In this paper, we present some reflections that have emerged from the incorporation of facial recognition technology in evangelical churches in Brazil. In these contexts, the faces of the believers shift from being questioned as signs of... more
In this paper, we present some reflections that have emerged from the incorporation of facial recognition technology in evangelical churches in Brazil. In these contexts, the faces of the believers shift from being questioned as signs of an identity to being supporters of a facial analysis taxonomy. In that interpellation, a gradual similarity is built between what the artificial technology recognizes and enunciates and what the priest or pastor expects to see. In this tension between the aletheic and the scopic, the face of the believer ceases to be a point of connection with an individuality to become the source of facial data. These data, finally, have a performative capacity: categories and patterns of recognition forge a reality.
Herein, I discuss the work of Ludwig Binswanger in an attempt, through phenomenological analysis, to provide an account of salvation that is grounded in the experience of salvation. In so doing, I hope to tease apart the essential... more
Herein, I discuss the work of Ludwig Binswanger in an attempt, through phenomenological analysis, to provide an account of salvation that is grounded in the experience of salvation. In so doing, I hope to tease apart the essential features of that experience from an ideological superstructure, which would favor this or that particular religious ideology. My hope is that, by restricting the focus of the discussion to the essential features of ‘being saved’, I can get at what would not only be phenomenologically relevant, but what would cut at the most general aspects of salvation in order to get an account of salvation generalizable and robust enough to account for the ontologically relevant structures of salvation, which would hold no matter the ideological superstructure associated with this or that account of salvation.
