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- [00:01]
Father Paolo Benanti
We can imagine church in a lot of way. One could be a pyramid with a big boss on the top. And he says something and everything happen. That's not the church that I know, especially because I belong to Franciscan. And we are used to say as a joke, we more than an order. We are a disorder. That means that, you know, we have a lot of different processes.
- [00:21]
Kara Swisher
Little Catholic humor for you. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [00:23]
Father Paolo Benanti
It's Catholic. It's for everyone. There is space also for someone like me.
- [00:38]
Kara Swisher
Hi, everyone. From New York magazine and the Vox Media podcast network, this is on with Kara Swisher. And I'm Kara Swisher. My guest today is Paolo Benanti, a Franciscan friar, Catholic priest, and one of the world's leading experts on the ethics of artificial intelligence. Father Benanti has advised the Italian government, the UN and two POPEs on technology. And some of his insights are reflected in Pope Leo's encyclical on AI Magnificent Humanity. In that formal letter to Catholics around the world, Leo called for an artificial intelligence that serves humanity, not one that would take the place of human intelligence and creativity. Benanti has a background in engineering and teaches moral theology as a university professor. He also has a healthy skepticism of tech oligarchs, as the Pope does, who stand to profit from AI. I'd love to talk to the Pope, obviously, about this topic, but I've known about Benante for a while and I know he's had a real impact on the thinking of the Church, which has been bubbling upward since before this Pope. With Pope Francis and the idea of what technology does to society, I think it's critical that the Church and other leaders have a role in this. And in fact, it's turned out that the Pope has more of an impact on Silicon Valley and their thinking than I thought possible. And I'm glad to see it. I am a lapsed Catholic, but I really do respect what the Pope is doing now. And it also almost gets me back into the Church. We'll see. Our expert question today comes from computer scientist and AI ethicist Yoshua Bengio. So stick around. Support for this show comes from Odoo. Running a business shouldn't feel like surviving a software group project. One app for accounting, another for inventory, another for sales, and somehow none of them ever talk to each other. That's where Odoo comes in. An all in one business management software that brings every part of your business together, from sales and accounting to inventory and marketing, all in one powerful platform. No messy integrations, no bouncing between tabs and best of all, no spreadsheets. Stop managing software and start managing your business with one unified system. Try it today for free at odoo.com cara that's O D o-o.com cara they say everything happens for a reason. But I suspect everything happens for a Reese's. Like this commercial break.
- [03:07]
Father Paolo Benanti
Did you need 15 seconds away from music or 15 seconds to eat a Reese's? Perhaps it's true.
- [03:13]
Kara Swisher
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- [03:45]
Father Paolo Benanti
It is over.
- [03:47]
Kara Swisher
Father Benanti, thanks for coming on on.
- [03:51]
Father Paolo Benanti
Thank you for having me.
- [03:52]
Kara Swisher
Just for people who don't know, you're a Franciscan friar, a moral theologian and you also advised Pope Leo XIV on AI. I believe you advised the previous Pope also. Correct. On technology issues.
- [04:04]
Father Paolo Benanti
Yeah. Much more. Pope Francis. Pope Leo is now shaping the courier in a way that is desired. So we are in the mean times area.
- [04:13]
Kara Swisher
Right, Right, right, exactly. So talk about why is the rise of AI a faith and religion issue? And you had been talking about this before.
- [04:22]
Father Paolo Benanti
Well, you know, there is something that happened before in the church 150 years ago with an encyclical that the name was Rerum Novarum pushed out by another Pope and The name was Leo 13 at that time.
- [04:35]
Kara Swisher
I think he named himself for that reason. I have a feeling, yes.
- [04:39]
Father Paolo Benanti
He said day one. He said day one. Like Leo 13 faced this idea of a technology pinging on the human. I'm seeing that AI has done the same things.
- [04:50]
Kara Swisher
Right. Explain Pope Leo XIII what, what he was discussing at the time.
- [04:53]
Father Paolo Benanti
Yeah, you know, that's the point. It's interesting things because it's not steam power the problem. The problem is that steam power was producing a shift of power in society and a leverage of things that was pushing a certain number of human beings in a really uncomfortable situation in a way in which we can define a sort of modern slavery. And today it's not a matter again of digital or artificial intelligence. It's not this the hot topic of the Church, but once again, is power coming back among us as a species in a domesticated way, like is it in democracy or is coming wild? And this is a little Bit the way in which Pope Leo XIV is looking at this new wave of technology in society.
