Jan Amos Comenius (1592-1670), arguably the father of Western education, argued in his work, The Great Didactic, that there must be three aspects to any successful model of education: Erudition, Virtue, and Piety. Erudition refers to the knowledge and comprehension of facts and principles. Virtue consumes itself with the proper application of those facts and principles to life in community. Piety concerns how learning is applied toward our relationship to God. For Comenius, all three components were integral to the education of men and women so that they might be useful to their families and to society.

Brute facts in and of themselves may seem valuable, but without virtue, how are we to apply the things we learn from said information? How are we to set boundaries on the studies that produce said brute facts? Over the generations, scientists, when unguided by virtue, have committed all sorts of cruelties toward mankind in the pursuit of said information. Examples abound, but eugenic experiments amongst the peoples of Appalachia and Vivisection were practices championed in science during the 20th century as tools intended to advance mankind and improve medical techniques. Sadly, the result of these experiments largely brought harm to those who were the subject of said techniques, with whole swaths of the community sterilized in the former and many animals harmed in the latter.

Virtue is the tool that constrains science within the bounds where it may benefit society. That does not mean erudition, as a principle, is immoral. In contrast, erudition in and of itself is morally neutral. The usage of said information establishes its morality at least on the most basic level. Another way of understanding this is to distinguish between Aristotle’s Material Cause (what it is) and his Final Cause (what it is for). We might even take liberties here and suggest that we include a Moral Cause to constrain how the Final Cause is applied.

Yet, virtue alone is not sufficient. Like a stool with two legs, one may balance upon it for a short spell, but it will collapse over time. The third leg to this stool is piety. For virtue to be sensible, virtue must be grounded in a principle that is outside of the individual. In fact, it must be grounded in something that is outside of all humanity, something that is true at all times and in all places. While virtues are largely consistent across cultures due to natural law, some values change from generation to generation. I grew up in a generation and culture where men were expected to wear suits and ties to church, and, depending on their job, in the workplace. My grandfather never owned anything but suits; when they wore out and were replaced, the old suits were used for gardening and yardwork. Today, there is a much wider range of clothing that is considered acceptable for men to wear, whether at church or at work.

The aspect of Comenius’ stool that governs virtue is piety. Ultimately, for an act to be virtuous, it must conform to God’s Law. God’s Law provides a fixed and immutable guide by which all virtue can be measured, and that again constrains erudition. When you lose God’s law, virtue becomes subjective, and in the end, erudition will run unbounded and free. While vivisection is a debate that seems to have largely passed out of the cultural conversation, Artificial Intelligence has not, and we are starting to see the effects of allowing AI models to act without the governance of virtuous and pietous constraints. 

One might suggest that programmers provide such constraints. Yet, if we can learn one thing from history, it is that human beings are fallen and flawed, bent toward pursuing their own interests. Certainly, there are scientists and developers who strive to be virtuous and pious, but not all.