Category: Technology
It’s Not the Economy: Big Tech, Anti-Trust, and the Future of Political Liberalism
After a full year of investigation and hours of congressional testimony, the recent House judiciary report on Big Tech is finally here. While many critics are already complaining that it’s arrival is too late for any actionable response by Congress...
Memes and Icons: Reflections on the Spiritual Meaning of Two Species of Imagery
(Print-friendly PDF) 1. Simply to function in the world, we need to assume that the future will resemble the past to some degree. Taken too far, though, this assumption blinds us to the new. With respect to internet media, I...
Sacraments, Technology, and Streaming Worship in a Pandemic
To stream or not to stream? That is the question facing empty churches across the country. At least, that is, how to stream and what to stream—few appear to have considered the possibility of not streaming at all. But why...
Putting on Avatars, Putting on Christ: Reflections on “American Democracy in the Internet Age”
G. K. Chesterton was once asked to publish a response to the question “what is wrong with the world?” With characteristic wit and aplomb, he sent the editors back four words: “Dear Sirs, I am.” The story, sadly, is apocryphal....
An Intercourse with Ghosts: The Unabomber, Irony, and Terror
1. To write about Theodore J. Kaczynski, known as the Unabomber, is to sit for a moment with the ghosts of his victims peering over your shoulder. The dead and the maimed, both. Just as much as you try to...
We’re All Truman Now: On Shoshanna Zuboff’s The Age of Surveillance Capitalism
It’s been over twenty years since the release of The Truman Show, directed by Peter Weir. Truman, the star of the show, is unaware that the show even exists. Billions of people around the world watch his every move, tracked...
Beyond Gunpowder: A Rational Perspective on Cloning
Hunting is either a discipline or a confused slaughter. Walking home this morning I thought first, not of hunting, but of my usual route along the road. I was also thinking about writing a paper on Johannes Kepler and emerging...
A Call to Remembrance: Notre Dame and the Internet Age
By Sean O’Hare Mere weeks have passed since the burning of the cathedral in Paris. All of us, each for their own reasons, were gripped by the flames that engulfed Notre Dame. Few recent events seem to have been saturated...
The Real Place for Conflict: On Keeping Controversy Close to Home
By Justin Frank Social media gives unprecedented opportunities to know about and engage in controversy. Many of these controversies are rooted in places far from us; involve people we’ve never met (and will likely never know); and grow out of...
Mere Orthodoxy Best of 2018
We ran our list of the best feature writing in 2018 yesterday. Today I wanted to recap the written work we have done at Mere O this year. Due almost entirely to changes with Facebook’s algorithm, our traffic numbers are...