Consequences

Continuing from yesterday, marching for peace or professing pacifism isn’t enough. It makes more sense to promote the conditions that lead to conflicts not happening in the first place. First and foremost, this is making sure that actions have consequences.

Much of the Old Testament is an exploration of humanity’s attempt to explore causality, consequences, and trying to avoid consequences. A flagrant disregard of ethics will eventually lead to disaster, even if the exact mechanisms of causality and consequences are beyond our complete understanding.

Leaving aside Russia and the War, this same disregard for consequences is rife in the tech industry. Break things, flout rules! It’s the dream of the techno-utopians to have ChatGPT replace humans. If something goes terribly wrong, oh well, it’s just an algorithm after all.

For me, this is the starting point of my spiritual practice. My actions today have consequences, for good or for ill. Exactly how and when this will all pan out, I can’t say, nor would trying to usurp this knowledge be prudent. And that’s enough to make me think carefully about what I do.