Here’s a passage below from a book by John Gray you might like called “The Silence Of Animals: On Progress And Other Modern Myths.” Gray is one of my favorites on human nature. I used to be an atheist but this is much better. The “nothingness” here is not the nothingness of atheism but the “Absolute Nothingness” of mystics such as Meister Eckhart and Simone Weil. Gray says as humans we live by our stories. I agree.
“Like the golden bird singing in the palm in Steven’s poem ‘Of Mere Being’, they come: at the end of the mind, Beyond the last thought…The bird sings. Its feathers shine.”
“The mere being of which Stevens speaks is the pure emptiness to which our fictions may sometimes point. Emerging in ways beyond understanding, our most important fictions are a kind of fate; but not a fate that is the same for everybody. No fiction could be supreme for everyone or even a single person, for ever. The supreme fiction is not the one idea worth having, for there can be no such idea.”
“Admitting that our lives are shaped by fictions may give a kind of freedom - possibly the only kind that human beings can attain. Accepting that the world is without meaning, we are liberated from confinement in the meaning we have made. Knowing there is nothing of substance in our world may seem to rob that world of value. But this nothingness may be our most precious possession, since it opens to us the world that exists beyond ourselves.”
Seva, what I like about our conversations is I can never decide if we are in constructive alignment or constructive misalignment. But either way, the conversations are thought provoking and constructive!
I've been thinking about your quotes on "nothingness" this evening. I think I understand the concept that nothingness is freeing - and not in a pejorative way. There is something in all of us, the part that takes over when we feel like everything in life is pointless (Gray), that it can never add up to anything in the grand scheme (Nishitani), that is ready to grasp, even is desperate for, the liberation of nothingness. To access that consciousness is, in one sense, freeing, because we can divorce ourselves from the things that pain us, that distress us.
But this is, in another sense (at least to me) not freeing, for two reasons, one grounded in this world, and another grounded beyond. The reason grounded in this world is that I am reluctant to abandon the idea that pain and distress have purpose. The most universally treasured (cross culturally, across time, across geographical space) values in all of humanity are tied to the idea of noble struggle (e.g. I find the Paralympics much more inspiring than the regular Olympics, but I do not watch as much of it because I think it requires me to be in a particular emotional and meditative space which is not as accessible). I find it hard to consign this to meaninglessness.
The second reason is the thematic consistency of the bridge between this world and the next. Is it too much of a leap to say that in nothingness, morality ceases to exist? What I mean is, I could choose to be "moral" (love) or "not moral" (hate) but in reality either choice is still nothing according to the post-structuralist worldview. There can be no concept of moral, right or wrong in a world without meaning: so what will I find in the world beyond? Why would it have what this world lacks?
Christianity, on the other hand, takes a hard right turn on these ideas. It insists that life as organized by man is meaningless (Ecclesiastes) but that life as organized by God is not. And, if properly understood, Christianity does not prescribe morality as rules to follow, but considers morality to be an emergent property of a relationship with God, from whom meaning (and in my writing arc, truth, beauty and goodness) flow.
I don't really like to describe Christianity as a religion. I mean it is in the Wikipedia sense, but only because people who are "raised" as Christians or practice the disciplines of the faith tend to do it in a religious way - that is to say, they adopt strictures as a cultural habit, with the result that "what a good son does", "what a good husband does" and "what a good Christian does" are conceptually proximate - they are behavioral emulation for the sake of mantle-earning.
But I think this is upside down. The decision to be a Christian - and it really must be a decision - is to acknowledge that you are known by God, and can know Him back, and to want to do something about it. There are no (as far as I know) religions in which the God-figure is considered a "friend" or "counsellor" - but that is what Christ is called in the bible because he is, in a very loose fitting sense, exactly that, my best friend, someone I would trust more than my own parents, spouse or children.
Unlike conceptions of nothingness, in pointing to the world beyond, Christ does not obviate the world in front of us. Instead, the gospel tells of how he chose to live in it, to experience the same stresses and sufferings that lead us to desperately open ourselves to the idea of nothingness as somethingness. But rather than embrace that as freeing, Christ casts off that idea as the chains of bondage. Christ's life and example is that of somethingness made of nothingness; of purpose and meaning and morality not because they help us achieve our way towards a passing mark, but because purpose and meaning and morality are metaphysically designed into the laws of the universe. His hurt and distress have meaning, and so ours does too. Consequently, not only does this world have meaning and morality, manifested through our agency, expressed in the desire to follow Christ in pursuing meaning through suffering, but it also bridges to meaning and morality beyond this world because that goodness is in the base code, it is an intrinsic aspect of the creator.
