I think McGahern's work has a genuine spiritual quality that reveals dimensions of humanity that are very significant, for all their depictions of the ugliness and tragedy of life.
Styron wrote that the Turner he found in Gray's text was a "dangerous religious lunatic,... a psychopathic monster"; rather than expand on the historical record, he chose to write a meditation on history, giving him "dimensions of humanity that were almost totally absent in the documentary evidence".
If a mere man could embody the sacred, what were the implications for the rest of us? "God became human," replied Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, "so that humans can become divine". Nobody had revealed this divine dimension of humanity more clearly than the martyrs, who were revered as "other Christs" because they had followed Jesus to their death.
He said he worried about "ignoring the spiritual dimension of humanity, which too much of higher education does".
"I think this is ultimately the key, or the portal, we have to pass through to realize the full dimension of humanity's long-term potential".
Nobody had revealed this divine dimension of humanity more clearly than the martyrs, who were revered as "other Christs" because they had followed Jesus to their death.
"I think this is ultimately the key, or the portal, we have to pass through to realize the full dimension of humanity's long-term potential". But, even as he avoided talk of existential risk, he pressed his audience to consider the danger of building an A.I. without regarding its ethical design.
"We all have a personal capacity to make ourselves a cultural menu in which we find the plastic arts, architecture, design, music, literature, theater, fashion even — perhaps cuisine since some consider that cuisine is an art, therefore an example of the cultural dimension of humanity".
To do so effectively, the world needs a global ethic with values which give meaning to life experiences and, more than religious institutions and dogmas, sustain the non-material dimension of humanity.
Far from being an unfortunate eruption of popular religion, historians such as Peter Brown have taught us that the cult of relics was in fact a serious attempt to explore the full dimensions of our humanity; surprisingly, it has much to teach us today.
Murder marks the first advance from apedom in the shadow of the monolith, and it is only when he pulls the plug on HAL that astronaut David Bowman seems to regain the full dimensions of his humanity and finally shows any emotions.
