Seduced into Self-Exploitation: Liberation Theology for the Algorithmic Age

Bo and I came in hot this week — Five Iron Frenzy concert tonight, a heated Chick-fil-A debate (Bo is wrong), In-N-Out orders, and the things southern Idaho doesn't have — before diving into the first five of ten thesis statements from the book I'm writing on the digital colonization of the self. I threw the whole document into an AI slide maker without any coaching and we're seeing the results live for the first time, slides out of order and all. We covered the algorithm as history's first successful colonization of human interiority (Jesus said go into your inner room to pray — that assumes there's a door, and the algorithm picked the lock), how this empire rules through seduction rather than coercion so we don't recognize it as empire, the disappearance of the face of the other and with it the possibility of ethics and love, neuroimaging studies showing the gray matter in high social media users' prefrontal cortex is physically shrinking, and Robin Dunbar's research on why screens can't transmit the endorphins that genuine social bonding requires — we're scrolling through pictures of food while our stomachs remain empty. Bo got under conviction live and committed to stop calling in pickup orders so he can stand in line around actual humans, we had a real exchange about spirituality versus religion, went on a significant detour about dating apps and the disappearance of in-person flirting, and we'll do the other five theses next week.

You can WATCH the conversation on YouTube

ONLINE LENT CLASS: Jesus in Galilee w/ John Dominic Crossan⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

What can we actually know about Jesus of Nazareth? And, what difference does it make?

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠This Lenten class ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠begins where all of Dr. John Dominic Crossan's has work begins: with history. What was actually happening in Galilee in the 20s CE? What did Herod Antipas' transformation of the "Sea of Galilee" into the commercial "Sea of Tiberias" mean for peasant fishing communities? Why did Jesus emerge from John's baptism movement proclaiming God's Rule through parables—and what made that medium so perfectly suited to that message? Only by understanding what Jesus' parables meant then can we wrestle with what they might demand of us now.

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