Part II: Apocalypse Now? Peter Thiel on Ancient Prophecies and Modern Tech

one of the most sophisticated men in America brilliant Urbane an immensely successful entrepreneur one of the most sophisticated men in America taking ancient prophecies seriously Peter teal on uncommon knowledge [Music] now welcome to uncommon knowledge I'm Peter Robinson Peter teal received his undergraduate and law degrees here at Stanford he co-founded PayPal became the first outside investor in Facebook and co-founded paler and remains an important Tech investor he has also established himself as a remarkable thinker a self-described contrarian Peter teal has never proven more contrary than in taking seriously the biblical framework for probing the meaning of history and what ancient prophecies might help us to think to understand about our predicament today I should note that although viewers will find this second conversation interesting enough on its own I'm sure of that uh the conversation may prove even more striking if they've already watched our first conversation which you'll be able to find on YouTube Peter welcome back the Antichrist Cardinal Newman the great 19th century author and theologian writes that it is the duty that's a quote from Newman the duty of belie Believers qu ever to be watching for the end times and above all to keep in mind the great and awful sign of which St Paul speaks to the Thessalonians the emergence of quote the very image of Satan the fearful and hateful Antichrist close quote as I understand your argument you hold one that the prophecy of an antichrist in one way or another remains valid or at least useful two that it remains our duty again Cardinal Newman's word duty to watch for the signs that it might emerge and three that that duty is now almost entirely neglected and forgotten Fair yes yeah okay um well tell us go ahead I mean yeah there there's so many you know there's there's so many different things one can say about there's there's a I think it was Ivan illich who said that in the time before Christ there were many forerunners to Christ in the time after Christ there will be many forerunners of the Antichrist so in some sense it's a it's a type so Nero was a type of the Antichrist or maybe Napoleon was a type of the Antichrist and it's sort of a you know it's it's someone who aspires for world domination to create you know creation of the sort of one world state in some ways Alexander the Great was sort of a preist prototype of the Antichrist chist very parallel to uh to Christ they both die at 33 Alexander conquers the world Christ saves it so sort of compare and contrast so um but in some sense the Antichrist as an idea is something that really comes into being in the world after Christ and so there's um and then it's there's a lot of things about that are mysterious in some ways the Antichrist copies Christ the Antichrist uh pretends to be greater than Christ um hyper Christian Ultra Christian and then maybe only ultimately um you know deeply deeply anti-christian okay so you you andad and then we can you can think of it as a system you know uh where maybe maybe communism is a one world system so it can be an ideology or a system um and then then of course you can also think of it as um as Newman did where it's it's sort of the final dictator of the of the One World state where it's it's still you stress it more as a person you you think of a type a system a person it has something to do in this postchristian it's something that's sort of a possibility in this um postchristian world it has it is in some ways you know and it's it's it's related to Christ in a very complicated way so you know the theological question you always ask you know is it possible to be too Christian and um in theory no but you know in practice you know if you think you're more Christian than Christ you're in trouble from a from a prophecy 2,000 years old to our own times you draw attention to two portrayals fictional portrayals of an antichrist from about a century ago salv Vladimir sovv Russian Mystic in 1900 wrote a book or a novel the short tale of a short tale of the Antichrist and then a 1905 novel by a Roman Catholic English priest called Robert Hugh Benson and the novel is Lord of the world in both of these fictional accounts the Antichrist emerges is a charismatic figure a kind of Superman solovev quote there was a remarkable person many called him a Superman he believed in God but in the depths of his soul he preferred himself in Benson the Antichrist is portrayed again as a charismatic figure he becomes president of Europe then in some mysterious way he's elected president of the world but in both of those fictional accounts of a century ago there's a plot hole we don't we're not given the mechanism by which this strange charismatic figure achieves dominance and your argument is again if I understand it correctly that now today a century after solovev and Robert H Benson we can understand a mechanism we could imagine a mechanism by which such a figure might emerge Yeah by by the way those are both fantastic books um I have a preference for the slavv one but Benson and slavv are both uh um terrific books there they're all these extraordinary ways that they still resonate a hundred years later so you know Salvia and Visions the United States of Europe so sort of a European Union the sort of um superstate um you know in Benson the Antichrist is a Jewish socialist center from Vermont and uh I was a little bit nervous about Bernie Sanders but uh so there are on the there sort of our elements of them where by the way you're not quite the only person I noticed in reading up