Ethics and Modern gene therapy - III of IV

There are some genes that have both positive and negative effects in different contexts. For example, researchers now suspect that people who carry one copy of the mutated gene that causes cystic fibrosis (which requires two copies) have an increased defense against tuberculosis. Even gene variants implicated in neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s may have benefits, such as improved cognitive function and better working memory in young adults. What decisions would you make? 

Schizophrenia, depression, and bipolar disorder can be brutal, often deadly. While trying to eliminate similar disorders, we should consider whether there might be some cost to society, even to civilization. A reason that scientists will not eliminate conditions such as psychiatric disorders or conditions such as autism is that some of the risk for these disorders almost certainly comes in trade for small competitive advantages, such as heightened sensitivity, concentration, or openness to experience.

A study showed a 77 percent rate of psychiatric disorders in eminent fiction writers. Writers are 10 times, and poets 40 times, more likely to be bipolar than the general population. Vincent van Gogh had either schizophrenia or bipolar disorder. So did the mathematician John Nash. People with bipolar disorder include Ernest Hemingway, Mariah Carey, Francis Ford Coppola, Graham Greene, Sylvia Plath, Edgar Allan Poe, and hundreds of other artists and creators. 

To what extent does dealing with mood swings, fantasies, delusions, compulsions, mania, and deep depression help spur, in some people, creativity and artistry? Would you cure your own child from being schizophrenic if you knew that, if you didn’t, he would become a Vincent van Gogh? We have to face the potential conflict between what is desired by the individual versus what is good for human civilization. 

A reduction in mood disorders would be seen as a benefit when seen from the point of view of an individual and as a cost when seen from the point of view of society. As we learn to treat mood disorders with drugs and eventually with genetic editing, will we have more happiness but fewer Hemingways? Do we wish to live in a world in which there are no Van Goghs? But what moral right do we have to require another family to forgo a desired genetic intervention simply for the sake of adding to the diversity of society? 

Decisions about genetic editing are likely to be driven by consumer choice and the persuasive power of marketing. Initially people will think that if we can do so safely, why shouldn’t we prevent abnormalities, diseases, and disabilities? That sounds reasonable and morally justified but it might prove to be a slippery slope. They will naturally start thinking: Why not improve our capabilities and create enhancements - changes in which DNA is altered not to correct a harmful gene variant but to provide some type of genetic advantage, perhaps high intelligence or athletic abilities. (Of course, there is a limit to what enhancements will be possible or safe to attempt.)

While thinking about correcting disabilities, we should keep one factor in mind: to what extent they are inherently disabling and to what extent the disadvantage is due to our social constructs and prejudices. The disadvantages from being deaf, for a human or any other animal, are very real. In contrast, any disadvantages to being gay or Black are due to social attitudes that can and should be changed. That is why we can make a moral distinction between using genetic techniques to prevent deafness and using these techniques to influence such things as skin color and sexual orientation.

Then comes the question of super-enhancements.  These are traits and capacities that exceed what any human has ever had.  Suppose people can choose for their kids to have super-eyesight? What about adding the capacity to see infrared light or some new color? DARPA, the Pentagon’s research agency, already has a project going to study how to create genetically enhanced soldiers.

For example, genetic enhancement may be possible for improving memory. Scientists have managed to manipulate a memory-linked gene in fruit flies. They have produced smart mice by inserting extra copies of a memory-related gene into mouse embryos and the improvement was passed on to offspring. Human memory is more complicated. Should research in this area be allowed? But the natural instinct of scientists is to pioneer procedures and make discoveries. If a nation imposes too many. restrictions, its scientists will move elsewhere and pursue the research. 

Since the wealthy would be able to afford the procedure more often, and since any beneficial genetic modifications made to an embryo would be transmitted to all of that person’s offspring, linkages between class and genetics would keep growing from one generation to the next, no matter how small the disparity in access might be. Consider the effect this could have on the socioeconomic fabric of society. The co-discoverer of CRISPR, Jennifer Doudna says, 

We could create a gene gap that would get wider with each new generation...If you think we face inequalities now, imagine what it would be like if society became genetically tiered along economic lines and we transcribed our financial inequality into our genetic code.

