John Lilly's Simulations of God - Science of Belief excerpt 5

Excerpt 1, number 2, number 3, number 4.

God as the Belief, the Simulation, the Model

In the modern world the distribution of the written and spoken word and the distribution of motion pictures and videotapes has become so widespread that those in charge of these media have constructed a new god, the God of Belief, the God of Simulation, the God of the Model. As was demonstrated by the owners of newspapers in the beginning of this cnetury, God as Power can be controlled and expressed through the belief, the simulation, and the model as expressed in language.

Those in control of the distribution of ideas thorugh the media have access to manipulation of power such as the world has never seen. The modern communication satellites, modern radio and TV, are demanded by masses of people. In most metropolitan areas the most commonly stolen objects are TV sets. The believers in the media want to be sure they stay in contact with what the media are saying.

Language can be used in many different ways; it is one of the most flexible instruments ever invented. It can be used to transmit essential information, to predict, to give instructions, to program individuals or large groups, to express very precisely very precise ideas; it can be used to harangue crowds, to excite war and its concomitant activities, to construct computers, to control the human species.

However, language is not universal. There are too many languages on the face of the earth to allow of universality. Therefore, there are discrepancies across language barriers: discrepancies in belief, in simulations, in models of reality and in models of one another. The devil is buried in language, as is God. As linguists have shown over the last fifty years, there is no primitive language left among humans. Every language which previously was called primitive, when looked at more carefully and studied more deeply than before turned out to be an extremely sophisticated instrument for communication of man's inner states.

Language itself contains mysteries. The study of semantics, of logic, of proto-logic has led ever deeper into theories, the science of the human, all science. As semantics, becomes polished, as mathematics matures, our beliefs, simulations, and models and their power are all improved-the power to dissuade from a belief, to construct a belief to take the place of another belief, to acquire simulations "as if true." The power of models where one's life is sacrificed in the service of models is also present in the advance of semantics, linguistics, and mathematics. God as the Word, God as the Sentence, God as the Meaning, God as the Belief rule our social reality.