Recommendations of the Editorial team
Pope Leo XIV has warned about the dangers of artificial intelligence. In his first encyclical he calls for more protective measures when dealing with technology.
In “Magnifica Humanitas: On Safeguarding the Human Person in the Time of Artificial Intelligence,” published Monday, the first American-born pope wrote that AI technology must serve the “common good” rather than profit. This while “remaining human.”
“Humanity, created by God in all its greatness, is today faced with a fork in the road. Either it builds a new Tower of Babel or it builds a city in which God and man live together,” the Pope wrote.
AI and deregulation
The encyclical comes at a time when the Trump administration has taken steps to deregulate AI – a course whose social consequences the Pope expressly warns about.
“Artificial intelligence must now be disarmed, freed from logics that make it an instrument of domination, exclusion and death,” he wrote. “It is not enough to invoke ethics in the abstract. What is needed is a robust legal framework, independent supervision, responsible users and a political system that does not abdicate its responsibility. A more moral AI is not enough if this morality is determined by a few.”
Meeting with Anthropic
Pope Leo
“We need more of the world — religious communities, civil society, scientists, governments — to do what His Holiness did here: take this seriously, look closely and move things in a better direction,” Anthropic co-founder Christopher Olah said Monday at the Vatican. “We need moral voices that will not allow themselves to be distorted by self-interest.”
