Ashvin,
I want to eventually answer all parts of your last post above, but all at once would make for too long a reply. I will start with the following:
AshvinP wrote: ↑Mon Aug 14, 2023 5:25 pm
It may surprise you to hear, and I am even hesitant to mention it here, but will risk it anyway in the spirit of Steiner's quote above, that I expect previous forms of
technology that arrived in horrible manifestations will be redeemed by spiritual seekers through the Christ impulse. For example a technology like 'eugenics'. In the future, this technology will not be limited to a purely physical understanding of manipulating genes and so forth, but will also take into account the full spectrum of soul-spiritual influences that go into the process of new incarnations. That will allow
humans on the physical plane to more precisely and effectively plan for incarnating souls in a way that furthers our collective evolution. Steiner speaks about how in ancient epochs birth was always planned for propitious times determined by the configurations of the stellar sphere. Now, through spiritual scientific developments like Powell's hermetic astrology, that ancient wisdom can be recovered and taken more consciously in hand. Can we see
a similar thing happening with respect to computer and robotic and VR technology?
I have now reviewed a few Steiner lectures. By the way, I read them from the bottom up - in reverse - and I find this a useful way to get a more objective grasp of what the intention was, the moment the ideas were expressed. My opinion is this:
I do understand that technologies, and manifestations in general, will be redeemed through the Christ impulse.
But I don’t see how this is the same thing as, for example, the idea that humans on the physical plane will more precisely and effectively plan for incarnating souls. I don't see the redeeming activity being performed
through actions on the physical plane, as if it was a lever.
The great task is always Spiritual Science, which is the task of evolution itself, as Steiner puts it. That’s where energies have to be concentrated. The task is never to
engage with this or that
manifestation on the physical plane, instead of standing by and looking. I don't think the relevant choice we have is between “letting transhumanists do evil with their tech, or, since they are here, choosing to engage in those technologies to make them moral” as you have argued.
The choice is always to either understand the spiritual plane and develop living thinking, or not to develop it. That is the primary choice. It’s the choice that Tomberg inspired you to express as follows - I will quote you again: “One cannot help but set that ideal [Neuralink’s] in contrast to the Ideal revealed in scripture.That is the Ideal of faithful striving through spiritual activity so we are graced with the power to have our sins blotted out, i.e. to karmically compensate for our past deeds that have crippled our psycho-physical organization. It is
a striving to spiritualize (or moralize) the soul and body, rather than to corporealize (or naturalize) the soul and spirit“.
The physical plane is and will continue to be a
reflection of how we were/are/will be able to understand spiritual reality. So the idea that we should now make a big difference on the physical plane, taking the bull by the horns, so to say, and
transhumanize ourselves on that plane in order to redeem humanity, is a diversion, as I see it. It amounts to a glorification of the physical plane, as if it was the alpha and omega of all-thing. It’s never been, and it’s even less going to become the crucial element now, when we are reascending the evolutionary curve and spiritualizing our being. You said:
Yes, I saw that [that Linnell calls Steiner a proto-transhumanist] and I think it would be an interesting and challenging question to contemplate carefully, without passion or prejudice either way. I think the term "proto-transhumanist" is already too charged and is probably unhelpful. It seems to me the overall issue is, since the merging of man and machine is practically a given at this point - and we are already merged with our machines to a significant extent even if they are technically separated in our consciousness from our bodies by abstract space - how can this inevitable development be used in a fundamentally moral way to further human and Earth evolution?
I think the question of “using an inevitable development” is not given. The development is surely inevitable. However:
1) Telling people that we should put efforts into engaging with these developments is going to divert them from thinking development. It happens
at the expense of living thinking. As you would say, it would relieve people from the creative responsibility of energetically developing living thinking. Which is why I find all this material pushed out by Linnell damaging, and ahrimanic: it diverts people from developing thinking, It tells people: “Consider AI as a valid portal to help save humanity from evil, and transition to Jupiter. It is a very meaningful life task you can feel satisfied with.”
2) Even if spiritual seekers were able to both develop higher cognition and engage with AI at the same time, the proposition is misleading, because
thinking is where humanity is lacking, not technology. Thinking is and will be the one lever. “Our society will steer the destiny of humanity through technology” - as Linnell likes to put it - is to me an
abstract proposition. Nothing can be steered
through technology, as if it was a lever. For the same reason I agree that it’s not worth it, and also misled, to actively oppose AI.
What should be actively opposed is the forgetfulness of spiritual reality, and the forgetfulness of the Christ events. All sorts of forgetfulness are the real enemy of the Consciousness-soul.
