"What sunlight is to the vampire, recognition is to those who feel dehumanized."
Vampires hate sunlight because it destroys them. It seems like he is saying that recognition and attention can help those who feel dehumanized to reclaim their humanity. So recognition is like the opposite of sunlight to a vampire. Not really that important, but this was bothering me.
Love the concept of the "polar" generation - it's our job to turn that ship around now, and although we face a great crisis in our society on all fronts, we also have an immense opportunity at our fingertips - if we can only foster that creative instinct of children, it could be the manual override/ switch that shuts off AI.
It is very easy to dehumanize someone if we never meet them or touch them (and realize they are flesh and bones just like us). I appreciate you write about the process of collecting eggs and giving them to Jeff (not throwing at him). The process shows a typical effort to see a person as he is, here not just his cannabis smell, but his laughter, his voice, his interaction with the neighbor. Cannabis smell and coughing doesn't reduce him to be some demon. He proved that through your effort to interact.
However, social media and western media, though, does not try to make an effort. And we in the process of being information consumers, are reduced into devices to dehumanize others. It is easy to do this with a meme, a twitt (mosty feels like a yell/shout at others to me). It has to be short, an extract of anger or extreme polarized emotion. If it is long, nobody needs. Here all the nuances of being human are trimmed into a stark piercing piece of anger (5 -second videos, 280 words, 2 second memes). That anger penetrates the vulnerability of "consumers" - consuming. Here we have the storm of anger. Here we fracture.
The family’s egg gift also demonstrates a biblical principle of ‘Where your treasure is, your heart will be also’, as in the eggs were valuable and collected carefully, given thoughtfully and endearing the recipient to them.
I appreciate the point about attention. The gift of attention is extremely yvaluable, not just in dollar amounts, thinking of the amount of money corporations spend on advertising and influencers. It’s about our relationships, coming back to ‘embodied reality’ yet again.
It comes to mind that what’s happening is some kind of descent into an underworld where truth becomes more and more impossible to discern. The end result if we are lucky, is people will be so lost and fed up that a totally new paradigm for what is truth will emerge. Meanwhile, one can always let love as you understand it be your guide.
I’ve wondered this too. And perhaps what emerges is not necessarily a totally new paradigm, but a totally revived understanding of something that has always been there.
Covid and Bitcoin are the events that have led me on this journey to look inward, to unravel the expectations created by others, to peel back the layers of traditions NOT of my making.
I applaud your decision to homeschool. Creative thinking, critical thought and independent strategies are in short supply traded for short term solutions tied to monetization that give shallow results.
You took the long term approach - an investment that pays dividends for the rest of your lives.
I am ashamed to say I took the convenient route. I thought study hard, get good scores equals a good job for life. End result - obedient drones, looking for approval/consent/acceptance, debt ridden and forever striving for the next dollar.
Not today.
The 2020 global lockdown woke me up. Angry. At myself. Every waking moment is spent - pulling down the curtain of delusion, kicking out the customs I thought of as my own and slowly climbing out of the engineered matrix created by those who think to control every aspect of my life.
1. Fiat is stacked against me - tax, inflation, devalued currency and increased interest rates - all forms of government theft.
Solution - think in Bitcoin. Government can't print it. Code is law -NOT man made regulation. I become my own bank. No third party. No permission needed.
2. Finding the real me. I didn't like what I found. Judgmental, them and us attitude, unrealistic expectations and really petty. There are many more -too numerous to count, but you get the idea.
Solution - Identify - turn into a positive value. Change the mindset. Still ongoing.
You invested in yourselves and your children. And you shared unreservedly. Thank you.
That sounds like quite a journey, Christine. In the aftermath of 2020, it seems like a lot of people have been waking up and doing a big re-think about everything, tech, economics, identity, values, etc. And I think we are a long way, collectively, from being finished with this process.
I have found your work & your wife's work very compelling, and it remains high-priority reading for me as I consider my relationship to my devices and technology.
What I notice, though, is a pretty consistent theme that centers people who are married and have children. I wonder if there is any word of hope or counsel in there for those of us who are single and live on our own. Obviously, since I'm reading this kind of stuff, the single-living-alone life is not what I hope for in the long term; I very much desire to meet someone and get married. But I wonder about what to do in the meantime. It doesn't help that my primary options for dating are via apps; and with so many of my friends now married, many with kids, they are naturally now turned inwards toward their own family life and less to friends like myself. I can't help feeling sort of superfluous, or optional, standing on the outside looking in. It becomes awkward to "insinuate" myself into someone else's domestic life for the sake of keeping friendships alive and preserving my own sanity. I'm plenty active in my church and various music groups, so I have lots to do, but there's just something missing for me as a single person. I'd love to know what you think.
