Skip to content

All the news that matters, in plain English.

Latest
  1. Anti-migrant activist Daniel Thomas arrested on suspicion of criminal damage after Channel dinghy slashing
  2. US cities take on the FCC over its plan to override local broadband rules
  3. Glasgow City Council to sack and rehire more than 20,000 staff in pay row
  4. Susan Sarandon and Hannah Einbinder among about 100 arrested at Netanyahu UN protest
  5. Finnish president Stubb pleads with Musk to let Ukraine use Starlink against Russian missile launchers
  6. Bank of England rate-setters warn of 'sparks in the tinderbox' as hike bets grow
  7. US Coast Guard suspends search for Carnival Panorama passenger Thomas Gigler
  8. Venezuela's Rodríguez promises elections in UNGA debut but gives no date

Technology

Pope Leo warns AI poses 'new dangers to security and international peace'

Pope Leo renewed his warnings that AI risks an 'apocalypse' in a Thursday speech to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences and is expected to repeat the call for global oversight at UNESCO in Paris on Friday.

By Sarah Whitfield · · 2 min read

Pope Leo has renewed his warnings that artificial intelligence poses an apocalyptic risk to humanity, telling a Vatican meeting on Thursday that the technology has introduced “new dangers to security and international peace”, Reuters reported.

In a speech to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, Leo said AI can benefit humanity but urged global leaders to “govern wisely” in overseeing its development. He is expected to repeat the warning on Friday in a speech at the Paris headquarters of the UN’s culture and education body, UNESCO.

Rev. Paolo Benanti, a leading Vatican adviser on AI issues, told Reuters that “this is not happening on day zero for the Holy See”, referring to recent calls for an AI slowdown endorsed by the CEOs of Anthropic, OpenAI and xAI at the United Nations Security Council on Wednesday. “The transformative power of AI … could produce a magnitude of societal changes that are very hard to predict,” said Benanti, an Italian academic who recently took part in the AI summit hosted by Britain’s King Charles. He declined to reveal details of the summit’s confidential discussions.

Leo, the first US-born pope, has placed AI dangers at the heart of his 16-month-old papacy and first discussed the issue publicly on his third day in office. In his May appeal, released as his first major document, he warned that AI systems spread misinformation, prioritise conflict and could lead the world down a path of “unending war”.

Sources

More on this topic: all Technology stories

Get Flip News by email

This opens your email app — we add you manually. No account, no spam, no third parties.