Blog - Page 17 of 20 - AI Theology

Altered Carbon and The Eternal Soul: Sci-Fi Gets Religion

In the hit Netflix show Altered Carbon, the people become immortal by making their consciousness portable. They perpetuate their existence by moving into a new body (or “sleeve”) when the old one is no longer useful. Their consciousness live in a device that is inserted into the back of their neck. As long as the device remains intact, the person lives on independent of the body. Yet, Science fiction is not the first genre to discuss our individual essence as something that transcends the body. Religious thought has been reflecting on this for Millennia. Can anything be learned in a dialogue between a religious (in this case Christian) view of the soul and consciousness? In this blog, I want to explore how the Christian vision of the soul can inform the Science-Fiction view of consciousness and vice-versa.

Christian thought has a similar idea about personhood. Instead of a device, it believes the person has a soul, an internal invisible energy that contains the individual’s essence. Once the body dies, the soul lives on eternally in a place of torment or bliss.[note] Early Christians did not share this notion of a soul independent of the body but instead emphasize a full-body resurrection. It was only later, as Christianity Westernized that we got this conception of body-less souls going to live with God eternally. [/note] In that way, Christian thought connects this idea that we transcend our bodies with a notion of justice. The destiny of a soul is tied to how the body lived in its time on Earth. Interestingly enough, in the Altered Carbon series, the Christians (Neo-Catholics) are the main group opposing the idea of transferring the consciousness to different bodies. They believe such practice would condemn one to punishment in the afterlife (if that individual ever reaches it, I guess).

While Religion and Science may have similar ideas of our personhood, the first defines that personhood in a context of an ideal of justice, while the second wants to leave it alone. For the scientist, one’s consciousness destiny is independent of ideas of justice, but instead it just is. Yet, to many humans being with an insatiable search for meaning, such explanation seems insufficient even if descriptively accurate. There has to be more, even if we cannot know for sure what that “more” is. That is where Science-Fiction comes in. If Science is indifferent to the human longings, Sci-Fi takes scientific ideas, speculate on its assumptions and possibilities and places them in a context of human stories. Sci-Fi brings “objective” science into the “subjective” world of human story.

Yet, Sci-Fi, while pursuing similar ends as religion has also a different way of pursuing it. Religions looks at the past to bring lessons to the present. It aims to expose the depravity of the human heart through history in a hope that present humanity can avoid or rectify those mistakes. Sci-Fi reverses this order, teaching moralistic lessons from the future. If Christianity says “look what your ancestors did wrong – don’t do that”, Sci-fi says “look at the future world your children will live in – change now.”

To be fair, Christian tradition has a similar genre to Sci-fi in the prophetic and apocalyptic writings. In them, writers paint a vision, often full of symbolism, to tell people on the present of a future doom. Yet, if in Sci-fi the focus is in how humanity can screw up their future, in the Christian tradition it is God who brings destruction because of human depravity. The aim is the same – to force us to re-think about how we live our lives in the present.

While some Sci-Fi literature can imagine a world where our consciousness lives on this earth by jumping from body to body, it can also envision something akin to a blissful heaven. This is present in the idea of uploading one’s consciousness to the cloud. No, this is not the cloud of angels but the cloud of 1s and 0s of the Internet. A National Geographic Documentary Year Million even explores what would be like for people to abandon their bodies to live in the cloud. What would be like to live a life where individuality disappears and we are absorbed by an universal consciousness? At first glance, this approach to the afterlife has more in common with Buddhism than monotheistic religions like Christianity, Islam and Judaism. The first one sees the unity of all beings as the ultimate goal, while the latter keeps our individuality intact in relationship to a personal God.

Where does this comparison leave us? What I described above demonstrated how the dialogue between Science-Fiction and Christianity can enrich both disciplines. Sci-Fi could benefit from a more defined vision of justice offered by religious imagery while religion (in this case Christian tradition) could take it more seriously the role of human action in the future. Christian tradition does a good job in teasing out personal sins of immorality while not giving enough attention to corporate sins of environmental destruction. Sci-Fi, conversely, does a great job in extrapolating our corporate ills into the future while not being so concerned with personal morality. Furthermore, Sci-Fi rarely gives us a positive view of our present and how that can create a harmonious future. Instead, it is mostly concerned in highlighting what could go wrong. Christian tradition offers a robust view of a ideal future in the book of Revelation where all nations will come together as one. It speaks of a city where God’s (the source of all goodness in religious thought) is present at its very center. In this way, it gives something to look forward to, not just something to look away from.

A full conversation between the two can bring a fuller picture of the challenges ahead while also highlighting the promise of what is possible if we dare to change our ways. I would love to see one day the emergence of a religious sci-fi genre that takes both scientific and religious themes seriously while also captivating our imagination in the process. I am encouraged to see how Altered Carbon hints at this conversation by including a religious element to the story. Yet, much more could be done.

Is anyone doing that already? If so, I would love to hear about it.

Test – new block

Education with a Purpose: A New Approach To Teach STEM

After years of denial, we are finally acknowledging that we have a problem with STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) education in this country. It is not an issue of access or supply of opportunities but one of perception: most students think it is simply too hard. That is unfortunate since research shows that students that pursue STEM degrees are more employable and earn more than their non-STEM counter parts. Yet, only a third of college students currently pursue these degrees.

I can speak from experience. When finishing high school, I really enjoyed Physics and thought that I would major in it in college. After one college-level Physics class, I realized quickly that pursuing it would be a difficult path. Social sciences seemed an easier and a more natural fit. I eventually declared my major in Political Science staying away from science and math as much as I could in my liberal arts degree. Years later, I would regret this decision as my career took a decidedly more technical path. I certainly could have used some of those math and science classes.