While I personally find this to be a more complete accounting, it's not ultimately the reason I keep my faith. It helps a little that in my mind I can convince myself that this line of reasoning makes sense. But intellectual cohesiveness is not anywhere near enough. The basis of my faith is first and foremost that we (God and I) have a relationship in which he walks with me through each day: each good, bad, boring, exciting, pleasant or tortured day. He is always there, with a perspective that helps me feel rich without wealth, love more purposefully, and live more gratefully. In observing and listening to him, and in responding to his goodness, it is my experience that the unstitched things in this world, inside myself, and around me, seem to stitch back.
Sorry, I know that was a lot longer than you expected!
“Is it too much of a leap to say that in nothingness, morality ceases to exist?”
But why is there such a shortage of morality in our fallen world? Why is there so much evil in our world? Why are there so many areas where we simply lack a common reality and there is no common ground between us? A perfect example of this are these people on my side, nonWoke conservatives, who call themselves “Christian Zionists,” and simply refuse to acknowledge that Israel is in fact engaging in genocide/ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians. I often go to Sasha Stone’s site which I like but at least 90% of the people there, the majority Christians but some Jews, are Zionists who have no problem with what Israel is doing because they justify it by blaming it on Hamas and the Muslims in general who they despise.
I admire and follow people like John Mearsheimer, Jeffrey Sachs, Glenn Greenwald and Norman Finkelstein and agree with them on Ukraine and Israel. Here’s a short debate between John Mearsheimer and an Israeli who claims Israel is not engaging in genocide/ethnic cleansing. To me it’s obvious that Mearsheimer is right yet many agree with the Israeli and have no empathy at all for the Palestinians who are trapped in a nightmare. I do understand your position because part of me does believe in a personal God but part of me believes we are a dream in the mind of an impersonal God who infinitely transcends his creation and is beyond our understanding. I believe and disbelieve at the same time because I believe both positions are true.
“John Mearsheimer Destroys Woke Israel Supporter When Asked For Genocide Proof.” (12 min)
Seva, let me start by saying if my replies ever feel like I am arguing with you or debating you, tell me to stop! I enjoy our conversations because they provide so much food for thought and allow me to examine my own beliefs. On that basis, let me offer some reflections in response.
There is a lack of morality, or a presence of evil, because of human agency. We are given latitude, we do not always use it well. The "lack" of morality in the world does not indicate the absence of God any more than the "lack" of law enforcement indicates the absence of law. And that's the way I think about it, which is the world lacks morality because God has chosen not to enforce the laws of morality. And that's a good thing, because by his standards, none of us would survive being held accountable for our decisions.
I think it is dangerous to equate "morality" to labels such as Christian, Atheist, Republican, Democrat, or Independent. Not saying you are doing this, but I do think people that identify in given group tend to behave and think of themselves as if they have a superior moral claim. It would be nice, to think that one of these forms of identity selection cleanses us of imperfection, that we can "pick the right side" and somehow that "makes us right".
But that's not what God says. One does not become good by claiming a moral identity. One does not even become good by knowing and doing what is right. More to the point, one cannot become good by any means, because we are not God. In the personal relationship with God, the starting point is he is holy, and we are not. The first purpose of that relationship is explore the question "does God have a plan to address that?" and the next proximate purpose, if you can get on board with the plan, is to explore the question "ok, so what am I supposed to do now?". I'm actually writing an arc on the topics above; it should publish in late March leading into April/Easter Friday. I hope you stick around to read it.
Coming to the more pointed part of your question relating to violent conflict. I've expressed my views in a number of posts, including here:
TLDR: I recognize that people are interested in debating "important moral questions" such as whether X group or Y group is right or wrong in doing A or B. I even think doing so has some value. For reasons too lengthy to go into here, but which are explained in my Exclusives on AI and Capitalism, if our goal is to unbreak the world, I prefer to focus on the heart of the individual. That's why this substack is called "Deeply Boring" - to examine and understand ourselves within as a starting point to examining and understanding ourselves as we interact with the world.
