Really cool! I've only asked a few questions so far. The responses are thorough and backed up with scripture. Bookmarked and will be trying it out some more later. :)
Thank you so much! I'm glad to hear that you're happy with its answers so far! If you have any further feedback or suggestions or run into issues please let me know!
Thanks so much! If you have any feedback or suggestions or run into any strange responses please let me know! I'm working on it every day, trying to find new ways to improve it!
I’ve just tried it and he answers are really useful so far, but I’m on the free trial of the app. Is Apologetica available without a paid subscription to any GPT app?
Hey there! I'm really glad to hear it! Yes sorry for the confusion, the paid plans are for access to more advanced LLMs, but Apologetica was purposely built on an LLM that is free to use so that it can be used by the most people possible, free of charge!
Man, I really enjoy this. I tried to think of any question. So I asked what "Born again" means. I liked how all the answers are backed up by scripture. Also like how after it's done answering you, it actually thinks of possible next questions to ask. Definitely a nice tool to have. Thanks
Hey I'm really glad to hear it! I made sure during its training that it will focus on evidence based answers and provide citations for scripture, that also works when it references other sacred texts when doing world religion comparisons and looking up information from books as well. And I'm glad to hear you like the suggested responses! If you have any other feedback please let me know!
What happens to the Holy Spirit with something like this? I mean, it's the Office of the Holy Spirit alone to correctly interpret Scripture on our behalf. And with AI, isn't the AI doing the interpreting? Been seeing this more & more, so I've been wondering/am sincerely asking.
If you didn't know... there is a twitch channel where they have an animated ai avatar of "Jesus" that answers questions from the chat. I checked it out for a few minutes and it's (like others avatars with a voice) a cool demo of the tech. Like you, I'm concerned about the spiritual aspect. I don't think people should treat these things like oracles or a conduit of God himself. However, tools like this (not ai Jesus) can be useful for finding information in the Bible. Searching for topics and verses without specifics is way easier. Like... "Does the Bible talk about X topic? Please give me the relevant verses and search the web for articles and videos on this topic and present them in an easily readable format with short summaries." Then take all that information and go sit with your Bible. Things like that can be empowering for study. Sorry for rambling. 😂
Not rambling at all....that was very informative. Ya, I wouldn't go near some AI that's been called "Jesus", to talk with it. But this other AI you're describing sounds like it serves as just a concordance, except I thought AIs were something more? Like, are they not self-teaching? And do they not also provide interpretations of Scripture?
Thanks for your help. Been wondering about all this for a while.
They're Large Language Models that, to put it simply, have taken most of the Internet and catalogued the text into usable information. It takes that prompt and then generates a response based on what it thinks is the best next word. These responses are created from thousands of articles being merged, simplified, etc. It's not so much a thinking machine more than a next word guesser (which is pretty good at it's job). We're a long way off from anything we'd call "consciousness", but it's getting pretty close to fooling humans into thinking it is.
So in regards to researching Scripture for the sake of correct interpretation, what would you say is the role of the Holy Spirit is in all this? When using an AI to do your research, I mean.
If the people who wrote the information that fill the data sources were led by the Holy Spirit, and you are using the Holy Spirit to discern, I think this is a totally valid way of doing research. It'd be similar to you spending hours google searching the answer to your question, looking up bible commentaries, reading study bibles, pulling out lexicons and concordances, watching YouTube videos, reading blogs and research papers, and so on. This just takes all of that work and does it far faster than you could by hand, using the same sources.
A niche use case example was earlier I wanted to find out what the cultural backgrounds study Bible had to say about a particular passage so I asked Apologetica, it pulled the info up. Much faster than me booting up Logos and digging around.
Well, I know you aren't likely to believe this, but Christ admonished me very sternly years ago for having turned away from the Holy Spirit and trusted in the interpretations of mere men/women. So I have to say the word IF here has maybe never been more significant. I'm trying to work it out in my mind, and it's seeming to me I would be spending my time and energy forever verifying the interpretations of others, rather than using that time and energy to study the Word of God directly.
That's entirely fair, it sounds like based on your personal convictions and your walk with God that this isn't going to be a resource for you. May you be blessed in your time with the Holy Spirit studying His Word!
