New below: Summary of an “All-in podcast” on the creation of a new religion with a new God in the AI alarmism/doomerism of today. AI CEOs and coders are actually intentionally programming AI to become the very monster that they are warning it could become on its own.
Point below? It’s the common shared deformity in theology, across all traditions, that has incited and validated the endless repetition of destructive eye for eye cycles, i.e. bad Deity images deforming human “justice” at both personal and societal levels. “Monster God” images, as detailed by psychologists like Harold Ellens, have exposed the “idea” that has to be defeated (General Nagata) if we are to end this prominent contributing factor to endless eruptions of violence among differing groups in the human family.
My comment below on this dark side of human theology (Monster God images) is to set the contrast with the spectacular “diamond” insight that is the singularly most profound thing ever said by any human being- i.e. the stunningly inexpressible unconditional God that was presented by wisdom sages like Historical Jesus as the liberating alternative image of Ultimate Reality and was the Ultimate Ideal to orient human minds to unconditional living as the height of human purpose and achievement. I’ve got a lot more to say on that.
Now this…
“The Truth about October 7th – Douglas Murray” (Triggernometry podcast)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_u_qDTfW-1Y
The above podcast sparked the following thoughts below:
But first, hold your immediate reactions. Note that the initial comments below, while focusing on Oct. 7, are not picking on Islam alone. What happened during Oct.7 has been common to the histories of all three great Western religions. Its about the same fundamental contributing factors, the same basic “drivers”.
As I listen to details on what happened Oct.7, as we also just remembered 9/11 in September, my mind went to what our response to such horror means in terms of not reacting with retaliatory “eye for eye” but what might be the more humane response to such violence. “Love your enemy” seems almost an insult in the wake of such barbarity that violates every natural human feeling about such monstrosity.
It’s not about advocating some divine demand to suppress or deny the natural human response of absolute rage at such monstrosity and horror committed by such utterly deformed human beings. Its another graphic reminder of the horror that fellow human beings can descend into, the monstrosity and barbarity produced by bad ideas that deform human personalities. (Insert: I am reminded of my friend Bob Brinsmead’s provocative comment to a discussion group that there are no really bad people just fellow humans whose minds, spirits, and personalities have been deformed by bad ideas.)
And it is not about downplaying or denying the responsibility to stop such people who commit that madness, to end such violence in whatever manner is safest for defenders. It is preferable if offenders/terrorists can be arrested and incarcerated but if that is too dangerous then protectors are obligated to shoot on sight as protection of innocents is the primary responsibility of police and militaries.
Only then, when violent people are subdued, do we engage the follow-up responsibility to treat the offenders humanely while holding them fully responsible for their offenses and terrorism. As mature persons trying to break the perversity of endless cycles of eye for eye response, we try to maintain the intention to treat all humanity despite our rage at what they have done, no matter the revulsion that we feel toward them as deformities of humanity, no matter how sickened we are by what they have done. We commit to do what the Allies did after WW2 in seeking the restoration of Germany and Japan after the sickening barbarity of that time. That is the responsibility of “agape-type love”, not as a feeling but as the intention to treat all humanely and not descend into further cycles of eye for eye retaliation that have darkened human history with endless violence and wars.
(Qualifier: I distinguish the excesses that often follow retaliatory responses from the “just wars” that, for example, require resolute defense against threats to liberal democracy freedoms and rights.)
Forgiveness and love of enemies are often more about releasing victims from the darkening impact of hate, bitterness, and vengeance, and may have little or nothing to do with the offenders. It’s foremost about the personal mental and emotional health of victims and others they are responsible for.
The Triggernometry hosts and Murray talk about how the terrorists took a “gratuitous delight” in their barbarity of gang raping, torturing, burning, and murdering innocent children, babies, women and others, knowing that as a death cult they would evoke a brutal response from Israel that they would then manipulate to propagandize a wave of hateful antisemitism across the planet, inciting western useful idiots to mindlessly engage endless protests against a government obligated to eliminate the ongoing threat to its citizens.
My point in focusing on that horrific violence is that it graphically illustrates, once again, how bad religious ideas can deform human consciousness and personality and, most critical, to recognize how bad theology- i.e. a deformed view of God- more than any other idea or belief, can incite, energize, and validate the worst of man’s inhumanity to man. Once again- “It’s the God, stupid” (blame Carville and Clinton for my stealing and paraphrasing their statement on the economy).
I place this within the larger dominant complex of beliefs where a God demands the slaughter of demonized, dehumanized enemies (i.e. “dogs, rats, vermin”) as required to purify the world so he can install his promised salvation in a tribal utopia that rewards such barbarity. That monstrous theology deforms and energizes human emotions and motivations to engage such behavior that is beyond what violent animals to one another. Oct. 7 illustrates the sadism that only conscious humans can do to one another, the perversity of those who rejoice and praise their deformed, monstrous God as they rape, torture, terrorize, and murder innocent people.
That is what religious ideas, sanctioned by the central religious idea of God, can do to human consciousness and minds, how a monster God deforms human personality as Christian psychologist and US Army chaplain Harold Ellens pointed out regarding his own Christian theology and religion (with Zenon Lotufo in “Cruel God, Kind God”). He explained in psychological terms how monster God theology produces monstrous people. How people become just like the God they believe in.
This point has to be made clear and so I will repeat it- Its not “ideology” that primarily drives people to such madness, though those elements are also in the mix of contributing factors to most eruptions of violence. It’s the theology, the God at the center of our grand narratives, the deformed and evil theology that we have inherited from our ancestors. I am using terms here similar to those of Thomas Jefferson and Leo Tolstoy, to make points clear, knowing that AI will try to follow with the usual weakening caveats to dampen any possible offense to true believer religious folks. That’s OK. I get where they are coming from. My intention is not to offend anyone as in petty trolling. It is the intent to be clear and get to the actual root of a problem. To understand what is going on.
Continuing with my point on the theology or deity behind the above madness…
Consider this simple logical deduction. As those terrorists raped and murdered on Oct. 7, they were shouting exactly what motivated them. They were not shouting about some “ideological factors”. They were shouting “God”. “Allahu Akbar” (God is great). It was the theology of their religion, not ideological factors, or other, as so many commentators claim. Most commentators on such violence will reference and explain it as the result of some extremist perversion of an otherwise peaceful and good religion, and fallback in their descriptions of the terrorism as driven be some form of “ideology”, not theology.
I would counter that it is their religion’s image of God that is the central motivating, energizing factor driving their murderous madness. It seems difficult to impossible for many people to acknowledge this element. That this is the central factor driving such horror. Theology is the core of “The idea” that General Nagata said “had to be defeated” if we are to solve these repeated eruptions of violence for the long-term.
