this post was submitted on 06 Nov 2025
267 points (98.5% liked)

Not The Onion

18556 readers
697 users here now

Welcome

We're not The Onion! Not affiliated with them in any way! Not operated by them in any way! All the news here is real!

The Rules

Posts must be:

  1. Links to news stories from...
  2. ...credible sources, with...
  3. ...their original headlines, that...
  4. ...would make people who see the headline think, “That has got to be a story from The Onion, America’s Finest News Source.”

Please also avoid duplicates.

Comments and post content must abide by the server rules for Lemmy.world and generally abstain from trollish, bigoted, or otherwise disruptive behavior that makes this community less fun for everyone.

And that’s basically it!

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 
top 37 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] Fmstrat@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago

This headline doesn't seem to match the article content at all. He never says that. He makes a statement about how people are interpreting AI as filling a "God shaped hole", but that's as close at it gets.

[–] Archangel1313@lemmy.ca 62 points 2 days ago

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

Yep. That actually checks out.

[–] xxce2AAb@feddit.dk 97 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Oh look: Another complete nutcase in a position of terrifying power.

[–] circuitfarmer@lemmy.world 20 points 2 days ago

Years of nepotism being the only thing that really matters will lead to such things

[–] Steve@communick.news 80 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (6 children)

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.

[–] the_wise_wolf@feddit.org 37 points 3 days ago (1 children)

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).

[–] Steve@communick.news 9 points 3 days ago

Oh! I didn't realise. Thank you

[–] foggy@lemmy.world 18 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Ooga booga antichrist

Plz gib billions 🥺

I fight antichrist and help bring back Jesus! 💪

I just need billions 🥺

[–] Formfiller@lemmy.world 5 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

I think Thiel might actually be this crazy and believe his own pseudo Christian narcissistic bs. He was raised fundamentalist. He works with a weirdo evil billionaire cult Acts 17. Behind the bastards just did a couple episodes on his Antichrist talks.

[–] flamingo_pinyata@sopuli.xyz 10 points 3 days ago (4 children)

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.

[–] Steve@communick.news 12 points 3 days 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.

[–] radix@lemmy.world 6 points 2 days ago (2 children)

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 7 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days 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.

The Episcopal Church of theUSA is welcoming to LGBTQ+ folks as is the United Church of Christ. Thiel isnt part of those though.

[–] Assassassin@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 3 days ago

Yeah, he's a bonafide nutcase

[–] wjrii@lemmy.world 5 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

He believes something incredibly toxic and nuts, but I'm not sure it's exactly that Christianity is "true," but rather that it's just so incredibly useful that it might as well be, and therefore it's not hypocritical to espouse it with gusto, regardless of what you personally think about the supernatural.

https://www.wired.com/story/the-real-stakes-real-story-peter-thiels-antichrist-obsession/

Holy fuck that is sinister

[–] QuoVadisHomines@sh.itjust.works 1 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Hasn’t he always been a weirdly Christian tech guy?

[–] Steve@communick.news 2 points 2 days ago

It's possible, but not that I'm aware of

[–] morphballganon@lemmy.world 46 points 2 days ago

Person not gullible in one respect also isn't gullible in another respect?

You don't say?

[–] SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world 27 points 2 days ago

Nothing will meaningfully improve until the rich fear for their lives

[–] cycadophyta@lemmy.world 15 points 2 days ago

These evil fucks need to go

[–] aarch0x40@lemmy.world 22 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

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

AI doomerism is driven by those with a clear perspective.

[–] qupada@fedia.io 14 points 2 days ago

"AI doomerism is driven by rational thinkers"

[–] Fedizen@lemmy.world 18 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

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.

[–] InternetCitizen2@lemmy.world 5 points 2 days ago

Blessed be the maker and his water

[–] QuoVadisHomines@sh.itjust.works 13 points 2 days ago

My family are Christians which by definition is apocalyptic, what is this guy talking about?

[–] scarabic@lemmy.world 12 points 3 days 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 13 points 3 days ago

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

[–] Ilixtze@lemmy.ml 12 points 3 days ago

Reinforces my position that AI is apocalyptic Christianity for techbros.

[–] taiyang@lemmy.world 11 points 2 days 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?

Palantir CEO can lick my entire taint

[–] t_berium@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago

I guess it's time for some Imperial Truth.

[–] hendrik@palaver.p3x.de 5 points 3 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Yeah, his founder Pether Thiel has some very weird takes on religion as well.

[–] avidamoeba@lemmy.ca 4 points 3 days 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.

[–] kbal@fedia.io 3 points 2 days 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.

[–] Flax_vert@feddit.uk 3 points 3 days 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.