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BP Flags $5 Billion Write-Down in Low-Carbon Segment, Warns of Weak Oil Trading
The warning and impairment—in its gas and low-carbon energy segment—cap off a tough year for the industry.
Windows info-disclosure 0-day bug gets a fix as CISA sounds alarm
: First Patch Tuesday of 2026 goes big
Why Hims & Hers Health (HIMS) Is Down 6.8% After Amazon Pharmacy Adds Wegovy Weight-Loss Pill
In recent days, Amazon Pharmacy announced it would begin offering Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy once-daily weight-loss pill through both insurance and cash-pay channels, including future availability via its pharmacy kiosks. This move directly targets the fast-growing weight management segment where Hims & Hers Health participates, raising fresh questions about how differentiated and resilient its broader telehealth platform and recurring-care model really are beyond GLP-1 offerings. We’ll now...
Boulder Highway project raises concerns for local business
A segment of Boulder Highway in the City of Henderson is undergoing a significant transformation as part of the "Reimagine Boulder Highway" project.The $170 mi
Illinois lending for social equity cannabis businesses tops $62 million
Forgivable loans an acknowledgment of problems many license holders face in raising cash from traditional sources.
About friends, family, business & the Browns – Terry Pluto’s Faith & You
What happens when you fire a friend/family member?
List of Twin Cities events canceled and businesses closed in response to ongoing ICE presence
Twin Cities businesses have been put in a difficult position by the massive federal presence.
Google pushing Gemini into Gmail, but you can turn it off
: Love Google AI Overviews? Now they're in your inbox
WellSpan Health Announces Comprehensive Migration of Technology Portfolio to AWS
Add to FavoritesWellSpan Health, the leading health care system serving Central Pennsylvania and Northern Maryland, today announced plans for a comprehensive cloud migration of its full technology infrastructure. Together with Amazon Web Services (AWS) as its preferred cloud provider, WellSpan will transition its applications, data and environments from traditional data centers to AWS. This migration will establish the foundation for delivering next-generation, AI-enabled health care solutions that reduce administrative burden and improve outcomes for patients across the region and beyond. Supercharging Innovation, Efficiency and Patient Outcomes WellSpan's migration of systems and clinical applications, which serve 1.2 million patients across nine hospitals and 250+ facilities, is expected to be complete by April 2026, one of the fastest full-scale migrations in the health care industry. This transformation enables WellSpan to unify disparate data systems for care teams and patients alike, achieving operational efficiencies and care improvements that fragmented systems are unable to deliver. “Our comprehensive migration to the cloud accelerates our ability to deploy new clinical capabilities that transform patient care while advancing our overall innovation strategy,” said Roxanna Gapstur, Ph.D., R.N., president and CEO, WellSpan Health. “When a physician can access complete patient imaging in seconds instead of hours, we're not just modernizing technology—we're improving patient outcomes. Our new cloud infrastructure also enables us to quickly implement solutions that will free our clinicians from thousands of hours of administrative work annually so they can focus on what they do best: caring for our communities.” The transition allows WellSpan to move away from a data center-based model and enables the rapid deployment and scale of AI technology. WellSpan’s strategic partner, General Catalyst’s Health Assurance Transformation Company (HATCo), facilitated the collaboration with AWS to support the migration. WellSpan’s transformation journey benefits from HATCo’s specialized technology solutions, as well as General Catalyst and AWS’s significant partnership to improve patient outcomes, which was announced in January 2025. “Our decision to go all-in on AWS will enable insights and innovations impossible in traditional siloed environments,” said Kasey Paulus, executive vice president and chief operating officer, WellSpan Health. “This is the largest health care technology transformation in our region's history, and it positions WellSpan to be a premier partner for technology leaders across the country.” “WellSpan is building a foundation with AWS that will improve care and outcomes for patients across their health system by bringing data together into standardized formats that are optimized for AI applications,” said Dan Sheeran, vice president and general manager, Healthcare and Life Science, AWS. “To do this, it is essential to have the most secure and compliant cloud when handling patient data, along with AWS’s built-in AI governance and responsible AI frameworks that follow the industry’s highest standards to protect patient