Ex-Facebook executive Chamath Palihapitiya told CNBC on Tuesday that social media is creating a society that confuses "popularity" with "truth."
"The tools that we have created today are starting to erode the social fabric of how society works," he said in a "Squawk Box" interview, in response to questions about similar comments he made that went viral. At a recent Stanford Graduate School of Business event, Palihapitiya said social media is tearing society apart.
On CNBC, he explained what he meant. "Today we live in a world now where it is easy to confuse truth and popularity. And you can use money to amplify whatever you believe and get people to believe what is popular is now truthful. And what is not popular may not be truthful."
"The reality is, I can take money and I can use that through all the social media systems that exist to hundreds of millions of people," said Palihapitiya, founder and CEO venture capital powerhouse Social Capital, which has $2.6 billion in assets under management.
"We can do that about vaccines, we can do that about gay rights, we can do that about bathroom laws, we can do that about Roy Moore," he said.
Palihapitiya, also co-owner of the NBA's Golden State Warriors, said social media exploits "our own natural tendencies in human beings to get and want feedback." He said the question people must ask is: "How do we live in a world where that is now possible?"
"That feedback, chemically speaking, is the release of dopamine in your brain," Palihapitiya said. The "feedback loops" get people to react, he added. "I think if you get to desensitized and you need it over and over and over again, then you become actually detached from the world in which you live."
Despite being a tech leader, Palihapitiya said he keeps his children away from social media by giving them "no screen time whatsoever." He said they don't get to use any devices.
Palihapitiya said his comments and actions were not direct attacks at Facebook. "I owe those guys everything," he said. "They made me."
Over his four-year tenure at Facebook, which started in 2007, Palihapitiya served in various management roles, including vice president of user growth.