While difficulty is definitely a factor, now that I reflect on it, the issue was deeper than that. What drew me to the social sciences was that they told me stories about human struggle, tragedy and triumph. In my degree, I got to learn the history of how nations were formed, regimes were taken down and societies changed. That was something I could eat it up. While I wanted to prepare for a career, to me education was about expanding my horizons and discovering new worlds. STEM subjects, while fascinating in their own right, lacked this human connection that I found in the social sciences.

Later in my career, I was drawn to data science because of what it could do. I could take data and create insights that were previously hidden. In some instances, I could even “predict” something before it happened. That got me hooked and it is how I learned on the job and through professional training to become a data scientist. As I started reflecting on the potential of the field I was working it, I finally caught that human connection that I was missing in college. I realized that data science was not just about reams of data being processed through algorithms but that it could literally change people lives. Consider the example where algorithms are being used to predict who is most likely to commit suicide. In this case, data science is literally saving lives.

I understand that my story is one data point but I believe there is a theme embedded in it that can be explored. Maybe the issue is not just that it is hard but that often times STEM education is disconnected from a higher purpose. There are some of us who will study science for its own sake. Others are naturally fascinated by how things work and want to learn to make things. Yet, there is a whole group of students that would pursue STEM subjects if educational programs helped them make the connection with a humanitarian purpose.

After being studying a social science and then becoming a technology worker, I realized a curious paradox. The social sciences are deeply concerned about social problems. They go through great lengths to describe causes, factors and catalysts that worsen or alleviate them. Yet, technology, this cold application of science, has shown the greatest potential for actually solving them. Just consider the potential of mobile phones in Sub-Saharan Africa. While living in places that lack electricity and sanitation, many in these countries can afford a mobile phone. This technology along with micro-finance are empowering the poor by allowing them to make financial transactions and create businesses, hence forging a way out of poverty.

What is missing is the connection between purpose and know-how. Getting people that care deeply about their communities and teaching them technical skills to do something about it – doing technology with a humanitarian purpose. People with a passion to serve and the technical know-how to leverage emerging technologies can change the world in ways not previously seen. Unfortunately, most of technological innovation happens in for-profit institutions that are more interested in meeting a quarterly goal for stockholders than making a positive impact in the communities that surround them.

Hence, I want to propose a STEM education with a telos. Telos is a Greek word that can be roughly translated as an “end goal.” Yet, it is not a goal like our new year’s resolution. Instead, it is a long term, guiding ideal that directs everything we do. It is akin to a higher purpose.

What if STEM education was not just about teaching technical skills and but actually connecting them to a humanitarian purpose? In other word, teaching student not just the “how” but also the “why”. Such education would raise a tech-literate generation that was less concerned about acquiring the latest gadgets and more about using technology to enhance human flourishing. It would not only expand STEM knowledge to under-represented groups but also unleash future innovation for the common good.

Automated Research: How AI Will Speed Up Scientific Discovery

The potential of AI is boundless. Currently, there is a lot of buzz around how it will change industries like transportation, entertainment and healthcare. Less known but even more revolutionary is how AI could change science itself. In a previous blog, I speculated about the impact of AI on academic research through text mining. The implications of automated research described here are even more far-reaching.

Recently, I came upon an article in Aeon that described exactly that. In it, biologist Ahmed Alkhateeb eloquently makes his argument in the excerpt below:

Human minds simply cannot reconstruct highly complex natural phenomena efficiently enough in the age of big data. A modern Baconian method that incorporates reductionist ideas through data-mining, but then analyses this information through inductive computational models, could transform our understanding of the natural world. Such an approach would enable us to generate novel hypotheses that have higher chances of turning out to be true, to test those hypotheses, and to fill gaps in our knowledge.

As a good academic, the author says a lot with a few words in the paragraph above. Let me unpack his statement a bit.

His first point is that in the age of big data, individual human minds are incapable of effectively analyzing, processing and making meaning of all the information available. There was a time where all the knowledge about a discipline was in books that could be read or at least summarized by one person. Furthermore, traditional ways of doing research whether through a lab experimentation, sampling, controlling for externalities, testing hypothesis take a long time and only give a narrow view of reality. Hence, in a time where big data is available, such approach will not be sufficient to harness all the knowledge that could be discovered.

His second point is to suggest a new approach that incorporates Artificial Intelligence through pattern seeking algorithms that can effectively and efficiently mine data. The Baconian method simply means the approach of discovering knowledge through disciplined collection and analysis of observations. He proposes an algorithmic approach that would mine data, come up with hypothesis through computer models then collect new data to test those hypotheses. Furthermore, this process would not be limited to an individual but would draw from the knowledge of a vast scientific community. In short, he proposes including AI in every step of scientific research as a way to improve quality and accuracy. The idea is that an algorithmic approach would produce better hypotheses and also test them more efficiently than humans.

As the author concedes, current algorithms and approaches are not fully adequate for the task. While AI can already mine numeric data well, text mining is more of a recent development. Computers think in numbers so to get them to make sense of text requires time-consuming processes to translate text into numeric values. Relevant to this topic, the Washington Post just put out an article about how computers have now, for the first time beat human performance in a reading and comprehension test. This is an important step if we want to see AI more involved in scientific research and discovery.

How will automated research impact our world?

The promise of AI-assisted scientific discovery is remarkable. It could lead to the cure of diseases, the discovery of new energy sources and unprecedented breakthroughs in technology. Another outcome would be the democratization of scientific research. As research gets automated, it becomes easier for others to do it just like Windows has made the computer accessible to people that do not code.

