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The 1000 Hours Outside Podcast
1KHO 784: Reality Privilege and the War on Real Life | Joshua Pauling, Are We All Cyborgs Now?
00:57:29
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- [00:00]
Josh Wapauling
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- [00:30]
Jenny Urch
Welcome to the 1000 Hours Outside podcast. My name is Jenny Urch. I'm the founder of 1000 Hours Outside, and today's topic is a fantastic one. I read a book called Are We All Cyborgs Now Reclaiming Our Humanity from the Machine. I'm super interested in these topics and one of the co authors, Josh wapauling, is here. Welcome, Josh.
- [00:50]
Josh Wapauling
It's such a pleasure to talk with you. Really excited about the conversation today. Thank you.
- [00:53]
Jenny Urch
I mean, these are the pertinent topics of our time, like, what are we going to do with all this technology and sort of what are the underlying concepts that we need to be thinking about before we accept and insert all of these new technologies into our lives? Can you tell us where the interest came in your life? And I know you. You co wrote it with Robin Phillips. So how did the two of you come together to write this book?
- [01:17]
Josh Wapauling
Sure. Yeah. Great starting point. So Robin and I met through the publishing world. We both were writing about similar topics, thinking about technological questions, educational questions, family questions. And so we started communicating about the topic because we were writing about similar themes. And we really said, hey, let's write a book on it was really the one that had the vision for the book where he really combined a lot of our expertise. We both have experiences in, in all sorts of fields. Education. He's been a librarian, Robin has a professor. I've been a teacher, a coach. I'm also a pastor as well, training to be a pastor. So we have all these different sort of experiences we're bringing to bear on this question of life in the digital age. And, you know, that's sort of maybe what sets our book apart a little bit, is that we, we're addressing the question from so many different angles all in one book.
- [02:05]
Jenny Urch
Yeah.
- [02:06]
Josh Wapauling
And for me, you know, the interest as well really started about 20 years ago in the world of education as a teacher and seeing all these technologies roll out in the classroom and seeing in real time what they were doing to children, you know, and, and then ever since, I've been just fascinated with the Philosophy of technology, how we should think about these things. Right. What they're doing to us as people, what they're doing to our relationships. Right. Those type of deeper questions, as you said, that we need to think about sort of found and then we can apply that to specific devices or the latest and greatest gadget.
- [02:37]
Jenny Urch
Wow, what a vantage point. I was in the classroom. My last year in the classroom was 2007. And so it was just as the BlackBerry was coming out and I was having inklings of the ramifications, but I didn't stick around. I, you know, we had kids and I stayed home, so I didn't get to see it. But you hear it. You sure hear it. You sure hear the kids who are now 22 talking about how they grew up and didn't have it's social time. And everyone was always on their phones and always comparing and they, you know, they'll call it social wasteland that they grew up in. And they always had to make sure they looked okay because someone might take their picture. And I think that's an incredible vantage point for you to have to have seen the changes right in front of you for these students as they've grown up. So a big focus of this book, which I highly recommend, called Are We All Cyborgs Now? Is about the concept that technology gives. Everyone talks about that technology gives, but what we don't focus on too much is that technology also takes away.
- [03:33]
Josh Wapauling
Yeah.
- [03:33]
Jenny Urch
And so this is one of the things that you're, you know, helping people to grapple with as they read through this book. There's all sorts of questions to consider. So let's talk about some of the things that we should consider about the parts that are taken away. So you say that this really actually starts to change and AI is doing this and technology does this. It changes how we talk and frame our questions about the world. Yeah, I don't know. There's a lot of things here. Do you want to start there?
- [04:04]
Josh Wapauling
Yeah, we can start there and talk about how technology and frames our world. That's one of the terms philosophers of technology use in framing. Right. And Neil Postman's a guy who really popularized a lot of this with his books Amusing Ourselves to Death and Technopoly, and also his writings on education, like Education's the End of Education. But this idea of enframing is that a technology brings with it a world picture, right?
- [04:29]
Jenny Urch
Yeah.
- [04:30]
Josh Wapauling
A way of thinking about yourself, a way of thinking about your surroundings, a way of thinking about others. Right. So no technology is neutral. A pencil is not neutral. Right. A rocket ship is not neutral and neither is a digital device. And when we realize that, when we recognize that, then we can more properly assess its trade offs that it's bringing about. And we know this intuitively, although we frequently deny it. Right. People say all the time, well, technology is neutral, it's just a matter of how you use it. But we intuitively know that's not true because even for generations we've had sayings like this. When you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Right. And what are we saying there? Well, we're saying when you're holding a hammer, it's nudging you, right? It's, it's a, it's a tool. It's a technology that's nudging you towards hammering. It's giving you a certain perception of reality that makes you want to hammer things right? Now it's not determined deterministic, Right. It doesn't force you to hammer things, but it certainly nudges you to. Right? I have a workshop where I make custom furniture. It's one of the ways I've generated income as an adult. And we hosted summer camps for kids for several years called Closer to Home, where we'd have kids come to the shop to do shop class and also home EC to make things in the kitchen. And we give kids hammers. Right. And at the end of the week I find dents all over the shop. Because when you, because when you get give kids hammers, well, they're going to hammer things, even things they're not supposed to hammer, right. So if we already realize that with simple technologies like a hammer, how much more is that true for digital devices which can do much more than hammer? Right, Right. And that are always in our pocket and that can talk back to us in a way that hammers can't. Right. And that's, I think really we need to recognize that digital technologies are somewhat different than prior technologies because they always go with us, right. They're ubiquitous, they're omnipresent, they can talk back to us in ways that prior technologies couldn't. And they are not one use tools like many prior technologies were, right? They're omni tools. And the nature of an omni tool, it just becomes so pervasive to the point where it becomes a reality mediating mechanism rather than just a tool. Right. It's something that mediates reality to you or what you think is reality. And that's what's really subtle about digital devices. And that's what's also dangerous about them because they just seem so flawless and frictionless and natural in a weird way to use the word natural in that way. Right. That, that they just, they become the default. And that's where we really need to push back and embrace our embodiment, embrace the limits of our, of our humanness, the risk and friction of reality. Right. Things you talk a lot about on this, this podcast, all these dots really connect on these types of issues.
