You don’t need to believe in a god to get a religious exemption from using AI at work

Pope Leo XIV has decried AI as a threat to human dignity, but it’s not just the devoutly faithful who might worry about how AI squares with their beliefs. David Durman, a nontheistic Humanist, recently secured a religious exemption from using AI in the workplace.

“Humanism is a collection of beliefs about the human experience and how humans interact with the world,” Durman, a University of Kentucky administrator, told TechCrunch. It centers on “human well-being and flourishing, both individually and collectively […] and implores a person to try to improve both their well-being and their flourishing as well as the others around them.”

As he watched AI grow more popular in daily life, Durman sought out the American Humanist Association (AHA) — a nonprofit advancing secular humanism — to investigate how he could gain legal protections against having to use AI at work. He believes that using the technology runs counter to his beliefs.

“The way we become moral actors for ourselves and for others is through the active application of our minds, and the diminishing of that [through AI use] is going to necessarily have a negative impact on our ability to do so,” he said, reflecting on how overreliance on AI might affect critical thinking.

In a statement published by the AHA earlier this week, Durman wrote, “AI is interfering with people’s ability to earn a living, the environmental costs spell disaster for humanity and our planet, and its supplanting and theft of human creativity threaten elements of our culture like art and literature that make society flourish.”

Humanism is not anti-religious, but it tends to appeal to people who are skeptical of a god or other supernatural power yet still seek a scientific and moral framework to ground themselves in.

“I hope that if [others] have similar feelings, that they feel encouraged to pursue some kind of resolution,” Durman said.

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