“Is artificial intelligence of the devil? Maybe.”

Steve Brown:
Is artificial intelligence of the devil? The answer to that maybe, on Key Life.

Matthew Porter:
If you think laughter isn’t spiritual or that faithfulness to God means conformity to Christian stereotypes, then this program probably isn’t for you. But if you’re looking for honest, Biblical answers to honest questions, welcome to Key Life. Here’s our host, author, and seminary professor Steve Brown, along with Pete Alwinson from ForgeBibleStudy.com.

Steve Brown:
Thank you Matthew. Hi Pete.

Pete Alwinson:
Hey man. How you doing?

Steve Brown:
I’m doing really good, as a matter of fact. I, you know, I’m old as dirt and I’m doing good and I keep telling Jesus it must be because I’ve been so pure.

Pete Alwinson:
It has to be.

Steve Brown:
And then he says, I think the angels are laughing. So, it’s pure grace, man. I feel really good. And I’m healthier than I ought to be. That’s Pete Alwinson, by the way. If you haven’t read his book, Like Father Like Son, you’re working on another book, aren’t you?

Pete Alwinson:
Yep. Five Marks of Manhood will be out later this year, next year maybe. Probably next year.

Steve Brown:
Oh man. I hope it’s going to be as good as the first one. I bet it’s going to be better. Five Marks of Manhood, but not yet, you’ll have to wait to find out what he says in that book, but get Like Father Like Son now. By the way, go to ForgeTruth.com for all things Pete Alwinson and Jesus. He comes in as you know, and we answer questions on Friday. We love your questions. You can call 1-800-KEY-LIFE, 24 7, and we record your question and sometimes you put it on the air. You can send your question to

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or you can e-mail your question to [email protected] and help us financially if you can. We’re a member of ECFA in the States and CCCC in Canada. And both those organizations oversee our books to make sure we’re not buying Mercedes and mansions and airplanes. We’re spending this for the glory of God. And I promise we’ll squeeze every dime. If you can help us do, if you can’t pray for us. Pete, would you lead us in prayer and then we’ll get to these questions.

Pete Alwinson:
You’ve got it. Father, we come to you today on this Friday, and what a grateful heart we bring. Lord, we come to you, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We thank you for always being large and in charge, all powerful, mighty, kind, compassionate. And Lord, even now, we, we know that we have had sins to confess and we do that. And you say that when we do confess our sins, you are always, because of the work of Christ, faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from our unrighteousness. So Lord, don’t let the enemy we pray keep us bound up in our shame and guilt. We come to you as your deeply beloved daughters and sons because of Jesus and we honor you. And Lord, we ask that you’d continue to bring your power into our lives and our relationships. Lord, some of us need jobs, some of us need healing. Lord, some of us need hope, we’re fearful and we ask that you would be our source for all of those things. We ask that you’d be with our pastors, priests, teachers, leaders, worship directors, all those that will lead us into your presence in worship this week-end. And we ask that you would be honored and glorified, and even in this time now of Q&A, as we pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Steve Brown:
Amen. Pete, let’s go to the phone lines.

Caller 1:
Is artificial intelligence satanic?

Steve Brown:
Well, that’s a good question.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
It really is. And you know, in our, in the media today, it’s almost like it’s been there for a long time. But all of a sudden, a lot of attention is being given to it, and there’s some significant dangers that are involved with artificial intelligence. You know, we even have lawmakers that are talking about outlawing artificial intelligence. Well, lots of luck with that.

Pete Alwinson:
Right, right.

Steve Brown:
And, you know, this is out, this genie is out of the bottle and you can’t outlaw it. It’ll do the same thing as, when we tried to outlaw booze, it’s just not going to work. There are other things that need to be done. But this is pretty scary, isn’t it?

Pete Alwinson:
You know, social developments like this, you’re absolutely right. But when the government starts saying, can we put a moratorium on it, a stop on it for now, so we can think through the ethicality of it? It never happens. So, you’re absolutely right.

Steve Brown:
Of course I am. I’m ordained.

Pete Alwinson:
Well, you’re the ordained and you’re the doctor, you know, so you know, I guess I would say, One thing about it, I would say, all good things can always be used for nefarious purposes. Right? And bad purposes, and so, the internet, the good purposes that God is using, I mean, we’re getting theological education all over the world.

Steve Brown:
Yeah. That’s true.

Pete Alwinson:
And yet there’s horrible uses of the internet. So, I think the same is true with AI. One of the things is the slanting of the internet and all communication.

Steve Brown:
So, you’ve got to keep Democrats and Republicans away from artificial intelligence.

