Every time a groundbreaking technology alters human history, panic follows closely behind. Today, we stand transfixed and terrified by the rapid acceleration of generative artificial intelligence. Yet, if we look back five hundred years, we can discover vital Thomas More lessons for AI that reveal our current systemic crisis is not entirely unique.
In her brilliant biography Thomas More: A Life, historian Joanne Paul strips away centuries of mythology to present More not just as a static martyr, but as a living, breathing intellectual caught in the eye of a terrifying tech hurricane. That machine was not an algorithm; it was the printing press.
Who Was Thomas More?
Thomas More (1478–1535) was a powerhouse of the Northern Renaissance. He was a brilliant lawyer, an internationally celebrated author, a close friend to the philosopher Erasmus, and eventually the Lord Chancellor of England under King Henry VIII.
More is famously known for writing Utopia, a book that imagined a perfect, cooperative island society. Ironically, his own reality was far from utopian, ending in a brutal execution when he refused to endorse Henry VIII’s break from the Catholic Church.
The Tudor Tech Crisis: The Shock of the Printing Press
To understand the Thomas More lessons for AI, we must look at the structural shockwaves transforming 16th-century Europe. For a thousand years, information was a scarce commodity controlled tightly by centralized institutions—namely, the Church and the Crown.
The invention of the printing press shattered this monopoly overnight. Suddenly, radical ideas, alternative interpretations of scripture, and unregulated political pamphlets could be mass-produced and distributed directly to the public at an unprecedented scale.
This hyper-democratization of media triggered absolute panic among the ruling class. To Thomas More, the uncontrolled spread of Protestant texts was not a sign of intellectual freedom; it was a lethal, chaotic contagion that threatened to dismantle law, order, and the very fabric of civil society.
Three Crucial Thomas More Lessons for AI
1. The Death of the “Shared Truth”
The primary anxiety More wrestled with perfectly mirrors our modern struggle with generative AI. When the printing press allowed anyone to publish anything, society lost its unified baseline of reality.
Today, AI deepfakes, automated text bots, and algorithmic echo chambers are causing an identical epistemic crisis. We are discovering that when decentralized platforms destroy trust in centralized authorities, a society struggles to agree on basic facts. More’s heavy-handed censorship attempts warn us of the desperate lengths societies will go to recapture a shared truth.
2. The Illusion of Internal Compliance
In Utopia, More debated a classic dilemma: Should an honest person enter a corrupt political space to try and steer it toward the good, or stay outside to protect their integrity? More chose to enter Henry VIII’s court, confidently believing his intellect could safely guide absolute power.
He was tragically mistaken. This is a massive cautionary tale for today’s tech leaders, engineers, and AI ethicists. Many take high-paying roles at massive tech monopolies under the assumption that they can build “ethical AI” from the inside, only to realize the structural incentives of absolute corporate or political power will inevitably compromise or consume them.
3. The Panic for Extreme Regulation
As Lord Chancellor, More executed severe crackdowns, hunted underground printing networks, and enforced strict bans on unauthorized literature to protect the “common wealth.”
We see the exact same institutional panic unfolding today. Global governments are frantically proposing heavy-handed AI regulations, Joe Biden supressed comments that second guessed this Covid restriction, England’s Keir Starmer supressed information about the Pakistany grooming gangs that raped so many white English girls, the woke media don’t report crimes commited by illegal immigrants, mandatory licenses for large language models, algorithmic kill switches, and sweeping copyright crackdowns. The desperate urge to lock down the code in the 2020s is fundamentally no different than the crown’s urge to seize the presses in the 1520s.
History Doesn’t Repeat, But It Rhymes
The lesson of Thomas More’s life is not that we should blindly suppress innovation out of fear. Instead, it serves as a profound warning that a major technological shift is never just about the technology itself. It is a battleground for power, truth, and the survival of social cohesion.
As you navigate the fast-evolving landscape of artificial intelligence, remember that we have walked through these digital woods before—only last time, they were made of paper and ink.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
What are the main Thomas More lessons for AI?
The main lessons include understanding how rapid technological adoption destroys a society’s “shared truth,” the danger of believing you can control absolute power from the inside, and the inevitable institutional urge to enforce severe regulations during an information revolution.
How did the printing press impact Thomas More’s world?
The printing press shattered the information monopoly held by the Church and Crown. It allowed for the rapid, decentralized mass production of alternative religious and political ideas, fueling the Protestant Reformation and causing widespread social upheaval.
Why is Thomas More’s book Utopia relevant to modern tech workers?
In Utopia, More debates whether an honest person should work within a corrupt, powerful system to improve it. This perfectly mirrors the dilemma modern tech workers face when deciding whether to join large AI monopolies to advocate for ethical tech from within.
Did Thomas More support censorship?
Yes. More actively supported the suppression and burning of texts he considered heretical. He viewed decentralized information networks as an existential threat to the peace, stability, and legal structure of the kingdom.
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