Staying Human: A Jewish Theology for the Age of Artificial Intelligence

by Harris Bor

Futurists speculate that we are heading towards a 'singularity,' where AI will outsmart human beings, and humanity will coalesce into a single, ever-expanding mind for which data is everything. The idea mirrors conceptions of God as everything, singular, and all-knowing. But is this idea of the singularity, or God, good for humanity? Oneness has its attractions. But what space does it leave for individuality and difference? In this book, British-Jewish theologian, Harris Bor, explores these questions by applying approaches to oneness and difference found in the thought of philosophers, Benedict Spinoza (1632-1677) and Martin Heidegger (1889-1976), to the challenges of religious belief and practice in the era of AI. What emerges is a dynamic religion of the everyday capable of balancing all aspects of being, while holding tight to a God who is both singular and wholly other, and which urges us, above all, to stay human.

342 pages, Kindle Edition

Published December 28, 2021

Reviews

[Haran · Rating 2 out of 5]

I enjoyed the introduction to Spinoza's thoughts on metaphysics and ontology. The author presented his views in a very clear manner - through the concept of dualism versus monism. After the first hundred pages or so the book shifts from Spinoza to compare his perspective on humans - which is that we have an innate desire to maintain both our physical and mental attributes - against that of Hedegger which is more absteact and allows for more human qualities such as lack of rationality and creativity. The latter discussion was less clear and the argument against Spinoza was unconvincing and appeared biased in Bor's religious upbringings - ironically yielding itself to Spinoza's argument about the innate drive of human's mental activities - to maintain coherence of our mental understanding of the world. Overall I would not recommend this book, it does a slow unconvincing job of arguing against Spinoza and then discussing its relation to modern Jewish theology.