> Unlike traditional religion technology is not subject to the same constraints as stone churches, dusty books and preachers.
Because technology can take physical form like robots and cars?
IMO religion has done so much damage in the form of wars, torture, and (mass and individual) mental illness that I imagine modern technology has a long way to go before it t can be considered as worrisome as religion and its memes.
> Because technology can take physical form like robots and cars?
Not so much that, no. Quite the opposite, because it's non-physical.
Physical technology has already taken on worrying forms, like atomic
weapons and gasoline automobiles. We've managed those admirably I
think [1] - even though it may seem otherwise at times. Physical has
inbuilt limitations. Consider Google Glass and the near unanimous
societal rejection of "glassholes".
I am just recycling Mumford, Ellul and Postman here, but digital
technology is different as it can produce near instantaneous change on
global culture.
> IMO religion has done so much damage in the form of wars, torture,
and (mass and individual) mental illness that I imagine modern
technology has a long way to go before it t can be considered as
worrisome as religion and its memes.
You're right, religion has and still does yield these consequences.
BTW I am not rejecting _all_ of religion, it has many good sides too.
But religion took thousands of years for its damaging effects to
happen. Much of what we blame 'religion' for is really a parochial
perspective on history (the view from now) and the playing out
of human evolutionary affairs through it. The same will be true
of technology .
What we must be mindful of is that they are (1) essentially the same
phenomenon, and (2) that digital technology will produce effects much,
much faster than religion. It;s really only been 50 years, which is
nothing in historical terms.
[1] That might seem like a disingenuous thing to say within a context
that feels so cynical, and we don't get to run control groups on
history, but I like to think that we're on course to correct for
climate change and that the game-theoretical MAD aspect to nukes has
proven somewhat correct so far and we will reach a future time of
disarmament. In that sense I have faith in science and people.
Actually the worst wars and killing events in history (WWI and WWII) were secular, technology driven.
And religion has cured far more than it caused. The statistics are pretty damn clear: religious people are happier, live longer, have bigger families, and score better on almost every measure of wellbeing.
The Spanish Catholics wiped out the entire culture of the Maya and the Inca. Four copies of the Maya codexes remain because the church destroyed the rest. The Inca quipu were destroyed en masse - we’re just now re-learning that they were more than just accounting. Both the Spanish and American churches committed cultural genocide against American Indians on an enormous scale. The destruction wrought by the church on the world includes the intentional wholesale destruction of the indigenous culture and history of the entire Western Hemisphere, and that’s just part of the blood ledger for one particular sect of Christianity.
I made my masters dissertation on the Spanish 'conquest' on the current territory of Colombia. It is a well established fact that it was illnesses (brought by Europeans, possibly by the rats on the boats) what actually killed the indigenous population in center and south America. Top of my head, only 10% of the indians survived the illnesses.
The rest of the conquest was not due to the military genius of the Spanish, but rather that they allied with less powerful indian groups against the dominant indians groups.
>>Both the Spanish and American churches committed cultural genocide against American Indians on an enormous scale.
The indigenous populations were barbarians. They were cannibals, they tortured people sadistically. I am so grateful of what the Spanish did in America.
I thank Spain and the church that they eradicated all those cultures and taught us Christianity.
Because technology can take physical form like robots and cars?
IMO religion has done so much damage in the form of wars, torture, and (mass and individual) mental illness that I imagine modern technology has a long way to go before it t can be considered as worrisome as religion and its memes.