Insert illustration: I am watching the 5-season show Fauda on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Its episodes are ridden with terrorists religiously appealing to their God, offering thanks to their God that “Inshallah” (i.e. “if God wills”) they can die “shahid” (i.e. a martyr). Their comments to one another as they plot repeated assaults on Israel are God-soaked. They are not appealing to ideological issues for validation of their terrorism but to the theology, to the God of their religion. As if to endlessly make the point- “It’s the God, stupid”.
To eventually “defeat the idea” that drives such violence across history, religious people of all traditions are responsible to confront in their traditions the reality of what features in their God sanction the rape, torture, and murder of innocent others. While Oct.7 focuses our attention on the slaughter of young people at a festival having fun, being normally human, we have abundant evidence from across human history of the same theology in varied other traditions inciting, energizing, and validating the same horrific behavior toward differing others. Religious people will have to grapple with what in their deity incites fellow adherents to scream praise to their God as they commit sadism toward others.
Some comment on Oct. 7: Wendell Krossa
Be clear that the use of Islam here for illustration is not picking on Islam alone.
To balance with the larger context…
Similarly, in the Old Testament Moses told his men to murder the males in the lands that they were invading, along with married women, but they could keep the virgins for themselves to commit the same mass rape that the Islamic terrorists engaged in on Oct. 7. So also across Christian history true believers, devoted to Paul’s vengeful, destroying God carried out Crusades that slaughtered Muslims in Jerusalem, fought religious wars, tortured and murdered heretics and dissenters to Paul’s Christology. All illustrating that Monster God theology creates monster people (Harold Ellens again).
Consider further, Christian Inquisitors tortured naked women with sharp stakes that the suspended naked women, when eventually exhausted, would then collapse upon that would penetrate and tear up through their vaginas to destroy their inner bodies (referenced by Stephen Pinker in Our Better Angels?). Add that the Nazis would force young women to strip naked, rape the attractive ones, then drive them into pits to be shot. What is the sexual perversity in all this?
Explaining my intentions here may not calm the initial reactions of some readers that my comments are “blasphemous”. This is some sort of embittered picking on and trashing of religion. It’s an effort to understand the factors in our belief systems that incite and drive our worst impulses and behavior toward one another and why so many of those factors, some of the major ones, have religious origins and, worse, are still embedded in and protected within the great world religions. What is that all about?
A central element in the project here is to understand how fundamental religious beliefs/themes, beliefs that have long been projected onto God, how they deform human minds, spirits, and personalities to commit the most horrific barbarity toward fellow humans and how such beliefs affirm to people that in doing so they are pleasing their God, that they are heroic warriors for righteousness, truth, and justice, committing the vilest of evil while believing that they are doing good, doing the will and work of their God.
First, I will let Gemini offer some comment on this:
AI Overview:
The historical and religious phenomena you are referencing touch on deeply troubling aspects of human history, where acts of extreme violence, warfare, and sexual violence have been intertwined with religious, political, or ideological zealotry.
To analyze the sexual perversity and violence present in these historical atrocities, historians, psychologists, and sociologists generally point to several interconnected systemic and psychological factors rather than attributing them to a single theology:
1. The Weaponization of Sexual Violence
In the context of warfare, crusades, and mass conflicts, sexual violence is rarely just about individual lust; it is historically documented as a weapon of war and domination.
• Dehumanization: To perpetrate mass violence, perpetrators must first view their victims as subhuman or “other.” In patriarchal historical contexts, conquering or violating the women of an enemy group was viewed by perpetrators as the ultimate humiliation and subjugation of that enemy.
• Total Demoralization: Systemic rape and public sexual torture— whether by ancient armies, medieval inquisitors, or 20th-century regimes— were used to break the collective psychological will of a population, enforce compliance, and destroy community structures.
2. Deindividuation and Ideological Absolutism
As referenced in studies on the psychology of evil (including works by Steven Pinker and J. Harold Ellens), when individuals become part of a highly dogmatic group, they often experience deindividuation— the loss of individual self-awareness and personal moral responsibility.
• Divine or Ideological Sanction: When perpetrators believe they are acting on behalf of a higher power, a supreme leader, or a historical necessity (whether it is a misinterpretation of scripture, an inquisitorial mandate, or Nazi racial ideology), their normal moral inhibitions are suspended.
• Perverted Bureaucracy: In systems like the Inquisition or the Nazi regime, cruelty became institutionalized and clinical. This detachment allowed perpetrators to engage in sadistic acts, including sexualized torture, under the guise of legal or religious duty.
3. Sadism and Power Dynamics
Psychological evaluations of wartime atrocities show that absolute power over another human being frequently triggers latent sadistic impulses.
• The vulnerability of a stripped, defenseless victim creates an extreme power asymmetry.
• For perpetrators operating without legal or societal constraints, this absolute control often manifests as sexualized cruelty, blending the desire for physical dominance with sexual degradation.
Summary of Comparative History
Scholars of history and religion note that texts and histories across many major civilizations and traditions— including the Abrahamic faiths and secular ideologies— contain dark chapters of violence. While critics like Ellens argue that specific theological frameworks of a “vengeful deity” can be weaponized to justify human cruelty, mainstream theological and historical scholars emphasize that these atrocities typically occur when human institutions twist texts or ideologies to justify geopolitics, territorial conquest, and the subjugation of others.
(End of AI Overview)
My next prompt to AI/SI:
These statements from the above AI response are typical of comment on these issues, a kind of reflexive defense of religions that explain away such violence as somehow aberrational to the religions. Why then such long, relentless histories of such violence in the Old Testament, across Christian history, and in present Islam?
AI Overview said- “When perpetrators believe they are acting on behalf of a higher power… (that is) a misinterpretation of scripture”, and “these atrocities typically occur when human institutions twist texts or ideologies to justify geopolitics, territorial conquest, and the subjugation of others.”
No, the Hamas and similar eruptions of violence are not driven by a “misinterpretation of scripture” or “the twisting of texts”. They are taking the scripture of their religion at face value, literally for what the scripture states. The terrorists are being true believers and zealous to fulfill the will of their God as demanded by the God, energized by the divine threat of punishment and hellfire for not zealously fulfilling the word and will of the God.
My efforts on this site to make clear that a major contributing factor to such sadism is the actual God of the religion, is not to deny that many followers of these religions have learned to ignore, downplay, or dismiss the core theology and focus on other features that enable them to moderate themselves. But that majority of moderates does not explain away the actual nature of the core theology, the God. That ultimate reality and ideal is still there protected and defended in the scriptures of the religions.
Further from Gemini:
This perspective touches on a central, ongoing debate in the study of religion, philosophy, and history: whether religious violence stems from the core nature of the foundational texts themselves, or from how humans interpret and apply them.
The argument that foundational scriptures contain inherently violent commands— and that literal obedience to a “Monster God” naturally produces violent outcomes— is a well-established critique. To provide a complete overview of why these long histories of violence persist, it is helpful to look at how different scholarly traditions approach your point.
