As the yin yang symbol teaches us, there is good and bad in everything. AI is here and moving forward, whether we like it or not and the public has had no say in approving or banning it. A couple posts back, I promoted the best discussion about this that I have ever heard [LINK]. Other spiritual thought leaders like Gregg Braden keep warning us that the use of technology is a threat to our own human potential which has been squelched by the scientific materialist movement. If we allow our DNA and brains to be altered technologically, we may lose our divine potential, the very most precious aspect of our lives.
One disturbing thing that is well on its way is the impersonation of voices. I have seen warnings from two sites that I follow that their widely known and followed philosopher-preachers are being imitated by AI in talks and youtube channels. They say some of the content AI generates is ok while other content is off base. Beware. Impersonations of Alan Watts and Neville Goddard are already going on. I’m sure there are many more.
Since I’m an old school blogger and still think its a fantastic platform, I can only go on the way I have in the past and hope for the best although I see AI as a big threat to bloggers, too. And it is being offered to us in our platforms, as an option in our software, in our images.
I also see this very time as being a crucial time period in which to seek out that which is true. I’m late to embrace new tech and just a week ago I subscribed to Spotify for the first time ever. I am also signing up for podcasts and audiobooks and am scrambling to get original broadcasts of people like the two I mentioned above, Alan Watts and Neville Goddard, and they are there and I will stick to the originals. It is possible we will never have this opportunity again to retrieve purity in teachings online.
For sometime I’ve been thinking I should re-read my top ten favorite spiritual books, and owning physical books that are unadulterated is also important for posterity’s sake. The first book I’ve begun to re-read after 30 years is “The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying” by Sogyal Rinpoche. I am also revisiting Paramahansa Yogananda’s vast talks and writings. Also, I’m taking in person weekly Zen classes from an Abbot and these classes adhere to ancient writings and teachings from China.
Not that there isn’t merit in synthesizing all of the best that is available into one writing, if only AI could judge which thoughts are more important than other thoughts. No one person, guru, or tradition has every single thing right. Spiritual seekers like to read from a variety of sources to see what resonates and overlaps, as well as to be entertained (in my case). Law of One refers to a “law of confusion” that exists and I expect that is a true law. sigh.
Today I see an absolute explosion of ideas from so many different people who are being interviewed by many interviewers on this wonderful worldwide web. This allows us to progress rapidly as we try to assimilate and use the best of what they have to offer and find the universal truths which in the past have been squandered by profiteers in our capitalistic society. For example, the government has used “remote viewing” all the while the sheeple have been told there is no basis for telepathy and so we are crazy if we think it’s real. Same with UFOlogy.
One observation about the explosion of online presentations by so many different people is that some spiritually prominent speakers and writers do have a “superiority” ego attachment even, sometimes, guised humbly, where in actuality, they are not so special, many others have had similar experiences and are leading similar interior lives, but not talking about it, or, at least are not so well known for it. I could give you specific examples from different platforms I’ve visited, and also from people I have known in real life. Don’t get me wrong, they all have a special place in this world to share helpful words but it just is as it is.
It is good that people who have had mystical experiences are now able to speak about them publicly. This is an unprecedented development in the modern world. By the time one listens to hundreds of the various experiences and ideas “out there” one concludes like the Buddhist’s teach, that “everything is empty”. This is good. In this way, too, the internet is good, it humbles us, while at the same time reassures us that we “all have Buddha nature” which means we are doing exactly what we are meant to be doing right here right now and we are already what we seek to be. “That which you are seeking is seeking you.” But, it often takes a lot of seeking to realize this.
One Seeker's Story 