Rough saturday night/Sunday morning. I went to bed before midnight only to wake up after one in a cold sweat and terrified of my own mortality. This happens from time to time–especially when I find myself wondering openly about the relationship between man, animal, and computer. This latest night of terror and fear of eventual oblivion was fueled by a dark realization that we may merely be biological computers. I’m not talking about the Douglas Adams conundrum, instead I’m thinking of a more basic realization. We are largely limited by the scripts we run (be they social, biological, or otherwise). Because they are derived from biology and sociology we see ourselves as somehow being higher order beings. What if a computer developed the same level of scripting as a human. What then would separate it from us besides the fact that we programmed it? Does this then mean that faith is a mass hallucination and in the end we are merely walking programs that will eventually run their course? There’s a lot to think about in those questions, so I’ll go through what triggered my terror and then try to relate that to the above.
What happens when we die? Those of faith speak of the afterlife as a place where the spirit remains intact. I struggle mightily with the idea of ‘post-life’ because I view life as a collection of experiences. I do not believe we can take that with us when we depart. I think the idea of a soul is real–I consider it to be the activation energy that initially charges all life. I don’t think that energy is capable of holding together that which makes us individuals. In fact, I believe we are reincarnated as other forms–perhaps even becoming people again. Those new people are invested with new social scripts and biological imperatives that come to define them as individuals the way ours come to define us. In other words, they are not us. They are a part of us and likely posses the same core soul but the memories dissipate. My memories are me and when I die I cannot create anymore. I essentially enter a halting state–like a computer shut down… Only a computer is built on non biological chips and can be started back up again.
We are far more fragile.
There is more to be said here, but I will continue this line of thought tomorrow.
Some Thoughts:
- My Iphone be dead, yo. If folks are trying to reach me, I apologize and I hope to fix the problem tomorrow.