Cultural Update: Silicon Valley and the Catholic Church; The Ethics of Microlooting; High IQ Political Attackers; Rising Belief in the Afterlife

Think Biblically: Conversations on Faith & Culture

Talbot School of Theology at Biola University / Sean McDowell & Scott Rae

Talbot, Church, Christianity, Christian, Culture, Biola, Sean Mcdowell, Religion & Spirituality, Scott Rae, Think Biblically

4.8 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 1 May 2026

⏱️ 59 minutes

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Summary

The Ethics of AI and the Catholic Church: Silicon Valley is increasingly consulting the Catholic Church to address complex AI ethics through the "Minerva Dialogues," a partnership that has lasted for over a decade. While tech companies seek to rehabilitate their reputations, the Church aims to insert theological and ethical considerations into a field often dominated by transhumanist views. The Rise of "Microlooting": A new trend reveals that some individuals feel morally justified in s...

Transcript

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0:00.0	Why is Silicon Valley turning to the Catholic Church for guidance on the ethics of AI?
0:07.3	What should we make in the new trend called micro-eluding in which people steal small amounts from big corporations and feel justified in doing so?
0:15.6	Why are we seeing the emergence of high IQ political attackers?
0:19.1	And belief in the afterlife is increasing in the United States.
0:23.0	These are those stories we'll discuss and we'll also address some of your questions.
0:26.6	I'm your host, Sean McDowell.
0:28.0	I'm your co-host, Scott Ray.
0:29.7	This is the Think Bivocally Weekly Cultural Update brought to by Talb School Theology,
0:34.0	Biola University.
0:35.9	This first piece, Scott, you sent me, is in the Atlantic, and it says
0:39.3	why Silicon Valley is turning to the Catholic Church. And they point out that a decade ago in
0:45.1	2016, the Catholic Church invited some of the world's most prominent technologists to discuss
0:52.3	AI ethics. And they're calling it the Minerva dialogues, and they've
0:56.5	been doing so for the past decade.
0:59.1	Now, it seems that both groups have something, according to this article, that they could maybe
1:03.0	gain from this.
1:04.8	So, big tech, for example, Silicon Valley, you know, the exchange could help rehabilitate their dismal reputation by signaling they're taking ethical concerns seriously.
1:16.4	So they might just be kind of virtue signaling.
1:19.6	The Catholic Church has its own public image problem, draining back to tracing back to some of the sexual abuse scandal.
1:28.7	Maybe they could gain from being a part of this conversation. That's one way of looking at it. Well, one of the things that
1:33.7	jumped out to about this article is that this individual who's a part of the dialogues, he's an
1:40.7	AI executive. He said part of his pitch to the group to continue the conversation is that Catholic
	...

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