Will New AI-Powered Necklace Help Fight Loneliness Epidemic?
The news of the week has been monumental, to say the least, from unprecedented political developments to weather-related disasters to the specter of an escalating war in the Middle East. So, for a day, let’s take a break from all of that to consider a whimsical headline that may be a sign of our times: “AI-Powered Necklace Will Be Your Friend for $99.”
“Friend” is a pendant about the size of an Apple AirTag. Avi Schiffman, the twenty-one-year-old Harvard dropout who invented it, told Wired that he created the device at a time when he had “never felt more lonely in my entire life.”
The onboard microphone listens to everything happening around you. Powered by AI, it will answer questions but also send unprompted messages to engage in conversation and offer encouragement.
In other words, it’s a technological companion to make up for the real thing.
It should not surprise us that Schiffman is in search of friends: his Gen Z cohort reports the poorest mental health of any generation in America as they struggle with alarming rates of loneliness, depression, and suicidal thoughts. They are also our nation’s least religious generation.
Perhaps there is a correlation, if not causation, here?
By contrast, actively religious people are:
- More likely to describe themselves as “very happy.”
- Healthier, with greater longevity, better coping skills, and less anxiety, depression, and suicide.
- More psychologically resilient with a higher quality of life.
- Better able to handle economic uncertainty and downturns.
Why, then, aren’t more Americans more religious?
When I Tried to Defy the Law of Gravity
When I was a small boy, I wanted to fly more than anything. I used to lay in the grass, look up into the clouds, and imagine soaring among them like Superman. So, one day I took some bedsheets and used them to make myself wings. I then climbed up on the roof of our house and jumped off.
My childhood mind truly believed that I would be able to fly when I did so, that the reality of gravity would submit to the reality of my newfound ability. But I was wrong (and lucky I didn’t break a leg).
Now consider the One who truly can supersede the laws of the world he created: “God is the King of all the earth . . . God reigns over the nations; God sits on his holy throne” (Psalm 47:7–8). This is a present-tense fact, no matter what circumstances might seem to say.
Our problem is that we judge objective reality by our subjective experience rather than the other way around. As a result, we are “breaking bones” right and left.
According to recent Gallup polling:
- 54 percent of Americans consider abortion to be morally acceptable.
- 53 percent support doctor-assisted suicide, a higher number than those who agree with medical testing on animals, at 48 percent.
- 69 percent find sex between an unmarried man and woman to be morally acceptable.
- 64 percent support gay or lesbian relations.
- 23 percent support polygamy (up from 7 percent twenty years ago).
Are we surprised that only 5 percent of us are “very satisfied” with the moral climate of our nation?
“When Your Child Swallows Poison”
How does our weeklong focus on God’s transforming love relate to today’s conversation? In a way, we might not expect.
In Smoke on the Mountain: An Interpretation of the Ten Commandments, Joy Davidman (the wife of C. S. Lewis) asked: “Mustn’t the churches adapt Christianity to suit the ideas of our time?” Then she answered her question:
No, they must not. Our ideas are killing us spiritually. When your child swallows poison, you don’t sit around thinking of ways to adapt his constitution to a poisonous diet. You give him an emetic [medicine that induces vomiting].
God wants to do the same for us.
It is because our Father loves his children so fervently that he hates everything that is not best for us. When our oldest son and our youngest grandson were diagnosed with cancer, I hated the disease with a passion beyond words. This is how our Lord feels about the sins that tempt us.
Of course, our spiritual enemy feels just the opposite. According to Jesus, Satan “comes only to steal and kill and destroy” (John 10:10). So the next time temptation arises, ask yourself:
- What will this steal?
- Whom will it kill?
- How will it destroy?
If the answers are not apparent, ask the Spirit to reveal them to you. And remember that “God is love” (1 John 4:8). If his word forbids something, it must be because it is harmful for you. If he commands something, it must be because it is best for you. His unchanging character requires it.
Now ask his Spirit to empower you to think, speak, and act biblically in response to your temptations and all through your day. When you do, you will experience the transforming love and abiding presence of your Lord in ways no technology (or human) could ever match.
How Michelangelo Sculpted David
I will always remember seeing Michelangelo’s massive statue of David for the first time. Standing seventeen feet tall in the Galleria dell’Accademia in Florence, Italy, it towers over those who come to view it. It took the famed Renaissance artist nearly three years to complete it, chipping away at a large block of marble until the masterpiece was completed.
When the pope asked the sculptor the secret of his genius, Michelangelo responded: “It’s simple. I just removed everything that was not David.”
If you were to resemble Jesus, the “son of David” (Matthew 1:1), more fully than ever before, what would your divine sculptor change today?
*Denison Forum does not necessarily endorse the views expressed in these stories.
Quote for the day:
“Be killing sin, or it will be killing you.” —John Owen
Photo Courtesy: ©Getty Images/Andriy Onufriyenko
Published Date: August 8, 2024
Jim Denison, PhD, is a cultural theologian and the founder and CEO of Denison Ministries. Denison Ministries includes DenisonForum.org, First15.org, ChristianParenting.org, and FoundationsWithJanet.org. Jim speaks biblically into significant cultural issues at Denison Forum. He is the chief author of The Daily Article and has written more than 30 books, including The Coming Tsunami, the Biblical Insight to Tough Questions series, and The Fifth Great Awakening.
The views expressed in this commentary do not necessarily reflect those of CrosswalkHeadlines.
For more from the Denison Forum, please visit www.denisonforum.org.
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