Parallels and Convergences: Mormon Thought and Engineering Vision

by A. Scott Howe (Editor), Richard L. Bushman (Editor), Terryl L. Givens (Introduction)

The earth will eventually be renewed and receive its paradisiacal glory. But how will our current world ever become the heaven of our dreams? The Lord is already on it; and, as the essays in this book provocatively proposes, He's following good engineering principles.Joseph Fielding Smith said, regarding inventions in these latter days, "The inspiration of the Lord has gone out and takes hold of the minds of men, though they know it not, and they are directed by the Lord. In this manner he brings them into his service."If there is "no such thing as immaterial matter," and "all spirit is matter," then what are the implications for such standard theological principles as creation, human progression, free will, transfiguration, resurrection, and immortality? In eleven stimulating essays, Mormon engineers probe gospel possibilities and future vistas dealing with human nature, divine progression, and the earth's future.Richard Bushman poses a vision-expanding proposal: "The end point of engineering knowledge may be divine knowledge. Mormon theology permits us to think of God and humans as collaborators in bringing to pass the immortality and eternal life of man. Engineers may be preparing the way for humans to act more like gods in managing the world."

Genres: Religion

190 pages, Paperback

First published February 27, 2012

About the author

A. Scott Howe is a licensed architect and retired robotics engineer at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He earned PhDs in industrial and manufacturing systems engineering from Hong Kong University and in architecture from University of Michigan. Dr. Howe spent 10 years of practice in Tokyo, Japan, and taught for 6 years at Hong Kong University. He functioned as Design Integration lead for the NASA Advanced Exploration Systems (AES) Deep Space Habitat team, and was the original designer of the Habitat Demonstration Unit (HDU) at Johnson Space Center, which has been renamed the Human Exploration Research Analog (HERA) doing mini missions with multi-week crews. Dr. Howe worked as a member of the JPL All-Terrain Hex-Limbed Extra-Terrestrial Explorer (ATHLETE) robotic mobility system development team.

Dr. Howe is an avid scuba diver, backpacker, amateur radio operator extra (N3ASH), 4-wheeler, and outdoor enthusiast. He is the author of over a hundred technical papers covering topics of space habitation, robotics, and architecture, and has been co-editor for technical books (as listed on this page). Technical papers can be viewed on the spacearchitecture-dot-org website, under "publications".

Dr. Howe has been writing science fiction as a hobby for over thirty years, culminating in a series called "One Eternal Round", which is written as a possible distant future fictional history based on his experience in the NASA community. the series (so far) includes:

Near future:
Book 1: Theoloop (2021)
Book 2: Chronosphere (2014)
Book 3: Replicycle/Retrocause (2022)

Far future:
Book 4: Waterball (2012)
Book 5: Blister (2013)

Reviews

[Max Evans · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found out about this book in the book section of a BYU Studies, and immediately had to get it and read it. Some parts of it were fantastic and really got me thinking and others of it were not so good.

The first section of the book was not that interesting. It was ruminations on how the spirit works using the parts of the scriptures that talk about the spirit. Sections that talk about the spirit such as "All spirit is matter but more pure and refined." and "The body and the spirit is the soul of man." and others. My reaction was that these people way over think this stuff. I'm pretty sure one or two people have thought that about me as well, but I guess I over think other stuff.

The parts that I found the most interesting were the section that talked about technology. The parts that talked about trans-humanism were pretty thought provoking. I didn't like the tone on the article that talked about space exploration, but the ideas were interesting.

The idea that I liked the most in the whole book was something that was about modeling. Basically this was the thought 1) Modeling is getting more and more realistic. 2. If you have a powerful enough computer you will eventually run the model. 3. Eventually models will be impossible to tell from reality. 4) How do we know that we're not in a model now? That really got me to thinking.

This book was overall pretty good and really got me to thinking that the millennium will be different from anything that we think it will be. When I was on my mission one of my companions got me to thinking about this. He said that he thought that the first thing that would happen to us after we die would be that we would learn how to learn. That thought revolutionized my thinking that perhaps the millennium will be a natural progression of scientific discoveries. One of Arthur C. Clarke's rules was Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." Which I alter to "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from miracles." I think what we think of as miracles will be technology, or as I ask the priests I teach, do you think the priesthood is magic? This book has greatly expanded my thoughts along these lines in ways I didn't expect, and it didn't touch other ideas that I've had. I like to think of myself as an LDS Engineering Geek.

[Seth Dunn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't buy into Mormon Transhumanism wholly, at least not its more extreme and theologically finitistic versions. But it is cool and not without its uses, several of which are on display here. Its speculative approach is a needed, if overzealous, corrective to decades of mormon "neo-orthodoxy." A lot of this is quite fun, even when large chunks are clearly written by engineers/physicists and not humanists.

[Lincoln Cannon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Parallels and Convergences: Mormon Thought and Engineering Vision