Thiel challenged the notion that America is a 'developed country' whose tradition of making new things is finished. He pointed out that in the 1960s, technology meant airplanes, medicines, space travel, and materials science — not just computers and software. He argued that the word 'developed' implies history is over and everything worth doing has been done. Thiel called this a self-fulfilling prophecy: if we choose to believe we're powerless to do anything unfamiliar, we'll be right, but only because of our own lack of ambition, not because of any limitation in nature.