ext-2025-08-25 Gary Sheng & Will Preble Christian Technology and Truth Management Dialogue Summary

Meeting Context

• Setting: Restaurant meeting in Austin, Texas
• Tone: Deep philosophical and theological dialogue between Christian technologists
• Key Development: Discovery of strong alignment on Christian worldview, technology ethics, and truth management concepts
• Additional Context: Will considering Austin relocation for better tech community access and networking

Major Topics Discussed

1. Introductions and Background Exchange

Gary's Current Transition: Moving away from institutional constraints

Gary: "So, where I'm at right now is exploring other new things. I have a big part of myself that, I mean I just... It sounds like such an obvious and almost ridiculous thing, but putting money aside, it's very clear for me what I would do. I would fight entrenched power full time."

Will's Business Focus: AI infrastructure and community impact

Will: "I've been working on an innovation studio for three and a half years. We had this internal experiment that focused on AI... the company is called Covenant, so we just launched our developer platform."

Covenant Platform Capabilities: Advanced AI infrastructure

Will: "So essentially, you can spin up open source models, dedicated GPUs, integrate with a bunch of compute providers, manage all the DevOps, all the deployment stuff, and then you can add all your own encryption. And so, essentially, I guess what we can say is that essentially we predict the model weights."

Location Strategy: Seeking better tech community

Will: "I've been in Phoenix, Scottsdale for about two years now, but I'm realizing that I spend more time meeting more people face-to-face... The tech scene, it's like, there's pockets in places all over, but it's kind of hard when you're doing something really tech, and you've got to be around that energy all the time."

2. Gary's Truth Management Vision and Organizational Critique

Alpha Schools Experience: Institutional dysfunction as catalyst

Gary: "I did this five-part boot camp, essentially, at Cal Poly AI. And that led me to consult for this school system called Alpha Schools, which I had a pretty bad experience with... When you try to scale a school system in the same way you scale software, I think like, You're more, not to say that the scaling of social media was good."

Truth Management Concept: Organizational worldview documentation

Gary: "Trying to make the case for really, really good documentation about what an organization believes. And really like, The world view, right? It's world view. How does the organization see the world? And what are the terms, what are the concepts that you need to define?"

Definition Crisis: Lack of clarity in organizations

Gary: "I call this truth management. Kind of intentionally provocative. What is the truth that you're orienting your business decisions on? A lot of it is stuck in the founder's head... Like the word crypto, what the fuck does that mean? When you say the word crypto, what does it mean? It could mean any number of things, right?"

Personal Application: Individual worldview documentation

Gary: "I've been overall trying to figure out what I believe, and I've been documenting that... I've basically documented how I see the world as a Christian trying to make sense of things."

3. Christian Worldview Foundation and Life Application

Faith as Decision-Making Framework: Practical Christianity

Gary: "If you ask two people that are Christian, what do you believe? And how are you carrying out those beliefs? What it defaults to is... If you think you believe something, how are you living it out? How would your life be any different if you were an atheist?"

Institutional vs. Personal Faith: Authentic Christianity critique

Gary: "You know, part of talking to a friend is just like confirmation that you're not crazy and feeling the way you feel. But if I were to talk to my atheist parents about leaving a well-paid job, they'd be like, what the fuck are you doing?"

Spiritual Community Challenges: Shallow Christianity critique

Gary: "Whatever your practices are for developing and maintaining and deepening your faith, it should probably lead you to more effective decision-making that's often just the exact opposite of what most people would do... It can be kind of like lonely when you're like, let's say you're in a bible study. It just feels like it may be better than nothing for most people there, but if you're like more serious about it than other people, it can feel alienating."

4. Will's Theological Framework and Logos Philosophy

Christocentric Reality: Christ as center of existence

Will: "If Christ is the Lord God, Christ is the way to truth, the way to life, the way to God, then the events of incarnation, crucifixion, and resurrection of Christ is the center of all reality. Christ is the center. We don't live in an anthropocentric universe. We live in a Christocentric reality."

Logos Concept: Greek philosophy meets Christian theology

Will: "So, John 1.1 is the Greek that's longest. The Logos, if you read Plato, if you read a lot of the Stoic philosophers, Greek philosophers, the Logos, they talk about the Logos. Essentially, how I understand it is they were effectively using philosophy to grasp at the nature of God."

