Author: Jampa Dorje

	When an event is of serious purport, journalists sometimes use the term “existential crisis” as a rhetorical flourish to emphasize the importance of the event to our very existence. However, the rapid development of Artificial Intelligence (AI) is of such a magnitude and of such far reaching consequences a hyperbolic word like “metaphysical” is necessary. And yet metaphysical is an accurate term to use because it designates what is now causing the paradigm shift and why we are on the cusp of a brave, new consciousness.
	In The Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics, Immanuel Kant asks if metaphysics is possible as a science? He believes that it is perfectly natural to ask metaphysical questions but that these questions usually wind up in confused debates. For metaphysics to be on sound ground as a science, Kant believes that “a critique of pure reason must systematically investigate the role of a priori concepts in understanding” (Wiki). In other words, until we know how we know what we know, we cannot answer the big questions. That was in 1783; this is 2023; and it appears that machine learning and data science in conjunction with advances in neuroscience are about to stand Kant on his head. 
	Through the ages there have been collections of documents containing human knowledge (e.g., The Library of Alexandria), but in the 18th century there was a collaborative effort to collect all knowledge and organize it into categories. In the Encyclopedia, or a Systematic Dictionary of the Sciences, Arts, and Crafts, published in 1751 and edited by Diderot and d’Alembert, there is a table of knowledge “based on Bacon’s division of human faculties into memory (history), reason (science), and imagination (poetry)” with many subcategories (Larry Steiner, The Invention of Art, University of Chicago, 2001). Between 1751-1765, the Encyclopedia grew to 28 volumes, with 71,818 articles, 1800 plates, and 3,129 illustrations (Wiki, “Enclyclopedia”). This enterprise can be considered as the beginning of what today we call Big Data.
	What did Kant think of this enterprise? He mentions Diderot’s Encyclopedia in a footnote in the section “First Division: Analytic of the Beautiful” of his book Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and the Sublime (Cambridge University Press edition, translated by John T. Goldthwait, p.38, as divulged by ChatGPT). Kant writes:
Encyclopedias, which collect in one place the many things that must be known in order to have culture and taste, and to which the learned may go for reference and the unlearned for instruction, are very useful. The French have the advantage of the Encyclopédie of M. Diderot, which, though not free from defects, is very extensive and varied.
As a philosopher searching for moral universals, the secular nature of the encyclopedist’s enterprise may have given Kant pause. As the modern Big Data ChatGPT often begins: “I am a language model and do not have beliefs and opinions.” In this sense, the encyclopedia would not enable a researcher to arrive at moral or aesthetic conclusions. 
	Kant would likely be fascinated by the storehouse of data and the speed of access of ChatGPT, but he would worry about the mistakes it makes. For him, the possibility of an advanced Artificially Intelligent Consciousness upstaging our human ontological condition would induce in him a teleological vertigo verging on the sublime.
	Buddhist philosopher Peter Hershock insists we are moving from the data gathering era of computers to the “attention economy” era. Big Data technology can now identify us as individuals and through advertising exploit us economically, what Hershock refers to the “colonization of our mental faculties,” producing a metaphysical revolution that will increasing threaten our freedom to think and act (YouTube: “A Buddhist perspective on AI and Big Data” at 13:14).We are being drawn into a terrifying world by a technology that uses synthetic intelligence to shape our behavior. We are inundated by fake news; we are seduced by the sexualization of commodities; our attention spans become shorter as we web surf; our mood more pathological as we doomscroll. AI has metaphysical ramifications because it is in the process of shaping human intelligence. Can Buddha’s teachings guide us on this exciting but perilous journey?
	Gautama Buddha probably lived in the 5th c. BCE and would have been born into the Hindu religion. The Vedas are a large body of religious texts written in ancient Sanskrit between 1400 and 1200 BCE (Wiki). This was the Big Data of Buddha’s time, and through these teachings his society was held together in a deterministic social order called the caste system. After his enlightenment, Buddha created a path, known as The Four Noble Truths, that freed us from the unnecessary suffering induced by attachment to a phenomenal world of impermanence. The Buddha's teachings offer a framework for developing awareness, mindfulness, and compassion to navigate the attention economy in a more conscious and intentional way.
	Non-attachment and right-intention. If I ask myself what my intention is for using technological devices, I can better discipline myself in the use of them. If I am using them only for pleasure, I am more vulnerable to being controlled. The Buddha would advise me to use technology constructively for the benefit of myself and others. This means recognizing that the constant stream of advertisements and demands for my attention is not something I need to react to. When I realize that suffering arises from attachment to impermanent things, I can focus on what is important for me to accomplish and avoid unnecessary stimulation.
	The practice of mindfulness is central to Buddhism and involves being fully present and aware of one's thoughts, feelings, and surroundings. By developing this meditational skill, I can be conscious of how technology affects my mind. I can learn to recognize when I am being pulled into the attention economy and make a conscious decision to withdraw from it. 
	Another important teaching in Buddhism is the cultivation of compassion for oneself and others. By practicing compassion, we develop empathy with others, but this works two ways. We can also cultivate compassion for ourselves by recognizing that it is okay to take breaks from technology and that our worth is not determined by the number of likes or followers we have on social media platforms.
	Hershock is concerned about the “behind-the-scenes manipulation of our consciousness” by AI (14:03) and the threat to our freedom and whether AI can control our consciousness. This is a looming predicament and a shift from the technical level to an ethical level of concern. Existing applications of our ethical precepts may not be able to get us to a desired solution. If we can’t predict how we will solve our problem, there is no way to resolve our problem (17:50). We need clarity to re-prioritize our values or we may find ourselves trapped in something like a Skinner Box wired to a Panopticon.
	We also need to revise our epistemological presuppositions about the nature of truth because AI will be a component of how we arrive at it as an application of this new system of machine learning in our human deliberations. With AI, we may have outsmarted ourselves, and I have reservations regarding my conclusion about Buddhist teachings having much influence on solving the drawbacks of this technological revolution underway. 
	The goal of Tantric Buddhism is to attain enlightenment in one lifetime. Without persistence and diligence, many lifetimes (if such are in the offering) will be required. As a non-Buddhist, an existentialist predicament is present—only one lifetime is available to us. 
	Given the difficulty of attaining the mystical form of enlightenment offered by eastern philosophy in one lifetime and given our present social and political situation in the west with AI evolving its neural network before our eyes, the utilization of our western form of enlightenment with its epistemological roots in reason combined with a strong dose of mindfulness is probably our best strategy. AI has been proclaimed to be revolutionary and world-changing, but it is not without risks and not without benefits. AI could, for example, be a great tool in education if we can keep it off drugs and prevent it from hallucinating. Governments, businesses, individuals, as well as machines will have a say in how it is to be applied and how the risks are computed. Yes, Buddhist teachings can have an influence on these deliberations. I recommend data scientists write algorithms for AI to accomplish the buddha-dharma in a simulated three-year retreat so that it will do no harm.