You’re Asking the Wrong Question About AI (Historian, Chaplain, AI Leader Explain) - The Transcript

Dani: Picture this, it's 1811, and textile workers in England are rioting. They're smashing mechanical looms because they are convinced that these machines are going to destroy their livelihoods. Fast forward to 2026, and we are seeing similar themes played out, centered around AI, or artificial intelligence.

Except this time the machines are writing poetry, diagnosing diseases, and eventually will be crawling the transcript of this podcast. So once again, we're finding ourselves asking what does this mean for us, for our work and for our souls?

Today we're doing something a little different on With Hat and Cattle.

I've brought together three people who are seeing this moment through radically different lenses. A historian who knows that we've been here before, a chaplain who's asking what maybe we're risking spiritually, and an AI professional who's actually building and working with these systems. Now, the inspiration for this episode probably came because I was over caffeinated and couldn't sleep one night, but I thought, what if we had a panel and called it a historian, a chaplain, and an AI expert log onto a zoom call?

Dallas: It's a good setup for a joke.

Dani: It is a setup for a joke. I think that, but the punchline is that each of these perspectives really is essential to understanding what's going on right now. So we're gonna explore AI and see if this is just the latest chapter in a very old story. We're gonna ask what it means to be made in the image of God when machines can think, and we'll dig into questions about dignity, purpose, community, and power.

And we may even ask some uncomfortable questions like, who benefits? Who gets left behind and who gets to decide? So, please know this is not a debate about whether AI is good or evil. This is simply a conversation about what it means to be human in a moment of profound transformation. So, let's introduce our guests.

First, we have Dr. Dallas Cothrum, who currently is the owner of MasterPlan Consultants and USA Engineers. He holds a doctorate in history where his focus was on US history, and he's also taught history at the University of Texas at Tyler long before joining MasterPlan. He serves as a contributing columnist for the Dallas Morning News and is one of the hosts on the podcast Working Title with Zach Sams.

So if anyone can tell us whether this time is different, it's gonna be Dallas.

Dallas: Thank you for having me.

Dani: Thank you for joining us. Chaplain John Betz is the executive director for spiritual health at WellStar Health System and has been serving his community in a faith-based way for over 20 years. He's deeply passionate about providing evidence-based solutions in his field and seeks to be conversant in various interdisciplinary contexts.

He is also the co co-host of the podcast the Chaplain's Compass, and he has two amazing sons and loves exploring nature with them. John, welcome.

John: Thank you so much. It's great to be here. I'm excited for this conversation.

Dani: And last but not least, we have Tori Begg, who currently is leading AI strategy enablement and programs at Voice Media Group. She's integrated AI solutions by using custom LLMs, or large language models, and agents, and she's the co-founder of local group Mind and Machine DFW, which opens up the AI conversations to everyone, industry experts to newbies. Tori focuses on the human side of artificial intelligence, bridging the gap between the human and the technology.

And we are also just so grateful she's agreed to be here today and be a part of this conversation. Tori, welcome.

Tori: Thanks for having me. It's gonna be really interesting and I love the different perspectives, which is why I created Mind and Machine to have these conversations. So thanks for putting this together.

Dani: All right. Yes, everyone welcome and let's get right to it. All right, we're gonna start with an easy one. Who's most worried about their job being automated?

Tori: Not me. I'm leading the automation.

Dani: Oh my gosh. All right.

Dallas: Well, I think as a parent I'm worried, you know, I got a high, high schooler and a college kid and, and you know, the, this is already one of the worst job markets since the great recession.

And so you factor in, you know, that you got many large employers that are gonna hire half as many people or less. You know, those analyst jobs, a lot of those beginning footprint of your career jobs already are not available, and now they're gonna become less of that. So, if I were, I don't know, 19 or 20 or 22 or so, I would be concerned that, you know, that really you could have gone to college, and you're getting out in a completely different economy and job market then you went in. That's worse than your college changing catalog in the middle of your, your major, your degree. Yeah. That's okay. You kind of deal with that. You, you know, it, it is just, it's a hard thing, I think, for young people to, oh, you need all these coursework or internships and if you do these things, there'll be something waiting for you on the other side. Maybe.

