Lima— el Pope Leo XIV He revealed that he has refused to have an avatar created with artificial intelligence (AI) And he said that, although he is not against this technology, he worries that he is developing at an “incredible rhythm.”
“Someone recently asked me authorization to create an artificial version of me, so that anyone could enter a website and have a personal audience with ‘The Pope’, and this Pope created by artificial intelligence would give them answers to his questions. I said: ‘I will not authorize that,” said the Pope in a long interview, the first one that gives from the beginning of his pontificate, which has been published in the book’ Leo XIV. Citizen of the world, missionary of the 21st century. ”
The Pontiff noted that “if there is someone who should not be represented by an avatar, it seems to me, it is the Pope,” although he immediately clarified that he is not “at all against artificial intelligence.”
“In the world of medicine, great things have happened thanks to AI, and also in other fields. However, there is a danger in this, because you end up creating a false world and then you wonder: what is the truth?” He said.
Leo XIV added that the development of AI, “which is happening at an incredible rhythm, is also worrying” and that “the Church has to raise its voice” if you lose sight of “the value of humanity” and you think “that the digital world is the most important.”
“Our human life makes sense not because of artificial intelligence, but for human beings and the encounter, for being with each other, for creating relationships and to discover in those human relationships the presence of God also,” he emphasized.
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The position of the Catholic Church before AI
The Pontiff considered, in that sense, that “it will be very difficult to discover the presence of God in AI” and also of values such as mutual respect, the importance of family, equality, and “to live and work together in peace.”
“Those are values that arise from a real understanding of the wonderful gift that God gave us as human beings. If the Church does not rise their voice, or if someone does not, although the Catholic church Certainly it must be one of the voices here, the danger is for the digital world to follow its own path and become pawns, or let’s be left aside, ”he warned.
The Pope also considered “very destructive” that many people are consuming false news, which spread with great profusion by different media today.
“Something is happening there. People want to believe in conspiracies, people want to look for all these false things and that is very destructive,” he said.
The book with the interview, which has been conducted by the journalist Elise Anna Allen, went on sale this Thursday in bookstores of Peruwhere the Pontiff developed more than twenty years of his pastoral career and whose nationality also has, while in Spain he will be available since Tuesday, September 23, edited by debate.