THEOLOGY AFTER GOOGLE: the demise of the “expert” – revealed (Part 2)

The control over information has been broken because knowledge (information) is easily transmitted and accessed nowadays.

The expert instead of being the “ultimate” authority in arbitrating truth from error, has been dethroned and it is forced to take a position among other sources.

This is a subtle, yet profound shift in the acquiring and management of information. The role of the expert has not been eradicated, only set in its rightful place. The expert gave way to experts: a diversity of educated views on the subject. The ease of information flow has helped on both ends of receiving and transmission. People don’t only get a wealth of information at their finger tips but have a way to express themselves in front of a world wide audience without the constraints of the traditional publishing channels. This way Google (with the help of a host of other factors, no doubt) did not only give us access to information, but helped us cement the realization of the flawed nature of uni-directional source of knowledge (where human beings are involved).

It is known you get a better understanding when you check more than one source, … that is, if you know other sources exist, you can get to them and it doesn’t take too long. This is where Google represents a step forward from the printing press (Books, magazines, etc.) In the old era, you knew about other sources and could access them if you were in some way connected to the academia. Nowadays a person from a third world country can access, for example, the library of Oxford, video recorded courses from MIT, recorded talks, respected magazines or any other information ever produced … with a simple computer connected to internet.

The laity has been empowered and has been conferred the right to share in the authority, the arbitrating role to decide what is true. Individuals validate or invalidate the experts, not the other way around. So in a strange way, we all become experts, more educated people. The power has been transferred from the hands of a few to the many. Since we are at the beginning of a new era, this transfer has not been fully realized. Unfortunately there are still power houses and institutions holding dear to their control of the masses and still a lot of people believing in their dependence upon them. But this is slowly changing and we witness the dawn of a new horizons.

This new era does not mean we now know everything or that we are experts in everything. We do not have the time, nor should we. We will continue to depend on other people to give us information, to educate us, to tell us the “truth” in a particular situation, on a particular issue or in a particular field. But now, we can check our sources making experts fight with each other for our devotion. We have the power to hire and fire experts, so that instead of the community serving them (which has been the case for eons), the experts now have to serve the community.

Next Monday we will look at how this shift has affected the world of theology.

Do you share in my view of this new era? What would you add to what I said?

What do you think of the demise of the experts? Is it really happening?

THEOLOGY AFTER GOOGLE: the demise of the “expert” (Part 1)

It is an undeniable fact that knowledge is powerful … that to know is to be empowered, to be enlightened and that until recently access to knowledge has been limited and controlled. There were certain channels through which knowledge was acquired and it was not directly available to everybody. Knowledge was in the custody of a few: the experts.

Some say people didn’t need the experts, because they had knowledge in themselves, but … this is knowledge too. You need to know that you know what you need to know. Then you need to know how to access that knowledge. Having gold in the backyard will not make you rich. First you need to know this. Then you need to know how to get to it.

This has led in time to the creation of a concept which would give expression to this paradigm: AUTHORITY. Authority embodies the source and validation of knowledge. To this day there is a residue of this in questions like, “What authority are you relying on?”

Knowledge is like a coin. On one side you have distribution and on the other you have literacy (I exclude oral traditions here). Now it’s important to note that literacy depends on distribution. Literacy is knowledge (we call it education). In order to know to read and write someone has to share this knowledge with you. Because knowledge empowers people, the distribution of knowledge (education) was limited to just a few (the elite), usually the wealthy or those in positions of power. The first step toward breaking this tyranny was the invention of the printing press, of which Gutenberg press was the most influential. It would take another 500 years till the full benefit of this would be materialized through the industrial revolution of the 19th century when “paper and books became financially affordable to all classes of industrialized society”. The second step was the wide spread effort to teach everybody to read and write. So literacy was no longer the privilege of just a few, but of the majority of the population.

Google represents the third step in the process of knowledge distribution, effectively ending the tyranny of the expert. Although until Google, pretty much all knowledge has been captured into books (a great and successful effort), full access to all these books continued to be limited to just a few (usually the scholars), which perpetuated the old aged limited access to knowledge.

With Google we have the beginning of a new era: information age. Google stated mission is: “to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.” Although their mission is not complete, the impact of their efforts is already profoundly felt in the super ease of access to knowledge for everyone who’s minimally literate.

Next Monday will explore the implications of this in the demise of the expert.

Till then, I want to hear from you.

How did Google change the expert paradigm?

Is there a role for the expert left in the information age?

The chaotic God of order

Introduction – Order – Chaos - Conclusion

Seeing God both an orderly God and a chaotic God allows us not only a deeper intimacy with Him but also a more harmonious engagement with the world we live in.

