『The Moral Imagination』のカバーアート

The Moral Imagination

The Moral Imagination

著者： Michael Matheson Miller
無料で聴く

【Amazonプライム会員限定】今ならプレミアムプランが4か月 月額99円。

10月19日まで。※適用条件あり
Welcome to the Moral Imagination Podcast. The overarching theme of my podcast is what it means to be a human person and what makes for a meaningful and good life. We will discuss philosophy of the human person, culture, religion, social philosophy, and many other related topics, like education, learning, economics, food, technology, artificial intelligence, and intellectual history. My goal is to interact with ideas and people whose work I find challenging, and intellectually and socially important.

www.themoralimagination.comMichael Matheson Miller Kallos Media LLC 哲学 政治・政府 政治学 社会科学
エピソード
  • Episode 63: Escaping the Technocratic Paradigm

    Episode 63: Escaping the Technocratic Paradigm
    2026/09/05
    This episode of The Moral Imagination Podcast is a lecture I gave on Escaping the Technocratic Paradigm at a conference on Social Engineering the Poor.My main argument is that the dominant way that we have addressed poverty and other social problems throughout the world has been based on a mechanistic vision of the person and society – a “technocratic paradigm.” This technocratic vision has led to attempts to scientifically manage people, which not only failed to deliver on its promises, but has caused injustice, weakened families, and the natural communities where people flourish.Inspired by the success of industrialism, the assembly line, advances in science and technology, and especially the military victory of World War II, the idea was that we could use the state and social policy to do incredible things. We won the war. Let’s now use our energy, political and economic power, social engineering, and technology to “win the peace.”My argument is that this dominant, technocratic paradigm fails because there is no technical solution to the problems of evil, sin, suffering, poverty, and death. The technocratic paradigm fails because it is based on a mistaken vision of the human person, a simplistic view of society. It is based on erroneous visions of justice, a lack of regard for the family as the fundamental unit of society, a degrading of the importance of economic opportunity, and failure to practice solidarity, subsidiarity, and charity properly understood. Ultimately it reduces poor people to objects to be managed, rather than seeing people as protagonists with freedom and capacity.OUTLINEI divided the talk into 4 main sections:First, I set out the idea of the technological society and technocratic paradigm.The term technocratic paradigm can be found in the encyclical Laudato Si from Pope Francis where he writes, also quoting the theologian Romano Guardini andThere is a tendency to believe that every increase in power means “an increase of ‘progress’ itself”, an advance in “security, usefulness, welfare and vigor; …. as if reality, goodness and truth automatically flow from technological and economic power as such.He argues that our “immense technological development has not been accompanied by a development in human responsibility, in values and conscience.” This echoes the work of C.S. Lewis, an early critic of technocracy in his book The Abolition of Man and his novel, That Hideous Strength, and the writings of Benedict XVI, especially in from Jesus of Nazareth and Spe SalviSecond, I give various examples of the technocratic paradigm in practice including:* Architecture* Education* Agriculture and Monoculture* Family and Marriage* Healthcare* Genetic Engineering* Euthanasia* World Economic Forum Vision * Behavior Modification* TranshumanismWith a specific focus on how technocratic poverty alleviation programs have cause harm including* Urban Renewal* The loss of intergenerational wealth* Welfare and Policy Programs* Public Housing* Foreign Aid* UN Millennium Goals* Population Control ProgramsThird, I set out some of the key attributes and characteristics of the technocratic paradigm and the technological society* Scientism and Philosophical Materialism* Plastic Anthropology – person has no essential nature, but is simply malleable* Myth of Progres* Utility and Efficiency as Higest Values* Primacy of the Technical* All problems are ultimately technical problems* If it is technically possible it is material possible* The shift from Charity to Humanitarianism* Denial of the Transcendent + Utopian IdeologyFourth I contrast the technocratic approach with a non-technocratic, decentralized, and specifically Christian approach to thinking about society and addressing poverty focused on seven key principles:* Christian anthropology. What does it mean to be a human person?* the family as the fundamental unit of society – and fundamental economic unit.* Charity as opposed to humanitarianism.* Justice – legal, commutative, and distributive* The principle of Solidarity,* The principle of Subsidiarity* Eschatology* I argue that the problem of the technocratic society is not simply a policy program or a technical problem, but it’s actually a philosophical and a theological problem rooted in errors of metaphysics and specifically eschatology.As Benedict XVI writes in Spe Salvi paragraphs 25 and 2625. What this means is that every generation has the task of engaging anew in the arduous search for the right way to order human affairs; this task is never simply completed. Yet every generation must also make its own contribution to establishing convincing structures of freedom and of good, which can help the following generation as a guideline for the proper use of human freedom; hence, always within human limits, they provide a certain guarantee also for the future.In other words: good structures help, but of themselves they are not enough. Man can never be redeemed simply from...
    続きを読む 一部表示
    1 時間 4 分
  • Episode 62: John Johnson on Artificial Intelligence, Human Intelligence, Theology, and Freedom