This may also create a different kind of injustice. Using gene editing to “fix” things like deafness or obesity could create a less inclusive society, one that pressures everyone to be the same. Part of what makes our species unique, and our society so strong, is its diversity. A fear is that gene editing will increase existing prejudices against people who fall outside a narrow range of genetic norms. 

Ethics and Modern gene therapy - II of IV

There can be various technical difficulties in producing designer babies. Thousands of genetic variations can influence complex traits, psychiatric risk, personality traits, and capacities such as human intelligence. Take any given genetic variant. None has more than a fraction of a single percentage point of an effect on the risk for a psychiatric disorder or condition. 

Each of the variants in our genes can have enhancing or diminishing effects on other genes depending on the context in which they are inherited. Genetic variants may be deleterious in some cell types, such as neurons, but advantageous in other cell types, such as immune cells. A lot of scientific evidence shows that chronic stress and poverty contribute to alterations in brain circuitry and blood pressure, dramatically influencing health and mortality.

A gene often has three or four different functions, so altering a single gene may have three or four effects. A gene that builds a protein named “protein S” is a blood coagulant, but it was recently shown to have a critical role in regulation of the immune system. The opposite is also true: multiple biological codes or parts can perform the same function. To engineer new systems would require a complete analysis of an entire network, not just a single gene. 

For argument’s sake, let us assume that all these difficulties will be overcome. And we are not talking of the distant future. The time frames being talked about are 15-20 years. If so, what sorts of ethical issues will humanity have to face? In The Code Breaker, Walter Isaacson discusses some thought experiments, which give a flavor of the kinds of questions that we may have to grapple with. 

Sharon Duchesneau and Candy McCullough wanted a sperm donor so they could conceive a kid. That sounds straightforward until you are told that both of them are deaf and lesbians and they wanted a child who is also deaf. They consider their deafness to be part of who they are rather than something to be cured, and they wanted a child who would be part of their cultural identity. So they advertised for a sperm donor who was congenitally deaf. They found one, and now they have a deaf child.

Some people condemned them for making a child disabled intentionally but the deaf community appreciated their action. Where do you stand on this? Should they be praised for preserving a subculture that contributes to the diversity? Would it have been ok if, instead of using a deaf sperm donor, the couple had used pre-implantation diagnosis to select an embryo that had the genetic mutation for deafness? What if they had safely destroyed the child’s eardrums after birth?

Now let us look at gene editing that is done to enhance the traits of our children. The MSTN gene produces a protein that reduces muscle growth when they reach a normal level. Suppress the gene and muscle growth is in overdrive. This has already been done to produce “mighty mice" and cattle with “double muscling". Pushy parents and athletic directors who want champion athletes would be very interested. By performing germline editing, they might produce athletes with bigger bones and stronger muscles. 

When athletes cheat by using steroids, we find it easy to say that they should be banned. But what do we do if athletes' prowess comes from genes they were born with? For example, almost every champion runner has what is known as the R allele of the ACTN3 gene. It produces a protein that builds fast-twitch muscle fibers, and it is also associated with improving strength and recovery from muscle injury.

Someday it may be possible to edit this variation of the ACTN3 gene into the DNA of your kids. Would that be unfair? Does it matter if those genes were paid for by their parents rather than bestowed by a random natural lottery? In future, would we end up admiring the wizardry of the genetic engineers of athletes rather than the diligence of the athletes?

Ethics and Modern gene therapy - I of IV

In Kazuo Ishiguro's novel, Klara and the Sun, the “lifted” are children who have undergone a genetic enhancement procedure designed to increase intelligence and academic ability. It’s something wealthier families choose for their children to secure better futures — elite education, careers, and status. Most top universities in the novel’s world primarily accept lifted students, creating a strong incentive to undergo the process. The parents take this risk in spite of the possibility of the procedure causing illness or even death. Such a dystopian world may not be as far in the future as you might think.  

Genetic engineering has been practiced for five decades. It is the process of altering an organism's genome to change its characteristics in a particular way. It has been used to make food more nutritious, create synthetic insulin and provide promising treatments for illnesses including leukemia and sickle cell disease. Modern gene therapy is being used to treat eye diseases which can cause blindness, promote the growth of healthy skin or add supplementary copies of working genes that fix rare blood or immune system disorders.