The fact that we are products of our environment or to put it differently, that our view of reality (and of God consequently) is determined by what we interact with need not be a scary thought. The Scriptures say that the Creator’s brand (DNA) is all over His creation. So the more accurate and honest we are in our observations of nature, the clearer understanding of God we have. I say honest because if we turn a blind eye to aspects of our experience that don’t seem to fit our preconceived notions we only rob ourselves of living well in the ecosystem we find ourselves in. You can’t live at odds with the universe and in harmony with God. Just as you can’t love God but not love people (who are an integral part of your world).

What we see in the universe, the world we live in and our experiences in it is that

order and chaos are so intertwined that they loose their meaning when set apart.

We find a “vertical” overlap of order and chaos, where chaos is part of an encapsulating order and order part of a greater chaos and so on endlessly. But we find a “horizontal”, sequential cycle also where order is born out of chaos and order is being transformed into chaos. The way we say this is that our world is in constant change and in never-ending metamorphosis.

How disconnected can we view God to think of Him in static terms! Check this post for more.

The reason we can’t see God a God of chaos is because of our negative view of chaos. As I said it earlier in these series, our infatuation with control and the false sense of achievement it gives us makes us resistant to chaos. This needs to stop if we are to embrace life in its fullness. Jesus’ invitation is to an abundant life, a fuller life. Our obsession with order will eventually sap all creative energy out of life leading to a dry, dead “life”. The idea that being in control and the ability of predicting the future are the keys to success and happiness gets projected unto God and in turn it is what we expect from Him. Heck, we demand of Him to be that way, if we are to give Him our allegiance! As a result instead of really enjoying life as is and delighting in an intimacy with God, we have designed a controlled environment according to the blueprint of our theology and have manufactured an idol that we feel comfortable worshiping.

We need to see order in chaos and chaos in order. Not forcing one to the detriment of the other but embracing them both as life presents them to us. We shouldn’t be looking for a certain type of God but by accepting that God is in all and everywhere (not contained by nature, but containing it) we connect to God in chaos and suffering just as meaningfully as we connect with Him in order and when “all things go well.” Instead of depressing over suffering and growing distant toward God, we find God in suffering and we embrace it as part of the beauty and wonder that life is.

Living with these false dichotomies only disfigures the life God has blessed us with. Learning, however, to leave in this tension will create thin places where we experience deeper dimension of reality.

Chaos and the meaning of life

Introduction – Order – Chaos – Conclusion

Dr. Matthew A. Trump wrote in a crush course on chaos, that until recently “the laws of physics have reflected the complete connection between cause and effect in nature”. Recently (about a 100 years ago), though, scientists have discovered chaotic systems in nature. Think about it, within our perfect, orderly world there is actually chaos!

Now we didn’t need science to tell us that (though it’s helpful when it does). One honest look at our experience and chaos is there to see. It is that which we try to do away with. You don’t hear people saying they want more chaos in their life. If there’s something we strive for, well, that is ORDER. But is it???

Let’s start by stating that order has no meaning apart from chaos. Order by necessity is born out of chaos. Order then breaks down in chaos only to give birth to a new order. And on and on goes the cycle of life as we know it. It is worth to note here that the biblical narrative speaks of God making the world not, as it has been claimed, out of nothing, but out of chaos.

Chaos, though, is something we’re mysteriously drawn toward. Just as we cannot live in complete chaos, we cannot live in complete order either. The fact that we experience boredom speaks of this. We hate routine. We just can’t do the same thing over and over again without experiencing a loss of engagement. No wonder God placed us in a universe that is in constant change (without us fully realizing it). Adventure is what keeps our passions aflame. Chaos is what jolts us out of our routine into something new. Yet we’re afraid of chaos.

Our drive for control pushes us away from chaos.

We think we need to be on top of things to get fulfillment out of life. We need to be in control of our lives if we are to achieve something meaningful. Yet we know the serenity, peace and deep satisfaction coming from surrender, not always knowing what’s next. We know instinctively that in the unknown, in the confusion, in the chaos there’s something beautiful emerging. But we cannot really delight in it until we stepped into the “unknown”, into chaos.

In order to step into new horizons and into new paradigms, we need to experience the chaos resulting from shattering of the old ones.

Chaos is also that which brings us together. Perfect order leads to independence. Chaos makes us say: we need each other if we are going to make it. We haven’t figured out everything, we don’t have all the answers … we need each other through the confusion.

Like it or not, chaos is part of our lives, part of our ecosystem. We can welcome it and enter into a dance with it or reject it and try to constantly fight life.

How do you deal with chaos in your life?

How do you experience chaos?