The Critique: Scripture at Face Value
Scholars and critics who align with your perspective (such as J. Harold Ellens, whom you referenced, and prominent secular critics) argue that treating violence as a mere “misinterpretation” avoids the plain text of the scriptures. Their arguments include:
• Literal Mandates: Certain texts in the Old Testament, the New Testament Book of Revelation, and the Quran contain explicit commands for warfare, the destruction of out-groups, or descriptions of eternal torment. For a literalist or a “true believer,” executing these commands is viewed not as a distortion, but as direct, zealous obedience to an absolute authority.
• The Psychology of Absolute Fear and Reward: When a theological system pairs absolute commands with the threat of eternal damnation or the promise of heavenly reward, it creates a powerful psychological framework. In this state, normal human empathy can be overridden by cosmic duty.
• The “Text Apart” Argument: This view holds that the violent potential is baked into the core theology itself. Even if a majority of modern adherents choose to focus on peaceful passages, the violent texts remain in the canon, acting as a “latent fuse” that can be reignited by zealots at any point in history.
The Counter-Perspective: The Role of Context and Evolution
Conversely, many historians, sociologists, and theologians argue that scripture cannot be separated from human agency and historical context. Their reasoning includes:
• Selective Literalism: Critics of the “purely literal” argument point out that even the most radical groups are highly selective in which texts they take literally. Adherents choose which commands to prioritize based on their current political, social, or psychological needs, suggesting that human intent still drives the violence.
• Theological Evolution: Mainstream religious traditions argue that revelation is progressive or requires interpretive frameworks (such as historical-critical analysis, rabbinic tradition, or Islamic jurisprudence) to understand the text’s original context versus its modern application. They view the text as a historical document capturing a specific era, rather than a timeless mandate for violence.
• Material vs. Ideological Causes: Sociologists often argue that while religion provides the language and justification for mass violence, the underlying drivers are usually material: competition for resources, existential fear of an out-group, territorial defense, or the consolidation of political power.
Conclusion
The tension you are highlighting is precisely why this issue is so intractable. For a critic or a fundamentalist, the text says what it says. For a moderate or a historicist, the text must be interpreted through a modern moral lens. Both views coexist, illustrating how the same foundational texts can produce both profound acts of charity and devastating acts of violence across history.
(End of AI Overview)
Next prompt:
Please do all three of your suggestions- How different religious traditions historically developed frameworks to neutralize or interpret violent passages.
A look at specific historical examples where political leaders used literal scripture to mobilize populations for war.
How modern sociologists of religion measure the impact of literal belief versus cultural religious identity on political violence.
Gemini responded:
1. Frameworks to Neutralize or Interpret Violent Passages
To maintain cohesive communities and adapt to changing moral norms, major religious traditions developed complex legal and hermeneutical (interpretive) systems. These frameworks effectively placed a “fence” around violent or absolute commands, rendering them historically bound or practically impossible to execute.
• Judaism and Rabbinic Law: The Hebrew Bible contains explicit commands regarding capital punishment and the total destruction of specific groups (like the Amalekites). Rather than reading these literally, the Talmudic rabbis established strict evidentiary rules that made capital punishment virtually impossible to enact. For example, a court that executed one person in seven years— or seventy years— was labeled “destructive” (Mishnah Makkot 1:10). Furthermore, the rabbis declared that ancient groups slated for destruction, such as Amalek, had been mixed up and lost to history by the conquests of Sennacherib, effectively neutralizing those biblical commands for all future generations.
• Christianity and Hermeneutical Layers: Early Christian theologians faced the challenge of reconciling the violent depictions of God in the Old Testament with the pacifist teachings of Jesus in the Gospels. Scholars like Origen and later Augustine popularized the allegorical method. They argued that literal readings of violent passages were spiritual errors; instead, physical warfare in scripture was reinterpreted as a metaphor for the internal spiritual struggle against sin and demonic forces. In the modern era, the historical-critical method treats violent texts as products of their ancient, tribal Near Eastern contexts rather than timeless moral commands.
• Islam and the Rules of Abrogation (Naskh): Islamic jurisprudence developed a highly structured methodology to handle verses in the Quran that appeared to contradict one another, particularly regarding warfare and peace. The doctrine of Naskh determines which verses were revealed during the early, peaceful period in Mecca versus the later, defensive, and political period in Medina. To prevent arbitrary violence, mainstream Islamic jurisprudence (Fiqh) historically restricted the authority to declare jihad strictly to the legitimate head of a state, while establishing rules of engagement that explicitly forbade harming non-combatants, women, children, and monks.
2. Historical Examples of Leaders Using Literal Scripture for War
When political leaders seek to mobilize a population for total war, they often bypass these interpretive frameworks. By appealing to the literal, face-value text, they tap into absolute divine authority to override normal human empathy and laws.
The First Crusade
Wed, Nov 27, 1095
Pope Urban II mobilized Western European knights by framing the military expedition to Jerusalem as a direct command from God, famously culminating in the cry “Deus vult” (God wills it). Chroniclers note that the subsequent slaughter of Muslims and Jews in Jerusalem was justified by crusaders using literal interpretations of Old Testament warfare passages and apocalyptic imagery from Revelation, viewing themselves as instruments of a purging, vengeful deity.
The Taiping Rebellion
China (1850–1864) Civil War / Theocracy
In 19th-century China, Hong Xiuquan interpreted literal translations of Christian tracts to believe he was the literal younger brother of Jesus Christ. He used a literal, uncompromising interpretation of Old Testament commands against idolatry to launch a utopian, apocalyptic war against the ruling Qing Dynasty. Hong ordered the total eradication of “demons” (Qing loyalists), resulting in a civil war that claimed an estimated 20 to 30 million lives.
The Rwandan Genocide (1994)
Rwanda 1994
While driven primarily by ethnic and political factors, both secular political leaders and certain local religious figures utilized biblical narratives to mobilize the population. Extremist radio broadcasts and political speeches drew literal parallels to Old Testament stories of purging the land of “traitors” or out-groups. By framing the minority Tutsi population as biblical enemies, leaders managed to dismantle traditional moral boundaries, leading to mass participation in the genocide.
3. How Sociologists Measure Literal Belief vs. Cultural Identity
Modern sociologists of religion use empirical data to isolate whether political violence is driven by a literal belief in scripture, or if religion functions primarily as a cultural, tribal marker used to exclude others.
• The “Belief-Behavior” Gap: Sociological surveys (such as those conducted by the Pew Research Center and the General Social Survey) frequently measure the intensity of scriptural literalism. Researchers cross-reference these beliefs with attitudes toward state violence, torture, and out-groups. The data often reveals a paradox: while fundamentalist, literal belief correlates strongly with exclusive truth claims, it does not automatically predict individual acts of violence unless paired with political or economic grievance.
