Welcome to Friday morning service at St. Paul's Cathedral, Germany.
All the parishioners are here. The same goes for the clergy. Well, if you include avatars equipped with artificial intelligence.
Today's service will feature sermons, prayers, and songs almost entirely brought to you by ChatGPT.
Although AI-driven services have not yet become mainstream, scientists and theologians are exploring how new technologies can coexist with the world's oldest teachings.
In places like Temple B'nai Or in Morristown, New Jersey, congregations of scientists young and old are attempting to answer the question, “What is it to be human?” And will incorporating technology into a fundamental human experience like faith change it in any way?
“We started to look to the future and question things like AI and, you know, uploading our minds to the cloud,” Rabbi Michael Satz told Scripps. told the news.
Satz says this is not the first time the nearly 4,000-year-old religion has had to face change.
“My ancestors wrote the Torah on scrolls. 2,000 years ago, the new technology was holding a book. So the ancient rabbis asked, “Can we use books liturgically when reading the Torah?'' They had to ask the question, and they decided: No, we need to read the scroll, because it connects us to our ancestors.
Today they face similar questions.
“How do we see AI as a tool to help us be ourselves, rather than distinguish ourselves from others?” Satz asked.
But can AI answer more difficult questions about spirituality, like “What is the one true religion?” “Why do bad things happen to good people?” “What happens after death?”
“We see people turning to AI as a research tool to answer these questions. And what have the great Jewish teachers said about this question in the past?” Satz he said.
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Kutter Caraway, associate professor of theology and culture and advisor on AI and faith at Fuller Theological Seminary, agrees that the human touch is needed.
“Depending on the datasets you're using, there are strong biases within AI right now,” Callaway told Scripps News. “And it reflects the same biases that we have as humans, which are shock and awe. So we're trying to help figure out how to interpret and understand the results that AI gives us. It's really important to have some kind of wise guide or mentor that can guide you.'' It's really important. ”
But Calloway says there are also good things that can come from AI, such as translating the Bible into different languages.
“This is a very difficult task when you need a human in the field who knows the language well, but when you are assisted through AI, all of a sudden you have a tool that can actually speed up that process significantly. ” he said. He said.
Rabbi Jeff Mittelman, who helped found the research at Temple B'nai Or through his organization Sinai and Synapse, agreed, saying AI could aid research.
“The best sermons I've ever heard were when a rabbi found a word in one text that was used in another text and connected the two,” Mittelman said. Told. “The AI can very quickly say, 'Yes, here are all the places this text is used,' and then the rabbi can say, 'Oh, that's interesting, I haven't seen that connection before. I could say, 'I don't know.' I knew this could lead to this.”
However, there are concerns across religions about the interpretation, bias, and misinformation of such documents.
“Spreading misinformation and creating and spreading misinformation, whether it’s using something like Dall-E or ChatGPT or using videos and algorithms that spread misinformation. Because it's been better that way, at least for hundreds of thousands of years.'' Humans, it's better to trust than not, right? ” Mittelman said.
That cautious view of AI and religion appears to be reflected in a variety of practices, a poll by Christian research group Barna showed.
More than half of Christians (52%) said they would be disappointed if they learned that AI was being used in their church.
In 2020, leaders of the Roman Catholic Church, IBM, and Microsoft signed the Rome Call for AI Ethics. The joint agreement will eventually include Jewish, Christian, and Muslim leaders to ensure that future uses of AI are transparent, inclusive, and responsible. And it's fair.
But all three agree that no matter how much technology advances, acceptance of AI and religious life will not happen overnight.
“In our tradition, we are taught that when two people are learning Torah together, the presence of God is with them. “Being with AI can be lonely because you're not with them,” Satz said.
It's just like the place of worship has changed to Zoom. Four years later, people are slowly returning to in-person worship. The clergyman we spoke to said there's a reason for that.
“If you think about all the great conversations and meetings you've had, how many of them were serendipitous conversations you had in a parking lot or at a service? Many of the joys of life is an unexpected encounter,” Mittelman said.
“Often it is assumed that Christian worship should be a hassle and an inconvenience. We celebrate the broken and wounded body of the God we worship by bringing our bodies into the same space as other bodies. There is a need,” Caraway said.
It goes back to church services in Germany and leads to the idea of bots one day replacing faith leaders.
“I think it probably is. It's coming sooner than we think,” Callaway said. “For me, I think what relies on algorithms is the moment when humans interact with other humans and with God. If you take humans out of that equation, you immediately take God out of the equation. Too much. too.”
Mittelman agrees.
“I think it would be foolish to say that it will never happen. I certainly don't think it's out of the realm of possibility, but I don't think it will be widely accepted,” he said. “Here, people need humanity, whether they are Christians, Muslims or Hindus. Many religions are not just beliefs, but physical manifestations. Kneeling and kissing the Torah scrolls. The same goes for standing or sitting.”