Yes, exceptional

Patriots come in different colors, in different religions, from different regions of the country, and they're even found in different political parties. If you are any sort of American patriot, you will enjoy these two patriots (who both live in the Northeast) talking about America.

First is Bari Weiss whose story you've heard, and then it's Dr. Akhil Amar, a Yale professor who actually loves his country. Listen to him telling the story of how our Declaration got written (it wasn't only Thomas Jefferson), and how those words affected us and our history.

Hopeful AI 2

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

So this author says AI will soon be smarter than us humans. That is still debated among the experts--but if true, then he's right that we will certainly have to lean on and develop the best parts of our human nature. 

Smartness has never been the only good thing about humans. It's good to know information and understand it, but as people created in the image of God, there's more.

• Having true friends and being one, having genuine relationships with other people, will never really be replaced by AI (though it can be faked).
• Creative thinking will never be replaced by AI, creative in the sense of creating new organizations, businesses, families, ideas (though some white-collar jobs will be replaced).
• Taking responsibility to build your own character virtues will never be replaced. Your experience of life will still be directly affected by your honesty, generosity, discipline, compassion, etc.

Materialists who believe nothing exists but physical reality may have to re-think their assumptions. Transcendent qualities like love and honor arise from outside the material world. 

These things arise from the immaterial spirit of a person (see Friday's post).

 

from The Free Press

Hopeful AI 1

So many experts in technology sound alarm bells about the danger of artificial intelligence (AI) to the future of humanity. Without a doubt, there are dangerous possibilities.

Other opinions, though, are out there. Naturally, CEO's of companies leading the way in AI are optimistic and enthusiastic. That would include Sam Altman and Larry Ellison. 

Altman's OpenAI has a vision for a beneficial role of AI in our future. They see AI elevating all humanity, functioning for our benefit. An AI user and an AI developer say, "This technology can usher in an age of flourishing the likes of which we have never seen."

 

But they also tell us to prepare for some disorientation as well, because "AI will change what it is to be human." They are certain that AI will exceed human intelligence by 2030 . . a mere five years away. So that means: we won't have intelligence supremacy anymore.

What should we do to prepare? More of what we are best at doing. We have value way beyond mere intelligence (see tomorrow's post).

 from The Free Press

(My image is Grok-generated)

(cont'd tomorrow)

Konstantin speaks

ARC's (Alliance for Responsible Citizenship) conference in London presented some good people. Last week I mentioned the brave and admirable Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Konstantin Kisin, whose parents brought him to Britain from Russia, is another. He likes to joke about woke thinking.

Some lines from the talk of this combination comedian and clear thinker:

"I love this country, and that is how you know that I still haven't integrated into British culture!"

"DEI, a system of anti-merit discrimination, is being dismantled [in America] and in the global corporate world as well. Once again we can dream that our children will be judged on the content of their character [referencing Martin Luther King] . . and not the color of the square they post on Instagram."

Soul

Materialists deny life after death and the non-physical spirit of a human being, like they deny God's existence. But some may be becoming more open to believing in the human soul.

That's because evidence shows that consciousness may continue even after death.

A study was done on 567 men and women whose heart stopped in hospital and who were resuscitated by CPR.  Some survived.

"Survivors reported having unique lucid experiences, including a perception of separation from the body, observing events without pain or distress, and a meaningful evaluation of life, including of their actions, intentions, and thoughts toward others." They didn't seem to be hallucinating or dreaming.

As an ER doctor says, the conscious mind "continues even when the brain does not seem to be functioning. Which raises the question that consciousness may be a separate entity from the brain. It’s not magical. It’s just not discovered yet. But it doesn’t die."

Your mind is not the same as your physical brain, and medical science is finding evidence for that. As the Bible (image) teaches, your soul or spirit has a supernatural destiny.

 

from Mind Matters

Fame-driven

Eric Metaxas is always entertaining, but serious as well. In this interview he and his guest talk about the powerful drive for fame. Some people achieve it. Are they satisfied? For those who succeed at that goal, it's often extremely disappointing. 

They urge us to take our lives seriously, to respond to a drive that means something. God's ideas are better.

"Do not envy these people!"

Freedom 2

re-post

So far, my fellow Americans, we still live in a free country. Freedom to govern ourselves is a gift from the founders who built a government-by-the-people . . and figured out a way for that to succeed where many others had failed. 

"America's founding was brilliant, a work of unsurpassed political wisdom. Where do we think that brilliance came from? Clean air and lots of trees? Rugged independence? The “American spirit”? No. The Founders were students. They knew their Bible, for starters, and that includes men like Jefferson who didn’t believe all of it. They knew their Hobbes and their Rousseau, their Locke and their Burke. They knew the Magna Carta, their English common law, and their European history."

Instead of the freedom to live a life of foolish consumption, we treasure the freedom to make life decisions according to our conscience - to pursue goodness, truth, and beauty. Don't take it for granted. It could go away. 

Freedom requires effort. Determine to make yourself a part of the solution instead of the problem. Read to educate yourself in the God-given freedom we have. I'll try to help.

Read 2

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

Some of us feel bludgeoned by media's focus on bad news, going from crisis to crisis. It's good to step back and get a bigger picture of reality, and that may mean reading a whole book by a serious author. 

photo

Increasing civil and economic freedoms have produced tremendous progress in our world over the last hundred years according to the book reviewed here. Apparently this author doesn't mention the importance of religious freedom, so I wouldn't have that in common with his views, but he recognizes the good that has happened:

"Despite what we hear on the news and from many authorities, the great story of our era is that we are witnessing the greatest improvement in global living standards ever to take place. Poverty, malnutrition, illiteracy, child labor and infant mortality are falling faster than at any other time in human history. Life expectancy at birth has increased more than twice as much in the last century as it did in the previous 200,000 years. The risk that any individual will be exposed to war, die in a natural disaster, or be subject to dictatorship has become smaller than in any other epoch. A child born today is more likely to reach retirement age than his forbears were to live to their fifth birthday."

