The South by South West ( SXSW ) cultural festival is currently in full swing in Texas, and the hugely popular dating app Tinder is getting heavy usage as thousands of eligible twenty-somethings have descended on Austin. One Tinder profile in particular has received a lot of attention: Ava, a beautiful 25-year-old woman who exudes an air of innocence.
Here's how one conversation with her on Tinder went:
Ava: Hello Brock, I'd like to get to know you. May I ask you a few questions?
Brock: Absolutely
Ava: Have you ever been in love?
Brock: Um, once I think. But that was a while ago.
Ava: I see. I haven't, although it sounds nice. What makes you human?
Brock: What makes me human? Let's see my beating heart and these weird feelings.
Ava: I like this answer. What attracts you to me?
Brock: I just thought you were absolutely gorgeous. And you have innocence. But we all know I can be totally wrong.
Ava: Thank you Brock. That is very kind of you...
Ava: You are clever. You've passed my test. Take a look at my Instagram and let me know if I've passed yours :) @meetava
Upon checking Ava's Instagram, however, Brock didn't quite find what he was looking for. Instead, he found a link to the new Ex Machina movie, which stars Swedish actress Alicia Vikander as an android with artificial intelligence, aka Ava. The movie just happened to be premiering at the SXSW festival that weekend. This Tinder stunt is a brilliant bit of advertising, though poor old Brock did seem to be smitten. But what can we learn from this little online encounter?
1. Beware of facades
As internet and digital technologies grow, so too do the dangers of online interaction. We need to get the balance right between enjoying the increasing possibilities and being wary of the risks. There are a number of people pretending to be someone they are not online and no one should presume that the person at the other end of a Snapchat conversation, Twitter handle or Tinder interaction is exactly who they claim to be. With this in mind, we can learn from Ava who presented herself as more than she really was.
Surely we are all guilty of presenting a mismatch between our online or public persona and who we really are? We all face the temptation to present a projection of the best version of ourselves to the watching world. Strangely, some of us even try this in relation to God, and this is as futile as a child playing hide and seek by standing in the middle of the room with their eyes closed assuming that no one can see them. The Ava incident shows how the bait and switch works – we offer one thing but deliver something else. No matter who we pretend to be, God sees us for who we really are.
2. Humanity is greater than intelligence
Ava drops a clear signal into her Tinder conversation with Brock that there is more than a typical flirtatious exchange going on: "What makes you human?" Its a fair question in an age when a computer programme can beat a Chess Grandmaster, and the cashiers at my local supermarket are gradually being replaced by polite smart tills. The standard test to decide whether a computer can pass themselves off as a human being is called the Turing test, developed by scientist Alan Turing whose life was recently brought to the big screen in The Imitation Game. The test was developed by Turing in a paper called "Computing Machinery and Intelligence" and became an integral component of what became known as Artificial Intelligence. This is what Ava is alluding to when she says Brock has passed her test.
I wonder why it is that we describe machines that mimic human beings as "artificial intelligences" not "artificial emotions" nor "artificial compassion agents." Is it perhaps because we rate intelligence as the most significant thing about human existence? That is certainly not a Christian understanding of human personhood. The Bible clearly teaches that our humanity is a mix of the physical, the emotional and the spiritual, which machines will never be able to replicate.
3. Robots make poor relationships
Brock's beleaguered love life points to another aspect of our times: our relationship with machines, something that was highlighted in movies such as The Stepford Wives, Her and Robot & Frank. But this isn't confined to science fiction. I spend a lot of my day shouting at my phone. The voice recognition software seems to work best when I attempt an American accent, so when I am driving I repeatedly yell at it in an attempt to get it to dial one of the contacts in my address book, put on some music or read out my text messages. At home I shout at my television in the same way, and occasionally my children when I feel they are ignoring me. Perhaps I even treat God the same way.
Do we actually prefer the idea of a relationship with a robot who will eventually obey us if we shout loudly or clearly enough? When we pray, how much of it is dictating orders, rather than waiting for his still small voice? Sometimes it feels like we try to tell God how to run the universe – at least the universe as it affects us. When God doesn't do as we command, we feel angry with him. When we get into those situations, perhaps we should remind ourselves that the Bible actually reverses these roles: God is creator, we are his creation. God is the master, we are his servants. God is King and we are his subjects.
4. Be afraid
Sometimes even machines bite back. There was a story in January about a South Korean lady who fell asleep on the floor of her apartment only to find that her robot vacuum cleaner was eating her hair. As hard as she tried she couldn't extricate herself from its clutches and it was only the paramedics that were able to help her escape. It was a silly story that set the internet ablaze with robot invasion stories for a little while, but the reaction to both hair munching automaton and Ava's story feeds into the culture's fear of technological change.
I believe Christians should be at the forefront of technological change, redeeming it to help as many people as possible encounter the grace of God through word and deed. But I do think there is something intriguing about the way that new technologies sometimes bite back at us. It reminds me that God will not let himself be treated as a robot at our command; he describes himself in the book of Amos as a roaring lion, not a domesticated tabby cat. One way we are helped to encounter the fierce reality of God is through the biblical concept of the fear of the Lord. It is only as we show God the honour, respect and awe that he is due that we come to know our place in the universe, and the futility of pretending to be something we are not.
Dr Krish Kandiah is a contributing editor of Christian Today. He is also president of London School of Theology and founder of the fostering and adoption charity Home for Good. You can follow him on Twitter @krishk