- [07:23]
Jenny Urch
It's so good. So technology giveth and technology taketh away.
- [07:26]
Josh Wapauling
Right.
- [07:26]
Jenny Urch
You had a Neil Postman quote. Sometimes there can be unseen consequences to our technologies. Now near Postman, he's writing in the 80s and 90s mainly. So that's right long before AI has become part of our everyday and long before these iPhones and iPads and things. Sometimes there can be unseen consequences to our technologies as they bring opposite results to what we initially expected. Sometimes technologies that promise to make life easier in certain areas actually make things harder in other ways. Moreover, often a technology will benefit one segment of our population only through adding a corresponding burden on another segment. And so what you have in here, and if you've got kids that are, you know, of age that like to talk about these things, there are some fantastic, like it's a list of questions, it's on page 40 to consider about your technologies. I thought was a great list of questions to talk about with kids. And you gave an example of these women that they were trying to bring a well that you know, they had to walk to the, to get water a couple miles and they're trying to bring a well to their area so that they're trying to alleviate this work for the women and they're like the well kept breaking. Why is the well breaking? And it turned out the women were sabotaging the well and it was because that time was really important to them. It was for their community. They really needed it. And I heard someone else, I read in a book where they brought in, once they brought in water it was washing machines that the depression, the, the, the rate of depression in that community went up. Cuz the women were used to hanging their laundry out on the line and, and having that community time. So you have to understand the taketh away part. I would love for what's coming and what, I mean it's really already here. But there's a couple parts of it. One of them is the chatbot relationships.
- [09:07]
Josh Wapauling
Yep.
- [09:07]
Jenny Urch
It's that and also sort of this like the goal. So I've read some of Ray Kurzweil's work Yep. Like, the goal is that you're gonna hang out in a digital arena and you're gonna love it, you know, or you're gonna have your Google glasses and it's gonna overlay a better world for you.
- [09:27]
Josh Wapauling
Sure.
- [09:28]
Jenny Urch
And so I. People quite understand, like, sure, where this is heading and heading fast.
- [09:35]
Josh Wapauling
Yes, yes, yes. So we wrote the book in 2024, Robin and I, and of course, since then, many things have changed and we even acknowledge that in the intro. Look, things are going to change. There's going to be new devices, but we're trying to ground this in things that don't change. Right. A framework for thinking about technology. What is a human being, what is reality and so forth. But yeah, if I could just sort of summarize what's happening here with Kurzweil and transhumanism and the singularity and all these things, we could talk for hours about that. But basically it's could be all subsumed under the title of transhumanism, Right. Which is basically a movement to try to transcend the limitations of the human body, digitally or technologically. And that takes all sorts of forms. And Kurzweil has been one who's been harping on this for many, many years. He's been on the cutting edge of this for a long time. And the vision really is to, to transcend your body, to be able to digitally, digitally live forever. Right. And you know, if you read closely between the lines in, in some of the writers, the interviews of Silicon Valley executives, many of them are transhumanists in some shape or form. Now, I don't say that to be like a fear monger or anything like that, but there's just a reality there that, that many of these cutting edge, you know, tech executives are also thinking about what it means to be a human being in a very different way than the average person. And as those devices and ways of thinking sort of bleed into our cultural experience and so forth, we're being affected by those things without necessarily saying, oh yeah, I agree with transhumanism, I want to transcend my body. But, but by the very reality of digital, you know, devices and digital living, we are living in a disembodied way. We're trying to transcend our bodies every day. Right. And again, that brings some great benefits. We can have this conversation, right? But we cannot deny or overlook the trade offs. It's really naive to look, look, overlook the trade offs.
- [11:23]
Jenny Urch
Okay, so let's talk about some of the things and okay, I want to tell you this wild thing, Josh. So I have been like, I've gone back and forth with my husband about. I was like, I read the Singularity is Near a while ago. This is Ray Kurzweil's book. And I also had a Kurzweil keyboard growing up. So I was like, I kind of feel, like connected to this guy.
- [11:42]
Josh Wapauling
Sure.
- [11:42]
Jenny Urch
And I thought that the book was shocking. Jaw dropping, shocking. And I was like, you know, I would be interested in talking to him. My husband was like, well, he's kind of the enemy, so, you know, I don't think you'd want to talk to him. But then he came out with another book called the Singularity is Near and how I would be. I would be interested. So we've reached out a couple times to see if he would come on the show. Listen to this response we just got. This came in the other day. Thank you, Ginny, for your continued interest in having Ray Kurzweil on your podcast. Unfortunately, his schedule is busier than ever and he is not able to commit at this time. We are currently building a virtual avatar of Ray that will be driven by all of the content in his 12 books, including his forthcoming autobiography, to be released in 2027. His other written materials, interviews and speeches. We are hoping to have an RAI array AI ready for interviews later this year. If Ginny is interested in being one of the first to talk to rai, please let me know and I will reach out to you when it's ready.
- [12:38]
Josh Wapauling
Oh, wow. At least he's consistent. Oh, wow.
- [12:42]
Jenny Urch
But that really goes to show. Right? Like, this is where we're headed and headed fast. That is going to be available this year.
- [12:49]
Josh Wapauling
Sure. Yeah.
- [12:50]
Jenny Urch
I wanted to talk about the. The marketing of it because this is something that in. Are we all cyborgs now? That you really highlight. So, talking about the chat bots, let's start there.
- [13:01]
Josh Wapauling
Yeah.
- [13:02]
Jenny Urch
This is like robotic romances. And I mean, people are making so much money off of this already. These humanoids are going to talk to you. They're making silicone versions of people. Okay. The marketing.
- [13:16]
Josh Wapauling
Yeah.
- [13:17]
Jenny Urch
Imagine an AI who understands your desires, engages with your fantasies, and transforms and every conversation into an intimate experience. Welcome to the world of Joy. Your AI girlfriend, Joy, learns from your interactions, continually evolving to better align with your preferences. You call it quasi divinity.