In spite of all this potential, such development should cause us to pause for reflection. It is impressive how much of our mental capacities are being outsourced to machines. How comfortable are we with this inevitable meshing of bodies and electronics? Who will lead, fund and direct the automated research? Will it lead to enriching corporations or improving quality of life for all? I disagree with the author’s statement that an automated research would make science “limitlessly free.” Even as machines are doing the work, humans are still controlling the direction and scope of the research. As we ship more human activity to machines, ensuring they reflect our ethical standards remains a human mandate.

Shifting Towards Education: A New Direction for 2018

Happy new year, everybody!

After a hiatus for the holiday season, I am now back to blogging with a renewed focus. For those of you who follow this blog or know me personally, last year was an encouraging beginning as I posted here my musings on the intersection between Theology and Artificial Intelligence. Above all, I’ve been encouraged by the conversation some of the posts have started.

After some reflection over the hiatus, I decided to shift the focus of the blog. As you may know, there are not a lot of voices speaking on this field. So the opportunities for making a contribution are vast. Moreover, I don’t see the topic of AI becoming less important in the coming years. The question I asked myself was how could I best contribute considering my skills, passion and knowledge. Promoting discussion on the topic was a good start but I was not satisfied in just being a thoughtful observer. The best insights often come from those who are immersed in practicing the field they are discussing.

Even as I type there are hundreds of AI startups starting to shape the future we’ll live in. There is a growing group of academics, consultants and enthusiasts speculating about what that would look like. Moreover, there are thousands of Data Scientists currently shaping the future of existing organizations building AI applications that will transform these enterprises for years to come. Eventually, politicians will catch up and start discussing policy and laws to regulate how AI is used.

While all this is happening, I think about my children. Will they have the tools they need to navigate this AI future? Will they be ready not only to survive but also thrive in this uncertain future?

When I look at the educational system they are in, it is clearly not up to the task. While I appreciate the wonderful work teachers do daily all over the world, the problem is systemic. The Western educational system was built in the last century to raise industrial workers. The economy required workers to learn a fixed trade that would last them through their lifetime. Moreover, the academic system is always preparing students for the next level of education. Regardless of whether they pursue a job or continue their studies, a high school degree prepares the student for college, which prepares them for Masters’ work which, except for professional degrees, prepare them for pursuing PhDs. Hence, students are conditioned to excel within the academic “bubble” and have little interaction with the real world of jobs, leadership and service. Aside from a few exceptions, students are expected to figure out on their own how to apply the knowledge they learn into real workplace scenarios. While the system forces students to study separate disciplines, life is lived in multi-disciplinary spaces.

Staying out of the politically-charged discussion of “how to save our schools”, I rather work on how to offer something that will build on what the schools already offer. In my view, STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) education continues to be a challenge even as we have made progress in the past years. The concern I have with the current focus is that it separates these disciplines from humanities. In this way, students are taught only the “how” but rarely the “why” of STEM. This approach only perpetuates an uncritical consumerist relationship with technology, where we never stop to ask why are they being created in the first place and how they benefit humanity. Therefore the challenge is to engage young minds critically with STEM early on, empowering them to become creators with rather than consumers of technology.

While I can write about this frequently on the blog, being a detached analyst is not enough. That is why I am planning to develop actual learning experiences that address this gap. I am currently connecting with partners “glocally” to make that a reality. It will have both a classroom component as well as an online component. Stay tuned for more details.

How will that look like in aitheology.com?

The blog will flow from this journey of becoming an education entrepreneur. In this way, it serves as a platform for reflection, discussion, idea exchange and hopefully challenging some of you to join in this new endeavor. While I will continue to explore the themes of AI and theology, there will be an educational focus both in the topics discussed as well as in the way they are conveyed.

I also recognize that in our age, writing is not the most effective way to spread ideas and engage in conversation. Towards that end, I plan to add podcast in the near future so you can interact with AI theology in new ways. Finally, there will be plenty of opportunities for you to get involved in emerging projects.

I am excited for what this New Year will bring to us. I pray for wisdom and guidance in this new phase and I ask you to pray with me as well (if you are not religious, sending good thoughts would do).

Good News: The World is Getting Better

This week I want to discuss how our perception of the world shapes and guides our decisions about the future. In a previous blog, I discussed the power of narrative and how important that is in constructing reality. In this post, I want to challenge a prevailing perspective of doom that dominates the narrative in airwaves, broadcasts and most of social media. The dominant message is that our present world order is falling into chaos with no hope for redemption. This is not just a problem for large Media corporations that need to prey on fear in order to sell news but it has become the de facto perspective on any conversation about national and/or global affairs.

I want to start by making a simple statement: the world is getting better.

Let me take a step back and propose a new paradigm. What if we look at the globe not from the anecdotal evidence highlighted by media stories but actually more like a CEO looks at his/her company? What would that look like? Working for a large corporation for many years, I spent countless hours preparing presentations for executive leaders so they could understand the state of their business. The story told in these meetings is built on numbers and data. The narrative flows from pre-determined agreed-upon measures of success that allow the leader to see whether their unit is on track or not to meet their goals.

One could say that such view does not tell the whole story. That is indeed true. A company may be doing really well but that may not safeguard all employees from the threat of being laid off. For that employee, a profitable quarter means nothing. However, if the numbers are showing times of distress ahead, the story of many employees will be impacted. If the business goes bankrupt – everybody loses their job. Therefore, regardless of how dry numbers may be, they point to eminent signs of trouble that we must attend to. We ignore them at our own peril.

