The large language model applications that are the foundation of the contemporary AI boom raise a complex set of questions for religion scholars, ranging from philosophical inquiries about the nature of self and consciousness to social responses to the challenges provoked by AI itself. This panel considers the full scope of these responses, examining both what religious philosophy can tell us about the nature of AI and how religious traditions might respond to it.
Debates about artificial intelligence tend to revolve around a recurring set of concerns: agency, consciousness, and the proper locus of responsibility. This paper brings classical Yogācāra philosophy into conversation with these discussions — not as a metaphysical doctrine but as a conceptual toolkit for analyzing layered cognitive structures. Drawing on Yogācāra accounts of recursive conditioning and appropriative self-grasping, I argue that advanced AI systems are better understood as stratified architectures of patterned activation than as emergent subjects. This framing makes the distinction between functional recursion and reflexive appropriation philosophically available in a way that much current discourse lacks. By situating technological systems within a model of conditioned emergence, the paper redistributes agency across socio-technical networks and refines ethical analysis without attributing subjectivity to machines — demonstrating, in the process, how Buddhist philosophical resources can function as genuine conceptual engineering within contemporary technology discourse.
In this paper, we propose ways theologians might respond to questions of human distinctiveness that arise from reports of religion-focused interactions with generative artificial intelligence (AI) systems. Through thematic analysis (Braun and Clarke, 2012), we examine two data sets: Reddit users’ reports of their or others’ religion-focused interactions with generative AI systems; and app descriptions, reviews, and commentaries associated with generative AI systems designed for religion-focused interactions (e.g., Bible Chat). Preliminary analyses suggest that users of generative AI systems disregard distinctions between human-human interaction and human-computer interaction (HCI) in such religion-focused exchanges.
Disregard for distinctions between human-human interaction and HCI poses a problem for theologians. Human distinctiveness has traditionally been central to theological anthropology, but recent critiques of modernity question strategies that bolster the category of the human. How might we address the question of human distinctiveness posed by religion-focused interactions with generative AI systems without replicating the harms of modernity?
A NYC subway sign reads: "friend: [noun] someone who listens, responds, and supports you." The advertisement is for friend.com, which promotes an AI friend that you can wear as an always-listening pendant around your neck. What draws the eye, however, is not the advertisement but the words "not your" added above the website. Another graffitied friend advertisement reads, "JOIN THE LUDDITE RENAISSANCE." This paper explores anti-AI movements and their raison d'être and considers Luddism as an ethical response to the many dangers of AI. I engage the Hebrew Bible narrative of the Tower of Babel in Genesis 11, in which humans seek to build a tower to reach the heavens, i.e., the arrogant pursuit of fame and power. In an age of globalization and technological advancement, a careful reading of the text can lead us into important considerations about hubris and progress.