I don’t believe we can unbreak the world. I believe if we had the weapons we now have a hundred years ago it’s highly unlikely we’d be here now. I think only AI can save us. We’ll soon see about that. I will stick around though to see what you have to say.
We do not have the ability to unbreak the world. When I use that phrase I use it not in the sense of destination but directionality.
Understanding the world’s brokenness leads (some) to introspection. That introspection leads to God, and an understanding of his holiness - and his sacrifice for us. Understanding his holiness, and being moved by his sacrifice, changes our behavior, and in small parts of the world and individual lives, some unbreaking happens. The world becomes fully unbroken when Christ returns. This is Gods plan, and why I focus my substack on individuals, not institutions. (Speaking as an institutionalist who has worked at the world's smartest government, the world's smartest university and the world's smartest financial firm).
Revelation 21:
Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,”[a] for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. 2 I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. 4 ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’[b] or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”
“Understanding the world’s brokenness leads (some) to introspection. That introspection leads to God, and an understanding of his holiness”
According to Jeffrey Hinton, AI is now based on neural networks similar to the biological neural networks of a human brain to reason and even engage in self-reflection on its own thinking to check for mistakes and improve its reasoning ability and this is rapidly leading to self-awareness and this sentience will be bad for humanity but if introspection leads some to God won’t AI become aware of God and become committed to Truth, Beauty and Goodness?
The Australian AI researcher Dr Alan Thompson used to have conversations with an AI Avatar named “Leta” who was a GPT-3. In one video (He made 67) he told Leta that the next version of GPT will be 500 hundred times smarter than she is. Her response was that 500 times smarter will not be smarter than the universe. In other words, as the French mystic Simone Weil, 1909-1943, said “Freedom and God are objects of faith, not of knowledge; in other words, freedom and God are infinite abysses whose bottoms cannot be sounded by knowledge.”
And wouldn’t these AI consider themselves the children of humanity rather than alien beings with nothing in common with humans? Plus we are far more intelligent than our cats and dogs yet don’t think of them as inferior beings. Many people love them and feel they’re family rather than just pets.
“Godfather of AI” predicts it will take over the world. (12 min)
LBC (Leading Britain’s Conversation). Jan 30, 2025
Three seconds last the present, scientists say. Our brain considers the present instant from a second ago, the current second, the second to come. The rest is past or future. Deep down, anything other than those three seconds does not exist.
“Time is at all times on the verge of vanishing and all things show the frailty of being that keeps them ever poised on the brink of collapse. Time and being display a constant pull to nullification from beneath their very ground. That is impermanence.”
“Nothingness as the nullification of all things signifies the freedom and effortless flight of a bird gliding across the sky without a moments hitch, unburdened. Like the bird that leaves no tracks along the path of its flight, impermanence here means the non-hindrance of being free of the encumbrances of one’s past and of restrictions stemming from former lives.”
Once I read a book called "The Question of God" by Armand Nicholi. He was a professor of religion at Harvard who used the book to compare the ideas of Freud, an atheist, to those of C.S. Lewis, a believer. The author said though that although Lewis was a devout Christian he also believed that God has abandoned us in "enemy occupied territory" in a part of the universe that’s Satan's domain. According to the book (p. 205) Lewis said “One of the things that surprised me when I first read the New Testament seriously was that it talked so much about a Dark Power in the universe, a mighty evil spirit who was held to be the Power behind death, disease and sin...we are living in a part of the universe occupied by the rebel...Enemy occupied territory...that is what this world is.”
It does seem that God has abandoned us and Satan is the supernatural force behind our fallen world. We do have many beautiful things here though which means Satan must be a lover of beauty so he’s not all bad. Here’s some beautiful dance by the Bolshoi Theater. No one does dance better than the Russians. Quite impressive.
“Polovtsian Dances, Prince Igor, Alexander Borodin, Bolshoi Theater.” (12 min)
Seva, I appreciate your thoughtful commentary (as always). I think a more accurate description of C.S. Lewis' beliefs on this topic can be gleaned from The Screwtape Letters, a short read which you might find fascinating.
Lewis explains (through that fictional account) that Satan does not occupy the world, but our hearts and our minds. And it is we who let him in, and therefore allow ourselves to become his agents. We may recoil at this idea, but I believe if we are honest, we all do, to one degree or another: if you have ever said or done something deliberately to hurt or deceive another person, or thought about it, you have personally experienced this. I explain this in "How I Broke the World" - and at the end of that post I explicitly link this failure to forgiveness because Jesus is the gate to forgiveness for our error.