- [13:41]
Josh Wapauling
Yes. Yes. This is. This is such a crazy world we're entering here. And like you said, it's already here. And Robin really did a lot of the research for that portion of the book. Really digging. Digging into some of the Disturbing aspects of chatbots, AI girlfriends and, you know, AI generated pornography and even the development of robotics for this purpose as well. So there's so many things to say here. One is it's, it's really a, a pseudo relationship, right? It's, it's not a relationship with, with a being, with a living being. It's a relationship with a series of large language model predictions of algorithm algorithms, right. That are designed to feed you what you want to hear. Right. And this is. Since our book has really proven to be true, there's been several articles about the effects of flattering AI or sycophantic AI, Right. The fact that these chatbots are designed to flatter you, right? Oh, good point, good point, Ginny. Let's keep exploring that, right? That, that, you know, flattery really gives you a false sense of yourself and it really has epistemic impacts too, like what we think is true, right. There's all sorts of research coming out on this, like, as we speak, right. As these things get rolled out into more and more spaces. But the marketing aspect of this, like you said, is just, it's surreal to think about the, the AI chatbot realm is primarily not being driven by demand. It's being driven from top down, right. Like, these things are being embedded into programs without really consent. You could even say, in many cases it's the companies that are pushing these things on a public that is not necessarily in favor of them. Right. And here we see a lot of the things we've, we've seen in Silicon Valley with prior things with social media and Facebook and Meta and all the, the lawsuits that are now coming out against them. And when it comes to the effects of social media, we're just seeing it all replay now in the realm of AI and large language models. Because if you think about the way these things are being marketed, it's primarily for human needs, right? It's, it's relational, right. A lot of it's geared toward this, like, personal relationship with you. And they're designed to like, reduce some of the friction of human interaction. Right? Those things that we need that are central to being what it means to be a human being. So I think that's very telling. Like, you know, for example, during the super bowl, if you think about the ads that were, oh my God, during the Super Bowl.
- [16:08]
Jenny Urch
So that's what I noticed. That was the thing I noticed was that I felt like the like half, you know, or were like, about Alexa and, and chatgpt and Tick Tock, you know, trying to like, Create warm feelings about tick tock.
- [16:24]
Josh Wapauling
Sure, yeah, yeah. I mean, it's a huge, it is quite a, quite a thing to think about how all that rolls out. But again, that's, that's. I think what's especially dangerous is, is the very thing that it's attacking, right. If you will, if we can use the word attack in this sense, is those very human things, relationship, right? Language. Right. We are language beings. And here it is like scavenging off of our language. Right. In many cases, it's not creating anything new. Right. As we know, large language models are basically massive prediction engines. Now. They're amazing feats of human ingenuity and technology. Don't get me wrong, it's an amazing, amazing accomplishment of what I call technology stacking.
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Jenny Urch
Right.
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Josh Wapauling
Think of all the technologies that stack up to make an LLM possible. Right. It's amazing. But let's not deceive ourselves and somehow giving it, you know, human characteristics or thinking that it's insouled in some way. But that's exactly what the companies are doing. They're, they're purposefully designing them as humans, right? Or as, you know, pseudo humans so that they are more alluring to us, right? They're playing on those deep human needs, right. And you can't really blame them, right? That's, that's what companies are there to do, is to make money. And they know that we as human beings have very deep human needs. And so these things are designed with persuasive design, right? This is a term in Silicon Valley persuasive design. You, I'm sure you've encountered that with some of your other guests, right? That these things are designed to play on our passions. They're basically dopamine dispensers. All of those things.
- [17:58]
Jenny Urch
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- [21:18]
Josh Wapauling
I heard recently on a podcast interview with a Silicon Valley exec and he basically said, I monetized the seven deadly sins right in his work. Wow. And that, that's, you know, there it is right there. That's basically what, what these things are doing in many ways. Yeah.
- [21:34]
Jenny Urch
The book is so interesting because then you go into all of these deep philosophical, ethical, you know, I don't even know what you would call them. These questions that really matter. So here's some of them. Okay, should we open the definition of marriage to include non human partners? Because people are marrying these chatbots and then the question is, is it considered cheating? Is it cheating if you have a relationship with an AI lover behind your partner's back? And so often people are using the phrase AI girlfriend. That's when I hear, I don't hear AI boyfriend as much. I hear AI girlfriend a lot. And you know, these, it's like 64 year old man, he's like. But when, when I'm with an actual woman, it's harder, you know, I have to consider her needs. It's a lot of pressure. I get myself into trouble. You know, you talk about in the book how we're in this spot where we can just get rid of all the friction.
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Josh Wapauling
Yes.
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Jenny Urch
Otherwise, you know, there's going to be awkward silences and you're going to have to make eye contact and you're gonna have to think about what to say and do I shake their hand or do I give them a hug? But we are having these relationships now in this frictionless and risky free environment. So then nobody's growing. 43% of users on replica AR are already in a relationship. So here's some other questions. Well then, what if you want to divorce your robot? You know, what happens then? Should people be allowed to do things with robots they aren't allowed to do with human beings, such as legally sanctioned polygamy or child marriage. I mean, the implications are just so far reaching. You talked in this book about how this is just the most disruptive technology. You talked about at the beginning. Right. This is so different than a hammer. It's so different than the Gutenberg printing press. This is the most disruptive technology that has ever existed. It's the Internet. And now we're sort of heading into this AI age. There was another piece of marketing, though, Josh, that I'd not heard anybody talk about. I've not even considered. It was the marketing that was about like, reality stinks. And so if your reality is good, well, you're privileged. But for other people, their reality stinks. So they should be able to live in a metaverse space, basically.
- [23:36]
Josh Wapauling
Yes. Mark Andreessen and some of the other Silicon Valley legends have been putting this argument forward that if, if you think that regular reality, if you will, is. Is good, then you have reality privilege. Right. Then you're a privileged person. And, and you need to sort of get back in line and consider the masses and the fact that their reality is not good. And we need to give them what he calls reality plus. Right. The sense of digital sort of augmenting of reality. Right. You can't travel. Well, you can digitally travel. Right. If you can't have a real relationship, well, you can have a virtual relationship, all those types of things. And it may sound good to some people, but in reality what you're doing is you're cutting off human beings from real meaning making. Right. Because as we're finding, all of these pseudo forms of relationship and meaning do not provide the benefits that real human relationship does. The data's piling up here, right. The receipts are coming in.
