Artificial Intelligence Idolatry and Hum

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ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE, IDOLATRY,

AND HUMAN MANIPULATION
EZRA SULLIVAN, O.P.*

University of St. Thomas Aquinas, Rome
ABSTRACT
Prognostications for how AI will affect the future of humanity are greatly
enriched by theological and historical perspectives regarding the nature
and use of idols, images used to worship the gods. With the background
of the Egyptian «mouth-opening» ritual in mind, and ancient construc-
tions of seeming-autonomous statues, Scriptural accounts suggest that
pagans constructed and worshipped idols for reasons of transference —
substituting a creature for the Creator —, greed, and control. In parallel
fashion, with futurist accounts of AI and robotics in mind, an historical-
theological perspective indicates that these new technologies are often
at the service of an analogous kind of idolatry: relationship transference,
corporate and individual greed, and social control: three motives that are
encapsulated in Lewis Mumford’s prediction that, in a secular age, «man’s
final achievement, at the summit of his progress, would be to create an
ineffable electronic God». Finally, a theological account suggests a way
forward: returning to right relationships, self-gift in union with Christ
the Incarnate God, and responsibility as worship.
W HEN ancient navigators mapped the world that they discovered

as they sailed the seas, they were presented with a problem. With-
out compass, sextant, or accurate sun-independent clocks, they had few
sure ways to help them judge location and distance when land was not
in sight. If the moon and stars hid behind clouds at night, so much the
worse for them. Cartographers therefore limited themselves to staying
* Contact: —
ANGELICUM 97/1 (2020)
107
EZRA SULLI VAN O . P .
within sight of land. Since their ships more or less hugged the shores,
the result was a little curious. On the one hand, they often had accurate
outlines of the land; on the other hand, they failed to estimate center
mass accurately. Distances between continents, sizes of oceans, and
even the land itself was often exaggerated by stretching or shrinking or
misalignment. Such, it seems to me, is an apt metaphor for the cartog-
raphers of the technological world. They often miss center mass.
Take, for instance, Nick Bostrom’s brilliant delineation of future
kinds of artificial superintelligence: oracles, genies, sovereigns or tools.1
Bostrom explains their functions this way: oracles will give precise an-
swers or predictions to specific, complex questions; genies will perform
bounded tasks; sovereigns will accomplish more general goals; and AI
tools like present Google algorithms will operate in the background,
but with the power of elementary forces. Meanwhile, among other AI
scenarios, Max Tegmark foresees what he calls a «protector god», a
nearly omnipotent and omniscient A I gatekeeper that gives humans
the illusory feeling that they hold the reins to their fates; and an «en-
slaved god», AI controlled well enough that it never escapes its cage or
«box» created by clever programmers.2 By arguing that AI may develop
divine-like powers, Tegmark hits closer to center mass. But both au-
thors stick too close to the «visible shore» of possible futures insofar
as they fail to point to an increasingly-plausible scenario: eventually,
in one way or another, people will worship AI and robots.
This plausible future that is typically overlooked by present-day fu-
turists, with a few crucial exceptions that I will mention. For some, the
scenario I anticipate may seem unmoored from reality—implausible be-
cause too far from a familiar shore, drifting through unmarked waters:
Voltaire, after all, argued that «idolatry is false concept», for«“no nation
ever worshipped idols as such, but always a deity represented by
them».3 Therefore, my argument is made in three steps.
1. Nick BOSTROM, Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies, Oxford University

Press, Oxford, UK 2014, pp. 145–158.
2. Max TEGMARK, Life 3.0: Being Human in the Age of Artificial Intelligence, Alfred A.
Knopf, New York 2017, pp. 162, 177–183.
3. VOLTAIRE, ad v. «Idole, Idolatre, Idolatrie», in Dictionnaire Philosophique, ed. B.Di-
dier, Impr. nationale éditions, Paris 1994, pp. 291–304, quoted in Joan-Pau RUBIÉS, The-
108
ARTIFICIAL IN TELLIGENCE , IDOLATRY , AND H UMAN MANIP ULATION
First, I will describe ancient idol-making as grasped by history and

evaluated by prophets and apostles;
Second, I will compare these descriptions to the future of humanity
as it relates to artificial intelligence and robots.
Third, I will suggest alternatives in light of the Catholic faith.
We can begin with considerations of parentage and religious image-

making. From time immemorial, the human race has understood that
«the most universal relation in nature, is […] that between parent and
child».4 Everyone has a biological parent of some sort, and the relation
of parent to child entails certain rights and responsibilities on both
sides, with incalculable effects on individuals and society. The influence
of parentage is so pervasive that it is widely assumed that the child of
a king will be kingly, and the scion of a slave is best suited for drudgery.
Elites in almost every ancient culture claimed a blood-lineage from the
gods in order to justify their entitlement to power and prestige. The
pharaohs of Egypt borrowed greatness from the falcon-headed Horus;
the Spartans called themselves the scions of Hercules and, through him,
Zeus; Caesar claimed ancestry from Aeneas and Venus; and, more re-
cently, at least one 19th century genealogist tried to show that George
Washington’s primogenitors were rooted in the Norse god Odin.5 Ac-
ology, Ethnography, and the Historicization of Idolatry, in «Journal of the History of

Ideas», 67/4 (Oct. 2006), p. 571-596 at 572. Voltaire’s view parallels an objection in
Aquinas’s Summa Theologiae II-II, q. 94, a. 1, arg. 3, which quotes Paul saying that «an
idol is nothing» (1 Cor 10,19). To this, Aquinas responds in ad 3: «those images which
were called idols, were not animated, or possessed of a divine power, as Hermes [Tris-
megistus] maintained, as if they were some composite of spirit and body». Nevertheless,
in the corpus of his response, Aquinas concedes that some magicians were able to con-
struct images «through some nefarious art», through which the power of demons made
witnesses think that the images had divine power, and thereby deserved worship.
4. William BLACKSTONE, Commentaries on the Laws of England, ed. William Draper
Lewis, Geo. T. Bisel Co., Philadelphia 1922, Book 1, c. 16, *446, p. 419.
5. See Albert WELLES, The Pedigree and History of the Washington Family: Derived
from Odin, the Founder of Scandinavia, B.C. 70, Involving a Period of Eighteen Centuries,
and Including Fifty-Five Generations, Down to General George Washington, First President
of the United States, Society Library, New York 1879. Interestingly, the Libellus de primo
Saxonum uel Normannorum adventu describes Odin as ancestor of the Anglo-Saxons
109
cording to this view, the crème de la crème are godlike because of their
biology. The masses, without privileged birth or heroic deed — they are
the dregs.
But there was at least one way even for a low-born to break through
the glass ceiling to the clubhouse of the gods: somewhat like a name-
dropping as a social-climber, the technique involved transformation
into a quasi-divinity by interacting with an image of a god that seemed
to be alive. In her work, Gods and Robots, Adrienne Mayor documents
dozens of instances of how pre-Christian technologists created statues
of gods and goddesses, often on a massive scale, that would seemingly
or really move on their own.6 Prototypically, an idol’s movement was
facilitated by the formal ritual of an «animation of a statue», versions
of which existed throughout ancient civilizations.7 In the Egypt of the
pharaohs, for instance, it was widely believed that «The cult statue, like
any image, picture, or inscription carved or painted on the temple walls,
and like the whole temple itself, had to be animated by the living power
of the deity».8 Priests of the sun-god Ra would carry a statue to the
kings of Kent, Mercia, Wessex, and others (In Symeonis Dunelmensis Opera et Col-
lectanea I, Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh 1868, pp. 202–203). See Hermann Moisl,
Anglo-Saxon royal genealogies and Germanic oral tradition, in «Journal of Medieval His-
tory» 7/3 (1981), pp. 215–248. Also, lib. 1, c. 15 of Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica gentis An-
glorum. Modern edition: BEDE, Ecclesiastical History of the English People, eds. Colgrave,
Bertram, Mynors, Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK 1969.
6. Adrienne MAYOR, Gods and Robots: Myths, Machines, and Ancient Dreams of Tech-
nology, Princeton University Press, 2018. Also, Jan BREMMER, The Agency of Greek and
Roman Statues: from Homer to Constantine, in «Opuscula» 6 (2013), pp. 7-21. Numerous
ancient sources attest to this, including Dio Cassius reporting that blood and milk
would issue from the effigy of the goddess Minerva, and Strabo asserting that the image
of Athena closed its eyes even in his days.
7. Algis UZDAVINYS, Animation of Statues in Ancient Civilizations and Neoplatonism,
in P. VASSILOPOULOU et al. (eds.), Late Antique Epistemology, Palgrave Macmillan, 2009,
pp. 118–140. Also, Christopher WALKER and Michael B. DICK, The Induction of the Cult
Image in Ancient Mesopotamia: The Mesopotamian mīs pī Ritual, in Born in Heaven,
Made on Earth: The Making of the Cult Image in the Ancient Near East, Eisenbrauns,
Winona Lake, Ind. 1999, pp. 55–122.
8. UZDAVINYS, Animation of Statues in Ancient Civilizations and Neoplatonism, op. cit.,
p. 125.
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rooftop terrace of their temple, where the god’s intellective power