- [05:43]
Kara Swisher
So why pick it now? You and I have talked about the Internet before and the Internet's been a rising power. Why does it become critical when it
- [05:51]
Father Paolo Benanti
comes to AI with the invention of ChatGPT? That is probably for everyone. The equivalent of AI is not true, but it's for the pop culture. It's the same things. My smartphone is thousand times 500,500 times most powerful than the computer that bring us to the moon, but is not able to compute something like that. And so we need a new centralized form of computation that this time has the shape of data center and cloud. What is the problem that this new centralization of data center is in some way collecting all the part of our life that we digitized in the last 30 years. And actually a data center is someone else computing that can simple compute and control what's going on in our life. And we are seeing a lot of countries that are doing this really, really effective try to think to China or rather non democratic country around the world. And so who is controlling the hardware now? Is controlling also a huge part of our life. That sound to me really political.
- [07:00]
Kara Swisher
Right. And so therefore the church needs to weigh in here. Now you have a background in engineering. You did make a note that AI has been here before. It's just taken off in this kind of Cambrian explos. Explosion is the word I tend to use. I mean obviously everyone remembers Galileo, but the church has been very deeply involved in science in not necessarily a negative way for many, many, many different times. Explain the juxtaposition between faith and science.
- [07:25]
Father Paolo Benanti
Well, you know, from a core point of view we are talking of an institution that is 2000 year old. So it makes sense that the perspective was not always the same. When the first Christian people arise, they have to confront with a really well shaped form of power that was the Roman Empire and the other country. It's interesting that Christian in a different way from other religions don't try to found their own regulation on God. But they found no reason why. Because if we believe as a Christian that there is a God that make us everything that he made in us is not against his will. And so everything that is reasonable is according in some way with God will. And that produced during this 20th century of history a lot of different reflections. Don't forget for example that one of my friar 13th century, the name was Raymondo Lull produced a book, the name was the Arts Mania in which he started to think well, can we say all the truth on God with that simple permutation award? And you have this double wheel things with a lot of words that are turning on. And couple of centuries later, Leibniz look at that and said, well, this is fantastic. Let's move to logic. And when you are typing something on a computer today, you are using logic that is driven by Leibniz, that is founded on a Franciscan reflection. Or you can have things like the genetic studies. Mandel, he was a monk. So this idea that if the nature is a gift of God, you can investigate, you can acquire it without fear, is something that belong at least to some tradition inside the church.
- [09:11]
Kara Swisher
And when you think about the history of the church, people don't realize there's a lot of scientists who are various Jesuits or Franciscans. Throughout history I was taught a lot. I went to Georgetown, I was taught by Jesuits.
- [09:22]
Father Paolo Benanti
Me too.
- [09:23]
Kara Swisher
Many of whom were science. Yeah, many of whom were scientists. One of the things that's important is that the church can weigh in on these things. And there's been pushback from politicians. Stay in your lane Church, essentially, or Pope. Stay in your lane Pope, I think is the message they're trying to deliver.
- [09:40]
Father Paolo Benanti
That was something that probably find the most powerful way with secularism, you know, in which they someone start to say, well, you belong to a specific place that is the sacristy of the church. So stay there. Don't go around like, you know, like a wild beast in the zoo. If I can use these images. But now let me push a little bit back on what does it mean to be a member of the church? If you do the priest, so only the priest, you should preach the gospel during the Mass. And so if the gospel say you have to look at everyone in this place like a brother and a sister, isn't it a political message? Isn't it something that go beyond a series of displacement of power that usually has the tendency to frame, divide and in some way shape the order in society. So of course that is not always clear in the history. When St. Paul wrote to the slave, you know, behave like a brother of your owners, and to the owners, behave like a brother to the slave. At that time, 20th century ago was not thinkable that slavery was something that is unjust. Today, if you would like to be Catholic and you think that slavery is acceptable, you are not Catholic. So it's an ongoing process, but it's political too, right?
- [11:04]
Kara Swisher
Right. So let's talk about the encyclical. Specifically. Scott and I discussed it on pivot and we were very impressed by it. In it, the Pope calls for government regulation protecting children. He warns against AI warfare. Talk about the conversations as he was writing this and the process. I'd love to understand where your role was in shaping it and where his mind was. Cause putting these things out is a very big signal by the Pope that this is an important topic. So talk about the creation of it.
- [11:32]
Father Paolo Benanti
Well, you know, we can imagine church in a lot of way. One could be a pyramid with a big boss on the top. That simple as a lot of work are done. And he says something and everything happens. That's not the Church that I know, especially because I belong to Franciscan. And we are used to say as a joke, we more than an order, we are a disorder. That means that, you know, we have a lot of different processes.
