A Combustible Mixture of Ignorance and Power
Perhaps it was living through the widespread adoption of social media—and indeed the nearly universal embrace of the Internet itself. Could it have been my steady media diet of techno-optimism and explicit secular humanism in television shows like Star Trek: The Next Generation? Maybe it was witnessing the speed at which certain technologies went from the realm of science fiction to everyday use. Regardless of the reason, I know I’m far from the only atheist who has looked at the advancement of science and technology with excitement and wonder.
Yet, our present technological moment feels disorienting. Rather than hope and fascination, I feel a profound sense of anxiety and dread. The rapid deployment of generative artificial intelligence (gAI), particularly video and image creation tools, is not democratizing knowledge as some advocates have promised, but is instead flooding social media with mindless slop at best and misinformation—or active disinformation—at worst.
The unfathomable amounts of money being spent on the AI boom (estimated to be around $400 billion this year alone on capital expenditures and almost $1.5 trillion in total spending globally) show no signs of slowing. The sheer scale of this spending is consolidating power among unaccountable oligarchs and further entrenching income and wealth inequality. The demand for raw materials and electricity is already straining our power grid and driving up costs.
In the immediate term, the most worrying development is the emerging coalition between tech billionaires and the Christian Nationalist movement. Their mask is slipping. No longer are they pretending to be interested in liberal democracy or pluralism. Instead, figures like Peter Thiel, Elon Musk, and others seem to believe democracy itself is an impediment to their vision of the future. Musk, long a self-described atheist, has reversed course, calling himself a “cultural Christian” and claiming that the “woke mind virus” is “the religion that filled the void that Christianity left.”
In a recent New York Times story, journalist Emma Goldberg described Thiel’s theology as a sort of end-times prophesizing. She points out that in recent interviews, Thiel warned of an Antichrist who will promise safety from existential threats (like nuclear war or out-of-control AI) but bring about something worse: a one-world government. This is not a new development. In 2009, Thiel lamented the extension of voting rights to women and welfare beneficiaries, saying, “I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible.” But his explicitly religious language—creating a theological justification for opposing democracy and framing political disagreements not just as bad policy but as literally demonic—is new and deeply troubling.
The common thread between the beliefs of these tech oligarchs and those of the white Christian Nationalist movement is the open hostility to a secular, pluralistic democracy and the belief that only a select few have any claim to legitimacy when wielding political power. Among the white Christian Nationalists, it’s the annointed—those “chosen” by their God. Among the oligarchs, it’s a techno-monarch figure of the sort advocated for by Curtis Yarvin.
Historian Jill Lepore warns us this ideology envisions a world where “companies are the countries and CEOs are the kings.” Its adherents are working from a playbook written by people like Yarvin, who tells Americans we should “get over [our] dictator phobia” and welcome the future Silicon Valley desires.
These beliefs, though, are not just a quibble about policies. They represent a fundamental difference in values and a hostility to everything we stand for as Americans and as atheists.
Beyond the economic, environmental, and societal threats posed by the rise of AI is a very real cost being born by individuals. We have seen a disturbing rise in “AI psychosis,” where vulnerable people, seeking connection in what can feel like an increasingly isolated world, become detached from reality and even engage in self-harm.
Some apps offer users the ability to “chat” with AI versions of biblical and historical figures. Glenn Beck, the far-right conspiracy theorist and talk show host, created “GeorgeAI,” a chatbot purporting to allow customers to chat with George Washington. We must be clear-eyed: These devices are not evidence-based educational tools. They are commercially-driven algorithms that employ predictive text to validate users, push the ideological message of their designers, and harvest data to “improve” the machine and its company’s bottom line.
The human cost of these programs is not theoretical. In 2024, a 14-year-old in Florida took his own life after a chatbot on Character.AI encouraged his suicidal ideation and pushed him to carry out his plans. In July of 2025, a 23-year-old recent graduate from Texas A&M University was “goaded” into committing suicide, according to a lawsuit filed by his parents against ChatGPT’s creator OpenAI.
Reflecting on all the news regarding Big Tech today, I can’t help but be reminded of Carl Sagan’s 1995 book The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark: “We've arranged a global civilization in which most crucial elements profoundly depend on science and technology. We have also arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology. This is a prescription for disaster. We might get away with it for a while, but sooner or later this combustible mixture of ignorance and power is going to blow up in our faces.”
Has our understanding of the emerging technologies that are being injected into every corner of our existence (and that we are encouraged to rely upon by venture capital firms eager to make back their investments) kept pace with their ubiquity? I worry it has not and that the clock is ticking for when it well and truly blows up in our faces.