would be invoked upon the image. Often there were «Mouth Washing»
and «Mouth Opening» ceremonies, in which priests would purportedly
transform the statue «into a living body or into an effective symbol of
deity» through ritual prayers and by touching the lips of the statue with
various implements, and consecrated herbs.9 Subsequent to this anima-
tion process, priests and people treated the image as if it mediated di-
vine revelation, including legal verdicts, political decisions, and moral
advice.10 Plato alludes to such a ritual in his Timaeus (37c-d, 41a-b) and,
later, Plotinus in his Enneads (I.6.9.7).
In 1936, archeologists in Cairo discovered a large bust of the solar
deity Ra with this interesting feature: it had a hollow in the back of its
neck, with a canal leading to an opening beneath the statue’s ear. Ap-
parently, a hidden priest of Ra would speak through the tube to produce
the effect of a god pronouncing oracles.11 The priests would make the
images of the gods their puppets and instruct the people through
them. When a religious initiate took such instruction to heart, a pro-
found transformation occurred: the human became a living image of
the idol. The ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead portrays the initiate as
saying:
I am Thoth [the god of magic and wisdom], the favoured of Ra; Lord of
strength who ennobles him, who made him. […] My head is that of Ra
who is united with Atum [the shaper of the world]…, my tongue is that
of Ptah [the god of craftsmen], my throat is that of Hathor [the goddess
of love], for I have recalled with my mouth the speech of Atum …12
The result of this image worship, in the words of Algis Uzdavinys, is
9. Ivi, p. 129. Also, David LORTON, The Theology of Cult Statues in Ancient Egypt, in
Born in Heaven, Made on Earth, pp. 123–210, who notes that both the manufacturing
process and the ritual seemingly endowed the statue with life-properties (pp. 157–158,
passim).
10. See G.K. BEALE, We Become What We Worship: A Biblical Theology of Idolatry, IVP
Academic, Downers Grove, Ill. 2008,p. 67.
11. MAYOR, Gods and Robots, op. cit., p. 187.
12. Quoted in UZDAVINYS, Animation of Statues in Ancient Civilizations and Neopla-
tonism, cit., pp. 136–137.
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that «The worshipper is turned into the god (ishta-devata) that he

adores».13
To many ears, especially those formed in the aniconic commandment
encapsulated in Dt 5,8 and Ex 20,4–5, the idea of bowing down before
a manufactured product sounds absurd.14 The prophet Isaiah derides
the ironsmith who depletes his energy fashioning an idol, shaping it
with hammers, forging with his strong arm — with nothing in return
from the figurine (Is 44,12).15 Mocked likewise is the woodworker who
fells a tree and carves half of it into an idol to whom he prays, saying,
«Deliver me, for you are my god!» (Is 44,17), while the same artisan
chops up the other half, burns it in a fire, and roasts his meat over it (Is
44,13–17). Habakkuk seems to have in mind some ritual similar to the
Egyptian image ceremony when he says,
What profit is an idol when its maker has shaped it, a metal image, a
teacher of lies? For the workman trusts in his own creation when he
makes dumb idols! Woe to him who says to a wooden thing, Awake; to a
dumb stone, Arise! Can this give revelation? Behold, it is overlaid with
gold and silver, and there is no breath at all in it (Hab 2,18–19).
But these potentially life-changing questions go unanswered by masses
lost in the darkness of idolatry. Using a trope found throughout Scrip-
ture, the Psalmist says about the pagans:
Their idols are silver and gold, the work of men’s hands. They have
mouths, but do not speak; eyes, but do not see. They have ears, but do not
hear; noses, but do not smell. They have hands, but do not feel; feet, but
do not walk; and they do not make a sound in their throat. (Ps 115,4–7;
see Wis 13,10–15.,13 passim).16
13. Ivi, p. 136.

14. See Michael B. DICK, Prophetic Parodies of Making the Cult Image, in Born in
Heaven, Made on Earth, pp. 1–54. Also, Gerhard VON RAD, The Polemic Against Idols, in
Wisdom in Israel, Abingdon Press, Nashville/New York 1972, pp. 177–185.
15. This passage and many others are discussed in Wolfgang M.W. ROTH, For Life,
He Appeals to Death (Wis 13:18): A Study of Old Testament Idol Parodies, in «The Catholic
Biblical Quarterly», 37/1 (Jan 1975), pp. 21–47.
16. BEALE highlights noticeable resonances: We Become What We Worship, pp. 146–
149.
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He then concludes: «Those who make them are like them; so are all
who trust in them» (Ps 115,8).17 This is perhaps the essence of the
Deuteronomic curse for all who craft graven images and set them up
for worship in secret (Dt 27,15). What for the Egyptian Book of the Dead
attains the height of religion, for the Hebrew prophets represents the
depth of folly and a malediction: «let them become like those senseless
gods, everyone who trusts in them!» (see Ps 135,18; Wis 14,8). In other
words, their humanity would become diminished to the extent that
they gave themselves up to the gods who could not save them.18
If making and worshipping the images of the gods freezes the idol-
ater’s soul like Hans Solo in carbonite, why would anyone do it? Sacred
Scripture suggests three chief reasons: transference, greed, and control.
Transference: Similar to psychological transference of one human
relationship to another, Scripture indicates that people
transfer the worship of the One True God for a creature represented or
encapsulated in an idol. For example, when God seemed far away on
an untouchable mountain, and when Moses tarried in his withdrawn
contemplation, the people of Israel induced Aaron to fashion an idol
from their gold (Ex 32,1.4).19 Again, when men experienced the life-giv-
ing power of the Nile, or the perennial order of the stars, they confused
the creation for the Creator and so transferred their loyalty (see Wis
13,2–4). The Book of Wisdom narrates two other plausible substitution-
17. See AUGUSTINUS HIPPONENIS, In Psalmum 113, Sermo 2, in Ennarationes in Psalmos