- [11:57]
Kara Swisher
Little Catholic humor for you. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [11:59]
Father Paolo Benanti
It's Catholic, it's for everyone. There is space also for someone like me. Well, so what does it mean? That means that we can imagine church like a cake with yeast. So the yeast is something that is used to produce an augmentation of the shared thinking. So it's not important to be in the Catholic Church that the Pope has a clear view and understanding of an issue, but it's much, much more important that this belong to every faithful. And this is a process that need time, need reflection. So when something surfaced on the top level of the Church, so as a Pope document, that means that there was a huge digestion of a lot of different things. Let's be Back to Leo 13. Leo 13 was a Nuncio that mean a diplomat of the Church to the northern Europe. And he saw what the steam power and machine are doing to the work and to the transformation. He reflect on that with a lot of people inside the Church in Europe. When he was elected Pope, he was able to connect the dot and produce this Rerum Novarum that say to the Church, look, we are not in the sacristy. We are with the step in the world and with the brain in the heaven. But we have to walk on this, on this world with other people. And that was really interesting because the same things probably is happening here with the Pope. Leo14 so there are a lot of people that are reflecting on that. Lay people, professor in the university, strange Franciscan like myself doing strange things like this discussion with you. And this is producing a sort of a global awareness. It start with Pope Francis, really clear 2018, then 2019, 2020. In 2020, it's not just a matter of what's happening inside the Church. But it's also something that happened in everyone's life with COVID Pandemic. And Covid pushed every generation on digital means, right? And so digital become top one of the topics. So you can go back and see that the topic of AI is surfacing a lot of time in discussion on autonomous weapon, in discussion of child protection, in discussion of ethical approach to the algorithm. Then it become a little bit more consistent in a note from the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith. And it will education the Casteri, because education is touched by AI and the name was Antiqua et nova Old and new things. And then Pope Francis passed away and Pope Leo is the first document that the simple proposed out. This document was signed and published. Meanwhile, a couple of office in the Olic that we are used to call the Caster, the Castery of Faith, the Castery of Integral Human Development. And the Castery of Education was involved in producing the blueprint of the document. And the Pope touched it with his personal style. So if you find a Santa Gaustine quotation or something like that, you can see how he's finishing this collective work. Because the Pope take the duty to offer to the Church a reflection that he said for me is what I'm understanding as a correct reflection. But it's not his own reflection. He's a reflection of the old church. And this is typical.
- [15:31]
Kara Swisher
The whole church had been discussing it, starting with Francis. And then it rises up to him as it's been worked on. And he presumably was involved in the part where Francis was focused on.
- [15:42]
Father Paolo Benanti
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Also because he was in charge of the new bishop and he invited me as a cardinal to talk to the new bishop about the challenge of the new media, the digital media and AI. And he has also a scientific background. So he's not far from the topic now. He take the duty of the office to tell to the Church, look, it's not a secondary element in everyday life. It's something that shape our personal opinion, the way in which we interact with either with other people. We are seeing something like conversation companion chatbot that can shape forever what we understand of intimacy. So let's have a reflection on that. This is not the end of the reflection.
- [16:26]
Kara Swisher
This is a time, the beginning of it. But he could have picked anything at all to start with. But this to him was central was what was happening with our relationship with AI and the tech executives that he does call out in some ways negatively and sometimes positively. Because when he presented the letter, Anthropic co founder Chris Oliver Law was Seated right there with him on the dais. Anthropic is currently suing the Trump administration after it refused to let the Pentagon use Claude for autonomous weapons and mass surveillance. Talk about was that a pointed rebuke to the Trump administration's handling of AI or in general, the kind of reflection that he was trying to establish was a more safety focused, human focused.
- [17:12]
Father Paolo Benanti
Well, we have to recognize that in this moment, the leading innovation on AI happening to countries, I.e. united States and China. But we do not forget that the majority of faithful probably belong to Africa and Latin America. And so when you see a document like Magnifica Humanitas, you have to see a more broader approach. It's not focused on Silicon Valley, it's focused on humanity. And if I have to express the percentage of preoccupation of the Pope probably will be on the effect of the most fragile in the world, that will be the Global South. And the idea that the big tech was present when the press release of the document was there, it's not to be understood as a picking one, because he is faithful to the document, because the Pope see really clearly, it's not enough an ethical approach that is decided by someone in the bottom room without a big sharing with other people. And this means that, you know, maybe Anthropic is the most active on AI, but it's not the way that the churching is looking too. Every human being in the same fact that these are human beings has the right to participate to the debate. So we are simple finding a dialogue also with people that are building such kind of things. We do not pretend that they are in the same page where we are. I think that this is a huge expression that Pope Francis leave to the Church. This ability to be open to the difference without fear and without the urgency to say we have to think everyone the same things now.