information. We look forward to continuing to work alongside WellSpan as they unlock the cloud and AI’s full potential to deliver exceptional care to their patients.” Key Benefits of the AWS Collaboration Full Portfolio Migration: WellSpan will transition its applications and data from on-premises data centers to AWS, including full IT environments and specialized applications for functions such as nursing, cardiology, pharmacy and the company’s supply chain systems. This represents approximately 7.5 petabytes of clinical and non-clinical data and more than 300 applications—the most comprehensive health system cloud migration in the Mid-Atlantic region. Approved Architectures: AWS will deliver secure, WellSpan-specific architectures tailored to each build, ensuring compliance and reliability across the health system. Unified, AI-Ready Data: Migrating to AWS enables WellSpan to harmonize data across separate systems, transforming unstructured clinical notes and multi-modal datasets into standardized, AI-ready formats. Accelerated Results and Improved Outcomes: Automated data normalization and processing will enable the deployment of applications that reduce turnaround times for items such as analyzing medical imaging or patient records from days to minutes, helping clinicians get patient results faster and improving overall health outcomes. Reduced Administrative Burden: The transition to AWS will enable swift deployment of AI-powered solutions that reclaim thousands of hours for WellSpan’s clinical and corporate teams, allowing them to focus on patient care rather than paperwork. Elastic Infrastructure: Cloud architecture will enable WellSpan to scale computing resources dynamically, supporting seasonal demand fluctuations without infrastructure investments, as well as the rapid deployment of new services across multiple locations simultaneously. Most Secure, Compliant Cloud: AWS offers the highest network availability of any cloud provider, with more than 166 HIPAA-eligible services and certifications for global compliance standards, including HITRUST CSF. Built-in AI governance and responsible AI frameworks ensure that WellSpan’s data is protected under the industry’s most rigorous standards. Tags:News releaseInnovation and partnerships
Large entertainment venues in Portland will now contribute to local arts trust fund
Entertainment venues with a capacity of 2,000 or more people are now required to contribute a portion of ticket sales to Portland’s local arts trust fund.
500 Worlds: Titus – Strike fast and hold the line with new Space Marines Detachments
Fill the sky with Drop Pods!
The moon has been secretly feasting on Earth's atmosphere for billions of years
A new study reveals that tiny fragments of Earth's atmosphere are transported to and absorbed by the moon via gusts of solar wind and our planet's magnetic field, upending a 20-year-old theory based on NASA's Apollo lunar samples.
Humongous 52-inch Dell monitor will make you feel like king of the internet with four screens in one
: Also: The XPS brand is back
Portland City Councilor approves fee for large entertainment venues
The new rule was developed after Live Nation proposed a giant concert venue in downtown Portland.
Baby's got clack: HP pushes PC-in-a-keyboard for businesses with hot desks
: Notebook updates and enterprise tools also inbound from IT giant
Gray Family Health Center announces closure
Another Maine health care provider is shutting down.
Dell’s Underperforming PC Business Seeks a Comeback
Chief Operating Officer Jeff Clarke says Dell got off course by focusing too much on premium tiers and ignoring other segments of the market.
Dell’s Underperforming PC Business Seeks a Comeback
Chief Operating Officer Jeff Clarke says Dell got off course by focusing too much on premium tiers and ignoring other segments of the market.
Xreal Revamps Entry AR Glasses With Lower Price, Better Video
Xreal Inc., an early pioneer in augmented-reality glasses, unveiled an upgraded entry-level product at CES, where smart eyewear will be a prevailing theme over the coming week.
Japan’s politics will face further pressure in 2026
In 2026, Japan’s fragmented Diet will have less room to govern as economic pressures, demographic decline and regional uncertainties sharpen policy trade-offs
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella calls for consensus about AI
: Exec argues we need a new metaphor focused on AI as a lever rather than a job killer
Small Business Administration suspends loans to thousands of Minnesota borrowers
On Thursday, the agency suspended loans for 6,900 Minnesota borrowers amid "suspected fraudulent activity."
Maine's minimum wage hike sparks debate on economy and local business challenges
As of New Year's Day, the state's minimum wage has increased to 15 dollars and 10 cents per hour.
How Chevy Chase made ‘Weekend Update’ work
Chevy Chase created “Saturday Night Live’s” most enduring segment. Here’s how the original “SNL” cast member turned the news into nonsense — and must-watch TV.