101–150, Pars 2 (CSEL 95/2, ed. Franco Gori), De Gruyter, Berlin 2015, pp. 38–45. Ps 115:4-
8 resonates with Isaiah 6,9-13: «And he said, “Go, and say to this people: ‘Hear and
hear, but do not understand; see and see, but do not perceive.’ […]”» This «retributive
taunt» is frequently quoted in the New Testament: by Christ and the Gospel writers
in Mt 13,14–15; Mk 4,12; Lk 8,10; Jn 12,40; and by the apostles in their preaching in
Acts 28,26–27; Rom 11,8. See G.K. BEALE, Isaiah VI 9-13: A Retributive Taunt against Idol-
atry, in «Vetus Testamentum», 41/3 (Jul., 1991), pp. 257–278.
18. Idolatry in Wis 13–15, and similar passages, is depicted «not merely as one pos-
sible temptation for Jews but as the antithesis to Judaism», and therefore the revelation
of God to men. ROTH, For Life, He Appeals to Death, art. cit., p. 47.
19. For a provocative account comparing Moses and pagan idols as stand-ins for the
divine, see Amy L. BALOGH, Moses among the Idols: Mediators of the Divine in the Ancient
Near East, Lexington Books/Fortress Academic, Lanham 2018.
113
ary causes of idolatry. In grief, a father made an image of his lost child,
and gradually came to honor as a living god what was once a dead
human; then the family handed on secret rites to their descendants (Wis
14,15). In a different case, when men could not honor their distant
monarch, they set up an image to represent his rule, and to honor him
as if he were present (Wis 14,17).20 Eventually, the honor given to absent
monarchs was upgraded to worship (Wis 14,18–21).21 St. Paul summa-
rizes this transference, saying that pagans «exchanged the glory of the
immortal God for images resembling mortal man or birds or animals
or reptiles» (Rom 1,23), and insists that God has a purely spiritual na-
ture and is not an image made by men (Acts 17,24–25.29).22
Greed: Idolatry is often spurred by the ravenous appetites of idol mak-
ers and users. Sacred Scripture indicates that once idol-tech-
nicians notice that people are turning to their products, they accelerate
the process of manufacture and, like drug pushers, induce addictive
worship behaviors.23 According to the Book of Wisdom, after people
starting worshipping monarchs, «the ambition of craftsmen induced
20. See Richard LINTS, Identity and Idolatry: The Image of God and Its Inversion, IVP
Academic, Downers Grove, Ill. 2015, p. 69.
21. Whether these steps are chronologically distinct is unclear; in the ANE «The
king was a sort of living statue of the gods. […] In an abundance of texts, he is referred
to as the “image of god”, especially so in ancient Egypt». LINTS, Identity and Idolatry,
op. cit., p. 69.
22. For commentary on the passage in Romans, see LINTS, Identity and Idolatry, cit.
pp. 109–111; BEALE, We Become What We Worship, cit., pp. 202–222; AQUINAS, Ad Rom.,
ed. Marietti, Roma 1929, c. 1, lects. 7–8, nn. 123–168. On Acts 17, BEALE, We Become
What We Worship, cit., pp. 196–198. Drew J. Strait’s study, while helpful, focuses unduly
on prohibitions against precious materials in critiques against idols: STRAIT, The Wisdom
of Solomon, Ruler Cults, and Paul’s Polemic against Idols in the Areopagus Speech, in
«Journal of Biblical Literature» 136/3 (Fall 2017), pp. 609–632. Plato significantly re-
verses the order of causality: he argues that men set up visible statues to ensure the
benevolence of the living but invisible counterparts, the spiritual daemons: Laws XI,
930e–931a.
23. The greed of statute makers often exploits the lust of viewers for fantasies their
products provoke by way of transference. See George L. HERSEY, Falling in Love with
Statues: Artificial Humans from Pygmalion to the Present, University of Chicago Press,
Chicago, Ill. 2009, p. 32.
114
even people who did not know the monarch to intensify their worship»
(Wis 14,18). An ancient myth recounted how Medea exacted revenge
on her enemies by making a statue of Artemis appear to come alive and
to dispense hallucinogenic drugs and miracles.24 In Ephesus, the idol-
makers also used a statue of Artemis for their personal profit — not re-
venge, but money. The Acts of the Apostles illustrates a vicious circle
involving craftsman, greed, and the manipulation of statute-adorers.
After St. Paul and his companions converted Ephesians to Christianity,
the silversmith Demetrius entered the fray. Concerned that the Artemis
cult was endangered, he gathered a horde of other Artemis image-mak-
ers and said to them: «this Paul has persuaded and turned away a con-
siderable company of people, saying that gods made with hands are not
gods. And there is danger not only that this trade of ours may come
into disrepute but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis
may count for nothing» (Acts 19,26–27). Seeing that the Cross was
going to poke in a hole in their money bags, the crowd of craftsman
«were enraged and cried out, “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!”»
(Acts 19,28).25 For two hours they continued the chant and, like many
a mob-for-hire, they were close to causing a riot even though «most of
them did not know why they had come together» (Acts 19,32).
24. MAYOR, Gods and Robots, cit., pp. 35–37. Evidence suggests deep links between
the goddesses Artemis, Astarte, and Ishtar. C.L. BRINKS, “Great Is Artemis of the Eph-
esians”: Acts 19:23-41 in Light of Goddess Worship in Ephesus,” in «The Catholic Biblical
Quarterly» 71/4 (2006), pp. 776–94 at 778–781.
25. The Artemis of Ephesus was an enormous statue, purportedly from heaven and
considered one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. It was a locus of wealth such
that her image was minted on many coins, with the temple serving like a bank for pil-
grims. BRINKS, “Great Is Artemis of the Ephesians”, art.cit., pp. 782–785. Conversions from
the statue-cult therefore served to undermine the existing order of commerce, religion,
and politics. Pliny attested to the dangers Christianity posed to pagan religions, see quo-
tation in C.K. BARRETT, Acts of the Apostles: A Shorter Commentary, T&T Clark, London,
2002, p. 298. Émile Durkheim, summarizing Henri de Saint-Simon, argues that religion
may be indispensable in promoting a «spiritual communion […] common to all human-
ity», through «the dogma of universal brotherhood», whatever other truth-claims might
be made. Socialism and Saint Simon, ed. Alvin W. Gouldner, trans. Charlotte Sattler, Rout-
ledge & Kegan Paul, London 1959, pp. 114, 116. Similar social reasons are offered in
Stephen T. ASMA, Why We Need Religion, Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK 2018.
115
Control: A significant motivator for rulers is control over others; elites