- [18:51]
Kara Swisher
Right? Right. Right. So it goes up through committees and then he adds to it. Right. Is that correct? And he just keeps getting worked on. And this is something you had been interested in and many others. Did he write it himself or he works with a group. As with any president or political figure, they work with a lot of people in formulating it correct.
- [19:12]
Father Paolo Benanti
What we can understand, probably the best metaphorical image to understand, that is like when a plant grow, you take water that come from outside, but is filtered from the roots. So there is not a scientific committee that advised him directly, but scientific and technological people was involved in a lot of satellite reflection that happened in the Holy See last September. There was one really big in which people like Joshua Banjo Hinton and other scientists Max Tegmark was talking about the danger of superintelligence. Or we have the roll call for AI ethics that's much more directly addressed to people like the tech guys, the people that make business on this or to the international organization. So all these different sources become something that is a nutrient for the developing of the process. But you cannot have. This paragraph is connected to this. This. This connected to.
- [20:16]
Kara Swisher
Right, Right.
- [20:17]
Father Paolo Benanti
Is a digested things.
- [20:21]
Kara Swisher
We'll be back in a.
- [20:32]
Father Paolo Benanti
Foreign.
- [20:37]
Kara Swisher
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- [22:44]
Father Paolo Benanti
It's me, the priceline negotiator. We don't need the jingle twice. What about a third time? Stop it. This is about vacation inflation and how Priceline negotiates amazing deals on hotels, flights and rental cars. Seems like you decided. Yeah, but I didn't mention that you can save up to 60% off hotels in the Priceline app. Time to be the timeline. Fine. No one deals more deals than Priceline. Please stop Priceline.
- [23:09]
Kara Swisher
Touche.
- [23:10]
Father Paolo Benanti
Priceline. Priceline.
- [23:12]
Kara Swisher
Cochleo sees work as a, quote, fundamental dimension of the human experience. And AI is threatening that. That's why it was called magnificent humanity. Essentially. Last week, the tech companies are trying anthropic. OpenAI's foundation and several other companies announced a $500 million effort, which seems small, to help states and employers prepare workers for the effects of AI on jobs in the economy. Talk about what, what you're all hoping. You know, I consider it reputation laundering. Maybe it's both that they really mean it or something. But let's talk a little bit about what the Pope hoped to have happen here. Just that the dialogue begins or what impact was the Church hoping to have here as a whole?
- [23:53]
Father Paolo Benanti
Well, you know, clear political statement that Pope Leo made on day one when he explained to the world why he picked that name was that what the Church has the to offer to the world is the wisdom of the social doctrine of the Church. Now, for people that are not, like myself, a theologian that work with this word every day, what does it mean? Well, first of all, we are not in a Galileo moment when the telescope was asked to be blessed or to be damned. Social doctrine of the Church. Simple. Take the things as it is. The machine is here, the genius is out of the battle. They will remain with us. And now the problem is how much is too much on how. This is the question and this is a different perspective. But the social doctrine of the Church in this shape is a reflection that is 150 year old. So in 150 years we are really clear, stating a multiple occasion that first, we are not the owner of solution. We are part of the debate, we are part of the dialogue. And probably the Church is also able to bring voices that otherwise will be excluded. Second, things has to be plural. There is a really interesting debate happening during the 60 and the 70 about unions. Should Christians look just for Christian unions? Well, the answer was really clear, no, because unions is something that is made to make social justice and negotiation of the paycheck is not important that you belong to the Church. It's much more important that you are looking for justice. And so also the solution that probably the Church is expecting is not a confessional one, but is a plural one. Something that can happen in a multilateral debate. And this is also politically interesting now, you know, in a moment in which multilateralism is seen like, you know, smoke in the eye. Well, it's stressing things that no one should be excluded more than one. There is another element when you talk about regulation. It's really cultural understood in China means yeah, the leading party give the rules that everyone will follow. In Europe is much more understand as an hard law things in United States we have a totally different understanding in the social doctrine of the Church. Regulation is also the name that you give to standard. When we produce a car, we decide that we can drive it on the right side of the curb or on the left side of the curb. And having such kind of standard is something that is avoiding accident that help to save life. So the first step is a standardization of AI in which it's really clear and transparent the definition of some of the criteria that is bringing this technology to us. Everyone knows that the quality of data, for example, is something that produce the quality of answer. And if there is a demography that is underrepresented, probably the judgment of AI will be not so just on such kind of things. And this is a standard. Should we declare that the number of people of the demographic or the quality of data that are behind such kind of system or should they can remain secret like the recipe of Coca Cola or Pepsi?