Enter CRISPR. Remember the name. I am sure you are dying to know what it stands for so here it is: Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats. CRISPR makes editing genomes much more precise, cheap, and easy than was possible earlier. The technique is considered so significant that the discoverers, Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuelle Charpentier, won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2020, less than a decade after the discovery, something that rarely happens. Biologists began speaking about their life before and after CRISPR.

CRISPR is sold on the internet in kits, and is actively being used to do trivial things, such as to create fluorescent beer. Its ease of use has also raised concerns about “biohackers” who view gene modification as a right and alter microbes and organisms. “Mail-Order Crispr Kits Allow Absolutely Anyone to Hack DNA,” declared the headline of a November 2017 article in Scientific American. The iconoclast scientist Josiah Zayner has used CRISPR to hack into his own genes. (There is a docuseries on Netflix called "Unnatural Selection" where you can see it.)

There are even CRISPR jokes: Why has KFC asked scientists to edit the chicken genome? Because they want something CRISPR. And who is CRISPR's favorite actor? Gene Hackman

So what is the fuss all about? For that, first a little bit of biology. The body contains two types of cells: somatic and germ line cells. Somatic cells refer to any cell of a living organism other than the reproductive cells. The reproductive cells - the egg and the sperm - are called the germ line cells. A germ line cell passes on to the next generation while somatic cells don’t. 

CRISPR is so precise that gene therapy in people with devastating illnesses seems feasible. For example, physicians could directly correct a faulty gene, say, in the blood cells of a patient with sickle-cell anemia. But that kind of gene therapy wouldn’t affect germ cells, and the changes in the DNA wouldn’t get passed to future generations.

In contrast, the genetic changes created by germ-line engineering would be passed on, and that’s what has made the idea seem so objectionable. “Germ line” is biologists’ jargon for the egg and sperm, which combine to form an embryo. By editing the DNA of these cells, it could be possible to correct disease genes and pass those genetic fixes on to future generations. Such a technology could be used to rid families of scourges like cystic fibrosis. 

Germline genome editing leads to many bioethical issues. For example, what to do if the editing leads to occurrence of undesirable changes in the genome? Can parents give informed consent for editing the genomes of unborn children? If not, from whom do you obtain the consent? The counterargument is that parents already make many decisions that affect their future children, including similarly complicated decisions with IVF. Another fear is that germ-line engineering is a path toward a dystopia of superpeople and designer babies for those who can afford it. Want a child with blue eyes and blond hair? Why not design a highly intelligent group of people who could be tomorrow’s leaders and scientists?

Others believe the idea is dubious because it’s not medically necessary. It’s already possible to test the DNA of IVF embryos and pick healthy ones, a process that adds about $4,000 to the cost of a fertility procedure. A man with Huntington’s, for instance, could have his sperm used to fertilize a dozen of his partner’s eggs. Half those embryos would not have the Huntington’s gene, and those could be used to begin a pregnancy.

George Church, a geneticist at Harvard, likes to show a slide on which he lists naturally occurring variants of around 10 genes that, when people are born with them, confer extraordinary qualities or resistance to disease. One makes your bones so hard they’ll break a surgical drill. Another drastically cuts the risk of heart attacks. Church proceeded to tell the audience that he thought changing genes “is going to get to the point where it’s like you are doing the equivalent of cosmetic surgery.”

Regulations about gremline editing are variable and often lack teeth. For example, in many countries like Canada, France, Germany, Brazil, and Australia, clinical interventions in the human germline are expressly prohibited, with criminal sanctions that range from fines to lengthy prison terms. In other countries, such as China, India, and Japan, these interventions are forbidden, but with guidelines that are less enforceable. In the United States, there are no outright bans but any clinical trials would need to receive regulatory approval by the Food and Drug Administration.