Pete Alwinson:
Because we know they’re going to use it.

Steve Brown:
Oh man, you’re going to try to slant it.. You know, Jeremy, who is the producer of this program, he sits in a room, that we look at him through a glass. He’s got all kinds of machines and buttons and stuff that he does, and he’s incredible. He’s incredible technically, and by the way, one of the finest musicians that I know. Plays several instruments and sometimes two at the same time.

Pete Alwinson:
Amazing.

Steve Brown:
And writes music for ESPN. And for their Christmas music, he wrote some of that. But back to that, he’s technologically advanced and we were talking about artificial intelligence before we came on the air, and he said that they’re already slanting it in a woke way. Now, I don’t know how you feel about woke. I would rather you be woken to Christ, than to what the culture says. But that can be kind of dangerous.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah. And that’s one of the ways AI can be weaponized, twisted as it inserts, you know, it was interesting, also to see, Elon Musk being interviewed

Steve Brown:
Yeah. That was a great interview.

Pete Alwinson:
on Fox. And he’s very thoughtful and he doesn’t lay it out, but he does, he was asked the question, could it take over and control other aspects? And he said, yes, his sort of, his big worry is that once that super brain comes together, it could overmatch, over control other, all other communication on the internet. Now, that’s above my pay grade, but it is one of the potentialities. It’s a theme that’s been in movies, like The Matrix and others.

Steve Brown:
Yeah.

Pete Alwinson:
Where the machines are ruling the day. Now, I think, we don’t even know probably all of the things that we ought to be concerned about

Steve Brown:
Yeah.

Pete Alwinson:
concerning AI.

Steve Brown:
I agree.

Pete Alwinson:
I guess the bigger question is what do we do about it, Steve? What do we do in light of the reality of AI?

Steve Brown:
Well, I think we can put some parameters, legal parameters around it. Not that it can’t be used, but that there will be prosecution with people that try to misuse it and hurt people with it. You don’t, you can’t throw artificial intelligence into jail, but you can say that it can be used to hurt people, to give disinformation, to twist truth, to put it in a particular philosophical, non-Christian way, to contradict things that we believe and hold to be true, to encourage pedophilia. You know, I could go on and on and on.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right. That’s right.

Steve Brown:
And I think it’s perfectly possible to make some legal parameters around the whole idea of artificial intelligence. And I don’t think our lawmakers are even thinking that way.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
I think, you know, they always come out of, they make a law for everything, and pretty soon we have a culture that is no longer free. And I don’t want to go there.

Pete Alwinson:
Right.

Steve Brown:
And we’re moving in that direction. Censorship now has become, in some places a legal thing. And that’s awful. So, I don’t want them to be bozos or knuckleheads, and they are sometimes, but to thoughtfully think through this issue and the dangers that are a part of it, and to create some kind of legal parameters.

Pete Alwinson:
Mm-hmm. I agree. I agree. I think that needs to be a part of what our leaders do. I think in addition to that, we as Christians probably, definitely need to pray for our leaders and legislators that they would bring some moral parameters around it. The problem is, is that most of those in public service today, most are not really thinking through the lens of the Judeo-Christian Biblical ethic.

Steve Brown:
That’s true.

Pete Alwinson:
So, when we say, to provide moral parameters around AI, they, they don’t have that. So, we need to ask that God would raise up voices that would bring that moral base to our leadership. I think another thing that we can do, we should do as Christians is that we have to know the truth as it’s in embodied in Scripture and understand Scripture deeply because the lies are going to become much more difficult to understand.

Steve Brown:
They already are.

Pete Alwinson:
They already are.

Steve Brown:
And AI would put that on steroids.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
In the hands of the wrong people.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right. And we need to be winsome communicators of that truth too.

Steve Brown:
And the thing, you know, we’re in trouble as a nation. And I’m talking to you guys in Canada too. We’re in some serious trouble. And the only remedy, and I don’t know of any leaders that know how to fix it, they’re as confused as everybody else is, and it keeps moving at this historic pace. And it’s scary. And it’s anti-Christian.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
Best thing you can do in our culture is to make sure you join a church, a good church, and you support it.

Pete Alwinson:
Right.

Steve Brown:
But going back to what you said about truth, the one thing that will salvage our culture. And you guys in Canada too is an awakening, a revival.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
And that comes from God.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
And artificial intelligence can and will be programmed to turn us away from the very thing that would save us.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free.

We need to know the truth and we need to speak relationally with people about the truth.

Steve Brown:
Good stuff. And by the way, you asked whether it was satanic? Well, in the sense we’ve been talking about, it can be. Key Life is a listener supported production of Key Life Network.