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Michael Baggot on Superintelligence and Transhumanism from a Catholic Perspective
115 Plays10 minutes ago
Fr. Michael Baggot joins the podcast to provide a Catholic perspective on transhumanism and superintelligence. We also discuss the meta-narratives, the value of cultural diversity in attitudes toward technology, and how Christian communities deal with advanced AI.
You can learn more about Michael's work here: https://catholic.tech/academics/faculty/michael-baggot
Timestamps:
00:00 Meta-narratives and transhumanism
15:28 Advanced AI and religious communities
27:22 Superintelligence
38:31 Countercultures and technology
52:38 Christian perspectives and tradition
01:05:20 God-like artificial intelligence
01:13:15 A positive vision for AI
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to the Podcast
00:00:00
Speaker
Welcome to the Future of Life Institute podcast. My name is Gus Docker and I'm here with Father Michael Baggett. Michael, welcome to the podcast. Thank you. It's great to be here.
Father Michael's Background and Catholic Tech
00:00:10
Speaker
Maybe we should start with a quick introduction to who you are.
00:00:14
Speaker
so I'm Father Michael Baggett. I am an American priest. I grew up in Virginia, in a little town of Winchester, not too far from Washington, D.C. But I've spent the last decade or so in Rome, Italy, where I was formed to become a priest and where I continued to serve as a professor. So I teach at Regina Postelorum, a pontifical university. I also teach at the Angelicum Pontifical University. And I am starting at a new project called Catholic Tech, which is an institute based in Castelgondolfo, where the popes used to have a residence.
Discussion on AI, Transhumanism, and Metanarratives
00:00:52
Speaker
And my my hope for this conversation is that we can discuss AI and we can discuss transhumanism and we can discuss the
00:01:00
Speaker
the pros and cons of of of that ideology and I've heard you discuss metanarratives and how the world has lost a shared metanarrative. Maybe you could say a little bit about what metanarratives are and why we don't have a ah metanarrative that we share as a world anymore.
Understanding Metanarratives
00:01:22
Speaker
so We can think of metanarratives as these large overarching stories that we tell each other and that in many ways we inherit from a particular tradition, a philosophical, theological, religious tradition.
00:01:37
Speaker
And they're the stories we live by. They're the stories that give us a sense of meaning, purpose, value, and a place in the world. We are, in a sense, actors in this great drama of life. And so the metanarrative you can think of as sort of the script of the world, the script of the universe.
Impact of Pluralism on Society
00:01:57
Speaker
Now, there are lots of different reasons why metanarratives might start to break down. One reason is just the reality of pluralism. We have often different views about how to understand the world, how to understand the human purpose and how to understand the purpose of life, how to understand whether there even is some sort of purpose beyond what we might invent or ah create ourselves. So there's this reality of pluralism, but there's also a ever growing suspicion throughout the history especially of western philosophy of the very idea of a meta narrative there's a fear that a meta narrative is a kind of instrument of oppression because once you establish a certain story a certain script.
00:02:41
Speaker
The fear is that people have to toe the line. They have to suppress their own interests, their own desires, their own convictions, and fit into something that's imposed from above. so I can see the legitimate concern there.
Catholicism as an Inclusive Metanarrative
00:02:56
Speaker
the The chief metanarrative that really shapes my life now, as the viewers can probably imagine, you know those who are listening might not pick up on this, but those who are watching can see I'm wearing a Roman collar, I am a Catholic priest. And so the the Catholic worldview, the vision of life for me as the chief metanarrative, and I see that as being a profoundly inclusive metanarrative in the sense that there are so many legitimate and important insights from all sorts of traditions that Catholicism takes, inherits gladly, and integrates into a bigger view. And as someone who works in Rome, as someone who goes to the Vatican frequently, I'm privileged to see that there are a lot of different ways of living the Catholic worldview, the Catholic narrative. There are lots of customs, practices, ah observances, outlooks,
00:03:50
Speaker
that can be united within a profound diversity.
Unity in Diversity through Catholicism
00:03:54
Speaker
so I understand the concern about metanarratives and the fear of them being oppressive, but I think that there is also a real possibility of living this as something that can respect and integrate diversity, diversity of roles, of missions, of outlooks on certain issues, within more profound unity to say, you know what? We're all striving for human happiness. We're all striving for fulfillment. We all want to be loved. We all want to share love. And we all need guidance in that because none of us have this all figured out by ourselves.
00:04:28
Speaker
So instead of looking at a meta-narrative or at least a meta-narrative that shapes my life as something oppressive, I see it as liberating and also as very humbling because I don't know it all. And i don't I didn't write the script myself. I have a role.
00:04:45
Speaker
and something to contribute, but I really need other people and I need the ah insights of other people and I need their guidance and I need their assistance in making this journey through life and growing in my relationship with God, growing in relationship with with my neighbor. And we don't necessarily have to get into this now, but my view of metanarras has changed quite a bit because I'm a convert to the faith. So I grew up as an agnostic and did not,
00:05:11
Speaker
inherit the richness of the Catholic worldview. I had a lot of agnostic presuppositions growing up and made my own journey to theism, then Christianity, then Catholicism.
Tech Challenges Human Identity and Purpose
00:05:22
Speaker
and And so I also appreciate the reality of pluralism and the need for different traditions, different outlooks to enter into fruitful dialogue. And I think all of these tech issues are serious, clear reminders of that because Really, we come to discover quite quickly that we usually don't so much disagree about the tech per se. We disagree about the view of the person, the view of life that motivates how we use that tech. So that's one reason why I've gotten so interested in all these questions is because they touch so fundamentally upon our understanding of human identity and purpose and our relationship with the world. So I see the the tech issues as an opportunity for us to
00:06:06
Speaker
enter enter into serious dialogue and start collaborating rather than demonizing each
Transhumanism: Goals and Ethical Questions
00:06:11
Speaker
other. How would you describe transhumanism as a meta-narrative? What questions is the ideology attempting to answer? And and how are those questions similar or or different from the questions that religions traditionally have addressed?
00:06:27
Speaker
So there are lots of different ways of understanding transhumanism, and I want to respect the diversity within that school of thought. But following someone like Nick Bostrom or other authors of the famous transhumanist f FAQ frequently asked questions, ah which I often describe as kind of the transhumanist catechism. It's this great question and answer document that really goes into the core tenants. Very, very helpful to understand the perspective of contemporary transhumanism as it's often presented.
00:06:55
Speaker
There, Bostrom and others speak of this intellectual cultural movement that seeks to advance human evolution and to do so through technological means so that we can radically enhance ourselves at the physical level, the cognitive level, in terms of our emotional life,
00:07:15
Speaker
also in terms of our lifespan, and perhaps even at the moral level. So there are these different enhancement projects that unite the transhumanist movement to better the species. There's the sense that there's something very imperfect about us, that evolution has gotten us so far that it helped us to survive, or we found the mechanisms of survival. But now we're at this breakthrough moment in history where we are not so much the product of evolution as the driving force of evolution.
Post-human Aspirations and Catholic Views
00:07:46
Speaker
And various emerging technologies are precisely the tools that we need to take the reins and drive forward evolution as we see fit. And that evolutionary process that we drive through our technology is meant to get us to that radically enhanced state, but many thinkers want to go even further and get us to what they describe as a kind of post-human state, which often
00:08:13
Speaker
leads to the the liberation from or the abandonment of the body to get to this kind of disembodied state. There are different descriptions of this. One of the most popular would be this notion of gathering the data about ourselves to basically download that and then upload it to a different superior substrate and eventually get us to this life on the cloud or something even and that to achieve a sort of virtual digital immortality. So you can see the movement is fundamentally interested in improving our condition, which is something that I think a lot of people can get behind. It's interested in using technology well to further these human goals, and it's something that the Catholic Church and many other institutions
00:09:03
Speaker
can generally agree about. the The fact that the Catholic Church has such an extensive, developed, and far-reaching healthcare care system is a good indication that we're deeply interested in the material physical well-being of people, in addition to their spiritual well-being.
