alt Hacker NewsSomething that strikes me every time I encounter SV Rationalism presented this way is the self-annihilation of it: tastes and preferences are to be optimized out as cognitive biases, grey uniforms mandated in lieu of individual expression (fashion). The god they're sacrificed to? “Technological progress"
I lived in SF for a few years and found the tech community's disinterest in art to border on allergy. It was as if expressing an aesthetic preference weren't an optimal way to spend one's time or money. Better to spend those things "optimizing efficiency” or optimizing oneself/one’s own life
It seems like Thiel and co _don't actually care about other people_ or human welfare writ large. This isn't a novel observation, but it bears repeating
It's mirrored in something I ask myself every time I hear that Thiel is a "libertarian" _while also_ being the founder of the biggest surveillance dragnet ever created: what about surveillance is libertarian? I thought libertarians were all about "live and let live" and "stay out of my business". It's the opposite. But I guess what he really wants is "freedom for me, surveillance for thee". Again, not a novel observation, but it finally clicked into place for me reading this piece
The state integration and the separatist fantasy aren't competing visions, though; you build the surveillance infrastructure inside the state, then exit into your own enclave that benefits from it. It all feels like a way to create the world depicted in Margaret Atwood's Maddaddam trilogy (fantastic if you haven't read it): corporate enclaves with private security built for employees and their families with lawless "pleeblands" outside the walls
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There’s really two types of people that tend to be drawn to libertarianism at some point: humanists and narcissists.
Those who are fundamentally humanist want to tear down systems of oppression because it pains them to see their fellow humans abused and brought low by corrupt laws and regulations. They (perhaps naively) imagine that if the system was dismantled or at least shrunk to minimum size, basic human decency will step in to fill the vacuum and people will thrive. Folks like Penn Gillette are the face of this group.
The narcissists are drawn to the movement because they feel like “if only everyone would get out of my way, I can do GREAT THINGS™ “. They like ideas like social Darwinism because they are already privileged enough to not be worried about losing in a survival of the fittest contest, and don’t tend to concern themselves with the second order effects of dismantling the system because it is simply an immoral impediment to their greatness. Peter Thiel and folks like him are the face of this group. This is largely the strain that has taken root in SV.
> I ask myself every time I hear that Thiel is a "libertarian" _while also_ being the founder of the biggest surveillance dragnet ever created: what about surveillance is libertarian?
Surveillance does not directly violate the non-aggression principle, and a myopic adherence to minimal principles without any consideration to where they lead is the central feature of libertarianism.
Libertarianism doesn't mesh well with reality; the government doing less is part of it, but it also requires a way for people to efficiently protect their property.
So you get to a point where mass surveillance is justified by the anti-crime angle; there is no contradiction, libertarianism logic where you can live and let live requires no crime...