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Religious Thought, Theology and Philosophy of Religion

Seattle Pacific University

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Artificial Intelligence And Human Hope, Michael Paulus Oct 2023

Artificial Intelligence And Human Hope, Michael Paulus

SPU Works

Slides from a book talk at Folio: The Seattle Atheneum on Artificial Intelligence and the Apocalyptic Imagination: Artificial Agency and Human Hope.


Revisiting The Meaning Of The City And The Library, Michael Paulus Jun 2023

Revisiting The Meaning Of The City And The Library, Michael Paulus

SPU Works

We are living through an information revolution connected with automated information processing and artificial intelligence. Previous information revolutions, connected with information agencies and information artifacts, resulted in cities—described by Jacques Ellul in The Meaning of the City as artificial and autonomous systems—and libraries, which augment human intelligence through technological systems as well as related formative practices. The library remains an important institution and infrastructure for confronting challenges and opportunities associated with the latest form artificial agency, AI. Focusing on the history of the library, this paper explores the history of—and future possibilities for—the role of artificial agency in cultural development.


Introduction: Imagined And Real Ai, Michael Paulus Jan 2023

Introduction: Imagined And Real Ai, Michael Paulus

SPU Works

The increasing role and power of artificial intelligence in our lives and world require us to imagine and shape a desirable future with this technology. Since visions of AI often draw from Christian apocalyptic narratives, current discussions about technological hopes and fears present an opportunity for a deeper engagement with Christian eschatological resources. This book argues that the apocalyptic imagination can transform how we think about and use AI, helping us discover ways artificial agency may help us create a better world.


Erotic Devotional Poetry: Resisting Neoplatonism In Protestant Christianity, Sarah M. Pruis Jun 2019

Erotic Devotional Poetry: Resisting Neoplatonism In Protestant Christianity, Sarah M. Pruis

Honors Projects

A genre best known for its appearance in Eastern religions, erotic devotional poetry uses sensual imagery to access an experience of the divine. Historically, many Christian traditions, excluding the mystical ones, have pushed back against such literature, seeing it as an impure model that degrades divinity by association with the physical, especially in the specific physical ritual of sex. This stance is a hallmark of Protestant Christianity. The idea of a dichotomy and hierarchy between soul and body, though, comes not from theology but from the introduction theologians made between Western philosophy, particularly Platonic Dualism, and Christianity, which was then …