- [27:13]
Kara Swisher
Right. And so you're trying to broaden debate Now Pope Leo met with representatives from tech companies including Meta, Google and Amazon on but do you know about the concerns he shared with them or what was the reason?
- [27:25]
Father Paolo Benanti
Well, let me say that this is happening in a sort of event that we are calling audience. An audience is a wild animal in the sense that can happen in a one to one private room in which you are really free to discuss about everything and nothing happen. Or it could be a public audience. And can you imagine when you are the CIO of a company that is at the value of 1 trillion, if you say something that can produce the lowering of value. So in that case they are really, you know, hard guard railed. And it's not easy that personal talking happens. Or it can happen in a plural way that is much more official, diplomatic, with a lot of, you know, dancing style. And so the speech that you are talking about happen in a really different condition. So we can imagine that in one to one private audience. I was in a private audience between Microsoft guys And Pope Francis the debate was really free because you can say what you want and nothing surface in a public moment with pictures, shaking of hands. Every declaration could be a nuclear weapon. And so it's much less, much less.
- [28:41]
Kara Swisher
But he's been. But Popli has been trying to reach out to talk to different tech people to also get their insight.
- [28:46]
Father Paolo Benanti
Presumably yes, it's a two way discussion
- [28:50]
Kara Swisher
but at the same time there's been some that have been very critical. Billionaire tech investor Peter Thiel, he was also in Rome ahead of the encyclical's release where he gave a series of talks including one where he reportedly said the Antichrist would be quote, a Luddite who wants to stop all science. What is he doing from your perspective? He's called people like me antichrists, things like that, like that.
- [29:11]
Father Paolo Benanti
Probably think that I'm a communist.
- [29:13]
Kara Swisher
Yes. What do you make of what he's up to?
- [29:16]
Father Paolo Benanti
Well, you know, I think that he is like everyone has his own ideas and blueprint and ideological blueprint. My sensibility tell me that he's not believing in democracy, he's not believing in society and he's believing that it's time for an a society made by individual. But this is good if something of the society is remain so you are looking to trench your own owned space and no one can trespassing. But if all the global society collapse well, you will have not security. Try to think that every time in the morning I wake up and I would like to wash my teeth I don't go and make any analysis on the water that is come out from the pipe because I'm believing that the water company other human beings, other member of my species are make what is enough to bring me the best water that they can. Welcome to the social contract. So in a really wild situation in which there is not more any social contract and you are an individual in a series with a series of individual. This is simple something that cannot work. And this is where the ideology has to face with reality. And so in my perspective the problem with Peter Thiel is this is pushing on an idea that is good. If you have to capture some values from a still remaining society. If it will produce the collapsing of society it will be the law of
- [30:46]
Kara Swisher
the jungle, which I think he prefers. I think monarchy is what he's going for. Vice President J.D. vance is the highest ranking Catholic in the US government but I'm sure you remember when he told the Pope to quote be careful when talking about theology. He's been a little more muted on the encyclical. And at the same time he sort of asked you all not to involve yourself in this thing. Were you surprised by that? And what would you like to see from him as a fellow Catholic?
- [31:14]
Father Paolo Benanti
Well, you know, I don't want to be involved in United States politics. I'm a foreign citizen. I'm a poor Franciscan. Let me talk about theology. That is easier and probably what I see as an Italian with the Italian politics that what you express in public sometimes as an end that is a politic hands and is not really connected to the word that you are expressing. So my feeling as someone that belonged to a country with a really complex politics and that probably we have to divide the content of the world by the political ends of the man that was pushing this and so he is free as a politician and probably as a brilliant one is he was elected as a vice president to use the political term that he want to make his own politics. Well, if we have to meet in a church talking about the gospel, what the gospel could be a different topic, you know.
- [32:07]
Kara Swisher
But you feel that as opposed to what these guys are saying that the church has every right to be weighing in on this and actually making the debate wider.
- [32:17]
Father Paolo Benanti
Well, my really deep faith as a Catholic is that the church cannot stop to talk about the gospel. And if the gospel bring us on some friction is not the first time in the history we have with a lot of different situation in the past and we will face also this.
- [32:38]
Kara Swisher
We'll be back in a minute.
