A Review of “Corpo:reality – Body and Embodiment in AI and Robotics”

The Corpo:reality – Body and Embodiment in AI and Robotics conference was held in early December in Würzburg, Germany, organised by Netzwerk für Theologie & Künstliche Intelligenz. Elon Musk recently indicated that AI would eliminate the need for all jobs and we will all have robot friends.[1] At the conference Dr. Ilona Nord raised the question will robots replace the pastor or is the physical presence more important? There are uses for robots in social care, industry and even to assist the pastor, but to replace them would remove the physicality. Even with Zoom meetings, YouTube services or in the metaverse, both pastor and congregation need to be physically present, even if represented by an avatar or text. There are advantages the robot can make predictions, collect and “crunch” data more easily, and with the advance of technology become even more humanoid, but there are risks around data collection, transparency, and engagement. Paul Tillich’s comments on the liberating advantages of technology were highlighted and Dr. Nord finished by quoting the French Philosopher Corine Pelluchon:

If we value technical devices like the food that sustains us, that shapes us, and that we shape in turn, then they become individualized without being personified, and we have to take care of them because they are as much a part of the common world as our natural and cultural heritage.

Quoted in: Ilona Nord, “The Appreciation of ‘Things’ in an Ambiguous World: On AI & Religion,” in Thinking tools for AI, Religion & Culture, edited by H. A. Campbell & P. H. Cheong (2023): 44.

A friend of mine has a robot vacuum cleaner who he has named “Harry” after his favourite football striker, and while he commands it to clean, he does not treat as an individual, it is a tool to do a role, not a partner to discuss the football with.

During the afternoon parallel sessions were held and I enjoyed an interesting presentation entitled “Life, Death and Reinstantiation: Brain Preservation from Neurobiological, Anthropological and Theological Perspectives” led by Dr. Alexander German and Max Tretter. Dr. German highlighted that we could transplant most parts of a body, but the brain is unique, it hasn’t been successfully transplanted. He was working on a project which was archiving and preserving part of the brain, with the hope that in future technology would be able to download the information it contained in relation to the individual. However, does “individualism” whether you describe it as spirit or soul actually reside in the brain?Following the conference, I went to Basel and visited the Karl Barth archive and wondered if technology could have “downloaded” his brain, would we have a finished Church Dogmatics or perhaps even more volumes? What about his assistant Charlotte von Kirschbaum, who was an integral part of his work? Would we need her brain as well?

The ethical considerations behind this sort of study are immense and led smoothly into the next session by Dominik Winter on AI, emotions and ethics which outlined why robots will not do ethics. They cannot, he argued, because they do not have emotions. The robot will make decisions based on its programming (and perhaps the creator’s prejudices). The example of a driverless car being involved in a collision and the question of whether it would differentiate between a younger or older person were considered. This introduced themes of responsibility and liability. Who is responsible and liable? The car, the manufacturer, the programmer, or the person in the vehicle? Unfortunately, the session was not long enough to consider all these questions in depth, but the conclusion was that robots will lack morals due to their inability to have and experience emotions.

Dr. Noreen Horsfield’s presentation with insights from her book The Artifice of Intelligence: Divine and Human Relationship in a Robotic Age included the question |how much skin does a body need for an authentic relationship?” She used Karl Barth’s fours parameters for humanity[2] of visibility, communication, mutual assistance and assisting gladly to illustrate her presentation, outlining that AI or robots definitely cannot look you in the eye (visibility) or show emotion (gladness). Can you look a robot in the eye? An interesting question, as yes physically you can, but what are you really seeing? Can a robot offer non-verbal communication like a human? The difficulty is the robot cannot offer emotions in response to our emotions, it can only do what it has been programmed to do, it has no sense of feeling or empathy. People create “robots” and AI in their image, but is this a reflection of themselves or the person they want to be in a relationship with, with recent examples including the use of the image of Scarlet Johansson.[3] We may be individuals, but how much control do we have over our image (or even voice) especially as we move into the future? Furthermore, if we are looking for AI as a partner then we are image focused. Surely AI is just a tool (albeit a very useful one)? Using Barth’s four criteria for an authentic relationship, AI falls short in several categories, it cannot be a realistic partner.

