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Tuesday, October 24, 2017

Black and White in a Grayscale World

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is here. It is in our homes, our businesses, our world. You can ask Google a question and expect an answer, even verbally, and anticipate that it will be reasonably helpful. Amazon and Google both have devices available for your home for these purposes. Recently Michael Sacasas wrote about how the question is no longer trusting machines, but whether or not we trust them too much. The problem with AI is that we are lulled into a sense that they're actually human-like in their thinking. The problem is that they're not. They might be able to find you a good deal on shoes or the closest Mexican restaurant, but they will never be able to make wise moral choices for you. By no means should we ever, for instance, lethally arm them and let them decide who and when to shoot. You see, making those choices is not for a machine. It's a human thing; they wouldn't understand.

The problem is what we call "gray areas". Just what are gray areas? Those are areas that are, by definition, not black or white. ("Duh, Stan. Thanks for the insight.") Okay, for the purpose of this conversation it is areas of morality that appear "gray" rather than clear cut. Here, a quick example. Is it wrong to kill? "Yes! (Whew, that one was easy.)" Oh, yeah? What about the death penalty? (Caution: If you say it's always wrong, you're going to have to contend with God who imposed the death penalty Himself.) What about to defend a life? What about in a just war? Never? And you've just walked into "gray".

Morally gray, then, does exist. Even biblically. Paul talks in Romans 14 about whether or not it is moral to eat meat. He says that it depends on the person. On matters such as this, "Who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another? It is before his own master that he stands or falls." (Rom 14:4) Gray. In 1 Corinthians it is meat sacrificed to idols. He warns against being "too smart" (1 Cor 8:1-2). On one hand, idols are not real, so meat offered to them is fine (1 Cor 8:4). On the other hand, it might damage the conscience or another or your own testimony, so it's not fine (1 Cor 8:7-9). Gray. Gray areas do exist.

So what's a believer to do? Well, by way of answer, I want to look for a moment at the printed "grayscale" you will find in most places. To obtain gray on a piece of white paper, the way it is normally done is to put black dots at intervals on the white background. The closer the dots, the darker the gray. In this medium, then, there is grayscale, but that gray is actually black and white. It only looks gray from a distance. In the same way, I believe in almost every moral question you will find the same thing.

Going back to the "is it right to kill?" question, I showed how you don't have a "black and white" answer, but I think we can say quite clearly ("black and white") that every situation has a right answer. For instance, in the case of whether or not you should kill someone you simply don't like, the answer is "No" (black) (Exo 20:13). In the case of a person rightfully convicted of intentionally killing women and children on the testimony of irrefutable evidence and multiple reliable eyewitnesses, the answer would be "Yes" (white) (Gen 9:6). Just two specific circumstances, but I hope it helps you to see that there is a "gray area" which, on closer examination, turns out to be black or white.

I believe, then, that for the largest mass of moral questions that might occur, there are biblical commands, prohibitions, or principles in play that will govern the believer for the correct response -- black and white. They may not be the same for every believer. They may not be the same for every situation. But I don't think there is a moral question we must face that does not have some biblical principle that directly affects the answer. We can be pretty sure of this because Scripture tells us that love is the fulfillment of the law (Matt 22:35-40; Rom 13:8; Rom 13:10; Gal 5:14). I believe, then, that it is entirely possible for a genuine believer to live black and white in a grayscale world. The real question, of course, is whether or not we're willing to do the work to figure out just where those black dots on the white background occur.

2 comments:

Bob said...

in last weeks Sunday school the teacher made the case that David could not build the temple because he was not pure. why was he not pure? because he killed people. his point was that in order to serve God we must be pure. at first glance we may agree, but i noted that this was a case where he distorted that context in order to support a pretext. his main idea was to promote the idea of the importance of purity in the believer, but in doing so he glossed over the main idea of the text. 1. building the temple was David's way of trying to do something for God. 2. David was rejected not because he killed ( warrior), but rather because he was a murderer. 3. although David had good intentions, he was at cross purposes with God.
the Sunday School teacher created a additional difficulty in forcing the Purity concept. it beg the question, how pure is pure enough? who is pure? how does one get pure? if purity is the criteria then we would have to eliminate the apostles, Paul, and everyone else because all have sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God.

Stan said...

"In order to serve God we must be pure." Really? The teacher advocated that? I suppose that would eliminate all but Christ.