The Questions We Ask AI – The Questions AI Answers

This is my contribution to the April 2024 Fishkill UMC newsletter; it will appear in an upcoming issue of God & Nature.

I am a chemist because of a question I was asked in 1966.  Some questions that I was asked in 1974 and could not answer caused me to evaluate my career path.  (It should be noted that I know the answers to those questions today).  I earned a Ph.D. in science education with an emphasis on chemical education because of some questions I was asking about how students learned chemistry.

I became a lay speaker/servant in the United Methodist Church because, in 1990, I asked myself what the best way was to fulfill the commitment I made in 1965 when I earned the God & Country award.

The path I have walked over these past years was determined, in part, because of the questions I was asked and how I answered them. 

It is perhaps an axiom of research that the answer to one question leads to the development of two new questions.

When chemists were still known as alchemists, they asked the question, “Is there a substance that dissolves everything?”

Can there be a substance that dissolves everything?  If there was, what would you put it in?  Obviously, if this substance dissolves everything, it would dissolve the container you put it in.  It would also dissolve everything which it contacted, creating havoc and destruction.  This leads to two questions.

First, how could we study such a “super solvent’?

Could we use AI systems?  We could provide the AI system with information concerning the nature of solvents, the nature of solutions, information about the nature of materials that make up containers, as well as a discussion of bonding and why containers normally do not react with the materials that are put in them.

AI systems have already been used to “solve” other chemistry questions.  One research group already used an AI system to reconstruct the periodic table from existing data.  However, it was not clear if the results included the noble gases (Stanford AI recreates chemistry’s periodic table of elements | Chemistry – https://chemistry.stanford.edu/news/stanford-ai-recreates-chemistrys-periodic-table-elements).

AI-systems can achieve results that humans may not achieve.  We can set up an AI-system to analyze a series of digital images (such as X-rays, MRI, and CAT scans) to detect the presence of cancer cells at a resolution beyond the capabilities of the human eye.  But to do this, someone must supply the images that have cancer cells so that the system can “learn” what to look for.  If the system does not have this information, it cannot determine what is a cancer cell and what is not.

At the present time, AI systems are not intelligent.  They do not create new information, only copy current information.  It still takes a human to create new information.

While some may use AI systems to write reports, all the system is doing is gathering all the information that can be found on the web that is related to the topic and putting it together in a readable format.  But this system has not created any new information, and, in my opinion, the ability to create new information is one hallmark of intelligence.

Joshua Conrad Jackson, a professor and lead researcher at Chicago Booth, conducted a study about the ability of an AI-system to produce a sermon.  He concluded,

“Our research arrives at a point where automation is pervading every job industry, and it suggests that some professions may not be automated so easily.  Robots may struggle in professions like priests or monks, that require high levels of creativity.” 

see Researchers tried out AI preachers — and it didn’t go so well (zmescience.com)– https://www.zmescience.com/science/news-science/researchers-tried-out-ai-preachers-and-it-didnt-go-so-well/

For all the benefits we might gain, the study of a “super solvent” generates two new questions:

“Why would you want to synthesize such a substance?”

“What value would there be in even designing a substance that might destroy the world?”

AI systems can gather large amounts of data, but it is becoming clear that this process cannot differentiate between good and bad data.  Reports created from this approach contain serious errors, so the veracity of any reports generated may have to be questioned.  A chemistry teacher reported on a Facebook group that their students were using AI-systems to gather information about various chemistry topics, but they were not checking the validity of the information.

AI systems are also being shown to be discriminatory.  Not everyone gains from the use of such systems.  The use of AI systems may only widen the digital divide we see developing today.  In addition, the approach used by AI systems seems to ignore standard privacy protections (granted that even we humans often have this same problem). 

What is to stop AI-systems from being used to develop potentially hazardous materials?

In the end, do the benefits gained from the use of AI systems outweigh the negative values?  Can AI systems be taught to differentiate between good and bad data?  Can AI systems understand the nature of privacy protection and other laws related to the use of personal information?

Notes on AI

I am not opposed to the development of new technologies, such as AI systems, if it will make my work easier to accomplish.  While I tend to prepare the initial drafts of my manuscripts with pen and paper, I do use current technology (personal computer, the Internet, online correspondence, etc.) to share the results of my work.  But the systems that I use only aid in what I do, not do it for me.

In the Star Trek movie “Resurrection”, Sojef, one of the Ba’ku leaders, says to Jean Luc Picard why his group rejected technology.

“We believe that when you create a machine to do the work of a man, you take something away from the man.”

Perhaps the ultimate question that must be asked is “what will the future be?”  Will the future be human driven or technologically driven?  Will it be progressive and positive but will our reliance and possibly subservience lead to the destruction of mankind?

As we move to an even more technologically oriented society, we must not be blinded by the movement.  There must be an active effort to keep humans in the equation and in control, not just part of the solution.

