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bambax ◴[] No.43992752[source]
> The machines had a good idea of what humans wanted at this point, and so they put vast green forests and big tall mountains onto the planet; they engineered warm sunsets, and crisp cool rain showers on hot afternoons. It was beautiful.

The point of all this is to liken "machines" to a very traditional image of God, and of the rest of nature to God's gift to man.

Machines aren't part of life. They're tools. The desire, or fear, of AGI and/or singularity are one and the same: it's an eschatological belief that we can make a God (and then it would follow that, as god's creators, we are godlike?)

But there is no god. We are but one animal species. It's not "humans vs. machines". We are part of nature, we are part of life. We can respect life, or we can have contempt for all life forms except our own. It seems modern society has chosen the latter (it wasn't always the case); this may not end well.

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lynx97 ◴[] No.43992825[source]
Modern society? I am not sure. Genesis 1,28 "... Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground."

Christianity is responsible for a huge part of the human superiority complex.

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1. bambax ◴[] No.43992929[source]
Yes but at the time Genesis was written, humanity didn't have the means to destroy life at scale. And in the New Testament, "killing the fattened calf" (Luke 15,23) is an incredibly rare event, something one does only when something remarkable happens.

Also, in the Middle Ages in Europe (granted, a very small window in place and time) animal life was much more respected than today.