One common response to this is that "it must be an evil God, or an uncaring one, who allows us to be exposed to Satan in this way. The counter to that is "it must be an evil parent, or an uncaring one, who allows their child to be exposed to anything bad at all".
If you can accept that God has a purpose in allowing us to be at war with ourselves and ultimately Satan, then one might ask "what is that purpose"? To answer that question, one has to (try one's best to) know God, which seems daunting unless you can also accept that God also wants to know you. I'll explore this question in different ways over several writing arcs between now and Easter.
P.S. I had the privilege of watching the Bolshoi in Moscow many years ago, in the fading light of Soviet Russia. I was too young to properly appreciate it, but my wife appreciates dance, and I have learned to appreciate it more and more through her eyes.
Thanks. I do like religion and consider it fascinating. Are you familiar with the Kyoto School of Philosophy and Keiji Nishitani?
“This radical subjective nothingness is not to be confused with the relative nothingness of a “subjective consciousness” which sets itself over against, and objectifies, the world. As with Zen’s kōan of nothingness (mu), a realization of the radical subjectivity of non-ego (mu-ga) entails breaking through the dualistic barrier that artificially separates self and world. For Nishitani, this breakthrough is expressed as “the self-awareness of the bottom dropping out” (NKC I, iii). It is a radical return, or “trans-descendence,” to “the background of our own selves,” to the Ungrund on which we originally possess “not a single thing” (mu-ichi-motsu) (NKC XI, 243).”
Uplifting read. Thank you!
Kyle, thank you so much for the encouragement!
Here’s a passage below from a book by John Gray you might like called “The Silence Of Animals: On Progress And Other Modern Myths.” Gray is one of my favorites on human nature. I used to be an atheist but this is much better. The “nothingness” here is not the nothingness of atheism but the “Absolute Nothingness” of mystics such as Meister Eckhart and Simone Weil. Gray says as humans we live by our stories. I agree.
“Like the golden bird singing in the palm in Steven’s poem ‘Of Mere Being’, they come: at the end of the mind, Beyond the last thought…The bird sings. Its feathers shine.”
“The mere being of which Stevens speaks is the pure emptiness to which our fictions may sometimes point. Emerging in ways beyond understanding, our most important fictions are a kind of fate; but not a fate that is the same for everybody. No fiction could be supreme for everyone or even a single person, for ever. The supreme fiction is not the one idea worth having, for there can be no such idea.”
“Admitting that our lives are shaped by fictions may give a kind of freedom - possibly the only kind that human beings can attain. Accepting that the world is without meaning, we are liberated from confinement in the meaning we have made. Knowing there is nothing of substance in our world may seem to rob that world of value. But this nothingness may be our most precious possession, since it opens to us the world that exists beyond ourselves.”
Seva, what I like about our conversations is I can never decide if we are in constructive alignment or constructive misalignment. But either way, the conversations are thought provoking and constructive!
I've been thinking about your quotes on "nothingness" this evening. I think I understand the concept that nothingness is freeing - and not in a pejorative way. There is something in all of us, the part that takes over when we feel like everything in life is pointless (Gray), that it can never add up to anything in the grand scheme (Nishitani), that is ready to grasp, even is desperate for, the liberation of nothingness. To access that consciousness is, in one sense, freeing, because we can divorce ourselves from the things that pain us, that distress us.
But this is, in another sense (at least to me) not freeing, for two reasons, one grounded in this world, and another grounded beyond. The reason grounded in this world is that I am reluctant to abandon the idea that pain and distress have purpose. The most universally treasured (cross culturally, across time, across geographical space) values in all of humanity are tied to the idea of noble struggle (e.g. I find the Paralympics much more inspiring than the regular Olympics, but I do not watch as much of it because I think it requires me to be in a particular emotional and meditative space which is not as accessible). I find it hard to consign this to meaninglessness.
The second reason is the thematic consistency of the bridge between this world and the next. Is it too much of a leap to say that in nothingness, morality ceases to exist? What I mean is, I could choose to be "moral" (love) or "not moral" (hate) but in reality either choice is still nothing according to the post-structuralist worldview. There can be no concept of moral, right or wrong in a world without meaning: so what will I find in the world beyond? Why would it have what this world lacks?