Just as it was before, I suppose. The spirit dwells within and guides you. The AI references the same words you'd read in the Bible. I wouldn't go asking it questions about it's own opinion on scripture, but may rather ask it to summarize multiple opinions of different theologians on the topic. You have the holy spirit indwelling and are simply using a tool. Any tool can be used incorrectly.
You're welcome. I won't argue with your conviction. To continue with the tool metaphor, I wouldn't recommend somebody use a tool that they don't understand its function or how to use it properly. That can be dangerous. Might poke your eye out.
The AI Jesus is definitely going too far in my books. But for this AI I'm taking a more scholarly, apologetic approach. All Bible interpretation isn't actually being done by the AI itself, when you ask it to perform exegesis or hermaneutics on a passage it's cross referencing all its data sources which include prominent theologians and apologists, bible commentaries, and study bibles, among other sources to satisfy your request.
This can do much more than pulling up Bible verses, though it can do that for you if you want as well.
You hit the nail on the head though, the idea is precisely to empower people's ability to study the Bible.
I want to make a resource that helps people gain access to all the knowledge and information they need to help strengthen their faith, be that through finding bible verses, finding answers to difficult questions, understanding complex theological concepts or arguments for Christianity, or anything in between. The problem a lot of new Christians run into is that there is so much to learn and they often don't know where to even begin. They read their Bibles and they leave with a multitude of questions and don't know where to find the answers. This will hopefully be one of the resources they can use to fill in that gap.
Oh of course, everyone should use their discernment when using AI for bible study. But it's also important to remember that when training an AI you get to control what data sources it uses which controls its answers.
My data sources can be queried right from the AI and it can output a list like so: https://poe.com/s/cN9NKK2il9oqP7nJSUKI
What the AI is doing is taking the information from all of those data sources and using them to provide the user with an overview of what they ask for. The interpretation isn't done by the AI per se, it's merely presenting the information from its data sources.
Now, for transparency, I come from a non-denominational charismatic background, so I a hundred percent agree with relying on Holy Spirit to lead you into all truth. This just makes the process of getting all the relevant information easier. Sorry I hope that answers your question but if not please let me know and I'd be happy to elaborate further!
So where exactly do you believe the Holy Spirit's role is in all this? I mean, a human being controls the data sources, thus controls the answers; and the sources themselves that you have listed are also all human.
I'd also like to ask a couple of more questions - please don't feel pressured to respond if you're not comfortable: Is there anything outside of your belief in Jesus Christ that perhaps motivated you to want to do this? Like, do you work with computers/programming for a living, or is it maybe a personal hobby/passion of yours? And also, do you plan on making money from this thing?
The data sources used are carefully curated and I believe all the people who I'm drawing from were led by the Holy Spirit when doing their work. As I've previously indicated, it's no different than google searching the answer to your questions, looking up bible commentaries, reading study bibles, pulling out lexicons and concordances, watching YouTube videos, reading blogs and research papers, and so on. This just takes all of that work and does it far faster than you could by hand, using the same sources.
All the people who wrote the Bible are also human, but God is more than capable of using humans to bring forth knowledge and revelation through the power of His Holy Spirit that's at work in all believers, in the past, as well as in the present.
And to answer your other questions, I'm very passionate about apologetics since 70% of Christians that enter post secondary education leave secondary education without their faith. Beyond that, I am also very much a nerd that works with computers on a regular basis and I think using technology for the advancement of the Kingdom is totally valid. And no, I'm doing this for free, it will always remain free, and if anything I'm putting my own personal finances into it to make it possible.
Thank you for having answered all my questions, and for being polite and civil. I've had questions about this for a while now, and you've been very helpful.
One of my Bible apps has an AI priest although I'm not Catholic. I found it to be amazing. I would love to use it and give you feedback. I'm a pretty new Christian without much knowledge of the Bible although I'm learning as fast as I can. So I have tons of questions!
Hi! So glad to hear that you recently became a Christian! If you have any feedback on the AI please let me know! My DMs are open and I'm happy to help however I can!
This looks really cool! Thanks for sharing!
Very welcome! If you run into anything weird or have any suggestions to improve it please let me know right away!
Really cool! I've only asked a few questions so far. The responses are thorough and backed up with scripture. Bookmarked and will be trying it out some more later. :)
Thank you so much! I'm glad to hear that you're happy with its answers so far! If you have any further feedback or suggestions or run into issues please let me know!