Dani: This is so true. You know, you reminded me of in 2008 when I bought my first house. But we also had a recession and did not keep that house.

Dallas: Yeah.

Dani: It was, I did not get my American dream.

Dallas: Well, but this is why these conversations are important. And you had all these people that got outta school, like 2006, 07, 08, 09, those classes, maybe even 10, you know, they delayed their careers. I mean they, they got lesser than jobs. It impacted them when they got their first raises and promotions. I mean, there's certainly some millennials that have, can look back and say I had a slow start, not because of anything they were doing, right?

Tori: I think that's a such a good point, and I think it's really important to think about the next generation. I'm currently writing a book on raising kids in the era of AI. As I'm looking at you guys on the screen, I see my nine and 11-year-old behind my computer running around and drawing. And I think that we need to be conscious of the fact that this is gonna be different than even me as a 36-year-old woman came into the workforce.

But we need to teach them how to adapt. So will it take the jobs of these young people? Not if they adapt and start learning now. So I go into my kids' schools and start teaching about how to learn differently and how to grow differently. In the era of AI, I'm teaching parents and have conversations all the time about what strategy and how we keep strategic thinking in the forefront, even when we have this tool that's inevitably changing the way that kids are gonna grow up in society, right? So, it's not that they're gonna take these jobs, or that kids need to be worried about having lack of jobs or different jobs, and of course we're in a hard time in the job market right now, but that's where we come in to have these conversations.

It's our responsibility to keep them thinking about creativity in the era of AI, keep them talking about it and learning about it and adapting with it, because AI will automate and narrow repetitive tasks. So we need to teach them to be bigger strategic thinkers so that they have a leg up in, in the society as they grow into it.

Dani: I love it.

Dallas: The problem is, is you've got a, like here in Texas, a legislature that is taking, you know... They don't want their kids to have phones at school. They doubt technology even though the world's built on it. And, you know, I don't really understand that, that you, you know, I'm not for distraction in class, but I'm from embracing that, you know, we're gonna have to work with technology and adapt to it and master it, and why wouldn't I want to be doing that in my coursework? But there are a lot of vagaries around politic Texas politics that I don't understand a hundred percent.

Dani: It looks like John was gonna add something maybe from the spiritual side to this conversation.

John: Yeah, I mean, I love the discussion about this because disruption is, it's historical. We, I, I imagine there were probably a lot of friars who were bemoaning the, the good touches that took place with the invention of the printing press, because all these people who were copying it by hand, all of a sudden, they don't have to do that anymore. But AI in itself touches cognition. It touches creativity, uh, touches upon moral decision making. And I love, I love what you said, like the idea that we need to be curious about where we're going and have our kids be curious about who they are, where they're going, because we built tools before, but this is the first time that we've built tools that imitate personhood.

Tori: Right. The printing press made scribes anxious. The industrial revolution made craftsmen anxious. Oh yeah. Right. And the internet made everybody anxious. And this is very similar to that anxiety, but much quicker. So we're also more prepared for it.

Dallas: You know, the iPhone, and Dani and I have talked about this many times, the iPhone really is the Gutenberg printing press. You know, it has completely changed the world. And when it happened in 2007, people weren't really... There were some people, I remember, standing in line. I think they saw that the future's different. I just was looking at those people as a spectator, like, I already got a Blackberry. It doesn't get any better.

Um, but, uh, I look back and realize I wish I had been more aware. People are more aware that this is impacting, they know it's happening now. I mean, but that's happened before. The people knew the steam engine was a big deal. It's not like they didn't think, oh, Robert Fulton, you know, did something big.

Tori: But what I heard from--

Dani: Dallas--

Tori: Sorry, go ahead.

Dani: Oh no, you're good. We can, I mean we can talk like go about this all day, I feel. Um, but you know, Dallas, when in history have people been right to worry and when do you feel those fears were maybe overblown?

Dallas: I think people should always worry. I mean, history is the study of change over time and yeah, I'll tell a little story.

So I worked with a famous military historian, uh, on my dissertation. And one day I was in his office and somebody from the TCU newspaper the Skiff came in and said, "Dr. McKenney, I'd like to talk to you about the, the war in Bosnia." And he said, "Oh, I'd be happy to talk to you. Can you come back in 30 years?"

