Every technological advance electricity, movies, telephones, televisions, computers once had some people speculating that civilization was being threatened. Isn't Artificial Intelligence (or Al) substantially the same just a tool that will help us live more comfortably and accomplish our ends more efficiently?

Maybe. But I believe that something qualitatively different is in play when were talking about Al and the pervasiveness of the internet.

It is not, as some have speculated, that Al will one day become conscious. Whatever is purely material-and whatever you say about Al, that is all it can be cannot have, even in principle, the qualities associated with personhood: reason and freedom, abstraction and love. It can gather information or, at best, present a simulacrum of personality, mimicking its sounds and gestures like Siri or the Waze app.

But it cannot transcend its own programming to become a person. Al can never be an I-only an it.

Instead, the problem is that, as study after study has revealed, the algorithms of Al are, in myriad ways and in a manner largely unbeknownst to us, manipulating us, getting us to think and desire in such a way as to foster the economic and political interests of others. In a word, we're not using them; they're using us. And their scope is so widespread that, before we know it, we might well find ourselves completely under their thrall.

Indeed, we see here the great danger of idolatry, of treating something other than God as God: "They have mouths, but do not speak; eyes, but do not see.... Those who make them are like them" (Ps.

115:5, 8). God, the Creator, guides us with his providence out of love: "O Lord... all that we have done, you have done for us"

(Isa. 26:12). Al, on the other hand—our own creation-controls us

through detailed engineering for pragmatic gain. In fact, take a look at your phone and find out how much screen time you put in last week, and then ask yourself honestly how much of your thinking and behavior was determined by that little machine? Next, compare how much time you spent supplicating the internet with how much time you spent praying to God. The answers are, I would guess for most of us, disturbing.

This is not to say, of course, that Al should be cast aside entirely. As a tool for gathering and conveying information in different ways, Al can prove very helpful indeed. But as evangelists, we must be very careful in how we use it. We must also never make the mistake of thinking that AI can do the work of evangelization for us. To evangelize means speaking heart to heart, person to person, and sharing your relationship with the Lord; it is one starving person who has found bread telling another starving person where it is. This simply is not something Al can do, no matter how advanced it becomes.

And we must educate ourselves about both the peril and promise of Al— precisely the goal of this issue of Evangelization de Culture. In the pages ahead, you will read articles on how Al works; on how it is impacting learning and literature, the Church and evangelization; on philosophy of mind and movies about Al; and more. You will even read an original poem on Al composed by AI. As you read, I invite you to reflect on the degree to which Al has become, and will continue to become, part of your life, and how-while exercising great caution and setting clear limits- you might harness its power for good.

+ Kout Fanen BISHOP BARON’S

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