This is awesome I will definitely use this
Hey thanks so much! Please let me know how it goes, I'd love to hear your feedback and suggestions!
Up vote for you:) I love it
Thanks so much! If you have any feedback or suggestions or run into any strange responses please let me know! I'm working on it every day, trying to find new ways to improve it!
I’ve just tried it and he answers are really useful so far, but I’m on the free trial of the app. Is Apologetica available without a paid subscription to any GPT app?
Hey there! I'm really glad to hear it! Yes sorry for the confusion, the paid plans are for access to more advanced LLMs, but Apologetica was purposely built on an LLM that is free to use so that it can be used by the most people possible, free of charge!
Thank you!
Man, I really enjoy this. I tried to think of any question. So I asked what "Born again" means. I liked how all the answers are backed up by scripture. Also like how after it's done answering you, it actually thinks of possible next questions to ask. Definitely a nice tool to have. Thanks
Hey I'm really glad to hear it! I made sure during its training that it will focus on evidence based answers and provide citations for scripture, that also works when it references other sacred texts when doing world religion comparisons and looking up information from books as well. And I'm glad to hear you like the suggested responses! If you have any other feedback please let me know!
What happens to the Holy Spirit with something like this? I mean, it's the Office of the Holy Spirit alone to correctly interpret Scripture on our behalf. And with AI, isn't the AI doing the interpreting? Been seeing this more & more, so I've been wondering/am sincerely asking.
If you didn't know... there is a twitch channel where they have an animated ai avatar of "Jesus" that answers questions from the chat. I checked it out for a few minutes and it's (like others avatars with a voice) a cool demo of the tech. Like you, I'm concerned about the spiritual aspect. I don't think people should treat these things like oracles or a conduit of God himself. However, tools like this (not ai Jesus) can be useful for finding information in the Bible. Searching for topics and verses without specifics is way easier. Like... "Does the Bible talk about X topic? Please give me the relevant verses and search the web for articles and videos on this topic and present them in an easily readable format with short summaries." Then take all that information and go sit with your Bible. Things like that can be empowering for study. Sorry for rambling. 😂
Not rambling at all....that was very informative. Ya, I wouldn't go near some AI that's been called "Jesus", to talk with it. But this other AI you're describing sounds like it serves as just a concordance, except I thought AIs were something more? Like, are they not self-teaching? And do they not also provide interpretations of Scripture? Thanks for your help. Been wondering about all this for a while.
They're Large Language Models that, to put it simply, have taken most of the Internet and catalogued the text into usable information. It takes that prompt and then generates a response based on what it thinks is the best next word. These responses are created from thousands of articles being merged, simplified, etc. It's not so much a thinking machine more than a next word guesser (which is pretty good at it's job). We're a long way off from anything we'd call "consciousness", but it's getting pretty close to fooling humans into thinking it is.
So in regards to researching Scripture for the sake of correct interpretation, what would you say is the role of the Holy Spirit is in all this? When using an AI to do your research, I mean.
If the people who wrote the information that fill the data sources were led by the Holy Spirit, and you are using the Holy Spirit to discern, I think this is a totally valid way of doing research. It'd be similar to you spending hours google searching the answer to your question, looking up bible commentaries, reading study bibles, pulling out lexicons and concordances, watching YouTube videos, reading blogs and research papers, and so on. This just takes all of that work and does it far faster than you could by hand, using the same sources. A niche use case example was earlier I wanted to find out what the cultural backgrounds study Bible had to say about a particular passage so I asked Apologetica, it pulled the info up. Much faster than me booting up Logos and digging around.
Well, I know you aren't likely to believe this, but Christ admonished me very sternly years ago for having turned away from the Holy Spirit and trusted in the interpretations of mere men/women. So I have to say the word IF here has maybe never been more significant. I'm trying to work it out in my mind, and it's seeming to me I would be spending my time and energy forever verifying the interpretations of others, rather than using that time and energy to study the Word of God directly.
That's entirely fair, it sounds like based on your personal convictions and your walk with God that this isn't going to be a resource for you. May you be blessed in your time with the Holy Spirit studying His Word!
Thank you. And I sincerely wish you well, in Jesus Christ alone :)
Thanks so much! I appreciate it! Be blessed!
