00:00You would prefer the human race to endure, right?
00:04Palantir's founders
00:05I love the idea of getting a drone and having light fentanyl-laced urine spraying on analysts who tried to screw us
00:13are controversial to many people.
00:15Palantir was founded in 2003 by a group of Silicon Valley figures,
00:19including billionaire investor Peter Thiel, CEO Alex Karp,
00:22and co-founder Stephen Cohen, Joe Lonsdale, and Nathan Grettings.
00:26It was built to answer one question.
00:28How did the government miss the signs before 9-11?
00:31And how could that never happen again?
00:33Alex Karp is not a typical tech CEO.
00:36He studied philosophy and law, not engineering.
00:38And that background matters, because Palantir wasn't built to optimize ads or sell products.
00:43Karp has always been blunt, sometimes aggressive, and very public about defending Palantir's work with police,
00:49immigration authorities, and the military.
00:51He has gone on record as calling Palantir anti-woke and described its culture as unapologetically focused on national defense.
00:57Supporters say that honesty in Silicon Valley is rare.
01:00Critics say it shows how comfortable the company is being that close to state power.
01:04Then there's Peter Thiel, quieter but arguably more influential.
01:08Thiel co-founded PayPal alongside Elon Musk, was Facebook's first major outside investor,
01:12and has long believed Silicon Valley should work with governments, not against them.
01:16After 9-11, Thiel argued that the biggest mistake big tech made was avoiding national security work altogether.
01:22That belief shaped Palantir from the start.
01:25The goal was simple.
01:26Connect dots across massive data sets so threats don't get missed again.
01:30Supporters point to examples where Palantir's software has been credited to help track financial crimes,
01:34coordinate disaster response, and support counterterrorism investigations.
01:38They argue the company's tools can increase transparency and reduce harm by improving decision making.
01:43But critics say the mission doesn't stop at counterterrorism.
01:46They argue that as war and conflict expand, defense budgets grow, and companies like Palantir grow alongside them.
01:53As we said in part one, Palantir's revenue is heavily driven by government and military contracts.
01:58And in 2024, investors publicly dropped Palantir's stock over the company's work and connections to Israel during the war in Gaza.
02:05Supporters respond that Palantir doesn't choose targets, strategies, or policies.
02:09It builds tools.
02:10Governments decide how to use them.
02:12But critics aren't convinced.
02:14They say Palantir represents how a company created to prevent another 9-11 became embedded in modern surveillance and warfare far beyond its original mission.
02:22And that brings us back to part one.
02:24Palantir may feel invisible to most Americans, but to government workers, protesters, and people watching global conflicts,
02:30the founders' beliefs explain why this company sparked such intense reactions.
02:34Palantir isn't just a tech company.
02:35It's what happens when trauma, data, power, and war collide.
02:39And whether that feels like protection or danger depends entirely on where you stand.
02:43For more breakdowns like this and updates on Palantir, check out our website and follow us here for more.
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