New Book
Bill Lauritzen
WILL ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE HAVE A SOUL?
In his new book, The Invention of God: On the Origins of Religious and
Scientific Thought, independent scholar Bill Lauritzen traces
religious thought back to the early human search to understand oxygen
and geology.
Lauritzen says that the search to understand oxygen was the beginning
of the concepts “spirit” and “soul,” and led eventually to the array
of chemical elements. “The roots of all the major religions trace back
to this, and it is ignored by most theologians and scholars,” said
Lauritzen recently. “That which we call ‘oxygen’ today, was known by
various names in various cultures: In Egypt by “Ba” or “Ka,” in China
by “Qi,” in Japan by “Reiki,” in India by “Prana,” and in Greece by
“Psyche.” Thus, robots, or future Artificial Intelligence, have just
as much right to claim a ‘soul’ as any species, although for them the
‘mysterious stuff’ animating them might be electricity.”
There is much complex theorizing about why religion exists, but
Lauritzen points out the answers are simple: “Early humans saw that
when a body dies and is burned up, all that is left is a few ashes.
This is a remarkable event from their viewpoint. They hypothesized an
invisible substance and called it the ‘soul’ or ‘spirit.’”
The other major factor that motivated the start of religious
thinking, claims Lauritzen, was geology. “Early humans observed
geological processes such as volcanoes and developed a proto-science
around them, which we now call “religion.” The Great Pyramids actually
represent volcanoes.” In fact, based on his studies of geology and
many ancient manuscripts, Lauritzen predicted that there would be
another huge tsunami in the Indian Ocean like the one of 1883 which
killed 36,000. “I did not think it would happen so soon, and I did not
imagine an underwater geological event,” said Lauritzen, “but it is
quite clear that early humans were trying to warn us of something like
this by way of their ‘religious’ writings.”
Several prominent scholars have highly praised the book. The late Sir
Arthur C. Clarke read several chapters of the book and stated, “Bill
Lauritzen is some kind of genius.” Dr. Mamikon Mnatsakanian, Ph.D, an
award-winning mathematician at the California Institute of Technology,
called it an “interesting and thought-provoking book.” Dr. Elizabeth
Loftus, Ph.D., an award-winning psychologist, now at UC Irvine, said,
"Anyone interested in science and religion should read this book." Dr.
Richard Marken, Ph.D., formerly of the Rand Corporation said, “This
book is chock full of fascinating stuff.”
The book is currently available for download as an ebook at the
author’s website: www.earth360.com. It is also available on Amazon
Kindle. Review copies are available.
Wolf K
[...]
> Several prominent scholars have highly praised the book. The late Sir
> Arthur C. Clarke read several chapters of the book and stated, “Bill
> Lauritzen is some kind of genius.”
With tongue firmly in cheek?
wolf k.
Wolf K
I checked out his website. A definitely idiosyncratic guy, with a lot of
intriguing ideas. Some of which are clearly kooky, some of which make
sense, and some of which are off-the-wall, but still make sense.
cheers,
wolf k.
Bill Lauritzen
Kooky? Ah well....