedom of religion is accepting that other Americans really do have religious beliefs that differ from your own sometimes, and that's okay. It doesn't mean you need to support the policies that he supports. But we d…

Thiel is bankrolling Yarvin’s ideological push among others.

A man who’s written essays claiming that “the obvious statistical differences in the average talents of human races” justified eliminating the system of representative government.

Does that sound like someone who would share his country peacefully with you?

You’re asking sheep to be tolerant of the approaching wolf.

Re: undefined

#44

Post by cogman10 »

luckydonkey wrote: post #17
davidw wrote: post #8

The current iteration of Silicon Valley is just sad to see. I remember the sort of techno-libertarianism from the 90ies, and... while I didn't always agree, it seemed at least kind of idealistic. Also unrealistic, but it didn't seem to come from a place of cruelty or a thirst for power. Quite the contrary, they didn't seem very good at getting the government on their side back then. Now they have money and power and…

> Now they have money and power and use both in pretty obscene ways, like starving children in Africa to death by yanking the aid that was keeping them alive away. It’s because there’s lot of corruption in places receiving aid, look it up. Fixing problems is not as simple as giving someone money, there needs to be lots of accountability, which is often missing. There are fake NGOs and non-profits which essentially tr…

The aide money wasn't there to fix things, it was there for soft power.

Once you understand that it makes a whole lot more sense why corruption was never really addressed and things didn't really get better.

The way it works was simple "Do what we want you to do OR ELSE we'll pull your aide. It'd be a shame if that happened".

That is ultimately the power that allowed the US to keep these countries in check. To make them follow US trade policy in lock step.

To sell that to the american public was simply masking the whole thing as giving aide.

Now, I think it's wrong to just completely pull the plug. The aide wasn't doing nothing and it wasn't just soft power. The needed reform shouldn't have happened in one big action.

Re: undefined

#46

Post by godsinhisheaven »

lordnacho wrote: post #22
ta9000 wrote: post #2

Or people are just seeing the real person. Before the filter was needed but now that views tangential to his are more mainstream it’s easier for him to let the full nut-job out. Same with the CEO of Salesforce.

I still can't decide which mechanism is at work: Person is a nutter -> nutters more likely to be at the extremes of achievement (success and failure) -> you see the successes -> there's a bunch of insane people who became billionaires versus: Some people win at the success game -> they start to think they are special -> environment encourages them towards extremes of thought -> bunch of crazy billionaires One way the…

You say nutter, I say neurodivergent. I think there is a lot more truth than you think to your first statement! I have a hypothesis that neurodivergent people are overrepresented at the highest levels of government, finance, technology, etc, and that this has probably been the case for, most of human history. Part of the (extremely justified) complaints about the rich and powerful is that they're "not like us", and I think that's true in more ways than one!

Re: undefined

#47

Post by baerrie »

He’s projecting his own guilt about his actions onto another. As the article implies, he is a top candidate for Antichrist if there is such a thing, and on some level he’s trying to avoid that truth.

Re: undefined

#48

Post by technothrasher »

labrador wrote: post #31

F. Scott Fitzgerald famously said in The Great Gatsby “Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me." However Peter Thiel was not born rich, which makes it safe for me to say he's just like several of my friends who've lost their minds on psychedelics. I've enjoyed them but the the trick is to know when to stop. As Ram Dass said "When you get the message, hang up the phone." Peter Thiel-Bac…

> F. Scott Fitzgerald famously said in The Great Gatsby “Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me."

The current crop of ultra-rich in the US seems a lot more like Jay Gatsby than Tom Buchanan.

Re: undefined

#49

Post by wat10000 »

lacker wrote: post #6

Personally, I'm not religious. But 20% of Americans believe that the Bible is the literal word of God. Is it really so crazy for one venture capitalist to believe that the Antichrist is real? Part of the freedom of religion is accepting that other Americans really do have religious beliefs that differ from your own sometimes, and that's okay. It doesn't mean you need to support the policies that he supports. But we d…

It's alright for people to believe crazy things. But it's much less alright for extremely powerful people to believe crazy things.

If Peter Thiel was a guy who lived three doors down and occasionally told me about the latest wacko stuff he saw online, that would be one thing. But he's not some random nut, he's trying to remake the country, and succeeding to an alarming degree.

What does it mean to share the country peacefully with someone who does not want to share the country peacefully in return?

This is why I'm opposed to billionaires. Inequality, shared prosperity, all those are nice things, but the most important thing is that money is power and having people with extremely large amounts of money means having people with extremely large amounts of power, people who were never elected to any office.

Re: undefined

#50

Post by ch2026 »

Calavar wrote: post #36
kelseyfrog wrote: post #4

Blood transfusions increase the risk of acquiring prion diseases.

Not if you're always getting the tranfusion from the same person

You’re obviously referencing the well known fact that Peter Thiel is a vampire who kidnapped Michael Moritz in 2009. Thiel has kept Moritz alive in his underground bunker, subsisting entirely on a diet of honey and macadamia nuts, and each morning siphons off a fresh liter of blood.
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