Revised revision

have you never

have you ever thought about how simony was a besetting sin of the highly ecclesiastical world in which Dante lived? norbert: and it's of course extinct in the more rationalistic and rational world of the present day.

profited from the spiritual sale of norbert's rational present day?

It is extinct! It is extinct. It is extinct?

dalla ripetizione della tua estinzione immaginata

perhaps the powers of the age of the machine are not truly supernatural, but at least they seem beyond this ordinary course to the man in the street!

from thinking of machines as any less than god, any separation from humanity or divinity

perhaps we no longer interpret our duty as obliging us to devote these great powers to the greater glory of God, but it still seems improper to us to devote them to vain or selfish purposes.

you think of yourself as able to make improper selfish choices with an object of divine automatisation

here is a sin, which consists of using the magic of modern automatization to further personal intent and profit or let loose the apocalyptic terrors of nuclear warfare.

as if the personal profit you imagine would be lessened by the technical nature of an algorithmic god

if this sin is to have a name, let that name be Simony or Sorcery.

and how do you fashion yourself as ruler of machines, as namer of sins, as judge of the personal and the profitable?

For whether we believe or not in God and his greater glory, not all things are equally permitted to us. the late Mr. Adolf Hitler to the contrary.. moral indifference which puts us beyond Good and Evil. And just so long as we retain one trace of ethical discrimination, the use of great powers for base purposes will constitute the full moral equivalent of Sorcery and Simony.

As long as automata can be made, whether in..