[3.0] covering our bases

definitions + a moratorium on calling things "cults"

Divine Innovation covers the spiritual world of technology and those who shape it. It’s published once every three weeks, and is written by Adam Willems.

It’s been so heartening to see Divine Innovation’s readership grow in the past few weeks, and to hear that people have shared this work with friends and enemies alike. Thank you for reading Divine Innovation, and thanks for forwarding it to other people too! We love a good chain mail sitch, bring back Y2K vibes!

And it is very tempting to move full steam ahead with upcoming issues on a whole range of topics and figures. I’m living my best planning life on the Divine Innovation calendar spreadsheet, thanks for asking. But it seems worth taking a quick break this time to really define what this newsletter is talking about.

A few lines up, I write that “Divine Innovation covers the spiritual world of technology and those who shape it.” But what do those terms really mean, you know?

Let’s walk through them a little, just to make sure we’re on the same page/screen.

What is technology?

Earlier this month, I asked the (very talented) artist Salome Asega how she defines technology. Here’s what she said:

SA: Technology to me is literally anything that is an extension of your human form. So any tool that you use to help you complete a task, maybe more efficiently or more creatively.

This interpretation differs pretty significantly from the top definition for technology in the Merriam-Webster dictionary, where it’s explained as “the practical application of knowledge.” The way I read it, the dictionary sees technology as anything that turns knowledge into some kind of output, so that can be within a human form, not just an extension of it.

In both Salome’s and the dictionary’s definitions of “technology,” the term doesn’t apply exclusively to the latest gadgets; it relates to a whole range of inventions, from the very oldest (like language or the wheel) to much more recent tools. A lot of the technology that you use on a daily basis probably feels mundane, but many of those plain technologies are the foundations for the latest developments in tech—both literally and figuratively. The newest gadgets rest on tables as they are created in buildings with foundations, and so forth. But they also depend upon frequently overlooked parts of our technologically-mediated lives, like electricity generation, food production, mining conglomerates, logistics infrastructure, and more.

Reading Salome’s definition with a more immaterial lens, and thinking broadly about what an “application of knowledge” can entail, invites us to consider the social life of technology. In ‘Technology and Magic,’ anthropologist Alfred Gell argues that the evolution and distribution of knowledge depend on “technologies of reproduction” such as kinship systems and the generations-long domestication of animals. And “technologies of enchantment” like storytelling, art, and gifts are then used to control the thoughts and actions of other human beings.

In other words, technology is a social product and force, and depends upon human practices for survival and evolution—which are themselves technologies. So, if we really wanted to, we could Russian doll this whole definition and consider almost everything that knowledge touches and informs as being a kind of technology. This might feel overwhelming—and this newsletter probably won’t go into the margins of the technological realm like that all too often—but at the least it shows that the relationship between technology and (often millennia-old) knowledge is inextricable, and informs the bulk of our everyday habits.

So now we know! When future issues of Divine Innovation dive into things like trains and paper, I’m still talking about tech. I do so to both showcase the breadth and significance of technology in our present and past, but also to highlight the human labor that went into these keystone technologies, and still do. People have changed the course of technology’s supposedly inevitable impact on our lives before, and these seismic shifts can come from anywhere—not just the powerful corners that we have come to associate with “innovation.”

How do spirituality and religion differ?

You’ve probably met someone who’s spiritual but not religious. There can be an “I know it when I see it” intuition to what that means, but concretely knowing the difference highlights the structural life of our beliefs and practices.

Various dictionaries fray in their own definitions of spirituality. Merriam-Webster kind of dodges the big question in its top definition, which outlines spirituality as “of, relating to, consisting of, or affecting the spirit.” Subsequent definitions refer to sacred matters or religious values. Big tautological energy.

Like clockwork, here come the academics (rightfully) calling for more nuance! I highly recommend Profs. Megan Goodwin and Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst’s podcast Keeping it 101, especially their first episode, which explains what religion is/isn’t in an accessible and fun way [they also transcribe their episodes]. I’m not one to binge podcasts, so take this recommendation at face value, or measure its weight in gold, whatever is more compelling for you.

The podcasting professors describe spirituality as “a way that people identify practices, beliefs, and systems that carry deeper, perhaps universalized meaning (think Truth, capital T) outside or purposefully in opposition to religious institutions (think The Church).”

Religion is therefore a more institutionalized and social expression—you are religious in a community of other people, there are people with defined roles, and you’re expected to abide by certain rules (even if they’re relatively loose).