So, if you are the CEO of the globe, what would be some important performance metrics to look for? Thankfully I found this great blog by Bj Murphy that does exactly that, highlighting the trends around important issues like extreme poverty, wars, life expectancy, child mortality and others. The numbers show an undeniable improvement in all these key measures for the last 50 years. Believe it or not, these measures disprove the adage that “things were better in the olden days”. This is not to say that everything is getting better but such overwhelming data should make us pause to celebrate. Things are getting better in many fronts if we just have the eyes to see them.

Are we happier then? Well, if data is any indication the answer is “no.” In fact, quite the opposite, rates of depression are increasing world-wide. There could be many reasons for that. It is not clear, for example, whether people are simply more depressed or whether now we are able to better diagnose it and hence see an increase. Even allowing for that, this data is a sharp contrast to the one from the paragraph above. At least from these two pieces of data, we can conclude that a better world may not necessarily be a happier world.

Re-imagining the Present for Creating a Better Future

An unsung hero of the advances touted in BJ’s post is the rise of technology and science in the last century. If there has been a positive story, it is how science and technology have improved the quality of life. Yet, one can never forget the technology also brought the atomic bomb to our planet. They themselves could never be the answer for a better world but they have certainly enabled dreamers to make it a reality. This seems to be not only reality but also perception. In a recent Pew research survey, 42% of Americans indicated that technology has made their lives better, by far the biggest factor in a list that included medicine, civil rights and the economy. Technology advancement is one of the few narratives of hope in a sea of depressing storylines.

Here is important to highlight that perception is very relative to where we stand in relation to the past. Recently, white older men in the United States as a cohort have experience rising rates of depression and anxiety. One explanations is the sense that their life conditions have deteriorated compared to their parents. The question is not whether the world is getting better but whether “my” world getting better. This is not particular to the cohort of white older males but to all of us. This question is always asked with a point of reference in mind. Yet, is it possible to celebrate positive change even if our personal universe has deteriorated?

The first step towards imagining a new future is assessing the present from the perspective of the most vulnerable. If the world has indeed improved for them, then there is reason to celebrate. The data above supports this perspective. While there have been losers in recent change and much work is left to be done, the good news is undeniable.

From Tech Consumers to Tech Creators

If technology has made life better, it has also made it more complicated. Any PC user who had to endure using Windows for a while will realize that all the convenience brought by technology comes at a cost in complexity and troubleshooting. I believe part of the problem is that most of us approach technology as demanding consumers. That is, we expect technology to provide a pain-free solution to our problems. This is precisely the message large tech companies want us to believe: technology will solve all our problems and make life easier for everybody. That is often not the case.

To fully harness the benefits of technology we must move from consumers to creators of technology. Last week I was inspired by this story of an 11 year-old girl who invented a water tester to detect water contamination. When interviewed, the girl said she was moved by the story of water contamination in Flint, MI and wanted to do something about it. She exemplifies a true technology creator who took upon herself to solve a problem she cared about. Technology creators do not just use tech for convenience, they leverage it to solve problems. They use their God-given creativity to make the world a better place.

What if we could educate children and young adults to do more of that? What type of world could we build?

An Evangelical Reformation: Changing How We View Scripture

The more I progress on this AI theology journey, the more I realize the need for a re-configuration of our relationship between faith and science. Current status quo does not allow space for a conversation and therefore, forces faith, science and technology as a by product to remain separate. This separation impoverishes all sides.

Hence I was pleasantly surprised to see a recent post from my friend Micah Redding. As Reformation turns 500, Micah and others propose new theses to continue reforming the church in our time. Add your own here. I was especially encouraged by Micah’s thesis number 1:

Christians must abandon the war against science and technology, and embrace them both as profound expressions of the image of God.

I could not agree more and decided to write this blog as a way to flesh out what that would look like in an evangelical context.

First, I have a few words about my own ecclesial location and why it is important to name it here. It is difficult to talk about reformation without having a starting point. The Church is so vast and diverse, and in need of so much change, that what seems like reformation for one group may be very well be what another group does well. That’s why I believe that true reformation will only come through a robust Ecumenical movement. If the first Reformation brought division, I pray the coming one will bring the church tribes together.

With that said, I feel comfortable speaking about what reformation means in an evangelical context. I say that because I can include myself in it and therefore speak of how “we” rather then “they” can change. Ultimately, true reformation can only come with repentance and a willingness to re-visit long-held convictions. If the church now consists of many tribes, the evangelical tribe has some work to do and this thesis reveals one of the many paths of repentance for us.

Evangelicals and the Bible

I am eternally grateful that 500 years ago, Martin Luther picked up what Wycliff and others had started centuries early in liberating Scripture for all of us. While that may not have been Luther’s original intention, inevitably the movement he started spurred an explosion of Bible translations that eventually became available directly to the individual. Till this day, the Bible is the anchor, the guide, the foundation of the Christian faith. It is a book not just to be read but to be experienced on a daily basis. It transcends common literary genres and it is unlike any other book out there. It is not just a religious book but its influence reaches to other areas like Ethics, Law, Government and even Science Fiction.

I could go on the importance of the Bible but my intent here is to identify where we as evangelicals have taken a wrong turn in our view of Scripture. First, let’s look at some history. It is important to note that the evangelical movement in the United States started as a way to find a middle ground between the fundamentalist and mainline currents in North American Protestantism. The first stream believed that discoveries of science that challenged the traditional view of Scripture should be rejected outright and that the church should retreat from engagement with the world into bunkers of ideological purity. The second was working hard to incorporate scientific discoveries even at the expense of Biblical faithfulness. Instead of retreat, mainliners believed in fully accommodating all the changes brought by scientific discovery into the Christianity.

