CBD 2026: Contemplation in an Age of AI: Ever Ancient, Ever New with Ilia Delio, OSF, PhD

Contemplation is an ancient practice of integrating the mind on deeper levels of consciousness. What happens, however, when the mind is extended into machinic life? Does Artificial Intelligence invite us to a new level of contemplation or is it an obstacle to contemplation? In this talk, I will explore the meaning of contemplation on the level of the Noosphere, the new level of global mind, and the emergence of hyperpersonal contemplation in cosmic evolution.

Ilia Delio, OSF. PhD is a Systematic-Constructive theologian who works at the interface of science, religion and culture. She holds a doctorate in Pharmacology from Rutgers University, Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences and a doctorate in Historical Theology from Fordham University. She is the author of twenty-six books including The Not-Yet God: Carl Jung, Teilhard de Chardin and the Relational Whole, The Hours of the Universe: Reflections on God, Science and the Human Journey which won the 2022 Gold Nautilus Book Award, and Making All Things New: Catholicity, Cosmology and Consciousness, a finalist for the 2019 Michael Ramsey Prize. She is founder and Executive Director of the World Institute for Science, Religion and Culture.

This session is part of the FREE Contemplation by Design Summit, Oct. 14-25, 2026.

The full summit schedule for this year will be posted at: https://med.stanford.edu/contemplation/summit.html.