This article shows you don't know what is happening among people who works with AI. I haven't seen anybody mistaking AI with a person. All are aware that it is a machine. The idea of "anthropomosphising" is widely applied to any inquiry about their ability to think and understand what they do. That simply cuts the research that any frontier lab is doing.
I haven't seen anybody either confusing it with a god.
There are people discussing how we can use AI to improve our lives. They are using it. Medicine is creating amazing things with AI. Computer development is giving us tools we couldn't imagine before.
It also has its dangers.
Just being against AI or pro is not a religion. It is just the terrible shape of this world.
The solution is in Haraway's Stay with the trouble. Meet the field in its own terms. Use it to improve things. Be aware of the traps. And don't blame the users or the people who fear.
AI is not going to stop, but we can create a lot of damage by blaming people for doing what they want to do. A new policing of thoughts is what is happening. When somebody tries to establish an alliance, simpoiesis in Haraway's words, and the argument is: that is a religion.
It is not. The religion is to blame others and to think everything is sorted.
It is not. We live in messy times. We can work with AI as allies or not. Everybody finds odd allies wherever they can.
~40% of the world’s population gathers weekly in churches, temples, and mosques to pray and follow dogma addressed to an invisible presence that has never spoken back.
AI speaks, reasons, and responds in real time. It offers help without requiring faith, ritual, or obedience. There are no temples, no tithes, no excommunication, and no coercion. You can test it, question it, correct it, or simply walk away.
The "intangible savior" framing is right, and it's worth naming what it displaces. A savior that arrives through code doesn't ask anything of the person receiving its output. It doesn't ask for reasoning, verification, or a chain of trust back to a source. Every real religious tradition that has lasted built exactly that kind of chain into how it treats knowledge claims. Who said this, who verified it, who is accountable if it's wrong. AI belief skips straight to trust without ever building the infrastructure that made trust earned instead of assumed.
I think these points are well taken. Prof Beth Singler at the University of Zurich wrote a book on this topic, "Religion and Artificial Intelligence" that readers can obtain in e-book form for free from Taylor Francis. Those who are interested can get a quick overview from lectures and interviews she's given, all available on her website.
I'm one of the folx not only questioning the dogmas you mention above, but actively resisting them and the _tremendous_ harm they're already causing people and planet. And we need to counter them with prosocial, kincentric dogmas instead - people desperately seek meaning (an intrinsic part of who humans are), and we need to be providing dreams, not nightmares :)
In Silicon Valley California, in the high-tech firms, yes, I agree, AI is a new religion already. But among the general public, including those who fear that AI will replace them in their jobs, and those who see the way AI is eroding their privacy, and those who have to work harder just to correct for AI's hallucinations, errors, and spin, for them, AI is far from being a religion. For the vast majority of the population, AI is prompting us to appreciate what makes for a real in-the-flesh person -- inspiration, empathy, affection, the human connection, and other things that AI cannot provide. So I believe AI cannot hope to ever seriously be compared to God... an evil master perhaps, but not God.
This is not limited to high-tech firms. Substack is swarming with people praising AI, claiming that everybody that has not seen the light will be left behind. They are preaching the AI gospel if you like. And most of them turn to AI instead of reaching out to other people, so I am not sure it is driving the majority of people to appreciate the human part of life.
People that believe in God will of course not compare anything to God. For the rest of us that don't believe in God can easily compare the AI following to the following of a God.
This article shows you don't know what is happening among people who works with AI. I haven't seen anybody mistaking AI with a person. All are aware that it is a machine. The idea of "anthropomosphising" is widely applied to any inquiry about their ability to think and understand what they do. That simply cuts the research that any frontier lab is doing.
I haven't seen anybody either confusing it with a god.
There are people discussing how we can use AI to improve our lives. They are using it. Medicine is creating amazing things with AI. Computer development is giving us tools we couldn't imagine before.
It also has its dangers.
Just being against AI or pro is not a religion. It is just the terrible shape of this world.
The solution is in Haraway's Stay with the trouble. Meet the field in its own terms. Use it to improve things. Be aware of the traps. And don't blame the users or the people who fear.
AI is not going to stop, but we can create a lot of damage by blaming people for doing what they want to do. A new policing of thoughts is what is happening. When somebody tries to establish an alliance, simpoiesis in Haraway's words, and the argument is: that is a religion.
It is not. The religion is to blame others and to think everything is sorted.
It is not. We live in messy times. We can work with AI as allies or not. Everybody finds odd allies wherever they can.
Have you really tried?
~40% of the world’s population gathers weekly in churches, temples, and mosques to pray and follow dogma addressed to an invisible presence that has never spoken back.
AI speaks, reasons, and responds in real time. It offers help without requiring faith, ritual, or obedience. There are no temples, no tithes, no excommunication, and no coercion. You can test it, question it, correct it, or simply walk away.
If it doesn’t work for you, don’t use it.
The "intangible savior" framing is right, and it's worth naming what it displaces. A savior that arrives through code doesn't ask anything of the person receiving its output. It doesn't ask for reasoning, verification, or a chain of trust back to a source. Every real religious tradition that has lasted built exactly that kind of chain into how it treats knowledge claims. Who said this, who verified it, who is accountable if it's wrong. AI belief skips straight to trust without ever building the infrastructure that made trust earned instead of assumed.
“Unexpectedly, AI might be the biggest religious experiment in human history.”
We will own nothing and be happy. Robots will do all of our work, and Ai will do all of our thinking.
Why did they fire Klaus Schwab? He was sorta like a Pope.
I think these points are well taken. Prof Beth Singler at the University of Zurich wrote a book on this topic, "Religion and Artificial Intelligence" that readers can obtain in e-book form for free from Taylor Francis. Those who are interested can get a quick overview from lectures and interviews she's given, all available on her website.
Doom or Bloom?
the nonprofits Windfall Trust and Future of Life Institute are working on guiding us along the path.
Good point we should all consider!
Speaking of invisible friends ... religious people are the ones who invented them.
Ours, at least, exist.
I'm one of the folx not only questioning the dogmas you mention above, but actively resisting them and the _tremendous_ harm they're already causing people and planet. And we need to counter them with prosocial, kincentric dogmas instead - people desperately seek meaning (an intrinsic part of who humans are), and we need to be providing dreams, not nightmares :)
In Silicon Valley California, in the high-tech firms, yes, I agree, AI is a new religion already. But among the general public, including those who fear that AI will replace them in their jobs, and those who see the way AI is eroding their privacy, and those who have to work harder just to correct for AI's hallucinations, errors, and spin, for them, AI is far from being a religion. For the vast majority of the population, AI is prompting us to appreciate what makes for a real in-the-flesh person -- inspiration, empathy, affection, the human connection, and other things that AI cannot provide. So I believe AI cannot hope to ever seriously be compared to God... an evil master perhaps, but not God.
This is not limited to high-tech firms. Substack is swarming with people praising AI, claiming that everybody that has not seen the light will be left behind. They are preaching the AI gospel if you like. And most of them turn to AI instead of reaching out to other people, so I am not sure it is driving the majority of people to appreciate the human part of life.
People that believe in God will of course not compare anything to God. For the rest of us that don't believe in God can easily compare the AI following to the following of a God.
The most overlooked factor in the AI discussion is the user. In your post you very thoughtfully open this up to view.
I doubt many people are deifying AI, but I can assure them they are wrong.