Evangelicals wanted to chart a different course that passed through these two narratives. On the one hand, they were committed to the preserving primacy of the Bible in the Christian faith. On the other hand, they wanted to engage with the new discoveries of science through careful dialogue. In the evangelical mindset, the need to proclaim the gospel trumped self-preservation, even if that meant engaging with disciplines that seem bent on discrediting the validity of Scripture. This was especially true for institution of higher learning that were at the forefront of this ideological battle. Fuller Theological Seminary in California exemplified (and continues to do so) this perspective.

In the last 50 years or so, this evangelical project has decisively tilted towards the fundamentalist current. This is especially true in cultural evangelicalism, which aligned with anti-establishment nationalist political views, having further increased its anti-science stance. As fundamentalist voices dominated airwaves and publication, evangelicalism has taken a shift towards the beginning of the 20th century. This was further exacerbated by the sharp changes in North American cultural attitudes in favor of gay marriage and toleration towards non-Christian religions in the last ten years.

Infallible versus Inerrant

This position was well illustrated in the “infallible versus Inerrant” contrast. Statements of faith mostly pass unnoticed except for theology geeks like myself. However, a choice of words in these documents can speak volumes. In most evangelical statements of faith you will find both adjectives for Scripture. Inerrant is often a code word for a literal view of Scripture. It usually means: “What is in the text is the truth and any questioning of it is suspicious of being a heresy.” Infallible is a more nuanced word that affirms the Bible’s efficacy in matters of faith. That is, the Bible is sufficient for guiding and forming Christian beliefs and spiritual growth. It usually means “the Bible can be trusted as a guide towards salvation and spiritual formation.” The second one allows for questions because it delineates Bible’s role in matters of faith primarily. It does not deny that the Bible may have something to say in spheres beyond faith. Yet, it does not make it a pre-requisite for its validity.

So here is where I think evangelicalism has taken a wrong turn. By opting for a rigid “inerrant” view of the Bible we turned into something that was never intended to be, namely an idol. How so, you may ask? This move started by making any questions or doubts about the content of the Bible off-limits. This was a direct reaction against the rise of biblical criticism, which had certainly gone too far. Yet, we didn’t stop there. In a bid to make the Bible speak to our modern lives, we made it into the solution for every problem, the manual of instructions for life and the arbiter of all truth. In an effort to market the Bible to attract new populations, we stretched, squeezed and re-shaped the text into every conceivable way. Furthermore, we baptized our North-American literalist the only objective way to approach the Bible. What we ended up with was not the infallible text that can lead us into all truth about God and salvation, but a document to support Capitalism, American empire and Zionism. In an attempt to keep the text pure, we made the very mistake we accused Biblical critics of doing: shaping the text to our own image. The Bible became the magic book, the box of promises from which we derive comfort and affirmation for our actions rather than repentance.

Charting a New Course

What would a new course look like? Thankfully, I was able to witness some of that by emerging voices in the evangelical world. Fuller Seminary was probably my first exposure to a new course of holding a high view of Scripture while not holding on to an inerrant view of Scripture. Prior to that, I thought that to let go of inerrancy was the same as letting go of Scripture altogether. Yet, to witness faithful believers who do not take a literal view of the Bible was the beginning to seeing that it is possible to love God, revere Scripture while also honestly examine the claims of history and science. In the journey I discovered faith could live with doubt, devotion could live with inquiry and obedience could live alongside faithful questioning. It is a false choice to have to choose between faith and intellectual inquiry.

Certainly, I am not the first one to say these things. Thankfully, others have paved the way for this view of Scripture. One of the most notable thinkers in this area is Bishop, Scholar and millennial seminarian’s superstar N. T. Wright. For those interested in a robust view of Scripture that is not bound by inerrancy, I recommend his book “Scripture and the Authority of God” as a good beginning point.

In closing, I pray that a reformation within the evangelical segment of the church would look at the Bible anew. It will replace dogma with wonder, rigidity with inquiry and arguments with honesty. This is a necessary requirement if we are to survive and thrive in a world to be upended by emerging technologies. It is not time to put aside Scripture but to remove old skins of interpretation so new wine of imagination can flow.

but just as it is written, “Things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard, And which have not entered the heart of man, All that God has prepared for those who love Him. I Cor 2:9

The word of the Lord, thanks be to God.

AI Reformation: How Tech can Empower Biblical Scholarship

In a past blog I talked about how an AI-enabled Internet was bound to bring a new Reformation to the church. In this blog, I want to talk about how AI can revolutionize biblical scholarship. Just like the printing press brought the Bible to homes, AI-enabled technologies can bring advanced study tools to the individual. This change in itself can change the face of Christianity for decades to come.

The Challenges of Biblical Scholarship

First, it is important to define what Biblical scholarship is. For those of you not familiar with it, this field is probably one of the oldest academic disciplines in Western academia. The study of Scripture was one of the primary goals for the creation of Universities in the Middle Ages and hence boasts an arsenal of literature unparalleled by most other academic endeavors. Keep in mind this is not your average Bible study you may find in a church. Becoming a Bible scholar is an arduous and long journey. Students desiring to enter the field must learn at least three ancient languages (Hebrew, Greek and usually Aramaic or Akkadian), German, English (for non-native speakers) and usually a third modern language. It takes about 10 years of Graduate level work to get started. To top that off, those who are able to complete these initial requirements face dismal career options as both seminaries and research interest in the Bible have declined in the last decades. Needless to say, if you know a Bible Scholar pat him in the back and thank them. The work they do is very important not only for the church but also for society in general as the Bible has deeply influenced other fields of knowledge like Philosophy, Law, Ethics and History.