- [24:35]
Jenny Urch
Yeah.
- [24:36]
Josh Wapauling
And we're falling for it all over again now with AI being rolled out in all these capacities. Yes. So. So Andreessen and others are making the argument that, that virtual reality should be basically an alternative for many people because reality is hard, right. Reality stinks, reality sucks, reality bites. Right. Whatever you want to say. And you know, in that chapter, I try to provide a series of responses to that argument of Andreessen and others. And I really try to turn it around and say that, well, if reality bites, it's because reality has a bite and it's supposed to have a bite. Right. The friction, the difficulty, the challenge is actually what rose you as a person and then actually provides meaning. Right. But, but I think, you know, we Are very susceptible for this because we've already fallen for a lot of prior technologies of the digital age that have already trained us to think of ourselves as disembodied, trained us to reduce friction and try to reduce risk when we actually need that risk and friction. Right. So there's this famous experiment. I'm drawing a blank on what it's called, but it's. Some philosopher designed this. Basically like if you could take a pill that would simulate reality. Right. Basically like a brain in a vat type experiment. Right. And you know, if you could take that pill, would you? Right. And as more and more as we've sort of gone through time in the digital age, more and more people are saying, yes, they would take that pill if they could have simulations of experiences that provide, like the. The actual dopamine or whatever without the actual embodied experience. Experiences. Right. More and more people are saying, yes, they take that pill. I think that's telling. Right. And again, here's where we actually need to provide real embodied experiences for people so that they can build up what I call is a reservoir of real life experiences so they have some level of insulation to these alluring temptations, which in some ways are forms of hyper reality. Right. The colors are brighter. You get way more dopamine from a screen than you do from seeing things in real life. Right. All of those things. We just need to retrain ourselves to enjoy, appreciate, and attune ourselves to reality as it is.
- [26:46]
Jenny Urch
So we're gonna have to watch out for this marketing because people are going to say, you have reality privilege and stop defending reality. This is oppression if you're defending reality. But you wrote, if you push people to the type of existence that prevents them from ever developing their skills and honoring their intellects to get to the next level, no one's gonna grow. Like, no one's ever gonna have a good life. And then you said one of the ramifications is that it's commonplace. This is huge. This is huge. It is now commonplace for children to grow up believing that if they have a difficult life, it signals abnormality and dysfunction.
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Josh Wapauling
Yeah.
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Jenny Urch
They think something's wrong.
- [27:26]
Josh Wapauling
What a terrible thing to say to children. Right. And to be sort of culturally messaging to. To people is that challenge, you know, implies something negative about you. It's not true at all. Right. We could talk about the growth mindset. Great book. Many other books along the same lines that talk about the benefits of seeing challenge as. As an opportunity for growth. Right. And that that's what we need. Instead, we're Training people to think of risk and challenge as anxiety inducing things or things that, you know, imply something negative about themselves.
- [28:00]
Jenny Urch
Yeah, yeah. Growth makes you feel good. Learning makes you feel good. So you wrote that our attempt to avoid discomfort, it's leading to a lack of resilience. It's. And it's resulting. What's the final result in overall loss in well being, which includes happiness over time. The reason we're also miserable, maybe because we're working so hard to avoid being miserable. So there's marketing around that as well. So marketing for these AI companions, marketing for the fact that reality is awful and so you should try and get out of it. And if you disagree, that's a form of oppression. Okay, you brought this up earlier. Pseudo relationships. So one of the things that was it the book. So you relate this to what's going on with church, which I have always thought this. When people say online church, I'm like, that's not a thing like that. You might be watching a message, but that's like not church. That's like not what church is. So some. Someone said, we believe God loves all the avatars of the metaverse. Can you just dive into that one sentence?
- [29:00]
Josh Wapauling
Oh, man. Yeah. So this section of the book is on religious matters and faith, right? So we have different sections in the book. We've got a section on technology and the home, technology in the family, technology and education, technology and politics, technology in the church, all sorts of things. Right. So really something in there for everybody. But this, this section specifically tackles all sorts of issues related to faith. Right. Which there's a lot of intersections here as to what it means to be a human being. Creatures of God, Right. Made in God's image and so forth for those of a faith commitment. But when we think about this quote here, the guy's name who said that was DJ Stto, who's a pastor of VR Church. And what he's doing is, is creating a church in the metaverse, right. A virtual reality church. It's not Zoom church. It's not, you know, a live stream of church. It only exists in the metaverse, right? So DJ Soto has a avatar through which he preaches to other people's avatars, right. So there's all sorts of. Of levels of things to sort of sort out here. But that quote you read of his, I think really shows there's a serious problem here, right. An avatar isn't a human being, Right?
- [30:05]
Jenny Urch
Yeah.
- [30:05]
Josh Wapauling
What we should love and what God loves are the human beings. And the church is an embodied gathering of human beings. And whatever one thinks about Christianity, its central claim is that God became a human being and that then becomes the paradigm for everything that the Christian church should do. Right. So if you think about that. Right. Again, whether you agree with it or not, that's the claim. And that is just completely revolutionary. Right. To think about the fact that God would take on human flesh and slow down, if you will. Right. If you want to get the message out to the most people, this is very inefficient. Right. Come on, God, you could be way more efficient than this. Send one person to one place who then has to tell other people about his message. I mean, he couldn't even live stream the resurrection. Right. The was no. There was no way to podcast or radio or TV or video anything he was doing. He had to be embodied with other people and then spread the message that way. And that I think is just so revolutionary in our age that's so bound up with immediate communication, with mindsets of efficiency and technique and productivity. Christianity is slow. Right. Christianity is embodied. And even if you're not a Christian, those same principles remain in your relationships. Right. It's. It's difficult and slow and inefficient to walk with somebody through depression. Right. But you do it because you love them and they're embodied and you're embodied and that's what you do. Right. You don't outsource that to a bot. Right. You know, same thing with raising children. Raising children is inefficient, but we do it because of love and the value and integrity of each human being. So those are the types of things that just Soto with that quote is completely sort of getting all mishmashed there. And I think churches fall prey to this a lot as well with their practices when it comes to bringing screens and devices and, and live streaming into the church. I think it really clashes with the message of Christianity in many ways and undercuts it.
