Re: The Palantir Manifesto
2026-07-24
I can't believe I'm this late on reading the Palantir Manifesto, which is a summary of some book Alex Karp published last year. I wasn't going to read that book anyway, and it probably would've made more sense just to post the summary and not the book itself; most big nonfiction books like that don't need to be doing all that. When I was reading through this manifesto, I had a take for basically every point, and I knew instantly that this was going to turn into a whole-ass piece. So with that, please enjoy my point-by-point reply to this manifesto.
1: Silicon Valley owes a moral debt to the country that made its rise possible. The engineering elite of Silicon Valley has an affirmative obligation to participate in the defense of the nation.
This seems to be an essentially unilateral position in Silicon Valley. Back when Google removed "Do Not Be Evil" as their slogan some time ago, it became clear that this is where it's all been heading. It makes complete sense, though, considering that for the last 80 years or so, technology has progressed the way it has due to its power to change war. Even going all the way back to Turing cracking those Nazi codes in WWII, all computer technology exists the way it does today to advance how nations fight wars. I've spoken on how normal citizens participate in this war every day already, and this manifesto seems to be an outright declaration of this sentiment; except soon, it won't just be us trying to discern psyops perpetuated by botnets.
2: We must rebel against the tyranny of the apps. Is the iPhone our greatest creative if not crowning achievement as a civilization? The object has changed our lives, but it may also now be limiting and constraining our sense of the possible.
The initial statement of "rebelling against the tyranny of the apps" is solid, but the justification is flat and clearly misleading. The only "possible" Silicon Valley cares about is that which aids in its constant, forcible attempts at self-preservation. They only want to preserve America because it just so happens to be where Silicon Valley is; anything outside of that means nothing to them. Really, the "tyranny" that they're speaking of is just them getting pissed at shooting themselves in the other hand; and of course, they want the rest of the world to foot the bill. I mean seriously, they burn all this capital into business models that don't make any fucking sense, turning no profit for years so that they can shift the culture in their favor REGARDLESS of what industries and jobs they decapitate, and literally force the public's hand to hold their frame—just to say that apps are tyrannical?
3: Free email is not enough. The decadence of a culture or civilization, and indeed its ruling class, will be forgiven only if that culture is capable of delivering economic growth and security for the public.
Email was never free—gratis or libre—and that's why it perpetuates the "economic growth" SV so clearly feigns. The decadence is real, but the growth is manufactured to sustain that decadence. If you can just make numbers up on financial statements to justify data centers that haven't even been built yet and call that growth, what does that say about the "security" these people want to actually have? Even outside of civilized paradigms like economies and institutions, nature itself operates on the binary of growth and decay; if something isn't growing, it's dying. So in effect, SV just wants to keep the gravy train running as long as possible so that they don't have to pay up. To be fair, SV isn't the only market that suffers from this problem; practically every multinational corporation exploits the legal system to defer taxes, and they are only able to do so because of the constant "growth" they report to the government, who in turn compromises by allowing them to purchase treasury bonds.
Maybe instead, we should focus on sustainability, and not creating looser permission structures for "growth."
4: The limits of soft power, of soaring rhetoric alone, have been exposed. The ability of free and democratic societies to prevail requires something more than moral appeal. It requires hard power, and hard power in this century will be built on software.
You mean the software that will be used to make security turrets and drones? That kind? No, it definitely won't be the software that lets people communicate from anywhere instantly. That would be absurd. To call that "soft power" is a bit of an insult, quite frankly, especially because the "hard power" that it generates rises from the sentiments driven by the platforms SV controls. Software, like any product, is only as good as the people making it, and with the absolute control platforms have over culture, SV needs to focus less on building technology that starts wars and more on building technology that stops them. Perhaps that's what Palantir is actually looking for, and their business model generally supports that, but if they don't realize just how hot their "soft power" can actually be, I think that'll be what ultimately kills them in the end.
5: The question is not whether A.I. weapons will be built; it is who will build them and for what purpose. Our adversaries will not pause to indulge in theatrical debates about the merits of developing technologies with critical military and national security applications. They will proceed.
They will proceed, but only because the West provides the economic infrastructure to do so. As much as the US needs Taiwan's semiconductors, Taiwan needs American cash. Sure, there could be some leverage that China could bring by establishing the Yuan as a world reserve currency, but after spending several decades artificially lowering its value to boost its manufacturing economy, there's not really much of a way it can catch up in value compared to the US dollar. Even if the Chinese or the Iranians or the North Koreans manufacture elaborate and lethal weapons systems, they have no incentive to use them against the US if they can't keep stockpiling its cash.