Trinity Metaphor: Understanding divine nature

Will: "So like, the metaphor I like is, the Father is like the mind... Christ is the way to truth, the way to life, the way to God."

5. Truth, Beauty, and Goodness Framework

Christ as Lens: Defining truth and beauty

Gary: "Everything has felt like it makes more sense the more I try to understand Christ and what he's saying. Everything makes more sense. It feels less chaotic... Life feels coherent and manageable, no more manageable. With Christ as like my lens to view the world."

Beauty Definition: God-centered aesthetics

Gary: "If beauty is, can then be redefined very simply, That which brings you closer to God in truth. Very easy. Wow. And then you're like, oh, all this is not art. This is noise, right? These are noises. These are random colors, right?"

Truth and Goodness Integration: Comprehensive worldview

Gary: "The kind of like, everything that sprouts with making Christ your lens of truth and having Christ's heart, everything that stems from that, the collective Flourishing of understanding of God's reality, that is truth. And then goodness is that which keeps evil on narrow paths."

Relativism Critique: Anti-postmodern stance

Gary: "If anything beautiful, nothing's beautiful. Right? So, if beauty is, can then be redefined very simply, That which brings you closer to God in truth... And it may be pleasing, it may be kind of coherent, but it's like not art."

6. Denominational Critique and Individual Faith Development

Denominational Outsourcing Problem: Critical analysis of religious institutions

Gary: "When you outsource all of your... Truth, development, to like an organism, like a dictatorship essentially... We are the correct part of this dictatorship. Think about it, that's like basically what it is."

Orthodox Appreciation with Reservations: Balanced denominational assessment

Gary: "And I have a lot of respect for Orthodox. I got this from a monastery. But, it's two-sided too... You're basically turning off your brain, and you're like, OK, what are the rituals?"

Individual Responsibility: Personal truth development

Gary: "So like, both things can be true. There's like, objective truth, but no one has been appointed by God to decide what that is. We're all figuring it out. But, are we figuring it out? I think most people have completely outsourced their thinking about it."

GitHub for Worldview: Version control for beliefs

Gary: "So I'm like, pretty bullish on GitHub-ing your groups so that you're, so you look at, and it's not just a metaphor, literally, and you don't have to use GitHub, you can just look at the platform, right? But like, Git itself is such a beautiful... open protocols."

7. Cultural Analysis and Spiritual Warfare Understanding

Elite Corruption Reality: Understanding systemic evil

Gary: "I have a friend that was raped by the former governor of New Jersey, who came down to Austin to kind of rebrand himself after all that... And part of how he's been doing that is by funding the New Age community here, including the sex market."

Moral Relativism Critique: Consequences of no truth foundation

Gary: "So if anything can be defined as good, anything can be defined as good. Oh, we're exploring our sensuality, we're challenging the norms. If challenging norms itself, but why is that good? Why do you think that's good?"

Foundation Crisis: Truth grounding necessity

Gary: "I think a lot of why people are going insane today is because they have no grounding of truth. They have no foundation to build the rest of their understanding about how anything works."

8. Will's Analysis of Self-Referential Culture

Circular Logic Problem: Cultural and intellectual bankruptcy

Will: "Yeah, I would agree with you... You don't believe in anything. I go, what do you believe in? They can't give me an answer... So you have math where it's just like a lot of people that are, it's like the oracle, it's like the snake eating its own tail, everything is self-referential."

Academic Citation Analogy: Intellectual dishonesty

Will: "And like the more you get into their, pulling at the strings of their view, it's like, it's like reference, like if you have a math equation or like a scientific... You have a scientific paper, and all the sources you cite are things that you wrote."

Church Fragmentation: Christianity's institutional crisis

Will: "And so it's even reflected in churches, too. You have a lot of people in Christianity who are falling into that same trap... Like, a lot of Christians go to church on Sundays, but you're not doing that thing over here. It's a part of our lives. It's fragmentation."

9. Cultural Rebranding and Language Manipulation

Radical Monogamy Example: Rebranding traditional values

Will: "But then it became, oh, well, this isn't lamb or whatever. This is, like, a radical, I don't know, like, a rebranded... Radical monogamy."

Language Corruption: Subversion of meaning

Gary: "Dude, I know... We're gonna rebrand heroin. I guess."

Christianity as Truth Test: Exposing ideological foundations

Gary: "Then you could argue why people like, love to attack Christianity. It's because it creates the best fear of how bullshit their ideology is... There's nothing grounding me."