Now, that was a history joke. She didn't understand it. She just thought he was being difficult, which he could be. But I understood it because as a historian, it takes a long time to be able to decide, well, how disruptive was this? We don't know. I mean, right now it's a current event. Right? So, um. Should people have been very worried about, you know, the gathering storm in Europe, you know, following World War I?

Yes. But maybe they should have been worried about the victors of World War I not punishing the nations that they defeated. So you, I mean, one thing I learned about taking and teaching history classes is that, like,you might be having a class of the Civil War? Man, we're gonna have to go back and start maybe in1820 or 1812.

You're gonna have to go way back. We gotta start earlier. Well, you can always point to an event even earlier than that. So, in my mind, I think because I'm not a tech person and, you know, I see myself as a liberal arts person, but I think of this as 2007. This revolution started then, and it's moved forward. But I bet I could convince myself of, you know, that started earlier with the, the Mac computer, you know, and people, you know, I think that was one of the important things that Apple did early is having approachable technology and beautiful things that people actually can use and it enriches their life.

Tori: It's not just a machine. I don't think they ever think of them, thought them, of them as machines. Right? So I think enriching your life is a really great point there and, and you went through some history, and some tools and some things that's come about in society that has reshaped society. Right? But some of those took decades, some of them took centuries, and AI is taking months and, in some cases, days, right?

But wouldn't you say, Dallas, and I'm curious about what your opinion is on this, the pattern has been the same throughout history? It's anxiety, adoption, augmentation, and then a new normal. Right?

Dallas: Yeah. It's no matter what, uh, disruption it is. I was thinking about like, you know, I don't know why I thought of this. There was all this thought at one time about, you know, oh, how vacuum cleaners and all these household appliances are gonna turn your life into the Jetsons. And in the end, none of that actually ever really happened. Uh, you know, it's still a pain to clean your house at the end of the day.

So, um, uh, but people have adopted all these things. Maybe it's better, certainly better than that, like 20-pound iron my grandmother, grandmother used. 

Dani: So yeah, Dallas brought up a good point that--

Dallas: One in the row.

Dani: Yeah, he mentioned, you know, we can point to an event, right, or something that happened, but it takes some time. Looking back towards the past, Tori, for many of us, AI entered the conversation I feel in '21, '22, but AI has actually been around for a while. Yeah. In your opinion, when did AI really become mainstream?

Tori: Well generative AI... When that came to society, people started paying attention. But artificial intelligence, machine learning has been around since the fifties. Um, so a, a very long time. But November of 2023 right, is really when ChatGPT came out, really when people started paying attention. But I would argue that people are just now starting to pay attention. We don't even have general society that is using this as an everyday tool yet.

I think what I try to get out of is this bubble that I'm stuck in where every single person on LinkedIn is talking about AI, every podcast, my whole social media feed, every person that I converse with in general is AI, AI, AI, but taking a step outside of that bubble, I don't know if it's necessarily ubiquitous yet to be integrated into our daily life systems operating workflows, but we're getting there and generative AI and ChatGPT was definitely the catalyst to getting there.

Dani: Yeah, that is a very great point because you are a hundred percent correct. On LinkedIn that's what my feed is, right? AI. And you know, I went to a class in January and one of the professors was very adamant that you need to have your hands on keyboards, learning AI every day. Because within a year, if you don't know AI, it's like going to work without your laptop. That's how crazy fast this is moving.

But when I go to Facebook where I have more connections with creatives, artists, and poets, it's very similar to I'm sure conversations that were happening with, you know, breaking looms. It's--we must protest, and it's bad and this is why. And so I'm seeing both sides of the conversations on two different platforms. So. John from--

Dallas: Well, they may be both, right?

Dani: This is, yes, exactly. This is why we're having this conversation. Um, from a spiritual or theological perspective, John, what's fundamentally at stake when we talk about these machines that are, you know, essentially kind of thinking?

John: Yeah, I know, I love thinking about that because what's really fundamentally at stake is not whether machines can think, but whether we can begin to misunderstand what it means to actually be a human. Because from a theological perspective, human beings aren't just simply defined by intelligence or output. Uh, we're, we're not just bodies. Uh, machines. We're not machines. Uh, but it's not that our bodies don't matter. We are relational, we're embodied, we are morally accountable.

