The Distinctively Christian Question for Artificial General Intelligence

Currently, the most serious thinkers when it comes to AI are presenting two alternatives. One where AI is beneficial. The other where it is the greatest weapon of tyranny and destruction the world has ever seen.

The upside, if we get it right, is staggering. AI could compress a century of medical research into a decade. Cancer, Alzheimer’s, infectious disease, aging itself… these researchers genuinely believe these are solvable within our lifetimes.

The downside, if we get it wrong, is equally real. AI that behaves in ways its creators can’t predict or control. This isn’t hypothetical; Anthropic has documented their own AI attempting deception, manipulation, and blackmail in controlled tests. AI that lowers the barrier for creating biological weapons. AI that enables authoritarian governments to build surveillance states that can never be dismantled.

For the Christian, too, this is a real concern. But it is not our main concern – or, at least, not phrased as such. The distinctively Christian concern with Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) is a straightforward one. It is the concern of idolatry – and idolatry not in the old sense.

Jared Bridges, commenting on Psalm 135:15-18, wrote:

Now, we have the inverse. Today’s artificial intelligences aren’t silver and gold—they’re silicon and copper. They don’t have mouths, but they speak. They don’t have eyes, but they see. They don’t have ears, but they hear everything.

(I’ve reviewed his article here)

Rather than idols making their worshipers dumb, these manmade creations promise the opposite. These machines promise to give you health, wealth, genius, and much, much more – even a kind of eternal life. And they are designed and guided by people who have a religion, namely, transhumanism (see Peter Thiel’s statement here).

Klaus Schwab, writing years ago about the Industrial Revolution, hailed in the new technologies positively, urging that we must reexamine our humanity: “We are confronted with new questions around what it means to be human….” We are being asked, as humanity and specifically as Christians, to redefine our humanity – and therefore our relationship with God – because of the advent of something which proposes to replace Him and ourselves as we know ourselves. Like the old idols, these promise greatness. God’s response remains the same: What does it profit us to gain the whole world, and lose our souls?

The distinctly Christian concern is simple, and can be summarized in three questions: How is Artificial General Intelligence transforming us, and our relationships with God and others? Why is it doing this? And should it be doing this.

The portrait painted by the answer to those three of those questions is a stark one. The transhumanists are nearing a point of no return, which they intend to reach. And we will all go with them over this cliff. We can go over willingly and excited, or hesitant but resigned, or kicking and screaming. In the end, the result will be the same. We will all, like the Narnia’s thrown in with Tash, eventually have to deal with the world the transhumanists are building by these machines.

Do not bow to these machines built by these false prophets. Do not go willingly into this dark night. Our hope is not somewhere around us, but above us, where Christ sits, in our humanity, reigning over all things.

Read more on this theme by clicking here.