PayPal and Palantir cofounder Peter Thiel is embarking on an unusual intellectual journey this fall—delivering a sold-out four-part lecture series on the biblical figure of the Antichrist. The private lectures, hosted by the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco, represent the latest evolution in Thiel’s increasingly public theological interests, which intertwine his Christian faith with his concerns about technology’s potential to enable authoritarian control.
The series, organized by the nonprofit Acts 17 Collective, will explore “the theological and technological dimensions of the Antichrist” in four sessions across September and October. The lectures remain off-the-record, with no transcripts or recordings made public, but they draw upon the work of René Girard, the French philosopher who profoundly influenced Thiel during his Stanford undergraduate years, along with thinkers like Francis Bacon and Carl Schmitt.
Thiel’s theological preoccupations might seem incongruous with his business empire, but they reflect a consistent worldview shaped by Girard’s “mimetic theory”—the idea that human desires are learned through imitation, often leading to conflict and violence. This philosophical framework reportedly influenced Thiel’s $500,000 angel investment in Facebook in 2004, which he credits to recognizing the mimetic nature of social media…