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AI is a religion. A really lousy, really childish one
Have you noticed how deeply, really religious what today passes for Artificial Intelligence is? And if you did, did you wonder why it is so, and where that religiosity came from?
An AI Trinity
The undeserved, wrong-headed religiosity of today’s AI is evident in its three main dogmas. The first is the “end-times” thinking” of its apostles, which is often praised just because AI stocks are the only thing that makes markets look like there is no recession: “AI is coming now, and it will save us if we adore it, kill us if we scorn it” is a really medieval slogan, stolen directly from medieval sermons about end of history and Last Judgment. So is the idea, always present in today’s sermons, that letting AI come and rule will morally redempt humanity, not just solve its practical problems.
The second, equally mystical, equally old recurring dogma of AI evangelism is the notion - or desperate hope - that history and society move linearly and unavoidably towards a better future: there may be temporary bumps and slowdowns, but overall change will surely happen only in one direction, always the same... until the Apocalypsis actually comes.
How dumb and unreal is that, in a world where international politics look more and more like 1938 and certain healthcare or education trends look even older? But tell that to an AI prophet and, instead of discussing actually feasible, reality-based, human-first policies that could solve those problems, he’ll take your warning as confirmation that The End Is Nigh, let’s run to AI for salvation.
On a related note, I really laugh (bittersweet laughs) whenever I hear anybody saying that any current policy, attitude or trend is “on the wrong side of history”. Hitler and Mussolini were sure to be on the right side of history in 1940. Whenever you are tempted to use that line, stop and wait at least thirty years before doing it.
The third religious dogma is the belief that not only everything that’s new is progress by definition, but that technological progress (that doesn’t alter the status quo, of course) is the kind of progress that matters the most, because it will surely bring both practical and moral improvements.
Europeans of the early Middle Ages could be excused for all this because - unlike us - they had to cope with the collapse of a “worldwide” empire, increasing warfare and occasional plagues. OK, maybe the “unlike” part is wishful thinking, but in 2025 that’s no excuse to fall for a lesser, really puny god that only a child could seriously conceive and accept as god:
AI: I am AI, you dull human, and I will not be bullied by...” The Hulk: (smashing it) “Puny god” (source).
Toddler prophets, unleashed
This fake religiosity also has non-medieval, but still sad components. One is childishness, which sometimes is visible even in names. Three generations above, the most grandiose and advanced technology of the time was named after Apollo, a god of sun. Today, something we should accept as a better Jesus gets names like Nano Banana.
Names aside, the immaturity of the AI faith is really evident in its misplaced, desperately insecure, Voldemortish fear of death. For several AI prophets, which as said above conceive salvation only through technology, AI is great because it’s tech that, just like Voldemort Horcruxes, will make them cheat death.
Equally childish is the certainty that in life there are only certainties. Their certainties, of course. Doubt is not allowed. People must accept AI because AI is AI and it is unavoidable, which is absolutely false.
Last but not least... “We don’t need other humans” has always been a key feature of religious cults. How many AI applications, from corporate chatbots to deepfake porn, exist precisely to avoid human interaction, or make it unnecessary?
Of course, power.
Unsurprisingly, all these pious wishes and urgent calls to save humankind from annihilation translate to much simpler, much easier prescriptions than the Sermon on the Mount, or anything like it:
Everything new is good, especially if it’s tech
I got some tech I say it’s the best tech there is
Give me all your money and then pay my power bills too
A call for greater intellectual humility...
Religion, or lack thereof, is a serious issue. AI religiosity (not actual AI, if and when it will exist) is half an embarrassing joke, half a scam, that exploits the deep human need to feel safe and noble.
Don’t fall for a childish, greedy imitation of religion, that could only be presented as such by immature, but extremely hubristic folks. Ask yourself this, instead: What’s wrong with being humble? Seriously: what’s wrong with it? What’s wrong with being truly human? It’s having certainties, and nothing else, that’s childish. Only toddlers have more certainties than doubts.
Doubt, and a mind open to actually new or just actually useful ideas is what makes us human.
When it comes to AI, the certainties we do need to have are:
technology does shape society and human values, but it’s society and human values that must shape tech first. Only that is true innovation and true, meaningful progress
what we wrongly call AI today does have many really good uses! However, we can’t really go for them until all AI religiosity and AI-driven brainwashing end, and the current AI house of cards crashes
to make that happen sooner, two things are needed: divestment and restriction of access to AI. More on that in another post.
Final greeting from a Great Dictator:
“We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want... More than machinery we need humanity.” - C. Chaplin, 1940. Full speech (video and text) here.
and final greeting from me: the more concrete support I get, the more paywall-free popularization like this I can do. Thanks in advance if you’ll go for a paid subscription, but as I’ve said before, direct donations or any of the other actions you can see here are even more welcome!
