Think about how prevalent artificial intelligence (AI) is already in your daily life to help you get more done in less time. When you ask Alexa to play a song or Siri to send a message to a friend, you are interacting with an AI.[1] It’s easy to fear artificial intelligence. But AI is not an amorphous, all-knowing intelligence that can solve any problem. Rather, each AI is built for a specific task. We must realize that computers are merely machines. They are programs that do what we tell them to do. They are not intelligent. AI programs are tools, and like tools, AI is designed and used for good or for evil. A hammer can be used for good to build a home. It was also used to pound nails through flesh to crucify the Savior. Social media platforms that help us to connect with one another can also tickle our desires to be loved or manipulate the masses. In this article, I will give a four-part framework to help understand how to do good work with AI. First, I’ll set the framework up by talking about how Christians view good work.
1. In this article, I will be talking about narrow artificial intelligence programs meant to solve a specific problem rather than artificial general intelligence (AGI) which aims to perform a wide range of tasks better than humans. AGI, what we think of as an autonomous intelligence, is the kind that is often portrayed in fantastical movies and does not exist.
Good Work
AI, like any technology tool, amplifies productive technique. And for a Christian, that production is aimed at good works. Good works are deeds born of love for God in obedience to His commands. The Holy Spirit empowers those who have faith in Jesus Christ to do good work (Titus 3:8). A tool can’t do good works. The Christian must desire to glorify God in good work with whole-hearted obedience (1 Cor. 10:31). AI does not produce wholehearted obedience. When others see our obedience to God in good deeds, we ought to do it in such a way that they acknowledge God for what has been done (Matt. 5:16). Good works are intended to testify to God working in us to his glory.
What is the Place of AI in the Good Work of a Christian?
The call of Bezalel illustrates how God accomplishes his work through believers, and it can help us think about how to use AI. I will display the verse in a way that helps isolate the various parts of the passage.
God gives the ability to work for his purposes by giving his Spirit. This passage lists abilities and the object of the craft, such as to carve (an ability) a piece of wood (an object). Yet, the passage does not mention the tool. What is needed to carve wood? It is as though the means is almost irrelevant, yet wood carvers must use tools to carve wood. The better the tool, the better the craftsman can accomplish his work. The carpenter can assemble a deck faster using a pneumatic nail gun than with a hammer.
Tools like AI can aid us in a variety of tasks. Here are four ways we can use AI for the sake of God’s good work through us.
- Speed up Skill
- Amplify Intelligence
- Curate Knowledge
- Extend Craftsmanship
While there are significant opportunities to use AI for good, there are also dangers inherent in the work and the design of the tool. In what follows, I will briefly discuss the opportunities and dangers associated with each potential application of artificial intelligence.
1. Speed up Skill
Skills are wise abilities given by God. AI does not supplant our abilities but supports them by carrying them out at greater speeds so we spend less effort. In other words, AI does not possess inherent skill, but, when programmed to perform a human skill, it can perform the task more quickly.
Opportunity: Examine the tasks that you perform regularly. If there are tasks that are executed the same way each time, it is possible for a wise person to use AI to expedite these tasks. For example, an investor wants to calculate the rate of return on several opportunities to identify the best one. Instead of individually calculating the rate of return for each opportunity, an AI could be programmed to take the inputs and calculate the return for each opportunity in a matter of seconds.
Danger: Evaluate the ethic of the AI to avoid immoral outcomes. Every program is made with a particular ethic that extends from a worldview, whether Christian or pagan. We need the wisdom to know the difference. We need to know how the AI we use works, how it has been programmed. What data has it been trained on? What are the assumptions that guide its logic? If humans have differing views on what is true and what is false, the programs they create will differ as well. AI may produce results more quickly than a human, but it cannot produce results according to any morality but the one it was programmed with and trained on. If AI is programmed by wicked people, it will simply produce wicked results more quickly. In the case of mathematics, the ethical risks are not as large. However, if an AI allocates insurance spending for end-of-life healthcare, the risks to human life are enormous.
2. Amplify Intelligence
Intelligence is the capacity for rational thought and understanding. AI cannot replace our intelligence; rather it amplifies intelligence by gathering information and helping us to focus on relevant facts by organizing and presenting this data. AI amplifies our cognitive ability by unveiling creative possibilities and bringing relevant facts into clear view.