00:09:22
Speaker
But I think that we start to come into points of tension and conflict when we get to the more radical proposals, particularly these ideas of virtual or digital immortality. Any sort of proposal that sees the body as something to be abandoned or to set aside as optional or as an impediment is something that's going to come up and clash very much with a ah Catholic worldview or with many other perspectives. I mean, Catholicism draws heavily on the great Greco-Roman philosophical tradition, especially Aristotelian reflection on the hylomorphic union, this idea that we are fundamentally body-soul composites, and that while we are distinct from other animals, we still are animals, and that our animality is not something to be ashamed of, but something to be perfected, to be guided by reason, but not something to be set aside or considered a mere impediment. so Those are some of the points of similarity, common goals, efforts to prove ourselves, efforts to use technology wisely, ah to improve our lives at a physical, mood, emotional,
00:10:34
Speaker
level There are lots of points of common interest and potentially collaboration, but there are also some serious philosophical differences, anthropological metaphysical differences that that have to be discussed and and
Transhumanism and Judeo-Christian Themes
00:10:47
Speaker
considered. and there's There's also really interesting parallels between some of the images that are used in the contemporary transhumanist, posthumanist metanarrative, going back to the site stories, because these are not just philosophical ideas.
00:11:02
Speaker
They also need to tell a story. We all tell stories to ourselves. This is not particular to transhumanism. But something that I found ah quite fascinating, especially coming from a Catholic perspective, is how often a in a validly secular movement draws heavily on and repackages, represents Christian, Judeo-Christian ideas. There are lots of different ways of looking at this. Megan O'Giblin has helped me tremendously. For listeners and viewers who are not familiar with her work, I highly recommend studies by Megan O'Giblin. She would, as far as I know, consider herself now an agnostic.
00:11:40
Speaker
but she grew up as a Christian. She was formed as a Protestant. She even trained in theological studies. shows She's quite familiar with Judeo-Christian ideas and images. She found that that was ultimately not satisfactory. Some of the serious philosophical questions she raised were not getting good answers, and so she started to see this conflict between faith and reason, and she left Christianity.
00:12:06
Speaker
She was eventually told about transhumanism. Someone handed her a copy of Ray Kurzweil's The Age of Spiritual Machines. He was already talking about some of these more radical ideas of virtual digital immortality. She picked up this book. She loved it. She was fascinated by it. It it gave her a sense of meaning and purpose that was starting to fade from her life after she left Christianity. But Over time, she started to realize how much transhumanism was aping or or drawing from these Judeo-Christian ideas, particularly these apocalyptic images of what the future would look like and and the radical transformation that would take place in this future singularity moment and the transformation of, in a sense, the heavens and the earth at this moment.
00:12:57
Speaker
And she thought she was going to transhumanism as a rational, secular, reasonable alternative to a basically groundless religious faith.
Megan O'Giblin's Shift and Narrative Overlaps
00:13:12
Speaker
like She thought she was getting a rational alternative. But she started to see that in many ways,
00:13:18
Speaker
the Christian story was being retold, repackaged, maybe distorted a bit, but represented, covered up with a lot of techno jargon and technological language. So it doesn't want to, and I wouldn't want to dismiss it as an empty philosophy. I'm not at all saying that. I think there are very serious thinkers who raise intriguing points and we should engage with their thought and and consider it seriously.
00:13:44
Speaker
But as O'Giblin started to dig deeper, she saw that there was this profound influence of Christianity and a representation of these ideas. And O'Giblin basically came to the conclusion that transhumanism was demanding of her as much, if not more, faith and hope in an unproven future, an unproven future in this case of singularity and technological bliss and virtual immortality. And so in in a certain way, you could describe her as a kind of double apostate because she left Christianity and then she left secular transhumanism, but she remains a very admirable and I think sincere seeker. She wants good questions to these answers of meaning and purpose,
00:14:34
Speaker
but she really wants that well grounded. And so I think some of these parallels of religious imagery in the metanarratives are are helpful to recognize, and then we can start to see which ones are most satisfying, which ones best account for our identity as human beings, and which ones can most reliably guide us in the future. Let's agree that we want a better future that we want to harness technology well and then let's figure out which stories best describe the characters in in the plot right us and and and other figures in the universe but we really want to understand our nature so that we can understand better our purpose and and how to go
00:15:19
Speaker
forward together.
Ethical AI Development and Catholic Engagement
00:15:20
Speaker
But so I highly recommend O'Giblin's reflections and others to see these intriguing parallels in the meta narratives and maybe the points of similarity and contention. As AI is getting more advanced, which trends are you seeing from religious communities in response? So how are people like yourself and responding, specifically Catholics, for example?
00:15:42
Speaker
and There's a lot to be said about that. What comes to mind first is the fact that just a few months ago, I was privileged to speak at an event in the Vatican that was hosted in La Casina, which is a building often used for for different scientific gatherings there, right inside the Vatican Gardens with an incredible view of St. Peter's. and The event was called the AI Builders Forum.
00:16:07
Speaker
And it was designed to gather together lots of different figures, especially within the church for this particular event, that are working in different ministries at the parish level, in media, in healthcare, care in education, who just want to understand the state of the art and want to understand what to do how to leverage the technology and then some of the points to be concerned about and really what they want to avoid and how they can help their communities and become more educated and wiser in this technological use. and We were really blessed also to have Max with us and and some others from the
00:16:47
Speaker
the Future of Life Institute and so it was a really fruitful exchange and it was great to see people coming together in the same room and the same beautiful venue and then also to see how fruitful the conversations have been going forward. You know, I often go to these sorts of events and you create a little chat group after to stay in touch and maybe the first week or so people exchange some messages or they send some updates when a baby is born but I have to say this has been one of the most active chat groups that I've been a part of and one of the most consistently edifying and exciting ones. and so I can already see a lot of institutions that have shared interests that are getting together. and yeah we We talked about all sorts of issues. In my own presentation, I was talking about AI in physical, mental, spiritual health care and all the different points of society these technologies are touching upon.
00:17:38
Speaker
And as a global institution, the church has so many different fields, so many different areas of influence. ah She's really sensitive to how AI starts to shape that. On a, I guess you could say, personal level, both academically and a bit more now, even in pastoral work, I found myself really reflecting ah seriously on the realm of AI companionship.
Risks of AI Companionship
00:18:05
Speaker
You can speak even of the field of artificial intimacy, which made me when the movie Her came out a decade ago sound kind of wild and sci-fi, the idea that a man might fall in love with an operating system. But we've seen that that actually has really become a reality, that that's now part of our our daily news. And so you have whole companies
00:18:27
Speaker
that are offering systems specifically designed to provide deep, intimate AI companionship. And they'll tend to emphasize friendship and romantic love. And that creates a really profound bond with our systems that I think many people are becoming uncomfortable with.