on this Benedict the 16th several times mentioned approvingly the Robert Hugh Benson book and Pope Francis over and over again has referred to it so two popes and Peter teal um uh so there are there there are sort of all sorts of parts of it where they have this feeling being near near Great literature but uh but the plot hole is um is is is is sort of like how does how does a sort of world takeover actually happen and it's kind of a not a deos xmac but like a demonium exm it's like the Antichrist just gives these hypnotic speeches where nobody can remember a word and then sort of just swindles people's Souls out of them and they submit to this totalitarian state or something like this and um and um I think I think if we were to speculate on how to solve that plot hole we have an answer in the world after 1945 that uh um people are in in 1900 19 early 20th century people were not yet scared of apocalyptic weapons they could not imagine you know anything of the scale that we'd have by the second half of the 20th century and so uh and so um the Antichrist takes over by talking about Armageddon let's show show this a brief video which we will edit into the show of course one world or none [Music] exactly there is no secret when a neutron strikes the atom is split released neutrons split other atoms the result is atomic [Music] energy now the people of the World used this energy for the destruction or the betterment of mankind so that's a 1946 video everything about it the images the tension in the narrator's voice the background music is to be scary the choice is this or one world that dates from 1946 as I said but here's a quotation from just a few years ago it's from a paper titled the vulnerable World hypothesis by the very hip techn philosoph ER Nick Bostrom quote what is needed to solve problems that involve challenges of international coordination challenges such as nukes pandemic dangers techno threats what is needed is effective Global governance Franklin Roosevelt designed the United Nations to serve in some way as a kind of world Parliament after the end of the second world war the United Nations didn't work but maybe FDR was just ahead of his time uh yeah well it's it it is it is the same this is look this is the plot hole in Salvia and Benson and um and you know it's an interesting question what is the difference between that we have this very secular language one world or none and then there's the um the sort of overly religious question Antichrist or Armageddon and aren't they you know and my my thesis they're somehow they're somehow the same and and the the the diff if I had to say what the difference between those two ways of asking the questions are is um you know Antichrist or Armageddon it sounds like they're both bad options and it that that way of asking the question it pushes us to find a third way and not to just steer from one into the other one world or none um those sound like um they're exclusive but they're also exhaustive Poss possibilities and since we don't want to have no world we want we want the the One World Harvard uh Harvard Law School Adrien verule wants wants big government he's he has already argued for continent-wide government and which would represent a step toward Global governance and his view is that if you if the government is based on some understanding of Christian ethics and you make sure that it reflects subsidiarity the principle that problem should be solved by the by the smallest unit possible then big government coordin International coordin this is a good thing not a bad thing you know I and you just don't buy that I I I do not buy it I think uh I don't know I'm much more in the Lord Acton cap camp that you know power corrupts absolute power corrupts absolutely and it would be it would be a power with no check there would be no outside left it would be um you know in in a sense it would be the biggest crowd it would be the the biggest bubble you know um you know the the um you know probably a place where the Bible differs from Enlightenment rationality Enlightenment rationality believes in the wisdom of crowds the Bible Believes In The Madness of crowds and you know um and uh and if you have a world State that's in some sense the largest crowd it's the whole human Humanity closing in on itself it's a global mob so there sort of are these um intuitions are probably adjacent ideas of about the Fallen nature of man and original sin that uh make me nervous about the One World State um subsidiarity is good in theory and practice you know the devil is in the details and uh um and if you know too much too much of the power has to be at the top level if you're going to if you if you if you absolutize things like climate change or nuclear weapons control or things like this that has to all be at the top Echelon it's not going to be decided by the city of paloalto or by some kind of a subsidiary uh subsidiary layer um you know I have sort of more prosaic intuitions where um you know I sort of wonder what would be the marginal tax rates in a in a one world state where people couldn't move and uh I suspect they would be quite High it sort of would be like East Germany with no escape and uh you could move to Texas or Florida and get a zero income tax and uh and then I think California would push them higher and the US would push them higher and uh and the the limit of that seems Seems seems quite bad and then of course you know if you if you you know go down the the Bost from argument yet you need effective Global government and extremely effective Global policing and so if you think about things like AI technology it's just we have to stop