In our last post, we discussed our desire for a theology of computing, and what that theology would be marked by. One of its marks is that it extends from the mundane up to the eternal. So far, the best way1 we have considered computing in its extension upwards is to consider our primordial mission to till and to keep.2
Let us expound upon a remark from the first post: that "the way we elevate the material world into our own rationality by making computing devices that help us reason is analogous to the way Christ has lifted our nature into a fuller, deeper relationship with God." What do we mean by this? At first glance, it seems ridiculous and strained. Do we really think our computing is godlike? At first glance, it can appear we are falling to some self-centered temptation to glorify ourselves by glorifying our line of work, or to an atheistic temptation to reduce God to simply a programmer and ourselves to programs. Instead, we hope to illustrate that this idea cuts to our primary vocation as humans, an understanding that was the joy of the saints before us, and ultimately to the heart of God who is Charity Itself.
The explanation of this starts with the wonderful Incarnation: the Word made flesh3. Jesus Christ came to save us, not so that He could simply re-establish the humanity we had before our sin, but to draw us into a union with God that is deeper and more profound than it was even before our straying from Him. For a rough image, consider kintsugi, the Japanese art of repairing cracks in pottery with gold. If the pot was beautiful before breaking, then the craftsman makes it glorious. More traditionally, this idea is expressed in the Exsultet sung at Easter Vigil: "O felix culpa, quæ talem ac tantum méruit habére Redemptórem!" - "O happy fault that earned for us so great, so glorious a Redeemer!" St. Athanasius, doctor of the Church, said "God became man so that we might become God.4" The very first paragraph of the Catechism says that "In his Son and through him, he invites men to become, in the Holy Spirit, his adopted children and thus heirs of his blessed life.5" The incarnation is such a central mystery to our faith because it reveals most deeply and most efficacious the nature of God and the mystery at the heart of all creation. God is Love. His greatest Glory is to create what He does not need and to draw it to Himself.
Christ's coming-down-to-lift-up is the archetype of all good relationships between unequal things. This pattern is repeated in fractal beauty from parent to child, from teacher to student, and mutually and ever-dynamically-shifting in marriage. Christ is not just the image, but also the source of the efficacy of these relationships by restoring our relationship with God and fulfilling the Old Law.
In the Tradition, from the Church Fathers to the medievals, this relationship extends downward still, to the non-human material world. The classical and medieval understanding was that there was a "Ladder of Being": at the top was (clearly) God, followed by the angels, humans, other animals, plants, and minerals. Applying the image of Christ, this means that it is our vocation to lift up all that is below us, allowing it to participate in the glory of what it can't be by itself. With the goal of all things to ultimately be the worship of God, man is the "hinge" of the cosmos, and the rest of the material world is in our responsibility to order it towards God.
At this point, we should take a moment to describe what it means to "order", because it can be easily misunderstood. First, consider that in Genesis6 Adam is placed within a garden. It is not a forest. It is something that has an overarching togetherness that extends beyond each plant and animal. This order comes from God himself, and it is good.
To be more formal, what defines man, as Aquinas describes, is that he is a rational animal. It is important to understand that rationality is not simply the reasoning of calculation. It would be helpful to take the Latin word for reason, ratio - which, among many other things, means to calculate and to judge in proportion - and place it alongside the Greek word for reason, λογος, (logos), which is often used with a more literary, story-telling bent, and the Hebrew word for reason, טעם (ta'am), which is used figuratively as "judgment" and literally as "taste." Man as a rational animal is not simply a calculating animal, but a verbal, literary animal, and a cooking, tasteful animal.7 It could be more proper, given our misuse of the word "rational" to simply the calculative, to describe man as a creative animal: he creates tools, he creates fiction, he creates beauty. G.K. Chesterton remarks that "God is that which can make something out of nothing. Man (it may truly be said) is that which can make something out of anything.8" This creativity is more proper to the medieval understanding of ordering than simply the ability to arrange plants in rows. To order is to set up things towards - and in proportion to - specific ends.
It is in this ordering that we fill our original vocation to till and to keep, as is stated in Genesis. This reference does not simply mean that farmers and shepherds were primordial occupations (though it does mean that too), but that the relationship we have with the material world is one that images our relationship with God: a coming-down-to-bring-up, to direct plants and animals to do what they can't do themselves, to participate in rationality and creativity, and ultimately direct all things to the worship of God. This ordering is also what it means to have dominion and subdue the earth.9
All of this so far applies to the material world generally. It is not just computing. To take a step forward into computing specifically, we can take the definition - the ordering of the material world to participate in our own natures and ultimately for the worship of God - and ask what materials and what part of our nature these materials participate in.
Digital computers - what we often mean by computers today - are designed to perform Boolean logic. This is part of a broader category that might be called reason, the logical working out of conclusions from premises. This, as alluded to before, is only part of our rationality, but it is nevertheless. Computing, defined for the moment to be the ordering of part of the material world, often silicon and transistors, so that it can participate in an aspect of our rational nature, is then a part of the original call to till and keep. In this way, computing is fundamentally good - and if you'll pardon the enthusiasm, we think that's really freaking cool. Computing is a good in itself.
To sum up:
God has made us and He lifts us up into what we cannot be ourselves.
This lifting-up is the pattern of Love.
In His image, we till and keep the material world, lifting it up into our rational nature.
One part of our nature is understanding and using Boolean logic. This logic is part of reason.
One material we often order (at this moment in history) to participate in Boolean logic is silicon built into structures of transistors.
This is what is commonly called computing.
Computing, in this definition, is a good. However, as is visible in our use of computing today, this does not mean that everything that computing brings about is also good. Based on the explanation here, we may anticipate a better understanding of what is happening in our misuse. If we no longer bring up the material world into the worship of God, but instead order the material world to ourselves, what happens? To be continued…
The arc of this argument - the discussion of fundamental anthropology - was first explained clearly to me (Mark) through the podcast series put on by New Polity, specifically the podcast "Creation is Political." https://newpolity.com/podcasts-hub/creation-is-political
Genesis 2:15
John 1
St. Athanasius, On The Incarnation (54)
Catechism of the Catholic Church, Paragraph 1
Genesis 2
I find it interesting that these characteristics of tool use, cooking, and language - perhaps alongside farming and religion - are often the markers anthropologists use to characterize early humans.
G.K. Chesterton, "What's Wrong with the World"
Pope Francis, "Laudato Si", paragraphs 66 and following