Divine Innovation covers the spiritual world of technology, as technology often influences universalized meaning outside formal religious institutions. I chose the word “spiritual” instead of “religious,” because spirituality is more individual, less concretely defined, structured, and named. However, there is certainly an argument to be made for thinking of technology as part of a religious world. Watch as our definitions of spirituality, religion, and technology mix together:

Salome thought of spirituality as a kind of technology itself.

SA: I think that spirituality in some ways serves as a type of technology. It’s something that exists beyond my human form and allows me to solve problems or address problems and challenges in creative ways and healing ways.

Jeremy Stolow, a scholar of communication studies, merits discussion here as well. In his creatively titled essay, “Technology,” he argues for thinking of religion as a technology. He does this by showing the great absence left if religion is devoid of “the practical application of knowledge”:

Imagine any form of religious experience, practice, or knowledge and see what you have left “without technology.” No instruments, tools, or devices; no architecture or clothing; no paint, musical instruments, incense, or written documents; not even the disciplined practices of bodily control—such as learned and performed methods of breathing, sitting, or gesturing with one’s hands—for those too are technical practices. Even thoughts and images seem to vanish with the removal of the representational technologies of language and iconography. The inescapable conclusion to be drawn from this exercise is that “religion,” however we choose to define it, is inherently and necessarily technological.

Stolow goes so far as to argue that gods themselves are technological devices. He points to Lord Vishwakarma in Hinduism, the Divine Architect of the Universe, and the god of architecture, as well as St. Claire of Assisi in Catholicism, the Patron Saint of eye diseases, embroidery, and—since the 1950s—television. [St. Claire is pictured below auditioning to become the Patron Saint of the smize.] Both of these religious figures are technologies insofar as that they are (in Stolow’s view, but maybe not yours!) nonhuman mediations of skills—applications of knowledge that take on lives of their own and that shape human experiences in turn.

Stolow’s argument might make religion seem less transcendental and divine, and much more of a deliberate human invention. But I think his larger point instead is to recover older understandings of the relationship between religion and technology, ones that recognize religion and the sacred everywhere, not just in the heart or within religious institutions.

To Stolow, figures like Galileo and Isaac Newton are “secular theologians” who turned nature into “mere matter,” a thing to be experimented on, rather than a divine force. If we begin to acknowledge that the technological is virtually everywhere—including in our religious beliefs—maybe we’ll appreciate matter and tools for the life force we give them, and that they give us.

What is a startup?

One of the most interesting rhetorical/political sleights of hand (scams?) of the past several decades is the command with which the term “startup” has taken over business speak. I remember sitting in my former startup employer’s open-layout (and therefore loud) office, and realizing that the only real difference between small business and a startup is perception. I thought to myself:

Why do small businesses get loans, but startups “seed funding” and “angel investment?” Why are small businesses held to a high standard of profitability, while startups can take decades to stop hemorrhaging money, if ever?

In this short video, Steve Blank, a Silicon Valley figure who makes money and talks about things, offers his take on what makes a startup different from a small business. He seems to suggest that startups are a category invented by and for Silicon Valley. Over inspiring background music, here’s what Blank says:

Founders wake up every morning saying, ‘I don’t just want to be self-employed, I want to take over the universe! I want to change the world! I want to do something important!’… I think [this] is the first major distinction between scalable startups in the technology cluster and small businesses.

So, in Blank’s eyes, what differentiates a startup from other businesses is ambition (or delusion, depending on whom you ask). With that ambition as a key differentiating factor, this Forbes op-ed by Neil Thanedar argues, startups’ accomplishments and stability matter less than their potential and growth; it is less about what the company does or accomplishes right now, but more about what it could be down the line.

I think it’s telling that Blank’s understanding of the “technology cluster” is relatively limited. It is restricted to Silicon Valley, and ignores the deep history and ubiquity of technology. Power plants, book publishers, universities, ports, construction sites, mines, and so many other places should be considered part of the “technology” cluster if we thought of technology in the ways defined more holistically above. Blank’s definition subtly convinces us that technological changes can only happen within Silicon Valley, in a high-risk startup environment that can “move fast and break things.”

This romantic idea of startups also ignores how the government has historically propped up the kind of companies that Blank praises. The “ambition” of founders didn’t emerge from the ether. In (the very good book) From Counterculture to Cyberculture, Fred Turner describes the ways that interdisciplinary, fast-moving corporate cultures largely came from government-funded research for military technologies during World War II. Turner writes:

The same military-industrial research world that brought forth nuclear weapons—and computers—also gave rise to a free-wheeling, interdisciplinary, and highly entrepreneurial style of work. In the research laboratories of World War II and later, in the massive military engineering projects of the cold war, scientists, soldiers, technicians, and administrators broke down the invisible walls of bureaucracy and collaborated as never before… They began to imagine institutions as living organisms, social networks as webs of information, and the gathering and interpretation of information as keys to understanding not only the technical but also the natural and social worlds.

