I am anticipating some complex and sensitive discussions in the upcoming year, re: “Are You Living In a Computer Simulation?” by Nick Bostrum, and I need some guidance.

If you have office hours this next term, I’m coming in.

Beware :)

I find this both sad and amusing as I presume the writer equates faith with belief in god and I infer that his message tells us to believe in god (and contribute to the upkeep of his infrastructure), even when we are not sure what said belief will mean to us.

Amusing, because to me this seems somehow akin to being directed to step from the side of a high bridge, with the assurance that wishing hard enough during the fall will cause some sequence of events that will arrest the fall or otherwise avert death upon impact. I do not know what Jesus would do (can’t he speak for himself?), but I need more than wishes–stout harness, NDI-certified bungie cord, and a bungie-jumping expert would nearly suffice. The sign outside my own church says, “Faith rewards only the prepared. Parking by permit only; all others towed.”

Sad, because I know that this first step can and frequently does lead to other steps; blind acceptance of dogma, contempt for the unconverted, disdain for rationality, isolation of the ego, and far too often, the utterly erroneous belief that the “faithful” and their actions can only be judged by their god.

Faith is really just a sort of gateway drug that admits the abuser to a world of fallacious delights.

I think the modal western spatial metaphor of behind and ahead may have some grounding in our western social influences and metaphors. “It’s behind you now (in the past), time to look forward” “it’s right in front of you” “You have so much ahead of you” … Maybe I should read the book :)