Dr. Matthew Muller, director of Benedictine College's Symposium on Transforming Culture, joins Bo Bonner to preview "The Church in an Algorithmic Age," a two-day gathering on how Catholics should think about artificial intelligence. The lineup pairs scholars with the people actually building the technology, including a Notre Dame theologian, a University of Michigan physician on keeping medicine human, and the CEO behind Magisterium AI. Bo also previews his own featured panel on technology and the sacred, unpacking what optimization and probability really mean — and why the Church already has better language for the moral life.
Dr. Matthew Muller, assistant professor of theology at Benedictine College and director of the Symposium on Transforming Culture, joins Bo Bonner to preview this year's conference: "The Church in an Algorithmic Age," Friday evening, September 4 through Saturday, September 5, on the Benedictine College campus in Atchison, Kansas.
The theme takes up artificial intelligence and technology head-on — the opportunities and the challenges — with a deliberate mix of scholars and practitioners. Featured speakers include:
More than sixty breakout and colloquium presentations run Friday afternoon and all day Saturday, spanning education, philosophy, politics, and more — roughly thirty-six hours of programming, all on Benedictine's academic hill.
Dr. Muller also traces the symposium's history: it began about twelve to fourteen years ago as a spring gathering of around fifty people, conceived as an intellectual retreat and Catholic think tank for people interested in evangelization and transforming culture. This year marks its first move to the fall — partly to catch people before the academic year wears them down, partly because Atchison is beautiful in September, and partly, he jokes, because the food is much better enjoyed outside of Lent. The event now draws attendees from across the country and occasionally overseas.
Bo, who has spoken at the symposium in some form for about nine years — often alongside his Uncommon Good co-host Dr. Bud Marr — previews his own contribution: a portion of the thesis he worked on in Europe this summer, parsing what we actually mean by "algorithms." He'll take up optimization and probability as the mechanics underneath algorithmic thinking, and argue that the Church has long had its own vocabulary for these ideas — and a better account of the ethical and moral life than the one the algorithmic age would hand us.
Registration and the full speaker lineup are at Benedictine College. A little space remains as of this recording.
Heard on the Catholic Morning Show, weekdays at 7 a.m. Central on Iowa Catholic Radio. More at IowaCatholicRadio.com.
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