Smartest Reading (Steelman Hermeneutic)

Smartest Reading (SR)

Smartest Reading is the steelman hermeneutic applied to ultimacy language: you interpret a tradition’s Translation Layer in its strongest coherent form, and you track where that strongest form is forced to land under the finite mind constraint.

Book: Finite Mind, Finite God. Location in text: Chapter Six, “Smartest Reading Drives Toward Negative Theology,” including the formal derivation (Definitions 6.1–6.4, Lemma 6.5, Theorem 6.7, Corollary 6.8, Remark 6.9).

WHAT IT IS

Smartest Reading starts from a predictable pattern in religion debates. A critic attacks a tradition at its weakest literal surface, and the defender replies, “That is not the smartest reading. You are reading it like a child, not like the tradition reads itself at its highest level.” In most public debates, that reply stalls the argument because the critic either refuses the upgrade, or does not know how to evaluate it.

Smartest Reading is the method that takes that upgrade seriously. It says: fine. Grant the defender their strongest coherent interpretation. Treat the doctrine as if it is trying to be maximally internally consistent, morally serious, and metaphysically disciplined. Now ask what that stronger interpretation is forced to do once it runs into the same constraints every finite agent runs into: tokening, mediation, translation drift, and predicate limits.

In FMFG terms, Smartest Reading is not “being nice.” It is an analytic discipline. You are not granting truth. You are granting best coherence. You then trace the structural pressure that coherence produces.

The key pressure is this: positive, literal predicates are finite. If you push an ultimacy claim hard enough, the tradition cannot keep applying ordinary predicates in a straightforward, univocal way without importing limitation. That is where the apophatic register appears. The more you protect ultimacy, the more you are forced to qualify your predicates.

This is why, across traditions, the smartest edges keep generating “do not reify” language. The tradition either (1) moves toward apophatic discipline, or (2) blocks critique using an ineffability posture while still keeping authority and positive loading. FMFG names that second move the Ineffability Shield.

WHY IT MATTERS

Smartest Reading matters because it removes the easiest escape hatch in theological debate. If you attack only naive literalism, the defender can always retreat into the strongest reading and declare victory. Smartest Reading accepts the retreat and then analyzes it. This means you can stop fighting the weakest version and still show that the strongest version has a cost.

It also explains a major convergence phenomenon. Traditions can diverge wildly in doctrine at the surface, but when you enforce ultimacy discipline plus predicate finitude, they often converge toward similar negation language. Not because they secretly agree, but because finite minds cannot keep saying “ultimate” while talking like they are describing a bounded object inside reality.

Smartest Reading also clarifies what religion is actually doing when it is at its most sophisticated. It is not delivering unfiltered metaphysical description. It is operating through a Translation Layer, which is a map-like system that links human interface states to claims about ultimacy. The smartest reading tends to admit the gap between the map and the territory, which pushes the tradition away from literal capture.

Finally, it gives you a clean diagnostic for “mystery talk.” Mystery can be humility, meaning the tradition narrows its claim content and accepts constraints. Mystery can also be immunity, meaning the tradition blocks evaluation while still issuing demands, threats, or authority claims. Smartest Reading draws that line and forces the system to pick a side.

FORMAL SPINE

The Smartest Reading package can be stated with the minimal FMFG machinery.

Definition (Steelman Hermeneutic, SR). Interpretive policy: assign a doctrinal claim its strongest coherent reading compatible with the system’s anchors, rather than its weakest or most literal reading (see Term 70). Under FMFG’s formal derivation, the steelman policy includes coherence maximization, ultimacy preservation, anthropomorphism reduction, moral intelligibility, and interface realism.

Definition (Apophatic Move). The systematic shift away from positive literal predication about ultimacy and toward negation or limit language (“not this”), used to avoid finitude contradictions (see Term 72).

Definition (Ineffability Shield). Using “ineffable / beyond words” as an immunity move to block critique while still keeping practical authority claims and strong positive loading (see Term 74).

Definition (Predicate Finitude). Any positive, determinate predicate applied literally to ultimacy imposes a boundary and therefore imports finitude unless it collapses into totality language (see Term 92).

Lemma (Finite Predicate Lemma). If an agent applies ordinary positive predicates univocally to an alleged ultimate, the alleged ultimate is treated as a member of a comparison class inside the world. That imports limitation. Therefore, preserving ultimacy forces a shift in predicate use. The tradition must either qualify predicates (analogy, negation, limit language) or accept that it is no longer speaking of ultimacy in the role it claims.

Theorem (Apophatic Convergence Theorem). Under steelmanning plus ultimacy discipline plus predicate finitude, a tradition is forced into a fork. Either it converges toward apophatic discourse (systematically downgrading literal positive predication), or it retreats into an ineffability posture that blocks evaluation while preserving authority and positive load.