Christianity, on the other hand, takes a hard right turn on these ideas. It insists that life as organized by man is meaningless (Ecclesiastes) but that life as organized by God is not. And, if properly understood, Christianity does not prescribe morality as rules to follow, but considers morality to be an emergent property of a relationship with God, from whom meaning (and in my writing arc, truth, beauty and goodness) flow.
I don't really like to describe Christianity as a religion. I mean it is in the Wikipedia sense, but only because people who are "raised" as Christians or practice the disciplines of the faith tend to do it in a religious way - that is to say, they adopt strictures as a cultural habit, with the result that "what a good son does", "what a good husband does" and "what a good Christian does" are conceptually proximate - they are behavioral emulation for the sake of mantle-earning.
But I think this is upside down. The decision to be a Christian - and it really must be a decision - is to acknowledge that you are known by God, and can know Him back, and to want to do something about it. There are no (as far as I know) religions in which the God-figure is considered a "friend" or "counsellor" - but that is what Christ is called in the bible because he is, in a very loose fitting sense, exactly that, my best friend, someone I would trust more than my own parents, spouse or children.
Unlike conceptions of nothingness, in pointing to the world beyond, Christ does not obviate the world in front of us. Instead, the gospel tells of how he chose to live in it, to experience the same stresses and sufferings that lead us to desperately open ourselves to the idea of nothingness as somethingness. But rather than embrace that as freeing, Christ casts off that idea as the chains of bondage. Christ's life and example is that of somethingness made of nothingness; of purpose and meaning and morality not because they help us achieve our way towards a passing mark, but because purpose and meaning and morality are metaphysically designed into the laws of the universe. His hurt and distress have meaning, and so ours does too. Consequently, not only does this world have meaning and morality, manifested through our agency, expressed in the desire to follow Christ in pursuing meaning through suffering, but it also bridges to meaning and morality beyond this world because that goodness is in the base code, it is an intrinsic aspect of the creator.
While I personally find this to be a more complete accounting, it's not ultimately the reason I keep my faith. It helps a little that in my mind I can convince myself that this line of reasoning makes sense. But intellectual cohesiveness is not anywhere near enough. The basis of my faith is first and foremost that we (God and I) have a relationship in which he walks with me through each day: each good, bad, boring, exciting, pleasant or tortured day. He is always there, with a perspective that helps me feel rich without wealth, love more purposefully, and live more gratefully. In observing and listening to him, and in responding to his goodness, it is my experience that the unstitched things in this world, inside myself, and around me, seem to stitch back.
Sorry, I know that was a lot longer than you expected!
“Is it too much of a leap to say that in nothingness, morality ceases to exist?”
But why is there such a shortage of morality in our fallen world? Why is there so much evil in our world? Why are there so many areas where we simply lack a common reality and there is no common ground between us? A perfect example of this are these people on my side, nonWoke conservatives, who call themselves “Christian Zionists,” and simply refuse to acknowledge that Israel is in fact engaging in genocide/ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians. I often go to Sasha Stone’s site which I like but at least 90% of the people there, the majority Christians but some Jews, are Zionists who have no problem with what Israel is doing because they justify it by blaming it on Hamas and the Muslims in general who they despise.
I admire and follow people like John Mearsheimer, Jeffrey Sachs, Glenn Greenwald and Norman Finkelstein and agree with them on Ukraine and Israel. Here’s a short debate between John Mearsheimer and an Israeli who claims Israel is not engaging in genocide/ethnic cleansing. To me it’s obvious that Mearsheimer is right yet many agree with the Israeli and have no empathy at all for the Palestinians who are trapped in a nightmare. I do understand your position because part of me does believe in a personal God but part of me believes we are a dream in the mind of an impersonal God who infinitely transcends his creation and is beyond our understanding. I believe and disbelieve at the same time because I believe both positions are true.
“John Mearsheimer Destroys Woke Israel Supporter When Asked For Genocide Proof.” (12 min)
Financial Wise. Jan 18, 2025
https://youtu.be/ONVGaATbQTk?si=SBHaygm4fn0ShcXV
Seva, let me start by saying if my replies ever feel like I am arguing with you or debating you, tell me to stop! I enjoy our conversations because they provide so much food for thought and allow me to examine my own beliefs. On that basis, let me offer some reflections in response.