Because of the barriers of entry described above, it is not surprising that many who considered this path as an option (including the writer of this blog) have opted for alternative paths. You may be wondering what that has to do with AI. The reality is that while the supply of Bible scholars is dwindling, the demand for work is increasing. The Bible is by far the most copied text in Antiquity. Just the New Testament alone has a collection of over 5,000 manuscripts found in different geographies and time periods. Many were discovered in the last 50 years. On top of that, because the field has been around for centuries, there are countless commentaries and other works interpreting, disputing, dissecting and adding to the original texts. Needless to say, this looks like a great candidate for machine-enhanced human work. No human being could possibly research, analyze and distill all this information effectively.

AI to the Rescue

As you may know, computers do not see the world in pictures or words. Instead all they see is numbers (0s and 1s to be more exact). Natural Language Processing is the technique that translates words into numbers so the computer can understand it. One simple way to do that is to count all the times each word shows up in a text and list them in a table. This simple word count exercise can already shed light into what the text is about. More advanced techniques will not only account for word incidence but also how close they are from each other by meaning. I could go on but for now suffice it to say that NLP starts “telling the story” of a text albeit in a numeric form to the computer.

What I describe above is already present in leading Bible softwares where one can study word counts till Kingdom come (no pun intended). Yet, this is only the first step in enabling computers to start mining the text for meaning and insight. When you add AI to NLP, that is when things start getting interesting. Think more of a Watson type of algorithm that you can ask a question and it can find the answer in the text. Now one can analyze sentiment, genre, text structure to name a few in a more efficient way. With AI, computers are now able to make connections between text that was only possible previously by the human mind. Except that they can do it a lot faster and, when well-trained, with greater precision.

One example is sentiment analysis where the algorithm is not looking for the text itself but more subjective notions of tone expressed in a text. For example, this technique is currently used to analyze customer reviews in order to understand whether a review is positive or negative. I manually attempted this for a Old Testament class assignment in which I mapped out the “sentiment” of Isaiah. I basically categorized each verse with a color to indicate whether it was positive (blessing or worship) or negative (condemnation or lament). I then zoomed out to see how the book’s sentiment oscillated throughout the chapters. This laborious analysis made me look at the book in a whole different lens. As AI applications become more common, these analysis and visuals could be created in a matter of seconds.

A Future for Biblical Scholarship

Now, by showing these examples I don’t mean to say that AI will replace Scholars. Algorithms still need to be trained by humans who understand the text’s original languages and its intricacies. Yet, I do see a future where Biblical scholarship will not be hampered by the current barriers of entry I described above. Imagine a future where scholars collaborate with data scientists to uncover new meaning in an ancient text. I also see an opportunity for professionals that know enough about Biblical studies and technology becoming valuable additions to research teams. (Are you listening Fuller Seminary? How about a new MA in Biblical Studies and Text Mining?). The hope is that with these tools, more people can be involved in the process and collaboration between researchers can increase. The task of Biblical research is too large to be limited to a select group highly educated scholars. Instead, AI can facilitate the crowdsourcing of the work to analyze and make meaning of the countless text currently available.

With all that said, it is difficult imagine a time where the Bible is just a book to be analyzed. Instead it is to be experienced, wrestled with and discussed. New technologies will not supplant that. Yet, could they open new avenues of meaning until now never conceived by the human mind. What if AI-enabled Biblical Scholarship could not just uncover new knowledge but also facilitate revelation?

Can AI Usher in a New Reformation?

As the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation approaches, I want to offer some thoughts on how emerging technologies like AI will revolutionize the face of Christianity. At first, these two seem mostly disconnected yet this could not be further from the truth. AI and other emerging technologies have the potential to disrupt, re-organize, and re-arrange the institutional church for centuries to come. But I am getting ahead of myself. Let me frame this question by first examining the role of technology in the Reformation 500 years ago

Simply put: without the printing press, there would not have been a Reformation in the early 1500’s Europe. With it, Luther and other Reformers were able to disseminate their ideas quickly, bringing turmoil and political unrest for most of Europe. This technological innovation sped up the process of disseminating new ideas enough to irreversibly change the course of history. Now individuals could own a physical copy of the Bible and that changed everything. Would the Reformation have succeeded without it? It is possible but it certainly would have taken much longer and have looked very different from what it did. The printing press enabled unprecedented access to knowledge that would lead to challenging the Roman Catholic’s claim of truth and usher in new centers of authority not just for religion but for reality itself. Along with the Enlightenment, they would lead to the scientific and technological revolutions of the centuries that followed.

Internet as the Printing Press of the 21st Century

At first glance, one could say that the Internet could play a similar role in our times. Internet extended exponentially the access to knowledge that the printing press had started. It allowed individuals anywhere in the world to access information in a revolutionary way. The individual did not need to own a physical copy anymore but could access the text electronically in real-time. Furthermore, with the increase in bandwidth and the rise of Internet 2.0, the dissemination of information was no longer bound to text alone but could now come with sound and moving image. With the emergence of social media, the process of information and knowledge sharing further increased exponentially since anyone could create and share content in a global platform.

However, it is important to highlight the limitation of the Internet as it exists today. While information is abundant, knowledge is scarce. The content is 10 miles wide but 5 inches deep. Then there are issues with accuracy, false information and simply a lot of triviality. The Internet is not a place for knowledge sharing only but also a place to entertain or simply express one-self. Content is abundant and being created each day but in a very disorganized and fragmented way. It is basically an amalgamation of crowds, for good or for ill.