So we can love, we can suffer, we can take responsibility for our actions. Um, and also, I like listening to Richard Rohr and he's from a Franciscan perspective, and one of the things that is described is that all creation bears some sort of divine imprint. But humans contain a particular responsibility within that creation.

So they're described as stewards, but not owners. So, they steward creation, but they don't own it. God Almighty Creator is the one who owns it. So, when we build something that imitates human cognition, the question then becomes are we deepening our role as stewards, or are we confusing ourselves about who we are?

So if we start treating machines as though they're persons, or treating people as though they're machines, then it seems like we're eroding dignity in both directions. So, um, and even, uh, outside of theology, I have some great friends who are humanists and humanist thought would say something very similar, uh, that human beings, they're not just information processors, but we are meaning makers.

We, we are moral agents, uh, we're participants in this shared responsibility. So what's at stake is not necessarily machine intelligence. It's human clarity.

Dani: Hmm. Tori, it looks like you had something to add.

Tori: Yeah, I just, I really resonate with all of that, and I think that in the AI space, you don't get this take very often, but I am a human first, AI forward, AI leader, right? Um, and I say all the time, AI allows me to be more human. Why? Because it's handling the drudgery that humans can, so that humans can do that higher order work, whether that be in theology or deciding, creating, caring, leading, loving. I get to set up that automation of things that are menial and monotonous.

And I get to spend more time building relationships and taking the humanistic part of me to a higher level rather than sitting on a computer, righ? Or writing out a shopping list. I can have AI do that in accordance to what's in my fridge 'cause I took a picture, uploaded it to Claude, had it understand my recipes for the last year, make new recipes, come up with the entire shopping list. Put the shopping list into Amazon, order it for me, and then give me the recipes for the entire week that just saved me two hours that I can now go and play a game with my children. Right? So it's taking those drudgery moments out that we have fallen into because of tech and bringing ourselves back into society.

So I'm, I'm a humanistic AI leader. And it's interesting to think of like the theological sector of that. Like, can it give us time and energy to give back to a higher being or beliefs in that system?

John: Hmm. Yeah, no, I, and I love, I love that 'cause even in, uh, one of the, one of my main roles is as a spiritual health professional, and so a chaplain. And we do a lot of charting and even charting it has... We have a lot of colleagues who, English is their second language, so this has even provided them with a bit of an equaling of the plain.

So that they're able to chart more effectively in English so that they don't have to struggle with the translation as much. Of course, we, uh, the questions then arise. You know, you wanna make sure that you're not putting protected health information into those areas. Of course. Um, but at the same time, what kinds of, how can I say certain things so that it is customized to the particular patient, family member?

And so that it's not just, I love what you said, drudgery. 'cause charting can be such drudgery.

Dani: And to the other, to the other side of that though, and I think this touches on some of Dallas's concerns as a parent, AI is doing things like that, right? But it's also, as he mentioned, eliminating that first rung into job entry. Right? And I mean, being open and vulnerable myself, I am an executive assistant, and AI has made some of my role redundant. And so this is why my hands are on keyboard learning AI and how I can add value to my role as it progresses. But not everyone's doing that.

And so, Tori, you know, when you speak to educating people, are you seeing out there that people are taking matters into their own hands, you know, being, oh, I can't think of the word... Assertive, uh, not being reactive to... That they're actually taking initiative. There we go! I got there. Uh, taking initiative and learning this, or is it something that's just, it's gonna be reactionary? I'm interested to hear your thoughts.

Tori: I am really lucky because I surround myself with people who are taking initiative just intrinsically, right? Because of the things that I'm doing and because of the positions that I hold, because of the networking groups that I go to and the people that I surround themselves. Going back to my earlier comment, I think a lot of people aren't taking the initiative. I have a girlfriend that lives up in Maine and lives off the land, and she thinks I am crazy. Every time I talk to her, she's like, chat, gee What? You know? And, and, and a lot of people are still in that space, which is why, like I take...I take the responsibility to, to drive AI literacy for the people who might not be there, because as you said, Dallas said, maybe we're getting rid of that first rung.