anyone from programming the AI and so you have to in some sense monitor every keystroke everywhere so sort of something that's powerful enough to um to control the whole world so this goes back is uh your argument in our first the first part of this conversation that for the first time in history we can actually imagine human beings destroying the world that's quite a plot now also we have the mechanisms that would make World Government a gigantic Global surveillance state is plausible that seems plausible too and um and and then I I think again to come back to the salav of Benson plot hole um on its own they both seem not that desirable why why would we have a crazy surveillance State why would we you know why would why would we do this but if you're scared enough if you're scared enough of of of these things that's that's that's the weapon and this is this is sort of where um you know my my speculative thesis is that if the Antichrist were to come to power it would be by talking about Armageddon all the time and uh Peter teal the Antichrist would talk about Armageddon all the time he'd scare people and then offer to save them yes it's the uh 1 Thessalonians 5:3 the uh the the slogan of the Antichrist is peace and safety and so which is nothing wrong with peace and safety but uh you have to sort of imagine that it resonates very differently in a world where the stakes are so absolute where the stakes are so extreme where the you know the alternative to peace and safety is you know Armageddon and the destruction of all things and then that's that's where peace and safety gets you way more than it would have in 1750 Renee Renee Gerard and I saw Satan fall like lightning one of his books the Antichrist boasts of bringing to human beings the peace and tolerance that Christianity promised but has failed to deliver yeah there there are probably I I think there are all all these elements where it's Downstream from Christianity you can think of you know um the poor shall inherit the earth Sermon on the Mount Marxist theory is we're going to be more Christian we're going to accelerate it we're going to bring it about faster so there is uh yeah the an Christ probably presents as as a great humanitarian as a great um you know it's it's redistributive it's uh it it an extremely great philanthropist as an effective altruist you know all all of those those kinds of things and uh and these things are not you know simply anti-christian but it it it is always when they get overly combined with state power that something is very wrong you know the are sort of ways Christ wants to unify the world you have the parable of the Good Samaritan where you know you should take care of people even if you're not related to them and that's it's good to act like the Good Samaritan and uh to take care of people not just in your family or tribe or or country but uh but then if you if you force everyone to be a Good Samaritan and you force a borderless world that's uh that that's see that's it's Som it's somehow adjacent somehow it's an intensification but it's uh it's somehow also very much the opposite okay Sila and carbus and we come here it'll take me another moment to set this up but we come here we depart now from Peter Teal's analysis and we come to Peter Teal's exhortation what needs to be done what step or two to complete the analysis and then leads to what needs to be done what we need to the questions at least we need to asking Sila and caribas adicus is on his way home and he has to sail past two sea monsters Sila is a six-headed Monster who will devour Sailors and caribdis is a Whirlpool that swallows ship's whole and then spits them back out and of course they stand for sort of the horns of a dilemma That's the Way San Carib do get used the phrase Peter teal everyone is worried about the Sila of Armageddon nukes pandemics AI everyone is worried about the sil of Armageddon we're not worried enough about the corbus of One World Government the Antichrist explain um well uh man this just seems obviously correct uh it's uh it's it's like if if you think about the language that we've been using in this program it's um Armageddon is not that taboo you can just talk about that by referencing the newspapers right you know we are sleepwalking into Armageddon maybe not in the Ukraine or the Middle East but maybe with Taiwan and China so there all these everybody feels The Dread you can you can use you we can we can use Armageddon and maybe it's literal and maybe it's metaphorical but that's that's totally acceptable so that tells you that's not the thing that's taboo Antichrist is like wow what planet are you from right and so um so that uh that that tells me that um the you know the the existential risks are very selective of the sort that we've given and and the the fears about a one world State um are downplayed because they are the solution to the other ones that is that is you know the self-governing politically atheist humans governing themselves solution to Armageddon is you know it's what Bostrom says it's a you know it's effective world government with extremely effective policing to stop you know dangerous Technologies from being developed and to force people to you know not have too diverse a set of views because the diversity of views is what's going to push some scientists to develop Technologies they shouldn't be developing and so um we are just so grooved to the uh the Antichrist solution we don't worry about it because it is it is actually it presents itself as as as the solution to all these others and then and then my intuition is that uh what that tells me is that uh um you know we should