In this sense, it’s worth thinking of startups as the kinds of companies that are allowed to take on high-risk endeavors, supported by government funding and/or policies. Not every small business is a startup, in part because they’re not allowed to be. A very particular funding environment exists for startups, one which largely rewards founders with the right connections and demographics.

Another (small) question to ask is at what point a startup just becomes a large company. The consensus seems to be that the corporate metamorphosis is complete once defined processes come into place, people have more defined roles, work is more stable, and the company has grown. So Facebook is a tech company/giant, no longer a startup (even though it says it’s “growing” and “learning” when caught in scandals as a way to deflect blame). You can read more about the difference between startups and larger companies here if you’re v passionate about business growth :)

Let’s talk about “cults” (baby)

It’s summer, so let’s feel good and beautiful but also use respectful language! With that project in mind, and recognizing larger political and historical forces, it’s time (for everyone including me) to stop using the word “cult.”

Professor Megan Goodwin (of the excellent podcast mentioned above) has made abundantly clear that people tend to use “cult” when they really mean “stupid religion that I don’t like.” And when a group is labelled a cult, such language invites state violence and surveillance against that community.

There isn’t perfect language to describe groups typically called “cults,” but “new religious movements” (NRMs) and “minority religions” are the two most commonly used and non-pejorative alternatives.

Groups deemed “heretical” and “cults” are often burgeoning religious groups with significant representation and support among Black people, queer people, and women. The Nation of Islam, for instance, was named a “cult” by the press and endured police and state surveillance and oppression. In this thinking, groups that bring religion in new and liberatory directions are thus “too free,” and need to be put in their place. Goodwin recommends New World A-Coming: Black Religion and Racial Identity During the Great Migration by Judith Weisenfeld to learn more about this topic. [My copy is on its way, and I’ve been using ~*technology*~ to track its imminent arrival to my current West Coast abode.]

It’s not just the term “cult” itself that is harmful. Many of the adjacent terms used to describe these groups come from racist and conservative projects. For example, the idea of “brainwashing” largely gained currency after the movie the “The Manchurian Candidate” came out in 1962, in which a US soldier is brainwashed by Chinese and Soviet agents to become a secret communist assassin. Brainwashing became a trope propagated by the anticultist movement, a collective of Christian organizations. They embraced brainwashing theory as a means of both (1) suggesting that members of NRMs lack the agency or intelligence to willingly join, stay in, or leave a religious group, and (2) implying that any religious group that deviates from orthodox Christian beliefs is heretical.

Some NRMs certainly do facilitate abuse. But, as Goodwin also clarifies, groups that aren’t called “cults”—like the Roman Catholic Church, or the Michigan State gymnastics team—are sites of rampant abuse too. Ideas like “brainwashing”—which is not a real thing—fail to hold people accountable for their actions (e.g. watching Fox News), and ignore the roles that peer pressure and intense socialization play in a range of social groups and settings.

And clearly, what becomes a legitimate “religion” has to do with who’s in power, much in the same way that what is considered a “startup” is contingent upon a larger set of policies and interactions.

I still think that my experiences at a startup demonstrate that the organization functioned like many fledgling religious groups have over the course of world history. They deployed their founding myth to demonstrate the uniqueness (and worth) of their “mission.” They courted state support in the name of growth, much like Christianity did on its path to becoming the official religion of the Roman Empire. Its leadership was the subject of disproportionate scrutiny and attention, even though everyday, rank-and-file workers drove much of both the positive and negative parts of being part of that community. I still believe that the spiritual dimensions of technology have to be named, and that the supposedly transcendental powers of startups and other organizations should be challenged.

But I can do and believe in that work without calling something a “cult.”

It’s harmful and facile, so I won’t anymore! And neither should you!

Spread the word, in the loving spirit of chain mail!

Now that we know these terms, we can think about a wide range of nuanced but deeply informative relationships between spirituality, religion, and technology. Full steam ahead!

First stop, trains (you read that right!). The next issue of Divine Innovation will talk about the role of railroads in shaping the religious and economic landscape of the Western half of the United States. It’s a story of tech-driven arrogance and the hubris that reality thrusts onto a technology’s leading evangelists.

Sound familiar?