Vatican Issues Encyclical Emphasizing AI Regulation and Ethics

Pope Leo XIV has issued his first major encyclical, 'Magnifica Humanitas (Magnificent Humanity)', criticizing military and commercial competition around AI technology and calling for strong global regulation.

The encyclical warns of the social costs that reckless competition to advance AI could bring. Key points include:

• Opposition to AI weaponization and autonomous decision-making: It stresses that AI systems must not be allowed to kill or make irreversible decisions.
• Labor exploitation and unemployment issues: It states that technological progress cannot justify mass unemployment, and labels labor exploitation in data-cleaning processes as 'a new form of digital slavery'.
• Call for global regulation: It argues that the international community must introduce strict national and global regulations for the AI industry.

Anthropic co-founder Christopher Olah was present at the announcement, and this move is expected to place strong ethical and legal pressure on future AI developers and governments to prioritize human rights and safety.