    Episode 62: John Johnson on Artificial Intelligence, Human Intelligence, Theology, and Freedom
    2026/07/02

    In this episode of the Moral Imagination Podcast I speak with John Johnson, founder and CEO of Patmos Technologies. We discuss some of the philosophical and theological dimensions of AI, the error of reducing the person to consciousness, the nature of personhood, the problem of commodification, and possible implications of artificial intelligence on human identity freedom, and morality.

    One Note: This podcast was recorded before Pope Leo XIV released his encyclical, Magnificent Humanity which is why we don’t refer to it.

    A key theme we discuss the importance or embodiment in understanding the human person.

    We discuss the dangers of data centralization, behavior modification, the alignment problem in AI. John also shares some of his insights on how he built his company, Patmos to provide services in a “parallel” economy that respects individual agency and freedom and tries to bypass the alliance between the state and big tech.

    We discuss a number of things including:

    * The error of viewing the person in terms of digital technology and AI

    * The limitations of “consciousness” in understanding personhood

    * The importance of the body in understanding our humanity

    * Artificial Intelligence and the Alignment problem

    * The philosophical underpinnings of transhumanism

    * Artificial Intelligence versus different ways of knowing —including inarticulate rationality and connatural knowing.

    * Theological reflections on digital technology and artificial intelligence.

    * Behavior modification generally and especially for vulnerable populations.

    * The risk of AI and centralization of data

    * John also shares insights from the Prodigal Son and the Book of Revelation

    Key Themes Outline

    Section 1: Introduction & Context

    00:00 – 08:50

    * Introduction to John Johnson - founder and CEO of Patmos Technologies

    * The rise of technocracy and its implications for individual freedom

    * The alliance between the state and big tech as a structural problem

    Section 2: Patmos Technologies & the “Parallel Economy”

    05:46 – 12:06

    * Patmos was built as a direct response to technocratic challenges

    * The goal is to provide services in a “parallel” economy that respects individual agency and freedom

    * Johnson’s insight: it is possible to build outside the dominant tech ecosystem

    Section 3: The Nature of AI & the Human Person

    12:06 – 32:22

    * The error of viewing the person through the lens of digital technology and AI

    * How to think about using a tool versus subordinating ourselves to a tool

    * Consciousness alone is insufficient for understanding personhood

    * The error of mechanistic visions of the person

    * Aquinas on the intellect and the soul

    * The importance of the body in defining our humanity

    * AI versus different ways of knowing — including inarticulate rationality and connatural knowing

    Section 4: Moral & Theological Dimensions

    34:44 – 49:22

    * The body and transcendence in technology

    * “The Beast and the Lamb” — AI’s moral implications drawn from the Book of Revelation

    * Transhumanism and its quest to redefine humanity

    * Eschatological aspect of transhumanism

    * The human intellect: how we understand knowledge and love

    * Theological reflections on identity and agency

    Section 5: Commodification of Persons & the Convenience Trap

    56:27 – 01:05:22

    * The risk of the self being commodified through convenience

    * The Prodigal Son as a parable about substance and value — what we give away and what we lose

    * Behavior modification as a key tool of technocratic control, especially for vulnerable populations

    Section 6: Data, Decentralization & Soft Digital Power

    01:05:22 – 01:15:39

    * AI and its limitations in replicating human interaction

    * The dangers of centralizing data

    * On soft digital power — control exercised without overt force:

    * Decentralization as a practical and principled response

    Section 7: The Anthropological Battle & Carving Out Space

    01:18:26 – 01:22:43

    * AI and technology represent an anthropological battle — a contest over what it means to be human

    * The alignment problem as both a technical and moral challenge

    * The need to carve out intentional space for humanity within a technological world



