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BULLETIN ONE HUNDRED & TEN

IN the NOV-DEC Edition of the Answers magazine, from Kentucky, there is a somewhat unusual and interesting article from the Dan Wooster,

In this article, pp. 35-37, Dan Wooster considers the impact of more and more versatile robots and automated formats resembling intelligence, and with capacities more like those of human beings. In many things, with technical advance, and with copying of principles of operation to some extent given by God to humans, he appears to consider man may have to take a dose of humility, of being outwrought by his own little creations, and no more able to tower in what one might style pseudo-magnificence, though Wooster does not use that word. Of course, he makes the points of our value to God in view of Calvary, and our position as image-bearers in leading in the praise of God. It is a matter of spreading influence.

Thus, with increasing contrived, copied facilities, or those approximating some of those of man, that might seem so, some might argue for man's displacement by his own creations. However, it is as Wooster points out, not in any case at that level that the AI products work!  Indeed, one must emphasise, technicalities are not everything, even functionally in achievements and relays, and Wooster points out that  "the best AI hardly comes close to the incredible creativity and design" of any human. Indeed, we might add, 'the human touch' (often vile, but often kindly) has a basis beyond any copying man can forge.

Since we are recipients not only of technical facilities and notable combinations of a wide range of functions that can suffer much imitation, those other ones aspects in and of man need to be considered in this context, and the extension of this emphasis is necessary.

Ever tried to create freedom ? conscious freedom ? logically based freedom and not some ersatz variety ? Here is logic NOT without tears! You cannot create freedom because to achieve any characterisability for AI, you need to operate at a level, or function, or collocation of controls, be they every so statistically oriented, that is simply not up to the level of that freedom which is of God alone. He being infinite in understanding, has no parallel, let alone co-performer, and when He creates a man in His own image, despite His own intense desire, that creation can digress to the point of self-destruction, even if initially only in part.

The depth back of this creation is infinite; the personality behind it is without limit of nuance and principle, subtlety and penetration, so that as in the technicalities behind bio-mimicry, so much more is it so in the sophistication and perspective of eternity, He makes His models, mankind, remarkable and personal. It leads to the feat and features sometimes  more like crushed or crumbling towers than soaring wonders, when they elect to depart from Him, in whatever mode this is displayed (cf. Genesis 3 and Ephesians 1:4, with John 15:21ff.).

The political realities which in our race have  become more and more in much and for many systematically defunct, instead of being episodically more appalling or less,  now move to an intensity of corruption, disruption, lavish immorality, that is almost like a chronic disease. Indeed, this development is even becoming more and more a matter of mandate, as in Isaiah 5, the State and many others calling good evil and evil good, while short-term gain is allowed to distance wisdom to the point of requiring spiritual field-glasses to  perceive in its setting. Such is the case in many such environments. It even has applications for many nations in unculled borrowings for one nation or group from another, which seem set to burden the next generation - if the Lord does not return first - with a harrowing financial incubus.

The courage, conviction and faith-built works of divine grace in others is both refreshing and staggering and amid the millions of those now displaced, homeless because armed thieves took the houses, often the result of their labours and turned them, the former occupants,  into hordes of displaced persons, is a contrary testimony. For many,  there is little question whether this is fast becoming a classic tribulation resembling the last in most points, as they suffer the consequences, en masse, of greed and devotion to a false glory on the part of their persecutors.

Man may align with God or not, and the differences create an infinite divergence and diversity because they draw on things infinitely apart. As God's power, grace and wisdom is or is not available on a systematic basis, according to the faith and conditions of the pilgrimage given to each of His people, so the imitation of it is impossible, In KIND. While some systematic faults in logic may be detected by a robot mentality, yet where it attempts to deal with the spiritual realities, it may like many, fail entirely to show, like its mentor, any grasp of the entire dimension in view, and so fail utterly. Grasping of such points does not readily appear in what is purposely without God, and the distortions are many.

It is when God Himself acts that certain mists may begin to clear (cf. Ephesians 4:17-19, Romans 1:17ff.). True He may yet intervene, but not save without Christ, and without salvation the cost itself which was paid to gain it, as Wooster notes, is indicative of its value.

That value ? it is one not only of feeling but of fact, status, spiritual things seeming foolish to the godless (I Cor. 2), and hence normally neither evaluated, presented or comprehended. It is not a matter of suffering as such,  for many Christians for Christ suffer agonies; it IS a matter of the whole realities of God (John 16:13-15), exposure to them, knowledge of them and of the liberality of the Lord.

As receptors, man may be elevated to understanding, wisdom, vision and victory that this world (and its creations) knows nothing of. It is hard to  represent what you do not know in any facility or with any ability, programmatic or otherwise. Nothing even remotely like a human being will ever come from a robot, nor will robot become spirit at the behest of man (cf. Isaiah 31:1-3). Man is mightily empowered and staggeringly limited, so that when you find man marvelling at his own greatness (the odious human racism, far the worst of all), it is small wonder the Lord often shows His contempt (cf. Isaiah 37, Ezekiel 28:9). Man is in no final danger of being left behind amid his creations, unless in a searing irony, it is merely his remnant, stripped of his due relationship with his God and Creator, that is left like a beached whale.

Robots can be amazing; man in potential scope is far beyond them. Even if in their reduced and non-vital, non-God-related minimality, robots may can maximise response to certain tasks and perform in battle notable achievements and show a certain species of sponsored creativity, yet their scope is limited like the lighting provided by a torch on a dark night, as God shows from time to time, in obliterative impact (cf. Ezekiel 37, Micah 7:14ff.), throughout the ages (cf. Jeremiah 18:13 - 19:8, Ezekiel 28, Jeremiah 50-51, Ezekiel 29:1-15, Zechariah 12). In such cases, He often predicts before He performs, as grace is defiled and justice is effectually invoked by many.

This aspect needs to be kept in mind. Many dictators seem to imagine they can construct themselves or their power or their opinions or their race or nation into looming objects of a pseudo-divine wonder; but they routinely fall, fail or look ridiculous. Death does not adorn them, and their dehumanising lusts depart with joy for the minds of many. Man is frankly ridiculous when he imagines that he can stand on the platform with (or instead of ) God.