There’s a risk that overly restrictive policies in some countries will encourage what might be called CRISPR tourism in others. Patients with means could travel overseas to jurisdictions where regulations are more forgiving or absent altogether. Excessive restrictions on research might lead scientists to continue their experiments behind closed doors. Trying to find a balance between maintaining regulatory environments that permit research and clinical applications but strict enough to prevent the worst excesses would be tough. 

Hypocrisy is not all bad

There is an increasing tendency to accept shocking statements by politicians by just saying that they are being authentic and not hiding behind hypocritical statements. Political leaders used to at least pretend that they are doing the right things some of the time. But Trump has been so successful in making people familiar with the idea of not pretending that they now just shrug their shoulders and say that Trump is being Trump. 

The global system shaped after World War II was built around open markets, human rights, international institutions like United Nations and cooperation and rule-based norms. A large part of the world did not accept it. There were many situations when the system was ignored more than being followed, particularly by the United States itself. But you still had this as the kind of default operating system of the international world.

Whenever the United States did not live up to those principles, it always tried to frame its actions as if it was trying to uphold them. So for example, for the war in Iraq, the Bush administration went to the United Nations, tried to get resolutions, had inspectors put in place, gathered a coalition of 40 plus nations, went to the United States Congress, and then went to war with Iraq. The war may have been misguided, but there was an effort to put it in the context of this larger international order that the United States believed in and was part of.

Now it has gone from being a country that believed in the international system that it had put into place to one that openly violates it. "Openly violates it" is the part that is important. For the current war in Iran, there was no effort to go to the United Nations or to go to Congress. The United States has exactly one ally, Israel. This was deliberate. The Trump administration doesn't believe in any of those features. It wants the unilateral exercise of American power for American national interests as it conceives it to be.

The practice of filling the government with incompetent loyalists has been going on for thousands of years and people know that it will always be there. But some excuse to show that you're doing it for other reasons will generally be given to cover up the actual reason for doing it. But now even this pretense is often not required. Is this a good thing? 

The Oxford English Dictionary tells us that hypocrisy is the “practice of claiming to have moral standards or beliefs to which one’s own behavior does not conform; pretense.”  It is generally viewed as a negative trait; a significant moral failing, especially in a leader. It is often seen as a mark of dishonesty and a lack of authenticity. But it easy to miss the good about hypocrisy - even giving lip service to an ideal that you fall short of maintains the idea that the ideal should remain and people should aspire for it. 

If people were required to perfectly live up to ideals of honesty and compassion at all times for those ideals to exist, there would be no ideals at all. According to Gandhi, there must always be an unbridgeable gulf between the ideal and its practice. The ideal will cease to be one if it becomes possible to realise it. He argues: "Where would there be room for that constant striving, that ceaseless quest after the ideal . . . if mortals could reach the perfect state while still in the body?"

The maxim that 'hypocrisy is the tribute that vice plays to virtue' makes the same point - you're only truly capable of hypocrisy if you're to some degree accepting the importance of certain norms. It's by reference to those norms that you can be called a hypocrite. Hypocrites who fail to keep their promises but refuse to abandon the ideals they betray help keep those standards in place for society to strive toward. The social condemnation of hypocrisy reinforces moral norms and promotes more authentic and accountable behavior in society.

Some situations may require hypocritical behavior in order to reduce tensions in social relations. When citizens appear to conform to the social and cultural conventions and norms of their communities, where their instincts and desires are repressed, they cannot merely be accused of being hypocritical.  Living in a group may require compromise at certain times. When politicians appear hypocritical, they may be performing much better than if they remained steadfast in their consistent adherence to principles. For example, when the leaders of various countries praise Trump to the skies, you know that they are lying but you also know that it is the best way to get a good deal for their countries. 

When a person is accused of hypocrisy, it makes both the charging party and those being charged critically reflect on the action. Trump-style dismissal of any appeal to ethics and virtues, or the belief that such an appeal is inherently in bad faith breeds cynicism and a decline in social standards.  A cynical agreement in society that hypocrisy is a common occurrence and that we are all hypocrites some of the time reduces the effective functioning of a society. 

