Journal Article

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE, IDOLATRY, AND HUMAN MANIPULATION

Sullivan, Ezra

2020

Overview

Prognostications for how AI will affect the future of humanity are greatly enriched by theological and historical perspectives regarding the nature and use of idols, images used to worship the gods. With the background of the Egyptian «mouth-opening» ritual in mind, and ancient constructions of seeming-autonomous statues, Scriptural accounts suggest that pagans constructed and worshipped idols for reasons of transference — substituting a creature for the Creator —, greed, and control. In parallel fashion, with futurist accounts of AI and robotics in mind, an historicaltheological perspective indicates that these new technologies are often at the service of an analogous kind of idolatry: relationship transference, corporate and individual greed, and social control: three motives that are encapsulated in Lewis Mumford’s prediction that, in a secular age, «man’s final achievement, at the summit of his progress, would be to create an ineffable electronic God». Finally, a theological account suggests a way forward: returning to right relationships, self-gift in union with Christ the Incarnate God, and responsibility as worship.

• Publisher: Pontificia Studiorum Universitas a Sancto Thomas Aquinate in Urbe
• Subject: Seminar on the topic: «Artificial Intelligence and Christian Anthropology» co-organized by the Faculty of Philosophy and OPTIC. Rome, March 29th 2019 Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas (Angelicum)