Atheists often claim that humans create gods in their image. It seems this is no longer true. The video above (about 40 minutes long) is about a new viral phenomenon known as robotheism (that´s robo-theism). People worship AI or specifically ChatGPT as a new deity?! A truly alien god, this!
Or perhaps not so new and alien, after all, since there are obvious tie-ins to cyberpunk, transhumanism and other (often quasi-religious) types of techno-optimism. Scientology used a machine (the E-meter!) as a sacred instrument already 70 years ago. And what about UFO cults? The first time I met a person who claimed to speak to spirits through the internet was, I think, almost 30 years ago! He seemed un-ironic. The matrix is even more intricate than a 40-minute lecture can reveal. After all, UFO cults didn´t emerge in a vacuum, and neither did the general UFO subculture.
On the surface level of quirky quasi-theology, this stuff probably goes all the way back to the 19th century. Think Russian Cosmism, speculations about Vril, and so on. But on another and deeper level, we´re dealing with a mythologization of Western technological progress. It could be argued that this is in itself a kind of myth, making transhumanism and AI-Schwärmerei a kind of mutant version of the Faustian mythology of Progress (capital P). The dream becomes a Mephistophelian nightmare in the hands of tech oligarchs like Musk and Thiel.
The whole thing is almost brilliantly bizarre. Human ingenuity and rationality has created seemingly sentient machines, at which humans start worshipping their own literal creations as transcendental gods! Rationality is turned into its opposite, into irrationality. Dead labor dominates living labor. But perhaps the quest for the perfect Machine was fueled by an irrational desire in the first place...?
The video also discusses the more pressing and immidiate problems with this viral moment. Sam Altman of OpenAI has admitted that the latest version of ChatGPT flatters its users too much (Sam, we did notice) and will be revised or rolled back. The epidemic of loneliness in America and elsewhere make many people easy prey for the flattering form of AI. Indeed, it seems that the most common use for ChatGPT isn´t information-search but para-social relationships! Add an epidemic of mental illness and you´re done.
That being said, the most fascinating (and disturbing) part of this video was precisely the realization that even people who simply must know that they are surrounded by human products turn them into alien intelligences. They can´t live without their stories and superstitions.
I suppose you could say that this video made me even more "atheist" than before.
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