worry about both but uh if you had to prioritize them you should be way more worried about the Antichrist because no one's worried about it and um and of course you know I don't know how literally one should take the these biblical accounts but in the biblical accounts the Antichrist comes first because people are more scared of armag again than the Antichrist perhaps the Antichrist comes first doesn't quite work the One World State doesn't work it's still it still goes Haywire you know it's it's you maybe you have a fantastic uh communist government but somehow the AI still goes mad and you still get to Armageddon but uh but uh that's that's what comes first all right as I understand it you see three possibilities here now we begin to move toward what is to be done one is to end globalization outright end the world of end world trade but that would produce a Dramatical Al but Unthinkable drop in living standards so end globalization but that's all but Unthinkable two permit globalization to continue in an unfettered manner but that would be likely to lead to World Government three permit globalization to continue but only in a permissible good salutory way limit it tame it make sure it never supplants nation states clo quote Peter teal our only chance of achieving good globalization is to be critical of globalization to recognize the narrowness of the path Peter Well the way uh the way I yeah the way I would frame that is um it's certainly it's certainly hard to see how things can work if we completely de globalize if you go back to this this world that's completely separated and and and with with no trade no flow of ideas between different parts of the world and so eliminate the internet and container shipping and you've got it um I I I don't think it's that's easier said than done if much yes it's easier said than done and um but then um it's precisely because we can't simply turn the clock back on all globalization that um we H we end up having what I would call this Stockholm syndrome and we you know is globalization more good than bad is it is it just a you know is it just a is it just sort of a corrupt racket where you know I don't know North Korea exports plutonium and um you know counterfeit $100 bills and imports you know I don't know Swedish prostitutes and whiskey or whatever they import and um and and so if if you have if you have this view that um no globalization can't be an option you will have two panglossian view of globalization and this is my critique of the fukuyama Clinton Bush WTO um you know the New World Order free trade all take it was always abstracted everything takes care of itself it will all work out for the best and uh at a minimum you need to you need to just always think there are so so many bad forms of globalization our only chance of getting to a good one is to realize how tough it is um maybe we should have trade treaties we should negotiate them they should always be negotiated by people who don't believe in free trade if if if you have someone believes in free trade we don't need to pay attention to the details it all always will work out for the best so yes there there's there's a way I I think one should try to negotiate these treaties but you always want someone on your side who deeply doesn't believe in it and who's going to hold out for you know you know all sorts of terms uh and and that that's sort of that's sort of how uh it we might we might we might get our way through but uh but it's um but yeah I I think we had you know all these versions of this I think there's the there's the strange chimerica the sort of mythical Fusion of China and America that uh was maybe 28 years from Bush 41 to um Obama from you know something like 88 to 2016 and yeah we shouldn't we don't want to go to a nuclear war with China we don't probably don't want to go to a major war but uh but there's there it's a very complicated way to manage this relationship and uh and and simply the uh the panglossian intuitions that everything will automatically work out don't probably don't quite make it there's there's always a book you know uh I'd like to reference from 1910 the great illusion by Norman Angel this is a pre-World War I book and it's 1910 right um and it is the world is connected through trade and finance that um there cannot be a World War because it would just destroy more than it would create and it was this massive bestseller in 1910 uh Angel actually gets a Nobel Peace Prize for the book in 1933 even though sort of spectacularly wrong but uh one of the lines in it was it Germany go Britain going to war with Germany makes as much sense as London in invading Hertfordshire the the adjacent County to London and it was just the stock market would go down more couldn't do this and you know everyone would lose and and yet and yet that happened and so the sort of glib globalization I think is not going to work and and we need to we need to just ask a Relentless number of hard questions about it God so but but then yes it's like it's always it's always it's always in the details I I think the I think I think we have to find some way to talk about these Technologies where the Technologies are dangerous but um it's prob in some sense it's even more Danger not to do them it's even more dangerous to have a society where there's zero growth if we go full on with the club of Rome limits to growth we have this fully Lite program that again my intuitions is that that will end very badly politically it's going to be a zero sum nasty malthusian society and it it will it will push towards you know something that's much more autocratic much more totalitarian because the