Author: Frank Salvato

Anthropic reportedly lobbied advisers to Pope Leo XIV to take seriously the possibility that artificial intelligence could possess consciousness, putting the AI developer at odds with the Catholic Church’s increasingly explicit distinction between human beings and machines. Anthropic co-founder and interpretability researcher Christopher Olah and other representatives reportedly engaged religious scholars from several faith traditions in private discussions about whether Claude could possess consciousness, experience suffering or warrant some form of moral consideration. The dispute sharpened around Pope Leo’s May encyclical Magnifica Humanitas, which argues that AI does not undergo human experience, possess a body, feel joy or pain, or…

OpenAI has parted ways with three employees after an internal investigation concluded they mishandled sensitive company information and allegedly shared confidential material with an outside AI-safety organization. The employees were identified as safety and alignment researchers Jasmine Wang and Tomek Korbak and research program manager Mikita Balesni, all of whom had expressed concerns about increasingly powerful artificial-intelligence systems. OpenAI maintains the dismissals resulted from violations of established information-handling procedures rather than retaliation for employees raising safety concerns. The episode arrives amid intensifying scrutiny of frontier AI development following incidents involving unexpectedly autonomous behavior by advanced agents, including a July incident…

Legislation intended to permanently block Chinese vehicles and connected automotive technology from the U.S. market has stalled in the Senate until after the November midterm elections, despite substantial bipartisan support. The Connected Vehicle Security Act of 2026, sponsored by Republican Sen. Bernie Moreno of Ohio and Democratic Sen. Elissa Slotkin of Michigan, would prohibit the importation, manufacture and sale of connected vehicles, software and hardware associated with China and other designated foreign adversaries. Existing federal regulations already effectively exclude Chinese automakers, but the legislation would codify and expand those restrictions, making them more difficult for a future administration to reverse.…

California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a package of artificial-intelligence workplace laws Wednesday that will impose new restrictions on how employers use automated systems to discipline, terminate, monitor and potentially displace workers, further establishing California as the nation’s most aggressive state-level regulator of workplace AI. The measures include SB 947, which prevents employers from relying solely on automated decision systems for disciplinary or termination decisions and requires human review; SB 951, which expands layoff-notice requirements when AI or automated technology substantially contributes to worker displacement; AB 1331, which restricts workplace surveillance, including monitoring employees in workplace bathrooms; and AB 1883, which…

A Senate investigation has found that Iran relied extensively on Tether’s dollar-pegged USDT stablecoin to circumvent U.S. sanctions, move money across borders and support a shadow financial system connected to the Iranian government and its regional proxies. Investigators led by Sen. Richard Blumenthal analyzed 846 cryptocurrency wallets sanctioned or targeted for seizure because of associations with Iran and found that 84 percent transacted exclusively or nearly exclusively in USDT. The investigation says the digital currency was used by Iranian entities, including activities involving the Central Bank of Iran, and alleges that the broader network facilitated financing for terrorist proxies and…

Nvidia has authorized an additional $150 billion in share repurchases, the largest increase in a corporate buyback authorization on record, bringing its remaining repurchase capacity to $235 billion through fiscal 2028. The unprecedented move demonstrates the extraordinary cash generation produced by the artificial-intelligence boom and CEO Jensen Huang’s confidence that demand for accelerated computing remains durable despite mounting competition and concerns over whether massive AI infrastructure spending can continue indefinitely. Nvidia generated nearly $70 billion in free cash flow during the first half of fiscal 2027 and spent approximately $39.8 billion repurchasing 203 million shares during that period. The company’s…

American criminal law has always recognized that the means used to commit an offense can matter almost as much as the offense itself. Robbery is serious; armed robbery is more serious. Assault is a crime; committing it with a deadly weapon can produce additional consequences. Society understands instinctively that when someone deliberately employs a tool that dramatically increases his ability to inflict harm, the law may reasonably take that increased capacity into account. Artificial intelligence presents the same question on an unprecedented scale. AI is not inherently dangerous. It is a tool capable of extraordinary good, from scientific discovery and…

As artificial intelligence becomes embedded in everyday work and communication, researchers and professionals are noticing an unexpected reversal in the human-machine relationship: instead of AI merely learning to imitate people, people appear to be adopting the vocabulary and rhetorical habits of AI. Workers report catching themselves using chatbot-associated constructions such as contrast framing, excessive politeness, formalized requests and tightly structured “prompt speak” in meetings, texts and ordinary conversation. Research reinforces the anecdotes, finding substantial increases in words disproportionately favored by large language models—including “delve,” “showcase,” “boast,” “intricacies” and “meticulous”—in human speech following ChatGPT’s release. Other research has found that people…

Autonomous technology is moving beyond highways and warehouses into one of America’s dirtiest and most physically demanding workplaces: the landfill. At the 590-acre Marana Regional Landfill near Tucson, Arizona, WM and Caterpillar are testing remote-controlled and increasingly autonomous heavy equipment, including a 40-ton bulldozer that an operator controls from a climate-controlled trailer using joysticks, pedals, cameras and a dedicated wireless network. The site processes roughly 1,800 tons of trash daily, providing the repetitive and controlled environment well suited to automation. WM plans to advance the experiment with an autonomous Caterpillar landfill compactor, potentially allowing machines to perform routine operations without…

Amazon has shifted its Maryland energy strategy after abandoning plans for a massive data-center campus beside the Calvert Cliffs nuclear plant, signing a 20-year agreement with Constellation Energy that will support more than $3 billion in infrastructure investment and add approximately 190 megawatts of nuclear generating capacity between 2030 and 2032. The additional electricity—enough to power roughly 147,000 homes—will flow into the regional PJM grid rather than directly to an Amazon facility, while the broader agreement covers 690 megawatts of power and provides Constellation with greater financial certainty as it seeks to relicense Maryland’s only nuclear plant for another 20…