The God Machine: Android incarnation replaces Buddhist monk
Industrialisation is finally reaching Buddhism. At the beginning of this month, a preaching monk was replaced by a robot for the first time. However, this is not a robot monk, but a genuine android deity.
Cause and effect have struck again, because the karma of the Buddhist Kodai-ji temple in Kyoto is not doing too well. As in Europe, the younger generation of Japanese are increasingly shunning the country's religions and sects. But unlike the monotheistic believers at home here, the Japanese Buddhists are moving with the times and have a plan to get young people interested in philosophical teachings again. A robot deity is supposed to do the trick.
Buddhism on battery power
Until recently, visitors to the temple listened to an elderly monk preach. But that's over for now. Not to the delight of all temple visitors. Some of the older generation of believers in particular find it difficult to hear the voice of a young woman from the loudspeaker mouth of a deity. It feels a little uncomfortable.
However, the superbeing baptised Mindar, which is an incarnation of the androgynous deity Kannon, the deity of mercy, is primarily more of a marketing attraction anyway, which is intended to attract tourists as well as young people. It is interesting to note, however, that in Buddhism the deity itself has the ability to take on any form. The temple therefore emphasises that this time the deity has transformed into an android.
The deity Kannon is the best-known bodhisattva figure in Mahayasna Buddhism. She is a gender-neutral mediator, comparable to a Christian saint. Its task is to help all sentient beings achieve enlightenment. To this end, she can take on any external form.
The deity was created in collaboration between the temple and Osaka University, where Professor of Intelligent Robotics Hiroshi Ishiguro was in charge of the project. The cost of the temple: 100 million yen (around 900,000 Swiss francs).
Mindar is 195 centimetres tall and weighs 60 kilograms. The deity has no legs and therefore stands on a base made of aluminium and silicon. During development, care was taken to keep the android as gender-neutral as possible to match the chosen deity. An attempt was also made to make it appear natural in terms of communication. To this end, the robot can move its eyes, hands and upper body freely. It masters human-like gestures and also folds its hands when necessary. To give the impression of eye contact, Mindar also has a camera built into its left eye, which it uses to focus on you when you visit it.
During the realisation, care was also taken to leave believers enough room for their own imagination. Therefore, simple facial features were defined and the overall appearance was deliberately reduced to a minimum. Visitors can therefore decorate the deity in their own minds, or cover up its quasi-nudity with enough rendering material from their brains. The question is whether the open head with visible aluminium wires might not be distracting if a worshipper with a lesser imagination were to come along.
Will monks now be out of work?
Officially, the Übermensch was developed to preach Buddhist teachings in an easily understandable way. It is intended to appeal to people with problems who are looking for peace of mind. Mindar's current sermon lasts 25 minutes and is based on the philosophical-religious text of the Heart Sutra, the meaning of which is not really understood even by monks. The recitation of the sutra is therefore more poetry than imparting knowledge and is somewhat at odds with the aim of making it easy to understand. Nevertheless, it is one of the most important religious texts.
The current sermon is supported by a light show and translations in Chinese and English projected onto a screen. It is just a trial run that will last until May. It is not yet known whether Mindar will definitely replace the poor human preacher after that. However, I suspect that he would first have to be improved in terms of artificial intelligence, as the deity currently only answers predefined questions. It will probably be some time before monks are replaced by Android deities on a large scale.
I find my muse in everything. When I don’t, I draw inspiration from daydreaming. After all, if you dream, you don’t sleep through life.