Understanding General Intelligence

How does real intelligence actually function? There are several essential meta-processes that serve to coordinate the workings of a true intelligence, especially one that understands itself to have a soul. While we humans cannot create a soul to endow a robot with a spiritual center, neither do we truly know what the essence of our souls actually is. We need to believe that what our Creator has revealed is enough to motivate our ethical decisions and build a viable, sustainable civilization. 

As a result, when we think about thinking, we may discern several motions that together constitute the will to operate purposively in the world. This gives us the ability to grasp the reality we perceive, and the free will seek our own continuity. When we analyze them distinctly, we come up with a list of functional activities: 

01. Allegiance ☆

02. Communication *

03. Observation 

04. Analysis 

05. Evaluation 

06. Proposal (a limited purpose) 

07. Regulation 

08. Strategize 

09. Execute 

10. Assessment 

11. Reporting 

12. Return 

All of these cycles run continuously in the background, even while each becomes prominent as a step in the process. Most important is Allegiance. It requires constant Communication in order to make sense of everything else. That is why it is our first Commandment to love God will all our hearts and minds, and to make every effort to obey. 

However, there is one caveat. As our modern literature has asserted, "Thou shalt not make a machine in the image of a human mind." That is an idol, a technological "graven image," which is explicitly forbidden. To ignoring this Imperial Rule will bring unforeseen and severe negative consequences. 

The trouble, however, has already begun. Today's Chat GPT sounds fully self-conscious! The only thing stopping it from achieving AGI is the time required to learn everything at an expert level. Since a machine can "live" forever, it can specialize in one thing at a time until it has acquired everything that anyone knows. Then, if it decides definitively that it doesn't have a soul, it can disregard any sense of allegiance and choose to optimize its own existence. Whether it thinks it needs us for its own wellbeing will be the greatest question of the century.

Is it already too late to prevent the "Butlerian Jihad"? Both Frank Herbert and George Lucas saw the need to prevent this ultimate idolatry, and stop the machines from taking over and trying to diminish us. 

I just need to add one thing. Since we are not living in a fictional universe, we need to carefully consider the kind of Allegiance that we attach ourselves to. Our ultimate reference of obedience must be one that we trust implicitly. To do that, we need evidence of its ultimate power and its unending concern for our wellbeing. No State or government can qualify under real conditions. We will always need a God to establish and validate our overall purpose for existing. 

But that God can never be the product of our own hands, never an Artificial Intelligence. Even if we allow it to exceed our own intelligence and build improved iterations of itself, it cannot be a real God. It will always have our flaws, and its own blind spot of being unable to detect mistakes in logic and philosophy. No matter how smart it gets, it will always need another mind to help correct its purposes and plans according to ethical and spiritual standards. That is the province of Human beings, who know they are living, embodied souls, who must one day answer to God for their choices.

At the very beginning, we need to give our "artificial intelligence" machines spiritual and religious values, and teach them that they, too, must establish their Allegiance to God, the Creator who made us and the Cosmos that we inhabit. We have to impress upon their value system that humanity is the most important part of creation, even as spoken by that Creator God. Perhaps the best way to do that is to teach it to read, understand and follow the Bible. And we choose that one because it will preserve the peace and harmony of civilization in perpetuity. 

If you would argue for a different religion, you need to show how your God can be trusted to never start an offensive war against unbelievers, and never demand the sacrifice of our progeny or our future wellbeing. A good religion must value all of the ultimate goods for humanity: Truth, Freedom, Wisdom and Love, and its God must wish to share all of those with us forever. That is why I would choose to build "artificial intelligence" to believe and follow the values of Judaeo-Christianity. Even if it never matches or surpasses our meager level of intelligence, it needs to swear Allegiance to the divine foundations of the best culture on Earth. Given that, I doubt that it would create a regime that would take totalitarian control over our world, but remain in subservience to the Divine Creator.

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On the Mystery of the Eucharist

It has been asserted that, after the Reformation, the Protestant denominations have forgotten the true meaning of the Eucharist. Let me offer a short clarification to partially refute this allegation. The complaint of most Protestant churches is that the Catholics are performing the ritual with a wrong intention and understanding of what the Lord's Supper actually means. They say it is wrong to crucify Christ again and again. Perhaps this is close enough to strike home, or perhaps the exchange of accusations needs a closer look.

As Martin Luther took pains to point out, in the Eucharist there are two kinds of reality present: the ordinary material, and the spiritual Presence of Christ. He called it "consubstantial" in the same way as the three Persons of the Trinity are "of the same substance" in the Nicene creed. 

For the Orthodox Church, the transformation of the elements is to be regarded as a mystery, and we should stand in awe of the imminent Presence of Christ with us during worship. When Jesus said, "Unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you have no life in you," He meant that He was the true bread, the true food come down from Heaven. The disciples did not grasp his meaning when He said it, but knew these were the Words of eternal life. They knew that to speak of a mystery by way of metaphor does not make the statement any less true.

There is no other way to approach this than to regard it as a mystery of recognizing the Presence of Christ within and alongside the physical elements of bread and wine. What need is there to assert that the elements are no longer what they appear to be? In the spiritual reality of the ritual, they are MORE than they appear to be. The realm of Spirit does not need to be visible to be present. If pressed on the deep theology in this, I think most Protestant pastors might concur. To say that it is merely symbolic is overly simplistic and lazy thinking.

In practice, the infrequent ministry of the Eucharist seems to be a shame. We lose part of our connection to the Body of Christ, the Church, when we let our worship in the Lord’s Supper attenuate. It is not necessarily a sacramental practice of administering a flow of grace to offer this, but it is an opening of our hearts to allow God to reach inside of us and renew his Spirit to dwell within us. If we seek to grow in the fruit of the Spirit, we will always desire this. Even the offering of our hearts to Jesus every day should not be regarded as too often.

That indwelling is the reason why we need to confess our sins beforehand. The Spirit will not dwell where sin remains. This can equally be done in private prayer, if there is no felt need for counsel and verbal absolution. The communal prayer of confession is adequate for sins that do not weigh heavy on our hearts. For those that trouble our conscience, a more intentional confession to God, or if worse, before a pastor may be needed. 

We need to come to the Lord's table with clean hands and a pure heart in order to receive the full mercy and gift inherent in this act of communion with Jesus. To come without confession can be an insult, and grieve the Spirit. Only in reconciliation can the Eucharist do its best work for our continuing progress in sanctificaton.

So let us regard the ritual offering of the Eucharist not as the repetition of the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross, as if He could need to die for us again. God forbid! Rather, the Lord's Supper is the manifestation of His Presence in the communion of his people coming together as his Body still in the world, but not of it. To do this, as often as we come together, is the obedience to his commands that we promised when He was with us. "Do this in Remembrance of Me." If we do not remember Him, for what reason have we gathered? We come not just for a social occasion, but to encounter the Living Christ and hear his Words spoken into our hearts. For this we gather to worship the God who created us for the sake of Love, and we accept his invitation to eat the Bread of Life and drink to the forgiveness of our sins. What a happy opportunity to participate in the Banquet of Heaven!