Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-lnqnp Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-25T16:21:54.242Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

1 - Introduction

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2024

Beth Singler
Affiliation:
Universität Zürich
Fraser Watts
Affiliation:
University of Cambridge
Get access

Summary

Artificial intelligence (AI) as an object and term remains enmeshed in our imaginaries, narratives, institutions and aspirations. AI has that in common with the other object of discussion in this Cambridge Companion: religion. But beyond such similarities in form and reception, we can also speak to how entangled these two objects have been, and are yet still becoming, with each other. This introductory chapter explores the difficulty of definitions and the intricacies of the histories of these two domains and their entanglements. It initially explores this relationship through the religious narratives and tropes that have had a role to play in the formation of the field of AI, in its discursive modes. It examines the history of AI and religion through the language and perspectives of some of the AI technologists and philosophers who have employed the term ‘religion’ in their discussions of the technology itself. Further, this chapter helps to set the scene for the larger conversation on religion and AI of this volume by demonstrating some of the tensions and lacunae that the following chapters address in greater detail.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bender, C. 2010. The New Metaphysicals: Spirituality and the American Religious Imagination. University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Castells, M. 2022. “The Network Society Revisited.” American Behavioral Scientist 67(7), 940946.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chandrasekaran, B. and Reeker, L. H. 1974. “Report on Workshop on Possibilities and Limitations of Artificial Intelligence.” In IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics SMC-4(1), 8Google Scholar
Dewey, J. 1925. Experience and Nature. Open Court.Google Scholar
Hofstadter, D. 1980. “Reductionism and Religion.” In The Behavioral and Brain Sciences, ed. Searle, J.. Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Penn, J. 2022. “Inventing Intelligence: On the History of Complex Information Processing and Artificial Intelligence in the United States in the Mid-Twentieth Century.” Unpublished PhD Thesis, Cambridge University. www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/315976.Google Scholar
Rapaport, A. 1964. “Review: Computers and Thought by Edward Feigenbaum and Julian Feldman.” Management Science 11(1), Series A, Sciences, 535.Google Scholar
Robinson, G. 1972. “How to Tell Your Friends from Machines.” Mind, New Series 81(324), 504518.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Singler, B. 2018a. “Roko’s Basilisk or Pascal’s? Thinking of Singularity Thought Experiments as Implicit Religion.” Implicit Religion 20(3), 279297.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Singler, B. 2018b. “An Introduction to Artificial Intelligence and Religion for the Religious Studies Scholar.” Implicit Religion 20(3), 215231.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Singler, B. 2022a. “Origin and the End: Artificial Intelligence, Atheism, and Imaginaries of the Future of Religion.” In Emerging Voices in Science and Theology: Contributions from Young Women, ed. Sollereder, B. and McGrath, A.. Routledge.Google Scholar
Singler, B. 2022b. “Left Behind? Religion as a Vestige in ‘The Rapture of the Nerds’ and Other AI Singularity Literature.” In Science and Religion in Western Literature: Critical and Theological Studies, ed. Fuller, M. Routledge.Google Scholar
Taira, T. 2022. “Introduction.” In Taking “Religion” Seriously: Essays on the Discursive Study of Religion, ed. Taira, T. Supplements to Method and Theory in the Study of Religion, vol. 18. Brill.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tucker, E. 2022. “Artifice and Intelligence.” Center on Privacy and Technology. https://medium.com/center-on-privacy-technology/artifice-and-intelligence%C2%B9-f00da128d3cd.Google Scholar
Turing, A. M. 1950. “Computing Machinery and Intelligence.” Mind 59(236), 433460.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×