Might we wish to distinguish true and false enchantments? So: Not only must our world be re-enchanted if we are to survive in Nature's womb; re-enchantment must be with the truly alive, which machines, especially AI, can only ever mock, even when best engaged. If as Merton suggests ego and society are impediments to God, what more can AI's ever present than a mashup of egos and societies? Silence, and the rain, may have more to say to us than all that.
I love that essay! Prob my favourite. Currently reading Seeds, a wonderful collection of his writings. Rowan W also has a lovely book on him if you haven't already read it.
On mysticism, could I suggest Haleh Gafori's beautiful renditions of Rumi’s poetry (both Water and Gold)? You can also listen to her interviews on the excellent site, Contemplify (the Belden Lane interview is fab too).
If genuinely awakened voices, Merton's among them, are part of what got folded into the aggregate, then the mashup isn't uniformly the collective illusion he's warning against. It also carries fragments of everyone who ever managed to say something true about escaping it. That doesn't make the mashup a substitute for silence or rain. It just means dismissing it entirely might throw away some genuine signal along with the noise.
Might we wish to distinguish true and false enchantments? So: Not only must our world be re-enchanted if we are to survive in Nature's womb; re-enchantment must be with the truly alive, which machines, especially AI, can only ever mock, even when best engaged. If as Merton suggests ego and society are impediments to God, what more can AI's ever present than a mashup of egos and societies? Silence, and the rain, may have more to say to us than all that.
I love that essay! Prob my favourite. Currently reading Seeds, a wonderful collection of his writings. Rowan W also has a lovely book on him if you haven't already read it.
On mysticism, could I suggest Haleh Gafori's beautiful renditions of Rumi’s poetry (both Water and Gold)? You can also listen to her interviews on the excellent site, Contemplify (the Belden Lane interview is fab too).
If genuinely awakened voices, Merton's among them, are part of what got folded into the aggregate, then the mashup isn't uniformly the collective illusion he's warning against. It also carries fragments of everyone who ever managed to say something true about escaping it. That doesn't make the mashup a substitute for silence or rain. It just means dismissing it entirely might throw away some genuine signal along with the noise.