Tag: technology
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You Have Searched Me and Known Me
Over at The Daily—my latest?commentary on consumer technology gets theological: Apple CEO Steve Jobs returned to the stage earlier this month to announce a long-awaited new product: iCloud. “We’re going to demote the PC and the Mac to just be a device,” he said. “We’re going to move your hub, the center of your digital…
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The Memory Theater, Revisited
Late last year, I published the sketch of an essay here called “Don’t Take Away My Memory Theater.” The feedback that came in the comments from you readers was enough to encourage me to try developing the ideas in it even more. Now, finally, a much-extended version has been published by the good people at…
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On Being a Talking Head
This week I had the chance to take part in my first “diavlog” at Bloggingheads.tv. I was fortunate to have as my counterpart Richard Amesbury, a scholar who has done some fascinating work about religion in human rights and the politics of New Atheism. We had a good conversation about those things, though I find…
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Don’t Take Away My Memory Theater
What concerns me about the coming literary apocalypse that everybody now expects—the full or partial elimination of paper books in favor of digital alternatives—is not chiefly the books themselves but the assortments in which they find themselves. Specifically, I am concerned about what’s going to happen to my own library. For public and academic libraries,…
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Spiritual Machines
Today at The Immanent Frame, I’ve got an interview with John Lardas Modern, one of the most exciting young scholars of religion out there today: I’ve always been taken with gadgetry in a lot of ways, but at the same time I’m also afraid of my television set. My academic interest in technology stems from…
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The Shooting Gallery
Once again in the New York Times Happy Days blog, I’m testing myself. Last time, I was testing my faith. This time, it’s my trigger finger: I’ve always really liked guns. Growing up, I fantasized about them endlessly, though my parents discouraged it every way they could. I came to agree with them in principle…
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Credit Card Rosary
The Row Boat has already become something of a destination for people interested in wallets. This post is a contribution to that burgeoning tradition. My friend/hero Will, who for the months since his success in electing Barack Obama president has made it his business to travel around “visiting people,” sent me a delightful little gift…