"Life Is Not Digital" (Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew)

Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople was interviewed on May 25th 2025 by George I. Androutsopoulos, Associate Professor of Law at the University of Athens, which was published on Sunday, May 25, 2025, in the University of Athens newspaper, “Vima tis Kyriakis”. We quote below a portion of the interview:

Question: I thank you very much, on behalf of the university community, for the honor and opportunity of our conversation. Let us start with the young people. One - the positive - side is that the students of our University record excellent performance when they continue their studies abroad or participate in international competitions. The other, however, is that our children and young people today spend a large part of their time on Instagram and TikTok, while the rise in the phenomena of violence among young people is impressive. Have the standards and the path of prudence and virtue been lost in our days? How could the University and the Church contribute to a restart?

Answer: Christ is Risen! Thank you very much for the invitation. I am familiar with the newspaper of the University of Athens and I congratulate you for the initiative to create this forum for dialogue and reflection, but also for the effort to highlight the multidimensional work that is being done in your historic educational institution for the benefit not only of the academic community, but also of the entire Greek society.

The "Policing" of our Lives (Metr. Hierotheos of Nafpaktos)

By Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos and Agiou Vlasiou

Society needs the police to impose order and balance on it, but man is uncomfortable with the policing of his personal life. Unfortunately, however, policing is increasingly moving into the private and internal areas of man, not necessarily by the police, but by modern technology.

We all know that phones, mobile and fixed, are monitored for social and national security. Also, various voices are heard about the chips that are inserted everywhere, even in ID cards.

However, the policing is done in ways that we do not suspect, since the mobile "smart" phones determine at least the place of our stay, and the GPS that we use for our path to the exact destination, tracks us with precision.

Artificial Intelligence as Artificial Brilliance (Metr. Hierotheos of Nafpaktos)

 

To an English speaker without a knowledge of Greek, this article won't make a lot of sense, since the author is using two different ways of talking about Artificial Intelligence (Τεχνητή Νοημοσύνη and Τεχνητή Εὐφυΐα). The literal translation of Εὐφυΐα is the word "brilliance", though it really is another word for intelligence, but the other Greek word for intelligence, Νοημοσύνη, contains the word "nous" or "noetic", which in Orthodox theology is the highest faculty of the human being that has spiritual connotations. This article therefore is about replacing the Greek word Νοημοσύνη with Εὐφυΐα, though in English both mean "intelligence". To understand the difference, I have rendered Εὐφυΐα as "brilliance". It is an important theological discussion, but not applicable in English, so do not think that "Artificial Intelligence" should be replace with "Artificial Brilliance" in English.

 

Artificial Intelligence as Artificial Brilliance

By Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos and Agiou Vlasiou

Nowadays, there is a lot of talk not only about Artificial Intelligence, but also about its consequences in our lives. Opinions are expressed about the benefits that will come from its implementation, but also the risks that result from the abolition of human freedom and the alteration of human rights.

Thus, the pioneers of Artificial Intelligence sounded the alarm of modern technology and emphasized that they must set limits.

For example, Geoffrey Hinton, who is described as "the father of Artificial Intelligence", in an interview he gave to the New York Times, explained that he left Google to speak freely about the dangers of Artificial Intelligence. In fact, he particularly emphasized that "some of the dangers arising from artificial intelligence Chatbots (software) were quite scary." “Right now, she's not smarter than us, as far as I can tell. But I think that soon it can be done."