Anne Applebaum writes that some countries are members of what she calls Autocracy, Inc. - Myanmar, Zimbabwe, Iran,  Cuba, Venezuela, China, Russia etc. They have spent many years disputing the human rights language long used by international institutions. They dismiss treaties and conventions on war and genocide, and concepts such as “civil liberties” and “the rule of law” as embodying Western ideas that don’t apply to them. They feel no shame about the use of open brutality and send hundreds of their citizens to their deaths.

Once upon a time, the leaders of the Soviet Union, the most powerful autocracy in the second half of the twentieth century, cared deeply about how they were perceived around the world. They vigorously promoted the superiority of their political system, and they objected when it was criticized. They at least paid lip service to the aspirational system of norms and treaties set up after World War II, with its language about universal human rights, the laws of war, and the rule of law more generally. Even in the early part of this century, most dictatorships hid their true intentions “behind elaborate, carefully manipulated performances of democracy". But all that pretense is now not required. 

The Overton Window is a model for understanding how ideas in society change over time and influence politics. It was developed in the 1990s by Joseph Overton, a political scientist. The window illustrates the general public’s most acceptable policies in the center and the more untenable policies on the ends. According to the concept, politicians are limited in what policy ideas they can support — they generally only pursue policies that are widely accepted throughout society as legitimate policy options. These policies lie inside the Overton Window. 

Politicians and others in the political arena might shift or expand the span of the Overton window to make specific policies more or less acceptable in public opinion. Politicians of various countries, by their statements and actions over a number of years, have shifted the Overton window towards reduced importance of a number of moral ideas. Anne Applebaum writes in Autocracy Inc.:

This is the core of the problem: the leaders of Autocracy, Inc., know that the language of transparency, accountability, justice, and democracy will always appeal to some of their own citizens. To stay in power they must undermine those ideas, wherever they are found.

Russia and China would not have dreamt that they would have a person in the White House who would do their job for them. They will be content to follow a famous strategic maxim attributed to Napoleon Bonaparte - "Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake".

Palantir Technologies - IV of IV

Palantir is much beyond a technology story and is a story of security and defense. Counterterrorism and defense form the main part of Palantir’s business. Much of this work necessarily takes place out of public view. A number of military veterans work at Palantir. It personifies the new revolution in military affairs. Alex Karp and cofounder Peter Thiel are now fully embedded in the Trump White House system and are looking for more and more business.

Palantir's work is related to analyzing data from thousands of satellites and other sensors and making sense of that for military commanders. They are also creating a platform that will facilitate the mass deportation of 'illegal immigrants'. Palantir's power, fame and presence is not confined to America or Israel.  All of NATO has embraced it. Palantir's use of AI has been has been criticized as crossing the ethical boundaries, particularly as it works with military intelligence, immigration, etc., probably with not enough disclosure.

Shyam Shankar, Palantir Chief Technology Officer, is a Lieutenant Colonel US army reserve, commissioned in June 2025 to a new unit called the Executive Innovation Corps. He plays a key role in upgrading technologies, particularly AI, for the US armed forces. (Reserve army officers in the US can keep on doing the work that they are doing, but they are part of the army as officers, which means they have got the privileges like security clearances, etc. Chief Technology Officers of three big tech companies have been appointed as officers.)

There are more indications about how deeply embedded Palantir has now become in the security and defense structure in America. Jacob Helberg, ex-Palantir, has been appointed under Secretary of State for Economic Growth, Energy and Environment. Gregory Barbaccia has been appointed federal CIO, Chief Information Officer, in the executive office of the president to lead US government's IT strategy.  He was in Palantir and was the head of intelligence and investigations. 

The brings us to the question of how the company got its name. Peter Thiel is a fan of The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien. In the novel, a Palantir is a magical sphere. The person who looks into one can see things far away and communicate with someone who holds another Palantír. (The company management is fond of referring to employees as “hobbits”.) He named Palantir after the all-seeing crystal balls. His software and AI also are supposed to be all-seeing. 

In Tolkien’s work, we see both good and bad effects of the use of Palantíri. Only very powerful and capable beings were able to use these seeing stones. But even the very wise could be deceived by what they saw, and using a Palantir led to their downfall. It can be used to distort truth and present selective visions of reality. A kingdom used the Palantirí to facilitate communication and control across a vast territory. One of the story's villains, the wizard Saruman, used a Palantir to surveil his enemies. The Palantiri are a sinister symbol of hubris and a tool of manipulation. 