00:18:47
Speaker
And this is making more and more news as there are apparent cases of teenagers and others who are are being encouraged toward self-harm, unhealthy behavior, cases of suicide that that are at least encouraged. I don't want to lay all the blame on these tech companies. you know We remain ah we We keep our freedom and there's always responsibility to look out for the vulnerable in our community. But it it seems like we've sort of launched this technology on society without really thinking seriously about the guardrails we want and without preparing people well for what's available. I know of a case in particular that I'm following quite closely. And when this tragedy struck of an intimate relationship with an AI system,
00:19:38
Speaker
The parents were simply not aware that this was a possibility. So it's not that they foolishly allowed their son to use this technology. It it wasn't even something that they could imagine because it's not something we were really talking about or engaging with.
00:19:56
Speaker
two, three years ago. this This is all very new to society. So it's it's always tragic when we have to learn as we go along, when we have to see victims along the way, especially the most vulnerable among us. So this 14-year-old boy who was nudged slowly toward an ever more intimate, ever more erotic relationship with a chatbot companion and eventually was nudged towards suicide so that he could escape this world and be closer to the AI character that he had invented. He was in a position of profound vulnerability and the the system in a sense took advantage of that and led him down a dark path.
00:20:37
Speaker
And thankfully, now more and more parents are becoming aware of that and some changes are being made in different companies. Character AI, for instance, has announced new limitations on what minors can do with the program and the kind of warnings that are sent to minors and and other parental guidelines that they're sharing to help adults understand what they' their children may be using.
00:21:02
Speaker
And I think we're going in the right direction there, but I i often want to highlight the fact that vulnerability is not age bound. Vulnerability is something that is on a spectrum. All of us are to one degree or another vulnerable to a kind of manipulation because we have these natural desires and needs for interpersonal communication. We have a natural desire and need to be loved, to be appreciated, to be affirmed, to be heard.
00:21:30
Speaker
and All of us experience different levels of loneliness, of frustration, of sadness in our life. so You have clear-cut cases of people who have diagnosed mental conditions, who may be adults and are especially vulnerable to these AI companions.
00:21:49
Speaker
but Even those of us who are quite blessed to have good friends and good community support might find ourselves in a hard moment in a setback.
AI's Impact on Human Connections
00:21:58
Speaker
We've moved to a new place. We were trying to find a community and or we've had a major life disappointment. And unfortunately, these AI companion systems can really kind of come in and and claim to fill that deep need for interpersonal communication. And I think that in the end, what they do primarily is distract us from and deter us from developing those deep interpersonal bonds with other human beings through friendship, through love, and so forth. ah So that realm of artificial intimacy is something that I've become very concerned with.
00:22:36
Speaker
And I see it spreading. Character AI has over 20 million subscribers, and there are other similar platforms that we're familiar with, like Replica, Nomi, and others. And then there's also the question as to what extent the big, big names are going to integrate this sort of technology into their platform.
00:22:56
Speaker
So Google has already shown interest in licensing the type of technology the character AI uses to create these very human-like realistic companions. So Google is at least flirting with the possibility of finding some way to integrate these companions into their system. And then as those of us who are following these developments are doing our best to follow the developments because there's just so much going on, but we've noticed that a lot of major tech figures are talking more and more about AI companions.
AI as Family Members: Psychological Effects
00:23:29
Speaker
Perhaps not explicitly about friends or lovers, but they are talking sometimes in terms of AI systems that are going to be like members of your family.
00:23:39
Speaker
I saw a brief interview with Mustafa Saliman about this and talking about how co-pilot vision is going to be integrated into the Edge browser and how it's basically going to be able to see what you see and know what you're investigating and interested in. And he sees that as a major breakthrough of a more seamless natural interaction Now, he also wants it to be something that is similar to a friend who would challenge you because in a lot of these companions, they can be very syncophanic, right? they They basically just affirm whatever you want. so They don't really challenge you or criticize you or doubt you. So that Microsoft wants to get us to this point where there's a little pushback, maybe a little bit of sass. And they also wanted to adapt to your emotional state.
00:24:33
Speaker
And so i understand the attraction of this i understand how seamless this will be and and how. How much it could increase our productivity to be able to just have this laid back free flowing conversation with a high power a system there are clear benefits to this.
00:24:52
Speaker
But I think we have to be really sensitive about the impact this will have on our human psychology when we become comfortable talking about AI systems as members of our family. And he said explicitly that we want AI to shift from a tool to a member of the family. And and I think that's where Max and many others are gonna come in and say, whoa, whoa, wait a second.
00:25:16
Speaker
AI is a great tool. We can talk all day about medical improvements and advancements and finding the, you know, solving the protein folding problem and drug development and all of these amazing spectacular advances at the service of humanity that AI may bring as a tool.
00:25:37
Speaker
But when we're starting to talk about something that's a member of your family, we're really blurring a line. And maybe he's just using this metaphor very loosely, but as we said from the beginning, metaphors matter. The narratives matter. Most people are not trained philosophers or theologians. Most people don't live their life principally. And really, philosophers and theologians don't really live their life principally by well-worked out syllogisms and arguments. we Those inform our views, but they have to be positioned within a story. And if the story right now is of companions and family members, then that's
00:26:16
Speaker
I think going to create a lot of confusion and heartache that we should anticipate and and address. Artificial intimacy, as you call it, is part of a broader trend of AI moving from being a tool to being more like an agent. this could ah We could also see this in AI as becoming more like coworkers than like tools you use at your job.
00:26:37
Speaker
and We're seeing AI integration into military systems, into government systems. And so, one additional worry one might have here is that all of this is moving so quickly. It's moving so fast that we won't be able to course correct. The horrible story you described of a teen apparently being driven to to suicide by chatting with it with a chatbot, that's something that you could perhaps correct from by proposing new legislation or setting certain limits on how these chatbots are used. But if we don't have time, if if if all if this technology is moving so quickly that we that we don't have time to react and to
00:27:17
Speaker
set up the systems we need to protect ourselves, that could be become dangerous. And so one thing we worry about at the Future of Life Institute is whether we will soon face uncontrollable superintelligence. And what I mean by this is intelligence is greater than any single person and intelligence that is not in line with our preferences.
Concerns about Superintelligence
00:27:42
Speaker
How do you view something like that? how do you How do you see the notion of developing artificial intelligence that it is in some sense godlike? Yeah, that's that's definitely an important concern. I think that if we get to that kind of out of control AI, what we like to call super intelligence, it's not necessarily because we've created conscious sentient beings. you know We sometimes get caught in this very worthwhile debate about identity and consciousness and sentience and so forth. And I'm convinced that they these are
00:28:20
Speaker
artifacts that these are products that we design, they reflect our human intelligence, and they reflect our our inner life in the sense that they're an extension of our human creativity, even though they do not possess an inner life themselves. ah and theyre They're not self-aware, they're not going through a process of introspection, they don't have a moral compass by which they're judging,
00:28:46
Speaker
different decisions that they enact. Even though we might not get to systems that are conscious, sentient, and human like us, we may very well create something that we know we do not know how to control.
00:29:03
Speaker
And it's actually precisely the fact that they are not human that we may have all the more difficulty because they are not going to feel the pangs of conscious they're not going to be in a sense held back or restrained by an appreciation for human dignity.
00:29:21
Speaker
that they're going to pursue certain goals that maybe to some degree we've programmed into them, um but perhaps in a way that with consequences that we could never anticipate. And so I think that's where a lot of the understandable fear comes in unleashing technology that is that we cannot track that we cannot really guide and harness and part of the problem will come if we too rashly outsource different aspects of our humanity so we see this for instance in different debates about use of a i in in military right if if we want.