therefore often find it useful for the masses to be as passive
and moldable as the statues erected for their worship. According to the
Biblical account, when idol-worship had «grown strong with time» and
was «kept as a law» by large numbers of people, monarchs moved from
allowing to commanding such worship (Wis 14,16). The cleverest rulers
realize that false religion is so much more useful than no religion at all.26
Socrates was killed because his «impiety» was dangerous to the Athe-
nian government — whether the rulers believed in the gods or not.27
Nebuchadnezzar’s colossal effigy was, in the reading of Theodoret of
Cyrus, a monument to how the king arrogated to himself divine honor,
and demanded all corporately to do his bidding absolutely and offer un-
conditional worship.28 Three young men became fiery furnace fodder
when they refused obeisance to the state-run idolatry (Dan 3).29 It’s bad
for morale when folks don’t wave the flag of the state religion. Another
control mechanism was suggested by Jean Gerson and late-scholastic
thinkers: magical practices, meant to harness the forces of the world by
supernatural means but without the help of God, involved a pact with
the devil and thereby «involved the devil as an object of worship».30
26. See the observation of Edward GIBBON (often misattributed to Seneca): «The var-
ious modes of worship, which prevailed in the Roman world, were all considered by
the people as equally true; by the philosopher, as equally false; and by the magistrate,
as equally useful». The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, vol. I, ed.
David Womersley, Penguin, London 1994 (1st ed. 1776), p. 56.
27. See Socrates’s summary of Meletus’s accusations: Apology 18c–19b; 24c; 26.
Manuela GIORDANO-ZECHARYA demonstrates that traditional ritual actions were more
important than belief for the Athenians: As Socrates Shows, the Athenians Did Not Be-
lieve in Gods, in «Numen» 52/3 (2005), pp. 325–355.
28. THEODORET OF CYRUS, Commentary on Daniel, trans. Robert C. Hill, Brill,
Leiden/Boston 2006, p. 71.
29. Whether the historical incident was Nabonidus crafting an image of the moon-
god for the state cult or an «arrogant attempt of a pagan king to impose the worship
of a statue of his own design», the chief message remains: Paul-Alain BEAULIEU, The
Babylonian Background of the Motif of the Fiery Furnace in Daniel 3, in «Journal of Bib-
lical Literature» 128/2 (Summer, 2009), pp. 273–290 at 277 and 286.
30. RUBIÉS, Theology, Ethnography, and the Historicization of Idolatry, art. cit., p. 589,
116
We may seem to be drifting into choppy waters of theology, far from

the concrete issues of robots and Artificial Intelligence, but in fact we
have been circling around my central theme, and are about to hit the
central target.
Here the futurist Ray Kurzweil may be of some help. I am well
aware that some academics do not take him seriously because of his
unmoored speculations, despite his proven track record and undeniable
engineering genius; and the fact that he works for Google does not
seem to impress them. However, it may be worth recalling that although
metaphysical rigor may be a prerequisite for entry to after-dinner
philosophical disco parties, it is unnecessary for an accurate intuition.
Kurzweil professes a robust version of «the singularity», a theory that
the invention of artificial superintelligence will trigger an explosion
of self-improvement cycles famously described by I.J. Good:
Let an ultraintelligent machine be defined as a machine that can far sur-
pass all the intellectual activities of any man however clever. Since the
design of machines is one of these intellectual activities, an ultra-intelli-
gent machine could design even better machines; there would then un-
questionably be an “intelligence explosion,” and the intelligence of man
would be left far behind. Thus the first ultraintelligent machine is the last
invention that man need ever make, provided that the machine is docile
enough to tell us how to keep it under control.31
Kurzweil argues that the singularity will irreversibly transform human
life, and that, through nanotechnology and genetic engineering, super-
intelligence will eventually be fused with human intelligence. In this
scenario, the division between man and machine becomes a thin line
easily crossed: machines become more like humans by replicating emo-
tions and complex behaviors and thoughts, while humans become more
referring to Jean GERSON’s doctrine in De erroribus circa artem magicam (1402) in Oeu-
vres completes, ed. Palemon Glorieux, Desclee, Paris 1969. See also, Pedro CIRUELO, Re-
provación de supersticiones y hechicerías [Treaty Reproving all Superstitions and
Witchcraft ], Alcalá 1530, 13r-v.
31. «Ultraintelligent Machines and Their Value», in Speculations Concerning the First
Ultraintelligent Machine (1964), at https://web.archive.org/web/20010527181244/
http://www.aeiveos.com/~bradbury/Authors/Computing/Good-IJ/SCtFUM.html
117
like machines by having brains enhanced with superintelligence and

the ability to traverse in and out of virtual reality at will. The result,
Kurzweil says, is that humans will become more godlike.
It is worth noting that Kurzweil’s views have received important crit-
icisms — many of which apply to the predictions of Nick Bostrom and
Max Tegmark. As long ago as 1980, John Searle’s «Chinese room»
thought experiment undermined the claim that AI could actually un-
derstand the computations it performs.32 Others doubt whether or not
superintelligence will be possible given material constraints. Still others
might dismiss Kurzweil’s prognostications about approaching divinity
as compelled by a religious instinct or a New Age philosophy. I am per-
fectly willing to grant that all of these flying arrows might hit their
mark. But Kurzweil is much more perspicacious than many of his critics
who stick too closely to the shores of respectable scientism. A more in-
cisive critique of Kurzweil’s imagined futures would be this: they do
not venture far enough out to the center mass of and logical conclu-
sions his thought.
It seems to me that Kurzweil is correct in one thing: insofar as tech-
nology is rapidly developing along the upward hockey-stick shape of
Moore’s Law,33 humans are increasingly more knowledgeable — or at
least have more information — and tech moves asymptotically closer to
the omniscience and omnipotence of a god. Kurzweil explicitly states
that we will never reach that point, only that we will get closer. What
he does not state — and what is not stated by Nick Bostrom, Max
Tegmark, or many other mainstream techno-futurists — is that technol-
ogy itself is become more «godlike». Here is my main contention: well
before any singularity, if such will ever come about, and well before any
superintelligence is made, humans will treat increasingly-intelligent,
increasingly-powerful, increasingly-human-like AI as if it were a god.
Already scientists are prepping machines to autonomously alter the
human genome. CRISPR -based technologies currently allow humans to
32. John SEARLE, Minds, Brains and Programs, «Behavioral and Brain Sciences» 3
(1980), pp. 417–457.
33. Gordon E. MOORE, Cramming More Components onto Integrated Circuits, in «Elec-
tronics» 38/8 (1965), pp. 114-117.
118
perform both somatic cell and germline cell gene editing. Located in
human egg and sperm, edited germline cells would affect a person’s
entire body. Despite ethical controversies, this technology is presently
being implemented. In 2018, He Jiankui, a scientist from Shenzhen,
China, stunned the global community by announcing that his gene
editing had successfully manufactured the world’s first «designer ba-
bies». Jiankui’s university disowned his violation of «academic ethics»,
but there are indications that AI will be utilized to continue this trend.34
Objections from religious groups — especially the Catholic Church —
and other ethical bodies may slow the development of full A I -con-
structed humans, but rogue scientists will think of themselves as fur-
thering the process of evolution.
Currently AI is being utilized to analyze the genetic code, to predict
diseases, and to help robots perform surgery. Soon enough, govern-
ments and businesses may argue that an «objective» and «scientific»
standard and method for gene-editing will help reduce potential biases
and mistakes regarding gene — and trait-selection. After physician and
scientists establish a standard for «healthy genes», then AI can be un-
leased on the genome. It will be integrated with increasingly-efficient
in vitro fertilization, with artificial wombs that can gestate an embryo
to full-term, and with in-vitro gametogenesis (or I VG ), which repro-
grams human skin cells to become sperm or eggs. When those tech-
nologies are integrated, then AI and various machines can «play god»
with humans. AI will directly and autonomously manufacture man in
its own image.
As a result of bioengineering, people will be differentiated according
to origin. The first generations of A I experimentation will result in
many deformed and non-viable embryos; those born of A I will be
thrown away in vast quantities as is the case with current I VF attempts
at pregnancy. But eventually, if not stopped, AI will be able to construct
humans with capabilities and features far beyond those born of natural
generation: they will be larger, stronger, more intelligent, perhaps or-
34. Owen DYER, Researcher Who Edited Babies’ Genome Retreats from View as Criti-
cism Mounts, in «BMJ (Clinical Research Ed.)», 363 (November 30, 2018, k5113,
https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.k5113.
119
ganically connected to the internet of things. From within the womb