This tiny plant is helping solve crimes
Moss may look insignificant, but it can carry a hidden forensic fingerprint. Because different moss species thrive in very specific micro-environments, tiny fragments can reveal exactly where a person has been. Researchers reviewing 150 years of cases found moss has helped solve crimes across multiple countries, including one case where it led investigators directly to a buried child. The study urges law enforcement to pay closer attention to these silent witnesses.
The top Charlotte business stories of 2025
Before we get too far into the new year, let’s take a brief moment to look back — this time at some of the top Charlotte-area business news of 2025. To do that, Tony Mecia of the Charlotte Ledger Business Newsletter joined our Marshall Terry for our segment BizWorthy.
‘No judgment, just help’: Mental health awareness campaign taking student art submissions
Maryland students are being invited to create posters that will be used to shed light on mental health issues.
Workers, residents evacuated amid mental health crisis at Chisago City business
SWAT and HAZMAT teams are on scene.
Thinking through what may be on tap in 2026
When the three-million-year-old bones of Lucy were unearthed in an Ethiopian valley in 1974, paleoanthropologists anointed her as the Eve to all of us. Though her skull was not big enough to accommodate our larger, homo sapiens’ brain, she was a genetic hominid. Although a few bone fragments of a greater age have been discovered […]
Small Town Politics: WALB investigates allegations of election fraud; several South Georgia counties being investigated by the state elections board
Across South Georgia, small town politics can divide communities, neighborhoods, and even families. That’s why we are launching a new segment...Dedicated to uncovering and unpacking stories about local corruption, confusion, and conflicts. Beginning in the city of Nicholls where the November election led to a recount.
Made for More Health: Knowing when it's more than a cold
In this Made for More Health segment, Dr. Diaz Martinez explains how to recognize when a simple cold may signal something more serious.
Bari Weiss’ ‘60 Minutes’ scandal is about more than one report
By blocking an approved segment on a controversial prison holding U.S. deportees in El Salvador, the editor-in-chief of CBS News has become the main story.
'60 Minutes' segment on Trump immigration policy accidentally airs online
The segment featured interviews with migrants sent to a notorious Salvadoran prison under President Donald Trump's immigration crackdown. The segment was removed from Canada's Global Television Network but still appeared on its app.
Microsoft wants to replace its entire C and C++ codebase
: Plans move to Rust, with help from AI
'Fragmented' Microsoft tools undercut efficiency at Amazon and Whole Foods, internal Deloitte review found
Whole Foods' use of Microsoft 365 apps remained disconnected from Amazon, leading to inefficiencies and security concerns, a Deloitte review found.
Anna’s Archive claims Spotify scrape to ‘preserve culture’
: Anna’s Archive’s idealism doesn’t quite survive its own blog post
Arizona Science Center brings annual Snow Week to the desert
Arizona Science Center is bringing a winter wonderland to the heart of the Valley with its 14th annual Snow Week.
Buckle up, memory prices aren’t easing anytime soon
: We haven't even hit the peak, TechInsights tells El Reg
Science with Stevie: Winter Solstice
Meteorologist Stevie Daniels explains what the winter solstice is and how it impacts various areas on planet earth in this Science with Stevie segment!
Youth Sports Was 2025’s Breakout M&A Theme. Here’s What’s Next
What had long been a fragmented, passion-driven corner of the sports economy became an active segment for investors and strategic acquirers.
Fire destroys business, apartment building in Patten
The State Fire Marshal's Office is investigating a fire in Patten that destroyed a business and nearby apartment building.
Rising memory costs are about to test buyers' patience
AI-nflation: Rising DRAM and NAND prices are squeezing handset makers and threatening a fragile market recovery
Apple and Google forced into emergency patching 0-day
: Both admit attackers were already exploiting the bugs, with scant detail and hints of spyware-grade abuse
Theresa May and the Brutality of Politics
Former UK Prime Minister Theresa May speaks with Francine Lacqua about Vladimir Putin and her approach to leadership in a world seeing a rise in "strongmen." (Source: Bloomberg)
A new dawn in global health: UHC as the path toward national health stewardship
The UHC High‑Level Forum in Tokyo marked an unmistakable turning point. It signaled a shift from dialogue to pragmatic action, with health and finance ministries jointly designing country‑owned, fiscally grounded UHC strategies to move beyond fragmented, crisis‑driven responses toward resilient, durable health systems that can make Universal Health Coverage (UHC) a reality. UHC means ensuring...