Read 1

So far, my fellow Americans, we still live in a free country. Freedom to govern ourselves is a gift from the founders who built a government-by-the-people . . and figured out a way for that to succeed where many others had failed. 

"America's founding was brilliant, a work of unsurpassed political wisdom. Where do we think that brilliance came from? Clean air and lots of trees? Rugged independence? The “American spirit”? No. The Founders were students. They knew their Bible, for starters, and that includes men like Jefferson who didn’t believe all of it. They knew their Hobbes and their Rousseau, their Locke and their Burke. They knew the Magna Carta, their English common law, and their European history."

Instead of the freedom to live a life of foolish consumption, we treasure the freedom to make life decisions according to our conscience - to pursue goodness, truth, and beauty. Don't take it for granted. It could go away. 

Freedom requires effort. Determine to make yourself a part of the solution instead of the problem. Read to educate yourself in the God-given freedom we have. I'll try to help.

Good choices 4

(cont'd)

AI is changing our culture and the way we manage the world of work/jobs.  Humans will adapt to AI-induced changes by focusing on our human distinctives. 

People are different from machines. We think (not just compute), we freely make choices (yesterday's post), and we have the capacity to choose virtue. 

Jay Richards suggests that a focus on these virtues will help us take advantage of our humanity in the age of smart machines:

1. Courage - willing to risk failure
2. Anti-fragility - learn from failure/suffering
3. Altruism - act for the benefit of others
4. Collaboration - learn from and work well with others
5. Creative freedom - master yourself and the skills you need to create value

Stories of people who have done this . . in next week's posts.

photo

from The Human Advantage

Bring a gift

(cont'd from yesterday)

So having good manners is not just a way of "acting all superior" (yesterday's post). As you saw in yesterday's movie clip, using good manners is a way to "show other people that we have respect for them."

"Forces outside of our control coarsen life (politics comes to mind) and reduce the connection we feel with others. We are more inclined to take without giving, extract value rather than provide value . . "

"Manners developed, not to make life more complicated and awkward (though elaborately ceremonial manners do), but to make it in the long run smoother and simpler – a dance, and not a series of bumps and jolts."

"Holiday season is now upon us. Why not take the occasion to try this out? Bring a gift to a party. Do it with a good heart and loving intentions. Watch what happens."

photo: geekyhostess.com

from "Why You Should Always Bring a Gift to a Party" at fee.org

Manners

In the 1999 comedy, "Blast From the Past," a young man comes out of the bomb shelter where he had lived all his life, mostly clueless. But in the clip below, his friends are amazed by his understanding of good manners:



"[Adam says that] good manners are just a way of showing other people that we have respect for them. See, I didn't know that. I thought it was just a way of acting all superior."

"You know what else he [Adam] told me? He thinks I'm a gentleman . . I thought a gentleman was someone who owns horses. But it turns out, the short and simple definition of a lady or a gentleman is someone who always tries to make sure that the people around him or her are as comfortable as possible."

"Where do you think he got all that information?"

"Oh, from the oddest place - his parents. I mean, I don't think I got that memo from mine."

Pretty soon the holiday parties and gatherings will start. But this year you're going into the party season having the memo -- which you'll get in tomorrow's post :)

(cont'd tomorrow)

Ugly art

Art used to aspire to the Profound and/or Inspiring and/or Beautiful.  The "art community" of museum heads, critics, and gallery owners now promote the standard of New/Different/Ugly.  Artistic standards have declined to the level of personal expression alone even if it is silly, pointless, or purely offensive.

Without aesthetic standards, we have no way to determine quality or inferiority.

"Why is modern art so bad?"  Artist Robert Florczak doesn't mince words as he explains what so many have noticed but often don't dare to voice.

Art should elevate.

Not marijuana

All those reasons to not smoke marijuana given in yesterday's post are pretty good.  But the next reason David Brooks gives as to why they eventually quit is really interesting.

Other things in their lives, "higher pleasures," took its place:  "a state of going somewhere, becoming better at something, learning more about something, overcoming difficulty and experiencing a sense of satisfaction and accomplishment."

"One close friend devoted himself to track. Others fell deeply in love and got thrills from the enlargements of the heart. A few developed passions for science or literature."

He says that, like most of us, they were "trying to become more integrated, coherent and responsible people. This process usually involves using the powers of reason, temperance and self-control — not qualities one associates with being high."

Elevate your life; choose the higher pleasures.

Marijuana

David Brooks, columnist at the NY Times, smoked marijuana with some friends as a teenager.  They did it for fun - of course - but it just petered out for most of them after a while. 

It wasn't that health reasons motivated them to quit (driving under the influence can get you killed, it can be addictive, you can suffer I.Q. loss).

On the contrary, they just had some unpleasant experiences.

"I smoked one day during lunch and then had to give a presentation in English class. I stumbled through it, incapable of putting together simple phrases, feeling like a total loser. It is still one of those embarrassing memories that pop up unbidden at 4 in the morning.

"We gave it up, second, I think, because one member of our clique became a full-on stoner. He may have been the smartest of us, but something sad happened to him as he sunk deeper into pothead life."

A third factor in giving it up is the most interesting to me:  tomorrow's post.

From:  NY Times article, "Weed - Been There. Done That."