Corollary (Anthropomorphic Predication Constraint). If the system is driven by Smartest Reading toward preserving ultimacy, then literal anthropomorphic predicates about ultimacy must be treated as metaphor, analogy, or translation artifacts rather than literal descriptive capture.

Remark. This is not a claim that negative theology is false. It is a structural claim about what happens to ultimacy talk when you enforce coherence under finite mind conditions. The smartest reading does not stabilize naive literal predication. It destabilizes it.

HOW IT WORKS

Start with the defender’s upgrade request: “read it in the smartest way.” Accept it. Write down their interpretive rules explicitly. Ask what they count as literal, what they count as metaphor, what they treat as authoritative, and what they allow to be revised.

Now apply the finite mind constraint and the human interface constraint. Whatever ultimacy is, you only ever receive a tokened Translation Layer artifact. You do not receive the territory directly. That means the defender’s smartest reading is still a reading of a map, not a direct access channel.

Next apply predicate finitude. If the defender keeps positive predicates literal, those predicates import a contrast class, and contrast imports limitation. If they refuse limitation because they want ultimacy, they must start qualifying predicates. This is where the apophatic move appears in practice. It often looks like “analogical predication,” “beyond comprehension,” “not like created things,” “not an object,” “not a being among beings,” or “cannot be said directly.”

At that point the tradition is forced into the fork. If it accepts the semantic cost, it moves toward apophatic discipline and becomes less like a literal metaphysical description engine. If it refuses the cost but still blocks critique by saying “ineffable,” it becomes an ineffability shield.

A simple diagnostic is: does the tradition allow the ineffability claim to reduce what it asserts, or does it use ineffability to avoid accountability while still demanding assent, obedience, fear, or worship.

COMMON OBJECTIONS AND REPLIES

Objection: “This is just reading religion out of existence.”
Reply: No. It is reading religion at its strongest coherence level and then tracing what that coherence forces. If the strongest reading becomes practice-forward, metaphor-aware, or apophatic, that is a result of the tradition’s own ultimacy posture under finite mind constraints.

Objection: “We already use analogy, so predicate finitude does not apply.”
Reply: Analogy is not an escape from predicate finitude. It is the evidence of it. The move away from univocal literal predication is exactly what the apophatic pressure predicts.

Objection: “Mystery is legitimate. God is beyond language.”
Reply: Mystery can be legitimate. The question is whether it is humility or immunity. If it is humility, the doctrine becomes narrower and more cautious, and it stops pretending it can issue clean, literal metaphysical capture claims. If it is immunity, it keeps strong claims and authority while blocking evaluation. That is an ineffability shield.

Objection: “Revelation solves the problem. God can speak clearly.”
Reply: Publicly, revelation still travels through the Human Interface Thesis pipeline. Whatever anyone receives arrives as testimony, text, institution, and interpretation. Smartest Reading evaluates what the agent actually has, which is the mediated artifact.

Objection: “This removes relationship with a personal God.”
Reply: It clarifies a fork the system already contains. If you insist on a personal preference agent, you accept finitude pressures and move toward the Finite God Trap. If you insist on ultimacy without limitation, you move toward nondual and apophatic registers. Smartest Reading does not create the fork. It exposes it.

CONNECTIONS TO OTHER PAGES

Connects backward to: Finite Mind Constraint (see Term 60). Smartest Reading is only necessary because all doctrine is tokened inside finite interfaces.

Connects backward to: Human Interface Thesis (see Term 68). The smartest reading still operates on mediated artifacts.

Connects backward to: Religion as Translation (see Term 82). Smartest Reading is a disciplined way of reading the Translation Layer as map rather than territory.

Connects forward to: Nondual Collapse. When ultimacy is preserved, discourse shifts toward totality and ground language rather than a separable agent.

Connects forward to: Finite God Collapse. If personhood predicates and preference structures are kept literal, ultimacy collapses into finitude.

Connects forward to: Control Overlays. The Ineffability Shield is one of the cleanest bridges from theology into institutional control, because it blocks evaluation while preserving authority.

Connects forward to: Fairness Clause and Salvation Paradox. Smartest Reading intersects judgment claims whenever the tradition treats assent as a moral gate.

TERMINOLOGY INDEX FOR THIS PAGE

Term 60: Finite mind constraint
Term 68: Human Interface Thesis
Term 70: Steelman hermeneutic
Term 72: Apophatic move
Term 73: Apophatic convergence
Term 74: Ineffability shield
Term 77: Fairness clause
Term 80: At-will test
Term 82: Translation layer
Term 83: Map territory gap
Term 84: Translation drift
Term 88: Anthropomorphic predication
Term 92: Predicate finitude
Term 103: Control overlay