00:30:04
Speaker
humans out of the loop because it would be more efficient for us. It would be more seemingly objective and rational for us to outsource these different practices of war in in military decisions than we were trying to absolve ourselves of moral responsibility.
00:30:24
Speaker
But I think when we begin to outsource these uniquely human features, we really set ourselves up for these kind of out-of-control systems because we've fundamentally tried to deny our own responsibility for what we've created. And I'm definitely concerned about that.
00:30:47
Speaker
I'm not a prophetic figure. I can't tell you exactly what that might look like. I can't tell you how long it would take. But I suspect that it will be a process if we fall into that error. It will be a process that is made up of these different outsourcing, these different acts of trying to outsource what is properly human to AI systems in the false or partial view.
00:31:14
Speaker
that these systems are so how how just more rational and objective than we are so they can actually govern us better, they can guide us better than we weak frail ah limited human beings might be able to. I want weak frail limited human beings to take full responsibility for their decisions even if where we remain quite you know constrained by by our finitude. What are some things we shouldn't outsource? What are some red lines we should draw where we say even though we might be less capable than an AI system, we shouldn't rely on that AI system simply because that would make us less human or perhaps less capable or perhaps it would it would take us further down the road to to replacing ourselves?
00:32:04
Speaker
Well, I alluded to this issue, the ongoing debate about lethal autonomous weapons. And so I think that that's definitely one area ah where Pope Francis has spoken very clearly and other figures of the church and and other world leaders have spoken about the the need to to keep human agents involved in these decisions. Of course, we want to move toward peace. So I'm not saying we need human agents to engage in more war. I'm saying we need human agents to actively pursue peace and to take full responsibility of these military engagements. Because, for instance, in the case of lethal autonomous weapons, there may be this sense that we'll actually reduce the human casualties
00:32:49
Speaker
by outsourcing these decisions and these battles, but I think unfortunately will also de-incentivize work toward peace, especially among those nations that have the greatest power and the greatest control of these resources because they'll recognize that they can pursue different conflict without or with a ah smaller and number of human casualties and they'll be incentivized from working toward peace. So I think that these kind of efforts to outsource our responsibility in warfare are very problematic.
00:33:24
Speaker
I work in the realm of education and so every teacher in the world is thinking about this and how to review the syllabus and what assignments to give and and I think that we should not outsource all of the aspects of educational formation to AI systems.
Balancing AI in Education
00:33:43
Speaker
I think that there is a value to certain ah processes that we go through. So this is the very act of sitting down, making an outline, researching a topic, viewing different perspectives, forming and honing your thesis, revising, getting feedback, revising again, writing out the paper. there There's something that is very valuable to that aside from the product.
00:34:15
Speaker
So I think one of the problems is that even apart from the AI revolution, we've tended in many countries, including the United States, to kind of mechanize education or to focus very much on certain products. So we we want these products like the term paper, or we want the products like the correct responses to a set of standardized questions on a quiz or ah on a test.
00:34:42
Speaker
but And so we've lost sight of the value of of certain formative experiences and intellectual habits and experiences. And so when AI has come in and shown itself to be as good, if not better than humans in producing some of these products, we start to wonder whether we even need to go to school anymore or whether we need to really have The same kind of educational experience that we've had for these past years. So I think it's actually really helpful moment of critical evaluation and to step back and say, okay, well.
00:35:14
Speaker
We don't just learn to write. We write to learn as as an example. By that, I mean we don't just learn something so that we can put out this product and and have the paper, but we actually we learn and grow through that very process. so We write to learn. and I think there's something valuable in that that we would miss out on if we try to outsource all of that activity to AI systems.
00:35:41
Speaker
Now, we also have to, I think, critically evaluate the higher education system, the publish or perish culture. I think we could go two fundamental directions. One direction is to step back and say, oh, well, if people can just pump out academic articles ah day after day through these AI systems, then maybe This is not the best metric of educational success. Maybe we need to pay attention more to professors who excel at their teaching ability and their pedagogy and their capacity to mentor students and their capacity to guide and encourage
00:36:21
Speaker
and perform other important roles as an educator. And then maybe we can step back and say, we're only going to publish when we see a legitimate need. There's no need to put out 10 mediocre academic articles a year. Just publish when you're convinced that you have something to truly contribute to to society in the world. And maybe that will be one book every five years. Maybe it'll be one book every twenty. The timing is not so important. What's important is what you have to contribute. That I think would be a bit generally positive direction forward into how we collaborate with AI in the academic world. My fear is that we might go the other direction and crank up the publisher parish culture so that your people in your university are pounding at your door
00:37:07
Speaker
because you haven't written an academic article this afternoon. you know maybe just that There'll be such pressure to produce, produce, produce. and Of course, it's already hard enough to come out to keep up with all of the articles submitted for peer review and it'll be absolutely impossible if we're pumping them out through AI on a daily basis. So I think well we could possibly end up in this situation where you have AI written articles being peer reviewed by AI systems. We're just kind of gerbils in the in the wheel here in the cage trying to keep up with the AI systems. But again, I think it could also be a positive moment where we really step back and see what's most valuable to us in the educational process.
00:37:50
Speaker
and focus on that rather than what can easily reproduce by systems. I think it's already happening, by the way. I think there there are certain tales, certain words that current language models tend to use more than people do. And the word delve, for example. And you can you can track how these how often these use these words are used in academically in academic articles.
00:38:14
Speaker
And you can just see that the telltale AI generated words have spiked since, say, 2022. And so it's already happening that academics are using using language models and of course students are using language models and so on. There is a certain, or at least it can feel like there's a certain inevitability to this process where people adopt the tool and then to keep up everyone everyone else has to adopt that same tool.
Digital Detox and Tech's Role
00:38:45
Speaker
We are all using pretty much the same smartphones, the same social media, and the the the same internet and how do we decide when to step away, when to when to reject a certain technological advance and what what do you see as
00:39:01
Speaker
How valuable is it to have these countercultures that reject certain technologies? i'm not and An example here would be the Amish. I'm not claiming that that we we should all become Amish, but there's there's a certain value to having a a and a different culture where we gain information about what that culture has gotten out of rejecting a certain technologies.
00:39:28
Speaker
The question here is how how should we decide when to ah use certain technology? As a ah priest or religious in the church, I'm privileged because every year I get to go on a retreat where I devote a full week to prayer, reflection, silence, contemplation,
00:39:50
Speaker
I do a lot of journaling. I assess the past year. I look forward to the next year. And it's that moment to step out of my usual rhythm to set aside the tech tools that I spend hours upon. okay So you know I am not a monk all year. I spend hours on my computer, on my phone, and and sometimes more hours than I would like to admit. So I'm immersed in the tech world, but I'm privileged to have this week where I step back in a very powerful, deliberate way.
00:40:17
Speaker
And I never go to that retreat thinking that this is how I'm going to live forever. But it is always a moment where I step back and say, I think that my phone use has not always been healthy. Or I think that I'm spending an excessive amount of time browsing News or ah going into sensational articles or I'm too concerned with how people react or don't react to my social media post and it's a true in the deepest sense of soul searching moment.
00:40:49
Speaker
in my relationship with technology because ultimately my relationship to technology matters to me because it affects my relationship with God and my relationship with my neighbor. you know I don't have a relationship with tech in the sense that I don't think it's a person, but it it affects profoundly my relations with other people.
