Peter Thiel talks about human stagnation: Starting in 2024, Musk no longer believes in Mars.

Technological development seems to be seeing stagnation, can humans only rely on the development of AI to lead us to break the existing ethical, physical, and political restrictions? This article is based on an interview with Peter Thiel by Ross Douthat, "The original tech right power player on A.I., Mars and immortality," compiled and rewritten by Peggy, Johyyn from BlockBeats. (Synopsis: Peter Thiel's exchange Bullish applied for listing on the New York Stock Exchange, stock code BLSH, bitcoin trading volume top five in the world) (Background supplement: Palantir founder Peter Thiel invested in 9.1% of BitMine mining company, optimistic bet on Ethereum) Editor's note: In recent years, the world has been confused about the close relationship between the Silicon Valley consortium and Trump, on the one hand, people will argue through various reasons why Musk supports Trump , When the relationship between the two broke down, they began to find various reasons to say that they had already predicted the disintegration of the two. This podcast gives us a whole new perspective on the choices of Silicon Valley in the Trump era: How did Peter Thiel deeply influence Musk? What is the deepest anxiety of the entire Silicon Valley consortium, "technological stagnation"? The moderator of the conversation, Ross Douthat, is a New York Times columnist and well-known conservative author who has published several books on religion, politics, and society. In this in-depth conversation about AI, politics and faith, he described Peter Thiel as one of the world's most influential right-wing intellectuals over the past two decades. And Peter Thiel again makes his consistent judgment: since the 1970s, technological progress is stalling, social structures are becoming more rigid, and humanity may be entering a soft totalitarian power in the name of "order and security." He talked about why he supported Trump in the first place, why he had cautious expectations for AI, and why he was wary of environmentalism and the technological totalitarianism that "global governance" could lead to. Antichrist, he argues, does not necessarily come from a technological outburst, but may stem from a compromise on "order and security." This article inspired Blockbeats a lot, and we want to dedicate it to you in front of the screen. The following is the original content (the original content has been consolidated for ease of reading and comprehension): Ross Douthat: (Opening remarks) Is Silicon Valley ambitious? What should we fear more: the end of the world or stagnation? Why is one of the world's most successful investors worried about the Antichrist? My guest today is the co-founder of PayPal and Palantir and an early investor in the political careers of Donald Trump and JD Vance. Peter Thiel was one of the original tech-right power figures, known for funding various conservative and even anti-mainstream ideas. But we're going to talk about his own point of view this time, because despite his shortcomings as a billionaire, there is a good reason why he is the most influential right-wing intellectual of the past 20 years. Despite his minor "flaw" — being a billionaire (not traditionally seen as the archetypal thinker) — there is good reason to think that he has been one of the most influential right-wing intellectuals of the past two decades. Peter Thiel, welcome to the Interesting Times. Peter Thiel: Thank you for inviting me. Technological stagnation: Why are we no longer futuristic? Ross Douthat: I want to take you back about thirteen or four years. At that time, you wrote an article for the conservative magazine National Review titled "The End of the Future." The basic thesis of the article is that on the surface, the modern world is dynamic, fast-paced, and constantly changing, but it is far less dynamic than people think. We have long entered an era of technological stagnation. Digital life did bring some kind of breakthrough, but it didn't change the world as radically as people had hoped. Overall, we're actually stuck where we are. Peter Thiel: Yes. Ross Douthat: You weren't alone in making this point, but it carried a lot of weight from your mouth — after all, you were an "insider" in Silicon Valley, personally involved in and made a fortune from the Internet revolution. So I'm curious: in 2025, do you still think that judgment will still hold? Peter Thiel: Yes, I still roughly agree with the idea of "technological stagnation." This argument is never absolute. We are not saying that the whole world has come to a complete standstill, but that the pace of development has indeed slowed down to some extent. It did not go to zero, but for more than two hundred years, from 1750 to 1970, it was an era of continuous acceleration: ships were faster, railroads were faster, cars were faster, planes were faster. This trend culminated in the Concorde and the Apollo missions to the moon. But since then, development has slowed down at all levels. I've always seen the "(the world of bits)" as an exception, which is why we see the development of computers, software, the Internet and the mobile Internet. Then, in the last ten to fifteen years, there has been a cryptocurrency and AI revolution. I think that's really a big deal in a sense. But the question is: Is this really enough to get us out of that pervasive sense of stagnation? In the "Back to the Future" articles, you can start with an epistemological question: How do we judge whether we are stagnant or accelerating? Because an important feature of late modernity is the high degree of specialization of human beings. For example, unless you spend half your life studying string theory, can't you judge whether physics has advanced? What about quantum computing? What about cancer research, biotechnology, and all these verticals? Further, how much is the progress in cancer treatment compared to the breakthrough in string theory? You have to "weight" these different areas to assess overall technological progress. In theory, this is an extremely difficult issue to define. And the reason why it is difficult to answer is itself questionable: today, more and more areas of knowledge are controlled by a small number of "circles of experts", who are often accountable only to insiders and collect evidence from each other. This closure itself is enough to call into question so-called technological progress. So, yes, I think on the whole we are still living in a fairly stagnant era, but that doesn't mean that everything has come to a complete standstill. Ross Douthat: You just mentioned Back to the Future. We just took the kids to see the first original of the film, the one starring Michael J. Fox. Peter Thiel: [It] is set from 1955 back to 1985, 30 years apart. And the timeline of Back to the Future 2 is from 1985 to 2015 - now, it was ten years ago.