Sex robots did make an appearance (not literally), but in presentations. We were introduced to Roxxxy[4] and the ArchAndroid[5] during two presentations, again reflecting on relationships. Are they real or just another opportunity for male power over females’ bodies? Robots cannot consent to any sexual activity, they do not have any choices, but just fulfill the desires of the owner, there is no two-way engagement as expected in an authentic relationship. They may reduce loneliness, but Dr. Kathleen Richardson suggested that this indicated the categories of real and fiction are blurred. She outlined her objection to sex robots.[6] Dr. Kate Ott’s presentation focused on the idea that people are wired for connection, whether that be online or onsite, with other humans or robots, and intimacy is part of that wiring. Constanze Erhard presented on “sexuality and gender in socio-technological artefacts: questioning the dualism of body and mind in AI robots” highlighting that often AI is about making a robot perform an action, that a human would need intelligence to do, like driving a car, and in the case of sex robots tend to reinforce our identarian views of gender and sexuality.

According to Dr. Anna Puzio’s presentation, the human body is different from the robot body, it is designed differently, often in the image of humankind though in spite of its appearance it is still not human. It does not suffer the same psychological, emotional and physical vulnerabilities as humans do. She gave participants the opportunity to design a robot in different groups. My group task was to design a religious robot. It was quite difficult (although fun) to gain a consensus and we ended up with an all dancing (literally) robot which answered prayers, gave religious tattoos, sang a religious song, painted art, and even heated the room. I am not sure it will go into production anytime soon! It did, however, highlight the different interpretation individuals have on their faith and the paraments they would not go beyond.

The group’s robot design.

The Burkardushaus is the conference centre of the Domschule, an institution of the Diocese of Würzburg. It was a good location for the event, right in the centre of town, near the Weihnachtsmarkt which provided an opportunity to purchase some gifts. It was also great to catch up with Matt Batten from the Practical Theology Hub Editorial Board, we had studied digital theology together at Spurgeon’s Bible College.

Although, Musk indicated that AI will eliminate the need for all jobs, we are not there yet, as demonstrated by the pilot on my plane home, he still needed to do a visual check on the wings for ice, and a robot couldn’t do that.

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Reference

[1] “Elon Musk tells Rishi Sunak at summit: AI ‘will eliminate jobs’,” https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/ai-safety-summit-deal-rishi-sunak-elon-musk-2rth63tcv. [Accessed 12/12/2023].

[2] K. Barth, Church Dogmatics, Vol. 3, The Doctrine of Creation: Part 2. Translated by Harold Knight, Edited by G. W. Bromiley and T. F. Torrance (T & T Clark, 1960), 222-285.

[3] “Scarlett Johansson takes legal action against use of image for AI” https://www.theguardian.com/film/2023/nov/01/scarlett-johansson-artificial-intelligence-ad. [Accessed 12/12/2023].

[4] “Now there’s a ‘frigid’ sex robot that allows men to simulate rape fantasies,” https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/now-theres-frigid-sex-robot-that-allows-men-simulate-rape-fantasies-1631203. [Accessed 12/12/2023].

[5] “Purifying Dirty Computers: Cyborgs, Sex, Christ, and Otherness,” https://cursor.pubpub.org/pub/ott-purifying-dirty-computers/release/3. [Accessed 12/12/2023].

[6] Campaign Against Sex Robots, https://campaignagainstsexrobots.org. [Accessed 12/12/2023].

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© Simon Werrett, 2024.

This work is licensed under Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0).

Cover Image: “Robot” by firepile is licensed under CC BY 2.0.