Paulos Huang

This article argued the following points. Firstly, the challenge posed by artificial intelligence (AI) to the essence of humanity is serious. Secondly, it is important to analyse the external context and internal dynamics of the history of interaction between knowledge and power. Thirdly, it is necessary to trace the intellectual history of humanity becoming god-like. Finally, by combining Martin Luther’s anthropology with insights from social science and philosophical theology, this article advocated for guiding human beings to use their capabilities for good rather than evil through ethical and legal constraints. Efforts in Chinese context should be made to resolve the conflict between humanity’s pursuit of omnipotence and its failure to develop towards complete goodness, so as to avoid catastrophic consequences for humanity.Contribution: The present article’s special contribution was the theological reflection referring to AI’s challenges to the essence of humanity from Luther’s anthropology in Chinese context. The conflict between omnipotence and omnibenevolence has been highlighted as the key problem which human beings need to solve in the face of AI’s challenge.

This article endeavours to prove that there were creation myths of human beings or certain things, but there were seldom creation myths of ontological cosmology in ancient China. This will be warranted through the distinction between the concepts of ‘to create’ and ‘to beget’, the distinction between ‘Cosmology I of creationism’ and ‘Cosmology II of begetting’, and the relationship between the One and Many. The only exception is the myth of Nüwa 女娲 as the creator of human beings, but not the creator of the cosmos. Therefore, in ancient Chinese tradition, there were mainly myths of begetting rather than myths of complete creation in the sense similar to creatio ex nihilo. Contribution: Previous research frequently underscores the profound differences between ‘Cosmology I of creationism’ and ‘Cosmology II of begetting’. Based on the discussion of concepts of ‘to create’ [ zao 造] and ‘to beget’ [ sheng 生], this article argues that, there were mainly myths of begetting rather than myths of complete creation in the sense similar to creatio ex nihilo.