VATICAN CITY
\nPope Leo XIV called for robust regulation of artificial intelligence and for its developers to work for the common good rather than profit, issuing a sweeping manifesto on safeguarding humankind as the technology impacts everything from work to war.
\n\u201cMagnifica Humanitas\u201d (Magnificent Humanity), Leo\u2019s first encyclical, has been eagerly awaited ever since history\u2019s first US-born pope announced days after his election that he considered AI to be the biggest challenge facing humanity today.
\nIn the text, Leo denounced the \u201cculture of power\u201d driving the AI race, especially in developing ever more sophisticated methods of remote warfare.
\nHe declared that it was \u201cnot permissible\u201d to entrust irreversible, lethal decisions to AI systems, setting up another flash point between the American pope and the Trump administration, which has worked aggressively to deregulate AI development.
\nExperts in the tech industry, academia and Catholic morality said the document will likely become a benchmark in the debate over AI, a point of reference for policymakers, researchers and ordinary folk alike.
\nIt comes as the near-daily developments in the technology trigger concerns rise over AI replacing human jobs and even human intelligence.
\n\u201cIt lends itself to people who are at the forefront of these tools and able to see the incredible things that they\u2019re able to do, to have questions about their own \u2018What does it mean to be human?\u2019\u201d said Taylor Black, a Microsoft AI executive and director of Catholic University of America\u2019s AI institute.
\nThe pope was to present the text at a Vatican launch Monday that featured the co-founder of Anthropic, which is currently locked in a legal battle with the Trump administration over access to its AI technology.
\nThe Vatican decided to involve Anthropic as part of its decade-long effort to engage Silicon Valley in dialogue over the human cost of AI.
\nAnd yet in his text, Leo repeatedly blasted the concentration of power and data in the hands of so few people in the private sector as a danger, especially to children and the most vulnerable, and called for external regulation of their work.
\n\u201cIt is not enough to invoke ethics in the abstract; robust legal frameworks, independent oversight, informed users and a political system that does not abdicate its responsibility are required,\u201d he wrote. \u201cA more moral AI is not enough if that morality is determined by a few.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
VATICAN CITY Pope Leo XIV called for robust regulation of artificial intelligence and for its developers to work for the common good rather than profit, issuing a sweeping manifesto on safeguarding humankind as the technology impacts everything from work to war. \u201cMagnifica Humanitas\u201d (Magnificent Humanity), Leo\u2019s first encyclical, has been eagerly awaited ever since history\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":548392,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-548358","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world"],"yoast_head":"\n