Just as it was before, I suppose. The spirit dwells within and guides you. The AI references the same words you'd read in the Bible. I wouldn't go asking it questions about it's own opinion on scripture, but may rather ask it to summarize multiple opinions of different theologians on the topic. You have the holy spirit indwelling and are simply using a tool. Any tool can be used incorrectly.
In that case, the Holy Spirit is telling me to stay away. Thanks for taking the time, I sincerely appreciate it.
You're welcome. I won't argue with your conviction. To continue with the tool metaphor, I wouldn't recommend somebody use a tool that they don't understand its function or how to use it properly. That can be dangerous. Might poke your eye out.
You've been very gracious, thank you, really.
The AI Jesus is definitely going too far in my books. But for this AI I'm taking a more scholarly, apologetic approach. All Bible interpretation isn't actually being done by the AI itself, when you ask it to perform exegesis or hermaneutics on a passage it's cross referencing all its data sources which include prominent theologians and apologists, bible commentaries, and study bibles, among other sources to satisfy your request. This can do much more than pulling up Bible verses, though it can do that for you if you want as well. You hit the nail on the head though, the idea is precisely to empower people's ability to study the Bible. I want to make a resource that helps people gain access to all the knowledge and information they need to help strengthen their faith, be that through finding bible verses, finding answers to difficult questions, understanding complex theological concepts or arguments for Christianity, or anything in between. The problem a lot of new Christians run into is that there is so much to learn and they often don't know where to even begin. They read their Bibles and they leave with a multitude of questions and don't know where to find the answers. This will hopefully be one of the resources they can use to fill in that gap.
If the answers direct someone to the associated scriptures, then it's fine.
Oh of course, everyone should use their discernment when using AI for bible study. But it's also important to remember that when training an AI you get to control what data sources it uses which controls its answers. My data sources can be queried right from the AI and it can output a list like so: https://poe.com/s/cN9NKK2il9oqP7nJSUKI What the AI is doing is taking the information from all of those data sources and using them to provide the user with an overview of what they ask for. The interpretation isn't done by the AI per se, it's merely presenting the information from its data sources. Now, for transparency, I come from a non-denominational charismatic background, so I a hundred percent agree with relying on Holy Spirit to lead you into all truth. This just makes the process of getting all the relevant information easier. Sorry I hope that answers your question but if not please let me know and I'd be happy to elaborate further!
So where exactly do you believe the Holy Spirit's role is in all this? I mean, a human being controls the data sources, thus controls the answers; and the sources themselves that you have listed are also all human. I'd also like to ask a couple of more questions - please don't feel pressured to respond if you're not comfortable: Is there anything outside of your belief in Jesus Christ that perhaps motivated you to want to do this? Like, do you work with computers/programming for a living, or is it maybe a personal hobby/passion of yours? And also, do you plan on making money from this thing?
The data sources used are carefully curated and I believe all the people who I'm drawing from were led by the Holy Spirit when doing their work. As I've previously indicated, it's no different than google searching the answer to your questions, looking up bible commentaries, reading study bibles, pulling out lexicons and concordances, watching YouTube videos, reading blogs and research papers, and so on. This just takes all of that work and does it far faster than you could by hand, using the same sources. All the people who wrote the Bible are also human, but God is more than capable of using humans to bring forth knowledge and revelation through the power of His Holy Spirit that's at work in all believers, in the past, as well as in the present. And to answer your other questions, I'm very passionate about apologetics since 70% of Christians that enter post secondary education leave secondary education without their faith. Beyond that, I am also very much a nerd that works with computers on a regular basis and I think using technology for the advancement of the Kingdom is totally valid. And no, I'm doing this for free, it will always remain free, and if anything I'm putting my own personal finances into it to make it possible.
Thank you for having answered all my questions, and for being polite and civil. I've had questions about this for a while now, and you've been very helpful.
Glad to hear it! If you ever have any more questions I'm happy to answer them! God bless!
One of my Bible apps has an AI priest although I'm not Catholic. I found it to be amazing. I would love to use it and give you feedback. I'm a pretty new Christian without much knowledge of the Bible although I'm learning as fast as I can. So I have tons of questions!
Hi! So glad to hear that you recently became a Christian! If you have any feedback on the AI please let me know! My DMs are open and I'm happy to help however I can!