A series of off-the-record lectures on the Antichrist, hosted by tech billionaire Peter Thiel, has everyone wondering what the hell is going on inside.
But on Monday, ahead of Night Two in the four-part series, one guest published notes of the first show — and is paying the price. Lecture notes published last week by tech worker Kshitij Kulkarni, head of protocol research at software company Succinct, provide the clearest look yet at what’s allegedly being discussed inside the secretive event.
When the sold-out talks began last week at the Commonwealth Club on the Embarcadero, the online invite (opens in new tab) vaguely said Thiel would be “addressing the topic of the biblical Antichrist” and its “theology, history, literature, and politics.” It warned spectators that the event was off the record.
Kulkarni, who published the notes as an essay (since removed) on his personal website (opens in new tab), was subsequently banned from the other three talks, according to a now-deleted X post from Michelle Stephens, executive director of ACTS17 Collective, the nonprofit that organized the lectures.
“You are in violation of the clear off the record [policy] we implemented and reiterated many times. Your ticket is revoked without refund,” Stephens said.
After last week’s lecture, The Standard met with attendees who said the talk largely repeated the points Thiel had made in previous interviews on the subject; namely, that the Antichrist would use the threat of Armageddon, or some looming crisis, in order to consolidate control and create a “one-world government.”
Kulkarni confirmed that summary, more or less, writing that Thiel explained that with the advent of atomic weapons, the human race gained the technology to destroy itself — that is, to usher in Armageddon. But more recently, apocalyptic fears have grown, with the advent of artificial intelligence and big tech’s race for so-called “super intelligence (opens in new tab)” — presumably this is when the robots rise up and wipe us all out.
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Thiel allegedly argues that because we are increasingly concerned about existential threats, the time is ripe for the Antichrist to rise to power, promising peace and safety by strangling technological progress with regulation. Thiel has previously suggested (seriously) that Greta Thunberg could be the Antichrist (opens in new tab), but attendees last week didn’t recall her name coming up.
“How does the Antichrist actually seize power? In late modernity, we finally have the answer: by talking constantly of Armageddon (or in secular terms, of existential risk).” Kulkarni writes. “He rides the wave of apocalyptic anxiety.”
Thiel also allegedly mentioned Biblical passages — including Daniel 12:4, Matthew 24:35-36, 1 Thessalonians 5:3, 2 Thessalonians 2:6, and Revelation 9:6 — which discuss the arrival of the Antichrist and the apocalypse, according to Kulkarni.
Stephens and Thiel did not respond to requests for comment. Kulkarni declined to answer questions about the lectures, citing the off-the-record policy.
Thiel has been speaking for at least a year about the Antichrist — who, for the uninitiated, is a biblical figure who will rise before the Last Judgment and attempt to turn people against Jesus.
But Thiel’s comments on the subject received greater attention after a June interview on New York Times columnist Ross Douthat’s podcast — in part because the venture capitalist failed to fully rebut Douthat’s suggestion (opens in new tab) that Thiel himself is ushering in the coming of the Antichrist with the technology he is developing with data mining firm Palantir.
Bloomberg previously reported that the Israel Defense Forces used Palantir’s software to strike targets (opens in new tab) in Gaza. According to Wired, Immigration and Customs Enforcement is paying Palantir to create a real-time tracking tool to target (opens in new tab) undocumented immigrants.