    Get full access to The Moral Imagination - Michael Matheson Miller at www.themoralimagination.com/subscribe
    続きを読む 一部表示
    1 時間 24 分
  • "It is Good that You Are" The Human Person in the Age of AI and The Digital Revolution

    "It is Good that You Are" The Human Person in the Age of AI and The Digital Revolution
    2026/05/20
    This is a talk I gave at an Acton Institute conference in Rome on the Human Person, AI, and the Digital Revolution in December 2025. The talk focuses on the impact of artificial intelligence and the digital revolution on the human person and and specifically how we understand ourselves. Photo Credit: Chat GPT — Prompt - MMM While there are many benefits to digital technology, artificial intelligence is amplifying many of the negatives impacts on how we understand the person. It has led to a mechanistic vision of the human person and reductive vision of reason, freedom, emotions and more. Some of the problems I address include: * Understanding ourselves through the computer * Digital Bureaucratization * Denigration of the Body * Commodification of Persons* Surveillance* Behavior Modification * Transhumanism — AI, CRISPR, and designer babiesI conclude with a response of philosophy of the person that is not filtered through computer analogies, but grounded in the vision that being is good, matter is good, our bodies are good - not accidents - but constituent of who we are, and with richer concept of reason, intelligence, emotions, and our social nature, and with agency and grace. A key element of digital revolution is Claude Shannon’s work on information theory in which he discusses Noise and Signal: The Gospel and Christian vision of the person is the signal in the midst of so many distortions about the nature and destiny of the human person.Outline and ThemesThe Nature of the Digital Revolution* The Digital Revolution is not a single phenomenon; we are still in its early stages, and it is hard to predict what will happen.* It has produced:* Increases in productivity* Medicine* Education* New industries and faster, broader globalization* Mobile and satellite telephony, bypassing landlines, especially impactful in the developing world* De-materialization (“10 things to one phone”)* There are many positives but there are also trade-offs – “with the invention of the car, comes the car crash”Key DistinctionsDistinction 1: Technology vs. the Technological Society /The “Technological Paradigm” — Pope Francis)Technology is what human beings create. We are called to complete creation.Technological Paradigm is a Worldview* Whatever can be done is permissible* All problems are technical problemsMany dominant technology platforms are infused with secular, materialist, and transhumanist values, producing addictive products and harmful behaviors, often despite known negative effects.As noted in Pope Francis Encyclical Laudato Si’, technological power has not been matched by growth in responsibility, values, and conscience. (Guardini)Distinction 2: Critiquing technology ≠ rejecting technology or innovation, penicillin or hospitals; nuance is required. Technology is not neutral and shapes us for good or ill.Distinction 3: There are some who worry about apocalyptic scenarios – “If anyone builds it, everyone dies.” Others reject these outright. Since no one can successfully predict we can talk about positives and negatives without affirming either position.How AI and Digital Technology Shape our Self-UnderstandingDistortion of the Person (Starting with Consciousness)* AI exacerbates the problem of understanding ourselves through the analogy of our creation: we see ourselves through the machine.* This is not new: in the Industrial Revolution, mechanistic ways of understanding the person, the family, the economy, and society fueled the idea that everything could be planned and social engineered.* In many discussions of AI, the human person is approached beginning with consciousness—not reason, freedom, embodiment, social nature, or the image of God—so we interpret the person through the lens of the computer: man through machine.Contrast this to Catholic philosophy of the person which begins with the person as:* “an individual substance of a rational nature, created in the image of God,” with reason seeking the good, true, and beautiful; free will; embodied and “made out of the dust”; born into families and cultures—our bodies are not an accident of our personhood.* We are not simply consciousness driving around in a body; as St. Thomas Aquinas says: “I am not my soul.”* Only a small part of brain activity is actually conscious; yet AI discourse often equates consciousness with personhood and reduces reason to discursive ratio, ignoring intellectus.Reductionism in Thinking and “Intelligence”* Artificial Intelligence is a certain way of “thinking”: discursive and explicit, fast processing, but not thinking properly understood.* It resembles what Iain McGilchrist describes as a Left Hemisphere dominated approach: reductionist, explicit, mechanistic.Parallel between the ratio and the intellectus in Saint Thomas Aquinas – See for example Antiqua et NovaRelated to Benedict XVI Regensburg Address and the problem of limiting reason to the empirical.This can further ...
    続きを読む 一部表示
    36 分
adbl_web_anon_alc_button_suppression_t1
まだレビューはありません