In this blog post, first posted on the Centre for Enterprise, Markets and Ethics blog, Neil Jordan discusses the risks of de-humanisation from the use of AI in HR processes
Read more >>The AI Job “Interview”
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God and Government
The idea that government should be based on Christian principles is continually under attack – not least on several occasions in the assisted suicide debate. Not only is that proposed law itself incompatible with Christian principles, but many of those proposing it have suggested that Christians should not be involved in the debate or that Christian principles should not determine our views on the issue.
Read more >>Assisted suicide – when one person’s right becomes another person’s duty
Catholic social teaching has always valued independent institutions for the provision of care, education, and welfare for workers. Culturally, such institutions provide a protection against a form of radical individualism which can elevate certain individual rights that are created by legislators above the common good of the community. They also protect against an over-bearing state. Far from undermining individual rights, civil society institutions provide the opportunity for people to work collaboratively for the common good: people choose to work for such institutions and they choose to be involved with them in other ways. The state, in turn, is there to protect the rights of civil society institutions and nurture their foundation.
Read more >>Statement to the 113th Session of the International Labour Conference
At the beginning of his Pontificate, Pope Leo XIV explained that “in our own day, the Church offers to everyone the treasury of her social teaching in response to another industrial revolution and to developments in the field of artificial intelligence that pose new challenges for the defence of human dignity, justice and labour”.
Read more >>(How) Does Artificial Intelligence Think? (What) Does it Know
A recent article reports on work by researchers at Anthropic, the AI lab that developed a ‘reasoning’ AI model, and their ability to look into the digital brains of large language models (LLM). Investigating what happens in a neural network as an AI model ‘thinks’, they uncovered some unexpected complexity that would suggest that, on some level, an LLM might have a grasp of broad concepts and does not simply engage in pattern matching. Conversely, there is evidence to suggest that when a reasoning AI explains how it has reached a conclusion, its account of how it has reasoned does not necessarily match what the ‘digital microscope’ suggests has gone on. Moreover, sometimes, an AI will simply produce random numbers in response to a mathematical problem that it can’t solve and then move on. On occasion, it will respond to a leading question with reasoning that leads to the suggested conclusion, even if that conclusion is false. Thus, it seems, the AI will appear to convince itself (or the human interlocutor) that it has reasoned its way to a conclusion when in fact it has not.
Read more >>A jubilee for workers!
As we continue to pray for Pope Francis through the Novemdiales – the period of mourning after the death of a pope – we also celebrate his legacy. Pope Francis was committed to upholding the dignity of workers and, with modifications, the ‘Jubilee for Workers’ and the ‘Jubilee for Entrepreneurs’ are both going ahead at the start of May.
Read more >>Pope Francis and fraternity
In the coverage of the passing of Pope Francis to eternal life, surprisingly little has been said about an important aspect of Pope Francis’s social teaching – fraternity. This was the theme of his second social encyclical, Fratelli tutti. It is an important theme because it links the pastoral, spiritual, theological and social teaching of the late pope. The title of Fratelli tutti in English is “Brothers All”, and it is subtitled “On Fraternity and Social Friendship”.
Read more >>Pope Francis RIP
It is with deep sorrow that the St Mary’s University community joins the global Catholic family in mourning the death of His Holiness, Pope Francis.
Read more >>Trumps tariffs are no solution to a non-existent problem
I have been giving talks about globalisation to Christian groups for some years. Over those years, it seemed to be a less and less interesting subject. It is disappointing that it has become topical again.
Read more >>How the march of assisted suicide devalues the lives of those who need our care
Recent media coverage promoting assisted dying clearly demonstrates a significant problem with perceptions on the current proposals to change the law. To garner support for assisted dying, media stories and celebrity interviews already refer to situations that lie well beyond the scope of the proposed assisted dying legislation. As a result, we may be marching towards the inevitable expansion of assisted dying to include death on request, based on feelings of pity, and in situations not confined to the request of the patient.
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