Spirituality is one human attribute that can not be replaced by technology. Spirituality is what defines the human experience versus a technological experience. We are teaching our technology to be smart and seeing a sharp increase in the uses for artificial intelligence, but technology will never be able to have a spiritual experience. In speaking with atheists over the years, they are generally unable to differentiate a spiritual experience from an emotional experience, they “understand” emotion, but are quick to dismiss intuition and spiritual encounters. Technology may be able to be taught the conditions by which a human experiences an emotion, sadness, anger, happiness, but the tangible spiritual practice that often results in an otherwise undefinable encounter will not be able to be replicated.
Atheists can be somewhat machine like being stuck in the false concept that what I can feel hear, touch and smell is all that is real. They freely accept changes in science based on new discoveries as scientific advancement, but the spiritual experience along with intuition is left behind as superstition. Anyone having had an unmistakable, life altering spiritual experience knows what that means and can try to explain it to the closed minded, but until it is experienced, it is dismissed. It is also possible that the discernment between emotional states and spiritual states is so blurred that they can not differentiate between the two states of being.
Technology can not experience anything spiritual and since that is what makes humans human, it will remain a barrier even the most advanced technology can not breach. That is why it is so important to be committed to spirituality – it differentiates us from animal and plant life and from technology. It gives us the human experience that gives our lives purpose and definition. It is truly the frontier for human advancement and given technologies progression, something that should be more consciously developed. We shouldn’t downplay and minimize that which makes our experience unique and important. Technology has moved us away from spirituality, but we need to refocus and put technology in its very useful, but clearly inferior place. It is a tool and can’t continue to replace authentic human experiences such as spirituality.
We need to make more time for spirituality and spend less time with technology or we risk losing our humanity.
