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It is said that the new vice president JD Vance is headed by technology investor Peter Thiel. The two are working with Musk to plan for the post-Trump era.
November 12, 2024 06:02November 12, 2024 06:30
Raphael Schupisser/ch media
It’s no secret that Trump thinks he’s the greatest. But sometimes you get the sense that he admires you more than himself: Elon Musk. When the former and future President of the United States took the stage on election night to declare victory, he spoke for 25 minutes. He dedicated four full minutes to Musk. It blew its horn into the microphone several times:
“We have a new star: Elon.”
Shortly after, Musk posted a photo on his social network X in which he saluted the American flag at dawn. Short text: “It's morning again in America,” Musk put into action.
Peter Thiel and Elon Musk founded Paypal in the early 2000s. Now they are working on rebuilding the system.Image source: Associated Press
Trump hopes to create a new position for him in the government: The tech billionaire will lead a “Council on Government Effectiveness.” His job was to make the state narrower, less bureaucratic, and more efficient. After acquiring the news service Twitter, he proved that the tech billionaire certainly has some skills when it comes to taking a radical approach. Within days, he laid off two-thirds of his 7,500 employees.
Musk has repeatedly assured him that he doesn't need any money or titles. But what does Musk expect from Trump? To see this issue more clearly, it’s worth digging into the minds of Silicon Valley makers.
No major upheaval expected from Trump, but he lacks content
German-American literary and cultural scientist Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht is a man who studies the ethos of Silicon Valley and the beliefs of tech CEOs. He teaches at top-tier Stanford University in California, a hotbed for many tech startups, and is known around campus simply as “Sepp.” He said in an interview with the German “Philosophy Magazine”: Musk has a good reason for not taking a political stance for a long time. But now he realizes that “Trump is suited as a placeholder for his long-term projects.”
There will be no major social upheaval or political revolution with Trump himself. But he lacks content. But what matters is what happens four years from now. Musk and those closest to him now have to prepare for this. Among them were two others in particular: investor Peter Thiel and vice president JD Vance.
Trump remains in the foreground.Image: trapezoid
Peter Thiel: Very knowledgeable, but said a lot of things that didn’t suit you
Peter Thiel, who founded Paypal with Musk before becoming a billionaire tech investor, studied philosophy at Stanford University, where Gumbrecht taught. Deeply influenced by liberal ideas, he once pursued a vision of creating islands in the ocean that would be free from state influence and to which no laws would apply. Laws, taxes and social equality should not inhibit technological progress and creativity.
Staying behind the scenes, but with a master plan: Peter Thiel.Image: trapezoid
Peter Thiel made JD Vance great. The young vice president owes his entire professional and political career to him. Gombrecht said:
“Till invented Vance.”
Although Vance had a difficult childhood in poverty, after earning a law degree from Yale, he worked for Peter Thiel's fund before establishing his own. Thiel has funded nearly all of Vance's campaigns since. He is said to have spent $15 million. Vance wins in 2022 and becomes an Ohio senator. Peter Thiel is said to have convinced Trump to appoint J.D. Vance as his running mate, thereby becoming the vice president.
In 2016, Thiel donated millions of dollars to Trump's campaign. But he’s not enthusiastic about what Trump’s four years have produced. Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht, who knew him well, told the Journal of Philosophy:
“When I invited Thiel to a panel in March, because he’s such a great conversationalist and generally so well-read, even though he said a lot of things that don’t sit well with you, he told me why he didn’t donate a dollar. There are not enough discontinuities for Trump in this campaign. “
“There's not enough discontinuity.”
J.D. Vance: “Kill the government like a tumor”
For Thiel, Trump is not radical enough. In 2009, long before Trump was first elected, he wrote in an article:
“I no longer believe that democracy and freedom are compatible.”
Some of Thiel's libertarian views and ideas can be traced to blogger and software developer Curtis Yarvin. Some people also call him the philosopher of the Tyr family. Arvin, who like Vance studied at Yale, believed that democracy was an inefficient system and advocated a technomonarchy. He compared the workings of government to software. Software can be updated and reprogrammed.
In 2012, four years before Trump was first elected, he wrote:
“The government is nothing but a corporation that runs the country.”
But the “government company” is poorly managed. That's why a new “national chief executive” is needed. He also later offered a suggestion as to who the “national CEO” might be: Elon Musk.
Curtis Yarvin dreams of a dataist world.Image: Breitbart News
It is understood that Musk himself has not commented on Jarvis. J.D. Vance, on the other hand, was a completely different story, raving about Yavin and his ideas in interviews and arguing that the current Democratic administration should be ripped out like a tumor (another metaphor). Vance himself now holds a government position. “Vance, Thiel and Musk now have four years to think about what this fundamentally different society should look like,” Gumbrecht told the Philosophical Journal in an interview. They consider whether they want the next election and who the candidates might be.
Will Musk become a “national CEO”?
Under current election laws that are often ignored, Musk cannot become president of the United States. Born in South Africa, he came to the United States via Canada, where he became a naturalized citizen. However, the presidency is reserved only for Native Americans – which is why “Terminator” Arnold Schwarzenegger's term as governor of California marked the end of his political career.
In Yavin and Thiel's opinion, this was, of course, just a programming error that could be eliminated by updating government software. But is Musk really looking for the role of “national CEO”? What does he want? He is not interested in money. His biographer Walter Isaacson lends credence to this claim.
Exploiting Trump: Elon Musk.Image: trapezoid
If money was his motivation, he wouldn't risk revolutionizing the automotive industry after selling Paypal and making millions while building the first private space company that could send people into space. He could have done more of what nearly all successful Silicon Valley founders do: launch another software startup. That's more promising. Or he could, like his partner Thiel, set up a fund and invest to become a billionaire. Even more promising.
What exactly is this “discontinuity”?
Ask Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht: What do Musk and Thiel want to do with their political influence?
“I think they actually think they have a better view of the world – which is true for most of us.”
They are also interested in power – like everyone who wants to influence politics. Gumbrecht suspects Peter Thiel has another motivation:
“I think I saw a curiosity in him: If this 'discontinuity' happened, what would it be?”
When Elon Musk was asked in an interview what the most important thing for humanity was, he said: “Colonize Mars.” In his worldview, this makes sense. Humanity must not die. If it lived on multiple planets, becoming “multi-planetary,” the risk of extinction would be halved. At some point, when the sun burned out, it must have reached another star anyway.
Yes, the tech billionaire thinks further than most. As far as we're concerned, however, it's crucial that Musk doesn't conclude that democracy is incompatible with multi-planetary humanity. (aargauerzeitung.ch)