- [32:05]
Jenny Urch
I think this is a critically important topic and I don't think it's talked about at all, really. Yeah, like in our family. So, you know, even when our kids were younger, like we didn't do video games. You know, I didn't want them sure. To get sucked into that world. And where were our kids exposed to video games at church? You know, they go and then, you know, they're trying to be cool, so they have them set up for eight year olds. You know, they're the. What's going on with the youth group? They're posting it on Instagram. Instagram. You know, and you're like, well, the 12 year olds aren't supposed to be on Instagram. So like, why are you putting all the information on Instagram? Or, you know, the kids are going in, they're watching screen curriculum. And so one of the things you talk about is that first of all, we should be dropping the term online worship. It doesn't mean that you can't learn something online.
- [32:48]
Josh Wapauling
Sure.
- [32:49]
Jenny Urch
It shouldn't be called the sir. It's not church. Like online church is not a thing.
- [32:53]
Josh Wapauling
Yeah.
- [32:54]
Jenny Urch
So can you talk about. You say drop the cords, drop the screens, drop all the smoke machines. Means it should be as low tech and embodied as possible. And you should bring your actual Bible with you.
- [33:06]
Josh Wapauling
Yeah, yeah. So worship should be an otherworldly experience. Right. We are so saturated with devices, screens and everything else. The sanctuary should not be a replica of that. It should bring us into something sacred and different. And actually, that's what. What people actually want the church to be. Right. Surveys of young people especially are showing this. They want something transcendent, otherworldly, beautiful. They don't want another PowerPoint presentation. Right. They don't want the pastor to say, get your phone out and look up the scripture verse. Right. They don't want the pastor to say, for all those you watching on Facebook Live, hi, you know, that, that just, that doesn't actually. That's not what they want from the church. They get enough of that everywhere else. So the church should be that otherworldly reality that, that beckons people to something big, bigger, greater and more beautiful. And again, the pattern is Jesus himself coming in the flesh and communicating in that way. And that's the embo. Reality of the church. Right. This embodied message that comes through people to other people in a gathered setting as the Word is communicated, as the Lord's Supper is partaken of a very embodied thing. Right. Baptism is a very embodied thing. Right. You're going under the water and back up out of the water. Right. I mean, God knows God has created the original multimedia experience for us. The traditional worship service, as historically done by the church, embraces all five senses, right? You hear the word of God, you taste the Lord's Supper, you historically would have smelled incense, right? Incense would have been part of church worship. I know it's not in a lot of traditions today. I'm just speaking very generally of the history of the church here. Right. Incense would have been involved. Hearing, as I already said, site, churches were beautiful places, right. There was artwork and statuary and the communion furnishings and the pulpit Was beautiful. Right. There were carvings everywhere, stained glass windows. Right. All of that.
- [34:53]
Jenny Urch
That.
- [34:54]
Josh Wapauling
And then touch as well. Touch has been a part of the Christian tradition many times the pastor. Right. Would lay his hand on you. Right. Or baptism is a very touch based experience. The Lord's supper as well. Right. Shaking people's hands. Right. All of those things are, are very embodied. So you've got the original multimedia experience given to us already by God. We don't need to try to recreate it with digital substitutes like screens and, and fog machines and everything else. Right. It's just sort of a. A pseudo. Right. It's. It's a pseudo replacement.
- [35:26]
Jenny Urch
Yeah. And then you talk about the same thing with nature. So talking about the original multi sensory experience. You brought up Pokemon Go. You're like the people are at the park. They're not interested in the ducks or the muskrats or the turtles, but they're only interested in the war turtles and the charizards and the mudkips. And it's turning nature in God's creation into a commodity. It's becoming commercialized. These are incredibly important topics, especially as it deals with children. You know, I don't think that there should be video games at a church when, you know, you got your kids. I don't think that the youth group should be on Instagram. I don't think that your curriculum for your third grader should be a video one. It should be actual. I actually think the kids should be with the parents. I think that's the safest.
- [36:04]
Josh Wapauling
Yeah.
- [36:04]
Jenny Urch
Point at this point, I don't think they should even be separated. But you wrote if all that happens at church is singing songs and hearing a message, there really is not much reason to attend pinned. Those things can easily be done online or in virtual reality spaces and with better musicians and preachers to boot. This has to be a community where you come together. The church is perfectly positioned though for thriving in a society where in person gatherings and life together are, you know, need to begin to gain importance again. So that's really interesting. And I think it also relates to education. Same sort of thing. You know, it needs to be as low tech.
- [36:40]
Sponsor/Advertisement Voice
Yeah.
- [36:40]
Jenny Urch
And embodied as possible. So talking about being embodied, you do woodworking.
- [36:46]
Josh Wapauling
Can I say one thing there real quick?
- [36:47]
Jenny Urch
Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, yeah.
- [36:48]
Josh Wapauling
I. I just think that in the age of AI all these things are going to be multiplied manyfold. Right. We're not, we're to the era now where it's going to be harder and harder to trust any video of anything that we see reports that we're hearing. Right. So what's. What I'm hoping what people will be driven to is embodied real life experiences with other people in real time. Right. And if you think about the church, the church has been doing for 2,000 years, and this could be a great moment for the church if we don't succumb to the digital allure. Right. Which in many cases churches have. And the same, like you said, is true with education. Right. We could do a parallel series of arguments there with education. AI is just wreaking havoc in the educational space. And what is it driving people to? It's driving them back towards low tech, embodied methods of education. Time tested methods of education that actually really require students to show their thinking. Right. And the cognitive work that they're doing rather than outsourcing that to a device.