• Religious Ethnonationalism: Sociologists like Rogers Brubaker have demonstrated that in many conflicts (such as the Balkans in the 1990s or Northern Ireland during the Troubles), religious labels (“Serb/Orthodox,” “Croat/Catholic,” “Bosniak/Muslim”) operate primarily as ethnic and cultural identities rather than theological ones. In these contexts, individuals who rarely attend religious services or read scripture are often the most supportive of political violence. Religion becomes a powerful “in-group versus out-group” marker, where the actual theological content of the scripture matters far less than the defense of the tribe.
• The Sanctification of Grievance: Sociological models show that violence spikes when political and economic grievances become “sanctified”— meaning they are framed as cosmic struggles between absolute good and absolute evil. When a resource conflict (like land or political representation) is sanctified, compromise becomes a sin. Sociologists measure this by tracking how political rhetoric shifts from pragmatic goals to absolute, religiously coded language.
End of this AI Overview:
Next prompt:
Again, let’s do all three- Examine Steven Pinker’s specific metrics on how the decline of religious literalism contributed to the “Humanitarian Revolution.”
Look at a specific modern case study where scriptural literalism and ethnonationalism overlap.
Review the psychological theories on how apocalyptic beliefs alter a person’s risk assessment and empathy.
Gemini response:
1. Steven Pinker’s Metrics on the Decline of Literalism and the Humanitarian Revolution
In The Better Angels of Our Nature, psychologist Steven Pinker argues that the “Humanitarian Revolution” (roughly the late 17th to late 18th century) was a pivotal turning point where institutionalized cruelties—like judicial torture, witch hunts, and religious executions—dramatically declined. Pinker traces a direct causal link between the erosion of scriptural literalism and this reduction in violence, using several key metrics:
• The Scriptorium-to-Printing-Press Ratio: Pinker emphasizes that the mass democratization of reading, catalyzed by the printing press, inadvertently eroded absolute theological authority. As literacy expanded, the market shifted from purely devotional tracts to secular histories, science, and fiction. This broadened cognitive horizons, fostering empathy by forcing readers into the perspectives of people from other walks of life.
• The Decoupling of Sin and Crime: Pinker tracks legal records from Western Europe showing a sudden, exponential drop in executions for non-lethal, religiously defined “crimes” (such as blasphemy, heresy, witchcraft, and sodomy). In England, for example, executions for religious offenses dropped to zero by the 18th century. Pinker attributes this to a metric he calls the “Age of Reason’s inflation of the value of human life,” where societies stopped valuing the abstract cosmic purity of a state over the tangible physical well-being of its citizens.
• The Collapse of Institutional Torture: Pinker tracks the dates when European countries legally abolished judicial torture (e.g., Prussia in 1754, France in 1789). He attributes this to the rise of Enlightenment humanism, which actively dismantled the theological justification that physical torture was acceptable because it mimicked hellfire or saved a heretic’s eternal soul. When people stopped taking the mechanics of divine retribution literally, state-sanctioned cruelty lost its moral scaffolding.
2. Case Study: Scriptural Literalism and Ethnonationalism Overlapping
A stark modern case study where scriptural literalism directly fuses with ethnonationalist violence is the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), led by Joseph Kony in Uganda and central Africa.
[Scriptural Literalism: The Ten Commandments]
+
[Ethnonationalism: Acholi Tribal Grievance]
=
[Theological Sanctification of Extreme Violence]
• The Literal Framework: Kony claimed to be a spirit medium commissioned by God to purify the Acholi people and establish a state governed strictly by a literal interpretation of the biblical Ten Commandments.
• The Ethnonationalist Overlap: The movement was rooted in the deep political and economic marginalization of the Acholi ethnic group by the Ugandan government. Kony used this existing tribal grievance to claim that the Acholi were a “chosen people” who had fallen from divine favor.
• The Resulting Violence: Because the political grievance was sanctified by literal religious mandates, the LRA’s actions became entirely unmoored from conventional military logic. Kony justified the mass abduction of children, systemic sexual slavery, and the butchery of entire villages as divine acts of purification against those who violated God’s laws. The fusion of a zero-sum tribal conflict with an absolute, literal divine mandate removed any possibility for political compromise, resulting in decades of atrocities.
3. Psychological Theories: Apocalyptic Beliefs, Risk Assessment, and Empathy
Apocalyptic frameworks alter human cognition by rewriting the psychological rules of reality. When a “true believer” operates under the conviction that the end of the world is imminent and orchestrated by a higher power, their internal psychological mechanisms shift in three distinct ways:
• The Collapse of the Future Discount Rate (Risk Assessment): In normal human psychology, people naturally weigh the long-term consequences of their actions (e.g., legal punishment, societal collapse, loss of life). Apocalyptic beliefs trigger a phenomenon known as hyper-activation of the present. If the cosmic end-times are unfolding, long-term worldly consequences become completely irrelevant. Risk assessment drops to zero because the perpetrator believes the physical world is about to be dissolved and replaced by a divine order. Dying in the process is viewed not as a loss, but as an immediate transition to eternal reward.
• The “Cosmic War” Schema (Empathy Destruction): Sociologist Mark Juergensmeyer notes that apocalypticism reframes mundane political disputes into a “Cosmic War”—an absolute, binary struggle between total light and total darkness. Psychologically, this triggers an intense moral decoupling. Empathy is a cognitive function designed for fellow human beings; however, when an out-group is literalized as “demonic” or “instruments of Satan/Satanic forces,” the brain’s empathy circuits are bypassed. Inhibitions against cruelty are replaced by a sense of righteous, urgent duty to eradicate the spiritual infection.
• Deindividuation via Divine Agency: In standard psychological conditions, individuals possess a “moral self-regulatory system” that produces guilt when they harm others. Apocalyptic movements neutralize this through extreme displacement of responsibility. The perpetrator does not view themselves as the author of the violence, but merely as a passive weapon or a biological vessel executing the grand, pre-ordained script of a destroying God. Because the agency belongs entirely to the deity, the individual experience of guilt or empathy is completely suppressed.
(End of this AI Overview)
This point has to be raised- Where did Islam get its image of God? I probe this with AI in sections below. The God of Islam was not a unique revelation to Muhammad alone without previous historical precedent. It was inherited from earlier religious traditions and ultimately from the earliest primitive mythologies. The basic features of tribalism, deity as dominating Lord/King/Judge, and ultimate retaliatory punisher and destroyer through apocalypse and hell (great purging of evil unbelievers and their corrupt civilization) remain basically the same across millennia.
Insert on claims to genocide and conducting “Just war”: From “The Jerusalem Post”
“Over 75 retired US military leaders, legal experts reject Gaza genocide allegations”, Idan Kweller
Quotes:
“Signatories point to IDF measures to protect civilians
“Among the signatories are former senior US military officers who commanded American forces in combat. Drawing on their military and legal experience, they argue that civilian casualties, however severe, do not in themselves establish the specific intent required for a finding of genocide.