Several Subway shops in Maine close as state revokes business certificates
Several Subway restaurants in Maine, owned by MTF Subs, were abruptly closed after the state revoked their business registration certificates Wednesday.
Kennebunkport business reopens after car crashes into store
Police say the 21-year-old driver was coming home from work early in the morning when he fell asleep at the wheel.
Maine lawmaker plans to submit mental health resources bill for heritage industries
A state senator plans to submit a bill in Augusta which would seek to address a lack of mental health resources.
Cox Enterprises Launches New Cox Outdoors Business Segment
Cox Outdoors unites the company’s recent investments in outdoor-recreation businesses and expands its focus on conservation.
HR giant SHRM faces blowback after a 'nuclear' $11.5 million employee discrimination verdict. Its CEO called it a 'blip.'
After the verdict came down, SHRM CEO Johnny C. Taylor addressed employees in a video, saying the judgment lacked merit.
Windows Insiders get a glimpse of Redmond’s agentic future
: Native MCP support lands in Insider Dev and Beta builds
MSC Cruises Unveils New Entertainment Experiences at Ocean Cay
MSC Cruises will introduce new family entertainment experiences at Ocean Cay MSC Marine Reserve in January 2026, including wellness programs, sports activities, augmented reality treasure hunts and a LEGO® pop-up with mascots.
Block all AI browsers for the foreseeable future: Gartner
: Analysts worry lazy users could have agents complete mandatory infosec training, and attackers could do far nastier things
Maine Human Rights Commission adds MSAD 52 to lawsuit over transgender sports policies
The Maine Human Rights Commissions is adding a sixth school district to their lawsuit over transgender policies.
'Maddie Moo Designs': Maine girl builds profitable sticker business
We love to highlight local makers and businesses here on ARC Maine, and one young entrepreneur is using her father as inspiration.
Latest Windows 11 updates may break the OS's most basic bits
: Microsoft warns Start menu, Explorer, and other XAML apps can crash or vanish on managed devices
Law of 'maximal randomness' explains how broken objects shatter in the most annoying way possible
A new mathematical equation describes the distribution of different fragment sizes when an object breaks. Remarkably, the distribution is the same for everything from bubbles to spaghetti.
How America’s Biggest Retailers Are Rethinking Their Businesses And Their Stores
America’s biggest department stores are changing, and changing fast. In the past quarter, for instance, Target has piloted a new store model in Chicago, where it’s begun segmenting some stores into more backroom operations and fulfillment for online orders, while high-foot traffic locations will prioritize in-person shopper engagement and on-shelf inventory availability. The company plans […]
Science must move from materialism to mystery
Theoretical physicist and neuroscientist Àlex Gómez-Marín argues that modern science has become trapped in a framework that mistakes matter for the whole of reality. In this wide-ranging interview, Gómez-Marín challenges the foundations of materialism, defends the scientific study of near-death experiences, and calls for a new type of science grounded in mystery and a renewed sense of the sacred. He suggests that abandoning materialism could open the door to a deeper understanding of consciousness, death, and the purpose of human existence. Simon Custer: You are both a theoretical physicist and a neuroscientist, and you have also been fiercely critical of materialist theories of mind and consciousness. What do you think the ultimate nature of reality is?Àlex Gómez-Marín: I don't know what the ultimate nature of reality is, but what I try to first assess is whether the stories that they [mainstream science] have told us about it are right, or maybe whether there are other alternatives. That's why I've been a fierce critic of materialism. As a scientist, I realized that they had sold us this idea that to be a good scientist you also had to subscribe to many other -isms, like materialism, reductionism, and even secularism. And so first I think one needs to unmount these -isms, and then, as is happening today in consciousness studies, we have a huge landscape where there isn't only one game in town, the idea that matter is the only thing that really exists. But because we are studying the hard problem of consciousness, it may be the case that other views of reality, like idealism, or even dualism, or other theories like dual aspect monism... these are philosophical ideas that now, I think, have room in science to be taken seriously. How does something like materialism relate to dualism or idealism? What is materialism in the first place?Well, materialism is the philosophical position that matter is the only really ‘real’ thing in the universe. And I think that worked kind of well because science started 400 years ago and Galileo made that split, I call it the foundational wound. It was a great business move.He said, let's start doing science on that portion of reality that lends itself more easily to mathematization and measurement. So, for some reason, the solidity of this table or the movement of planets lend themselves very well to this foundational idea of science. But as time went on, 400 years later, we realized that we had forgotten the other side, which is what really matters.What really matters is pain, is love, is feelings, sensation, consciousness, which is very hard to define, but very intimate. We all know what it is. It's that thing that