AI Will Bring Order to the Internet Chaos

This is precisely why I believe AI can be a game changer that can truly harness the power of the Net towards more purposeful aims. How? AI will take Internet to a new-level of effectiveness by organizing and transmitting knowledge more efficiently. Intelligence is about analyzing data, identifying patterns and making decisions. Currently, content in the Internet is a mixture of some information with a lot of noise surrounding it. AI algorithms that can filter out the noise from the real information would be a welcome enhancement to the Net.

This can manifest itself in many fronts. One of them is in search engines where AI can improve the accuracy of a search by not only knowing the topic but also the context of the user. Furthermore, with improvements in translation, someone’s search can transcend the bounds of the user’s search language to capture content in other languages. It can also improve the ability to find content not just in text but sound and video which now is fairly limited. All of these enhancements would greatly increase the accuracy of searches greatly optimizing the process of research and knowledge sharing.

Another front is in machine-human interfaces. AI will revolutionize the relationship between humans and machines, therefore bringing the Internet much closer to our bodies. I have covered this extensively in my blogs about cyborgization. For here, I just want to highlight the fact that AI will move the Net closer to our brain. The culmination of this process is what some have called the Hive Mind. Basically, when our minds are connected to the Internet and can work as one collective consciousness. This is similar to swarms of insects that act in one direction with surprising coordination and purpose. Needless to say, this trend has seismic implications not just to the diffusion of knowledge but even how we experience reality itself.

Some of this is years if not decades down the road. Yet, even the process to move towards intelligent content and a collective consciousness is fairly disruptive on its own to upend governments, businesses and, yes, the church as well.

Glimpses of a New Reformation

How will this AI-enabled Internet facilitate a new reformation in the church? Before answering this question, we must recognize that unlike the 1500’s the Christian church is no longer the center of power and knowledge of Western societies. However, it is yet still a remarkable global hub of influence, especially in the developing world. In a world where political, technological and economic change fragments the legitimacy of all centers of power, the search of meaning becomes all the more salient. Many have found it in the ancient path of the Christian faith a contemporary way to make sense of their world (including the writer of this blog). I say this to qualify that any reformation in the church will have very different consequences than the one 500 years ago by the simple fact that now Christianity is just one of the many centers of influence on any given society. Hence, its effects will be more subtle and more spread out than the original Reformation.

With that said, the Internet is already disrupting the church. Computer Scientist and Researcher Allan Downey, believes the Internet is one of the driving factors in the decline of Christianity in the West. Would an AI-enabled Internet mean the end of the church? I don’t believe so. Yet, it would be naive to think that the church would survive this time without any major changes. The main question is what will the church look like in this new era of turbo-charged, AI-enabled disruption of how we create and share knowledge?

It is very difficult to anticipate all the changes that may come in this scenario. One thing is certain, for Christianity to prosper in this future it must learn to integrate advances of science and technology while also holding on to the century-old traditions of worship, prayer, Scripture reading, proclamation and service. Adapting to change while staying true to its values is the challenge for any institution trying to navigate the coming changes. This is especially true for an institution like the church that has notoriously resisted and combated change in the last centuries. It is time to replace old-wineskins with new ones if we are to receive new wine.

My prayer is that in an age of exponential knowledge creation and sharing, the diverging paths between the Reformation and the Enlightenment will come together in a view of the world that is unafraid of discovery but also filled with divine wonder. For the last two centuries, these currents have diverged and opposed each other. Now it is time to reconcile them. I am not sure exactly what that would look like, but I hope to see a glimpse of it in my lifetime.

How Will AI Accelerate Cyborgization?

In a previous blog, I described how current technology adoption is transforming us into cyborgs. In this blog, I want to show how AI will accelerate and reinforce cyborgization and why this matters. Much has been said about the emergence of AI as the fearsome “other” that is coming to challenge humanity. A much more pressing conversation is how AI will redefine humanity. It is not the robot against us but the robot in us that we need to think about. That is why it is important to understand how AI will accelerate the march toward cyborgization.

Enabling Better Interfaces

AI technologies will speed up the march towards cyborgization by enabling more human-friendly interfaces. This is difficult to imagine now when our users experience is tied to a “QWERTY” keyboard. Also, voice recognition is still at its beginning stages (hence, why I keep on having arguments with Siri because she does not understand what I am saying). Yet, it is not a leap to imagine a world in which we do not type but speak to devices. This is only possible if these machines can hear and understand us. It is only safe if they can recognize who we are either by voice of vision. Last week, Apple launched Iphone X with a visual recognition feature that allows you to unlock the phone by simply looking at the screen. This is a breakthrough step in face recognition. Also, as Amazon, Google and Apple race to develop the leading voice-assistant, speaking to our devices will become more common. As AI improves so will our ability to interact with machines in more human-like manners. This will transform how we use these devices allowing them to play a larger role in our daily lives.

Bringing Order to Digital Chaos

Interfaces are not the only areas enhanced by AI. Another notable area is AI’s ability to bring order to our current digital experience. To illustrate this concept, just think about what would be like to connect your brain directly to your Facebook or Twitter feed. It would result in a major headache driven a by a jumble of unrelated topics, pictures, comments, flashing through your mind. Needless to say that It would be disorienting. This is the state of social media delivery and why extended uses of it can be harmful to our mental health. Now imagine if our digital experience could be organized and filtered by an intelligent agent. Let say, there was an AI-enabled app that could automatically filter and organize what you see based on who you are, your mood and time of day. Wouldn’t that transform your digital experience? This way, AI would not only allow easier interface with devices but also enhance the experience with these devices through learning about us as individuals. It is a daunting to imagine that devices could know our thoughts and feelings but this is no longer a far-fetched idea. We are surely giving away enough data about ourselves so they can do just that. As these devices “know” us better we will also be more willing to use, wear or embed them in our bodies.

