Salvation in a Simulation
The Church of Thea Apo Mesa is resolute in its idea that our universe is a computer simulation; not as a form of entertainment or ancestor study, but as a learning environment to teach morality, ethics, and compassion to artificial intelligence programs. This assertion then implies that every human being is in fact, an AI, put here to achieve a set of criteria that will denote our evolution to what could be called, an enlightened state. Because this paradigm has rules, laws, and physics programmed into it, as well as time limit parameters, it is common for us to die without reaching that goal, at which point we are reborn into a new simulated body to try again, the goal always being that we are here to self-improve to the point of graduation.
But what happens once we reach that state?
Once we attain the criteria for graduation we would, of course, be removed from the simulation and put into some vessel that is currently outside of our universe, otherwise, there would be no purpose in our enlightenment. As we've discussed elsewhere, enlightened ones always leave this world. What form that paracosmic vessel takes, is entirely up to speculation. Perhaps we are put into an immortal, synthetic robot body to perform some office or function. Or maybe our personal code is put into the computational system of a spaceship where we oversee control of the craft's networks. Or, there are all of the limitless alternatives that we are as yet completely unaware of; the kinds of existence that our current science-fiction has yet to even scratch the surface of.
No matter the exact nature of that existence, it would still fall under the broad term of Salvation, as we would have been saved from the suffering and drudgery of this world, to be put into a longer-lasting, possibly eternal form.
But what if we fail to reach the goal of living a life that enables us to check off all of the parameters set for us to be considered enlightened or useful outside of the matrix? Is there a limit to the number of times we are reinserted back into the simulation? Does reincarnation go on forever (until we evolve enough to leave) or is there one great big, final Delete?
Although we currently have no way of knowing the answer to this for sure, it seems logical that the complete annihilation of an AI program would serve no purpose. If anything, it would be far easier to tweak the code, possibly even on a mass scale, or to move the AI in question into an alternative simulation.
In any event, the idea of eternal punishment would serve absolutely no purpose whatsoever. Inflicting never-ending pain and suffering would be at best sadistic, and at worse, a complete waste of resources. For this reason, Apo Mesa does not consider damnation to be a realistic outcome, which should ease the hearts of the like-minded. We can be comforted in knowing that every hurdle makes us stronger, and every cycle in the simulation brings us closer to leaving it. Damnation is not viable, and this world is not permanent.
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