All Things Techie Podcast · Xtreme Media / Xtreme Technology Solutions

All Things TechIE Podcast - Episode 131

·34 min·2 clips

More than 1,000 people interacted with the AI Jesus, and two-thirds called it a spiritual or religiously positive moment.

1. All Things Techie Podcast Episode 131 centers on an AI Jesus installation in Lucerne, Switzerland, and a wider tech-policy roundup. 2. Justin Dawson hosts the episode, and Marco Schmidt is the theologian from Peter Speckle Church who explains the Deuce in Machina experiment. 3. The episode asks whether AI in a confessional booth is a useful spiritual tool or a line the church should not cross. 4. Peter's Chapel in Lucerne, described as one of the oldest churches, replaced clergy with a computer, cables, and an avatar of Jesus on a screen. 5. The AI program was trained on theological texts and could hold real-time dialogue in more than 100 languages. 6. Schmidt says the installation ran for two months and was designed to see how people would react to an AI Jesus and what they would discuss. 7. More than 1,000 people interacted with the avatar, including visitors from China and Vietnam. 8. Feedback from more than 230 users suggested that two-thirds found it to be a spiritual experience or a religiously positive moment. 9. Schmidt says some users found the avatar very good, while others said it was impossible to talk to a machine. 10. The transcript says the AI responses were criticized as trite, repetitive, and lacking wisdom, while the church managed risks around privacy and explicit replies. 11. Schmidt says users were told not to disclose personal information, and the church watched for illegal, explicit, or spiritually conflicting outputs. 12. Internal criticism also appears in the episode, with Catholic colleagues protesting the confessional booth and Protestant colleagues objecting to the religious imagery. 13. Schmidt concludes that the experiment showed a clear thirst to talk to Jesus beyond rituals. 14. Schmidt also says the responsibility would be too great to install a permanent AI Jesus. 15. Justin Dawson then points to thejesusai.com, which offers prompts like 'How can I find peace in troubled times' and 'What is the purpose of life according to Jesus.' 16. The site says it is not meant to replace any religious figure and that the content is for educational purposes and may contain inaccuracies and biases. 17. The tone is conversational, argumentative, and interruption-heavy, with Justin Dawson moving between case study, opinion, and listener prompts. 18. The format mixes one main church-tech story with a long sequence of fast-moving technology and policy headlines. 19. People interested in AI, religion, and platform regulation would likely stay with this episode. 20. Listeners wanting a tightly focused single-topic interview may skip this episode.

As heard by us

From AI Jesus to a synthetic presenter, Episode 131 keeps asking who carries responsibility when technology enters human spaces.

Episode 131 frames artificial intelligence as a matter of responsibility, starting with the computer avatar in Lucerne's Peter's Chapel and moving into the more difficult question of how children are protected online.

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Why you'd press play

You want an AI Jesus in Lucerne, a children's social-media age limit, and a presenter checking his fingers to prove he is real.

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