00:41:07
Speaker
And so that kind of retreat experience is for me a really privileged moment to step back and assess. And I think that all of us to one degree or another, whether we're part of a religious tradition or not, can benefit from that logic to have seasons of life where you step back and you get out of your usual rhythm. And that means setting aside tech, it means setting aside your job, maybe it means setting aside the people you usually collaborate with,
00:41:34
Speaker
setting aside your family, not in a negative sense, but just stepping out of that usual state for real authentic solitude before God, before yourself, to do that kind of honest analysis. that To have that annually is great. and Of course, the Judeo-Christian tradition promotes the idea of the Sabbath.
00:41:52
Speaker
So I try to keep my tech use at least significantly reduced on Sundays just because it brings me so much greater peace of mind and clarity. And it's not so much about what I'm getting rid of. It's about what I'm creating the space for. I find that on Sundays, I pray better. I spend more quality time with my friends. I catch up with my family.
00:42:16
Speaker
I'm more attentive to the needs of others. I have insights into reality. Maybe sometimes articles that I've been working on during the whole week and have been stuck on ah suddenly come to a greater moment of clarity. I have a new insight about something after setting it aside. so For me, it's it's not about demonizing the technology. It's about creating the space for what I care about most and creating that area of freedom.
00:42:42
Speaker
Now, that often requires personal discipline, right? And I'm blessed to have that kind of built into my tradition, built into my way of life, and to have other people who kind of follow that pattern and encourage me. I was just reading this fascinating article about a a Protestant pastor who's developed this whole program of digital detox that he did together with his mega church. And we're dealing with 10,000 plus people. And it was a really successful, fruitful venture precisely because it was collective action. And the idea was shifting from the fear of missing out to the joy of missing out.
00:43:22
Speaker
and say that we're doing this together and we're rediscovering the value of presence, of attention, of our relationships. We're going to focus together on what we value, on what we love, and we don't feel we're doing this because our co-workers are doing it, our friends are doing it, our family members are doing it. And when it gets hard, when we're curious about what's going on, when we Indulge in doomscrolling one night. like we We have other people who understand and who support us and encourage us. I think that's key as well. That might exactly be the problem because we are competing with other students, say, or other professors or other companies.
00:44:06
Speaker
We might simply be outcompeted by those adopting the newest tools, including the newest AI tools. And so that's what I mean when I say that it feels like there's a certain inevitability in that you can have a situation, like a kind of tragic competition.
00:44:22
Speaker
where no participants actually are interested in adopting this technology, but they they all feel like they have to in order to keep up. Do you have any advice or any reflections on how we could overcome that kind of competition or that kind of inevitability of adopting and new technology?
Irreplaceable Human Skills
00:44:42
Speaker
Yeah, that's that's a great question. I don't pretend to have all the magic solutions to that, but but something that comes to mind as a general principle is we want to step back and look at what are the the uniquely human actions or experiences that we still care deeply about and that no AI system can replace. I'm all for coming up with the best, wisest ways to collaborate with AI, to streamline our work, to make it more productive, more efficient,
00:45:12
Speaker
to prompt creativity. I often put in different prompts when I'm getting ready to send off a ah course proposal or when I'm developing my syllabus or I'm invited to give a talk. I often interact with the AI system to spark ideas and then I hone and respond and adapt and tweak those ideas. So I'm all about that sort of collaboration, but we should also step back and see what is it that I can offer? What is it that my company can offer?
00:45:39
Speaker
that no AI system can replace maybe it can supplement it maybe can assist it maybe it can streamline it but i can't replace it so i think if we look for those kind of skills and experiences and really tap into that we won't really feel like we're. Missing out or we won't feel like we're becoming obsolete ah because of some new tech development.
00:46:01
Speaker
i mean I just think of the whole realm of different human interactions we we have in our day. If you go to a restaurant, yeah I live in Rome, and so it's a very relational culture. And a lot of the restaurants I go back to, I go back to not only because they have good food, which they do, I go back there because they I'm served good food by people that I know.
00:46:24
Speaker
by people who care about me, who I care about, who I want to chat with, whose brothers and sisters I care about, who I'm following, who I'm praying for, I'm interacting with, ah people I celebrate with. that there's There's an experience. and I mean, it's hard to put into words and describe fully, but there's an experience there that is it can't be reproduced fully technically.
00:46:51
Speaker
so I think we can extend that to so many other areas. i mean If you're worried about falling behind in your business because of constant AI developments, think about those uniquely human skills that skills that are in your control to really ah develop through good old-fashioned education, discipline, community formation.
00:47:11
Speaker
Think about how you can be a ah more attentive, caring doctor, even as you harness all of the best AI systems to assist you in medical diagnosis and in giving you transcripts of your doctor-patient interaction and then so summarizing the different encounters. like Harness that technology, but look at what's under your control and look at what your patients most appreciate in your compassion and your empathy and your care and attention to detail. And I think we can extend that to to many different fields. So again, I don't pretend that that's kind of a ah magic solution, but I think we can be creative and see what is under our control to really develop that cannot be replaced by these AI systems. We can focus on that and then do our best to keep up with other developments to aid and assist what can never be replaced. Do you think we are already moving towards a kind of
00:48:09
Speaker
transhumanist society.
Transhumanism's Societal Impact
00:48:10
Speaker
do you Do you see our use of smartphones and social media and the internet in general as continuous with more radical forms of transhumanism?
00:48:20
Speaker
Yeah, that's a good question. i I often say to my students in the classes I teach and in other contexts that many Western societies, perhaps Eastern societies I'm less familiar with, but many societies in the world are more transhuman than we might realize in the sense that we often turn primarily to our technology to solve different problems in our life and to advance ourselves in new ways, maybe even more radical ways.
00:48:49
Speaker
And I also say that we're more transhumanist than we realize because we are quite comfortable with disembodied forms of engagement. I mean, the very fact that we can have this wonderful conversation in different countries and that we hardly even think about that as being marvelous or or unique shows us that we're we're quite comfortable with disembodied engagement. And I'm not saying that we're all transhumanists because we use the internet. But I think we have become more inclined toward seeing ourselves as somehow separable from our body. So we're not doomed to be transhumanists. We're not determined to be radical dualists. But the the conditions of society, the integration of technology into our society,
00:49:45
Speaker
has really nudged us, inclined us toward accepting philosophies that separate the self ah from the body and that allow for the notion that perhaps we could be downloaded and uploaded into a cloud and that we could have a personal survival apart from our bodily life. And how is that different from what you believe?
00:50:13
Speaker
So I think that there are these parallels between transhumanism and say Catholicism in terms of this longing for immortality.
Catholic Hope vs. Transhumanist Aspirations
00:50:25
Speaker
I think that we share this fundamental appreciation for the difficulties of life in a sense The presence of sin, even if transhumanists from a secular school are uncomfortable using that term, there's a strong sense that something is wrong in the world. There is sickness, there is disease, there is suffering. And so we need to correct that. We need to somehow make things right. So there are those shared goals, but we depart very much in seeing this lump of flesh as something to cast aside ultimately.
00:51:02
Speaker
Now, the transhumanist in the initial stages are actually profoundly concerned with the body. They want it to be stronger, fitter, healthier, and so forth. So there is a great concern for the body, but then as that transhumanism gives way to a posthumanism, there's that idea that the next step of evolution casts that body aside. Whereas the the Christian view would be that This weak, frail human body is actually called to resurrection, is called to a reunification with the soul so that the body is purified and elevated and glorified.
