Note Bene: We read the entire encyclical and we didn’t use AI. And we don’t use AI to draft, write, or edit our own writing!

Show Notes:

Full text of the encyclical

Anthropic co-founder Chris Olah’s remarks on Pope Leo XIV’s encyclical “Magnifica humanitas”

The importance of Pope Leo’s first encyclical (Phil’s preview of the encyclical— posted before it appeared)

Pope Leo breaks new ground with encyclical on AI (News/Analysis by Phil, posted on the day it appeared)

No, the just-war tradition is not ‘outdated’ (Phil’s comment on the encyclical’s treatment of just-war theory, which we didn’t even have a chance to discuss in our podcast)

Promise and problems in Magnifica Humanitas (Phil’s reflections a few days after publication)

Other interesting analyses of the encyclical:

Idols of the Valley (Yuhal Levin in New Atlantis)

Pope Leo Isn’t Standing Athwart the Singularity (Ross Douthat in the New York Times) (archived here)

Between Thomas Aquinas and Silicon Valley: The first encyclical of Leo XIV (David Berger)

AI Chatbots are Evil by Marc Barnes

More on what we recommend on Catholic Social Teaching and Natural Law in general:

Whether the intellect is a power of the soul? Thomas Aquinas, The Summa Theologiae

Divini Illius Magistri, encyclical on Christian education, Pius XI (1929); good overview of “the three societies” of flourishing human life.

Reclaiming Catholic Social Teaching by Anthony Esolen (affiliate link)

Knowledge and Decisions, by Thomas Sowell (affiliate link)

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