| When people talk about the existential threat of AI, stories like this are the reason I find those risks worth taking seriously. Judeo-Christian roots are good for making exactly the wrong kinds of conclusions about the world. Set aside ethics for a moment; this worldview instills the belief that the world we live in was made, and that it is humanity’s right to exercise dominion over it. That when we screw things up badly enough, that’s actually a precursor to the greatest event in human history. Explicit is the belief that the next world is the world that matters, and that this world is just a playground to establish what kind of people we are before we go to heaven or hell. Implicit in this belief lies a fundamental ignorance of the intrinsic interconnection of phenomena, the sheer improbability of our existence, and an attitude that imagines us to be greater than the forces of nature. And once you mix in a side of anthropomorphizing AI, it’s frightening to think about the hubris involved in a statement claiming that ethics emerge from Judeo-Christian thinking. As an atheist who was forced to study the Bible in my youth, the biggest thing I took away from the experience is that “Judeo-Christian thinking” has little to do with what Jesus taught. If it did, it’d be a pretty cool religion for the most part. Instead, it stands in as a justification that people can apply to their existing beliefs. A mental crutch to bypass the need to expand one’s worldview. I’ve met some good Christians.
But they’re not the kind of people who represent the average beliefs held by the community. |