What is it about?
Our temptation to personify machine intelligence is not unexpected. We named our dolls as a child and took our Teddy Bear to bed with us. Today we ask death bots to comfort us with post-mortem conversation. All the while we know this to be pretend. Yet we must ask: if Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) or even Artificial Super-Intelligence (ASI) become available, will our game of pretend continue? Or will intelligent robots actually become selves deserving of dignity that hitherto could be ascribed only to human persons? If government-imposed guardrails shut the door on development of AGI and ASI in order to preserve human dignity and wellbeing, we might never learn whether AGI or ASI could develop selfhood, personhood, virtue, or religious sensibilities. The tie between intelligence, selfhood, and dignity should become the subject of social, philosophical, theological, and ethical analysis.
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Why is it important?
It is important that the public theologian assess claims made about the future of AI to draw out its significance and make a critique of excessive expectations.
Perspectives
Even though ethicists within the AI industry believe we should keep AI in the status of a tool and aligned with human values, a critical review will show that some human values can be sinful, malevolent, and dangerous.
Prof Ted F Peters
Graduate Theological Union
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Machine Intelligence, Artificial General Intelligence, Super-Intelligence, and Human Dignity, Religions, July 2025, MDPI AG,
DOI: 10.3390/rel16080975.
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