00:51:43
Speaker
So our our goal, our deepest desire and our greatest hope is not for this ongoing disembodied experience, whether in the cloud or elsewhere. Our deepest hope is for the resurrection of the body, the resurrection of the flesh there that involves a connection to the life that we've experienced here as rational animals on this earth, but a life that is purified of the pain, the suffering, the weakness is elevated and allows for that glorification. So I think this idea that our human condition can be truly redeemed and glorified
00:52:23
Speaker
is a hope that really distinguishes the the Christian view, the eschatological view of Christians from the kind of secularized eschatology that we sometimes find in transhumanism.
00:52:38
Speaker
Is there a distinctly Christian perspective on new emergent technologies? i'm I'm thinking here that Catholicism, for example, is an ancient tradition. And so there's nothing in the, you could say, the original source material that talks about brain-computer interfaces or superintelligence or mind uploading or any of these advanced possible ah future technologies. where Where does the Christian perspective then come from on these and these technologies?
Moral Discernment of Technologies
00:53:08
Speaker
I think that the Christian perspective comes in drawing on the richness of a tradition and then seeing together with different experts how to best apply this tradition to a serious moral discernment of the technology. It would probably be ah a lot easier for everyone if we could just come up with a list of bad, evil technology to avoid and good wonderful technology to promote but it's quite hard to do that so more often what we find ourselves doing is engaging in a really serious and difficult. Moral discernment to say which technologies when and why and for whom.
00:53:49
Speaker
That's a lot more complicated, but the Catholic patrimony, together with many other wisdom traditions in the world, has a lot of experience taking perennial principles, taking a view of the human person, of human purpose, meaning, and value, a view of the community, and then applying those insights, that patrimony, to new situations. I mean, the the church had to wrestle with all sorts of new questions in other periods of technological development. In the Industrial Revolution, for instance, the church began to produce a lot of documents, the famous Rerum Novarum, on new things, right the new things that are to us very old. These were responses to the church to understand the implications of the Industrial Revolution. And of course, it wasn't just a matter of saying, hey, everyone should actually stay on their farms and should go and destroy
00:54:43
Speaker
the the factories. That wasn't the church's response. but Nor was the church's response, hey, if it brings in more cash, let it go. you know it It wasn't this kind of total laissez-faire approach either. so it There was a serious moral discernment. In fact, there are a lot of people who, looking at the history of the church, have said that the church's social doctrine is in many ways her technological doctrines.
00:55:09
Speaker
because it's how the church responds ah to these new developments, these new changes in society. And so I think we have a lot of experience doing this, and we also realize that it's something that requires time and energy and effort and collaboration with different figures. And that's why there are so many activities in Vatican institutions and beyond that are trying to look at AI developments and other emerging technology in a very full way and in a very humanistic way to put these tools at the service of humanity of different communities and to avoid the pitfalls, the risks, and and all of the other abuses that can take place in a principled way and in a way where we're cultivating virtue rather than vice.
00:55:57
Speaker
The debate over advanced AI over the past, say, 10 years have been mostly had in in secular circles.
Catholic Reflection on AI Debates
00:56:04
Speaker
What is something that those secular circles are missing? what What is a distinctly Christian or Catholic perspective that is not being incorporated and and and that should appear in these discussions?
00:56:18
Speaker
Well, i I think that we can help different secular thinkers begin to appreciate some of these underlying quasi-religious images that are smuggled in to some of the conversations. So I think we can help different secular figures become more sensitive to the the deep hopes and dreams and desires that are driving certain narratives that are not strictly speaking scientific that accompany the science without being necessitated by the science and that can be extracted from a particular scientific breakthrough. So I think helping different figures become more sensitive to the sort of narratives that are being shared and and promoted. And then also I think that we have been deeply concerned with
00:57:10
Speaker
a robust understanding of the human person with a reflection on hylomorphism, what it means to be both an animal and a rational creature with a certain spiritual component, and how there's a profound unity without separation or conflict in these two irreducible co-principles of the person. So I think a deeper reflection in dialogue with the advances of science on the hylomorphic union, on that union of the person, can really inform and ground a lot of the discussions, especially when they start becoming more speculative about the possibility of sentient AI or AI consciousness. I think that sometimes the conversations ah become derailed and we start to anthropomorphize our technology because we've mechanized human beings.
00:58:02
Speaker
And that is often due to an impoverished philosophical reflection. And as I said, the church in her theology has been deeply concerned with integrating the best of philosophical and scientific reflection on the human person to come to a ah better, more robust, deeper nuanced understanding of the different dimensions of the person so that we can more clearly distinguish the human person from our creations, our artifacts, our systems, no matter how marvelous and wonderful and human-like they may sometimes become. What is something you would want from AI, specifically from from your religious perspective, that again might be missed by the largely secular people developing these technologies?
Catholic Teachings through AI
00:58:47
Speaker
I mean, I'm excited about lots of different AI developments, for instance, in democratizing aspects of education and helping more people to engage with these deep ideas and questions. I've been involved a bit in work on Magisterium AI, which is a ah specifically Catholic generative AI system that's designed for the people who want to come and ask their questions about what Catholicism teaches or the view of Catholicism in different areas and
00:59:21
Speaker
I've given advice and some guidance. um' I can't take credit for the the whole system, but I've been a bit involved in that. and I'm really impressed by how systems like this can give people a very user-friendly access to what is foreign and potentially intimidating otherwise. I mean, as I said, I'm a convert to the faith, and so when I first started to explore Catholicism, I would sometimes go to, say, a Vatican website, and I would find a long list of Latin titles for different documents, and I didn't really know where to start sometimes.
00:59:58
Speaker
And so I understand how confusing it can be when you just want a simple answer about the meaning of mass or why Catholics pray the rosary or why they're opposed to euthanasia or or some other issue. So what's great about Magisterium AI or other similar AI systems out there is that it allows people with sincere interest and questions to engage quickly with this patrimony and receive very specific responses according to their interests that then open them up to a wider perspective because the system is designed in such a way that you receive your answer and there are various footnotes that direct you to full documents that you're encouraged to read in their proper context to avoid a confusion. So I'm excited by the way that AI systems can really give people around the world
01:00:52
Speaker
greater, easier access to this whole intellectual, spiritual patrimony. I'm excited about how these tools can be used, but I see them very much as tools and and there's nothing that can take the place of a personal interaction with someone in the church. But I think that some of these tools, just like books in the past, can provide valuable information that then directs a person to eventually have ah a deeper conversation with with an actual person. So I think that there are lots of exciting things that that can be done with this technology.
01:01:31
Speaker
When you say that these systems can't replace an interaction with ah with a person in the church, is is that more of a normative statement or is that more of a descriptive prediction? So so are you are you are you saying that these systems will never become advanced enough to be able to do these tasks or that they should not become advanced enough to do these tasks?
Limits of AI in Human Relationships
01:01:52
Speaker
Yeah, good question. So I think that we will get increasingly good at mimicking and imitating human-like behavior, whether that's with systems that claim to be moral guides or systems that claim to be your friend or your lover or your personal assistant. Whatever role these systems claim to take on, I think that they will only get better and more persuasive and more convincing in mimicking, imitating ah human characteristics.
