Historian Jill Lepore Says Tech Leaders Are Building an 'Artificial State' That Undermines Democracy

Harvard historian Jill Lepore, promoting her new book The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State, argues that Silicon Valley leaders are replacing democratic government functions with corporate-controlled systems and misread cautionary science fiction as instruction manuals. She calls the emerging model a 'return to tyranny and mystification in the form of rule by algorithms' and singles out Elon Musk as a leading offender. Lepore contends the artificial state is inherently unsustainable because it requires destroying the natural resources it depends upon.