6: National service should be a universal duty. We should, as a society, seriously consider moving away from an all-volunteer force and only fight the next war if everyone shares in the risk and the cost.
This is just stupid. Americans have already been psyopped to death about the nobility of their military, and forcing conscription on US citizens would not only further exacerbate young Americans' animosity toward the military, but it would also radically increase expenditures for a defense system that is already bloated and needlessly complex. Maybe if SV didn't keep deferring their tax money to the next fiscal year, it could cover the costs of conscription; but they have no incentive to do so, and the feds simply will not make it happen. Instead of forcing conscription into law, SV should keep playing their hand with that soft power and actually make young Americans want to support their military. Oh, also, maybe we should stop pouring so much money into the obviously gamed system of funding "disabled" veterans too. Maybe it'll happen after those boomers die, but we'll see.
7: If a U.S. Marine asks for a better rifle, we should build it; and the same goes for software. We should as a country be capable of continuing a debate about the appropriateness of military action abroad while remaining unflinching in our commitment to those we have asked to step into harm's way.
I generally agree with this statement, but it also contradicts the implications from statement 5. So, which one is it, guys?
8: Public servants need not be our priests. Any business that compensated its employees in the way that the federal government compensates public servants would struggle to survive.
"Please, Mr. President. We can't keep pretending we pay taxes," Alex Karp sobs softly while eating the feds' assholes. Businesses also don't have to fight wars or follow the law, apparently—so maybe that's why we listen to public servants. Just a thought. The last thing I'd want is a technocracy; there's no way I'd want Meta or Google or Palantir acting as some kind of law enforcement entity. If that happens, the people would fight back. We already hate Big Tech as a business, so if it receives any kind of extrajudicial authority from the State, that's a one-way ticket to Cyberpunk 2077.
9: We should show far more grace towards those who have subjected themselves to public life. The eradication of any space for forgiveness—a jettisoning of any tolerance for the complexities and contradictions of the human psyche—may leave us with a cast of characters at the helm we will grow to regret.
This is extremely reasonable. However, what we see is that the panopticon fucks with everyone, not just people of eminence. So in effect, the argument is just that if famous people get the privilege of better privacy, then that privilege would extend itself to the public. But just like how it played out with economics, trickle-down privacy would not actually happen. Karp's heart is in the right place, but he's being rather myopic here. People in public life are supposed to be scrutinized because that's how we hold them accountable. If they can't play ball, that's on them.
10: The psychologization of modern politics is leading us astray. Those who look to the political arena to nourish their soul and sense of self, who rely too heavily on their internal life finding expression in people they may never meet, will be left disappointed.
Yeah, the 24-hour news cycle sucks. All political commentators suck. If Big Tech can actually stop this from happening, I will bend the knee immediately. However, I just hope that doesn't mutate into an excuse to become exclusively force-fed propaganda from mainstream social media and nowhere else. But honestly, I don't have much stake in that kind of thing anyway, and most people don't. However, instead of calling it psychologization, I'd prefer to call it aestheticization. Clearly, most people wear political beliefs like clothes. I mean, just look at Richard Spencer, Gavin McInnes, etc. However, have fun trying to convince Mark Zuckerberg to shut down his business. If SV can get unilateral on that position, I'd be on board.
11: Our society has grown too eager to hasten, and is often gleeful at, the demise of its enemies. The vanquishing of an opponent is a moment to pause, not rejoice.
Schadenfreude is an ugly part of human nature, and no amount of propaganda or social movement is going to ever change that. To quote Sniper from Team Fortress 2: "As long as there are two people on this planet, someone is going to want someone else dead." This is a fair point, and I can see how this extends the argument from point 5; the time to deliberate is after taking action, particularly in the realm of the rapid development of military technology. My hope, like most others', is that after whatever sad events have to occur, we can take that pause and find a better way forward.
12: The atomic age is ending. One age of deterrence, the atomic age, is ending, and a new era of deterrence built on A.I. is set to begin.
