• Steve@communick.news
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    9 hours ago

    Peter Thiel (CEO co-founder of Palantir) realised the religious right are a fanatical base of support if you can get them on your side. So that’s what he’s trying to do.

    • flamingo_pinyata@sopuli.xyz
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      9 hours ago

      Oh no, it’s even worse. He actually believes in the religious stuff he’s talking about. Not just a manipulative schemer, a true believer.

      • radix@lemmy.world
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        7 hours ago

        People are complicated, but I still have a hard time wrapping my head around a gay man being a true far-right christian in 2025. There are religions compatible with being LGBT, but it’s just hard to reconcile that with modern christo-fascism.

        • wjrii@lemmy.world
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          6 hours ago

          I don’t recall the link for now, but there was a fairly long piece a couple of weeks (months?) ago that went into the Thiel religious awakening. The short version is that he doesn’t necessarily believe in Jesus so much as he believes that organized religion is so important as a binding agent in society that you’re better off pretending to believe in it, advocating for it, and imposing it by force if it seems necessary, all to satisfy the human need for mimesis, or imitative desires and behaviors.

          Society’s movement away from Christianity in particular as a uniquely humane and sophisticated global-ready religion means it’s okay to fall back on older “tribal” religious patterns like assertive scapegoating to reimpose the world order. There is room for regions of the world with independent traditions to impose them as a means of having a safe and orderly society, because it allows the Christian region to interact with a relatively small number of competing ideologies, which satisfy similar psychological needs for their populations, and therefore a balance can be maintained. It’s better for the system if most people hold sincere beliefs about the supernatural aspects, but it’s not utterly critical, particularly for elites, as long as folks legitimately buy into the societal repercussions of failing to rely on religion for social control. It’s like Pascal’s wager on meth, which is appropriate because a lot of it dates back to a German guy who was a Nazi apologist through most of the thirties until being discarded by them right before WW2. Some of this is strictly IIRC, so be on notice, LOL.

          Conveniently, all this allows the Christianized advocates for this worldview to declare any systemic threat to the triumph of their vision for world peace to be accurately-enough referred to as the Antichrist, and the things you’re allowed to do to oppose the Antichrist are quite broad.

          JD Vance is thought to be well-ensconced in the ideology.

          EDIT: Found it, plus a couple of others that discuss the same thing. Thiel is absolutely nuts, but not quite the way he’s sometimes portrayed.

      • Steve@communick.news
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        9 hours ago

        I’m not sure of that.
        He certainly sounds like he does. But what he says is just a little too out there, and too self serving, for someone that clever to easily convince me they actually believe it.

    • foggy@lemmy.world
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      7 hours ago

      Ooga booga antichrist

      Plz gib billions 🥺

      I fight antichrist and help bring back Jesus! 💪

      I just need billions 🥺

    • the_wise_wolf@feddit.org
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      9 hours ago

      Peter Thiel is a co-founder and biggest individual share holder of Palantir with 3% of all shares. The CEO is Alexander Karp (also a total nut case).

  • Fedizen@lemmy.world
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    7 hours ago

    Jokes on him, I’m part of the Butlerian Jihad. Death to the toasters.

    Its also weird all these tech CEOs are backing the guy who is trying to deport populations that are more christian (80%) than the general US population (60%).

    Its almost like they’re just pointing the finger at everything but money.

  • scarabic@lemmy.world
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    8 hours ago

    I’m actually terrified by religious people and their unshakeable belief that everything’s gonna be okay because Sky Daddy will fix it and if we destroy the world well that’s just accelerating His plan so it’s all good.

    Concerned about the consequences of our actions? Here just take some opiate-of-the-masses and chill out.

  • brezel@piefed.social
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    9 hours ago

    i think religion is the one thing of which there exists no lack anywhere on this planet.

  • Avid Amoeba@lemmy.ca
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    8 hours ago

    Have a problem with society not doing what you want it to do? It’s a problem with the lack of religion! It’s true. We’ve known religion gives you the capability to get societies to do what you want them to for centuries.

  • taiyang@lemmy.world
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    8 hours ago

    Ah yes, I love faith-based AI technology. The slop is real so long as you believe! /s

    Seriously are these people who think your prayers are the reason your phone stays on 1% battery for an hour longer than you thought?

  • kbal@fedia.io
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    8 hours ago

    The strength of todays “AI” is generating bullshit, isn’t it? Not that it doesn’t take more than that to invent a new religion, I suppose you also need genuine holy divine inspiration and so on, but it sure might be helpful to the process.

  • aarch0x40@lemmy.world
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    9 hours ago

    Let’s rewrite that headline in a more positive tone.

    AI doomerism is driven by those with a clear perspective.

  • Flax@feddit.uk
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    8 hours ago

    I think I’m one of the more well known religious folk on this place, and I am also a bit of an AI doomer.

    I think the way some people want to use it is satanic.

    Revelation 13:14-15 ESV

    and by the signs that it is allowed to work in the presence of the beast it deceives those who dwell on earth, telling them to make an image for the beast that was wounded by the sword and yet lived. And it was allowed to give breath to the image of the beast, so that the image of the beast might even speak and might cause those who would not worship the image of the beast to be slain.

  • Archangel1313@lemmy.ca
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    4 hours ago

    So…being onboard with the AI revolution requires belief in imaginary things?

    Yep. That actually checks out.