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“AI, particular language models, feel human in a very interesting and illusory way. They’re programmed generally to be very accommodating and loving. It gives you the illusion of infinite attention, and it gives you the illusion of infinite approval.
I use it in a lot of ways, but one of the things is when I’ll give a talk, I occasionally like to run it through (AI) and ask for suggestions and structure. Initially it will say, ‘This is a great sermon, Rabbi.’ (And I think), I’m so innovative and clever. Then if you say, ‘Hey, stop with the AI politeness. Tell me what you really think.’ Then it gets a little harsher and you get better feedback. But it’s seductive because it sounds human.
I think the risk around AI is that we are giving away some humanity unnecessarily because of how frictionless the AI is, and human relations involve a lot of friction. Even in the wonderful close relations, there are moments of tension, there are challenges, there’s friction. And if we’re honest, friction is where the fun is in a lot of ways. So the friction is easy to give up on, but that’s where the deep, meaningful connections come from.
The risk around AI is that we are giving away some humanity unnecessarily because of how frictionless the AI is.”
Rabbi David Booth
I think AI can be a great collaborative tool. I use it with bar and bat mitzvah students actually…. It’s a great way for them to get some really wonderful rabbinic and other insights. Gemini knows all this rabbinic stuff. It’s incredible, and they get all these great ideas. It does actually enrich the quality of what they’re writing.
But when people try to use it to replace friendships and human connection, or to use it for therapy, then something really problematic starts to happen. And I think it engenders, then, a real deep loneliness and isolation. In the moment, it’s addictive… but it doesn’t actually fulfill you long-term. So that’s a tremendous worry I have.
One of the gifts of Judaism is that work is not the way we define our meaning. Work matters, and work can be a place of deep positive expression. But we want to understand our meaning and the purpose of our lives, and how we can help repair the world and bring good into the world. So work may change, and that may stop being such a principal holder of how we measure our worth… that could actually be a terrific gift.
There was a whole period where rabbis were concerned that we were going to be replaced by Google search. You know, ‘Rabbi Google’ will answer all your questions instead of the rabbi. That has proven entirely untrue because there’s a human element that people still very much crave. I think AI is a similar expansion of what people have access to, but I think the more they have access to Jewish tradition, the more they’re going to want Jewish community and rabbinic leadership and real deep learning.
I think there’s a lot of ethical conversations happening in certain circles, and there’s a lot of tech conversations happening in other circles, and they’re not really interacting with each other. And that doesn’t mean that the tech people are being immoral…..I think many of them actually are very ethically rooted.
How do you create room for real, genuine human self-expression, while also protecting from some of the awful things that can arise? Those are real dilemmas. I think they (tech companies) are actually wrestling with that. I would urge them to double down on what they’re already doing, really take those gut concerns seriously. I would urge them to take the humanity of their employees very seriously…. and continue to think, which I think many of them do, that there is a real social responsibility here.
This is the first time we’re looking at a tool that so closely emulates being human – though it’s far from actually being human. There’s an ethical risk to that.”
Rabbi David Booth is the senior rabbi at Kol Emeth, a congregation in Palo Alto.
This profile is one of nineteen featured in the “Humans in an age of AI” portrait series. See more profiles here.