Thanks for mentioning this. I think it’s a hugely important consideration, especially given that increasing numbers of people, like yourself, are single. I don’t have an immediate answer, but we will certainly keep it in mind. We really appreciate this kind of reader feedback, which brings our blind spots into awareness.
Thanks for your question. The fact that you are active in your church, music groups, and connect with families is very positive, and provides fertile ground for forming relationships. For someone who desires to meet someone and get married, it takes a lot of initiative to find like-minded people, and dating apps are not the most desirable avenue. We know several young singles who were in search of a marriage partner, who had to actively look around for churches with lots of unmarried young people, rather than stay in their home church which was composed of mostly families and seniors. This was a success for most of them, even though it took patience and persistence. One local church in our town organizes a bi-monthly folk dance evening, where lots of young people gather from throughout the region, providing a great opportunity for forming new connections. Are there any such regular events near you?
Young single men can play an important role for young teenage men. Recently a young single man from our church arranged a "guys weekend" for the teenage boys in our church where they had a chance to go fishing, have a campfire, ride on ATVs, play games, etc. They had an excellent time and it helped them to form deeper bonds.
These are just some thoughts that came to mind now, but we will keep your question in mind in future writings. Thanks again:)
A superlative piece, far-reaching yet coherent. For me, your thoughts on the contingency of resilience formed the jewel center, or what the poet C. S. Giscombe would call "the eye of the duck," that sentience sighted in the bramble.
There are so many brilliant things in this post that I don't know what to highlight in a mere comment. But thank you both so much for sharing. Know that if (when) you publish a book on the "UnMachine" mind, I will buy it.
This quote is confusing me:
"What sunlight is to the vampire, recognition is to those who feel dehumanized."
Vampires hate sunlight because it destroys them. It seems like he is saying that recognition and attention can help those who feel dehumanized to reclaim their humanity. So recognition is like the opposite of sunlight to a vampire. Not really that important, but this was bothering me.
Good point -- you untangled a convoluted metaphor!
Love the concept of the "polar" generation - it's our job to turn that ship around now, and although we face a great crisis in our society on all fronts, we also have an immense opportunity at our fingertips - if we can only foster that creative instinct of children, it could be the manual override/ switch that shuts off AI.
It is very easy to dehumanize someone if we never meet them or touch them (and realize they are flesh and bones just like us). I appreciate you write about the process of collecting eggs and giving them to Jeff (not throwing at him). The process shows a typical effort to see a person as he is, here not just his cannabis smell, but his laughter, his voice, his interaction with the neighbor. Cannabis smell and coughing doesn't reduce him to be some demon. He proved that through your effort to interact.
However, social media and western media, though, does not try to make an effort. And we in the process of being information consumers, are reduced into devices to dehumanize others. It is easy to do this with a meme, a twitt (mosty feels like a yell/shout at others to me). It has to be short, an extract of anger or extreme polarized emotion. If it is long, nobody needs. Here all the nuances of being human are trimmed into a stark piercing piece of anger (5 -second videos, 280 words, 2 second memes). That anger penetrates the vulnerability of "consumers" - consuming. Here we have the storm of anger. Here we fracture.
The family’s egg gift also demonstrates a biblical principle of ‘Where your treasure is, your heart will be also’, as in the eggs were valuable and collected carefully, given thoughtfully and endearing the recipient to them.
I appreciate the point about attention. The gift of attention is extremely yvaluable, not just in dollar amounts, thinking of the amount of money corporations spend on advertising and influencers. It’s about our relationships, coming back to ‘embodied reality’ yet again.
“Where your treasure is, your heart will be also.”
This has always been one of my favorite verses, so brief, yet so powerful a reminder.
I add my feet to your suggestion that treading a path together out beyond isolation is the beautiful way forward.
It comes to mind that what’s happening is some kind of descent into an underworld where truth becomes more and more impossible to discern. The end result if we are lucky, is people will be so lost and fed up that a totally new paradigm for what is truth will emerge. Meanwhile, one can always let love as you understand it be your guide.
I’ve wondered this too. And perhaps what emerges is not necessarily a totally new paradigm, but a totally revived understanding of something that has always been there.
Thank you for your article.