In this perspective, I strongly disagree that “Steiner proto-transhimanist” is an interesting and challenging question. It is instead, in my opinion, a disrespectful and misled question.
Disrespectful - because, when one says that Steiner was proto-whatever, it’s implied that he was “proto”, meaning someone who, without being fully aware of it, was kind of presaging something, kind of unconsciously laying down the initial premises of something. Now, I can hardly think of an adjective that would be less appropriate that this one to describe Steiner, who could not have been proto-anything, as aware as he is of the true-scale trajectory of evolutionary - hence historical - becoming.
Misled (by Ahriman) - because the essence of a transhumanist is, as you brilliantly said, to
corporealize, or naturalize, soul and spirit. Evidently, this activity, which is
literal mortification of spiritual activity, has zero to share with all that Steiner is. As Steiner said: “We can only advance the cause of progress in the epoch of the Consciousness Soul, when men recognize the validity of spiritual realities. Therefore
everything depends upon this one aim: the search, the quest for truth.” Everything depends on one aim: development of higher cognition.
To be honest, when I hear you say this idea “since AI it’s here, let’s engage with it and try to make it moral” I get an impression similar to the one you get when you hear people engaging so much in “identity politics now - racial this, gender that, matriarchy/patriarchy this, cultural appropriation that”, if you can understand what I'm trying to convey. Along the same lines, I disagree with that:
Ashvin wrote:Not everybody has it in their Karma to evolve higher cognition and become initiates … In fact, if Linnell is experientially unfamiliar with higher cognition, it is exactly the responsible thing for him to focus his efforts on the broader conceptual outlines of spiritual evolution.
I think that the path of initiation - now, and even more so going forward - has little to share with what the word 'initiation' still evokes. It’s not anymore that secret, high-sounding, pioneering life endeavor, pursued by some elected few. It is more and more like a necessary task for anyone who is able to touch the realization of its importance.
It’s like paying taxes. Maybe in the present day it is still a sort of special tax, but everyone who has the minimum level of drive and acumen to get their head out of the predominant materialistic current, should both pay that tax, and pay it forward, for both individual and collective benefit. And I think that the representatives of Anthroposophy do have a particular responsibility in that. They should pay that tax themselves, and they should guide their audience in that direction, as well. I'm not saying this in order to continue the particular debate on Linnell. I am saying it because I would like to see whether you maintain that the "exactly responsible" thing to do for people unfamiliar with higher cognition is to focus on the broader conceptual outlines. I think this is a crucial point. I was very surprised to read that thought. If you maintain it, one could then notice that focusing on the broader outlines could be an easy excuse to precisely
get rid of our creative responsibility as free beings, as you often notice. This sends us back to the arbitrariness in your methods that I referred to in my last post (and I still miss an understandable answer on that point).
To come back to your initial proposition about eugenics, I don’t have at all the clairvoyance to see how the process of incarnation will evolve in the future. However, even without that, I don’t think that it makes sense to envision that robotics and VR, in combination with gene manipulation, can become the
means for humanity to optimize incarnation from an astral and etheric perspective. Maybe it will happen, that those technologies will evolve much further
at the same time as some humans will be able to become
more conscious of the incarnation process. You try to bring forth your argument using the bridge of hermetic astrology as an example, but, as I see it, there is a link that is inevitably
severed if we now attempt to consider AI and gene manipulation in a similar way. That is, those technologies operate and die on the physical plane. The physical plane cannot become a cause,
an instrument of spiritualization . It can only become an
object of spiritualization. These are very different things. I don't think there is a way to make technology moral. That’s an oxymoron.
Death cannot be made moral, it can only be made conscious. It only can be experienced, passed through in awareness. What is moralized then, is not the object-technology. Only our consciousness-soul can be made moral. Physical objects are physical objects. Their destiny is to decay in their physicality, just as they have already decayed in their essence, as soon as we fully realize that. We don’t bring them 'with us' by moralizing them, we don’t coopt them by transforming them, we don't have to turn isolated physical objects inside out. Rather, we leave them behind, as we freely moralize our soul.
This is also the confusion that I think I see in Linnell’s message. He outlines the great trajectory of human evolution in fitting anthroposophical fashion, only to conclude with the abstract jump that we should then enter the portal of AI, and 'therein' redeem the world. But then in concrete, not abstract, terms, nothing is said about this supposed morality of AI, it all remains at the level of empty words. And I understand why. It's because
morality is the fabric of the Spirit and it's an abstract idea to try to weave some AI thread inside it.
I may have some more detailed comments of Steiner passages, but in another post.