disappears when we go into deep sleep and comes back in the morning. SUGGESTED VIEWING On the edges of knowledge With Michael Shermer, Rupert Sheldrake, Güneş Taylor It's what it is like to be, as Nagel said. It's the feeling of being alive. So, materialism is good to study certain things, but then when it ossifies into this ideology and then is dressed like science, now it's preventing us from understanding these key questions that are really that everybody wants to know.Why are we here? Why do we feel reality? Where do we go when we die? And so we need other ways. We need pluralism. I'm only asking for having more options on the table and taking them seriously. Why does materialism fail to explain consciousness? For example, if you were to lobotomize me, I would not be a functional human being. What do you say to someone who might think that materialism adequately explains the mind?Well, here we could speak about different things. We could talk about physics or about neuroscience. I happen to have training with both.For instance, for neuroscientists, 99% of them, I'm not included in that portion, believe that the brain can only be a productive organ. It's an organ that somehow, somewhere, consciousness emerges. It's like a lamp. And then something happens, magic happens, and then consciousness emerges.That's the position you need to be if you're a materialist because if the only really ‘real’ thing is matter, then you need to say, just give us some more time and money and we'll figure out how mind emerges or is produced from matter. There are many philosophically sophisticated ways of criticizing this.Now there's another option, which is the brain as a permissive organ. This was said by William James more than 100 years ago.Now then the brain wouldn't be like this machine, like for instance, a heat engine whose smoke is consciousness, which is what we would have in the first big model, the productive model. But in the permissive model, the brain would be a kind of a filter. And so the brain would still have a very important role in consciousness, but it wouldn't be a productive role.It would be permissive, much like a filter or much like a prism which would receive light. And - I'm speaking metaphorically - it would receive the light of the mind and then it could reflect it and refract it.Now, with these two big options on the table, I think we can make progress into what I call the edges of consciousness, which are all these experiences, weird experiences that many people have, but we don't talk about enough, like near-death experiences, precognitive dreams, synchronicities. These experiences are very important for humans and they have a place in the permissive hypothesis and they are literally impossible in the productive hypothesis. So that's yet one more reason to explore alternatives to materialism. There may be anecdotal evidence for near-death experiences, but is there robust evidence that would be accepted by the majority of scientists who subscribe to the scientific method?Sure. And the plural of anecdotes, someone said, is data.And there's a lot of data. Actually, this year is the 50th anniversary, half a century, since Dr. Raymond Moody realized that we have two ears and one mouth and started listening to what his patients had to say about their experiences while they were clinically dead.The heart had stopped, breathing had stopped in these patients. These patients would come back and tell him these amazing stories that some people may say are hallucinations, but for the patients were hyper-real, like seeing light at the end of the tunnels, seeing deceased family members waiting for them, feeling bliss.___I would say the evidence suggests that the mind can survive the death of activity of the brain.___And so he and others started taking them seriously and writing their accounts down. And then you can do a science based on that material of experience that people have. Now, on the more objective side, more recently people have started to measure what's going on in the brain when people are clinically dead and brought back. This has opened a proper field of study, which is near-death studies.Evidence is a difficult word, because sometimes people think that when you say evidence, this is just the final proof. Evidence is like in a jury. You bring testimony, you bring pieces of data that point in one direction or another.I would say the evidence suggests that the mind can survive the death of activity of the brain. When brains are broken or shut off, there can still be mind going on. And that's revolutionary.That would entail that when we die, it's not game over, which, by the way, is the thesis of materialism. If consciousness survives, materialism dies. It's game over for materialism if something of us continues after we die. Do you think that there is mental continuity after death?Well, I think so, and I believe so, and I could also say I may have experienced it myself, because four years ago I had a near-death experience. I was in the hospital, I lost a lot of blood, and I saw those beings at the end of the tunnel, three beings, and there was yellow light. I was in a well, I was looking upwards, and I hadn't read about NDEs by then, but when I came back from this experience, I decided I would try to integrate this also in my professional life. Not just my personal life, of course, but my professional life as a physicist and as a neuroscientist. So I may have had the experience of glimpses of what an afterlife would be, and I'm not ashamed to say it in this way, and then one can do science of it, and then one can do philosophy of it.One can think about what -isms we