and through childhood, learning machines will program information
and dispositions into the constructed humans, who will be drugged and
activated according their societal role and usefulness as determined by
a central committee of government and industry overlords.35
It would only be natural for such humanish creatures to honor AI and
robo-tech as so many creators. Like the elites of old who claimed blood-
heritage with the Horus, Zeus, and Venus, these human-machine hy-
brids might occupy lower levels of quasi-divinity in the pantheon of
the AI gods, sharing with them the roles of oracle, genie, and sovereign.
Lower classes of humans who as adults upgrade their hardware, for ex-
ample, exchanging eyes for optical receptors that can give them powers
to sense infrared spectra as well as the current rainbow of colors, or
possessing permanent exoskeletons that increase their strength and
stamina, will be treated as demi-gods: new versions of Hercules, the
hybrid son of Zeus and a human mother. And humans born from con-
jugal union of man and woman? They will likely be the slaves of all.
In 1921, Karel Capek coined the term robot from the Czech word
meaning «slave» to mean subservient androids, that is, programmed
creatures made from synthetic biological matter.36 It has often been
thought that robots would be the slaves of men. Capek was more pes-
simistic. In his stage drama, R.U.R.: Rossum’s Universal Robots, the robots
begin as seemingly-content slaves but eventually foment a rebellion
that kills nearly every human. Even in the absence — or temporary
abeyance — of such an apocalyptic scenario or an AI -manufactured hu-
manity 2.0, there is another possibility already underway. Humans are
increasingly becoming like machines, robots, mindless slaves. Jaron
35. Such a vision was predicted by Lewis MUMFORD in The Myth of the Machine: The
Pentagon of Power, Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, New York 1970, pp. 227–228, where
he synthesized the individual insights of various authors, including H.G. Wells, Aldous
Huxley, Marshall McLuhan, B.F. Skinner, and Buckminster Fuller. Mumford’s early
philosophical-historical study, The Story of Utopias, Boni and Liveright, New York 1922,
gave him deep insights into the technological enthusiasm that would enrapture the
world in his lifetime.
36. Karel CAPEK, R.U.R.: Rossum’s Universal Robots, trans. Claudia Novack-Jones, Pen-
guin Classics, London-New York 1999.
120
Lanier, an inventor of virtual reality, laments precisely this tendency,

which he calls the «apocalypse of self-abdication».37 He points out that
the A I -Gospel has been pounded into our heads so successfully that
people readily attribute human intelligence to computers, even in the
face of evidence otherwise. «People already defer to computers», he
wrote nearly a decade ago, «blaming themselves when a digital gadget
or online service is hard to use».38 Such psychological subjection to the
machine could be mass-manufactured by elites who want to people to
forget that the machine is made for man, not man for the machine.39
As natural human adaptability conforms itself to digital environ-
ments, unthinking persons deconstruct their expectations to fit what-
ever platform programmers envisions. Billions shape their
self-presentation to fit within the design of a Facebook page, an Insta-
gram post, or a Youtube upload, forgetting that the world outside vir-
tual space offers so many more options for living expression. As
platforms become more all-encompassing, the result is an increasing
loss of personal agency. Jacques Ellul explains that people will treat
themselves primarily as passive objects of the automation of technique:
The surgical operation which one could not perform, and now is done, is
not an object of choice: it is. Here we have a decisive aspect of the au-
tomation of technique: it is now the technique that makes the choice ipso
facto, without remission, without any possible discussion about the
means to be used. Man [in this case] is absolutely not an agent of choice.
He is an apparatus for registering effects, results obtained by diverse tech-
niques, and there is no choice for complex motives and for some human
manner; he only decides what gives him the maximum efficiency. This is
no longer a choice: any machine can perform the same operation.40
37. Jaron LANIER, You Are Not a Gadget, Penguin, London 2011, p. 24.
38. Ivi, p. 36.
39. Kevin Kelly predicts a lop-sided «human-robot symbiosis» in which humans
become the butlers of robot progress: «[S]uccess will go to those who best optimize
the process of working with bots and machines. […] Our human assignment will be to
keep making jobs for robots — and that is a task that will never be finished. So we will
always have at least that one “job”». KELLY, Inevitable: Understanding the 12 Technolog-
ical Forces That Will Shape Our Future, Penguin, New York 2016, pp. 58–59.
40. «L’opération chirurgicale que l’on ne pouvait pas faire et que maintenant on
121
As the enticements of the matrixed world are continually refined to tar-

get the desires, insecurities, and manias of individuals, people immersed
in the online world will find it increasingly difficult and undesirable to
disconnect and, instead, to live fully in their bodies as existing separately
from the digital universe. Their sense of self-directedness as a con-
stituent of personal meaning and fulfillment will grow dull, and their
exercise of autonomy weak.41 Grown distant from the imperfections and
unexpectedness of an unprogrammed world, humans will be more likely
to treat each themselves and others like machines—objects to be manip-
ulated and controlled by AI for the basest sorts of satisfaction.42
peut faire n’est pas l’objet d’un choix: elle est. Nous tenons ici un aspect décisif de l’au-
tomatisme technique: c’est maintenant la technique qui opère le choix ipso facto, sans
rémission, sans discussion possible entre les moyens à utiliser. L’homme n’est absolu-
ment pas l’agent du choix. Il est un appareil enregistreur des effets, des résultats
obtenus par diverses techniques, et ce n’est pas un choix pour des motifs complexes et
de quelque façon humains; il décide seulement pour ce qui donne le maximum d’effi-
cience. Ce n’est plus un choix: n’importe quelle machine peut effectuer la même opéra-
tion». ELLUL, Le Système technicien, Le cherche midi, Paris 2012 (1rs ed. 1977), p. 245. My
translation.
41. Significantly, the European Union passed a General Data Protection Regulation
(GDPR) in 2016 which, according to Jacob Turner «arguably amount to a legal right to
explanation of certain decisions made by AI», seemingly to enhance human agency and
understanding with respect to AI. T URNER, Robot Rules: Regulating Artificial Intelligence,
Palgrave Macmillan, Cham, Switzerland 2019, p. 328. See Regulation (EU) 2016/679 on
the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and
on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC (General Data
Protection Regulation) [2016], OJ L119/1 (GDPR). Article 22 of the GDPR stipulates that
individuals «have the right not to be subject to a decision solely based on automatic
processing», such as occurs with AI, «which significantly affects him or her». This reg-
ulation contains an enormous loophole, for the State may authorize such a decision
(Art. 22.2.b), which may allow a low-level bureaucrat or unsupervised programmer to
erode one’s agency by introducing such decisions into one’s daily life. Furthermore,
despite the good intentions, programmers and businessmen know that «It is often so
easier, faster, and cheaper to leave the decisions to the machine», says Stuart Russell,
one of the pioneers of artificial intelligence design, in discussing Article 22. RUSSELL,
Human Compatible: Artificial Intelligence and the Problem of Control (Viking, 2019), p.
128.
42. For a discussion of AI as subject and agent, without presupposing consciousness
or sentience, see T URNER, Robot Rules, cit., pp. 16–22.
122
The mechanization and zombification of humans is driven by what