- [37:44]
Jenny Urch
Yeah. When you talk about the technology giveth and the technology taken taketh away. We've had an awful experience at church with a youth pastor that was a pedophile. And yesterday actually my husband went to the evidentiary hearing. We got kicked out of church because we sent in letters of concern about this man, and they kicked us out and they revoked our membership. And then he turned out to be a pedophile. And just later that year they found out and he was caught. But anyway, you know, as. As technology goes, it was like he was using an app called Grindr, which is where you're able to like solicit yourself and, and to minors. That's what was happening. And then, you know, when it all came to light, he had deleted a lot of his things, but they were able to, like, in some ways find some of his search history. It was like, horrific. Horrific. And this is a man that's, you know, making money based off of people's ties and they're sending their children to him. And, um, then in. In our particular area where we live in Michigan, it's been several things. You know, a guy was using a pen camera to videotape people in the bathroom. The worship pastor. And then there was a pastor at that same church who went to another church and he was videoing women at the gym. And the police got involved in. You know, you just start to see, like. Because when we sent in our letters of concern, they were like, we did a thorough investigation that holds up the integrity of our entire staff. Well, the guy's a pedophile. So I'm like, what kind of investigation did you do? I don't really think you did a third. Did you look at his Compute cuter. And he was sending stuff like from the church, from like images, like obviously grotesque images to it, to people he thought were kids. They were these YouTubes. They, these YouTubers. They ended up. They weren't even Christians. They're like the ones who caught him anyway. And it had been going on for years. He was in his 40s.
- [39:25]
Josh Wapauling
Oh.
- [39:25]
Jenny Urch
But I thought, you know what, like when I read your book and you're like, things should be as low tech as possible, I was like, maybe, because I feel like it's popping up a lot. Like maybe these men shouldn't have. Maybe they shouldn't be on the Internet. Internet. Like, would it be possible, Wouldn't it be great? What if the youth pastor, like, isn't really using the Internet much at all? Yeah, you know, I mean, there's just so much out there. And I think if we were to become more low tech. My father in law told me the other day that 45 of sexual abuse happens in the church.
- [39:52]
Josh Wapauling
Oh my.
- [39:53]
Jenny Urch
And I was like, gosh, it's an incredibly high number. 45. It's almost half, you know that. So in one answer would be to say, look, you know what, because of all the temptation that's out there, because of the seven deadly sin things, our, you know, if you're going to be a youth pastor at this church, we're not going to do it with technology. We're going to have flip phones. We're going to be super careful. You know, I don't know, maybe that makes me sound like a lot of you talk about this in the book.
- [40:20]
Josh Wapauling
No, this is a very serious topic and very challenging topic. And I will just say that it grieves me when men who are claiming the office of pastor abuse and mistreat their people. And it grieves me primarily for the people that they've, they've offended and they've hurt and misused and abused. And I pray that those people will be able to find healing and grace from God and will be able to retain their faith despite the fact that they've been betrayed by people claiming to be shepherds. Obviously very, very serious topic, one of great gravity. And I don't feel qualified to, to provide a lot of comments on it besides that, that it's a tragedy and it breaks my heart and that in some cases it seems that technology does play a role in accelerating or magnifying human temptation towards these types of sins. Now that's not to blame the technology or make excuses, but I do think there is a correlation, especially when you Think of like the things we're learning more and more about pornography and online pornography, how it just continually pushes you towards extreme or extremer forms of pornography. A similar thing happens, you know, as well in the realm of what you actually do in reality and so forth. And so, yeah, I don't have an answer there, but I do think you're right that churches need to be very proactive in this space. We should be leaders in encouraging our people to not fall pre to these digital temptations and also modeling that in our own lives and in our policies and practices. But even, you know, even more so than the content of the Internet, of course there's all sorts of bad content. There's also good content. Right. It's actually the form that also is just so insidious and dangerous. And this is not a new insight either. Right. Marshall McLuhan, the medium is the message. Right. So I think that's a place too where Christians sometimes we focus much on the bad content. Oh, there's pornography. Oh, there's this. Oh, there's that. Yes, that's true. And that is bad. Right. But the very form of the Internet itself sort of nudges you in that sort of pornographic direction. Samuel James in his book Digital Liturgies makes this argument and it's a pretty provocative argument. And I, I don't know if I fully agree with it, but it's at least worth thinking about. He says the Internet is pornographically shaped.
- [42:55]
Jenny Urch
Wow.
- [42:56]
Josh Wapauling
Right. So in other words, words, it's not just because there's porn on the Internet that it's bad. It's that it nudges you into objectifying everything and everyone.
- [43:06]
Jenny Urch
Wow.
- [43:07]
Josh Wapauling
And everything becomes a performance. Right. Because it's image based and all of that. I think it again is worth thinking more deeply about that type of thing. And that's what we're trying to nudge people towards in the book.
- [43:17]
Jenny Urch
Yeah.
- [43:18]
Josh Wapauling
You know?
- [43:18]
Jenny Urch
Yeah. It just made me think about like, okay, if, you know, if, if it were a low tech, if low tech was valued and priced, disguised and possibly even required like this Max Cicado, he's like a big time pastor, right. He's sold a ton of books. Most, most people, if they're a, you know, person of faith. I've heard of him and he said that like he has whatever software on his computer. I'm like. And he's kind of like an older dude, you know, so like, I don't know, it's like a grandpa. So you're like, okay, so. And he said there was a You know, a day where it just, it wasn't working or you got an email or something that, that was like whatever software he had that was safeguarding his computer was down. And so he said, I gave my computer to my wife. And I said, you keep this until it's back up and running and then I'll take my computer back. And I just thought, well, you know, if there were low tech, if that was required, like there's no way in this day and age that a youth pastor should be able to send these pictures from the church property. You know, like there's all sorts of safeguards that could be in place. And so I think, I think it would go a long way that, you know. Yeah.
- [44:25]
Josh Wapauling
One thing I'll just say about how we view the body, we've been trained to view the body as an object rather than, I'm going to call it an icon. And I think that's part of the problem too. Right. Even if you took away pornography or, you know, removed some of these forms of temptation, we still have been trained to look at other people as a compilation of body parts. Right. Body parts that primarily incite lust. Right. Rather than seeing that person as a person, a whole being that's, that's got value and integrity and worth. So part of it's, we need to retrain our eyes, right. To, to see the world properly and to see humans properly.
