Naomi Klein
Available now: "End Times Fascism". Bestselling author of: "Doppelganger," "This Changes Everything," "On Fire," "The Shock Doctrine," "No Logo." UBC Professor...
“I don't think we have ever had as much of the global economy based on a bet of something that is supposedly about to happen, but that doesn't line up at all with the product that is actually being sold, right? So that sort of sense of living in the about to, living in the imminence, I don't think we've ever been so sort of not where we are, but in the about to be. And that does feel quite religious.”
Galaxy Brain · October 2026
Charlie Warzel had called AI a "faith-based technology" that is always sold on its future version. Klein replies that capitalism has always promised things are about to get better, but earlier booms at least shipped products that delivered on the pitch.
Transcript
…industry, as the main way that venture capital flows in and that people gain a foothold in the industry and power. And so I think that that is really interesting, the way that there is that parallel there, that the tech industry has sort of taken on a religious nature in how just how it behaves.
…technology feels like really apt, right? It's just like, just believe, just put all the money in there, just put all the resources in there. Like, you know, don't doubt, don't doubt what we're making. But I think the lesson maybe here is as simple as like, don't worship capitalists, right?
But I think the imminence point is really is really key because I, I mean, there's always an imminence in capitalism where it's just kind of always about to get better. You know, the trickle down is going to happen, like just sort of pray to those gods, right? But so there were still like actual material products that were legible that were kind of delivering the things that they said that they were going to deliver and that people were paying money for. So I don't think we have ever had as much of the global economy based on a bet of something that is supposedly about to happen, but that doesn't line up at all with the product that is actually being sold, right? So that sort of sense of living in the about to, living in the imminence, I don't think we've ever been so sort of not where we are, but in the about to be. And that is, that does feel quite religious.
And there's an odd dynamic to all of this as well, as you mentioned the economics of the AI boom and the. Everything being built towards this speculative future. But there's also now, because of the amount of investment, because of how predicated the economy is on NVIDIA and the magnificent seven…
Well, and it's not our imagination. I mean, we are being conscripted into this dream, whether we like it or not. I mean, the way the SpaceX IPO was structured, right? Where just like rather than having a wait period before the stock is in everybody's pension who has a pension, right? They change…
I'm curious in your minds, what is the world that the tech right is trying to build? As in this whole group investing in all these different technologies, from the things that Musk is doing to things that Palantir are doing. What is the world that you see them trying to build right now?
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