John Wyatt on Artificial intelligence and Simulated Relationships

The latest Cambridge Paper from the Jubilee Centre is available online here (from where a pdf can be downloaded), this one by John Wyatt:

John Wyatt, ‘Artificial intelligence and Simulated Relationships’, Cambridge Papers 28, 3 (December 2019).

Here is the summary:

‘Interactions with apparently human-like and ‘emotionally intelligent’ AIs are likely to become commonplace within the next ten years, ranging from entirely disembodied agents like chatbots through to physical humanoid robots. This will lead to new and troubling ethical, personal and legal dilemmas. Will the promotion of “relationships” with machines contribute to societal wellbeing and human flourishing, or provide new opportunities for manipulation and deception of the vulnerable? As biblical Christians we are called to safeguard and to celebrate the centrality of embodied human-to-human relationships, particularly in essential caring and therapeutic roles, and in our families and Christian communities.’

Romans 12: God’s New People #3 – Body Matters

Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God – this is your true and proper worship. Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is – his good, pleasing and perfect will.

Romans 12:1-2

Paul uses the language of the temple here – in words like ‘offer’ and ‘sacrifice’ and ‘worship’. But that earlier way of doing things is now transformed.

What is it we offer? Our bodies, says Paul.

As Christians, we can have a lingering ambivalence about our bodies. It’s all too tempting to think that the ‘real’ me is something ‘inside’ me – the ‘soul’ bit or the ‘spiritual’ bit. But Scripture often insists and everywhere implies that the ‘real’ me is embodied.

So, as Paul writes in Romans 3, human fallenness reveals itself through our bodies: in tongues which practise deceit; in lips which spread poison; in mouths which are full of bitterness and cursing; in feet which are swift to shed blood; in eyes which turn away from God. Then, several times in chapter 6, Paul calls us to ‘offer’ (the same word as in 12:1) our bodies as an ‘instrument of righteousness’, while in 8:23 he looks forward to ‘the redemption of our bodies’.

If Christianity involves a recovery of what it means to be truly human, it should come as no surprise that the body is caught up in that restoration. God has saved us – the whole of us. And the whole of us is to be offered back to him – hands, feet, eyes, ears, and mouth. The challenge is to take seriously what we will do, even today, with our hands or our eyes or our tongue or our brain. The delight is that all that makes us who we are and are becoming in Christ – all the joys as well as the limits of bodily life – can be seen as an ongoing act of worship to God.

But there is something more going on here. We are physically embodied, but we are also socially embedded. Paul’s appeal that we offer our ‘bodies’ (plural) as a ‘living sacrifice’ (singular) suggests he has in mind the whole community of Christians in Rome. This is not a sacrifice made by a wealthy patron on behalf of others in the church, but an act in which all God’s people take part.

So, it’s not just that the body matters, but that every body matters! And there is something about the goal of this sort of worship that allows the church – you and me, even today – to be the embodied presence of Christ in the world.

Interpretation 67, 1 (2013) on Embodiment

The main essays in the January 2013 issue of Interpretation: A Journal of Bible and Theology, are devoted to the theme of ‘Embodiment: Reclaiming the Body for Faith’.

Silvia Schroer and Thomas Staubli

Bodily and Embodied: Being Human in the Tradition of the Hebrew Bible

A depiction of the ancient Hebrew understanding of the human being must take into account the fact that the Bible does not contain a systematic anthropology, but unfolds the multiplicity of human existence inductively, aspectively, and in narrative fashion. In comparison to Greek body/soul dualism, but also in the context of body-(de-)construction and gender debates, this circumstance makes it a treasure trove of interesting, often contrasting recollections and insights with liberating potential. This assertion will be illustrated concretely in terms of the nexus points of the human body (throat, heart, and womb), the relationship of humans to animals and angels, and the questions of the power and value of a human being.

Yung Suk Kim

Reclaiming Christ’s Body (soma christou): Embodiment of God’s Gospel in Paul’s Letters

Traditionally, “the body of Christ” has been read through an organism metaphor that emphasizes unity of the community in Christ. The weakness of this reading is that there is no clear articulation of how members of the community are united with Christ. The body language in Paul’s letters can be best understood when read through a metaphor for a way of living that emphasizes Christ’s embodiment of God’s gospel. The body of Christ in Paul’s letters is, first of all, his physical body that represents his life and death. Then, derivatively, it is also associated with Christian living – for example, “You are Christ-like body” (1 Cor 12:27).

Nancey Murphy

Do Humans Have Souls? Perspectives from Philosophy, Science, and Religion

This essay seeks to promote a concept of human nature that is usually called nonreductive physicalism, which is at least not ruled out by Scripture, and may in fact be closer to biblical thinking than dualism. The essay then looks to neuroscience to show that it provides useful insights into how and why we behave as we do.

Debra A. Reagan

Reclaiming the Body for Faith

This essay examines what it means to be embodied members of the Body of Christ, exploring the metaphor in 1 Corinthians 12:12–27 in terms of gender, race/ethnicity, variant embodiment, abused bodies, and sexual bodies

Matthew Lee Anderson on Our Bodies

I’m looking forward to getting to Matthew Lee Anderson’s Earthen Vessels: Why Our Bodies Matter to Our Faith (Minneapolis: Bethany House, 2011) when it comes to the top of my ‘to read’ pile.

Meanwhile, I suspect a flavour of his reflections will be available in a recent Christianity Today piece – ‘God Has a Wonderful Plan for Your Body’ – and a conversation with Trevin Wax on ‘Thinking Theologically about the Body’.

In the latter, Anderson claims that ‘evangelicals have not given enough attention to the body from a uniquely theological standpoint’.

In the Christianity Today article, he suggests that evangelicals have tended to offer piecemeal approaches to the body, with ‘Jesus-approved’ versions of whatever happens to be in vogue at any given moment, whether related to sex, diets, or yoga.

He says:

‘While Christianity clearly impinges on every aspect of our bodily lives, the piecemeal approach to a theology of the body has significant drawbacks. Beyond the fragmented understanding of the body that comes from attending only to diverse activities and functions, the absence of an overarching theological backdrop risks reducing our ethical teachings and pastoral care to mere legalism. We lose the sense that Christianity proposes more a distinct way of life than a moralizing list of dos and don’ts.’

He suggests that evangelicals might learn from Pope John Paul’s significant work on the theology of the body, which ‘manages to merge theology, pastoral reflection, and practical teaching in a way that orients the reader toward genuine transformation’.

The brief conversation with Trevin Wax ranges widely over theology, gender, and sexuality, concluding with some takeaway thoughts for everyday living, including this:

‘One of the most pervasive counterfeit approaches to the body is rooted in a repudiation of all limits and a desire to overcome them through technological enhancement. On the extreme scale that leads to transhumanism. But for some of us, that just means rejecting the limits of sleep and depending on Red Bull to carry us through the day. My hope is that as we think theologically about the body we will see some of those limits as good for us, rather than repressive.’