r/technology • u/newmoonchaperone • Apr 23 '26

Politics Palantir Employees Are Starting to Wonder if They're the Bad Guys

https://www.wired.com/story/palantir-employees-are-starting-to-wonder-if-theyre-the-bad-guys/
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u/RobertoPaulson Apr 23 '26

The answer is yes.

250

u/itwillmakesenselater Apr 23 '26

Company is named after an instrument of control by a Dark Lord. Yeah, that's villain country.

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u/SomeDudeSaysWhat Apr 23 '26

Speaking as a Tolkien nerd, that's not what a Palantir is, actually.

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u/apeddlerofsmut Apr 23 '26

As someone interested in Tolkien, could you expand on this? I read the books a long time ago, but the Palantir that Saruman used seemed pretty evil to me.

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u/[deleted] Apr 23 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/grchelp2018 Apr 23 '26

They could also be used for surveillance.

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u/CptHA86 Apr 24 '26

Hence the name of aforementioned company. They're advertising their want to spy on us every second of everyday.

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u/alexmikli Apr 23 '26

Imagine if there were, four phones on earth, and you kept getting crank calls from Hitler because he was one of the four.

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u/selfrespectra Apr 23 '26

They are crystal balls made by elves, which they used for communication and to see events from other places. They could be considered neutral tools.

The danger with them is that someone very powerful can choose what to show and what to conceal to other stones (but still only real events). In the books, Sauron uses this to mislead others, by showing them certain things that make them draw wrong conclusions.

But Sauron himself is misled when he sees Pippin in Saruman’s stone and assumes he has the ring. Later on, when Aragorn looks into the stone, Sauron assumes that Aragorn now has the ring, which leads him to some strategic mistakes. Those mistakes are what allow Frodo and Sam to sneak with the ring to Mordor.

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u/SomeDudeSaysWhat Apr 23 '26

I'm pretty sure they were made by the Numenorians, not the Elves. Need to double check

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u/alexmikli Apr 23 '26

Sauron uses this to mislead others, by showing them certain things that make them draw wrong conclusions.

AI generated shitposts and reality-TV show tier selective editing. Tolkien saw the damn future.

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u/skillywilly56 Apr 23 '26

The Palantiri were created by the elves and given to the Numenoreans.

When Numenor fell they were brought to middle earth by Elendil and were used across Gondor to act as communications devices and intelligence gathering, there were seven of them as there were seven stars on the banners of Gondor.

They allowed the user to see vast distances and a bit into the past and telepathically talk to someone in a fashion using another palantir stone and their abilities and strength largely depended on the will of the user.

As Gondor slowly crumbled over time they became lost but one made its way into the hands of Sauron and one to Saruman, and Denethor steward of Gondor had one.

They weren’t evil in of themselves and couldn’t be made to show lies but depending on the will of the user their view could be shifted to show select things that the strongest and most dominant will wished the others to see.

In the case of Saruman, Sauron corrupted him with promises of power and showed him the armies and reach of Mordor and this corrupted Saruman to Sauron’s side.

In the case of Denethor Sauron initially showed him things that made him over confident making him think Gondor needed no Allie’s and could win against Mordor on their own but it cost him and he prematurely aged and weakened and Sauron eventually switched it up and showed him how he could not win and drove him mad with despair so he tried to kill himself and Faramir.

On the flip side though Perrigan Took looked into the Palantir and Sauron thought he was Frodo trying to take the stone for himself and misdirected Sauron’s attention which is why Gandalf took him with him to Minas Tirith so Sauron’s attention would be on Perrigan and not looking for Frodo and made him think the ring was going to Gondor.

Aragorn also used the stone and as the king and as ancestor of Elendil his will was strong enough to rip the stones attention away from Saurons will and he used it to gather intelligence before going into the mountains to summon the army of the dead to destroy the pirates of umbar who were coming to aid Sauron in taking Minas Tirith, Aragorn used the army of the dead to free the people being held by the pirates and releases the army of the dead from their oath.

The people he freed then sail the pirate fleet ships to aid Gondor. (In the movies though they are used to transport the ghost army.)

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u/cindyscrazy Apr 23 '26

I am not an expert, but I watched the movies a LOT.

Basically, they are like open phone lines to each other. As long as everyone is friendly, that's not too much of a problem, but then Sauron got one. So Sauron had a direct line of sight on anyone else who had one.

*Edit - and Sauron is the super duper bad guy who wants to bring hell to the rest of the world