Pope Leo XIV warns of the dangers of AI on youth
Pope Leo XIV criticized the potential negative consequences of growing AI use in a message this week — an emerging through line of his papacy.
The message, released
by the Vatican this week
, was directed to participants of an annual conference on artificial intelligence and its ethics in Rome. Despite noting AI's potential for good, the pope also said there is a possibility for 'misuse for selfish gain' and as a way to 'foment conflict and aggression.'
'All of us, I am sure, are concerned for children and young people, and the possible consequences of the use of AI on their intellectual and neurological development. Our youth must be helped, and not hindered, in their journey towards maturity and true responsibility,' the first American pontiff said.
The pope's message on AI is part of a growing theme of his pontificate.
In his first address to cardinals one month ago, he warned of the dangers of AI to 'human dignity,'
POLITICO reported
earlier this month.
Even his choice of papal name — after Pope Leo XIII, who championed workers rights during the industrial revolution — was 'not a casual reference,' a Vatican spokesperson said shortly after the conclave ended.
Leo's stance on AI is similar to that of his predecessor, Pope Francis, who warned in 2024 that our societies were experiencing a loss 'of the sense of what is human.'
'Access to data — however extensive — must not be confused with intelligence, which necessarily 'involves the person's openness to the ultimate questions of life and reflects an orientation toward the True and the Good,'' Leo said in his message.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
USA Today
34 minutes ago
- USA Today
Supreme Court sides against disabled firefighter suing for health benefits discrimination
WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court on June 20 ruled against a retired firefighter who wants to sue her former employer for reducing health care benefits for disabled retirees, a decision that failed to give the same ADA protections to retirees that current employees have. The court ruled that Karyn Stanley can't sue the city of Sanford, Florida, under the Americans with Disabilities Act. That upheld a lower court's ruling that the ADA didn't apply to Stanley because she no longer worked for the city when she filed her challenge. Writing for the majority, Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote that someone claiming discrimination under the ADA must prove that she held, or wanted, a job that she was able to perform at the time of the alleged discrimination. "In other words, the statute protects people, not benefits, from discrimination," he wrote. "And the statute tells us who those people are: qualified individuals, those who hold or seek a job at the time of the defendant's alleged discrimination." If Congress wants to expand the law to protect retirees like Stanley, it can, he continued. "But the decision whether to do so lies with that body, not this one," he wrote. 'Essential building blocks of the American dream' In a dissent, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said retirement benefits are 'essential building blocks of the American dream.' 'Disabled Americans who have retired from the workforce simply want to enjoy the fruits of their labor free from discrimination,' she wrote in the dissent that was joined in part by Justice Sonia Sotomayor. 'It is lamentable that this Court so diminishes disability rights that the People (through their elected representatives) established more than three decades ago.' Jackson said Congress could step in 'to fix the mistake the Court has made.' The Americans with Disabilities Act was designed to protect active employees and job applicants from discrimination. It was not intended as a law that extended to employers' relationships with former employees, the business groups and associations representing cities and counties against Stanley's allegations argued. The law covers someone who 'with or without reasonable accommodation, can perform the essential functions of the employment position that such individual holds or desires.' Stanley's lawyers argued she was employed – and thus covered by the law − when her future benefits were curtailed in 2003. When Stanley became a firefighter in 1999, the city paid for $1,000 of her approximately $1,300 monthly premium for health insurance. Anyone retiring after 25 years of service or because of a disability would continue to receive the benefit until age 65. After Stanley left the department in 2018 at 47 due to Parkinson's disease, she discovered that benefits for disabled retirees were reduced in 2003. The city covered $1,000 of her $1,300 monthly health insurance premium for only two years, after which she was required to pay the whole premium herself. Arguing that the city discriminated against her because of her disability, Stanley sued, asking the city to continue to pay $1,000 of her monthly insurance premium until she turns 65. The city countered that even though Stanley's benefits were reduced, the company treated her better – not worse – than non-disabled employees who retired with less than 25 years of service because those employees get no subsidy while she retained it for two years. The case is Stanley v. City of Stanford.