- [32:51]
Father Paolo Benanti
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Kara Swisher
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Father Paolo Benanti
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- [34:35]
Father Paolo Benanti
My name is Joshua Bengio and the big question I would ask Father Paolo Benanti is the international collaboration on AI safety is currently being outpaced by a competitive race to develop increasingly powerful models. How does the Vatican intend to continue leveraging its unique position to unite countries around shared human centered safeguards for AI which are the main stakeholders that you believe also need to be involved? Well, you know, Joshua is always brilliant and he put the nail in the cube. The problem is, is it a competition and always competition something that is in some way good for everyone? Well, you know, competition bring a mathematical model that says winner take all. So if you win, I lose. When we face the most important thing in the world, like for example achieving a cure for the cancer, if you and me sit at the same table and you have an idea and I have an idea, both of us have two ideas. So the difference is a zero sum game and a non zero sum game. So if we are looking at the best outcome for humanity, we have to play a non zero sum games that do not mean to not be naive because there are sections like for example security, the protection of the most fragile in which there are to put some guardrail in action. But if the global landscape will become at zero sum games, we are not producing any kind of wealth, we are not producing any kind of good results for humanity and probably also for the tech company because you know, we can imagine, imagine a gold rush model, but with a gold rush model. Well, you know, I don't know if all the money that they are putting in inside this model will bring back some kind of return of investment. And so here it's a matter of a win win situation which is not just a matter of being faithful to the gospel, but also matter to being really rational on what does it mean to look to a real return to everyone and return to someone, to everybody.
- [36:54]
Kara Swisher
So what can the Vatican do? To continue to leverage this. What is next from your perspective to keep these human centered safeguards that was talked about in the encyclical in place. And who are the main stakeholders here? Who do you have to continue to be in dialogue with?
- [37:09]
Father Paolo Benanti
Well, it's easy this kind of question because it belonged to the social doctrine of the church. So I simply have to repeat like in a catechism, some kind of point. Well, first of all, we saw really clearly we have not the way, but we could be the square. You know, it's not easy to have a dialogue if I know that you have billions and I have billions of interest on both sides. But because church is not investing, Church has not money that are going on. We could be a square in which different player come to discuss. Which player? Well, the social doctrine of the church state really clearly and we are talking of the late 18th century where we are not so open like we are now today. That is not for the elected, but is for every woman and man of goodwill. So everyone that is looking for the best, good, best interest of humanity is welcome here. So the only thing is, are you open to change your mind if you see something that sound really convincing on the topic that we are discussing? This is the entrance gate and I think that could be workable as a long time institution. That is not the first time that is crossing a changing of time. So we are not the united nation, we are not a sovereign state that globally has nuclear power or things like that. But we know something about what does it mean to be human and that there is a lot of voices that are asking to not be simple, suppress for the convenience of someone.
- [38:46]
Kara Swisher
Right. So you would be a square. An actual public square would be a model. I know the tech companies think they're a public square, but they're not. It's a private square owned by them, controlled by them.
- [38:55]
Father Paolo Benanti
Probably this is the mistake that we make in the first decade of the century.
- [38:59]
Kara Swisher
I've said that, you know, this has been my thing.
- [39:01]
Father Paolo Benanti
I said Mark, I give this part of youth speech to my student and
- [39:05]
Kara Swisher
also they know very well private, it's a private city in which he doesn't help you. You don't get water, you don't get power and you pay your rent. It's just, it's not, it's not a square.
- [39:15]
Father Paolo Benanti
Yeah. And the funny thing here is that we use a word that has a really high value, that is democratization. Because when you know the fighting for civil rights produced that a black woman sit on a chair that was reserved to white people. We was democratizing a right that we wrote in a paper but was not active in society. If now we say that democratizing something is the ability that you have to have a login and password to a social network, well, I feel that we are betraying. What does it mean to democratize things?
- [39:49]
Kara Swisher
That's correct, yeah. They love to use a lot of words that aren't true anyway. So you write a lot about belief. On one hand, all of Catholicism is based on believing in an all seeing, all powerful God. On the other hand, we have AI, a technology that is used, said a quote, voice that has no face, no history. And you've asked how do you resist the seduction of a system that sounds like it knows everything? End quote. Talk about that idea and what can the church teach us about what deserves to be believed? I always say to people, there's nobody there, there's nothing there. You know, it's the most performative reflection of ourselves in a way that isn't controlled by us. So talk about what you meant by that. And how do you resist the seduction of such a system with church teachings?