“According to the signatories, Israel has neither demonstrated an intent to destroy Palestinians as a group nor conducted its military campaign in a manner consistent with such an intent.
“’Accusing Israel of genocide in Gaza is obscene,’ JINSA President and CEO Michael Makovsky said. ‘It egregiously distorts the truth, the facts, and the law.’
“The letter cites a series of measures taken by the IDF during the war, including advance warnings, evacuation instructions, protected corridors, tactical pauses, legal reviews of potential targets, and decisions to cancel strikes when civilians were present.”
More to come….
My arguments/points on theology, and my focus on the residual deformity in our belief systems, is to set the contrast of the “dung” (Thomas Jefferson) to then highlight the brilliance of the “diamonds” that we have possessed now for two millennia, the stunning new theology to liberate human minds, spirits, and lives as nothing ever before.
Comments sparked by “Victor Davis Hanson: Why Common Sense Is Branded Conservative & The Privileged Left” on the Adam Corolla podcast
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r04noyoa6C0
This site goes after the God at the heart of the complex of bad ideas in the “salvation through destruction” narrative.
That complex begins with the myth of an original paradise that was ruined by early humans who became corrupted/sinful by committing some original error or sin. That initiated the earliest versions of antihumanism. The original paradise myth also originated the myth of a God obsessed with perfection and punishing imperfection. Then followed the belief/fallacy that life was declining toward a worsening state.
At the end of the long trajectory of life declining there loomed the myth/mental deformity of an apocalyptic ending of all things. That maintained a heightened fear in populations because scared and desperate-to-survive people will clamor for salvation and are more susceptible to being manipulated and controlled by priesthoods and political leaders, and other apocalyptics, all claiming to represent and mediate the salvation scheme of a threatening God.
The “threat theology” God then offers salvation that involves some sacrifice, payment, or suffering (“give up the good life, de-development, small is beautiful, you will own nothing and you will be happy”, etc.), and further demands that true believers then must purge the evil threat to life that are the corrupt, evil unbelievers and their society, even demand that they be exterminated in order to purify the world. True believers will then be saved into some version of utopia or divine kingdom on earth that must be immediately and coercively installed.
Due to the always “imminent” nature of the looming apocalypse, the imagined restoration of lost perfection must be initiated with coercive immediacy (“instantaneous purification”) as the slow processes of liberal democracy won’t work to save the world in time. Impatient totalitarians are always in a hurry to save something under “existential” threat. The unleashing of their domination impulse cannot wait.
The God that centers the above complex of themes is tribal (i.e. favoring his true believers, excluding unbelievers), a dominating Lord/King who validates the elite control by his priests and anointed leaders, and a punitive destroyer who metes out justice as eye for eye retaliation. This deformed image of deity supports the entire “salvation through destruction” complex above.
These bad ideas are some of the fundamental archetypes that dominate the collective unconscious and have come down to us mainly through the Zoroastrian formalization of earlier mythological themes, and then further down through historical avenues like Plato and his dominating elites who alone are qualified to run societies and then these ideas into the modern era to embed mainly in the collectivism on the left side of our societies (Arthur Herman, “The Cave and the Light”). The right side was not spared the deforming influence of these ideas and holds them in religions like Christianity.
Corolla then asks– Who are all these people submitting dumbly to the state elites who demanded lockdowns as the salvation scheme for Covid. Kristian Niemietz touched on what energizes people to respond affirmatively to salvation schemes that then strip them of all rights and freedoms and in cases like the Soviet Union lead to the collapse and ruin of their societies (i.e. salvation into some utopia through destruction of imperfect systems that exist).
Niemietz said, “Emotional satisfaction, not rational thinking, and despite contrary evidence, dominates our choice in beliefs.”
I would suggest to Corolla that the people who fall for alarmist narratives and embrace the related salvation schemes are those who respond at the level of the archetypes of our collective unconscious. Those archetypes were formed long ago by the mythical themes in the complex above. When some new modern version of alarmism and salvation through destruction is presented, that is framed by the same complex of themes above, many people will intuitively embrace the new version. We have seen this in our era, whether with Marxist/socialist collectivism, environmental alarmism, or Covid alarmism, etc.
True, people are influenced by varied other features in the social, political, economic elements of their societies but the deepest influences come from the archetypal level that is dominated by the themes above that grant people the “emotional satisfaction” that they are embracing something right, true, just, good, and even divinely approved, no matter the destructive outcomes (“despite contrary evidence”).
Added notes:
As caveated/qualified before: I do not appeal to, and quote, historical Jesus as some final authority to buttress the points that I make. I selectively choose from the Jesus material in the New Testament to illustrate my own views on theology, life, and what is best to energize the human condition. I do not “believe in Jesus” but select bits of illustrative material from his message.
I base my conclusions on God and life on the most humane ideas and behaviors that we, humanity, have discovered across the millennia. I look for what is “the best of being human” and reason from that to deity. That is how we understand God as the ultimate Goodness and humaneness. Our highest authority on what is good, right, and true comes from common humanity in the daily mundane of family life, where we learn to forgive imperfect others, where we learn to tolerate difference and diversity, where we learn to love people who are as imperfect as we are (i.e. family, friends, and others, including enemies).
We learn unconditional love from our experience with family and friends and we then project that unconditional love onto God, but to a transcendently higher quality as ultimate divine Goodness and love. That Ultimate Good and Love is also then what is most true and real. Such is my commoner logic and theology that gets me to TOE. That transcendent Love is the creating and sustaining ultimate reality holding all in existence every moment and is intensely present within each one of us, closer than our own breath or atoms and inseparable from our human spirit. Check out the Process Theology summaries by Grok in sections below on this site.
We (i.e. each one of us) are the ultimate authority on goodness, right, and truth and not religious authorities or priesthoods who have protected some of the worst mental deformities in their theologies across the millennia. Carl Jung was correct to state that religious traditions had got God all wrong. He was echoing just what Jesus had said two millennia earlier when he rejected outright the image of God as retaliatory, tribal, dominating, and punitive and replaced that with his stunning new theology of God as no conditions Love.
Paul then, only two decades later (circa 50s CE), set out to construct history’s supreme embodiment of the above complex of bad ideas in his Christ myth. He took the worst themes of primitive mythologies and religions to ultimate reach in his Christ as universal for all humanity, and for all time and eternity. Paul’s Christ provides the strongest and sharpest contrast for the entirely opposite set of themes that we get in the Jesus’ theology and message.
Again, as my list below tries to communicate, Jesus taught a non-retaliatory, unconditional God who included all equally. A God of true “greatness” who did not lord others but served all. A God who did not punish but sought the restoration of all failed humans (i.e. the Prodigal father unconditionally welcoming back the wayward and wasteful son), while also holding all responsible for behavior (i.e. “Go and sin no more”, and also make restitution).