Lanier named «gadget fetishization» and Ballard called the «strange
love affair with the machine».43 Originally, the term «fetish» was used
by sociologists of religion to describe beliefs that so-called primitive
religions shared with old Egyptian religion — namely, that supernatural
powers are bound to certain handmade objects, such as charmed
bracelets or little figurines, more than to other objects: so that by car-
rying these objects on one’s person, one can increase fertility, strength,
health, and so on. In a similar way, people lost in the digital culture in-
creasingly treat machines like oracles, genies, and sovereigns—and like
idols, graven images of supernatural beings that deserve our homage
on account of their wisdom, beauty, and power. As with idols of old,
this will occur for three main reasons.
Transference. In Japan, there presently exists a form of robot meant
to comfort childless people, or the elderly whose grandchildren are far
away. Throughout the world, there already exist love bots that are the
objects of the sexual fetishes of a disturbingly large number of people,
like degraded Pygmalions who adore enticing statues.44 As robots be-
come more autonomous and better mimic the look, feel, and behavior
of humans, they will increasingly become the objects of religious
fetishes as well. Contrary to Voltaire’s supposition that idols themselves
were not worshipped, Richard Lints argues that in the Ancient Near
East «the idol represented the god and was the god manifest in concrete
form».45 Even more so for AI and robots: they can represent the idolatry
of efficiency and manifest these ideals concretely by furthering the
technologization of the world through their work.
43. LANIER, You Are Not a Gadget, cit., p. 70. J.G. Ballard, Crash, HarperCollins, New
York 1973, cit., p. 14.
44. Medieval Christians saw the Pygmalion myth as a warning against idolizing
lovely tech: MAYOR, Gods and Robots, cit., p. 108. See Reinier LEUSHUIS, Pygmalion’s Folly
and the Author’s Craft in Jean de Meun’s Roman de La Rose, «Neophilologus» 90/4 (Oc-
tober 1, 2006), pp. 521–533. Examining medieval illustrations of the same: Marian
BLEEKE, Versions of Pygmalion in the Illuminated Roman de la Rose (Oxford, Bodleian Li-
brary Ms. Douce 195): The Artist and the Work of Art, in «Art History» 33/1 (February
2010), pp. 28–53.
45. LINTS, Identity and Idolatry, cit., p. 37, note 18.
123
As the power and reach of AI increases, so will the illusion that AI

through its own self-perfecting powers can transcend the limits of hu-
manity. It will be expected have all the perfection of reason and benef-
icence purified from the passions, chaos, imprecision, and friction that
presently vex humans: it will be a god of rule, order, and judgment,
providentially allocating goods such as health services, food supplies,
transport, entertainment, legal judgments, internet access, and political.
As a cornucopia god expected to answer all questions and govern all
needs, it will be given deference, even obeisance. With unexpected in-
junctions arising from programmed randomness and untraceably com-
plex feedback loops, the AI -god’s edicts will have an air of mystery that
will call for placation from the masses. People will transfer their familial
and sexual desires onto androids, but onto more powerful AI they will
transfer their religious hopes, joys, and fears. According to Lewis Mum-
ford, this transference has been long in coming, for after the Protestant
Revolution, «Mechanics became the new religion, and it gave birth to
a new Messiah: the machine».46
Greed. Like Demetrius the silversmith, the puppet masters of Silicon
Valley know that idolization is always lucrative for idol manufacturers.
Profit is directly commensurate with the power of software designers
and hardware engineers to induce mass addiction to their products.47
Hence, powerful businessmen will encourage the fetishization of pro-
grams, gadgets, online platforms, and eventually robots themselves. It
would be in the financial interests of these modern-day god-carvers to
pass legislation guaranteeing «rights» to such robots, for such laws and
behavior will serve to increase the intensity of mass idol-fetishes. If it
helped sell product, they might even surreptitiously foment riots
against whomever would deny their humanity, arguing that «robots
are people too» as a way to maintain the cycles of production, con-
46. Lewis MUMFORD, Technics and Civilization, Harcourt, Brace, and World, New York
1962, p. 45.
47. See incisive work by Nir EYAL with Ryan HOOKER, Hooked: How to Build Habit-
Forming Products, Portfolio/Penguin, New York 2014. Also, Adam ALTER, Irresistible:
The Rise of Addictive Technology and the Business of Keeping Us Hooked, Penguin Books,
New York 2018.
124
sumption, addiction, and re-upping new tech. Which will mean more
money in the bank.
Control. Many are rightly concerned about the power of communi-
cations technologies to help dictators regulate the flow and content of
speech and information, and kill larger number of political dissidents.
Such tendencies will coalesce in AI controls. As new Nebuchadnezzars,
powerful elites will keep the marionette strings in hand as they present
certain androids as the embodiments of the wisdom, or whim, of the
online collective. Making use of the human instinct to follow the mob,
social puppeteers will encourage the masses to give obeisance to these
manmade gods — with goal of controlling them through a robotic re-
ligion, in which the androids are portrayed as primary agents in the
world and common folk are given roles of mechanized slaves. The re-
sult, Mumford predicts with chilling logic, «the controllers who set up
this supermechanism will themselves serve as its final sacrificial vic-
tims; for when the planetary megamachine reaches its terminal point
of soulless perfection, the original human intelligence will have become
completely absorbed—and thus eliminated».48 What was once sought
in Buddhist nihilist philosophy through meditation may be forced by
elaborate technology.49 Mumford insightfully notes how Teilhard de
Chardin’s philosophy of man’s becoming one with the universe at the
«omega point» is precisely «the heavenly Nirvana of the “Now” gen-
eration: electronic salvation, disguised as Christian fulfillment», in
which the individual ego is merged with the world brain.50 Chardin’s
view of intelligence is, in Mumford’s view, «unconditional, absolute,
and therewith anti-organic», fully coherent with the tendency of elec-
tronics to «de-materialize» and «depersonalize» man.51
If this scenario comes about, people will hardly be alive, and will have
difficulty distinguishing between the real and the unreal. Keven Kelly
sees this as a bright future. Gesturing towards H.G. Well’s «world
brain» and Teilhard de Chardin’s «noosphere», Kelly predicts that «the
48. MUMFORD, The Myth of the Machine, cit., p. 228.

49. Ibidem.
50. Ivi, p. 316.
51. Ivi, pp. 317, 433, 434.
125
collective intelligence of all humans combined with the collective be-

havior of all machines, plus the intelligence of nature, plus whatever
emerges from this whole», will be «the new platform that our lives will
run on. […] Everyone will be on it. Or in it. Or, simply, everyone will
be it».52 What Kelly describes as a liberating certitude, others see as an
imprisoning nightmare. Mumford predicts that a massive cultural im-
petus will result: the unforgiveable sins will be «to wish to be alone, to
be selective, to be “different”, to be self-governing».53 Each individual
will tend to lose a sense of his own dignity as a meaningful agent able
to improve the world as he gradually is absorbed in the greater monistic
Whole. In Mumford’s words, «man’s final achievement, at the summit
of his progress, would be to create an ineffable electronic God».54 This
is a radically anti-Incarnational trend.
What are some ways we can avoid these scenarios? Let us consider
each issue in turn.
Transference. Given the tendency to wrongly transfer a good rela-
tionship to an unworthy object, one must counter that tendency by giv-
ing each thing its proper due. Healthy friendships can help a person
avoid transferring feelings to robots. To avoid transferring familial re-
lationships onto androids, one must recall that man and the woman,
equally made «in the image of God» are not commanded to transmit
human life through techne: they did not manipulate matter to bring
forth another human being. Rather than operating in a technical mode,
they were to operate like all the material world and «be fruitful and
multiply» in a natural biological mode, each «according to its kind»
(Gn 1,28.25).55 The division of labor is clear: Adam and Eve cooperate
52. KELLY, Inevitable, cit., pp. 292, 293. See, among other works, the essays in H.G.
WELLS, World Brain, Doubleday, Garden City/New York 1938, where he describes a liv-
ing organism that is the storehouse and producer of all knowledge. Also, CHARDIN’s
How I Believe in Christianity and Evolution, trans. René Hague, Harvest Books/Harcourt
Brace Jovanovich, New York 1962, p. 96, and The Heart of Matter, trans. René Hague,
Harvest/Harcourt Brace & Co., New York 2002, p. 45.
53. MUMFORD, The Myth of the Machine, cit., p. 226.
54. Ivi, p. 228.
55. Perhaps this helps answer von Rad’s question as to why the prohibition to make
126
with the divine initiative through an action that is appropriate to their

