An Islamically inspired critical pedagogy in the AI era: a multiplex framework for fostering wisdom

As Artificial Intelligence (AI) systems become more capable, their role in education is often welcomed for promising greater access, personalisation, and efficiency, but uncritical adoption risks weakening the teacher-student relationship, peer learning, and grounding in tradition – foundations essential to intellectual, ethical, and spiritual development. This chapter introduces a Multiplex Critical AI approach, combining critical theory with the multiplexity framework of Senturk et al., to offer a multidimensional perspective on education and AI. It is grounded in three core principles: multiplex ontology, which understands human beings as composed of interconnected dimensions – body, mind, heart, and spirit; multiplex epistemology, which values multiple sources of knowledge including reason, revelation, experience, and tradition; and open civilisational exchange, which supports meaningful dialogue and respectful diversity without marginalising non-Western perspectives. By foregrounding wisdom, moral responsibility, and layered human development, the Multiplex Critical AI approach offers a timely alternative to the dominant, efficiency-driven models that increasingly shape AI-powered education.