- [40:36]
Father Paolo Benanti
You know, I'm also a philosopher, so let me twist the two concepts together. I grew up and during my elementary school, my teacher to make me be practical with a pencil allowed me to draw mushroom, red mushroom with white dots. Then some other teacher persuade me to not eat because they are toxic. So here is how we become human. Not by a set of instincts, but by the transmission of the lived experience of the former generation to us. This transmission needs that. I'm sorry, we believe to such kind of things. You have to believe that the mushroom is toxic without testing it, otherwise you have no chance to get by. And sometimes we believe, sometimes we have not to believe. Otherwise there is no such things as a progress. And so human nature that require to believe to someone else experience is also required to make problem on someone else experience. Welcome to the human journey that bring us to the moon, but bring also us to the ability to kill someone because it's different by us. And this is the. If I can express in that way the tragedy in the sense of the playing that we are doing as humanity now. AI is a new act in such tragedy in which we shape the way that we give for granted to acquire the quality of someone else experience. The way that we get was a really architectural way. When we enter in the library of Georgetown, you know that it's huge, is fantastic. And you have the scaffold with medicine. And you have the scaffold with Social science. If during COVID pandemic I tell to you, you know, if you make a mat wash with vinaigrette, you don't get the virus. You don't pick this piece of information and bring to the medicine scaffold, but you bring to probably fancy stories collected in a night bar from a drunken Franciscan. Well, this way work and allow us to grow in science, allow us to criticize some kind of bias that was injected in soc. Now AI is changing. There is not anymore any scaffolding. But the machine is throwing out things. And we don't have a brain helmet, a pair of lenses, an instruction that allow us to judge what is deservable to be truth and what is not. And this is producing a lot of tension that go between the innovation of science, like for example, what AlphaFold can produce in drug discovery and the spreading of things like, you know, conspiracy theories and other fancy stories, right?
- [43:29]
Kara Swisher
And so that's the, that is the problem. These are synthetic beings who are just giving us information, not in, not facts, information. So one of the things that's important is to understand that it's being controlled by, as you noted, a very small group of people in this private square. And Pope Leo warned about the risks of consolidating power in the hands of a few. Talk a little bit about that because he is the Pope too. And that's the power is consolidated in the hands of the Pope. How could he show being more transparent to make this point? Now the Church is not, as you said, investor. Church is not making money from it. It's just trying to collect souls, presumably over time. How could he be even more transparent about making a public square more public here?
- [44:15]
Father Paolo Benanti
Well, Kara, you know me and you know that I don't resist when I can make a joke as a Roman, as an Italian. So let's start from the starting point. The power in the hands of the Pope. You know, the Pope is someone that also confess. And you know very well that between saying something and that the people do what you say, there is a huge, huge difference. So you can be a voice, and the voice can achieve the bottom of your heart, but it's a voice. The second thing is really interesting. How can we be sure that the participation is really effective? Well, first of all, because the Church is not the authority that has to put the seal on it. So could be the square, but it's not the means. You cannot enforce these things in the force of the Church. And so you need something else. And that means that the dialogue remains as a dialogue. You need something that is an institution, an institution according to the rule of law. According to John rules, they are founded on the rule of law and on this idea that the participation and the transparency and the publicity of the ruling mechanism belong to everyone. So the Church can offer a space, but the enforcement has to be made through the rule of law. That means there has to be also diverse and it's parting of the rule of law that there are countries that can feel much more at easy with one way and country that will feel much more at ease in another way. But they democratically and according to the rule of law produce a discussion on this topic. And now here is a clear window where we see that the way in which we do think is much more important than the result of the things in itself.
- [46:01]
Kara Swisher
So one of the things that I've noticed, the moral authority of the Church had come into question as a result of Chinese child sex abuse scandals, et cetera, had caused a lot of people to lose faith. It seems like this is gaining moral authority for the Church again like focused in on what affects average citizens and humanity. Because most people in the United States right now tend to agree with what the Church is saying here, even if they're not Catholics. You know, in terms of AI, I know just as a personal thing, my son is, I'm Catholic, but I never took my children to church. My second son is going to mass every week now, and I never brought him, which is kind of interesting. But one of the things that attracts him, he's a technologist, is this moral authority of the Church on not just AI, but in terms of what it means in a bigger sense. Does this give the Church an ability to recover that authority, moral authority? Because it seems to with him. And that's just one case.
- [46:58]
Father Paolo Benanti
You know, there is a danger in such question because it's like if the Church would like to have it like a form of power on caution.
- [47:05]
Kara Swisher
Right, Right.
