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That's the Global News Podcast, wherever you get your BBC podcasts.
Thirty years after two civilian airplanes were shot down, why is the US government now bringing charges against the former Cuban president, Raul Castro?
I'm Asma Khalid, and I host the Global Story podcast from the BBC.
Cuba's government is calling this all a political maneuver, but the Cuban exile community in Miami calls it justice.
30 years in the making.
Is the US setting the stage for a military intervention?
For more, check out The Global Story on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts.
Is AI an existential threat?
The Pope thinks so.
Artificial intelligence needs to be disarmed.
And even some tech leaders agree.
There is a real possibility that AI will displace human labour at a very large scale.
If that happens, supporting those displaced will be a moral imperative.
Yes, is it time to clip AI's wings?
World Business Report from the BBC.
I'm Ed Butler, and today we're going to be looking at the intervention of the Holy Father into the great AI debate.
Will papal intervention make the difference?
Also today, the latest on the tentative steps towards a Gulf War peace deal.
And sports car giant Ferrari unveils its first electric vehicle.
But has the prancing horse lost its kick?
Today, the Pope has, Pope Leo has released his first major document, the Encyclical.
It's an official letter written by Pope Leo to guide bishops and practitioners.
It's not about religion, though.
This one is about artificial intelligence.
The Vatican says it addresses the protection of the human person in the age of artificial intelligence.
Artificial intelligence needs to be disarmed.
The word is strong, I know, but deliberately chosen because this moment needs words capable of attracting attention, awakening consciences and indicating paths forward for humanity.
Strong and striking words from the pontiff while attending the evening is Christopher Ola.
He's the co-founder of Anthropic, which has billed itself as the AI company that puts safety and risk mitigation at the forefront of its research.
He, alongside the Pope and his first encyclical, launched this document on the care of human dignity in the era of AI.
Every frontier AI lab, including Anthropic, operates inside a set of incentives and constraints that can sometimes conflict with doing the right thing.
The pressure to stay commercially viable and to stay at the frontier of research.
Geopolitical pressure. and the older, plainer pressures of pride and ambition.
There is a real possibility that AI will displace human labor at a very large scale.
If that happens, supporting those displaced will be a moral imperative of historic proportions.
This task will be difficult enough, but I worry most dialogue misses an even harder challenge.
AI development is concentrated in a handful of wealthy nations.
How will we ensure that the gains of AI are shared globally?
We do not have a mechanism for this.
It is an unsolved problem.
And it is the kind of problem the church has historically refused to let the world ignore.
And now we're entering an extraordinary world.
And I will be honest, we keep finding things that are mysterious, even unsettling.
We find structures that mirror results from human neuroscience.
We find evidence of introspection.
We find internal states that functionally mirror joy, satisfaction, fear, grief, and unease.
I don't know what that means, but I think it warrants ongoing discernment.
The thoughts of Christopher Ola, co-founder of Anthropic.
So is confronting the risks of AI now really a moral imperative, as he says?
Let's speak to Dr Noreen Hertzfeld, author of In Our Image, Artificial Intelligence and the Human Spirit.
Thanks for being with us, Dr. Hertzfeld.
So tell us, I mean...
First, what jumped out at you in terms of the details and the delivery of this letter?
Well, the first thing that jumped out to me was Leo's insistence that this is really a question of power, of who holds it and how it is used.
And, as Chris Ola mentioned, this power should be used for the common good and not simply for the few.
Leo's clear that technology and AI technology in particular is not morally neutral.
It reflects the desires and it reinforces them of those who build it and train it and those who implement it.
And it also reflects their assumptions and their biases.
He also picked up, didn't he, on the use of AI in warfare.
This has been a hot topic for a few years now.
He says that reducing human control of weaponry makes it harder to consider war just, and he's warned against the launching of an AI arms race.
Yeah, as we look at the history of warfare, it has continually moved to place distance between the adversary and the one who is targeting them.
Initially, people had to look their adversary in the eye.
With the advent of flight, we could drop bombs on people from a distance.
Even drone operators, though, still kind of know what they're doing.
They're still purposefully hitting that button, hitting the trigger.
But once we have lethal autonomous weapons, we're distanced mentally as well as physically from the field of battle.
And the problem there then becomes one of responsibility.
Who do you hold responsible if war crimes are committed?
You can't hold a machine responsible because it has no moral compass.
And humans can all too easily say that decision was made by a machine.
It also, if you don't have your sons and daughters' boots on the ground, might make it much easier to go to war instead of prolonging diplomacy.
Stay with us for a second, Dr Hasvat, but I want you to listen to this.
This was an investigation launched today by the Financial Times in the UK.
It's discovered that software tools that remove safety protections from various AI models those developed by Meta, Google and other tech groups are being used to create thousands of altered versions of stripped of their original controls.
The modified AI systems provided responses to prompts involving biological weapons, malware and child exploitation.
