Wake Up, Look Up

Hello everyone, and thanks for listening to Wake Up, Look Up, a podcast where we connect events happening in real time to the gospel of Jesus Christ. I'm Zach Weihrauch, and in today's episode, we're asking the question, who helps you understand you? This is prompted by an article I read in the Washington Post comparing, interestingly, palm readers and AI chatbots. The article was by Herbert Lynn. A fascinating approach. Basically, this is his argument. Palm readers, we know, don't really read our palms. They read us. A palm reader is someone adept at kind of figuring out who you are, what's going on in your life. Body language, clothing, facial expressions, and then kind of mirroring that back to you so that you feel seen, you feel known, and therefore you feel confident that whatever future they predict is actually going to happen. And Lynn's point is that chatbots actually use that same kind of protocol. And you know this. If you've engaged with any kind of AI Chatbot, what it does is learn the language of you and then mirror that back to you so that what you get can feel like friendship or companionship, but is really more a reflection of you. Now, people are overwhelmingly turning to AI chatbots for friendship. Recent, studies show one in eight American teenagers use AI chatbots for emotional support. 31% of American teenagers say that AI conversations are as satisfying as talking with real friends. People are finding they're having the best emotional conversations with chatbots. But here's the problem. One of the main functions of friendship, of intimacy, of relationship, is to help you figure out what's going on in you, to help you sort out good feelings from bad feelings, wise thoughts, or helpful thoughts from unhelpful thoughts. To do that, you, don't need a mirror reflecting you back to you, because after all, you. If you knew how to do all that, you wouldn't need friends. You need a window. You need friends who, through time with you, can see into what's going on in your heart and your mind and affirm what is worthy of being affirmed, but then challenge what needs to be challenged. Of course, AI doesn't do that. It's reflecting back. It's taking your side. Even, for example, if it tries to disagree with you and then you disagree with it, it will say back to you, oh, you totally. You're totally right. You know that if you've experienced it. what Lynn is saying is that AI can't replace human relationships because it's just a palm reader. It's giving you what you want to hear in order for you to Keep giving it business instead of a friend who's willing to say the hard thing. You know, this makes me think, by the way, about even having a relationship with God. Because of course, the danger is if we train ourselves to think that the best emotional conversations, the best expressions of intimacy are just someone affirming you, then we're going to take that from an AI chatbot into our marriages, into our friendships, and even in, to our relationship with God. But keep in mind that the writer of Hebrews, for example, in Hebrews 4:12 says this. the word of God is living and active. It judges thoughts and attitudes of the heart, meaning a dynamic relationship with God as he reveals himself in the Scriptures through the power of his Holy Spirit and the person of Jesus Christ. He is going to challenge you. And you need that right? Because Jeremiah 17 says the heart is desperately wicked. The word of God, the presence of God tells, us what is good in us and what is bad, calls us to, to a new way of living, which means challenge. It's a challenge of love, of course, a challenge to help us grow. But there is no path to growth. There is no path to holiness that doesn't involve challenge. So I guess in some ways what I would say is this. We are developing in ourselves an appetite for and a definition of what real relationship and real conversations look like. If AI forms that and we're gonna stop growing, we're gonna live in a thought bubble of our own making, and we'll never be challenged and we'll never actually grow as Christians. I'm not saying we can't use AI but I'm saying we can never go to AI for what God has told us to come to him for. And we should never go to AI for what God has told us to go to each other for. There's a reason why God tells us that he wants to speak into our hearts. There's a reason why he surrounds us with a church that helps us grow and form in a healthy way. So by all means, develop and find ways to use artificial intelligence, but do not let it replace a God of challenge. Friends of challenge. Because you need them to become the person that God has for you to be. Hey, thanks for watching this episode of Wake Up, Look Up. If you enjoyed it, please help us get the word out by sharing it with someone you think might benefit from it. And while you're here, make sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to get further content or even download the CCC app, where you'll find even more resources to help you grow in your faith and relationship with Jesus Christ.

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