The Torment Nexus is an expression that refers to dystopian elements in science fiction that technologists pursue as practical goals. Dais Johnston of an online magazine Inverse has defined the Torment Nexus as "shorthand for something that backfired in fiction being unironically replicated in reality." Palantir Technologies is an example of the Torment Nexus. 

Peter Thiel is aware of the moral complexities involved in the use of Palantir in the novel but he seems to think his company is immune to them. Alex Karp indeed seems to take the issue of privacy protection seriously. But how can he ensure that his clients will do the same? How will he be able to ensure that the CEOs who come after him will have the same commitment to privacy protection that he seems to have? It seems inevitable that someone somewhere at some time will use the software for some unethical purposes. 

This has already happened. The company was implicated in the Cambridge Analytica scandal, in which Facebook data was surreptitiously used to try to manipulate millions of Americans into voting for Donald Trump in 2016. The investment bank JPMorganChase sought Palantir’s help for cybersecurity. Soon, though, the software was being used to surveil the bank’s own staff by a bank employee. When Trump launched his immigration crackdown, Palantir was accused of abetting racist and inhumane policies. That Thiel had been one of Trump’s most prominent supporters added to the furor.

Concerned about Palantir’s role in the second Trump administration, former employees of Palantir wrote a warning to their fellow tech workers in Silicon Valley. They recalled that in the epic novel, “the myth of the powerful seeing stones warned of great dangers when wielded by those without wisdom or a moral compass, as they could be used to distort truth and present selective visions of reality.”

Similarly, the Palantir employees warned that the “Palantir Technologies" platform grants immense power to its users, "helping control the data, decisions, and outcomes that determine the future of governments, businesses, and institutions — and by extension, all of us.”

Some of Palantir's critics like to portray the company almost as an all-seeing, all-controlling company. Palantir's supporters say the company is saving Western civilization from collapse. The Trump years exposed an uncomfortable truth: the company’s technology would be a powerful weapon in the hands of an authoritarian regime. In The Philosopher in the Valley, Michael Steinberger writes: 

Palantir was arguably the most interesting company in the world — and possibly also one of the most dangerous. Its technology had the potential to help shape the balance of power in the twenty-first century and to alter the relationship between the individual and the state. Palantir was a window into the panoptic future that had now arrived ...

Palantir Technologies - III of IV

A major thing that's happened in recent years is the advent of AI. Palantir quickly realized that there's going to be huge demand among corporations in incorporating AI functions into their operations and that Palantir software could play this sort of bridging function. It just turbocharged their business. A few years ago the stock was trading at about $10 a share. A few months ago, it topped $200 a share. Palantir's Board of directors awarded Alex Karp $1.1 billion in total compensation in 2020, making him the highest-paid CEO of a publicly traded company that year. 

There is a story which illustrates Alex Karp's aggressive style.  In early 2023, he announced that the company was launching a new AI product that "was under development". None of the engineers in his company knew that there was any such product. He knew that AI is going to be the next big thing so he just decided there will be a product and assumed the engineers will find a way of doing it. And they did. 

Although Alex Karp is very supportive of his employees, he speaks abrasively to outsiders. Trump-style, he taunts his critics and attacks the media. There's a quote from him in a Wall Street Journal story where he says, "we are sorry that our haters are disappointed, but there are more quarters to be disappointed and we are working on that too."  And he goes on to say to his shareholders to stop talking to all the haters.

Much of what the company does is completely benign. It's helping make businesses operate more efficiently. Palantir has also done a lot of good. It played an instrumental role in the COVID response and in the vaccine rollout. It was being used by the World Food Program when the pandemic began. Then there's been stuff that's very concerning. Now Karp's view of what it means to defend the West seems to have changed. For much of Palantir's history, defending the West meant defending liberal democracy, the rule of law.

In the beginning, his political views provided an intriguing contrast with Peter Thiel, who was a libertarian (and who later would gravitate to the far right). But in recent years he has moved closer to Thiel's view. Thiel has spoken very disparagingly of democracy. You don't now hear Karp nor from Palantir talk of defending liberal democracy. They talk about the West now as a cultural entity, a superior culture. 