There is still quite a bit up in the air with this, and it's something we are seeing in real time with the current wars being fought. If automated bomber drones end up causing the precise levels of damage hoped for by the militaries of today, it'll be interesting to see how that is handled in the intelligence agencies of tomorrow. If there's one thing we can learn from that previous atomic age, much of this warfare will be fought with demoralization and disinformation campaigns. This is already prescient today with the AI-generated memes from various political administrations and the complex political theater found in Russia, China, and North Korea. As regular everyday people, our aim should be to find the most effective ways we can to cut through the noise and maintain vigilance in the face of the onslaught of propaganda at home and abroad.
13: No other country in the history of the world has advanced progressive values more than this one. The United States is far from perfect. But it is easy to forget how much more opportunity exists in this country for those who are not hereditary elites than in any other nation on the planet.
If you want to call capitalism "progressive," then sure. I don't care about multinational corporations waving Pride flags or giving military discounts, and I most certainly have no preconceived notion of "equal opportunity," hereditary elite or otherwise. We all have our lots in life, but I'm not going to shoulder the entire blame for the follies of a system that's been rigged since before I was born. In the same way I don't have those preconceived notions, SV should at least be honest not just with the world, but with themselves; the "progression" they have fostered has not been in the aim of societal advancement, but to better facilitate their stake in the competitive capitalist market they found themselves in, also before most of them were born.
14: American power has made possible an extraordinarily long peace. Too many have forgotten or perhaps take for granted that nearly a century of some version of peace has prevailed in the world without a great power military conflict. At least three generations — billions of people and their children and now grandchildren — have never known a world war.
This long peace has only been in the United States, and that's exactly why our nationalist propaganda is so effective. However, to say that it's the result of the valiant and intelligent efforts of the post-WWII American military would be an absolute mischaracterization; the reason why we haven't seen a war fought on American soil isn't because of our grand strategic maneuvering through causing mayhem and violence elsewhere. Geographically, the United States is in perhaps the greatest strategic position globally; our borders were so effectively fought for by people who have been dead for quite some time, and we are their sloppy failson inheritors. The only strategically "sound" thing the US has done since WWII is switching from the Gold Standard to making the US Dollar the world reserve currency, and quite frankly, that is the only thing that has allowed us to be so fast and loose with our imperialism. If we didn't have the entire world trading with our cash, we would've been toast quite some time ago.
15: The postwar neutering of Germany and Japan must be undone. The defanging of Germany was an overcorrection for which Europe is now paying a heavy price. A similar and highly theatrical commitment to Japanese pacifism will, if maintained, also threaten to shift the balance of power in Asia.
As long as this false notion of "European sovereignty" persists, there will be no "defanging" or whatever you wish to call it. For both Germany and Japan, as well as Europe and Asia as a whole, the biggest problem is a persistent and cumbersome population decline. This population decline will not just end the sovereignty of those nations, but perhaps capitalism as a whole. Once we realize that the numbers simply will not add up, we'll probably usher in that new era of feudal communism or whatever you want to call it. Either way, the wars are going to get worse, and once the fallout of those wars happens, that's when we'll probably see that next population boom occur. The big question would then be: will our descendants learn from the lessons taught by late-stage capitalism? History says no, but we'll see.
16: We should applaud those who attempt to build where the market has failed to act. The culture almost snickers at Musk's interest in grand narrative, as if billionaires ought to simply stay in their lane of enriching themselves . . . . Any curiosity or genuine interest in the value of what he has created is essentially dismissed, or perhaps lurks from beneath a thinly veiled scorn.
Build what, exactly? The problem here is that behind Musk's delusions of "grand narratives" lies a blatantly false and harmful assumption: that technological and societal progress has no ceiling. That's why capitalism has persisted the way it has; it's such an ancient and pernicious folly of man, isn't it? We snicker and scorn at people like Musk because the vision of their world is bullshit, and despite all the provocations and attempts at course-correction, we keep steering ourselves toward it. Besides, Musk and Zuckerberg both have the same business problem: the only smart business decisions they have made are in acquisitions, and that's only debatably smart. Everything else has been a wash, only covered in lies and hankering back down on the single thing that has worked, and turning away from it due to their insatiable and destructive pride and arrogance. Maybe one day we'll stop listening to them, but I doubt that'll happen any time soon.
17: Silicon Valley must play a role in addressing violent crime. Many politicians across the United States have essentially shrugged when it comes to violent crime, abandoning any serious efforts to address the problem or take on any risk with their constituencies or donors in coming up with solutions and experiments in what should be a desperate bid to save lives.
Please see my response to point 8. Get out of here, Arasaka!