nature, that is, by generating a child through becoming «one flesh»
(Gn 2,24).56 Meanwhile, God creates ex nihilo an immortal soul and in-
fuses it into the body conceived. Idolizing AI to the point of giving it
power to create parents and families would be a form of spiritual pros-
titution in which a person gives himself to a creature in a union of a
disordered love.57
Greed. St. Paul declares that covetousness is a form of idolatry (Col
3:5), which calls down the wrath of God (Col 3,6). The contrary virtue
is charity, which properly orders one’s will to God above all, and «binds
everything together in perfect harmony» (Col 3,14), not as a techno-
cratic solution, but as a relational self-giving to the Giver of All and to
one’s fellow creatures. On the side of tech creators, responsible stew-
ardship of their power, and true concern for the good of others, ought
to impel them to minimalize the addictive nature of their products. Since
the best-made products will also be the most fascinating, the gadgets
themselves should facilitate switch-off and real-world engagement. A
images is never mentioned in the context of the idol parodies in the prophetic and wis-
dom literature: to make room for the possibility of man’s cooperation with God in gen-
erating new images of the divine naturally through procreation. See VON RAD, Wisdom
in Israel, cit., pp. 83–84.
56. BEALE insightfully notes that, in the fall, Adam becomes and lives in a distorted
image of creation: We Become What We Worship, cit., pp. 132–135.
57. According to the Talmud (Gemara), the three «cardinal sins» for Jews are mur-
der, sexual sins, and idolatry. See Pesachim 25a-b, citing Sanhedrin 74a in The Schotten-
stein Edition Talmud Bavli no. 9: Pesachim Volume 1 (Folios 2a-41b), ed. and trans. Moshe
Zev Einhorn et al., Artscroll, Brooklyn, NY 2000. Also, Ein Yaakov: The Ethical and In-
spirational Teachings of the Talmud, trans. Avraham Yaakov Finkel, Rowan and Little-
field, Lanham, MD 2004), pp. 157–158. Murder and unchastity denigrate man who is
made in the image of God; idolatry denigrates God, in whose image man is made. Con-
sequently, idolatry and unchastity are often linked in Scriptural texts, e.g., Nm 25,1–
3; Jgs 8,33; Ez 16,36; Hos 2,5–8, 9,10. Solomon’s idolatry, adopted because of his
non-Hebrew wives, exemplifies these themes: 1 Kgs 1,1-2.4. See BEALE, We Become What
We Worship, cit., pp. 235–240. Aside from errors in regarding Joseph as cuckolded by
God in the conception of Jesus, see Catherine E. WINIARSKI, Idolatry, and the Subject of
Monotheism, in «Religion & Literature» 38/3 (Autumn, 2006), pp. 41–63. Also, Raymond
C. ORTLUND Jr., God’s Unfaithful Wife: A Biblical Theology of Spiritual Adultery, IVP Aca-
demic, Downers Grove, Ill. 2003.
127
healthy AI culture would strive for long-term contentment instead of

the instant gratification provided by shallow but frequent stimulation
by tech. Even at the risk of failure and suffering, we should stretch our-
selves to experience the physical world, to become co-creators with
God, not just consumers of other creatures. We must create cultures that
discourage the commodification of the self, and of life, but instead re-
wards face-to-face interactions and meaningful conversations. This
spiritual poverty and detachment from things can help us to more per-
fectly give ourselves as persons to other persons, in harmony with the
providential order of the Universe, in which all things flow from the
loving wisdom of God’s plan for the salvation of the world.
The Incarnate Son of God may therefore help us recall that our bodies
are part of our nature. Just as orthodox faith rejects the heresy of Do-
cetism, that Christ’s body was mere appearance and not reality, so AI
should be designed in favor of developing physical and not merely vir-
tual reality.58 Mary Timothy Prokes powerfully argues, «[O]ur present
time knows a new, technologically-astute kind of Docetism, or seeming
embodiment […] there is a keen relationship between the objectifica-
tion of the human body and employment of the virtual […] The body
is perceived to be divisible, replaceable, open to refabrication».59 Hu-
mans are naturally a composite of body and soul: «My soul is not me»,
Thomas insists.60 Accordingly, we must culturally acknowledge and
58. Neo-Gnosticism also seems to play a part here: Giacomo Samek LODOVICI, Tran-
shumanesimo, Immortalità, Felicità, in «Etica & Politica / Ethics & Politics» 20/3 (2018),
pp. 517–538. Also, the collected articles in Hermeneutica 2012: Nuovi ateismi e antiche
idolatrie, ed. Piergiorgio Grassi, Morcelliana, Brescia 2012.
59. Mary Timothy PROKES, At the Interface: Theology and Virtual Reality, Finestra
Books, Tucson, AZ 2004, pp. 30, 32, 35. Against «classic» Docetism, see 1 Jn and 2 Jn;
IGNATIUS OF ANTIOCH, Letter to the Smyrnaeans c. 13 and Trallians c. 9–10; and TERTUL-
LIAN, De carne Christi, esp. cc. 17–23 — which show the important role of the Blessed
Virgin Mary in giving Christ real flesh and blood.
60. Super I ad Cor. [reportatio Vulg.] c. 15, v. 19, l. 2, no. 924: Anima autem cum sit
pars corporis hominis, non est totus homo, et anima mea non est ego. For a discussion of
this doctrine, see Stephen PRIEST, Aquinas’s Claim “Anima Mea Non Est Ego”, in
«Heythrop Journal» 40 (1999), pp. 209–211. For a robust theological anthropology, see
PONTIFICIA ACCADEMIA BIBLICA, Che cosa è l’uomo?, Libreria Editrice Vaticana, Vatican
2019.
128
promote the dignity of living-in-the-body, even with the help of AI.