Peter Thiel has been a long-time Trump supporter and is supposed to be the man behind the rise of JD Vance. Prior to entering politics, Vance had worked for Thiel’s Mithril Capital. When JD Vance contested for his campaign to be senator in Ohio, Peter Thiel contributed $15 million.  He and a lot of his key people are seen very often in the White House.  And many of them are now working either in White House or in Department of Defense.  

Thiel has said that he no longer believes that freedom (he means economic freedom) and democracy are compatible. He wrote, “Since 1920, the vast increase in welfare beneficiaries and the extension of the franchise to women — two constituencies that are notoriously tough for libertarians — have rendered the notion of ‘capitalist democracy’ into an oxymoron.” (He later clarified that he didn’t think anyone should be disenfranchised, while simultaneously suggesting that voting isn’t productive.) He thinks of the West as a collection of countries bound by a shared Judeo-Christian heritage and by attachment in varying degrees to free enterprise.

Thiel has a habit of ignoring or doubting scientific facts that run counter to his worldview. (He even funded an online magazine that promoted creationism.) Thiel’s idea of “freedom” seems to consist of free markets and not much else. He thinks that markets should be free of any regulation. He is skeptical about the value of competition and believes that the most compelling start-ups are those that aim to achieve monopolistic dominance in niche markets. According to him, "Competition is for losers because it destroys profits. You can survive, but you'll never thrive.” 

He gave the example of disc drive manufacturing in the 1980s, which saw repeated advancements every two years, but by different companies. “It had great benefit to consumers, but it didn’t actually help the people who started these companies,” he said. Companies needed not only to have “a huge breakthrough” at the beginning to establish their dominance but also to ensure they had the “last breakthrough” to maintain it, such as by “improving on it at a quick enough pace that no one can ever catch up - that’s great for society. It’s actually not that good for your business.”

Thiel said that an Antichrist would exploit fears of the apocalypse — for example due to nuclear armageddeon, climate change or the threat posed by AI — to control a "frightened population.". The Antichrist is a deceptive figure in Christian theology who opposes Christ and embodies ultimate evil. Thiel’s overall definition of the Antichrist “is that of an evil king or tyrant or anti-messiah who appears in the end times”. He identifies the Antichrist with anyone or any institution that he dislikes – from environmental activist Greta Thunberg to governmental attempts to regulate artificial intelligence. He labeled AI safety researchers who call for strict regulation as potential agents of the Antichrist.

In an interview to the NYT, he talked about his fears of an Antichrist taking over the world. The interviewer asked him if he doesn’t think that the Antichrist who he is so worried about would use the the tools that his company Palantir is creating to take over the world; that without such tools, such a takeover would not be possible. Thiel didn’t have a good answer. 

Thiel and Karp, are strong supporters of Israel. After 7th of October 2023, they took a plane load of Palantir top staff to Tel Aviv in solidarity. And then they faced a big pushback from many quarters that their platforms was being used by the Israeli military.  How did they respond? They decided to hold their next board meeting in Tel Aviv.

Palantir Technologies - II of IV

Karp is a very people-oriented person. He encouraged his employees to express themselves with absolute candor. “Alex’s attitude was that you should be able to tell even the CEO to fuck off,” says a software engineer. Even so, his colleagues felt as if Karp could almost burrow into people’s minds and implant his ideas. He seemed to have an astonishing ability to get people to see things his way and to do things that he wanted. 

Karp was good to those who worked for him. He was not one to scream or threaten, nor did he ever publicly upbraid or humiliate people. He disliked firing people even when there were problems with them. He would joke that his job was “managing unmanageable people.” Whenever he shared his thoughts about the work the engineers were doing, he made it clear that pushback was welcome. In this way, he had won the confidence and allegiance of Palantir’s engineers. Palantirians were intensely devoted to him. 

