Could Robots Become Religious? Theological, Evolutionary, and Cognitive Perspectives.
If artificial intelligence (AI) programs start manifesting religious interest or behavior, how could we know whether it is genuine? This article explores the necessary conditions for robots to develop authentic religiosity from theological, evolutionary, and cognitive angles. Theology is more open t...
| Published in: | Zygon: Journal of Religion & Science Vol. 59; no. 3; pp. 768 - 788 |
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| Format: | Article |
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Open Library of Humanities
Sep2024
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| Online Access: | View this record in EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=hlh&AN=182128256&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: hlh uiTerm: 182128256 longDbName: Humanities International Complete uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 05912385 ZYG jtl: Zygon: Journal of Religion & Science issn: 05912385 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: Sep2024 vid: 59 iid: 3 pid: 15576 pub: Open Library of Humanities artinfo: ui: 182128256 10.16995/zygon.16902 ppf: 768 ppct: 20 formats: fmt: – @attributes: type: T – @attributes: type: P size: 2MB tig: atl: Could Robots Become Religious? Theological, Evolutionary, and Cognitive Perspectives. aug: au: Dorobantu, Marius affil: Assistant Professor of Theology and Artificial Intelligence, Faculty of Religion and Theology, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, the Netherlands su: Religious behaviors Artificial intelligence Popular culture Science fiction Robots sug: subj: Religious behaviors Artificial intelligence Popular culture Science fiction Robots ab: If artificial intelligence (AI) programs start manifesting religious interest or behavior, how could we know whether it is genuine? This article explores the necessary conditions for robots to develop authentic religiosity from theological, evolutionary, and cognitive angles. Theology is more open to the hypothesis of religious robots than naturalistic approaches, which regard the emergence of human religion as highly contingent on the idiosyncrasies of our embodiment, needs, cognition, and evolutionary history. Drawing on Robin Dunbar's work and educated guesses about the mental world of future AI, I argue that common human intuition about potential robot religiosity--as captured in sci-fi and pop culture--is plagued by two fallacies: (1) a bias to equating religion with only its intellectual or doctrinal layer at the expense of the embodied, shamanistic dimension, and (2) a naïve assumption that intelligent robots will develop humanlike thoughts, aspirations, and concerns. Due to its alien type of intelligence, AI will likely not engage in something so typically human as religion. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: Y custom: Copyright of Zygon: Journal of Religion & Science is the property of Open Library of Humanities and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. item: Zygon: Journal of Religion & Science holder: Open Library of Humanities dt: @attributes: year: 2024 holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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