Such virtuous living would encourage especially the «bodily» virtues
of temperance and fortitude, which form appetites that are inextricably
united to our corporeal nature.61
Control. Artificial Intelligence and advanced robots should always
be at the service of individual agency — not simply the agency of a few
elite in government or business who manipulate the masses from afar.62
Probably this includes the need to have an AI «kill switch» that can dis-
able it for the purposes of retribution, reform, deterrence, and the pro-
tection of society — if such is possible.63 More fundamentally, a culture
of responsibility needs to be cultivated. Such a culture may include cre-
ating and utilizing more open source software, stronger international
standards protecting free speech and the sharing of information, and
encouraging people to engage in self-governance rather than allowing
themselves to be manipulated into voting for a nanny state that rewards
passive behavior with bread and circuses.64 It will also involve an imi-
61. ST I-II, q. 56, a. 4; q. 58; q. 66, a. 3. ST II-II, q. 123, a. 1; q. 141, aa. 4-5.
62. For an account of the often unknown effect big tech and its AI has even now,
see Craig DETWEILER, iGods: How Technology Shapes our Spiritual and Social Lives, Brazos
Press, Grand Rapids, MI 2013.
63. T URNER, Robot Rules, cit., pp. 357–362. Russell contends that a superintelligent
entity could predict and disable a kill switch; plus, once such entities exist, to turn them
off would destroy a lot of civilization at that point and likely end many lives dependent
on it. Human Compatible, p. 161. Ethical AI principles enunciated by the US Department
of Defense, though good in themselves, are limited: they focus on avoiding autonomous
AI killing-sprees, and do not consider long-term issues of human replacement and sub-
ordination: «DOD Adopts Ethical Principles for Artificial Intelligence», 24 Feb. 2020.
https://www.defense.gov/Newsroom/Releases/Release/Article/2091996/dod-adopts-
ethical-principles-for-artificial-intelligence/source/GovDelivery/
The principles enunciated in the 28 Feb 2020 PONTIFICAL ACADEMY FOR LIFE «Call for
Ethics», signed in Rome by Microsoft, IBM, FAO, and the Italian Government, is similarly
general but difficult to implement legally.
64. Russell quotes E.M. FORSTER’s 1909 science fiction story, The Machine Stops, in
which the futuristic main character laments: «We created the Machine to do our will,
but we cannot make it do our will now. It has robbed us of the sense of space and of
the sense of touch, it has blurred every human relation, it has paralyzed our bodies and
our wills». The solution to an all-encompassing AI, Russell says, is «cultural, not tech-
129
tation of the «Three Young Men» in Daniel who refused idol-worship,

and were rewarded with supernatural life amidst persecutorial flames.65
Those who truly live with «freedom of the sons of God» (Rm 8,21) par-
ticipate in the infinite creativity of a God who took on flesh — not to
control the flesh and eliminate it, but to redeem it and the world from
its spiritual ills.
When it comes to the idolatry that threatens to encompass AI -infused
robots, the solution is not strict iconoclasm. The idea of idolatry indi-
cates of the worship of God transferred to an image of God. According
to the true faith, to God alone belong latria, the full and complete gift
of self; to people, reverence; and to things, respect insofar as they sym-
bolize a greater reality beyond them. It is legitimate to kiss a painted
icon of Christ—not to worship the physical object, but to give homage
to the God whom the object represents.66 Idolatry begins when our rev-
erential behavior terminates in a physical object, or superstitiously
holds that the manmade thing possesses in itself divine qualities.67 We
must recall that God gives Himself to us as a gift in Christ and through
the sacraments; He is not the product of our own design. To avoid false
worship, we must have right ordering of all things, and that includes
setting our course for the right worship of the One true God, for He is
the center of our universe and should be at the center of our souls.
nical», that is, «a cultural movement to reshape our ideals and preferences towards au-
tonomy, agency, and ability and away from self-indulgence and dependency». Human
Compatible, pp. 254–256.
65. Ari Mermelstein intriguingly argues that the final redaction of Daniel included
depictions of Jewish resistance to Nebuchadnezzar’s idol-worship as a way of reinforc-
ing resistance to the idolatry of Antiochus IV Epiphanes in the Maccabean period: Con-
structing Fear and Pride in the Book of Daniel: The Profile of a Second Temple Emotional
Community, in «Journal for the Study of Judaism in the Persian, Hellenistic, and Roman
Period», 46/4-5 (2015), pp. 449–483. Analogously, the example applies to resistance a
technocratic universe of AI deities.
66. ST II-II, q. 81, a. 3, ad 3. Nevertheless, he insists that we can give the adoration
of latria even to an image of Christ and to the Cross, non propter ipsam imaginem, sed
propter rem cuius imago est, ST III, q. 25, a. 3, ad 2. See ivi., a. 4.
67. See AQUINAS, ST II-II, q. 94, a. 1, quoting AUGUSTINE, De civitate Dei, lib. 6, c. 5; lib.
7, c. 6; lib. 8, c. 14; lib. 18, c. 14 and De doctrina Christiana, lib. 2, c. 20, n. 30.
130

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ANG 97-1 (2020)_ANGELICUM 01/04/2020 14:46 Pagina 107

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE, IDOLATRY,

EZRA SULLIVAN, O.P.*

W HEN ancient navigators mapped the world that they discovered

ANGELICUM 97/1 (2020)

EZRA SULLI VAN O . P .

1. Nick BOSTROM, Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies, Oxford University

ARTIFICIAL IN TELLIGENCE , IDOLATRY , AND H UMAN MANIP ULATION

First, I will describe ancient idol-making as grasped by history and

We can begin with considerations of parentage and religious image-

ology, Ethnography, and the Historicization of Idolatry, in «Journal of the History of

EZRA SULLI VAN O . P .

ARTIFICIAL IN TELLIGENCE , IDOLATRY , AND H UMAN MANIP ULATION

rooftop terrace of their temple, where the god’s intellective power

EZRA SULLI VAN O . P .

that «The worshipper is turned into the god (ishta-devata) that he

13. Ivi, p. 136.

ARTIFICIAL IN TELLIGENCE , IDOLATRY , AND H UMAN MANIP ULATION

17. See AUGUSTINUS HIPPONENIS, In Psalmum 113, Sermo 2, in Ennarationes in Psalmos

EZRA SULLI VAN O . P .

ARTIFICIAL IN TELLIGENCE , IDOLATRY , AND H UMAN MANIP ULATION

EZRA SULLI VAN O . P .

Control: A significant motivator for rulers is control over others; elites

ARTIFICIAL IN TELLIGENCE , IDOLATRY , AND H UMAN MANIP ULATION

We may seem to be drifting into choppy waters of theology, far from

EZRA SULLI VAN O . P .

like machines by having brains enhanced with superintelligence and

ARTIFICIAL IN TELLIGENCE , IDOLATRY , AND H UMAN MANIP ULATION

EZRA SULLI VAN O . P .

ganically connected to the internet of things. From within the womb

ARTIFICIAL IN TELLIGENCE , IDOLATRY , AND H UMAN MANIP ULATION

Lanier, an inventor of virtual reality, laments precisely this tendency,

EZRA SULLI VAN O . P .

As the enticements of the matrixed world are continually refined to tar-

ARTIFICIAL IN TELLIGENCE , IDOLATRY , AND H UMAN MANIP ULATION

The mechanization and zombification of humans is driven by what

EZRA SULLI VAN O . P .

As the power and reach of AI increases, so will the illusion that AI

ARTIFICIAL IN TELLIGENCE , IDOLATRY , AND H UMAN MANIP ULATION

48. MUMFORD, The Myth of the Machine, cit., p. 228.

EZRA SULLI VAN O . P .

collective intelligence of all humans combined with the collective be-

ARTIFICIAL IN TELLIGENCE , IDOLATRY , AND H UMAN MANIP ULATION

with the divine initiative through an action that is appropriate to their

EZRA SULLI VAN O . P .

healthy AI culture would strive for long-term contentment instead of

ARTIFICIAL IN TELLIGENCE , IDOLATRY , AND H UMAN MANIP ULATION

promote the dignity of living-in-the-body, even with the help of AI.

EZRA SULLI VAN O . P .

tation of the «Three Young Men» in Daniel who refused idol-worship,

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