Thinking Positive

AI, they tell us, will save us. No, really. It will solve so many problems; you can't imagine. Once again, technology is our savior. It will augment our abilities and make life better and, in the end, save us from ... everything. Yes, I exaggerate, but there are those who thoroughly and warmly embrace our coming AI overlords. I am not one of them.

I don't think we'll end up with killer robots a la Terminator or iRobot. Nothing so blatant. You see, technology isn't moral. Technology is a tool. How a tool is used determines whether it is moral or not. A knife can be used to cut vegetables -- good stuff -- or throats -- definitely bad. Knives (an early technology) are not the issue; people are. Through history we've been developing technology that will always "make life better." From rudimentary technology like plows or horse-drawn carts through to modern computers and smartphones, we've developed technology to ease our load, do our work, and make us happy. And we've repeatedly failed miserably because of the ongoing and constant unexpected consequences. America today, for instance, is an obese nation because of technology. We have so many work-savers that we just don't have to do much physical labor, the very thing necessary to maintain a healthy weight. They tell me that our nation -- especially the younger generation -- is suffering from an epidemic of depression and loneliness. Why? Technology. The very technology that was intended to connect us all -- the Internet, social media, smartphones, etc. -- has, in fact, created vast distances. Humans took over the technology and created algorithms to engender reliance and addiction to their technology. Where families used to sit down to a meal together, now they sit down to a screen session with smartphones in hand, ignoring one another while they're with one another. I know people who list as their primary friends people they've never seen because they're all online friends. That is a different category of "friendship" than the normal human version. We no longer remember facts because we can look them up or phone numbers because they're stored on our phones or how to spell because we have spell checkers, all if which are not improvements for the human mind. And so it goes.

Here's the actual problem. I have it on good authority that the heart is deceitful and desperately wicked (Jer 17:9). I have it from reliable sources that humans as a whole are sinners (Rom 3:23), generally hostile toward God (Rom 8:7), unable to understand spiritual things (1 Cor 2:14). What we are doing now with AI is creating new, extremely powerful technology for a depraved society to use as its tool. It is naive to think that we will use it for good. We don't even have a grasp of "good" (Rom 3:12). So we are, in essence, creating a weapon that can be used for good or evil and putting it in the hands of sinful humans, and we're hoping for a positive outcome -- we, who don't even know what "a positive outcome" really is in the eyes of our Maker. AI is aiming to solve problems in a materialist world where the actual problem is spiritual ... and neither its makers nor AI itself (which is now making much of its own existence) has a clue. If I'm trying to think positively here, I'm fairly positive that this won't go well for us as a race (Prov 14:12). I am equally positive that my God rules.