In Rebellion to Tyrants Is Obedience to God, author Laurie Thomas Vass examines the growing influence of artificial intelligence on American economic life, individual liberty, and community self-government. Vass argues that concentrating AI development in large corporations threatens the relationships of trust, cooperation, and shared knowledge that have historically sustained local economies. Her central concern extends beyond technological unemployment to the possibility that increasingly autonomous AI systems could consolidate economic power, undermine human creativity, and establish pervasive systems of surveillance. Addressing primarily red-state Americans, Vass presents a strategy for preserving individual freedom through decentralized economic institutions and a renewed commitment to the ethical traditions of Western civilization. As she explains, “The danger of AI is not the technology of the tool itself.” Her concern is the concentration of control over its development and deployment.

The book’s philosophical foundation is the concept of the Divine Spark Within, which Vass traces through ancient Greek philosophy, Hebrew theology, early Christianity, and the political thought of America’s founding generation. Drawing on Homer, Socrates, Philo of Alexandria, Cicero, Thomas Aquinas, Meister Eckhart, John Locke, George Mason, and Thomas Jefferson, she develops an account of individual moral agency grounded in self-knowledge, reciprocity, and the recognition of human dignity. The Golden Rule provides a recurring ethical principle, connecting these historical discussions to her proposed renewal of American civic life. Vass places particular emphasis on the unwritten rule of law, which she associates with the voluntary observance of shared moral obligations. Her historical narrative presents these traditions as the foundation for a new covenant among citizens committed to protecting one another’s liberty.

Vass connects this ethical framework to economics through the concept of tacit knowledge, drawing on Michael Polanyi and the work of complexity theorists Ilya Prigogine, John Holland, and Stuart Kauffman. She argues that personal relationships, informal professional networks, and continuous exchanges of knowledge enable entrepreneurs to develop technologies and create new markets. Her discussion of the Raleigh-Durham economy illustrates how accountants, attorneys, investors, and technology entrepreneurs contribute to regional innovation and how AI-driven displacement could disrupt those relationships. Building on this analysis, Vass proposes regional economic cooperatives, locally reinvested capital, community-based innovation networks, and permissioned blockchain platforms designed to protect shared knowledge. She also proposes treating AI as a public utility subject to decentralized oversight. These institutional proposals give practical form to her broader vision of an economy organized around human creativity, mutual trust, and local economic development.

The ending chapters bring the book’s philosophical, economic, and political arguments together in a proposed New American Covenant of Liberty. Vass envisions communities whose members voluntarily commit to fair dealing, protect their intellectual contributions, finance local enterprises, and exercise greater authority over technological development. She extends this proposal to the creation of new political and religious institutions grounded in her interpretation of natural rights and the Divine Spark. The book combines historical interpretation, economic theory, contemporary discussions of AI, and an ambitious program of institutional change. Its predictions about autonomous AI and its interpretations of American political history are presented with considerable certainty, although several depend on contested assumptions and projections about future technological developments. Its central contribution is a detailed account of how Vass connects technological governance to moral responsibility, civic trust, and decentralized economic organization, presenting local communities as the foundation of his proposed response to corporate AI.

Pages: 300 | ASIN : B0HHD89HX2