were discussing, what views on reality would allow those experiences to be really ‘real,’ as opposed to, well, poor guy, the brain was kind of broken, it must have been a hallucination. Do you have a view about whether individuality or “the ego” persists after death, or whether we sort of merge into some sort of cosmic consciousness instead?I don't know, but my view would be along those lines you're suggesting. I think we could speak about a kind of universal mind, and then the problem is not how we emerge from matter, but how we fragment from a more holistic consciousness into these individual eddies and then when we die, this kind of dissipates.But I'm not sure. For instance, idealism would promote that view, but then what would survive of us after these eddies just vanish and become again the big Consciousness, I'm not sure what that would be. I don't know for sure, but I would tell you I believe something of us survives.And there are other lines of research, not just near-death experience, that can address this really hard question of survival. For instance, there are children who remember previous lives. This was studied by Ian Stevenson at the University of Virginia for more than 50 years.___Research takes place within a selection mechanism that also sometimes reinforces things that are not very scientific.___It's amazing research. He went all over the world, especially in the East, and collected all these case studies, all these stories. In plural, these were data of kids, very young age, who would describe up to 40 items that then he could go and verify.There was no internet. There was really no way the kid could know. Why would the kid say that when I was living in this other body and I was a woman and that's how my house would look like or that's how I would die, right? Again, there is evidence, not proof, but there's evidence not only that something weird and interesting is happening as we cross the threshold, but also when we come back to this life.Scientists should not be afraid of studying this, but they are because there's stigma. There's usually stigma upon the enigma, and this is so unfortunate. And one of the reasons is because of the ideology of materialism, because those things cannot be possible. What is wrong with the politics of science such that they have generated this stigma?So many things. Science is a human activity to begin with.So it falls prey to all our passions and ego and greed. That's one thing. Science is a job for the good and for the bad.You need to get a salary. You need to get grants. Research takes place within a selection mechanism that also sometimes reinforces things that are not very scientific.And then, we didn't have time to unpack this, but science for many years become entangled, as I was suggesting before, to other -isms, materialism, secularism. So anything that smells like the afterlife, people may think has to do with God, and then they freak out.Anything that suggests that there's something about the mind that may not need a physical material substrate to exist, it smells like non-materialism. So, all these -isms are ideologically blocking that kind of research, and then there are all these sociopolitical constraints as to what should be studied and what shouldn't be studied.I call it the backstage of science. Sometimes we scientists or science communicators seem to speak as if the data is the only thing that matters. We say, well, data and theory.But then there's a third leg of this stool, which is all the politics that goes behind the scenes. And we often don't speak about this, and it's quite vicious and petty, and it's very real. Why is materialism so attractive to most scientists?Well, an easy answer is because we've grown up with it.It's what the educational system promotes, and that's what you hear when you go to university. So it's like growing in a culture. It feels like the air in which you breathe.So it's very hard to begin with to detect, well, maybe there's another alternative. Maybe there are other ways of doing science, other environments in which one could do science. That's one reason.And other reasons maybe are more profound, and I'm not qualified to explain them, but I could say, looking at this 400-year history of science, since it started around 1623 with Galileo's book The Assayer, that science went and coupled with all what's going on in the West.And so the fall of religion, you could say, and science presented us this new alternative that then could be coupled very well with other -isms, and this idea of growth, and then science losing its good twin brother, which was philosophy. There's a whole natural history of science starting as philosophy, kind of emancipating or breaking out from philosophy, and then marrying technology, and then marrying other social systems.From that point of view, materialism is a very convenient idea to propose. There were attempts, like the German idealists tried to do a more romantic science. But no, the idea prevailed, like Francis Bacon said: You should pursue nature through all her corners, he said, and make her spill her secrets.Our attitude towards nature in the science that dominates is very much reflecting how we treat nature in our society, in our culture, like a resource to extract secrets by force and then dominate it. How is materialism related to the notions of growth and progress? What's wrong with having a productive citizenry?This is another very interesting and very difficult question to answer.But there's this recent book coming out by Paul Kingsnorth. In it, he explains this idea of the machine and this idea of progress. And this, again, this conflation