I just saw Balaji’s comments yesterday about the Anthropic situation, which is quite interesting. He pointed out something we often overlook: the principles we see in the worlds of politics and technology are often just disguises for tribal interests.

A clear example is this—Democrats support Starlink for Biden’s military needs, but immediately oppose Anthropic when Trump asks for it. This isn’t about consistent principles; it’s about the interests of each group. This is the dialectic playing out on the ground: between claims of universal values versus the reality of power struggles.

What’s interesting from Balaji’s perspective is that he reminds us that Americans used to be different. Polarization now is far worse than in earlier eras. AI practitioners once naively hoped that consensus would return, but what’s the reality? They have to contend with the fundamental dialectic between networks and the state. This isn’t a technical issue—it’s a matter of power.

From this arises an interesting phenomenon—Silicon Valley is starting to spread into entrepreneurial cities around the world. Why? Because they realize that staying centralized in one place means being bound to one tribe, one set of interests.

Balaji has an insight worth thinking about: “Within a tribe, collaboration can happen. Between tribes, collaboration is also possible. The key is to know which tribe you belong to and which tribe you’re interacting with. You can have your own principles, but understand this: only principles that provide collective strength for the tribe can survive natural selection.”

So this isn’t about right or wrong—it’s about understanding the actual game being played. It’s worth thinking about this more deeply.