Living With AI Without Living in Fear
What Ultron taught me about the AI debate
You know what I first thought of when AI started making headway? Candidly, Marvel’s Avengers: Age of Ultron. You know what I’m talking about? The artificial intelligence project Tony Stark and Bruce Banner tried to orchestrate through Loki’s scepter?
If I haven’t scared you off with my nerdiness yet, let me just say that I appreciate you indulging me for those first few sentences.
But more seriously, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to form a complete opinion these days. You’re either for AI or against it, using it for everything or hardly using it at all. It seems that this invention has created a pendulum of opinions: either we embrace it completely, or we reject it entirely.
I think that if we spend too much of our energy arguing over whether AI should or should not be used, we can find ourselves in a dangerous place, wasting our breath, energy, and time. I mean, after all, Ultron ended up creating an army of robots while the Avengers sat around arguing.
Every new invention has had its panic
But AI isn’t the first invention to cause people to panic. Throughout history, new technologies have often brought fear, uncertainty, and heated debates over their implications.
Electricity. The printing press. Television. Weapons of mass destruction. Cell phones. Social media. Just to name a few.
C. S. Lewis addressed this very kind of fear in his 1948 essay, “On Living in an Atomic Age.” He wrote:
If we are all going to be destroyed by an atomic bomb, let that bomb when it comes find us doing sensible and human things—praying, working, teaching, reading, listening to music, bathing the children, playing tennis, chatting to our friends over a pint and a game of darts—not huddled together like frightened sheep and thinking about bombs. They may break our bodies (a microbe can do that) but they need not dominate our minds.
Lewis was speaking to people who were living under the very real threat of nuclear destruction. Their fear was understandable and, in many ways, justified. Yet that fear could become so consuming that it crippled people from simply living their lives. They could become so preoccupied with what might happen that they stopped participating in the things that made life worth living.
I think we can fall into the same trap today.
Fear can cause us to cope in unhealthy ways. Sometimes we cope by arguing and becoming divisive over the very thing we fear. Other times, we numb ourselves to its reality. And sometimes, we do the opposite: we embrace the fearful thing too closely, engaging with it recklessly because we convince ourselves that if we can control it, we no longer have to fear it.
Scripture offers a different answer
But Scripture gives us a different answer.
And to aspire to live quietly, and to mind your own affairs, and to work with your hands, as we instructed you.
— 1 Thessalonians 4:11 (ESV)
When we return to the very things God has created us to do, we begin to exercise the Spirit’s discernment in the world around us. Instead of asking only, “Should this exist?” or “Should I be afraid of this?” perhaps we should also be asking, “How can I steward what is in front of me in a way that glorifies God?”
Walking is a way of living, not a destination
If we find ourselves crippled by so much fear that it paralyzes us, psychology can offer us an interesting perspective, one that I think the prophet Micah helps illuminate.
He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?
— Micah 6:8 (ESV)
The key action verb I want to highlight here is “walk.”
The Hebrew word translated “walk” is halak (הלך), a word that can carry the idea of walking, living, or conducting oneself in a particular manner. In other words, walking with God is not merely a destination. It is a way of living.
A picture from the garden
When I think about walking humbly with the Lord, the Holy Spirit reminds me of another time in Scripture, one of many, when mankind walked with God.
The Garden of Eden.
Genesis 3:8 tells us that Adam and Eve heard “the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day.” The passage seems to present God’s presence in the garden as something familiar and intimate. Before sin entered the picture, humanity experienced fellowship with God in His creation.
Of course, we know what happens next.
But for a moment, I want to stay in that precious and glorious picture of humanity walking with the Lord in the garden.
A time to enjoy His presence.
A time to experience community.
A time to be surrounded by creation.
A time to enjoy the fruit of our labor.
A time to simply walk with God.
Perhaps this is part of what God is redeeming us toward.
What psychology calls behavioral activation
Interestingly, psychology has a concept called behavioral activation, which focuses on helping people move from the outside in, to begin engaging again with meaningful and constructive activities rather than remaining trapped in avoidance.
Psychology Today describes behavioral activation as a way of “changing from the outside in,” where individuals intentionally engage in constructive activities that can interrupt negative feelings and avoidant behaviors. These activities can be remarkably ordinary: meeting a friend for coffee, listening to a podcast, or simply going for a walk in the park.
There is something significant about that.
Sometimes we think we have to feel better before we can start living again. But sometimes, we begin living, and in doing so, our feelings slowly begin to follow.
And perhaps there is a spiritual parallel here.
Sometimes the answer is to get up and walk
Sometimes the answer to our fear is not to spend another three hours arguing about the thing that frightens us.
Sometimes the answer is to get up and walk.
Go outside.
Talk to a friend.
Do your work.
Pray.
Read.
Listen.
Create.
Serve.
Enjoy the people God has placed around you.
In other words, live.
So whatever new man-made invention comes our way—AI, technology, social media, or whatever comes next—let us not allow ourselves to be struck down by fear.
Let us not become so divided over its use that we forget how to love one another.
Let us not become so paralyzed by what might happen that we stop participating in the life God has given us.
And let us not become so enamored with our ability to control these things that we forget who is actually in control.
Instead, let us humble ourselves before God.
Let us steward the things of this world wisely and faithfully.
Let us use discernment rather than fear.
And ultimately, let us keep walking.
Finding our way back to the garden
Because perhaps the goal isn’t simply learning how to live in a world with AI.
Perhaps the goal is learning how to live in a world with anything, without allowing the things of this world to pull us away from the presence of God.
Maybe, in the end, we are simply trying to find our way back to the garden.
Back to the place where we can walk with God in the cool and peace of His presence.
References
Lewis, C. S. (1986). On living in an atomic age. In Present concerns: Journalistic essays (pp. 73–80). Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. (Original work published 1948)
English Standard Version Bible. (2001). Crossway.
Psychology Today. (n.d.). Behavioral activation. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/behavioral-activation
By Brittany Ertz, LPC
Brittany Ertz is a Licensed Professional Counselor specializing in trauma, anxiety, depression, and life transitions for teens, adults, and couples. Drawing from her own experiences and trained in EMDR, EFT, and CBT, she connects clients' past experiences to their present struggles to foster deep, lasting healing. Britt enjoys traveling, finding new coffee shops, going to the gym, and reading. She and her husband, Cisco, love serving at their church and enjoying the company of friends.
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