of more is better, of we need to go forward always, and convincing us that the way to do that is to continually extract more from nature. But because we don't have the religious context anymore, because God is dead, then what do we have? We have what we can do as humans with our own gadgets.It's kind of the story of the Promethean fire. We will just build anything to make ourselves God.A good example today is transhumanism. Transhumanism is this pseudo-religion dressed in technoscientific language whose goal is very religious. They promise immortality, they promise redemption, they promise transformation of the entire natural world, but it's done by human means through technology. Are you suggesting that we can't have ethics without religion?Well, we should have ethics with or without religion. That's another pruning that has happened in science. We say, forget about aesthetics, although some physicists still think that beautiful means probably true, and forget about politics. We pretend there's no backstage of science, and even let's forget about ethics.___Science needs to be in the service of mankind.___Scientists, when they become more like engineers, they're just thinking how to make things work so that they can go to the moon, go to Mars, make machines that think, but they don't think whether that's a good idea.And also consider metaphysics. Many scientists for a long time pretended, and maybe that comes from the stream of positivisms, that really one doesn't need metaphysics at all, except that materialism is always the metaphysics running the system.You see, it's not just ethics. It's the pruning of all of these, you could say, five main legs of philosophy that just makes a kind of unconscious science, a science that doesn't really know what it's doing. It's doing it very well locally, but it just doesn't know what it's doing globally. Do you think science has to have an ultimate vision and purpose behind it for it to be effective or for it to be meaningful and transformative?Yes, a way I would say that is that science needs to be in the service of mankind. And it hasn't been that. And we can see it through, you know, when we discovered the secrets of the atom, and all of a sudden, the Manhattan Project, and then we create nuclear weapons.And now we're trying to crack how machines may think, and now we're creating this mess, right? So science needs to be in service of mankind, not in service of a few ideas that maybe want to make more money or just dominate upon nature. What about planes, trains, automobiles, and modern medicine? Hasn't science served mankind by helping us develop those technologies?Yes and no. I see where you're going, and it's fair.I came here by plane, and it's a blessing. When I almost died, the surgeons did their job, and they saved my life. But these two forced choices between Luddites and Silicon Valley types, I think, of course, it's a false dichotomy.Progress, in a way, it's good, but we often don't speak about the dark side of the moon. We say the great things that progress has brought, and we don't speak about the disasters, the side effects that it has come with, and the same when we promise new technologies. We tend to think that any technology is great, that email is going to save us so much time because we don't need to write letters and send them anymore.Is that true? I spend so many hours a week writing emails. Let's just say there are great things about it and bad things about it. People like Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker, for example, argue that we've made moral progress over time because of the Enlightenment. Do you think that's totally wrong-headed?I think he's emphasizing a side of the moon, and he does that very well, and you can find tons of plots where there's a slope going up and say it's great. But I think he should also tell the not-so-friendly story.But if your ideology is just to resist and continue to explain that the Enlightenment is the best thing ever and reason is the best thing ever… this feels to me like you're worshipping these abstractions.I'm very critical of it and also of these, again, science communicators and scientists that say, Oh, science says, in the name of science, experts say. It's like, come on, let's be careful because we can shoot ourselves in the foot by putting forth to the people an image of science that we know is not really true. Recently there's been a resurgence of spirituality and of people who say that they're spiritual but not religious, especially in the United States. If materialism is going away, what is going to fill that gap? Are we going to return to traditional religion? Do you see that being connected with the rise of the political right?I'm not a fortune teller, so I don't know what's going to happen. But, yeah, we could say we're in this post-materialist age and even post-secular age. One cannot come back to the past, but maybe just to contact with the roots is a good idea.What do I mean by that? I think we need to do a science 2.0, a science that says thank you to Galileo and thank you to materialism, but we need to reinvent even a new kind of scientific method. We need to do so in a culture where we realize humans cannot thrive in a vacuum where there's this idea that the sacred has to be removed.Now, how do we do that without bringing in back all the vices of religion? I don't know. I'm from a Catholic country.Here we are in England, so there are differences and interreligious dialogue has always been a challenge. But I think maybe a way of putting it is: after all these conflicts and branchings I was quickly alluding to, science from philosophy and