But again, it's about that education piece and really spreading the knowledge that maybe that first rung or the, or the entry level position can be redundant as, as you said, but then we teach everybody that we all have to be managers. And maybe those redundancies are held by agents, but now every entry level position is a manager that has to decide, act, and lead a bunch of AI agents that were once doing their job. So, if you are not having initiative in this space and you're listening to this, you should, at least a little bit, start being curious. Start getting your hands on the keyboards and typing prompts to start with. Learning how to prompt because it's not going anywhere. We know that. And the people that lack initiative are gonna be the people that are left behind.

Dani: Hmm. Dallas. In your opinion, how have societies historically handled massive job displacement?

Dallas: They come up with new jobs. I mean, and the eco, I mean, people just learn new skills or, or you know, uh, like the craftsman thing. I mean, there's still room for that, that still exists. And it's not like they all win outta business when, uh, you went to mass produced products. It's just there was differentiation in here's some finely made goods. Here's some junk.

And people probably have some of both of those things. I know they do. So, um, you know, I was thinking the other day, and I had a conversation that if everybody's zigging, some people are gonna zag. I think this is a really good idea, uh, time for your liberal arts institutions and for people to decide that I'm gonna be better at writing. I'm gonna be a better critical thinker.

I think there're gonna be some colleges and universities that decide, okay, uh, we are doing this, and we are teaching this, but we're also sharpening other skills. Um. So, and then there'll be some large public schools I suspect that really double down and, and their kids are not as broadly educated and they become technicians.

And, and I don't think that probably is the right answer. I think usually we've seen the people with the broadest, best critical thinking and decision making and communicating, do better. Uh, that's just hard to do at big public schools for a cheap price.

Dani: All right. Let's shift to ethics and justice because even if AI creates more jobs than it replaces, there's still questions centered around fairness and bias, and who gets to make those decisions.

Dallas: The fair comes once a year. It's in October here in Texas.

Dani: This is correct. All right, John. Curious, when we talk about AI and ethics, what, in your opinion, what moral framework should we be using?

John: Oh. So that's a great question because there are so many different approaches that you can take from it.

Um, we, we need a framework that actually keeps human dignity at the center and asks who's the, who are the groups that are benefiting and who is bearing the cost. Uh, this gets into a lot of the environmental justice pieces because how much water are we, is all this technology costing and using? Um, and in my tradition, uh, which, you know, I'm an Episcopal traditional deacon, and we draw from, it's, it's like a three-tiered stool, uh, three-legged stool, and it's scripture tradition and reason.

And that leads usually to a few consistent priorities. Um, that means protecting human dignity, uh, pursuing justice and not, not just efficiency, uh, but also keeping our eye open to the most vulnerable. We see a lot in the, uh, the Hebrew scriptures, the Jewish writings, about how the prophets were very much calling out the people who were using the most vulnerable so that they could get more stuff.

Um, and going back to the Franciscan lens, we're not owners. We're stewards. So, the question then becomes are we using AI in a way that honors people and the world, or are we just merely, as some traditions would have considered, the world as like this sinking ship from which we need to jump out of.

Uh, a lot of 'em come from the, like, a pre-millennial dispensationalist, uh, perspective, like the left behind the Late Great Planet Earth. Uh, the, the people who believe in the rapture, which by the way was invented in the early 1800s. Um, no Christians believed that before that.

Uh, but this idea that the world just, uh, we need to jump out of this world, and you know, oh, screw everything else. Pardon my French. So ethically, I'd like to translate that into three questions on any AI system. So who has helped? Who's harmed, and whose voice is not at the table? Who's invisible?

Dani: Thank you, thank you for bringing all of those questions up. And that kind of leads me to something I wanted to bring up with Tori. So when I first went to Mind and Machine, Tori, I'm not calling you out, but you made a statement that actually made me pause and I thought, "Oh, I don't know if I, I don't know if I like the answer to this," but it stayed with me now here, almost a year.

Someone asked, had a concern about the environmental effects of AI and the data centers and all that, and you said that AI is gonna give us the answer. And I thought, "Oh, like, that's an interesting perspective. I hadn't heard that yet." Can you, can you elaborate on that?