Opportunity: Use AI to collect and display information that is relevant and true. AI can quickly pull data from thousands of sources, making it useful for serious research or simply finding the best recipes for Key lime pie. It can also amplify intelligence by organizing information into creative graphics, project plans, or articles with references.
Danger: Discern whether the AI is fit to present true and good options. We must understand the wise application of the skill with which AI is programmed. We must understand how it helps us in our good work, while avoiding false and wicked work. We also need to know how to use it well. If we feed garbage into the machine, we will get garbage as a result. It is very easy to pick up a tool to use it without knowing what it can do and then to use it foolishly. Take care of what you put before your eyes and your mind. You wouldn’t give your 10-year-old a chainsaw and say, “Go have fun cutting the wood.” He would almost certainly hurt himself, possibly fatally. We must learn how to wield the chainsaw with appropriate wisdom and skill.
3. Supplement Knowledge
While intelligence is the capacity for rational thought, knowledge is the result of such learning and reasoning acting upon data. Knowledge is not divorced from data but includes it. In order for data to become knowledge, it needs to have discernment and wisdom applied to it. AI cannot supplant our wisdom, but it can support our discernment when we know how it is programmed to render its conclusions. AI assists by curating and presenting data with algorithm applied knowledge to help us make faster and better judgments. For example, a financial AI can take profit and loss numbers, then project future trends and identify problems.
Opportunity: Investigate the ability of an AI to curate information for wise decisions. AI can help with decision-making to provide the right information at the right time. As mentioned above, AI is fantastic at recognizing patterns and synthesizing those patterns for presentation. AI not only recognizes these patterns though; it can also predict results based upon trends and evaluate those trends with wise criteria programmed in. For example, when AI has reliable input on traffic patterns, it can provide us alternate routes that we could decide to use or not. AI can support diagnostic and predictive capability in medical conditions such as endometriosis. AI offers interpretive support around data to help us to better synthesize knowledge so that we can make wise decisions.
Danger: Discern whether the AI is trustworthy to avoid foolish decisions. The danger is that the AI may not use a wise and godly heuristic. We must be on the alert for how AI programs make decisions and never abdicate our own judgment. We need to have the wisdom to know what an AI should never do. Can it be exploited with data that produces harmful consequences? If the GPS guides us to go across the bridge but the bridge is out, we must retain our judgment to stop and go a different direction. We have to be especially careful with media that has images generated by AI that are false and used to mislead.
4. Extend Craftsmanship
Craftsmanship is wisely applying a skill in an occupation or trade. AI cannot create God-given skill, but it can be created to craft with skill. AI extends capability for all kinds of craftsmanship.
Opportunity: Automate abilities with AI to accomplish tasks we cannot do to support the things we can do. Many robots are programmed for specific tasks and handle repetitive actions that a person may not be able to do, such as lifting a car chassis and welding a door on it. Yet humans oversee the robots and are able to stop them or intervene or perform quality checks upon the work. The AI does the heavy lifting while a person performs a complementary task. Even as a deck carpenter used to use primarily a hammer and now uses a pneumatic nail gun, so in the future he may use an AI assisted robot.
Danger: Automate only what produces a reliable, good result with limited autonomy. The assumptions used to program AI can result in inappropriate autonomy that can wreak havoc. For example, while AI can identify patterns of foreign nations attempting to interfere with election results, social media platforms have run into numerous problems by locking accounts and censoring posts. AI can introduce evangelistic content and answer questions through chat, yet it would be inappropriate for an AI to pray for someone.
Conclusion
Notice the theme in all of these applications of AI. AI cannot replace wisdom. Wisdom is given by the Spirit of God. Wisdom is present in all aspects of ability: skill, knowledge, intelligence, and all kinds of craftsmanship.
In every case, AI is not truly intelligent. “Artificial Intelligence” is a tool, an extension of human ability, namely, technique. Tools assist us in using our God-given skill to get work done better with less effort. Yet, even the best tool is insufficient for producing good works on its own. God gives Christians his Spirit that we may “work in accordance with all that the Lord has commanded” (Exod. 36:1) that others “may see [our] good works and give glory to [our] Father who is in heaven” (Matt. 5:16).