Covid and Bitcoin are the events that have led me on this journey to look inward, to unravel the expectations created by others, to peel back the layers of traditions NOT of my making.
I applaud your decision to homeschool. Creative thinking, critical thought and independent strategies are in short supply traded for short term solutions tied to monetization that give shallow results.
You took the long term approach - an investment that pays dividends for the rest of your lives.
I am ashamed to say I took the convenient route. I thought study hard, get good scores equals a good job for life. End result - obedient drones, looking for approval/consent/acceptance, debt ridden and forever striving for the next dollar.
Not today.
The 2020 global lockdown woke me up. Angry. At myself. Every waking moment is spent - pulling down the curtain of delusion, kicking out the customs I thought of as my own and slowly climbing out of the engineered matrix created by those who think to control every aspect of my life.
1. Fiat is stacked against me - tax, inflation, devalued currency and increased interest rates - all forms of government theft.
Solution - think in Bitcoin. Government can't print it. Code is law -NOT man made regulation. I become my own bank. No third party. No permission needed.
2. Finding the real me. I didn't like what I found. Judgmental, them and us attitude, unrealistic expectations and really petty. There are many more -too numerous to count, but you get the idea.
Solution - Identify - turn into a positive value. Change the mindset. Still ongoing.
You invested in yourselves and your children. And you shared unreservedly. Thank you.
I'm investing in me. I'm learning to share.
That sounds like quite a journey, Christine. In the aftermath of 2020, it seems like a lot of people have been waking up and doing a big re-think about everything, tech, economics, identity, values, etc. And I think we are a long way, collectively, from being finished with this process.
The answer to the machine age is to stop acting like a machine--a person programmed to respond without thinking, regardless of our environment.
Thank you.
Thanks for reading Alistair:)
I have found your work & your wife's work very compelling, and it remains high-priority reading for me as I consider my relationship to my devices and technology.
What I notice, though, is a pretty consistent theme that centers people who are married and have children. I wonder if there is any word of hope or counsel in there for those of us who are single and live on our own. Obviously, since I'm reading this kind of stuff, the single-living-alone life is not what I hope for in the long term; I very much desire to meet someone and get married. But I wonder about what to do in the meantime. It doesn't help that my primary options for dating are via apps; and with so many of my friends now married, many with kids, they are naturally now turned inwards toward their own family life and less to friends like myself. I can't help feeling sort of superfluous, or optional, standing on the outside looking in. It becomes awkward to "insinuate" myself into someone else's domestic life for the sake of keeping friendships alive and preserving my own sanity. I'm plenty active in my church and various music groups, so I have lots to do, but there's just something missing for me as a single person. I'd love to know what you think.
Thanks for mentioning this. I think it’s a hugely important consideration, especially given that increasing numbers of people, like yourself, are single. I don’t have an immediate answer, but we will certainly keep it in mind. We really appreciate this kind of reader feedback, which brings our blind spots into awareness.
Thanks for your question. The fact that you are active in your church, music groups, and connect with families is very positive, and provides fertile ground for forming relationships. For someone who desires to meet someone and get married, it takes a lot of initiative to find like-minded people, and dating apps are not the most desirable avenue. We know several young singles who were in search of a marriage partner, who had to actively look around for churches with lots of unmarried young people, rather than stay in their home church which was composed of mostly families and seniors. This was a success for most of them, even though it took patience and persistence. One local church in our town organizes a bi-monthly folk dance evening, where lots of young people gather from throughout the region, providing a great opportunity for forming new connections. Are there any such regular events near you?
Young single men can play an important role for young teenage men. Recently a young single man from our church arranged a "guys weekend" for the teenage boys in our church where they had a chance to go fishing, have a campfire, ride on ATVs, play games, etc. They had an excellent time and it helped them to form deeper bonds.
These are just some thoughts that came to mind now, but we will keep your question in mind in future writings. Thanks again:)
A superlative piece, far-reaching yet coherent. For me, your thoughts on the contingency of resilience formed the jewel center, or what the poet C. S. Giscombe would call "the eye of the duck," that sentience sighted in the bramble.
The book collaboration between you and Ruth sounds excellent. I’ll be glad to read it and share it with friends.
There are so many brilliant things in this post that I don't know what to highlight in a mere comment. But thank you both so much for sharing. Know that if (when) you publish a book on the "UnMachine" mind, I will buy it.
I am happy to have found your work--and that of your wife’s! Please keep us posted on the book--I would be very interested.