10. Technology and AI Ethics Discussion

AI Worship Danger: Technology as false god

Gary: "So like, there's this other idea of how do you make sure if you are using these AI models, you're not, you are clearing the history, like, so it's not like feeding on its own bullshit."

Sycophancy Loop Problem: AI reinforcement of delusion

Gary: "I saw this interesting explanation about... If on the record is like, you're right. You're absolutely right. You're the rightest person in the world. Because it's using the previous chat history where it's looking at its own responses of saying, you're right."

Truth Management Integration: AI with truth foundations

Gary: "So I'm getting it documented... Everyone should document their worldview, whether you're an individual or an organization, and clarify a lot of everything."

11. Business Collaboration and Truth Management Applications

Organizational Truth Management: Business application potential

Gary: "So, I'm now like exploring to what extent is being ridiculously precise with what we mean by all these different things. How might I be able to benefit someone to take correct action for them as an organization, right?"

Will's Experience: Founder-led vs. corporate culture

Will: "It's like, well, you know, you're investing your money, but on a spiritual level, it's almost like to your point, a lot of founder-led companies have a different character and quality because they're stemming from the soul of that founder... Versus you get into this kind of corporate This is our mission statement, how we use the word."

Vision Coherence: Organizational alignment necessity

Will: "Versus, is there a coherent vision of the future that we're orienting towards?"

12. Austin Community and Networking

Walking Club Introduction: Community building opportunity

Gary: "Um, well one thought is, there's a walking club that might be good for you to attend. It's 8am everyday. Basically, a lot of entrepreneurs in the area, real estate people."

Community Assessment: Evaluating city culture

Gary: "I feel like any city that's hyped up attracts a lot of people that kind of want to be part of like a... I don't know if there's any city that would satisfy what I'm looking for."

Church Culture Analysis: Authentic vs. performative Christianity

Gary: "But does church culture mean like Christly culture?... Whatever your practices are for developing and maintaining and deepening your faith, it should probably lead you to more effective decision-making."

Key Themes and Strategic Insights

Theological Alignment

• Christocentric Worldview: Both participants share deep commitment to Christ as center of reality and truth
• Anti-Relativism: Strong opposition to postmodern truth relativism and cultural manipulation
• Individual Faith Responsibility: Critique of denominational outsourcing of theological thinking
• Practical Christianity: Emphasis on lived-out faith affecting decision-making and lifestyle

Technology Philosophy

• Christ-Centered Technology: Integration of Christian principles with technological development
• AI Ethics: Concern about technological idolatry and AI worship
• Truth Foundation: Need for objective truth basis in technological development
• Community Impact: Balancing innovation with social responsibility

Truth Management Framework

• Organizational Clarity: Need for documented worldviews in organizations and individuals
• Version Control for Beliefs: Using technology tools for worldview development and maintenance
• Definition Precision: Importance of clear terms and concepts in organizational communication
• Foundation Before Scale: Truth grounding necessary before growth or influence

Business Collaboration Potential

• Complementary Expertise: Gary's strategic narrative with Will's AI infrastructure capabilities
• Aligned Values: Shared Christian foundation for business decision-making
• Market Opportunity: Truth management systems integrated with AI infrastructure
• Community Building: Austin tech/faith community development

Cultural Analysis

• Elite Corruption Recognition: Understanding systemic moral compromise in institutions
• Language Manipulation: Awareness of cultural rebranding and meaning subversion
• Foundation Crisis: Diagnosis of societal problems stemming from lack of truth grounding
• Christian Response: Building alternatives rather than just critiquing existing systems

Relationship Dynamics

This conversation represents a rare meeting of minds between two Christian technologists who share sophisticated theological understanding, practical business experience, and commitment to truth-based cultural engagement. Gary's strategic narrative and movement-building capabilities complement Will's AI infrastructure expertise and community development experience.

Both participants demonstrate mature integration of faith with professional excellence, avoiding both secular compromise and performative religiosity. Their shared critique of denominational outsourcing, combined with commitment to individual theological development, creates foundation for innovative collaboration on truth management and Christian technology initiatives.

The discussion reveals potential for significant partnership combining Will's Covenant AI platform with Gary's truth management concepts, creating powerful tools for faith-based organizations and communities. Will's consideration of Austin relocation could facilitate ongoing collaboration within the emerging Christian technology ecosystem.