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Last Friday, Pope Francis became the first pope to address a G7 summit. The Group of Seven (G7) was established fifty years ago to coordinate global policy and is populated by industrialised demographic countries including the UK, Canada, United States, France, Germany, Italy and Japan. During the meeting, the Pope discussed the threat and potential of artificial intelligence (AI), the "techno-human condition", human vs algorithmic decision-making, AI-written essays, and the necessity of political collaboration on technology.

The Pope dedicated his address to the G7 to the subject of artificial intelligence. He began by saying that the birth of AI represents “a true cognitive-industrial revolution” which will lead to “complex epochal transformations”. These transformations, the Pope said, have the potential to be both positive  – for example, the  “democratization of access to knowledge”, the “exponential advancement of scientific research”, and a reduction in “demanding and arduous work” – and negative – for instance, “greater injustice between advanced and developing nations or between dominant and oppressed social classes.”

Noting that AI is “above all a tool”, the Pope spoke of what he called the “techno-human condition”. He explained that he was referring to the fact that humans’ relationship with the environment has always been mediated by the tools that they have produced. Some, the Pope said, see this as a weakness, or a deficiency; however, he argued, it is in fact something positive. It stems, he said, from the fact that we are beings “inclined to what lies outside of us”, beings “radically open to the beyond.” This openness, Pope Francis said, is both the root of our “techno-human condition” and the root of our openness to others and to God, as well as the root of our artistic and intellectual creativity.

The Pope then moved on to the subject of decision-making. He said that AI is capable of making “algorithmic choices” – that is, “technical” choices “among several possibilities based either on well-defined criteria or on statistical inferences”. Human beings, however, “not only choose, but in their hearts are capable of deciding.” This is because, the Pope explained, they are capable of wisdom, of what the Ancient Greeks called phronesis (a type of intelligence concerned with practical action), and of listening to Sacred Scripture. It is thus very important, the Pope stressed, that important decisions must “always be left to the human person.” As an example of this principle, the Pope pointed to the development of lethal autonomous weapons – which can take human life with no human input – and said that they must ultimately be banned.

The Pope also stressed that the algorithms used by artificial intelligence to arrive at choices are “neither objective nor neutral.” He pointed to the algorithms designed to help judges in deciding whether to grant home-confinement to prison inmates. These programmes, he said, make a choice based on data such as the type of offence, behaviour in prison, psychological assessment, and the prisoner’s ethnic origin, educational attainment, and credit rating. However, the Pope stressed, this is reductive: “human beings are always developing, and are capable of surprising us by their actions.  This is something that a machine cannot take into account.” A further problem, the Pope emphasised, is that algorithms “can only examine realities formalised in numerical terms:”

The Pope then turned to consider the fact that many students are increasingly relying on AI to help them with their studies, and in particular, with writing essays. It is easy to forget, the Pope said, that “strictly speaking, so-called generative artificial intelligence is not really ‘generative’” – it does not “develop new analyses or concepts” but rather “repeats those that it finds, giving them an appealing form.” This, the Pope said, risks “undermining the educational process itself”. Education, he emphasised, should offer the chance for “authentic reflection”, but instead “runs the risk of being reduced to a repetition of notions, which will increasingly be evaluated as unobjectionable, simply because of their constant repetition.”

Bringing his speech to a close, the Pope emphasised that AI is always shaped by “the worldview of those who invented and developed it.” A particular concern in this regard, he said, is that today it is “increasingly difficult to find agreement on the major issues concerning social life”  - there is less and less consensus, that is, regarding the philosophy that should be shaping artificial intelligence. What is necessary, therefore, the Pope said, is the development of an “algor-ethics”, a series of “global and pluralistic” principles which are “capable of finding support from cultures, religions, international organizations and major corporations.” “If we struggle to define a single set of global values,” the Pope said, we can at least “find shared principles with which to address and resolve dilemmas or conflicts regarding how to live.”

The Vatican has played a key role in driving the ethics debate around AI development and use, with its Rome Call initiative subscribed to by a range of organisations including technology giants Microsoft and IBM. Speaking to those assembled, the Pope emphasised that AI is always shaped by “the worldview of those who invented and developed it.” A particular concern in this regard today, he said, is that it is “increasingly difficult to find agreement on major issues” with less and less consensus regarding the philosophy that should be shaping artificial intelligence. The Pope held a number of additional one-on-one bilateral meetings with world leaders, both before and after his speech.

‍Fr Paolo Benanti, a Franciscan monk and technology and bioethics professor advises Pope Francis on AI. You can find out more about Fr Benanati in this interview with Brad Smith, Microsoft's vice chair and president ‍

‍Source: Vatican Media