Yet another article on AI, part 2
I’m looking at a headline this morning that screams “AI Creators Fear the Extinction of Humanity,” and I suppose they could turn out to be right. But it’s still a bit early to declare a global emergency and turn all the machines off.
Continue reading Gwynne Dyer: Is Artificial General Intelligence “Coming Alive”?
Baseball team apologizes to Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence after removing group from event amid conservative opposition
The Los Angeles Dodgers announced that the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, a well-known San Francisco order of queer and trans “nuns” that has existed since the 1970s, are once again welcome at the team’s annual Pride Night.
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NOTE: The data is, I think, irrefutable: measured by the “Three Bs” of religion — Belief, Behavior & Belonging — the USA is steadily “losing” its religion(s), and becoming a more secular, nonreligious place.
I’m a good example of this, yet also a bad one. Good, in that I “lost” the religion I was raised with (Catholicism); and bad, in that I didn’t really “lose,” but left it. And I didn’t then turn secular; instead I took up a new one (new to me), Quakerism. Continue reading Exploring Why & How More Americans Are Losing Their Religion
[NOTE: For those, like this blogger, who is taking a spring break from indictment chatter until indictments really happen (if they do), this passage from a talk given in 1998 by the late Friend Bill Kreidler, is meant to help us cope with our withdrawal symptoms via distraction.]
Bill Kreidler: It was about eight years ago (late 1980s, in Boston) that I started to learn the value of spiritual storytelling. I was in a very low period in my life. Part of this low period involved a serious alcohol and drug problem; and finally in desperation I called up a Quaker lesbian I knew was in recovery and asked her to take me to an AA meeting.
I didn’t know what would happen at an AA meeting, so on the subway ride there she explained that people tell their stories. They tell about their drinking, what led them to it, and they tell about hitting bottom and about finding their way out in recovery. Continue reading A Gay Quaker’s Unexpected Encounter With A Catholic Mystic Saint
