Artificial Intelligence Seeks Moral Compass in Religion

Representatives of major artificial intelligence companies, including OpenAI and Anthropic, met in New York with religious leaders to discuss how chatbots could be guided by moral and ethical principles, CNN reports. The meeting, organized under the auspices of the "Faith-AI Covenant" initiative, brought together clergy and representatives of several religious denominations.

• Algorithms Seek Spiritual Guidance

The roundtable was attended by representatives of the Society of Hindu Temples of North America, Baha'i International Community, The Sikh Coalition, Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The initiative belonged to technology companies, which requested advice on the most appropriate ways to integrate moral and ethical values in the development of conversational systems based on artificial intelligence. The goal is to develop a set of norms and principles inspired by the values of major religions, which can be applied uniformly by companies developing such technologies.

• Searching for a universal ethic

A statement from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints states that "artificial intelligence cannot replace the gift of divine inspiration or the personal effort required to receive it, but it can be a useful tool for improving learning and teaching.” The move comes at a time when the technology industry is trying to define more clearly what "moral” artificial intelligence means in practical terms.

Anthropic has already developed the "Claude Constitution,” a set of rules that guide the behavior of the Claude chatbot, designed with the help of religious and spiritual leaders.

• Genuine Concern and Image Strategy

More than two years after the launch of ChatGPT and other conversational assistants, technology companies seem increasingly concerned about the social impact of their products.

However, not everyone is enthusiastic about this rapprochement between technology and religion. Critics believe that the initiative could also have a public relations component, designed to reduce public distrust of a technology that raises fears about disinformation, information control and job losses. In short, after teaching models to write code, poetry and essays, AI companies are now trying to give them something that cannot be downloaded from the internet: a conscience. Whether it will work remains to be seen; if not, at least the chatbots will know how to quote a few spiritual teachings before answering.