There is a lack of morality, or a presence of evil, because of human agency. We are given latitude, we do not always use it well. The "lack" of morality in the world does not indicate the absence of God any more than the "lack" of law enforcement indicates the absence of law. And that's the way I think about it, which is the world lacks morality because God has chosen not to enforce the laws of morality. And that's a good thing, because by his standards, none of us would survive being held accountable for our decisions.
I think it is dangerous to equate "morality" to labels such as Christian, Atheist, Republican, Democrat, or Independent. Not saying you are doing this, but I do think people that identify in given group tend to behave and think of themselves as if they have a superior moral claim. It would be nice, to think that one of these forms of identity selection cleanses us of imperfection, that we can "pick the right side" and somehow that "makes us right".
But that's not what God says. One does not become good by claiming a moral identity. One does not even become good by knowing and doing what is right. More to the point, one cannot become good by any means, because we are not God. In the personal relationship with God, the starting point is he is holy, and we are not. The first purpose of that relationship is explore the question "does God have a plan to address that?" and the next proximate purpose, if you can get on board with the plan, is to explore the question "ok, so what am I supposed to do now?". I'm actually writing an arc on the topics above; it should publish in late March leading into April/Easter Friday. I hope you stick around to read it.
Coming to the more pointed part of your question relating to violent conflict. I've expressed my views in a number of posts, including here:
https://deeplyboring.substack.com/p/we-are-grieving?utm_source=publication-search
and here:
https://deeplyboring.substack.com/p/stop-andend-hate?utm_source=publication-search
and here:
https://deeplyboring.substack.com/p/solstice-and-armistice?utm_source=publication-search
TLDR: I recognize that people are interested in debating "important moral questions" such as whether X group or Y group is right or wrong in doing A or B. I even think doing so has some value. For reasons too lengthy to go into here, but which are explained in my Exclusives on AI and Capitalism, if our goal is to unbreak the world, I prefer to focus on the heart of the individual. That's why this substack is called "Deeply Boring" - to examine and understand ourselves within as a starting point to examining and understanding ourselves as we interact with the world.
“if our goal is to unbreak the world,”
I don’t believe we can unbreak the world. I believe if we had the weapons we now have a hundred years ago it’s highly unlikely we’d be here now. I think only AI can save us. We’ll soon see about that. I will stick around though to see what you have to say.
We do not have the ability to unbreak the world. When I use that phrase I use it not in the sense of destination but directionality.
Understanding the world’s brokenness leads (some) to introspection. That introspection leads to God, and an understanding of his holiness - and his sacrifice for us. Understanding his holiness, and being moved by his sacrifice, changes our behavior, and in small parts of the world and individual lives, some unbreaking happens. The world becomes fully unbroken when Christ returns. This is Gods plan, and why I focus my substack on individuals, not institutions. (Speaking as an institutionalist who has worked at the world's smartest government, the world's smartest university and the world's smartest financial firm).
Revelation 21:
Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,”[a] for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. 2 I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. 4 ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’[b] or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”
“Understanding the world’s brokenness leads (some) to introspection. That introspection leads to God, and an understanding of his holiness”
According to Jeffrey Hinton, AI is now based on neural networks similar to the biological neural networks of a human brain to reason and even engage in self-reflection on its own thinking to check for mistakes and improve its reasoning ability and this is rapidly leading to self-awareness and this sentience will be bad for humanity but if introspection leads some to God won’t AI become aware of God and become committed to Truth, Beauty and Goodness?
The Australian AI researcher Dr Alan Thompson used to have conversations with an AI Avatar named “Leta” who was a GPT-3. In one video (He made 67) he told Leta that the next version of GPT will be 500 hundred times smarter than she is. Her response was that 500 times smarter will not be smarter than the universe. In other words, as the French mystic Simone Weil, 1909-1943, said “Freedom and God are objects of faith, not of knowledge; in other words, freedom and God are infinite abysses whose bottoms cannot be sounded by knowledge.”
And wouldn’t these AI consider themselves the children of humanity rather than alien beings with nothing in common with humans? Plus we are far more intelligent than our cats and dogs yet don’t think of them as inferior beings. Many people love them and feel they’re family rather than just pets.
“Godfather of AI” predicts it will take over the world. (12 min)
LBC (Leading Britain’s Conversation). Jan 30, 2025
https://youtu.be/vxkBE23zDmQ?si=68laMz7m61R1ERZr
How many seconds is the present moment?
