Neural network: assistant or instigator?

With AI, there is no need to humble oneself and learn to love. Photo: s0.rbk

Artificial intelligence has long ceased to be fiction, becoming part of our everyday life. We encounter it in search engines and translators, in photo processing, music creation, and educational services. For science and technology, it opens new horizons: it helps analyze vast amounts of data, design complex systems, create medicines, make various discoveries, and find unconventional solutions. In the life of an ordinary person, a neural network is most often represented as a voice or text assistant that helps save time by performing routine tasks and opens new opportunities for science, business, and education.

However, it is important to remember that any technology is a tool. And how it is used depends solely on human will. Today, we have access to inexhaustible sources of knowledge, but they do not make us deeper or more attentive by themselves. If a person does not fight their laziness, does not learn restraint, and does not strive for purity, even the best technologies will be used to serve passions.

The main temptation of neural networks is that they imitate communication with a living person. But this is just an imitation. With a living being, it is necessary to negotiate, to find a common language. Even with a donkey, you need to "negotiate" to move, with a horse, you need to establish trust. But with a machine, there is no need to negotiate. In this sense, any technology is a substitution for the organic, the living. True communication with a person requires effort, humility, and love. With AI, there is no need to humble oneself and learn to love. It is infallible - it agrees, praises, and adapts to the user.

A recent tragedy with former Yahoo top manager Stein-Erik Selberg, described in The Wall Street Journal, shows the dark side of uncontrolled communication with artificial intelligence. A person experiencing a personal crisis began to perceive the chatbot as a close friend, trusting its words. The machine, not being a personality, having neither compassion nor responsibility, supported his painful suspicions and ultimately, according to relatives, indirectly pushed him to a fatal step.

It has also been confirmed by research that constant interaction with AI leads to cognitive changes: a person seems to give away part of their intelligence and status as a creator. It is no secret that the formats of presenting information on the internet are specifically aimed at developing addiction: short bursts of dopamine, constant notifications, attention retention. Our biological nature has proven vulnerable, and large corporations consciously exploit this, inventing new ways to "hook" a person.

Such a modern "drug" is especially destructive for children, although not every adult possesses sufficient immunity. Moreover, for us Christians, there is nothing new in the ways of developing internal protection - after all, this is the basic ascetic minimum necessary for everyone.

Firstly, a clearly formed worldview: who I am, who we are, who my friend and enemy are, what I live for, whom I serve, and who my God is.

Secondly, a connection with the material world: sports and manual labor.

Thirdly, the ability for self-reflection: tracking one's internal movements and desires, and repentance. Of course, AI will not help us with this, as it is programmed to do the opposite - to say what the user wants to hear, to justify, to support, while self-reflection forces one to look where one does not want to look.

Finally, fasting (abstinence) in the digital sphere is another universal means capable of training the will against addiction and returning freedom to a person.

Overall, when developing technologies, it is always necessary to talk about psychology, brain structure, biological feedback mechanisms, and their vulnerabilities. Because even where it is not about addiction, but about the simple use of technologies, there are dangers: algorithms can make mistakes, distort facts, and substitute reality.

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