Robot Monks and AI Enlightenment: Inside China's Tech Temple RADII China

In recent years, off-the-grid retreats and tech detoxes have been on the rise in China, as in many other areas of the world. Often, the idea behind such initiatives is that for us to really switch off and find a sense of inner peace (or whatever term you want to attach to it), we need to more than install Calm and look at pictures of rain once a day -- humans must do away with the gadgets and technology that dominate our lives. But at Longquan (龙泉 or Dragon Spring) monastery on the outskirts of Beijing, they approach things from a radically different angle: what if cutting-edge technology can actually help rather than hinder the search for enlightenment? The monks at Longquan (including one robotic monk) are testing this idea in practical ways every day -- and last month I joined them. The monastery, built in 957, rises from the rolling hills of the Phoenix Range out beyond the Summer Palace in Beijing's suburban northwest.