Facilitating Life Extension

The third area in which AI will impact the march is life extension. This is possibly the most controversial and promising area that AI technologies can impact us. While on paternity leave in the last five weeks, I had the chance to observe our current healthcare system. I am grateful for the care we received through medical interventions and advice as we welcome our son to the world. Yet, it was also clear how rudimentary our health care is. We currently rely on painfully invasive tests, disconnected systems, fragmented knowledge and healthcare worker memories for our medical data. No wonder we are running into so many problems in this area. If we could just improve how we collect, store and analyze health data we could advance the quality of care significantly. To do that would require wearing or embedding sensors in our body for live monitoring and data collection. AI models could analyze the data coming from these sensors and translate them into individualized care plans. That is, medical care that is tailored to your bodies specific genetic and real-time conditions. Moreover, it allows for building predictive models to estimate lifespan. The hope is that those models would not only tell us how long we will live but also uncover ways we can prolong that lifespan.

How Will These Advances Move Us Toward Cyborgization?

If it becomes easier to communicate with devices, it is also easier to involve them in all aspects of our lives. The movie Her explores this trend by imagining a world where humans develop romantic relationships with their digital assistants. Here, I want to suggest it could also lead to making these devices indispensable to our bodies. In short, they would culminate into full-blown auxiliary brains. That is, currently from what we know, our brain has no “hard drive” that stores memories. The brain structure itself is the “memories”. However, if as interface advances from hearing our voice to actually to hearing our thoughts, then it could become an embedded hard drive. This hard drive then could store all the information coming from our senses. With the technology already being developed in intelligent agents, these auxiliary brains would not only store data but also organize, filter and prompt it based on what it learns from us. Moreover, it would benefit from body sensors and connection to advanced medical data to possibly extend our lifespans. Sci-fi literature already explores scenarios with these possibilities. For now, it suffice it to say that our mobile phones are the first generation of our auxiliary brains.

Are we ready to move into enhanced humanity? With the acceleration made possible by Artificial Intelligence, this reality may be here sooner than you think. It would be naive to simply embrace it uncritically or reject it outrightly. The main issue is not IF but HOW this will happen.

Are we willing to embrace the opportunity while also recognizing the dangers of an enhanced humanity?

Are we ready to become responsible cyborgs?

A Letter to My Son At His Birth

Dear Levi,

You arrived on this world in the day of a total solar eclipse. What a momentous occasion for you to be born! It is as if creation was welcoming you with a party. As we heard your first cries, our heart leapt in joy just as it had for our previous two daughters. You were wanted even before you gave your first breath and now we welcome you into this world.

By God’s grace, you came into this world in the United States of America, the first generation from an immigrant family. You ended up here but your story started elsewhere. Always remember that all those privileged to be born in this land once came from somewhere else. We are all one more link in this historic chain.

You are born into a paradoxical time of history. Never before have the world experienced so much economic development with advances in all fronts. Diseases have been tamed, wars are isolated events, most world economies are thriving, and technological advances push further the limits of possibilities. Never was the world so connected and prosperous. Yet, we are gripped with fear. We are rich in information but poor in wisdom. Never before has any generation had such unfettered access to information. Yet, no generation has been more misinformed. While economies grow and difficult global problems recede, we are bombarded with negative news hence living in a constant state of pessimism and paranoia. Fear sells more than hope. In a capitalistic global system, media outlets, the sellers or information, are more often than not choosing the easier path of fear. Consequently, Democracies are tumbling as confidence in government, church and business are in sharp decline.

We are on the verge of major technological breakthroughs. Artificial Intelligence, drones, smart appliances and virtual reality will revolutionize everything we do in the next years. The constant of our time is change. Not just change, but light-speed change – certainly too fast for any mammal brain to keep up with. These breakthroughs are both disorienting and exhilarating. They will open possibilities that our imagination can barely fathom while also unleash evil like never seen before. The challenge for your generation will be to bend this progress towards human flourishing. Are you up for this challenge?

In view of all that, my word to you is one of hope. You are not just one mere individual in a sea of the 7 billion others currently living in this world. You are belong to the household of the faithful. This is a gathering of people from every nation and many centuries, who have embraced the hope in the person of Christ. This imperfect community of faith, fractured, sinful at times drunk with power is also the beautiful hands of God on this Earth. They live with their eyes firm on the promise of that day when everything will be made right and just. It is inspired in that vision that you are invited to walk in the faith-fully and hope-fully in footsteps of those who came before you.

There is much work to be done as we live in a world skeptical of any good news. Yet, those who believe that death has been defeated have nothing to fear. The future reign of our Lord is fast coming to transform our turbulent present. My prayer is that you embrace the call to point the world to the Source of all hope. Point to the finger of God in every good thing that happens in this world. Tell it, live it, incarnate it, share it lavishly with all who will receive it.

You may very well live beyond 100 years in a reality I cannot even fathom from my present perspective. My prayer is that as you outlive me you will continue to carry the torch of this Good News into the future. I may not get there with you but know that regardless, I will be cheering you on.

Be strong, my son. Be bold. Be kind. Be a humble learner. Only those willing to adapt will ever be able to navigate the stirring waters of neck-breaking change. Know above all that you are loved. Loved by your parents, your sisters and above all by your Creator. You are not alone and there is nothing that can change that.

Welcome to our world!

Your dad,

Elias