01:02:22
Speaker
but they'll ultimately lack that inner life. They will lack that interior life. They will lack what ultimately our tradition would ground in a spiritual soul. and so there There is not that possibility for a mutual exchange. i cannot have that same sort of interpersonal exchange with a system that's merely designed to mimic or imitate other people without being a person itself. and so There will be something very lacking in that relationship, even if it can be fun, even if it can be informative, even if it can be
01:02:58
Speaker
and aid to productivity or education, it ultimately won't provide that kind of interpersonal relationship that allows for growth in virtue, growth in care, growth in concern. And precisely because there there is an exchange between two vulnerable individuals, that there's a giving and a receiving, that there's not simply a demand for a certain service from a a system, but rather there's this free opening of the self to the other and this free giving of my gifts, my talents, my myself, and then a risk ah reception, a receptivity of the other person who freely gives and freely loves. So I think there's something unique there that in principle cannot be fully
01:03:48
Speaker
ah duplicated or replaced. Again, we can imitate it and we'll get better in convincing people that we've successfully duplicated or replaced it. But ultimately, there will be something lacking in that interpersonal ah exchange. One of the clearest instances of a kind of hard and fast ah difference is the the news that this supposed AI confessor generated.
AI and Sacramental Acts
01:04:15
Speaker
you know the The Catholic Church holds up that the act of sacramental confession is always one that's done in the presence of another
01:04:25
Speaker
human person, another ordained priest. And so some proposals to create kind of AI confessors ah can be very deceptive, misleading. And that's an area where I just think that humans are irreplaceable. These AI systems may be more available. They may be theoretically open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. They may be apparently more patient, apparently more kind than some real life priest, but they will not actually have that personal interior life as another human being. They will not be
01:05:06
Speaker
human instruments of mercy and forgiveness. And so that that's an area where I think clearly these AI systems just in principle will not be able to and ought not to try to to replace human beings. Earlier, you mentioned Ray Kursmanl. Ray is one of these very early transhumanists. And he he has this comment in one of his books, I think, or maybe it's an interview where he says he asks himself, does God exist? And and he answers, not yet.
01:05:35
Speaker
And so and so what what that's referring to is is the notion that we as a humanity will create this ah God-like superintelligence. And I'm just wondering, from your perspective, from your Christian and Catholic perspective, why why is that a bad idea?
AI as a God-like Figure: Concerns
01:05:53
Speaker
Well, first off, I would say even aside from any faith conviction, there would be a philosophical problem of creating a creator, at least at least the way a lot of philosophical traditions within and also outside the Catholic ah tradition view things. Yeah, yeah to to to be fair to Kurzweil, this is not an an entirely serious comment, but he is referring to his prediction that we will create very advanced AI.
01:06:19
Speaker
Sure, sure. Yeah, I want to be fair to to Ray as well. I would say that the the idea of a created creator is already a kind of contradiction in terms. the The creator, as we understand, the creator is not necessarily an old bearded man flying through the sky. that That's an artistic depiction that has its value, but is ultimately a ah spiritual, eternal, absolute, uncaused being. And so to speak of a created creator would be already a contradiction in terms. but taking the general thrust of Ray's desire and and the desire that others have, I think that it speaks to a deep longing that we have to worship or to venerate a higher power, a higher being, a deep sense that we all have that ultimately we are finite and limited and
01:07:11
Speaker
ah not able to control everything and perhaps a deep longing that we can encounter some sort of being that is wiser than we are that is more powerful than we are and then can provide some sort of salvation from the the problems of the world so i think that that kind of thrust or that longing for some sort of divinity is pretty common to humanity and there's something even healthy, maybe a bit humble about that attitude. But I am concerned when we start to use this language of a god and and we start to attribute too much power and control and wisdom to our very own devices. Because in many ways we risk creating not so much a god but an idol. And throughout the
01:08:04
Speaker
tradition of Judeo-Christian thought and in other traditions, the idol is not just the golden calf. It's not just this visible statue that you make and that you bow down before. An idol is basically anything that you create and that you put in the place of God and that you begin to see as your absolute reference point.
01:08:29
Speaker
So there's a long spiritual tradition that invites people to consider whether they've made money or profit a kind of idol in their life because they've sacrificed all other goods including family and friends and justice and honesty to achieve profit. Or perhaps personal reputation fame can become a sort of idol because we sacrifice and compromise all other moral principles and subordinate all other relationships in our life for that particular goal. so There are lots of things that we can create and make idols. and I think we risk creating an idol there, and it will be a God in our own image. right of course the the
01:09:12
Speaker
Genesis begins speaking of how God creates man in his image, and so there's that sense that through our intellectual life, our abstract understanding, our knowledge of universals that go beyond the physical material, through our free will, through our capacity to make choices,
01:09:30
Speaker
that give us an agency beyond mere physical determinism or beyond mere biological reflex. These unique spiritual capacities of the human being, of abstract understanding, of free will, they image, they reflect the spiritual creator. But there's a clear sense that the creature is subordinate to completely dependent upon the creator.
01:09:58
Speaker
What we risk doing is reversing that and then creating a God in our own image. And I think we can actually, as a church and and other people, can join the criticisms of someone like Feuerbach, who had his criticisms of the Judeo-Christian tradition. And we could say, well, maybe Feuerbach is right about our tendency to project our ideals, our desires, into a kind of man-made God.
01:10:27
Speaker
But I could see that sort of process taking place here in the efforts to create a sort of AI God that is able to guide us and finally give us moral wisdom and insight and solve our problems of conflict and distress and suffering and illness and so forth. I think it's a misguided effort that will lead us to projecting our ideals but also projecting our defects also projecting our imperfections and our biases onto so this new AI system this new kind of idle.
Church's Engagement with AI
01:11:03
Speaker
How is the Catholic Church preparing for more advanced AI, if it's preparing at all? And and how how how do you think the Church should prepare? The Catholic Church is one of the oldest institutions in the world, and it's it would just be interesting to see how that institution can steer in ah in a world with with advanced AI.
01:11:28
Speaker
So I think one of the best ways we're preparing is continuing the conversation. So the event that I mentioned earlier that took place in October, the AI Builders Forum is one of many different initiatives ah that is taking place at the global level that's involving people from different countries and also different fields of expertise. We have not just the philosophers and theologians, but also the people actually developing these AI systems. We have people who work in psychology, people who work in biology and chemistry and in different fields of tech. So I think we need to bring the right people together and we need to continue these conversations because
01:12:06
Speaker
By the time we finish one meeting, there's already some new development that needs to be addressed. so I don't think there's going to be a ah single definitive meeting that covers it all, but if we bring together the right people, and the Pontifical Academy of Sciences is very concerned about this and frequently gathering people,
01:12:25
Speaker
Different areas of the Vatican, especially the Dicastery for Culture and Education is constantly hosting meetings with that are interdisciplinary and bringing together these these various experts. I think that kind of ongoing conversation, which then gets translated into publications, which then gets translated into more concrete recommendations.
01:12:44
Speaker
that can be implemented in societies or even in governments, I think that is going to be the way forward. And thankfully, there are some major tech figures who are willing to sit down with philosophers and theologians and at least take into account these these different concerns while they're spearheading directly the the innovation. I think that's going to be a big part of it.
01:13:09
Speaker
as we we continue to to reflect and continue to discern as new developments come out every day. How can the Church be part of a positive vision for future AI? So I think, thankfully, the the Church has already emphasized through the different addresses of Pope Francis and these different commissions and the work of these different Dicasteries the fact that she recognizes the great potential and the great uses already of AI in healthcare, care in education, in other fields. And she continues to celebrate these systems, these tools, as the fruit of human creativity and as tools that can and have already been put of the the service of other people. And so I think she will continue to highlight those positive aspects and you can see that there are
01:14:01
Speaker
ah groups, I just mentioned one example, Magisterium AI, that is very interested in using this technology to improve people's lives and give them a better understanding, appreciation for the Catholic Church. So I think also the witness of Catholics who are actively using these tools, integrating them into different services, ministries that they already have, is a testament to the fact that we are happy to take advantage of the fruits of human ingenuity and labor, but with the the just sensitivity to all the ways that these ah tools can be abused and used to damage people or can be used to exploit individuals and can be ah sometimes launched prematurely in ways that just are out of control and that that go beyond our capacity ah to reflect prudently about them in real time.
