Does anybody else find the internet too limiting? I regularly find that what I’m searching for flummoxes even Google when it comes to trying to find things. The internet doesn’t encompass all of reality, I guess. For example, the other day I encountered the word “evemerized.” Even Google vociferously insisted that I meant to search for “euhemerized,” which is a different thing. It did, however, reluctantly give me a couple of websites that use, and even define the word. What is it that the search engines are not showing us? Oftentimes in my searching I admit to being at fault. I don’t know the correct string of words to use to get algorithms to understand me. I guess I’ll be one of those up against the wall when AI takes over. “Does not compute,” it will say in its sci-fi robot voice.
Some of us still like to unplug and pick up a real book. Or take a walk in the woods. I do have to admit, however, I wouldn’t complain if the internet could find a way to mow my lawn. (I don’t mean giving me a list of those companies that haul around inverted-helicopter mowers that make every summer morning sound like Apocalypse Now. “I love the smell of cut grass in the morning.”) I am, and hope I always will be, a seeker. I’m aware that our brains did not evolve to find “the Truth,” but I’m compelled to keep looking in any case. There’s so much in this world and we’ve tried to distill it to what you can accomplish with a keyboard and a screen. And even with those I can’t find what I’m looking for in this virtual collective unconscious that we call the web. There are others better than me at web searching, I’m certain of it.
Despite our current understanding of the virtue of curiosity, there have been periods of history (and pockets of it still exist now) when religions have presented curiosity as evil. This is generally the case with revealed religions that invest a great deal in having the truth delivered to them tied up with a bow. I can’t believe in a deity that created curiosity as a sin. Early explorers of religion exhibited curiosity—if Moses hadn’t wondered what that burning bush was no Bible would ever have been written. Of course, the internet didn’t exist in those days and seeking was, perhaps, a little bit simpler. Even if Moses was evemerized.
Moses gets down
" data-orig-size="312,392" data-image-title="moses_with_tablets" data-orig-file="https://sawiggins.files.wordpress.com/2009/10/moses_with_tablets.jpg" data-image-description="" data-image-meta="{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":""}" data-medium-file="https://sawiggins.files.wordpress.com/2009/10/moses_with_tablets.jpg?w=239" data-permalink="https://steveawiggins.com/2009/10/05/let-us-make-moses-in-our-own-image/moses_with_tablets/#main" alt="" class="wp-image-598" data-large-file="https://sawiggins.files.wordpress.com/2009/10/moses_with_tablets.jpg?w=312" />Moses gets curious
