Digital ID, A.I. - And The Soul of Man

Only if “Artificial Intelligence” (AI) is allowed to control what human beings have called the “soul,” does it become capable of competing with the Kingdom of God.

If we accept that the soul is the “essential me,” that is capable of communing with the Divine, we ought also to remember that throughout recorded history, there have been several attempts to control, even take over, the soul of man. The instruments of the attempted takeover have varied but there has always been the titanic struggle for the soul of man waged not by material forces defined by Newtonian or other laws, but by light and darkness, good and evil, soul crushing servitude and freedom.

The nature of this struggle is so germane to our lives that it has even extended to the realm of the invisible atom - atomic power harnessed for the good of man; or the atomic bomb, designed for destruction and murder.

Just over a century ago, many new technological marvels like the motor car were thought to be the very incarnation of evil - famous newspapers and magazines referred to the car in apocalyptic terms. The NY times, for example, ran an article in 1924 with the headline, “Nation Roused Against Motor Killings,”  in which was condemned “the homicidal orgy of the motor car.”

Mr. Orville Wright, the inventor of the airplane, naively believed that his “flying bicycle” would be refined to fly further and longer - but that it would become an instrument of peace and a deterrent to war! Within a few, short years, airplanes were dropping bombs on other people - and a new and wonderful technology was busy waging war again, for the soul of man.

Many of us are alarmed by the imminent arrival of “digital ID” and by the likely adoption of such bizarre AI platforms as “Chat GPT.” We have good reason for urgent alarm - but not because digital technology or AI are by themselves evil.

Some of my readers may be surprised to learn that we already live in a world of digital ID! We might ourselves have allowed it to happen, but many of us have embraced the reality of digital conveniences. Our identity and several details of our lives associated with that identity are already known to grocery stores (when we “tap” our credit cards on the digital counter), banks (when we “e-transfer” etc.) and corporations (when we buy goods on Amazon)! We have also allowed physicians to maintain personal health information on “electronic medical records” (EMR) on their computers, which can in turn communicate with government databases!

Similarly, we use AI in our daily lives, perhaps much more than we realize. Every search engine on the internet is based on AI algorithms, as is the “fly by wire” modern airplane (which has made take off and landing much safer). A more sophisticated code may have produced “Chat GPT,” but the technology is already in every day use.

Perhaps we ought not to have invented the personal computer (or even the first computer)! This is a serious proposition, since many people believe that life was simpler and in some way more “meaningful” in the years immediately preceding the ubiquitous flooding of our homes and workplaces with digital technology. 

When we ask such questions as, “was the invention of the computer necessary?” Or even, “was the invention of the motor car necessary?” - we are really acknowledging in very basic terms, the ancient battle for the soul of man. We know intuitively, that these powerful tools, in the hands of the wrong people can be turned into wicked instruments of tyranny, control, manipulation and oppression. But the tools themselves are amoral and neutral in this great spiritual and moral struggle for control.

Whether by genocide, war, biowarfare, totalitarian rule by fiat, or the slow strangulation of oppressive laws and taxes, governments have been responsible for many orders of magnitude more of human suffering, misery and murder than any other agency.

By limiting our freedoms and by taking away the ability to choose, governments are undoubtedly seeking to take over and dominate the soul of man with digital ID and other digital tools. The tools then become instruments of evil - and we cannot allow these tools to be used against us. Nor can we hand them over to those agencies (governments) capable of great evil.  That is the real battle - not the technologies themselves.

One important question of course, is how much control we have already given up to government and corporations - and whether we would be prepared to go back to an age before computers (or a watered down version of that age). Society must face squarely and grapple with very basic questions such as these, if we are to bring about the change we desire.

But the much more important and urgent issue at hand is to recognize that unless individuals (who make up our societies and governments) yield themselves to God and the purposes of the Kingdom of God, evil and the tools of evil (the technologies) which are already stalking mankind, “like a roaring lion,” will soon devour us all.  The power controlling these powerful tools is the lynchpin upon which depends the future of mankind.

The struggle was familiar to the prophet Jeremiah in ancient Israel - and our tragic history as human beings has been a ringing testament to his pronouncement that “the heart of man is desperately wicked above all things.”

This desperately wicked heart must be transformed, if we are to survive as a people. A soul thus transformed will be able to use all technologies, including digital ones, for good rather than for evil.

In speaking of the transforming power of Christ and its impact upon every area of human life and experience, St. Paul says that “if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.”

The transformed soul, the “new creature” will also be able to effectively organize and fight against giving governments and corporations the very tools with which they seek to control, oppress and destroy us. 

That inner transformation puts us on the path to a very different destiny for ourselves, our societies and our nations.