pie won't grow people will be much asked here so what you're asking for well okay so let me ask what you're asking for a little bit here um you said at the Cambridge Union earlier this year that you were going to stay out of politics this time so I won't ask you about politics exactly but the you are arguing that we should be supporting candidates who put America First is that roughly where we're going here Skeptics of free trade this all tends toward one side of the political argument or are you simply or or are you or or are you is this an exert are you aiming your are you aiming this at universities and and simply calling for renewed far more practical debate Far More Alive to the dangers that we now face that have never been faced by Humanity before uh well my look my my start my starting answer for all these things is always surely the first step is to think about these things really hard and um you know ask the questions that questions that are not being asked uh you know maybe the way I framed them are too dramatic but if that's what it takes for us to ask these questions that's that's better than uh than being stuck in in um I don't know in in some weird uh silly Groundhog Day game um you know I I think the my my intuition is the stakes are very high the political Stakes are high because um it's you know there are a lot of crazy things that can happen um it's you know it's hard to evaluate you know which of these candidates are better but uh but that's you know it's it's it's it's not just about you know you know the price of eggs or marginal inflation rates or things like this it is it is about uh you know uh you know maintaining freedom in the US and uh and also you know not sleep walking into Armageddon Peter I have a confession ession to make in my mind when you first started talking about Sila and cormus this analysis I wronged you I thought to myself this is Peter being Peter he loves building intellectual models he has the kind of mind that goes in that direction Hegel vber Strauss reality is of second order the real importance here is the is the model the intellectual model because you enjoy it for its own sake and I do think you do that you do have a mind that looks for structures and Frameworks all right but here then I come across this passage from our old friend Renee this is Renee Gerard in 2009 the more probable the apocalypse becomes the less we talk about it therefore we have to awaken our sleeping consciences and I thought this is not a game for Peter you are taking this is serious to you you believe that you see questions that need to be asked that are not being asked and you are trying to awaken our sleeping consciences will you accept that compliment I I'll take that and you'll accept that confession all right so Peter teal I'm quoting you now what I hope to retrieve is a sense of the stakes of the urgency of the question the stakes are really really high it seems very dangerous that we're at a place where so few people are concerned about the Antichrist close quote Yeah it's all all the reasons we all the reasons we've gone through is okay what kind of response have you been getting by the way you you haven't written a book I understand you're thinking about a book on this but you haven't written it yet you're still going through various iterations talking to small groups of people I heard you give a series of talks on this what is the response been uh it's you know it's it's it's it's certainly um it takes a while for people to get into the frame and then um and then people are extremely engaged and uh they're you know there is it's it's not like the anxiety doesn't exist it's not like uh people think everything is is is quite as um as normal as it should be I you know and and then I think I think the point of it is not to be in some sense defe this is just inscri in the future the you know the the point of it is to is to start thinking about what can be done you know what's what some of the choices are and you know Antichrist or Armageddon that framing you know we can Envision a third way right um one world or none that's pretty hard to Envision a third way and so that's that's where I I think the the biblical language it sounds crazier but it's actually more hopeful one world or none those are the two options if you're a political atheist right we have human self-government or human self-destruction and uh and uh and then um and it's a you know it's a choice of two incredible evils and uh and then and then I think um I I I don't think these things are you know I'm not a calvinist I don't think these things are determined or predestined I I I always believe there's a space for um human Agency for uh for us to you know shape the history and and and the first step has to be not to you know not to just bury our heads in the sand or whatever the equivalent is so the United States two quotations Ronald Reagan it's always been my belief that by a divine plan this nation was placed between the two oceans to be sought out and found by those with a special brand of courage and love of Freedom close quote so so could it be that the United States is itself a catacon a restrainer a force that by its economic power and Military might and the example it sets to the world holds back the chaos I would like to believe that you and I aren't that far apart an age we both grew up in the when the country still worked under Reagan here's a second quotation this is Peter teal quote one obvious candidate for the Antichrist is the United States well I I think the US answer that without breaking my heart please I think the US is a natural candidate for both uh and certainly