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I'm sure that's true; a common fate for popular authors is that they barely know many of their readers and don't know other readers at all.

And Trump said he knew nothing about project 2025 before the election. Yarvin has been close to Thiel for many years, is his advisor in some capacity, has invested in Yarvins companies, likely even friends. Vance worked for Thiel and his political career was bankrolled by Thiel. And you believe they barely know each other?

Is it plausible? yes. So far evidence directly from Yarvin contradicts this and there's no hard evidence pointing to them being good buddies so I'm willing to accept his account.

> "'How dangerous is it that we are being linked?' Thiel wrote to Yarvin in 2014. “One reassuring thought: one of our hidden advantages is that these people”—social-justice warriors—'wouldn’t believe in a conspiracy if it hit them over the head (this is perhaps the best measure of the decline of the Left). Linkages make them sound really crazy, and they kinda know it.'"

Vance has called him his good friend before.

Trumps administration is implementing RAGE, something Yarvin came up with.

Why are you even trying to deny it when its so easily shown to be true.

https://newrepublic.com/article/183971/jd-vance-weird-terrif...

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2022/04/inside-the-new-right...

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2024/07/18/jd-vance-w...

Thousands of people work for Thiel that closely. Most of them don't know each other at all.

> "'How dangerous is it that we are being linked?' Thiel wrote to Yarvin in 2014. “One reassuring thought: one of our hidden advantages is that these people”—social-justice warriors—'wouldn’t believe in a conspiracy if it hit them over the head (this is perhaps the best measure of the decline of the Left). Linkages make them sound really crazy, and they kinda know it.'"

Vance has called him his good friend before.

Trumps administration is implementing RAGE, something Yarvin came up with.

Why are you even trying to deny it when its so easily shown to be true.

To contextualize that claim, I'd quote the article:

> "'How dangerous is it that we are being linked?' Thiel wrote to Yarvin in 2014. “One reassuring thought: one of our hidden advantages is that these people”—social-justice warriors—'wouldn’t believe in a conspiracy if it hit them over the head (this is perhaps the best measure of the decline of the Left). Linkages make them sound really crazy, and they kinda know it.'"

In this context, three years ago, Vance was describing Yarvin as his "good friend" (when he was campaigning for a seat in the US Senate, which he won), while four months ago, Yarvin is saying he barely knows Vance. If you're suggesting that the apparent discrepancy is a result of strategic dishonesty for reputation preservation, that would mean that either:

1. Yarvin wants to distance himself from Vance because he fears reputational damage from being associated with the US Vice President. (But from other evidence, cited in https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/moldbug-sold-out, this seems implausible.)

2. Vance wanted to exaggerate his closeness to Moldbug in order to enhance his own reputation. This doesn't seem plausible either; it's implausible that more than 0.1% of the Ohio electorate had any idea who Moldbug was, and at the point that you're a plausible candidate for a US Senate seat, your reputation will no longer be enhanced by being associated with a little-known blogger.

A much more likely explanation is that Vance admires Moldbug and wants to encourage his followers to read him.

You've left out the fairly obvious possibility #3, which is "Yarvin fears reputational damage to Vance that might prevent Vance from helping him advance his ideology". This, after all, was Thiel's concern in the quoted exchange.

#2 gets a lot more plausible when you remember these folks often care more about the backing (especially $$$) of someone like Thiel than the regular public, too.

Hmm, in that case you'd think he'd've avoided giving an interview to the New York Times?

Pride and the opportunity to get your ego stroked makes people do dumb stuff all the time.

On the other hand, Yarvin may also be making the decision that any publicity will drive readers to him and net him more followers overall and that the risk of damage to Vance is less than the perceived benefit of new followers.