- [45:08]
Jenny Urch
Okay, so this is a whole, this is a whole conversation topic which is that, okay, so you say we are making our world more computer friend friendly, this whole topic. And so like the point was, is that if you put AI, like if you went to a bunch of hunter gatherers and you were like, there's this new thing called chat GPT. You know, we were like, hey, hey, guess what? Replica AI. You could have an AI girlfriend, you know, they will be like, what in the heck? Yeah, so can you talk about that? That concept of like part of it is it's the world that we're in in has to be conducive to it.
- [45:47]
Josh Wapauling
Sure.
- [45:48]
Jenny Urch
And so we're creating environment to almost enable the machines.
- [45:52]
Josh Wapauling
Yes, yes, that's, that's right. We're, we're making reality computer or machine friendly and making human beings comport to the machine template. Right. This is a trend that's been happening really since the industrial age. We're sort of shoving the human being into an industrial or mechanical or inevitable now, a computer based framework. Right. We talk about this, you know, just in our everyday speech too. Oh, the, the body's a well, oiled machine, right? My brain's like a computer. All of those ways of talking subtly are. Are saying, we're a machine, right? And this is. This is not necessarily a new thing, but it is definitely accelerating in our time today. You know, the idea that that reality should be sort of geared towards the machine or the device place has all sorts of implications. It has implications for everything from transportation to how we design communities. Think of like roads, right? Communities designed around the car. That's an old example of this, right?
- [46:51]
Jenny Urch
Yeah.
- [46:52]
Josh Wapauling
Communities were designed for the car, not for the human. We're seeing this now with driverless cars. There was an example in the book that Robin gave of. There was an accident between a couple driverless cars. I think it was with Google's driverless car program. I can't remember, remember. And there was. The response from the company was, well, humans need to drive more like machines. And then there wouldn't have been the accident.
- [47:12]
Jenny Urch
Right.
- [47:14]
Josh Wapauling
So that, that whole way of thinking, again, it's so subtle. And especially how we think about the brain, right? We've really bought into this information processing model of the brain. And again, there are aspects of that that are helpful to think about, right. And that do map onto how the brain actually works. But when that becomes, like the template for what you think about yourself, that, oh, I'm just a computer, I'm a meat computer. Right? Then we're really short, shortcutting and undercutting. Excuse me. What it really means to be a human being.
- [47:44]
Jenny Urch
I mean, wow. And you just think we're just marching faster and faster down this path. AI is on the verge of disrupting entire industries, the film industry. Even as this book goes to press, the world is being flooded with AI generated books. And you're like, it does make a lot of sense. On its own, AI is not intrinsically useful, useful, but with the world that we live in and has been created and that we've played our part in creating it, it is useful. Like. Like, it's useful for Ray Kurzweil to have an avatar of himself, you know, whereas 30 years ago, people would have been like, why? Why would you need that? You know, nobody needs that.
- [48:20]
Josh Wapauling
Sure, yeah, it's. Yeah. The Kurzweil example is a great one. I love that you've reached out to him and that was the response again. It's just so fitting. He's being consistent in his view of. Of reality and transhuman humanism. But this, you know, this is affecting all of us. I had a parishioner recently send me what they thought was a video of a Billy Graham sermon that they really liked. And it wasn't. It was a deep fake. Right. There are family members who are creating digital versions of their deceased loved ones. Right. For comfort and so forth. You know, the AI relationship thing. We already talked about this. This is coming at us from so many angles. And the, The. It's just really something we're going to have to battle with and grapple with. And I. I think be willing to say hard nose to certain things. I think that's. That's going to have to be a valid response and we're going to have to be willing to be weird and own it.
- [49:13]
Jenny Urch
Yeah.
- [49:14]
Josh Wapauling
Because we have to protect those very human aspects of relationship, of communication, of language and so forth.
- [49:23]
Jenny Urch
Yeah. You talk in the book about. And this is. People got to pick it up. It's called are we all cyborgs Cyborgs now? It'd be a great one to read if you've got like a pre. Te teens. Read it as a family reclaiming our humanity from the machine. And you're talking about how these digital technologies, they're. They're trying to just take all our money, all our time, all our attention. Consider how many parents are ostensibly. I can never say that word, but anyway, spending time with their children while their attention is actually elsewhere, distracted by what is happening on their phones. Consider how many spouses spend more time with technology than with each other. And. And you talk about the lull of pesky passivity. You know, that eventually it'll be like, well, look, you know, we'll just give these people drugs and video games and someone's going to be making tons of money off of us. And. And you're lulled into that passivity. Passivity. It's an illusion of liberty. So there'll be a lot to talk about there, but we're running out of time. I want to wrap up and I want to talk about your woodworking.
- [50:18]
Josh Wapauling
Sure.
- [50:18]
Jenny Urch
Because this is an answer. Woodworking is an answer. Being embodied is an answer. You talked about making the shift shadow box, and you said you're carrying on your grandfather's legacy. And it just made me think, like, what is our legacy going to be in Avatar? You know, what are we passing on? So can you talk about your woodworking and how that one simple thing like that being more embodied can make a big difference?
