Surprising God
Kevin Kelly, “senior maverick at WIRED Magazine” and author of What Technology Wants and, most recently, The Inevitable was the guest of Krista Tippett, host of On Being on January 18, 2018
Mr. Kelly understands technology as an “extension, acceleration of evolution through life – that its origins is actually not in the human minds, but, actually back at the Big Bang.”
He goes on to say of technology, “That’s sort of its role, is to increase the variety, the diversity the options and the possibilities that we have so that anybody who is born would be able to surprise God.”
Additionally he says, “But the character of the internet, whether it’s international or transnational, whether its commercial, whether it private, whether it is open or close, all those questions are not at all inevitable.”
It does seem as if us humans love to explore and find new ways to put pieces of the universe together. It does seem as if we are destined to question everything and as Mr. Kelly says, “to increase the possibilities in the universe, increase the number of degrees of freedom.” He then, however, goes on to say that the character of the Internet or other technology is not inevitable.
I am intrigued by Mr. Kelly’s introduction of the idea of surprising God. He weaves together an understanding of the framework of Christianity with the generally more “scientific” notion of evolution in such a way that while us humans seem to be destined to ask questions and to carry on the work of creation through evolution the outcome of this combination is not pre-ordained as the Calvinists and others have posited.
When Mr. Kelly talks about the character of the internet he is asking the age old questions of not only who we are going to elect or appoint to make decisions about how this increasing freedom is used, but the questions about the underlying goals or what I will recently called the prior questions – those questions the answers to which determine who we will be as humans as we interact with others and with the rest of the universe(s). These are the questions over which we have fought wars, captured and held slaves, engaged in human trafficking, in in other ways abused each other and polluted a universe.
When I think of surprising God, I think of the freedom which technology could afford us to take care of each other, to discover how to feed and clothe each other while creating a more harmonious relationship with the rest of the environment. I think about the freedom to choose to become attached to technology or to use the freedom it affords us to live and take care of each other as equals.
I suspect that it is not a question of whether we surprise, God but whether we surprise “I am” with our capacity for compassion and empathy or our capacity for ignoring our mutual interdependence and sacredness.
Written January 19, 2018
Kevin Kelly, “senior maverick at WIRED Magazine” and author of What Technology Wants and, most recently, The Inevitable was the guest of Krista Tippett, host of On Being on January 18, 2018
Mr. Kelly understands technology as an “extension, acceleration of evolution through life – that its origins is actually not in the human minds, but, actually back at the Big Bang.”
He goes on to say of technology, “That’s sort of its role, is to increase the variety, the diversity the options and the possibilities that we have so that anybody who is born would be able to surprise God.”
Additionally he says, “But the character of the internet, whether it’s international or transnational, whether its commercial, whether it private, whether it is open or close, all those questions are not at all inevitable.”
It does seem as if us humans love to explore and find new ways to put pieces of the universe together. It does seem as if we are destined to question everything and as Mr. Kelly says, “to increase the possibilities in the universe, increase the number of degrees of freedom.” He then, however, goes on to say that the character of the Internet or other technology is not inevitable.
I am intrigued by Mr. Kelly’s introduction of the idea of surprising God. He weaves together an understanding of the framework of Christianity with the generally more “scientific” notion of evolution in such a way that while us humans seem to be destined to ask questions and to carry on the work of creation through evolution the outcome of this combination is not pre-ordained as the Calvinists and others have posited.
When Mr. Kelly talks about the character of the internet he is asking the age old questions of not only who we are going to elect or appoint to make decisions about how this increasing freedom is used, but the questions about the underlying goals or what I will recently called the prior questions – those questions the answers to which determine who we will be as humans as we interact with others and with the rest of the universe(s). These are the questions over which we have fought wars, captured and held slaves, engaged in human trafficking, in in other ways abused each other and polluted a universe.
When I think of surprising God, I think of the freedom which technology could afford us to take care of each other, to discover how to feed and clothe each other while creating a more harmonious relationship with the rest of the environment. I think about the freedom to choose to become attached to technology or to use the freedom it affords us to live and take care of each other as equals.
I suspect that it is not a question of whether we surprise, God but whether we surprise “I am” with our capacity for compassion and empathy or our capacity for ignoring our mutual interdependence and sacredness.
Written January 19, 2018
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