As A.I. Makes Strides in Mathematics, Mathematicians Urge Caution; The New York Times, June 2, 2026

 Siobhan Roberts, The New York Times ; As A.I. Makes Strides in Mathematics, Mathematicians Urge Caution

"Among the potential threats that the Leiden Declaration authors articulate are accuracy and reliability: Journal editors are already complaining about a flood of plausible seeming A.I.- generated papers and proofs that have turned out to be incorrect, and in ways that are difficult for mathematicians to discern.

Perhaps most pointedly, the authors raise the question of whether the many A.I. companies tackling mathematics — major players such as OpenAI, Google DeepMind and Anthropic, or start-ups such as Harmonic, Math, Inc. and Axiom Math — are keeping the field’s best interests in mind. “Technology companies’ involvement in research,” they write, “raises the risk that research questions are prioritized and incentivized because of their amenability to A.I. methods and models, rather than their deeper significance to understanding.” In turn, they point out, this disadvantages researchers who choose not to use the technology, and those who do not have access to it.

For Rodrigo Ochigame, a historian and anthropologist of computing and artificial intelligence at Leiden University in the Netherlands, and one of the statement’s authors, the latest OpenAI proof illustrates why this sort of collective reckoning in the discipline is necessary. “The story follows the same pattern as many other announcements by commercial A.I. developers,” Dr. Ochigame said. “The A.I. model is proprietary and unavailable to anyone outside the company. We get a flashy promotional video, while basic information needed to assess the scientific meaning of the result is kept secret. The company disclosed nothing about the methods, human-written prompts, training data, or computational resources consumed.”"

'AI has no soul': Pope Leo expected to address AI's ethical challenges; USA TODAY, May 13, 2026

Marc Ramirez, USA TODAY ; 'AI has no soul': Pope Leo expected to address AI's ethical challenges

"Is thinking basically computing? Are humans just biological versions of machines – only less efficient than their AI counterparts?

The concept that people may develop such a mindset is a major concern for Catholic observers given the breakneck pace at which AI is developing.

“As soon as you start thinking of yourself as a machine, only not as good, then you’re just a commodity and have no other reason to live,” said John Cavadini, director of the McGrath Institute for Church Life at the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana. “It’s a pathway to desolation.”

That’s why Cavadini and others are looking forward to the imminent release of Pope Leo XIV’s first major encyclical, expected to address the growing ethical and moral challenges of artificial intelligence.

The treatise will be Leo’s most authoritative document to date, as topical as it is symbolic: Though the Vatican has set no specific date, a May 15 release would come 135 years to the day that Pope Leo XIII, with whom the current pontiff shares his name, issued what is considered the first social encyclical of modern times, Rerum Novarum...

As the term implies, an encyclical is a "circular letter" designed to be shared among a community...

The overarching concern, Daly said, is whether AI will be leveraged to promote human flourishing or whether efficiency and productivity will become the focus, leaving patients behind...

Another overlooked but important risk of AI, Daly said, is that technological advances tend to favor those already represented in such settings – in other words, those adept with new technology and who have electronic health records...

Hayes-Mota hopes the papal document can place the church, especially in the U.S., at the forefront of an emerging and urgent public conversation. The pope, he said, can play a leading role in fostering that conversation and ensuring it’s “anchored in moral values” and the fundamental questions AI is raising."