Politico
38 minutes ago
- Politico
Majority of staff axed at Voice of America
The Trump administration on Friday sent out termination notices to hundreds of employees at Voice of America. Included in that group are employees working for the network's Persian-language service who were called back from administrative leave just last week in the wake of Israel's attack on Iran, according to two people familiar with the decision. The move — which makes official what has long been expected since hundreds of contract employees got termination notices in early May — is a part of the Trump administration's sweeping target to downsize the government and remake America's role in the global order. Critics of the administration's focus on VOA have said that the network has played a vital role in combatting disinformation abroad. But the administration says these cuts are in service of 'cutting waste' and putting 'American taxpayers first.' 'Today, we took decisive action to effectuate President Trump's agenda to shrink the out-of-control federal bureaucracy,' senior presidential adviser Kari Lake said in a statement released Friday . The move eliminates 1,400 jobs at U.S. Agency for Global Media, VOA's parent agency, roughly an 85 percent cut to the workforce. The last day on payroll for the employees will be Labor Day. Some of those affected by Friday's cuts who are not old enough for mandatory retirement, are being terminated without severance pay, according to one of the people. The move would contradict USAGM's policy on severance. 'As our legal team fight[s] for our rights under the law, we call on Congress to continue its long tradition of bipartisan support for VOA,' the named plaintiffs in VOA's lawsuit against the Trump administration said in a statement. 'Moscow, Beijing, Tehran and extremist groups are flooding the global information space with anti-American propaganda. Do not cede this ground by silencing America's voice.' Lake said in her statement that 250 employees will remain across the USAGM, VOA and the Office of Cuba Broadcasting. She noted that none of the OCB's 33 employees were terminated. The government-funded network, which was founded 80 years ago to combat Nazi disinformation during World War II, has — largely unsuccessfully — fought the administration's decision in court. The administration sent RIF notices to employees in small batches for weeks. But Friday's notice could deliver the coup de grâce for Voice of America after decades of providing the world with accurate information in countries where media is state-run.
Newsweek
39 minutes ago
- Newsweek
What Ted Cruz's Iran Moment Reveals About America's Foreign Policy Illiteracy
On June 17, Tucker Carlson asked Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) what should have been a simple question: What is the population of Iran? Cruz didn't know. Carlson then asked him to name the country's major ethnic groups. Cruz came up blank again. This was not a gotcha moment. It was a spotlight. Cruz is a senior U.S. senator, a former presidential candidate, and a vocal advocate for a hardline U.S. posture on Iran. The fact that he couldn't name the most basic demographic facts about the country he wants to confront says a lot about how foreign policy operates in the U.S., and who it's meant to impress. Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) delivers remarks during a press conference on Capitol Hill on May 8, 2025, in Washington, D.C. Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) delivers remarks during a press conference on Capitol Hill on May 8, 2025, in Washington, happened in that exchange wasn't just awkward, it revealed something more troubling. It laid bare the way American foreign policy often functions: heavy on confidence, light on depth. When elected officials speak with authority but can't answer the most basic facts, it reveals more than a personal gap. It reflects a deeper failure in how we prepare, and tolerate, those who shape our foreign policy. Cruz reflects a pattern that's become far too common. According to a 2020 Morning Consult/POLITICO poll, only 23 percent of Americans could locate Iran on a map. The rest pointed to Eastern Europe, South America, even Australia. And yet the same electorate regularly weighs in on questions of war, sanctions, regime change, and diplomatic withdrawal. The reality is that many Americans have strong views on foreign policy, but no geographic or historical grounding to anchor them. In a moment of relative global calm, that gap might be more forgivable. But we aren't in a calm moment. In fact, we're in the most conflict-saturated period in recent history. According to the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO), 2024 recorded the highest number of state-based armed conflicts since 1946. Sixty-one such conflicts were active last year, including four between nation-states, the highest number of interstate wars in over 35 years. Almost 130,000 people were killed in battle-related deaths globally. We don't just live in a volatile world. We live in a dangerously mismatched one, where the complexity and lethality of modern conflict is rising, while public literacy about that complexity is falling. And this isn't just a polling problem or a media failure. It's a democratic one. In a system built on civilian oversight of military and diplomatic power, ignorance becomes a liability. It allows narratives to be crafted not around facts, but around vibes. When voters can't distinguish between a proxy conflict and a territorial war, or don't understand where the Strait of Hormuz even is, it becomes easier for bad policy to sound like strong policy. Slogans win. Nuance loses. This isn't just a voter problem. It's a leadership problem. When our lawmakers are allowed to posture confidently on matters of war and peace without even the most basic command of regional realities, the public follows their example. We normalize strategic amnesia. We reward theatrical strength over intellectual depth. And we end up with a foreign policy debate that centers on volume, not value. We also risk generational disengagement. Younger voters are inheriting a global environment that is far more multipolar, fragmented, and ideologically diffuse than the Cold War framework their textbooks still teach. But they're doing so with less geographic instruction, less civic education, and more algorithmically filtered noise. If that continues, the quality of our foreign policy conversation will degrade even further, not just in accuracy, but in accountability. This disconnect weakens democratic oversight. It makes military action easier to sell and harder to question. It elevates performative certainty over strategic thought. And it turns foreign policy into something closer to domestic theater, a place for identity posturing rather than global consequence management. You don't need to be an expert on every region to have a valid opinion about the world. But you should at least be able to find the country on a map before you advocate for bombing it. And our elected officials should be able to answer basic demographic questions about the places they want to sanction or confront. Because when they can't, and when we don't care that they can't, the result isn't just ignorance, it's escalation. We are in a moment where ignorance no longer leads to inaction. It leads to conflict. And we're going to pay for that gap with more than just polling errors. We're going to pay for it with human lives, diplomatic credibility, and the erosion of global stability itself. Brett Erickson is a governance strategist and certified global sanctions specialist (CGSS). He serves on the advisory board of the Loyola University Chicago School of Law's Center for Compliance Studies. The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.
