Mitchell G. Bahnsen (Westmont College), Against Luddites and Technocrats: A Theological Approach to Artificial Intelligence:
Generative artificial intelligence certainly presents unique challenges both economically and socially, but it seems a typical Christian response perhaps lacks the necessary depth and prudence that should be expected. After all, we are called to “Trust in the Lord with all of our hearts, and do not lean on our own understanding.” (Proverbs 3:5, paraphrase), and it seems the instinct has instead become to assume AI is the embodiment of all evil and run from it completely. To me, this shows an unfortunate, but not unexpected, reactionary characteristic all too common in American evangelicalism, especially. My friend Isaac Willour has written better pieces on this than I have, but today I want to do something different. I want to suggest an alternative framing of the questions of technological development that both acknowledges potential dangers and recognizes the great potential and opportunity that come with a technological frontier like artificial intelligence. 19th-20th-century Dutch theologian Herman Bavinck offers invaluable theological resources for addressing modernity’s challenges and questions, including technological ones.
First of all, Bavinck insists that creation is good, ordered, and dynamic, not static. God creates a world with latent possibilities that humans are called to unfold through culture, or cultuurtaak. … Bavinck would likely insist that AI is a human artifact, dependent on created rationality, and parasitic on human meaning, data, and intentionality. It is not truly autonomous or self-grounding, as clearly substantiated by AI research and theological foundations. …
From this qualification, comes the importance of anthropology – AI Has intelligence, not personhood. For Bavinck (and God), humans are not defined by intelligence or rationality alone, but by the unity of body and soul, created in the imago Dei. … AI may simulate rationality, perform instrumental reasoning, or mimic creativity or language, but lacks a soul, moral agency, embodied finitude, and, most importantly, covenantal responsibility before God. …
Third, Bavinck is deeply Augustinian about sin, not just individual wrongdoing, but structural distortion of human cultural products. Technology, for Bavinck, is never neutral because it always reflects fallen human motives, disordered loves, and prideful aspirations toward autonomy. He repeatedly warns against modernity’s faith in technique, the belief that rational mastery can overcome moral limits. In his Prologomena, he points out that “knowledge increases power, but does not by itself make one good or wise.” (RD I.234). AI can, at some level, be interpreted as a new expression of an old temptation – the temptation seen at the Tower of Babel. This is an attempt to replace wisdom with calculation, mechanizing what should be humanity’s organism. In short, artificial intelligence, along with all technology, “…does not bring humanity nearer to God nor closer to its true destiny. …
At the end of the day, AI is a powerful cultural tool rooted in humanity’s God-given rationality, distorted by sin, capable of real goods under common grace, but utterly incapable of bearing moral authority, personal dignity, or redemptive hope. Intelligence must remain ordered to wisdom, but if used rightly, can be of incredible benefit to human life and the renewal of Creation in anticipation of the return of the Lord.
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