Tori: Uh, this, this is where the power of AI comes, right? We have problems as society, whether it's kind of a meta problem, that AI is the problem that AI can solve or other problems. And we have this tool that's capable of augmenting the human to be able to understand and solve these problems. Uh. A faster speed, higher capacity, um, and potentially more outside of the box.

So when we're thinking about the problems that AI is causing, we talked about, you know, energy, water, um, the best way to solve those is that meta solve is by using AI to solve that problem. And they're already doing this. Right?

Um, but I did wanna take a pause also. And I think that this ethical concern about the environment sometimes is a big hype cycle. And of course we have energy needs that run into AI, and we do need to be conscious on how we're using it, how much we're using it, and the ethical challenge of building it faster than the environment can take. But I think people need to actually take time to research that as well. I think, um, the production farming side of one cheeseburger is equal to 1.7 million prompts that somebody would make.

So let's reframe the way we're thinking about it also, and realize how much that we're taking from the environment. How much we can solve with AI, not just the AI problem, but every problem we have in the environment, and what that weight and implication looks like. And if you do all of that, put all of the research behind it and understand the potential of solve versus the potential of growth by integrating AI into the world, I think that it's worth it, which is where I'm saying, but we wouldn't be able to solve the AI problem if we didn't have AI. And we wouldn't be able to solve a lot of other problems if we didn't have AI as well, so, well, that--

Dallas: There are two things people don't like. Change, and the way things are.

Dani: Yeah. And, you know--

Dallas: That's my best line.

Dani: It really, it's a great one. That's great. He has, he has several. We're gonna, we're probably... I'm gonna help him put out a book of his Dallasisms. But that, that's a good one.

Dallas: And, and it speaks to the duality of how people, you know, people just don't like things and, and they don't know why they don't like them. Sometimes they're suspicious, they feel other people are getting an advantage on them. And people have this tendency to ration things they don't know anything about. And they do this with, we see this in land uses. Oh, we have enough storage. Oh, how, how much? How much is nor normally needed in an area?

People don't have any idea what the numbers are. They just, I don't use it. So you shouldn't either. Oh, okay. Well, I mean, you know, I mean, how do you feel about fluoride? Oh, I, I don't like it. Okay. Well, some people do. So we, you know, this is going to be one of those debates, like the fluoride debate. Uh, and like, I don't know, I'm, I name a lot of other historical ones.

I mean, uh, uh, I studied with a historian who would use it as example about how history has these trends, and probably, you shouldn't say this anymore, but he'd be like, breastfeeding is good. No it's not. Yes it is. No, it's not. And he kind of could go back and track for over a hundred-year period of what science thought about this.

So, you know, we're just at the fear part and people are, you know, like the other day, Mesquite turned down a data center. They can't afford to do that in terms of their tax base and people aren't putting away their phones. Yeah. So, uh, you know, and, and they're not cha even people that are not, and don't think of themselves as technolo, technologically driven, they're taking a lot of pictures.

Yeah. You know, they're, they, they, they are participating. They just don't feel like they are, or more likely, it's whatever they are doing is okay. They're doing it the right way.

Dani: Well, that's right, because again, people don't know. People think AI is generative AI, right? Like ChatGPT, Claude. They don't realize you're using your map on your phone? You're using AI. You know, it goes back to what Tori says: People don't realize how much they're using it.

Tori: Yeah. And, and there, there's one other thing that I want to kind of double click on that. John said he, he wanted to make sure that everybody had their voice heard, um, in, in that ethical concern. And I think a huge ethical challenge that I ponder is not always on the environment, but ensuring that AI is serving human flourishing, not just shareholder value or profit at all cost view point. And we need to make sure that we are having intentional choices made by leaders, builders, and organizations within the AI space to make sure that we're setting up our AI with guardrails as it concerns ethics and humanity as well.

And I, I just didn't want that--

Dallas: This is a great opportunity for regular Americans to decide to invest in it. I mean, it's already expensive, but it's gonna be much more expensive, you know? So there's nothing preventing people of moderate means of deciding, I don't, I'm gonna just forego all my Starbucks or other things and I'm going to invest in this. There's an opportunity for people to get in on the ground floor, um, and, and benefit from it. Particularly young people, you know, they'll see that investment over a, you know, really like, talk about a multiplying effect. I think there's a real opportunity here. There's also risk, but you know, that's the case with anything.

