Pope Leo Issues Apocalyptic Warning About AI Creating a 'Paradise of Machines'
In yet another position opposed to that of President Donald Trump, Pope Leo XIV spoke Friday about fears that artificial intelligence could dominate the world.
During a speech at the United Nations on Tuesday, Trump said the United States “rejects any attempt to construct a globalist scheme to control” AI, according to Politico. He rejected fear-mongering over AI as a “hoax.”
However, during a Friday visit to France, the pope said there is much to fear if AI is allowed to develop unchecked.
“If we are to avoid losing our humanity amid a ‘paradise of machines’ invading and conditioning our daily lives, there is an urgent need for education in ethical discernment and the capacity to acknowledge the moral good,” he said, according to Newsweek.
“Over the centuries, many tasks once performed by human beings have been entrusted to machines whose capabilities and applications have continued to expand,” he said. “More recently, certain artificial systems have even been given the name of our human faculty of thought intelligence.”
The pope said the world is living in a paradox.
“While ‘intelligence’ is attributed to computational systems, we struggle to recognize the inalienable dignity of human persons, whose lives are judged according to the criterion of efficiency and, when deemed no longer productive, are rejected and discarded,” Leo said.
“Although such systems can correlate data, they cannot answer questions that concern the meaning of human life, which is rooted in lived experience,” he said, adding that “human beings cannot live without meaning,” and that “meaning is the oxygen of the mind.”
Leo said communication is not an end in itself.
“Information is abundant, but that is not synonymous with wisdom,” he said.
Leo said during his trip that he believes tech companies are receptive to his message, according to the New York Post.
“And I think from their perspective, many of them, they’re very much open to looking for ways of making sure that AI does not displace or ultimately destroy humanity, but rather than be a tool for human beings,” he said.
In addition to taking a position opposed to Trump, Leo sent a shot at the president without mentioning his name, as noted by Forbes.
When a CNN reporter asked him for a comment for colleagues having “difficulties” with the White House, the pope said he was glad to have the media with him and said, “You’re all welcome.”
Leo said good media coverage is important, adding “that we have it all the way around, for everyone.”
Trump has criticized the pope’s involvement in the war in Iran and immigration.
As noted by The Hill, this spring Trump posted to Truth Social that “Pope Leo is WEAK on Crime, and terrible for Foreign Policy.”
White House border czar Tom Homan has said the pope should “leave politics alone.”
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