- [47:06]
Father Paolo Benanti
I think it's a secondary effect of pursuing what does it mean to be faithful to the Gospel. And the moment in the history in which we stress such kind of a concept is also the moment in which we lose it. And so with my feeling as a Franciscan, as someone that belonged to a saint, that simple say respect everyone and don't grasp power on everyone is a if we have them really happy because means that the Gospel is resounding in society. The seeking for true and the moral reflection that we are doing are shared with people. But this is not the end of the journey. We are not doing that to achieve this we have to serve the human dignity magnifica humanitas is saying. And if this is resonating with people, well, I'm much more scared that probably the damage that that are produced by this transfer of power to few privates and is already produced a deep wound inside the society. Then if you ask me as a theologian, is it this thinkable 20 years ago? I don't think. But this is interesting because, you know, history can surprise us.
- [48:17]
Kara Swisher
Well, one of the things when I think about the idea of what, you know, the church does have a moral authority and they do seem to have their finger on the pulse of what average people think right about this thing. And one of the arguments I keep having having with tech people is that why are they so reasonable and you are not? And this is a church, it's a hierarchical church. And so it's a really interesting juxtaposition to have a church talk about democracy in the correct way and the wealthiest people on the planet insisting on their way or no way at all. And so when you think about where it's going, what is your best case scenario here for the impact of this encyclical and what is your biggest worry?
- [49:04]
Father Paolo Benanti
Well, my best scenario is that we open up way. And so because technology is running probably things we're running much and much and much in this scenario. The square is open and we continue the dialogue. And the dialog will also produce a changing in some view of the Church. Because of course having for example, what does it mean to have the responsibility as a state on a lot of people is not so well experienced in the Church. And this is something that where we can have some kind of enrichment in the dialogue. What will happen? I don't know. I see that the most endangered animal here is not anymore the panda could be the democracy as we know. I think that is, you know, it's an ideology that is really dangerous. Fukuyama told us that transhumanism could be the most dangerous things. I think that the end of democracy could be the most dangerous things. Because you know, in a really technological way you can understand democracy as an algorithm that produce a result. And I see a lot of these people say, well, it's not enough efficient simple change algorithm here. But this algorithm cost a lot of blood. It was a bloody century, the century that we simple left. If we forgot it. I'm scary that we are betting on someone else blood to bring back what is important for us.
- [50:35]
Kara Swisher
Yeah, that is absolutely. I said to one of them many years ago when I was thinking about income inequality a lot. Like, in terms of them getting that this is when they were just a little bit rich. Now they're really rich. Like, it's really. They were super rich, but not like what's happened now. And I said to the person I've sold this story before, that you're either gonna have to do something about income inequality and what's gonna happen here in terms of people being a permanent underclass, or you're gonna have to armor plate your Tesla. That is where we're going with this. If you don't. If you're not careful and you're all making all the decisions and you don't care, and you are less and less caring about all of humanity and more and more caring about yourself and your group of people. And I swear to God, I looked at this guy and I thought, he wants to armor plate his Tesla. That's what he wants. That's the world he does want. And that terrified me.
- [51:25]
Father Paolo Benanti
I remember thinking, yeah, you know, the history will judge it. What we are remembering from middle age, brilliant things or armored things that remain in a museum. You know, I think that the history will judge this. That does not mean that we don't have to act because it will cost a lot of blood, especially of the most fragile people. But this is where ideology came in. If you say it's better than armor Tesla that a public square in which you can walk and enjoy what is there, I don't know if you are thinking good on this.
- [51:59]
Kara Swisher
Yeah, I would agree. Anyway, Father Benanti, I really appreciate it. Thank you so much for talking to me. It's always a pleasure. And I will see you in Rome, I promise.
- [52:07]
Father Paolo Benanti
I hope so. Thank you. Thank you for all the job that you are doing.
- [52:11]
Kara Swisher
Thank you. Today's show was produced by Michelle Aloyte, Kathryn Milsop, Tracy Hunt, Madeline LaPlante, Dubie and Kaitlin Lynch. Nishat Kirwa is Vox Media's executive producer of podcasts. Special thanks to Lissa Soap, Eamonn Whalen and Julia Sharpe Levine. Our engineers are Fernando Arruda and Rick Kwan, and our theme music is by Trackademics. If you're already following the show, you've fended off the Antichrist for another day. If not, that's a heresy and you'll need to seek forgiveness. Go wherever you listen to podcasts, search for on with Kara Swisher, and hit follow. Thanks for listening to on with Kara Swisher from Podium Media, New York magazine, the Vox Media podcast network, and up us, we'll be back on Monday with more Uncovered windows can make your home
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Father Paolo Benanti
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Father Paolo Benanti
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Father Paolo Benanti
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Kara Swisher
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