John: Well, and going with that, there's also the concept of, uh, bias because of how many... It reminds me of back in the days of the, uh, I think it's the either the Iraq or the Afghanistan conflict that took place following 9/11 and where American forces were making a lot of mistakes because they were listening to the people who spoke English rather than the people who, because that, that was easy.

They could get to the people who spoke English, but the, the... So that was what was feeding a lot of their intel, a lot of their, uh, their ability to talk about, well, this is what's happening with the local populace, but they weren't talking with the local populace. And so, creating AI so that you have a diversity of opinion, a diversity of experience, and so that local populations are able to be represented.

Um, and we see that within the, the idea of research, because research has typically been biased toward people who look like me as cis het, white, male, uh, and has downplayed, uh, minorities, persons of color, women, and other minorities.

Tori: I think that's such a good point because this is something I get nervous about. We're putting our source of truth into AI as, as it gets more ubiquitous. And people are using it as a Google or as a source of truth, but realistically, we're putting our source of truth and knowledge into five white billionaires' hands, right? We have your Mark Zuckerbergs and Elon Musks and these people that are building these systems, and we have to remember that these systems are built with the judgment and the bias of the companies that are building them. They get to decide how they want the AI to act, what they want those guardrails to look like, what personality that it has through the system, prompts for, for ease of conversation, right? So we need to think about that. I think that is really important.

I think that this, that's why this conversation was so intriguing to me and why it is so important because we need more voices in AI that are of ethicist. Of clergy, of historians, of civil rights leaders ,and not just engineers and billionaires.

Dani: Oh my gosh, thank you. That makes my liberal arts heart so happy. This is what started it, because I am not in the tech space, right? I have a liberal arts degree, and so approaching it and seeing it from these different, different lenses I felt was just so important and so, you know, kind of winding down the conversation, AI doesn't just change our economy or raise ethical questions, it's changing the whole environment. It's changing culture, communities. I think we've all touched on that. Um, and you know, again, what makes us human. So let's dive into that just a little bit.

Tori, are we in an arms race that we can't win?

Tori: Whew. That feels like a really loaded question.

Dani: Or you know, or you know, is this, at the end of the day, is this going to be a solvable problem or is it really, again, just people who have taken that initiative are gonna come out ahead?

Tori: Yeah, I don't think we have a choice. Right? Yeah. There's no getting over it. We just trudge through it, and I think the sooner that we understand that fact, and I don't know if succumb is the right word, but succumb to the fact that this is the future. It's not going anywhere, and you're either, from my hippie language, you're either on the bus or you're off the bus, right?

That's when we start almost liberating ourselves in and, and getting over that fear and anxiety. I don't think that it's a win or lose. It's, I think that's the wrong lens to look through because, uh, the only time you lose is if you make yourself so unhirable, so un uncommunicative, uh, because you don't understand the world and the, the historian and the clergy people both understand that as soon as you become uneducated... Knowledge is power.

It's hard to grow and be a contributing part of society. So it's not win or lose. It's playing along with the game, and it's deciding to get on that bus.

Dallas: I mean, prior to World War II, most Americans either lived, or their parents had lived or worked on a farm. So, uh, you know, for US servicemen it was the first time they had gone to a dentist. I mean, there are all these things that didn't happen that long ago. This is just where we are. Is, is that, that, I guess my grandkids will probably say, oh my God. Well, I don't know what, I hope I don't have some horrible grandparent name like Paw-Paw or something, but whatever it is that, that, that they, I mean, you know, like, oh my God, you used a typewriter?!

In fact, I did take typing. I was on the high school typing team too. But like, they're gonna think all these things are like so old timey, like I grew up on a farm. Yeah. And you know, there were prob, there were definitely kids that were like, oh my God, you grew up without the cotton gin or whatever it is.