then also from religion, now there's a time of reconciliation perhaps and maybe debates in the proper sense, like exchange of ideas in service of learning and getting into something higher than both poles. We need science to talk to religious people and it's interesting when people say they're spiritual and not religious.I think this is just a way of saying, no, I don't want to go back, I want to go forward. But at the end of the day, religions have offered us practices and grounding that we now desperately need. Everybody can and should just meditate or pray or do whatever they want, but we're in a crisis and it's time for reconciliation. What do you say to critics that say you are merely projecting our need for meaning onto a fundamentally indifferent universe?Yeah, I know that the typical science communicator says something like this. But we're not projecting. Human beings feed on meaning.It's the other way around. If you're a materialist, because the only thing that there is is matter, all that comes next, free will, consciousness, meaning, this is a kind of illusion that we need to explain.They're just craving for meaning, but there isn't really for them. I would also like to remind my materialist friends that for decades, if not centuries, they've said in the name of science, we know that this and this and this doesn't really exist. I think now they sense they're forced to say, well, actually, we don't know. We've been saying, for instance, that there's nothing after you die, and now probably they need to admit that they don't know the answer.___We need to do a science 2.0, a science that says thank you to Galileo and thank you to materialism, but we need to reinvent even a new kind of scientific method.___So it's a moment to open up possibilities and also to gently but fiercely critique these claims that I think harm society. If you say in the name of science, get on with it, when your father dies, you'll never see him again. Well, what the F do you know about it? You haven't studied the literature, you haven't had any of those experiences, and basically what you're doing is you're just doing marketing on ideology. This needs to stop. Do you think that it's scarier for some people to entertain the thought that there might be life after death, compared to a materialist worldview where you just die, given that there might be consequences for unsavory behaviour?Well, death and dying is scary. It's maybe the ultimate ending. It's a limit on life, and when we're in this conquest mode, we don't like limits.And it also has, there's a shockwave backwards, so I think if you change your notion of what death is or may be, you live differently. It also has consequences, as you're saying, for the future because this is not our only goal here and we come back in whatever form. And again, different religions would say different things. I the East, they are more happy with the idea of reincarnation, and here in the West, there are other preferences. But in any case, it changes how we live, and that's really what matters.It's not about just projecting or imagining what we'll be after, but how we live now and also how we treat those who are dying. So it goes from the individual to the families, to the hospitals.Now in the near-death research I do, this has ramifications at all these levels, all the way to society.But our society is thanatophobic. It has a phobia of death. We don't want to hear about death, and this is another thing we need to put on the table and be willing to talk about it. Do you think that we might get closer to answering ultimate questions like why is there anything at all if we jettison materialism?That’s an excellent question, Simon. Two things: we should stop treating reality, I believe, as a great sudoku, as an enigma, as something that with intelligence, money, and time that we will crack and instead treat reality more like a mystery. And what you do for in front of a mystery is not to be the clever guy in a class and say “I’ll solve you” but more like “I will bow and you will transform me.”I know this sounds a bit like a scientist speaking like a mystic. But I think this reorientation is needed. In the end, we won’t crack the big questions, but they will transform us. If we free ourselves from this prison of materialism, the way we will explore these questions will be freer, more creative, and in service of mankind. Do you think exploring mystery is the reason why we are here?I think we are here because, and this pseudo-theological argument I’m making off the cuff, But the One, the Absolute, if there is such a thing, had everything except limitation. We are that absolute experiencing that contingency. It’s like an act of divine proprioception. It’s a wonderful adventure, it’s just incredible to be alive. Perhaps we have forgotten why we are here and the whole point is to experience the flesh.Let me end by saying this. I criticize materialism harshly. I bang on this dead horse, because I think it’s dead. But matter is a great mystery. So maybe my invitation is as follows: hey materialist friends, come here, let’s work on materialism 2.0! Consciousness is a mystery, but matter is also a mystery. The fact that we can have an intersubjective experience consensus, the fact that we can apply mathematics, that we can measure things... the physical world we take for granted, but it is a great mystery too.Maybe that’s related to your last question: why are we here? Why did spirit decide to incarnate? Being in the flesh may be a great thing if spirit decided to do so.Àlex Gómez-Marín, thank you very much.My pleasure.
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