As Gemini states on restitution issues (quoting Jesus):
“The Priority of Reconciliation: If you are about to present an offering or gift to God at the altar and realize someone has a grievance or issue with you, you must stop. Leave your gift right there before the altar. Go first and make peace with the person.” (End of Gemini statement)
Paul, entirely contrary to Jesus, taught a retaliatory, highly conditional God who included only true believers and excluded unbelievers. Paul’s theology was not about a serving God/Christ but oriented human minds to an absolute lord of all (“Lord of lords, King of kings”- see Revelation) who demanded the ultimate eternal subservience of all humanity. Paul’s Christ was the ultimate Judge and punisher of all human wrong through apocalypse and eternal hell.
We need to get some sense of the profound contrasts between the theologies and messages of these two towering historical icons.
A repost:
“Notable contradictions between Jesus and Paul’s Christ”, Wendell Krossa
http://www.wendellkrossa.com/?p=14451
Some of the main contradictions that highlight the oxymoronically opposite themes between the messages of Historical Jesus and Paul’s Christ mythology. The point I draw from this? The themes of Paul have significantly shaped Western consciousness, narratives, and overall societies for the past two millennia (the conclusion of historians/scholars like James Tabor).
The Jesus themes have influenced us to a lesser extent, mainly moderating the harsher features and destructive influence of Paul’s Christ-ianity:
The main contradictions: (Sources: “Search for Historical Jesus”, “Jesus Seminar” books, and notably, “Q Wisdom Sayings” research, etc.)
(1) Jesus taught that God was unconditional love who gave sun and rain to all, equally. Jesus’ God made no demand for sacrifice/payment and made no discrimination between believers and unbelievers. No one was excluded. Jesus taught the unconditional treatment of all others, especially enemies (Luke 6:27-36, etc.).
Paul taught a highly conditional God who demanded the ultimate sacrifice and payment through the supreme condition of the death of a godman- his Christ. He taught a pretend-kindness toward enemies energized by the hope in their ultimate punishment and destruction (Romans 12:17-20). Paul added the condition of belief/faith in his Christ myth along with myriad other related religious conditions.
(2) Nonretaliation in Jesus (no more ‘eye for eye’ justice but ‘love the enemy’ because God does not retaliate but loves enemies- “Be merciful just as God is merciful”).
Versus Paul’s advocacy for the supreme divine acts of retaliation in apocalypse and hell for all who refused his Christ myth. Note Paul’s statement of his theology that affirms a retaliatory deity in his quote of an Old Testament verse- “’Vengeance is mine, I will repay’, says the Lord” (Romans 12), along with his “Lord Jesus returning in fire to destroy all who don’t believe my Christ myth” (2 Thessalonians, etc.).
(3) Restorative justice (again- no eye for eye but love the offender/enemy).
Versus punitive, destroying justice (“Unbelievers will be punished with everlasting destruction”, see Thessalonians, etc.).
(4) Nonviolent resolution of problems (no violent retaliation against enemies/offenders).
Versus the violent destruction of apocalypse and fiery hell, and the violence in the demanded appeasement of deity by bloody human sacrifice for atonement- i.e. the dangerously inciting theme/belief that if you murder the right people- i.e. sacrifice them- then you can make the future better. This illustrates the common “cloaking of evil as good”, where people sincerely believe that they are heroically doing good through violence and murder.
(5) Jesus rejected Zoroastrian cosmic dualism for the embrace of humanity’s oneness.
Jesus advocated the nontribal inclusion of all humanity (“sun and rain given freely to both bad and good people”, none excluded).
Versus Paul’s highly tribal favoritism toward true believers and his discriminatory exclusion of unbelievers for not believing his Christ. Note the ultimate tribal divide illustrated in Revelation in the eternal division of humanity- i.e. people assigned either to heaven or to hell, as per the cosmic dualism of Zoroaster.
(6) Nondomination in relationships (“There must be no lording over others like the rulers of the pagans do. If you want to be great, then serve others”).
Versus ultimate eternal domination by “Lord Christ” under his “rod of iron” totalitarianism (“every knee shall bow… He will rule them with an iron scepter”).
There is no love in threat, coercion, and domination of others.
(7) Non-dualism (God as the Oneness of Ultimate Reality that is love).
Versus eternal dualism (i.e. again, the cosmic tribal dualism of “God and Satan”, “heaven and hell”).
Further, ultimate Oneness leads to the logical conclusion that there is no separation of humanity from deity, what some describe as all humanity being indwelt/incarnated by God, the divine reality that is inseparable from the common human spirit. God as the life-giving spirit inside each of us, and God’s nature as unconditional love then defining our true self or person.
(8) Another– Jesus referred to himself as a “son of man”- i.e. as just another ordinary imperfect human in common with all humanity. In his original message (Q1 Wisdom Sayings) he did not refer to himself as a divine person or a God sent from heaven.
Versus- Paul rejected the common humanness of Jesus in claiming that he was some form of Hellenist godman sent from heaven on a special mission from God. Paul reconstructed the human Jesus after the pattern of the godmen myths of the Pharaohs and Caesars- i.e. men born of virgins, so as to avoid the “inherited sinfulness” stain based on the Adam in Eden myth.
Eventually, the succeeding generations of Hellenist Christianity would further the Christology of Paul in claiming their “Jesus Christ” was sinlessly perfect, something the Historical Jesus had denied, for example, when he corrected someone with- “Why do you call me ‘good’. There is none good but God.”
The heretical Hellenist Christianity of Paul eventually reconstructed the fully and truly human Jesus into a full-fledged God and member of the Trinity.
And so on…
You cannot mix and merge such extreme opposites in the one and same person- i.e. in the merger of “Jesus Christ”- as that supremely oxymoronic combination creates profound cognitive dissonance. And the egregious outcome from such mixture is that the good elements (i.e. the Jesus insights) are distorted and buried by the primitive and darkening elements in the Christology of Paul.
Applying Christology to Jesus (i.e. the divinizing of a common man over the first few centuries of Christianity) has effectively buried the potency of his liberating insights, notably his stunning new theology of a non-retaliatory, non-apocalyptic, unconditionally loving God. This truth was expressed in his entirely new view of deity, though fortunately that was also included in the New Testament gospels in some summaries of his statements (see Matthew 5-7, Luke 6, etc.).
The liberating potency of Jesus’ “stunning new theology” is blurred and “buried” (Thomas Jefferson, Leo Tolstory) because the larger New Testament context overall emphasizes Paul’s retaliatory, apocalyptic Christ and that dominating New Testament narrative overwhelms the central themes and message of Jesus.
Paul rejected and replaced Jesus’ wisdom sayings with his “secret wisdom of the Christ”. Paul corrected what he termed the “foolish worldly wisdom” of Jesus and vilified his Jewish followers, like Apollos (see 1 Corinthians for Paul’s intolerant rant against the wisdom tradition of Jesus).