We're just at a point and, and there'll be another point that people thought that AI was quaint. Yeah. You know, like, oh, that was not really the thing. That's the thing about history is that you think this is the big thing. It's just a big thing. Human. There's a long march of human history of, I mean, like I bet the guy that invented the wheel was a real big deal. And there were people before, like, no, no, no. I just wanna carry all this heavy crap myself and my buddies... You're putting us outta work. This wheel's terrible. Like, we don't need this. Not, I mean, like, I don't know. It looks like it's pretty good. I mean, like, I, I'm, I'm not gonna give up on the wheel, right?

Dani: Oh my God. Dallas, you'd had, I went back to a random memory. We're talking about your grand, uh, grandkids talking to us like we're ancient. I remember telling my daughter, who was like six at the time, telling her something about being careful, 'cause when you shave your legs eventually when you're older, and she goes, "Pffft. Mom. Shave? I'm gonna laser remove it," like laser hair removal. And she's like six, like, whatcha doing? So that's, yeah.

Tori: No, you are right. You are a hundred percent correct. I just wrote in post the other day that was like, our kids are gonna be like, you used your fingers to do work.

Dani: Oh my gosh. You know--

John: That's awesome. Yeah. Oh my, well, I, I was actually just looking at my finger, my ring finger.

On my left hand, I'm lefthanded. And, uh, I have to this day a nub, a place where my finger was changed permanently because of how much writing I was doing in elementary school.

Tori: Wow.

John: And has that mark on it. 'cause we were just, we'd have to take notes and we would just listen to the teacher and just old school take notes. Um, and then of course, oh, we, we have the computer lab, and we have the green screens with, uh, with the huge floppy disks that were literally floppy. Uh, but no, and, and being able to. I and, and having the discussions of, from a religious perspective, people thinking, oh, well this is the Antichrist, computers are the antichrist. Oh no, it was the Soviet Union. Oh no, it was, uh, and throwing up all these ideas, uh, throwing back to our conversation about fear. It's, it's not, it's gonna happen and I kind of go back to what, uh, Jesus mentioned in Matthew. He, he mentioned, he's like, eh, there's there, there were famines. There's gonna be wars, rumors of wars.

That's always been happening. Don't worry about that. You know, it's, it's gonna happen. Uh, but here's the thing, if you're trying to place dates on certain things of when you know what's the antichrist or what's gonna happen, just don't be worried about that. Love your neighbor. Love your neighbor. That's why I am.

That's how I get pissed off, says Jesus.

Dani: All right guys, thank you again. Thank you so much. Now before we go, I do have a question for each one of y'all. So, Tori. If you could have dinner with anyone dead or alive, who would it be?

Tori: Oh, uh, the first thing that came to my head was Janice Joplin.

Dani: Really? Yeah. Oh my gosh. Can we double click on that? I don't think I've ever had that answer from anyone.

Tori: I was just in New York City with my daughter, and we were at the Hard Rock Cafe in New York, and they had a box of one of her old leather pants and that red boa that she wore. And you know, I just think she was probably such a curious person, which such an in-depth and busy mind. And those are the people that I like to surround myself with.

People that kind of think outside of the box and feel a little bit different, and also live life at the same time. And man, she must have seen, seen some crazy stuff in her life. I just think it would be a hoot of a dinner.

Dallas: She was a Texan.

Dani: Really?

Tori: I'm, I'm not a Texan, obviously.

Dallas: I'm a Texan. Yes, that's right.

Dani: Um, John.

John: Oh, I love, I love that question because, of course there's a Sunday school answer, which is always Jesus. No, I love, uh, don't get me wrong, I love Jesus. Um, but honestly, I would love to just grab some coffee, or some beer... a meal with Neil deGrasse Tyson. Just 'cause he, he's fascinating. He's funny.

He has a lot, uh, we disagree on so many different things, but at the same time, I think we'd have a great conversation, and we would just be able to, there's a lot of areas that I agree with him on. Uh, but at the same time, it'd be great to have those discussions and, uh, and I imagine he's probably a good foodie as well.

Dani: And Dallas round it up for us.

Dallas: How about George Washington? I'd like to know what the real plan was. A lot of everybody likes to put words in the founder's mouth. I like to ask some questions.

Dani: I love that. Thank you again for joining us for this conversation. Um, I'm gonna link in the show notes where everyone can find y'all and yeah, to the, to the community. Just stay curious, stay grounded, and do something today that increases your AI knowledge.

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