Pope Leo XIV warned Friday of the negative impacts artificial intelligence (AI) can have on young people, and his comments were sent to a conference on AI and ethics.
Part of the conference took place in the Vatican. In his message, the pope cited the effects AI could have on the intellectual and neurological development of the younger generation, the Associated Press (AP) reported.
The Catholic leader said, “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. Society’s well-being depends upon their being given the ability to develop their God-given gifts and capabilities.”
“In the end, authentic wisdom has more to do with recognizing the true meaning of life, than with the availability of data,” he added, bringing into his remarks one of the possible negative spiritual effects of AI.
In May, First Lady Melania Trump made similar comments while announcing the signing of the Take It Down Act, which makes it a criminal offense to post a real or artificially generated sexually explicit photo of a person without their consent.
“Artificial intelligence and social media are the digital candy for the next generation: sweet, addictive, and engineered to have an impact on the cognitive development of our children,” she stated, adding that “unlike sugar, these new technologies can be weaponized, shape beliefs, and, sadly, affect emotions, and even be deadly.”
A 16-year-old boy in Kentucky reportedly committed suicide in February after he was blackmailed with AI-generated nude images of himself and a message demanding he pay $3,000 to prevent them being sent to his family and friends, according to Breitbart News.
It is also important to note that pedophiles use AI to create realistic child sexual abuse images that are difficult to distinguish from real photographs, the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) said in 2023. In addition, Breitbart News reported in 2024, “Video creators are increasingly turning to AI tools to rapidly produce low-quality videos targeting children on YouTube, raising concerns about the impact of such content on kids.”
For Pope Leo, AI is one of the most pressing and critical matters people face today, the AP article stated.
“He has explained his concern for [sic] AI by invoking his namesake, Pope Leo XIII. That Leo was pope during the dawn of the Industrial Revolution and made the plight of workers, and the need to guarantee their rights and dignity, a key priority,” the outlet said.
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