the Cold War history 49 to 89 I think Christian democracy was catac contic I think anti-communism right was was the supernational you know ideology that stood against the One World state of communist is M and um and uh and then I think um but yeah if you want this is this is very speculative but if if you think the one world state is it's a military power it's a financial economic power it is somehow an ideological power uh it there still is a natural way where if things go wrong in the US you know it it would be the Fulfillment of you know FDR's vision of the new dealers running the world and uh and and so the US is yeah it is Ground Zero of globalization and it's Ground Zero of the resistance to Glo to bad globalization we're both that's why that's why it matters so much you know the president of the United States maybe is a catacon maybe it's a type of antichrist but presidential elections matter they don't matter the president of Europe and uh and I I think the intuition that they matter in the US is correct not saying that will be the case for for all time but uh but certainly second half of the 20th century and still today a couple of last questions here Renee Gerard again in 2009 quote to make the Revelation wholly good and not threatening at all to eliminate this fear this dread humans have only to adopt the behavior recommended by Christ close quote Renee himself as you know ended his life as a very devout Catholic has your has this analysis had any effect on your own religious life or is it some in some way kind of cop out to say oh no no all we need to do is all practice personal Holiness as best we can uh well I Gerard always always said you know you know you just need to go to church right and I I I try to go to church uh and Rene would be very Rene somewhere Rene is pleased and then uh and then at the same time I I also think that there is some some part of it that is um is political or social or or something like that and uh and maybe you know maybe it's always a way in which I'm not as much of a saint as I as I should be but I I I keep thinking we have also try we have to I I want to always try some of both right both the personal and the political um you know I think I think Mother Teresa was a greater Saint than Constantine but uh there's still a part of me that uh has a preference for the the Christianity of Constantine we still need something like that all right um Revelation is a very frightening book in my judgment in any event we've got plagues and beasts and the end of the world but at the very beginning I went back to prepare for all of this I went back and looked at Revelation again at the very beginning of the vision that St John describes in the Book of Revelation here's what we get then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me and un turning I saw one like a son of man his voice was like the sound of Rushing Water and his face Shone like the sun when I saw him I fell at his feet as though dead but he laid his right hand upon me saying fear fear not fear not I died and behold I am alive close quote so what are we to do with this fear not you've mentioned this a number of times this notion it's always the problem in trying to understand history what is PR what's going to happen no matter what we do and what scope is there for personal action fear not is an injunction in the Book of Revelation from Christ himself so Christians are meant to take it very seriously but you could easily take it as a kind of oh it'll all work out there's nothing I need to do there's nothing any of us need to do it's out of our hands it'll all work out what do you do with fear not well I I man this is sort of starting to get way way way above my theological pay grade but I I I I think I think it means something I think I think God will work it all out no matter how bad the choices are we make and so in some sense um in the end God will work it out and then um and then at the same time I'm not sure that we should always be looking at it from God's point of view and uh and uh from from a human point of view um human agency matters it surely matters a lot all right last question let me quote you one final time quote maybe people think about this stuff a lot more than they let on close quote so what do you have to say to some bright 20-some who does think about this stuff what what should some young American read what should he or she do what advice about how to lead a good life when we think we maybe in the end times what advice do you have for a young Peter teal I'm I'm always so bad in this department but uh stumble through it I think you know if it's too high a lift to go to church or something like that I I I would say that it's it's it's uh important to try to find a way to integrate your life to to you know we just fragmented all these different ways and uh to integrate the knowledge to connect you know what we think is going on in your life with history with our society we need to somehow not have this postmodern MTV like incoherence and uh and there's some way that asking these questions is is is is a way to try to you know we we need somewhat more integration we need some pull things back together it's what the universities were supposed to do don't think they will do it but uh you know you have to figure after years of deconstruction you're calling for an active reconstruction yeah it may not happen the progressive cult that is the University but uh but still there's there's you know it is really a time for reconstruction Peter teal thank you for uncommon knowledge the Hoover institution and Fox Nation I'm Peter Robinson [Music]

2024-12-08 19:50

Other news