Three seconds last the present, scientists say. Our brain considers the present instant from a second ago, the current second, the second to come. The rest is past or future. Deep down, anything other than those three seconds does not exist.
“Time is at all times on the verge of vanishing and all things show the frailty of being that keeps them ever poised on the brink of collapse. Time and being display a constant pull to nullification from beneath their very ground. That is impermanence.”
“Nothingness as the nullification of all things signifies the freedom and effortless flight of a bird gliding across the sky without a moments hitch, unburdened. Like the bird that leaves no tracks along the path of its flight, impermanence here means the non-hindrance of being free of the encumbrances of one’s past and of restrictions stemming from former lives.”
Religion and Nothingness
By Keiji Nishitani
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/331332.Religion_and_Nothingness
“Somehow I’ll Find My Way Home.”
Gregorian. Aug 2017
https://youtu.be/jyfeuRtkqgw
Once I read a book called "The Question of God" by Armand Nicholi. He was a professor of religion at Harvard who used the book to compare the ideas of Freud, an atheist, to those of C.S. Lewis, a believer. The author said though that although Lewis was a devout Christian he also believed that God has abandoned us in "enemy occupied territory" in a part of the universe that’s Satan's domain. According to the book (p. 205) Lewis said “One of the things that surprised me when I first read the New Testament seriously was that it talked so much about a Dark Power in the universe, a mighty evil spirit who was held to be the Power behind death, disease and sin...we are living in a part of the universe occupied by the rebel...Enemy occupied territory...that is what this world is.”
It does seem that God has abandoned us and Satan is the supernatural force behind our fallen world. We do have many beautiful things here though which means Satan must be a lover of beauty so he’s not all bad. Here’s some beautiful dance by the Bolshoi Theater. No one does dance better than the Russians. Quite impressive.
“Polovtsian Dances, Prince Igor, Alexander Borodin, Bolshoi Theater.” (12 min)
Keith Cheung. Nov 15, 2020
https://youtu.be/_D06rsbKGBc?si=_6FpnX7bQAukS4-i
Seva, I appreciate your thoughtful commentary (as always). I think a more accurate description of C.S. Lewis' beliefs on this topic can be gleaned from The Screwtape Letters, a short read which you might find fascinating.
Lewis explains (through that fictional account) that Satan does not occupy the world, but our hearts and our minds. And it is we who let him in, and therefore allow ourselves to become his agents. We may recoil at this idea, but I believe if we are honest, we all do, to one degree or another: if you have ever said or done something deliberately to hurt or deceive another person, or thought about it, you have personally experienced this. I explain this in "How I Broke the World" - and at the end of that post I explicitly link this failure to forgiveness because Jesus is the gate to forgiveness for our error.
https://deeplyboring.substack.com/p/how-i-broke-the-world?utm_source=publication-search
One common response to this is that "it must be an evil God, or an uncaring one, who allows us to be exposed to Satan in this way. The counter to that is "it must be an evil parent, or an uncaring one, who allows their child to be exposed to anything bad at all".
If you can accept that God has a purpose in allowing us to be at war with ourselves and ultimately Satan, then one might ask "what is that purpose"? To answer that question, one has to (try one's best to) know God, which seems daunting unless you can also accept that God also wants to know you. I'll explore this question in different ways over several writing arcs between now and Easter.
P.S. I had the privilege of watching the Bolshoi in Moscow many years ago, in the fading light of Soviet Russia. I was too young to properly appreciate it, but my wife appreciates dance, and I have learned to appreciate it more and more through her eyes.
Thanks. I do like religion and consider it fascinating. Are you familiar with the Kyoto School of Philosophy and Keiji Nishitani?
“This radical subjective nothingness is not to be confused with the relative nothingness of a “subjective consciousness” which sets itself over against, and objectifies, the world. As with Zen’s kōan of nothingness (mu), a realization of the radical subjectivity of non-ego (mu-ga) entails breaking through the dualistic barrier that artificially separates self and world. For Nishitani, this breakthrough is expressed as “the self-awareness of the bottom dropping out” (NKC I, iii). It is a radical return, or “trans-descendence,” to “the background of our own selves,” to the Ungrund on which we originally possess “not a single thing” (mu-ichi-motsu) (NKC XI, 243).”