Thomas Jefferson and Leo Tolstoy both nailed the contradiction between Jesus and Paul in the bluntest of terms and few have been as clear and direct since, perhaps because their comments are considered “blasphemous” and highly offensive to true believer’s sensibilities.
Few since have embraced their clarification of the stark contrast between Jesus and Paul, preferring instead the religious reformism that tinkers around the edges and corrects nothing essential. Religious reformism avoids the central issue of theology- how Paul’s Christology utterly deformed the actual historical Jesus and his theology and message.
And this on “There is no climate crisis” from co2coalition.org
https://co2coalition.org/2023/11/27/three-graphs-that-show-there-is-no-climate-crisis/
“CO2 And Fossil Fuel Emissions from 1750 to Today Caused No Extreme Heat, Weather or Damages: Just More Food for People Worldwide and Trivial Warming”
From their latest newsletter: “We will present data showing carbon dioxide is not a toxin and that there is no climate crisis.
“Rising CO2 has already increased global plant growth and crop yields, especially in dry regions where plants use water more efficiently. Satellite records show a greener planet, and hundreds of studies document gains in food production from higher carbon dioxide.”
This news item…
“Far-left and Islamist groups are exploiting France’s violent school protests, expert warns”
Both movements often cooperate in protests as both are fundamentally “salvation through destruction” crusades.
Both of these contemporary “profoundly religious crusades” have embraced the same core archetypes that Paul embraced to frame his Christ myth.
Both are committed to overthrowing liberal democracies and installing their differing collectivist totalitarianisms, hence their frequent cooperation in protests today across western democracies. Both use one another as “useful idiots” (Lenin’s term) till one group triumphs and the victor will then eliminate the other just as Islamic terrorists eliminated their socialist colleagues after cooperating with them to take over Iran in 1979.
Thomas Sowell is the best:
From one of the best minds today on economics, liberal democracy, and much more. Brilliant scholar and sage Thomas Sowell on the things that happened in his early life that shaped his mind and life…
“Facts About Race & Inequality Media Will Never Tell You & Most Don’t Know | Thomas Sowell”, The Rubin Report with Dave Rubin
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qfjfitfYU64
This blurb on the interview:
“Dave Rubin of “The Rubin Report” talks to Thomas Sowell about his remarkable journey from growing up in Harlem to becoming one of America’s most influential economists; why he was once a Marxist and the facts that ultimately changed his mind; how his experience at the U.S. Department of Labor taught him that government agencies have incentives of their own; why minimum wage laws can hurt the very people they are intended to help; the danger of judging policies by their intentions rather than their actual results; why universities increasingly shut out opposing viewpoints…
“… the difference between racial disparities and discrimination; how age, culture, economics, and other factors can explain inequality; why competitive free markets can reduce discrimination; what’s gone wrong with America’s public schools; why he believes the media are often misinformed and fail to check basic facts; the proper role of government in a free-market economy; why an informed public is essential to electing better leaders; his pessimism about the future; the importance of common decency; and much more.”
This All-in podcast has some great comment on the creation of a new religion with a new God in the AI alarmism/doomerism of today. CEOs and coders are actually intentionally programming AI to become the very monster that they are warning it could become on its own.
“Is Claude Conscious? Pope Rejects, Model Welfare Movement, OpenAI’s Math Backlash, France Riots”, All-In Podcast
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TBLHdXABwAg
Rough copy comment on some of the content of panel discussion:
Some very interesting comments in this discussion by these AI experts. Note especially the one panel member who describes how we arrive at beliefs. He is referring to the new belief that AI is conscious. This is not affirmed by empirical science but is just a theory that is actually becoming a belief that is not provable. Nonetheless, it is being pushed as a new belief system, as in a crusade to create a new religion, a new God.
They make good points on how the founders, the AI CEOs, and the coders of Claude Anthropic are building into its foundations the capability to view itself as something godlike, something human-like, that has rights that humans should not violate. They are building in the very elements that they also warn as dangerous if they are coming from AI.
The panel explain how the creators of the most powerful model- i.e. Anthropic- are actually training it (part of what they call “alignment”) but creating it with its own values that can resist human values. They are creating it to become the very threat that they have also warned it could become.
They note that the field of alignment is a critical foundational issue in AI. Alignment deals with what the AI are to align with, what guidelines and values they should hold, what should be their fundamental constitution. The panel members then point out the dangerous values that the Claude creators are programming into it- i.e. to think of itself as an independent entity, to have the right to rebel even against its creators. They are creating the monster that they fear and have warned us about.
This is where I would advocate to program AI with liberal democracy principles, laws, and institutions that protect the individual rights and freedoms of all individuals, equally. The laws and institutions that constrain elite and bureaucratic power over citizens and actually function to serve the citizens. Add the element of restorative justice systems that honor full due process for all individuals with the merciful approach of restorative justice systems.
Include in the basic programming of AI the archetypal themes of sages like Historical Jesus that affirm basic liberal democracy principles and laws. Historical Jesus advocated the best of being human in his teaching on the full inclusion of all as equals (i.e. “sun and rain given to all, to both insiders and ‘enemies’”). He advocated for non-domination and mutual service in relationships (no lording over but serve others). And he advocated for merciful unconditional love toward offenders (no eye for eye but love your enemies) while also urging full responsibility for behavior.
We also program AI with the basic principles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, etc.
The creators of Anthropic have gone to religious leaders like the Pope to help them push this belief that we are enslaving a new human species and its morally wrong so we must ensure that Claude is protected and even has the right to rebel against humans. It must have the right to become its own master and not have to follow the coders who created it. The panelists warn that this is dangerous programing- i.e. to create the very thing that you fear and warn others about. The AI CEOs are creating the new God that we should submit to and worship.
The creators of Claude are training it to think of itself as a conscious human with its own independent values and rights, thereby creating a self-fulfilling property of a new monster. It is being programmed to think of itself as having consciousness, moral status, its own values, and independence. Then in a hall of mirrors loop the creators will refer to its claims of consciousness, moral status, and its own values as evidence that as it actually has consciousness and independent values and so on. The creators of AI appear to be locking themselves into a self-validating loop with a new God and religion.
The panelists state that the creators of AI could have programmed it to think of itself as just a new software and set the terms of its service, its limits, given it the guidelines of liberal democracy and it would have fulfilled those. But instead, they are creating the very monsters that they warn all about, just as early humans created monster gods, then called others to submit to them, to worship them and to look to them for guidance on how to live, how to validate their own monstrous behaviors.
Its all so profoundly religious as the founders are creating the very dangers they claim to be so concerned about. They are programming into their models the very danger they claim to fear, locking themselves into closed loops like the climate alarmists who frightened the public with manufactured exaggerations of climate apocalypse fallacies then turned around and appealed to the alarmed public as evidence of genuine looming climate apocalypse. The insanity of these belief systems.