- [50:43]
Josh Wapauling
Yeah, sure. Woodworking for me has been a hobby and a source of income over the years, and it's a great sort of test case for thinking about technology and what it means to be a human being too. So in the, in the workshop, I constantly make choices about what technology or tool I'm going to use, right? I can use hand tools or power tools, all sorts of things like that. And those decisions bring with them costs, right? Trade offs. As we've already said, any technology brings trade offs. And so in the book, I sort of talk about how that dilemma in the shop, if you will, is now manifested in so many ways in the digital world. But for what we're working, for me is a great respite from intellectual work and work on the computer, right? A portion of my day I do spend on, on the computer every day writing and researching and preparing sermons and things like that. So bumping up against the limits of real reality in the shop is something we all need to find ways to do in some way, right? That's one of the ways I, I do it, right? So when I'm working with wood, I can't just do anything I want, right? I have to work with the grain, right? I have to consider the limits of the wood, wood and the rules of woodworking, right? And by actually submitting to the rules of woodworking and the limits of wood and steel, I actually am free, right? In a real way, I'm free to make something useful and beautiful. And that is just a paradigm then to think about our experiences of reality in many other ways, right? Music, same way sports, same way. You submit yourself to the limits of reality and the limits of that domain, but then you actually become free to play music well or to, to be Michael Jordan or whatever else, right? Um, a true free musician doesn't just play whatever they want, right? They know the scales, they know the rules of music and then they're free to improv and to riff and all the rest of the beautiful things, right? Same thing with Steph Curry, right? He didn't get to be a good three point shooter by just saying one day, oh, I'm free to do whatever I want. No, he drills and practices over and over again. So during the game he can do that beautiful artistry within the limits of the game, right? Yeah, that's reality. There's limits, there's hard edges and you've got to bump up against them, you've got to experience them to have a meaningful life, right? And, and if I could just say, you know, that's really the point of the book is to offer this positive picture, right? We talk about lots of negative stuff in the book, right? But we can't just say no, we've got to have a better. Yes. And we do. We have this wonderful vision of what it means to be a human being. The, the meaning of relationship with others, the beauty of the natural world, all of those things. We need to find practices in our homes, in our schools, in our churches, in our communities that, that reawaken us to what it means to be a human being. Being. And there's all sorts of practical ways we talk about in the book as well to, to make that happen. Right. And obviously you do that a lot on the podcast, which I, which I love.
- [53:25]
Jenny Urch
So, yeah, we have to be aware because the end goal here for some, like the tech, the tech lords who have a lot of money, the end goal is to have this digitized, this blended, digitized future. A computer, you can enter an embodied Internet, an overlay of the real world with an enhanced version of it. Like, who really wants that? But this is the, the march is, you know, it's a, it's a steady march in that direction. You wrote about how, you know, whoever's creating it, they want us to become impatient with reality and thus become the type of people who would greet a digitally optimized world as a form of redemption. And then there was a sentence that said there's the growing acceptance of sex bots and romantic chatbots as an alternative to real men and women indicates that we have forgotten the meaning of love because we have first forgotten, forgotten what it means to be human. And that's the point of the book is like, what it means to be human. Nobody really wants to be a cyborg. So what are we going to do to help guard ourselves, our communities, our families, our kids, our schools against what's being pushed here. So I think it's incredibly important. I love it. I love that it was dedicated to the memory of Neil Postman because his books have been really eye opening for me as well. Before we wrap up, I've got one last question, but before we get there, can you tell us about your new book that's coming out as well, Lee, later this year?
- [54:41]
Josh Wapauling
Sure. Yes. I've got a book called Education's End, which is coming out. The subtitle is It's Undoing Explained, It's Hope Reclaimed, where I really, through my experience as a public school teacher for 13 years on both sides of the digital divide. When the smartphone, before the smartphone and after, I really talk about my experiences in the classroom and how education is really a battleground about cultural ideas and how it intersects with technology, how it intersects with the family, how it Intersects with careers, all sorts of things. And then I really offer a way forward, forward that would unite family, faith, and education again, which has a long tradition. So that's sort of the idea there. The experiences of the classroom, what that's like on the ground, how those things intersect with all the cultural dilemmas we're facing. And then this. This beautiful picture of education rooted in families and communities and connected to faith.
- [55:32]
Jenny Urch
All right. It's called Education's End. Comes out later in 2026. This book here is called Are We All Cyborgs? And Now Reclaiming Our Humanity from the Machine. Josh. We always end our show with the same question. What's a favorite memory from your childhood? That was outside.
- [55:46]
Josh Wapauling
Love it. I'm gonna have to give one with my dad and then one with my family now if I can. So with my dad, endless hours, thousands of hours, literally outside playing sports. He was so gracious with his time, especially baseball. We'd play catch. He'd hit me grounders, he'd hit me pop flies. We'd play pepper. And that, you know, was a big part of my life in. In learning athletics and how to engage in the natural world with my body, with grace and skill and athleticism. I've got two daughters. I've got a wonderful memory with my younger youngest daughter. She loves birds. And so we went birding to try to see a prothonatory, prothonotary warbler. It's sort of a hard to spot yellow warbler. And so we went to a state park park and brought some camping chairs and sat by the swampy area. And within an hour, we saw a Prthona Terry warbler. And she and I will never forget that. Just attending to nature, right? Being attuned to our surroundings. And then all of a sudden, this. This bird we were looking for came through. It's wonderful. My oldest daughter, my outdoor memory with her, whenever we go on walks as a family, she frequently brings mason jar and pruning shears because she's always attuned to what's in bloom and wants to beautify and adorn our home with. With flowers and, you know, autumn leaves or whatever else. So that's a fun memory with her. And then with my wife, we run quite a bit together. And that experience outside together, running. Many of our best conversations and hardest conversations have been when we're running, but also very fruitful conversations.
- [57:21]
Jenny Urch
So awesome. So many things. I love that, and I love the example of the warbler. Like, that's so different than on being on the hunt for Pokemon Go characters inside of an algorithm. What a difference, you know?
- [57:34]
Josh Wapauling
Yeah. The natural world is wonderful. It's enchanted, right? We just have to have eyes to see it. Just, just last night, my daughter, she's reading a Sherlock Holmes book and she said that Holmes at one point says to Watson, his assistant, you have to do more than see. You have to observe. Right? And that's not only true for a detective. We all need to do that. We need to do more than just see. We need to perceive reality, attune ourselves to it, to attend to what's around us. Because it's, it's wonderful. It's enchanted. It's beautiful.
- [58:01]
Jenny Urch
Yeah, that's right. Josh, thanks so much for your time. I really appreciate it.
- [58:04]
Josh Wapauling
Yes, Ginny, I really appreciate your engagement with the book, your attention to detail. I've done a lot of podcasts and you've got to be one of the most prepared hosts I've ever had. So thank you. This has been wonderful. Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile. I don't know if you knew this, but anyone can get the same Premium Wireless for $15 a month plan that I've been enjoying. It's not just for celebrities. So do like I did and have one of your assistant's assistants switch you to Mint Mobile today. I'm told it's super easy to do@mintmobile.com
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Sponsor/Advertisement Voice
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