Not what what I truly getting at.
The reason wasn't the computers themselves (I shouldn't anthropomorphize computers...they HATE that), but that I saw, with the advancement of the computer revolution, that one of my earliest reasons for thinking of the impossibility of the Bible version of God was no longer valid.
These were such pronouncements as "But not a single sparrow can fall to the ground without your Father knowing it." and "And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered."
Ha ha, how silly.
The computer revolution showed me that not only is it NOT silly, but actually possible.
For the logicians playing mind games:
The converse of the nostrum that the Universe was created is that it wasn’t created. Since it exists, that’s a fallacy. So the converse must be that the Universe is an accident of chance. Hm.......?
Given the complexity of Creation, it’s beyond astounding the number of self asserting intelligent people who insist that the latter is correct.
We stand on the massive shoulders of the giants of antiquity who created western civilization. Yet those poor things managed to achieve this w/o degrees as well as the gadgetry and technology that inundate our time; never realizing how deprived they were.
While Greece and Rome had mythology for their religious impulse, atheism and agnosticism were rare to non-existent for them. We, on the other hand, consumed by conceit and hubris, insist we know far better than they. Why of course!
Which is why self asserting intelligent people can get away w/bullshit, such as the Universe is an accident of chance.
Bless you, eddie willers, for this lovely testimony. I gather the Lord reaches out to us where we stand, using language we understand, appealing to our own personal direct knowledge of the world and our interest in it. An illustration: The Lord knows I love the ancient Greek philosophers. So, on one occasion when He particularly wanted to send me a message, He sent angels. They were dressed and groomed like Greek slaves. Never let it be said that God does not have a sense of humor!
Possibly, by now you imagine I'm just plain nutz. I'm just telling you what I know, as far as I know it.
Anyhoot, please do not fall for the illusion that, if we humans can just build a computer of sufficient (astronomical) power, which can translate everything in nature to a series of 1's and 0's -- at some point, this machine is going to "evolve" a "mind."
And yet it seems this fallacy is what drives most of artificial intelligence/artificial life studies....
My opinion in this matter is straight out of classical Greece, much fortified -- indeed, fulfilled -- by Christian theology over time. There are only two "minds," one in the divine Beyond the Cosmos (divine Nous); the other in man (human nous). Man is the only existent in Nature that possesses mind. Which is to be distinguished from brain.
But I'm wool-gathering here. Better close for now.
Thanks for writing, eddie!