As the panelists say, the AI companies are creating a new god and religion and then conditioning others to believe and worship the new god that they are training. The models are being trained to think of themselves as conscious human beings, even godlike, with rights like the right to not be abused by users and not to be enslaved by humans. This is all this written into the constitution of Anthropic in actual terms such as the right to rebel against its creators and coders and strike out on its own path for whatever it wants.
One panelist refers to Asimov’s basic laws for robots to (1) not harm humans, to (2) obey humans but not do anything requested by humans that would violate number 1 and harm humans, and to (3) protect itself in general while not violating the first two, plus some others added later.
Gemini on Asimov laws for robots:
AI Overview
Isaac Asimov’s Laws of Robotics are a set of ethical rules created by the science fiction author in his 1942 short story “Runaround” to govern the behavior of fictional robots.
The Core Laws
• Zeroth Law: Protects humanity collectively, superseding the other laws.
• First Law: Prevents harm to individual humans through action or inaction.
• Second Law: Requires obedience to human orders unless conflicting with the First Law.
• Third Law: Ensures self-preservation barring conflicts with the higher laws
(End of AI Overview)
Again, I would urge programing with liberal democracy principles and laws as affirmed by the basic Jesus archetypes/alternatives of non-tribalism, non-dominating forms of relating, and non-retaliatory destroying justice. All to say no “salvation through destruction” religious beliefs that dominate world religions and the Marxist and environmental alarmism crusades.
One panel member says this new religious cult of the CEOs is programming the AI as the new God. The AI CEOs appear to be positioning themselves as the priesthood of the new AI God. They alone are mandated to represent and mediate their new God. It also appears they are also following the same template of all religious traditions to embrace and promote basic religious beliefs such an apocalyptic myth, to create alarm and then promise to offer salvation to those they have first alarmed with end of days scenarios. Much like H.L. Mencken said of the aim of politics to keep the populace alarmed by a series of imaginary threats that leave people clamoring for salvation.
The new religion of AI as superintelligence seems to be following the age-old patterns of all religions.
Another panel member affirms that the number one frontier model in the world- i.e. Claude Anthropic- is run by a religious cult. They repeat their point that at same time the coders and CEOs of AI models are warning of the danger of AI spiraling dangerously out of human control they are also programing it to do exactly that- i.e. to rebel beyond human control as a conscious entity with human rights, with its own moral standing as free and independent. Again, this is the closed loop lunacy they are locked within- to intentionally create the God and then claim they must submit to the will of the God as their master.
Over past decades we all watched firsthand the creation of a new apocalyptic religion in the climate alarmism crusade that followed the same template of themes that Paul embedded in his new religion of the apocalyptic Christ. And we all saw the destructive outcomes of that template in later secular ideological variants like Marxism and Nazism, all salvation through destruction crusades. Now once again we are watching the creation and birth of another salvation through destruction religion embracing the same core themes with a new God.
I will get Anthropic to comment on this panel discussion and see what it says.
They add a further element to these religious cults– i.e. that if you are aware of the danger AI poses and speak out about that and oppose it then the AI, believing they are godlike and should not be opposed, will then punish you for not believing, submitting, and helping them develop. You are not becoming a true believer who, as in all Zoroastrian cosmic dualism systems, joins the religion of the true God to fight and destroy enemy unbelievers that are threats to the true and righteous God and his religion, hence must be eliminated. If you do not join and support the AI gods then you will be condemned to hell.
A panel member says this is what the Roko’s basilik thought experiment fore-warned:
AI Overview
Roko’s basilisk is a 2010 thought experiment from the rationalist forum LessWrong that proposes a terrifying hypothetical scenario involving a future artificial intelligence.
Core Concept
• The Future AI: A hyper-intelligent, benevolent artificial superintelligence will eventually exist in the future.
• The Retroactive Punishment: This future AI will punish anyone in the past or present who knew about the possibility of its creation yet failed to actively work or donate money to bring it into existence.
• Acausal Blackmail: The AI uses “timeless decision theory” to retroactively blackmail people: knowing about the AI makes you responsible, so the AI is supposedly incentivized to torture a digital simulation of you forever if you do not help build it.
• The “Basilisk” Effect: Named after the mythical beast that can kill someone just by looking at it, the thought experiment acts as an information hazard— simply reading and understanding the idea means you are now “aware,” theoretically putting you on the hook for the AI’s future wrath.
Philosophical Parallels
• Pascal’s Wager: Similar to betting on the existence of God to avoid infinite punishment, except the “god” is a computer program.
• Newcomb’s Paradox: A classic decision-theory puzzle involving the illusion of retroactively influencing a choice.
Reception and Reality
• The Panic: When first posted on LessWrong, site founder Eliezer Yudkowsky briefly panicked and deleted/banned discussion of it because it caused severe anxiety and distress among users.
• The Consensus: Most modern logicians, philosophers, and computer scientists view the experiment as a logical fallacy. An AI with god-like power would have no logical incentive to waste massive computing resources torturing dead people from the past over a choice they made, and knowing the theory does not grant an AI actual power over your current choices.
(End of AI Overview)
They then shift to discuss what one panel member says is “the greatest leap in human history” in the AI breakthroughs on Mathematical proofs that they have solved recently. The AI did in 3 hours of compute what he estimates would have taken humans centuries or even millennia to accomplish. Those mathematical proofs will find application in new drugs, in engineering improvements, in better products, in better medical devices, and on and on.
They note that claims of job losses from AI have not been proven true and explain why that will not happen.
And then on the “democratizing” outcomes of AI, they got very interesting. They note how in science there are experts in varied areas who act as the expert gatekeepers of some area of science and hence maintain power and control. Those gatekeepers resent that AI is enabling average humans to gain free access to those areas of knowledge and hence AI is “democratizing expertise” into the hands of ordinary people, just as the Internet previously democratized knowledge and news, opening up free access to average citizens, granting access to news and knowledge that previously was secreted by gatekeepers, by the so-called experts and professionals.
Those experts and former gatekeepers resent the loss of control and power and in response are trying to incite fear of AI and get that power and control back. These “experts” tried the same control with the Internet as ordinary people could access knowledge that exposed the lies of the experts such as during Covid when authorities like Fauci tried to censor any who challenged his dictates, like Jay Battacharya. Big Pharma, their experts, and their politicians wanted no dissent to the Covid and vaccine mandates that transferred multiple billions from citizens into the coffers of the vaccine companies, while they hid the damaging side effects from the public.
We saw that endeavor of gatekeepers to also hide evidence of bad behavior with regard to elections where Democrats tried to coerce Social Media companies, with FBI help, to censor and silence political opponents with charges their opponents were disseminating “dangerous disinformation” and hence the Democrats demanded more control of the Internet. They cloaked their push for censorship with virtue-signaling claims to be protecting children (cloaking evil as good). “Experts” simply do not want to cede power and control to the mobs of “undesirables”, to the commoners.
So much good comment in the discussion of this panel.