18: The ruthless exposure of the private lives of public figures drives far too much talent away from government service. The public arena—and the shallow and petty assaults against those who dare to do something other than enrich themselves—has become so unforgiving that the republic is left with a significant roster of ineffectual, empty vessels whose ambition one would forgive if there were any genuine belief structure lurking within.
Perhaps the lack of a genuine belief structure is why the exposure of their private lives is so scandalous. People in positions of power today know the hypocrisies they have to contend with every day, and fighting against them is harder than hiding in the shadows—and so they hide. If I were some ambitious person and had to choose between the private and public sector for work, the private sector offers so much more money and material comfort. That's why most public officials end up getting private sector jobs after their tenures in public service; they're acting like it's a choice between either sector, but the overlap is disgustingly fettered with so many conflicts of interest it makes me want to puke every time I look it up. Also, the absolute gall to call corrupt politicians people who "dare to do something other than enrich themselves" is telling. I know so many people who work way harder than any politician ever does, and the fact that those people are the ones who always end up losing tells you just what exactly is wrong with everything.
19: The caution in public life that we unwittingly encourage is corrosive. Those who say nothing wrong often say nothing much at all.
Okay, there's a difference between having a hot take and being a genuinely despicable and horrible human being. If you want to have a hot take, fine, but at least don't use the benefits of power to engage in disgustingly shallow and low-frequency behaviors. I want more caution from those in public life, not less.
20: The pervasive intolerance of religious belief in certain circles must be resisted. The elite's intolerance of religious belief is perhaps one of the most telling signs that its political project constitutes a less open intellectual movement than many within it would claim.
The thing with religious belief is that it is a dogmatic phenomenon. It's not dialectical like philosophy; either you follow the dogma, or you don't. It isn't up for debate, and it's not subject to the same kind of intellectual rigor the elites like to fancy themselves with. Their intolerance comes from the fact that it isn't something that can be challenged, which is why they find it dangerous. Besides, elites are all for openness—that is, as soon as it faces any kind of scrutiny. So much for "disruption" and "going against the grain," huh? As a religious person, I don't want those kinds of people taking on my religion anyway, lest they corrupt it and kill it with all their heretical and fantastical bullshit.
21: Some cultures have produced vital advances; others remain dysfunctional and regressive. All cultures are now equal. Criticism and value judgments are forbidden. Yet this new dogma glosses over the fact that certain cultures and indeed subcultures . . . have produced wonders. Others have proven middling, and worse, regressive and harmful.
This is clearly some classic alt-right rhetoric, and it fails to distinguish nuances like geography, ecological makeup, etc. Many people have this weird notion, especially today, that humans are the all-powerful arbiters of nature and their environment; but clearly, we are a product of it, and we should have more respect for that. Cultures that might seem regressive to some Eurocentric person actually make a lot more sense when you put them in the context of their environment; if you add the flow of trade to that, it makes less of a case for certain cultures being superior to others in any kind of way. Sure, globalization has had a massive impact on culture, and we most certainly are seeing more homogenization now than ever before. When it's all said and done, however, we are still subject to whatever environment we find ourselves in.
22: We must resist the shallow temptation of a vacant and hollow pluralism. We, in America and more broadly the West, have for the past half century resisted defining national cultures in the name of inclusivity. But inclusion into what?
Gee, I don't know, probably inclusion to cheap money. Yeah, probably that. The second the West loses its grip on its finances, the second that sense of pluralism goes away. All those immigrants who proclaim to be American? Yeah, they'll go home once the gravy train makes its last stop. What will we be left with? It's tough to say, but I don't see any pluralistic nation coming from that any time soon. Let's just hope that for the people who stay, there will be enough left for them to figure things out.
Conclusion
I ended things much less optimistically than I thought I would, and as I was writing this piece, it became much more polemic in nature. But let me at least be somewhat charitable and highlight the missing pieces that these SV guys don't want you to see. Here is the reason why companies like Palantir exist: the powers that be want to create a monopoly on violence. They want this because, in their minds, if all violence is strategically planned and executed, that would lead to less violence globally. Sure, they might have to create a giant surveillance state to accomplish this, but hey, at least people will be out there buying more stuff instead of dying, right? And that's ultimately it: less violence means more people buying stuff. There, I solved your game of geopolitical strategy.
Now let me go buy some more anti-dandruff shampoo on Amazon in peace.
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