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Notes

AI and humanity – Lutheran Alliance for Faith, Science and Technology (luthscitech.org)

What Is Artificial Intelligence? How Does It Work? – Sinai and Synapses

A Path of Science and Faith

This is my contribution to the 2024 Religion and Science weekend, sponsored by the Clergy Letter Project, and Boy Scout Sunday. It will also appear in the upcoming February issue of the Fishkill United Methodist Church newsletter.

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I had no idea when I began my journey with Christ back in 1965 where it would lead or what I would do.  It wasn’t until I drove across the plains of north Missouri back in the 1990s that I was reminded that I had entered a covenant with God and that I needed to fulfill my part of the covenant.  I then began exploring ways to become a lay speaker/servant and ultimately a lay minister (A Reminder | Thoughts From The Heart On The Left (wordpress.com) – https://heartontheleft.wordpress.com/2018/02/09/a-reminder/).

Similarly, when I choose to become a chemistry major in 1966, I had no idea what I would do with the degree.  To be honest, on the day I graduated from Truman State University, I thought that I would be going to graduate school at the University of Memphis.  But I received a phone call from a local school district shortly after graduation and, a few hours later, sign a provisional contract to teach chemistry and physical science.  This diversion from graduate school to teaching would provide the impetus for my later graduate studies and the completion of my doctoral studies at the University of Iowa.

In one of my classes at Iowa, we discussed the issues of creationism and intelligent design and the impact these issues would have on science education.  This was not the first time I encountered these issues.   

In 1980, the Missouri state legislature was preparing to pass a bill that would have told biology teachers how to teach biology, by including creationism in the discussion of evolution.  I suppose I could have ignored this because I only taught chemistry, but one must be careful when individuals who do not have any knowledge of the processes of science (“The Processes of Science”) try to tell science teachers what to teach and how to teach it.  I was prepared to resign if the law passed and was surprised to find that my department chairman, a devout Southern Baptist layman and biologist, was also going to resign (No one told me: Thoughts on the relationship of science and faith | Thoughts From The Heart On The Left (wordpress.com) – https://heartontheleft.wordpress.com/2021/07/23/no-one-told-me/). 

I don’t believe that I have ever had a conflict with my faith and my science background.  I accepted the idea that God created the earth and the heavens, but I never accepted the idea that it was done in six days.  And the more I studied things, the more I began to see the hand of God present in creation.

And as my studies and work in the areas of faith and science began to converge (“The Confluence Between Religion and Science” | Thoughts From The Heart On The Left (wordpress.com) – https://heartontheleft.wordpress.com/2019/02/06/the-confluence-between-religion-and-science/) I began to discover two things.

First, those who argue for a science only or faith only approach to life do so only for their own power.  Each group seeks to impose its view on the people as the only acceptable view.

The second thing I discovered was that many of the individuals that I studied in chemistry and physics were men of God as well as men of science (A Dialogue of Science and Faith | Thoughts From The Heart On The Left (wordpress.com) – https://heartontheleft.wordpress.com/2009/12/31/a-dialogue-of-science-and-faith/).

It is entirely possible that I could or would have come to Christ without having been a Boy Scout but that is clearly a question for another time and place. Besides finding a path to God through the God and Country award, I also began to develop an appreciation for the world around us. I cannot call myself an environmentalist but clearly, having seen the beauty of the Rocky Mountains when camping with my troop and seeing the physical wonders of this country and then seeing the awesome view of galaxies far away, I know that there is a Creator out there. And if there is not a Creator, then how was this all done?  (“Removing the Veil” | Thoughts From The Heart On The Left (wordpress.com) – https://heartontheleft.wordpress.com/2013/02/11/removing-the-veil/)

I did not need to know that Boyle and Priestley were men of God to understand their work and what it meant to me as a chemist.  But knowing that their work helped them better understand how God works is also true for me.

Can I use the skills that God gave me (allowing me to use other words from Genesis that state that you and I were created in His image) and begin to work out the mysteries of the universe, from the moment of the Big Bang to the present day and perhaps far into the future?

The author and activist Stephen Mattson wrote.

Some people mistakenly believe that trusting in God requires them to distrust science, history, art, philosophy, and other forms of education, information, and truth.

But intelligence is a friend of faith, and ignorance is its enemy.  God loves knowledge and truth, and any faith that objects to either is terribly misguided.

Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., wrote,

Science investigates; religion interprets. Science gives man knowledge that is power; religion gives man wisdom that is control. Science deals mainly with facts; religion deals mainly with values. The two are not rivals. They are complementary.

In a world that is fast dividing, it is the joint study of faith and science that will be one means of bringing people together.  For as science brings us knowledge of the physical world, faith brings us an understanding of the spiritual world and together we can bring the world together.