Like you say, people who are interested in AI existential risk tend to be secular/atheists, which makes them uninterested in these questions. Conversely, people who see religion as an important part of their lives tend not to be interested in AI safety or technological futurism in general. I think people have been averse to mixing AI existential ideas with religious ideas, for both epistemic reasons (worries that predictions and concepts would start being driven by meaning-making motives) and reputational reasons (worries that it would become easier for critics to dismiss the predictions and concepts as being driven by meaning-making motives).
(I’m happy to be asked questions, but just so people don’t get the wrong idea, the general intent of the thread is for questions to be answerable by whoever feels like answering them.)
It might be true at the moment that many religious people tend not to be interested in AI issues, safety, or AI X-risk. However, as the debate around these issues goes more mainstream (as it has been in the last month or so), enters the Overton window, and gets discussed more by ordinary citizens, I expect that religious people will start making their voices heard more often.
I think we should brace for that, because it can carry both good and bad implications for EAs concerned about AI X-risk. Sooner or later, religious leaders will be giving sermons about AI to their congregations. If we have no realistic sense of what they’re likely to say, we could easily be blindsided by a lot of new arguments, narratives, metaphors, ethical concerns, etc. that we haven’t ever thought about before (given the largely-atheist composition of both AI research and AI safety subcultures).
Good question; I’m not sure. I’d be very curious to know what leading Catholics, Evangelical Christians, mainline Protestants, Muslims, Buddhists, and Hindus think about all this.
Pope Francis issued a statement about AI ethics in January, but it’s fairly vague and aspirational.
Like you say, people who are interested in AI existential risk tend to be secular/atheists, which makes them uninterested in these questions. Conversely, people who see religion as an important part of their lives tend not to be interested in AI safety or technological futurism in general. I think people have been averse to mixing AI existential ideas with religious ideas, for both epistemic reasons (worries that predictions and concepts would start being driven by meaning-making motives) and reputational reasons (worries that it would become easier for critics to dismiss the predictions and concepts as being driven by meaning-making motives).
(I’m happy to be asked questions, but just so people don’t get the wrong idea, the general intent of the thread is for questions to be answerable by whoever feels like answering them.)
Hi Steven, fair points, mostly.
It might be true at the moment that many religious people tend not to be interested in AI issues, safety, or AI X-risk. However, as the debate around these issues goes more mainstream (as it has been in the last month or so), enters the Overton window, and gets discussed more by ordinary citizens, I expect that religious people will start making their voices heard more often.
I think we should brace for that, because it can carry both good and bad implications for EAs concerned about AI X-risk. Sooner or later, religious leaders will be giving sermons about AI to their congregations. If we have no realistic sense of what they’re likely to say, we could easily be blindsided by a lot of new arguments, narratives, metaphors, ethical concerns, etc. that we haven’t ever thought about before (given the largely-atheist composition of both AI research and AI safety subcultures).
Are there any religious leaders concerned about us creating God-like AI?
Good question; I’m not sure. I’d be very curious to know what leading Catholics, Evangelical Christians, mainline Protestants, Muslims, Buddhists, and Hindus think about all this.
Pope Francis issued a statement about AI ethics in January, but it’s fairly vague and aspirational.