World Chess Champion Garry Kasparov and billionaire entrepreneur Peter Thiel discuss technology, chess, Russian and American politics as well as human rights and prospects for the world economy.
Garry Kasparov
The youngest world chess champion in history at 22 in 1985, Kasparov remained the top-rated player in the world for 20 years, until his retirement in 2005. He then became a leader of the Russian pro-democracy movement against Vladimir Putin and is currently the chairman of the NY-based Human Rights Foundation. The Kasparov Chess Foundation promotes chess in education around the world with centers in the US, Europe, and Africa with more soon to come. Kasparov speaks and writes frequently on technology, decision-making, and risk. His book, “How Life Imitates Chess,” has been published in more than 20 languages.
Peter Thiel
(45 min) Warren Buffet, America’s richest man in, does not invest in technology.
Tyler Cowen: Garry Kasparov on AI, Chess, and the Future of Creativity
All he has to do — and he proved to be a very capable dictator — to make sure that these groups are fighting each other. He could be a kind of judge on top of that. I always call it the spine of the system, which means that if he goes down, you don’t expect a simple transition of power.
Despite crackdowns, political resistance to Putin grows in Russia
Kasparov: As long as Putin is in power, there can be no peace because Putin needs conflict to justify his role as strongman to revive Russia’s power in a world full of enemies. He needs conflict to survive.
Q&A: Garry Kasparov on the press and propaganda in Trump’s America
If I recall, it was a joke made while the press conference was still going on, and I was struck by all the flags around him and the scripted questions early on. It was his first real press conference as president-elect, and it was all show and campaign-style rhetoric, despite the large backlog of important policy questions that he faced. To be fair, he actually did answer a few questions that weren’t staged, which never would have happened in the USSR. But while all traditional politicians understand the importance of messaging and perception, they realize that avoiding substantive questions only leads to more of them. During the campaign, and during his presidency, Trump has attempted—with considerable success—to transcend that norm, as with so many others. He responds instead with counterattacks and bold statements and accusations, knowing they will get more attention than subsequent fact-checks. It’s one of many ways that Americans are learning from Trump that much of their democracy was run on the honor system, on agreed standards, not laws, and now there’s someone who isn’t going to play by those rules.