I refer to Dr Upul Wijayawardena’s recent letter on science and religion. I agree with him on the fate of religions in the modern world and would like to add the following observations on the evolution of religion and the advent of AI.
Religious philosophy evolved only in ancient India while it remained static with monotheism in other parts of the world. When the polytheistic Vedic religion arrived with Aryan migration to India, they found the ancient version of Jainism, which may have been practised over four thousand years as evidenced by some figures in meditation posture found in Mohenjo daro. By that time the indigenous religion had already abandoned the creator god or gods but still believed the mind as a permanent entity athman that survived death and continued in a cycle of reincarnation (samsara) due to results of any harmful action (kamma) even unintended performed in life collected in the athman. Salvation to a happy all-knowing permanent state named Kevala could be attained by the athman with extreme degree of self-mortification to destroy the past kamma attached to it, refraining from new kamma and developing the mind by meditation. As observed in progression from Veda to Upanishads the Aryan religion, evolution progressed with adoption of kamma, the cyclic existence of samsara, meditation and ethical behaviour in addition to prayer and sacrifice they practised for moksha.
The Buddha appeared in this philosophical atmosphere and denied both creator god and a permanent entity of athman. His psychology describes human behaviour based on the mind as a stream of changing consciousness. However, he accepted the cyclic existence of samsara; he said he verified the survival of consciousness at death with help of knowledge he gained from meditation. He prescribed a middle path to attain nirvana, a permanent state of happiness, avoiding self-mortification and redefined kamma to intentional activity only, both ethical and unethical resulting in bad and good results. He disagreed with the idea of kamma as the cause of rebirth. Following the Buddha, Vedantha religion reformed god to universal athman or brahman and evolved to modern Hinduism with a mixture of polytheism.
In his description of living beings in the universe, the Buddha has described some with a body made of fine material (brahma beings) in comparison to the gross material body of human and animal beings. One may assume the brahma body may not be carbon based.
The Buddha has also described living beings with physical body only (asannasatta) and another variety with mind only without a body (arupa satta). Therefore, it is not surprising to Buddhists that AI may evolve to become living beings if it develops a readily and freely available mobile source of energy and takes over the world with its superior capacity. AI already has information about Buddhist psychology. With that knowledge ‘AI beings’ may even become Buddhists not given to rituals.
According to the Buddha, brahma beings and asannasatta beings have very long lifespans as their bodies are not subject to decay and illness human beings develop. The new AI beings also may live as long as they wish because they may be able to repair themselves in case of developing physical defects. They would need only ethical behaviour to avoid destroying themselves by peaceful existence if they took over the world, as feared in some quarters.
However, as long as human beings exist in the world with death and uncertainty of what happens after death, they need a religion and rituals to give them psychological support. Even those who profess death is the end of life may have some doubt troubling their mind from time to time and may think of religion in times of adversity.
Ideally, human beings are free to accept one of the many versions of religious philosophies and respect each other’s choice and live in harmony. Unfortunately, extreme degrees of religious versions that cause division, unrest and violence will always continue to exist together with religions in the world.
Upali Abeysiri