(This is a draft with unfinished ideas, potential errors, etc. It's published for peer review.)
The Trinity doctrine says God is three persons in one being. It's built on Bible verses that imply that. After saying there's one God, many passages seem to alternate between Many people have said God can't be three and one at the same time.
In the Bible, there is one God. He reveals Himself as the Father (Yahweh), the Son (Jesus Christ), and the Holy Spirit. Passages in the New Testament alternate between describing those three as individual person or the same being. They seem to be both three and one. The early church invented the Trinity concept to describe this. Nobody really understands it, though. We just take God's Word for it knowing it's already proven enough.
The main objection is that God can't be three and one at the same time. That this is illogical. They talk like nothing could ever be that way. Christian counters try to build analogies on things like multiple, personality disorder (my first attempt). The analogies, or things in them, are inherently flawed and broken.
Then, we quit trying to disprove 3 vs 1 or the specifics of the Trinity because because we accept God is too complex for our brains to handle. We believe in it because the man from heaven, Jesus Christ, old us God is three and one. He'd know. From there, we study the traits of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit to learn about their relationship to us and each other, and how to imitate them. We simply admire the beauty of God's mysterious nature.
Much as I enjoy the mystery, I kept feeling like the atheists' counter was wrong. We're not saying that 3 is 1 as if the two numbers are the same thing. We're saying 3 of X is 1 of Y with X and Y being unified in some way. They are separate things that share a substance, identity, or existence in some way. Can anything on Earth have separate personas in one being? Can we find an example that millions of people from all walks of life are thinking about right now in 2023?
Multiple Tasks, One Being (CPU)
A single computer can run many programs at once (multitasking). In your Task Manager, there might be a whole screen of stuff running in the background. In front of you, you have a web browser, you’re listening to music, and an antivirus is doing a scan. You'd think three things are happening that are independent of one another.
In reality, your computer might have a single chip doing all of that. The chip might be rapidly switching between them on one, execution unit (single core) or running them at the same time (multicore). That might correspond to the Trinitarianism vs modalism debate, too. corresponds to two theories about God, too. What it makes clear is that our eyes can see three, independent programs which are, in reality, one thing (the computer).
Three Persons, One Being
We can do better, though. Let's change the three apps to three A.I.'s with faces, personalities, the ability to reason, and so on. They're digital “persons.”
The AI persons are Siri, Cortana, and Alexa. In this metaphor, they're running on the same computer with a configuration that makes them all work towards the same goal with similar methods.
They are distinct entities, like "persons." You know they exist even though you can't see where they are. They always listen when you say their name. They act on the world. Humans start forming relationships with them, too, even though that's probably unhealthy. Maybe they are just talking to people who aren't really there. Some designs have emotions, bodies, memory, childhoods, and so on. You can give them everything a person has except a soul.
Each one is also a being: the computer chip. It has a body with senses and the ability to act on the world. We call it input/output. Each AI person has the attributes of the computer, of that being. You can say they're one thing with equal capabilities if you focus on what the computer can do. If you focus on the persons (models), they might be very different.
If running on one device, they are 1 and 3 at the same time. Anti-Trinitarians say being one being and three persons must be contradictory. Do 1 and 3 contradict here? No, both are true. So, that's refuted.
Three Persons, Nearly Identical, and One Being (CPU)
Now, let's add multi-agent systems to further explore how three and one can co-exist. These can be separate models working together on the same system. However, one can use the same model with different modes of operation, different instructions or goals, to work on the same problem. Once again, they're sort of the same thing but also three, different things. We're still in modalism.
One model can also be forked, or spun off, into a separate copy. Each copy has all of the attributes of the original but can act differently if asked to. What about how only the Father knows when the Son (Jesus Christ) will return in the Second Coming? How would we do that in A.I. models?
We can fine-tune A.I. models to add more data to them or condition them to act a specific way (i.e. role). One could have additional information the other two don't. That would make them identical in every way, with identical capabilities, except for access to that specific information. With different prompts, one might also be asked or taught to act like the master and the other like a servant. Again, the two are identical except for what roles they perform.
One can train a specific model in a set to have extra information for planning purposes. From then on, all models see whatever changes happen in the world around them. They're moving forward step by step with each possibly having knowledge the others don't. One can also be programmed to ignore a specific thing that others might respond to. They can also communicate with each other ("let us make man in our image"). At this point, three models are nearly identical, share almost all knowledge, and are different in some memories and responses.
With the setup I've describd, we have a system whose agents are different persons but also the same in deep ways. They share one substance (physically), nature (the code), internal knowledge, and ability to interact with what is external. Yet, they are three, different entities that act differently. They also have different access to or respond to specific facts. They can also collaborate despite being one being.
One model forked into three with different alignments and prompts... constantly working together in harmony.. all in reality one machine, substance, knowledge base, and set of abilities... is my best metaphor for three persons in one being.
It's still merely a metaphor that in no way tells us what God is. It just counters the myth that three persons can't be one being. It also proves a being could have other attributes of the Trinity. Now, there's no excuse to doubt these things are possible.
Unlike the above metaphor, God's nature is perfect, was not created, and is from everlasting to everlasting. His knowledge, even differences within the Trinity, has always existed. Unlike three agents on one computer, God wrote the laws of our universe, sustains them, forgives our sins, and gives us eternal life. If you believe the Gospel, you will one day meet Him. Then, you can ask Him face to face about anything you've ever wondered about, including the Trinity.
(Read the Gospel with proof its true. Some predictions He made to motivate us. If you're a believer, this site will equip you.)