Intrigued by the title, I down loaded Daniel Goleman's excellent book Emotional Intelligence and can’t help but record my thoughts after just consuming his writing about the last moments of Gary and Mary Jean Chauncey battling the swirling waters of the river into which the Amtrak train they were on had plummeted. With every bit of energy they had, both fought desperately to save the life of their young daughter Andrea, who had cerebral palsy and was bound to a wheelchair. Somehow they managed to push her out into the arms of rescuers, but sadly, they themselves drowned. Some would like to explain such heroism as evolution's imprint, that we humans behave this way by virtue of evolutionary design for the survival of our progeny. As I think about it, I’m hard-pressed not to ask, "Why did the healthier preserve the weaker and not themselves?" But even Goleman seems unable to explain it all in mere Darwinistic terms. He added that "only love" could explain such an act.
In another story, I recall the chess victory of the computer "Deep Blue" over the world champion Gary Kasparov, which caused many to compare the similarities of machines and humans. I dug out an old article, archived on the internet, which I had vaguely remembered due to my renewed boyhood interest of the game of Chess, twenty years ago. The then, Yale professor David Gelertner in Time magazine disagreed. He writes: "The idea that Deep Blue has a mind is absurd. How can an object that wants nothing, fears nothing, enjoys nothing, needs nothing, and cares about nothing have a mind? It can win at chess, but not because it wants to. It isn't happy when it wins or sad when it loses. What are its [post]-match plans if it beats Kasparov? Is it hoping to take Deep Pink out for a night on the town?"
He continues: "The gap between the human and the surrogate is permanent and will never be closed. Machines will continue to make life easier, healthier, richer, and more puzzling. And humans will continue to care, ultimately, about the same things they always have: about themselves, about one another, and many of them, about God."
Father, I glorify You this morning, for what I think specifically as: Your unique capacity to feel. From the selfless sacrifice of my loving parents to my own personal thought life, I recognize that this ability is one aspect of the insurmountable differences between me and machines. In the words of the biblical writer, it is me; not my PC's, iPhone, nor iPad, which has been made "a little lower than the angels." Life, feeling, and thought are Your special gifts to me and every other person. And where it's rare to follow Your thoughts, I can't feel and act in any higher measure. Thank You again for the Holy Spirit for a new and fresh insight. Amen