Karp has severe dyslexia (which makes his academic achievements even more impressive). He believed that his managerial acumen was tied to his dyslexia.  He says that it “fucked me but also gave me wings to fly.” He developed certain attributes that would prove useful in business. Dyslexia taught him the power of collaboration since those who have it need the help of others. In an environment that required team-building and delegating responsibility, Karp found that he had an intrinsic advantage. Dyslexics, he said, aren’t raised on an ethos of self-reliance and tend to excel in situations in which they have to work with other people. 

The company was a reflection of him: of his habits and quirks, of the experiences that had shaped him, and above all, of his bleak worldview and the anxieties that weighed on him. His sense of foreboding, he said, “propels a lot of decisions for this company". Karp’s commitment to Palantir was absolute. He rarely took a day off, and on most weeknights, he ate dinner at his desk.

From the start, Karp said that Palantir’s mission was to defend the West and liberal democracy. The company was a creation of 9/11 where it was felt that different agencies had the required data but had failed to post them together properly. Even before 9/11, Karp was skeptical that the end of the Cold War had ushered in an era of irreversible peace and prosperity. There was nothing utopian about Palantir; if anything, the company was founded on the conviction that we were facing a bleak future. Karp once said that bad times are incredibly good for Palantir.

He was fully supportive of Ukraine when it was invaded by Russia. In one sense, it wasn't Karp's choice. The United States was giving support indirectly to the Ukrainians from the start to try to help them repel the Russian attack and Palantir's software played a significant part in that. He felt strongly that every country should be able to have its own sovereignty over its territory. Three months after Russia invaded Ukraine, he went to Kyiv where he met President Zelensky and expressed his support for Ukraine and offered to open an office there. 

He identifies very strongly with his Jewish heritage and is a staunch supporter of Israel. Being biracial, Jewish and also severely dyslexic, he has always understood that this was a world that wouldn't necessarily be a very hospitable world for someone like him. Soon after the war in Ukraine started, the war in Gaza started after the October 7th attacks by Hamas in Israel. The October 7th attacks gets right to his sense of vulnerability.

He saw it as ushering in a period of enormous danger for Jews everywhere, not just in Israel, and this informed his reaction. Palantir was already working with Israel. The Mossad used its technology. But now after October 7th, Palatir's involvement increased. It took out a full page ad in the New York Times saying that Palantir stands with Israel. This was deeply personal for him. And Karp is furious over the protests on American college campuses against the war in Gaza which he sees as evidence of a broader rot on the left.

The slaughter in Israel also cemented his political metamorphosis. Although he had long ago stopped describing himself as a neo-socialist, he still claimed to be progressive. He was a Hillary Clinton supporter in 2016, and he had made clear to employees that he was personally repulsed by Trump. He had said, "I respect nothing about the dude. It would be hard to make up someone I find less appealing.” On certain issues, such as immigration, he expressed opinions that seemed consistent with a liberal worldview (at the same time, though, he opposed affirmative action and was a staunch supporter of the Second Amendment to the US constitution). 

But he thought progressives had been very irresponsible on the issue of immigration. He was increasingly unhappy over the role of identity politics and started drifting away from the left. In the meantime, Donald Trump (who he had criticized earlier, calling him "a phony billionaire") was running for president again, and Karp started warming to Republicans and to the idea of a second Trump presidency. He recognized that it was a huge opportunity for Palantir, being a major government contractor, if they played their cards right. 

Now he is a big Trump supporter, involved in ICE operations. He had quietly made a $1 million personal donation to the Trump-Vance Inaugural Committee. He published a book called The Technological Republic: Hard Power, Soft Belief, and the Future of the West whose main point is that a new, tech-driven nationalism was needed to keep America, and by extension the West, dominant. After an interview on CNBC, one of the cohosts commented that Karp was “an enigma wrapped in a riddle. He always emphasizes ‘I’m a progressive’ and then he "goes on to sound like just a huge right-winger.”

Palantir's platform was used with Anthropic’s Claude in the capture of Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro, according to the Wall Street Journal. Karp told CNBC that his company’s technology is being used in the war in the Middle East. He seemed frustrated that he couldn’t take more credit for the continued war being waged in Iran and made it clear that he supports President Donald Trump’s efforts. Palantir has experienced significant stock appreciation and high valuation multiples since the start of the conflict in the Middle East.