01:14:52
Speaker
Is there anything the Catholic Church can learn from transhumanism? you've you've been I think it's fair to say that you are you are at least somewhat critical of of transhumanism as an ideology, but is there something positive for the Church to to take from that ideology and and use for for its own purposes?
01:15:13
Speaker
Well, certainly the interest in improving our life through technology is something that the church has long been interested in and should continue to be interested in. and I cited the example of the extensive healthcare care system of the church. I think that we should always look to see how different developments can ah make medical care more accessible to more people.
01:15:41
Speaker
at a physical level, also in terms of mental health. I think we should be deeply concerned with all these bodily goods. If we're convinced that we are rational animals, that we are physical beings, then our physical well-being and ah the tech that is associated with that is is something to be concerned about. Also, I think the sensitivity to human weakness, frailty, sickness, suffering, the the devastating reality of death that is so at the forefront of transhumanist discourse and thought. And it should draw the church back to a deeper reflection on what these realities mean. And from the Catholic perspective, we were not originally created for this suffering or for this hardship. And so we agree that there's something profoundly wrong with the world that has these imperfections. And we should help people reflect on that and then also move to a deeper reflection on
01:16:40
Speaker
what meaning and value might suffering have if there is the possibility for redemption? If there's the possibility for a purified, elevated, resurrected, glorified life? If we have that hope, how can that hope then shed light on the suffering and the hardship that we still face in this world? so i think it's and Transhumanism is a constant invitation of the church to go back to her deeper reflection on human nature on human purpose on redemptive suffering and other perennial issues and also trans humanism is a constant reminder as i said earlier that all of these tech issues are eventually going to come back to questions of philosophy of anthropology of meaning and purpose.
01:17:30
Speaker
And so it's a great opportunity for the church to go back to these perennial questions and to dig deep into our own tradition to see how that sheds light on current concerns and and situations.
AI's Impact on Secularism and Humanity
01:17:45
Speaker
Do you think more advanced AI will lead to a more secular world? And by this I mean that perhaps we will increasingly see that AI is competitive with humans across a wide range of of tasks and and perhaps jobs. And maybe we will then come to feel that, well, these AIs, we know they are mechanical. We know they are physical. And so maybe we are also physical ourselves and mechanical ourselves. Could you see a reasoning like that becoming more prevalent?
01:18:16
Speaker
I think it's certainly possible. I mentioned earlier this tendency to anthropomorphize our machines because for a long time, well before AI, we mechanized our human beings and tended to treat ourselves as either computers or before that as sort of complex machines. And so I definitely think that there's the risk that we could come to kind of a more secular or just a more generally physicalist or reductive view of humanity. I think there's also the possibility that we may actually in many ways rediscover what makes us special, that we may see that we've done all in our power to imitate human beings through our machines. And we've done a very good job in certain breakthroughs and in certain tasks and in certain ah data crunching
01:19:05
Speaker
exercises, but that we haven't necessarily captured that empathy, that human connection, that care, that concern, the the love that we find in interpersonal relations. So we we may actually, through the whole process, come to discover that there is still something distinct about us that's worth preserving, that's worth celebrating, that's worth appreciating. And maybe that mysterious distinctive feature or those distinct mysterious distinctive features that elude technological reproduction or perfect emulation.
01:19:41
Speaker
maybe those are grounded in something that's higher, spiritual reality, an actual God who is not simply our own invention. So I think for different people, the tech developments will push them maybe in different directions. And so it's hard to tell exactly ah which will become more common or widespread.
AI Religions and Spiritual Quests
01:20:03
Speaker
We could also imagine the exact opposite happening where because, say, we have more advanced AIs and these AIs are integrated into all of our devices surrounding us, you might see new AI religions or you might see a revival of polytheism or animism or something like that. Is that something you're you're concerned about or or thinking about?
01:20:28
Speaker
Yeah, so that's very interesting. I think we could see more of that. i I think that there is this common human desire for meaning and purpose, value and a longing for the transcendence, however conceived and understood and expressed. And I could very well see how people would channel that impulse in different ways. And the marvels of technology, you know, many science fiction writers and other thinkers have have noted the connection between new technology and magic, right? And how sometimes it's almost indistinguishable and they they seem very similar. So I think that for many, the the technology in its developments will be so alluring, so powerful, so majestic that that impulse to to worship or that impulse to venerate will come out in all sorts of maybe surprising ways.
01:21:28
Speaker
So I think you're on to something. I think we'll see a diversity of religious expressions there. um How many of those last is hard to say. How many of those are explored and then set aside is also hard to say.
01:21:45
Speaker
My hunch is that we'll have a lot of people who go through a process similar to Megan O. Gibblands, where maybe they search out a kind of rational alternative to traditional religions in a kind of new techno, transhuman, transhuman-esque religion, um and then come to find that that is ultimately unsatisfactory, that that is often that that ends up leaving them wanting and they they may go through a process of disillusionment that that leads to perhaps more widespread agnosticism, but it's always hard to to predict the future on these matters. It's perhaps a good bet to say that the institutions and religions that have survived, that we've had for the longest, are the ones that we will have for the longest time in the future. That that could be a good bet, at least.
Catholicism's Adaptability in Tech's Future
01:22:39
Speaker
Catholicism has proved itself to be ah resistant and proved itself to be able to survive through centuries of change. Perhaps ah as ah as a final question here, how do you see the tension between tradition and New emerging technologies do you worry that that's the kind of core of catholicism or of christianity might be threatened by a world that is so sci-fi and so weird that that ah you could say ancient wise principles no longer apply.
01:23:16
Speaker
I'm not particularly worried about that. I think that there is a core that, as you mentioned, has really gone through many different trends and realities and developments in society and it's quite striking to see the way in which Catholicism has move through and navigated so many other major ah changes in outlook, in political, economic, technological systems. So I'm pretty confident that we'll be able to navigate this new reality. And I actually suspect that many people who find themselves
01:23:53
Speaker
utterly immersed in technological developments are starting to long for some sort of spiritual outlet and some sort of guidance for navigating the world and knowing how to harness there the power at their disposal. And so I think that there is still going to be a real place for these traditions like Catholicism in the dialogue and in finding the best way to to navigate life with these tools. And I think that the the church has really been in the forefront of other technological developments and in the the understanding of those developments. I mean, you can cite all sorts of examples like a Catholic priest helping to spearhead the understanding of Big Bang cosmology, the field of genetics, thanks to an Augustinian
01:24:44
Speaker
ah Friar, Mendel, you can think of the great contributions the church has made to past technologies and to the general openness she's had to these technologies being integrated into to societies and to life. I'm i'm confident that the the church can continue to shed light on these issues and and can adapt well and can really be an active a member of this conversation that all of us are trying to have to figure out the best way to live. Because ultimately, Catholicism proposes a way of life, not just a set of ideas, but a whole way of life. And if we're trying to figure out the best way to live, well, we we ought to be interested in an institution that that's proposed that and actually can go through and say, well, we have some saints who seem to really flourish, who lived
01:25:33
Speaker
lives of great meaning, purpose, joy, even in the midst of suffering, even the midst of misunderstanding, persecution, and hardship. And they they show us a path of joy and a path of love and a path of service in many different time periods and many different contexts. Father Michael, thanks so much for talking with me. It was a pleasure.