So, in other words, you could jump in and trigger those responses those, if you like, advice from the AI models on subjects like those.
I've been speaking to Kawin Etharajah.
He's an assistant professor of applied AI at the University of Chicago's Booth Business School.
He explained to me that AI systems don't even publish their inner workings.
These are still at risk.
We saw quite recently that Claude, which Anthropic, famously does not release sort of open weights because they're very concerned about the malicious use of their model.
Even still, Claude was used in a cyber attack, I believe, on various Mexican firms and institutions.
Regardless of which level of abstraction you're operating at, there are always these techniques available for a malicious actor to potentially exploit the model.
It's really a matter of weighing the potential...
Benefits of having a model out with.
You know various levels of openness and the risk involved you know in doing so.
Right.
So but basically, can anyone do this?
Can anybody jump in with reasonably street level knowledge and deploy one form of tech to manipulate another and to weaponise it basically?
I wouldn't say anyone, but the barrier has certainly fallen quite a bit, right?
So one of the concerns with developing AI models and LLMs in general is that, for example historically, if you were a malicious actor and you wanted to build a biological weapon, doing that was quite difficult.
Maybe the knowledge there was there.
It was just scattered all over the internet.
And it would take someone very, very persistent to figure that out.
So Dario Amandai, who's the CEO of Anthropic, famously likes to say that the number of people who are both extremely malicious and extremely smart that intersection was very small historically.
And so we were, even without any sort of explicit safeguards.
We as a society were able to sort of avoid the worst of things.
The better and better LLMs get, and the easier it is to write software because of tools like QuadCode or Codex or even some of the coding models from the Chinese labs, the lower the barrier is for anyone to do anything malicious.
That's Cowan Ethayaraj.
He's a consistent professor of applied AI at the University of Chicago's Booth Business School.
So, returning to Dr Noreen Herzfeld, I mean, Dr Herzfeld it's, It's striking there, obviously a real world example of how AI is morphing into something that even those major tech firms seem unable to exactly control as they would see fit or wish to.
It does raise a certain question, doesn't it?
Who is going to be the moral leader to stand up to this wave?
Because there is so much money involved now.
Exactly.
And once AI is out there and of course, the intent of these corporations in Silicon Valley is that everyone will be using it and that it will become a part of our day-to-day lives we do have to worry about malicious actors.
Every tool can be used for good ends or for bad ends, and AI is no different there.
But AI is an extremely powerful tool, and that means that the bad ends can be far worse than tools that are less powerful.
But I also think we need to worry about... unintended consequences.
In other words, there are many ways in which we do not understand exactly how this tool works.
A lot of coding is being done now is vibe coding, where people are just giving prompts to AI and letting the AI build the code.
And the code that results from that has been found to often have numerous security loopholes.
And those are loopholes that could be to the advantage of any malicious actor who wishes to hack into these programmes and change what they do.
Now, Pope Leo, I see, has convened a commission to take this work forward.
It has been pointed out that in 2015, the late Pope Francis wrote his encyclical Laudato Si', which focused on the urgent need to address the climate crisis.
And he had to follow it up in 2023, talking about his own disappointment.
But nothing had changed.
I mean, do you think Pope Leo has the moral reach to galvanise people?
Well, I think in some ways that remains to be seen, doesn't it?
I do fear that the tech pros in Silicon Valley who are developing these tools may not have the ears to hear because they are locked, as Chris Ole said, into a bit of a race to see who can be the first to get an artificial general intelligence.
I do think that this encyclical however, becomes a tool in the hand of bishops, of priests, of educators, to help people think about this technology and think about how they might want to incorporate it into their lives or their businesses and how they might decide not to incorporate it.
Dr. Noreen Hesfelt, thank you very much indeed.
So now I'm joined in New York by George Conboy.
He's the chairman of Brighton Securities with our Normal Markets Roundup.
A quick thought about AI.
What chance do you give the tech bros listening to the Pope?
Oh, I wouldn't give too much weight to what the Pope says to the tech pros.
I think in 1945, the late, unlamented Joseph Stalin said, how many divisions does the Pope have?
And there may be a few thoughts along those lines in Silicon Valley.
There is no Silicon Valley in Europe.
Maybe that's why the Pope moved there.
I don't think it will amount to a hill of beans.
It is Memorial Day in the US, so no markets.
But of course, it's not stopping the global oil market, is it?
Oil prices falling below $100 a barrel on Monday.
Stock markets rising on hopes that the US and Iran could be inching closer to a peace deal.
Right.
At a real sawtooth pattern lately.
Where there's some war action, investors get scared.
Interest rates go up, stock prices go down.
Then we think maybe there's going to be a deal and the oil prices are down 10 bucks and the markets back up.
But the interesting thing is, people ask me all the time why is the US stock market doing so well with all these problems?
And there are two reasons, right?
Internationally.
When there's instability, it's probably and by it I mean the US stock market the most stable, secure and diversified place your capital can rest.
And Fact is that at some point we will resolve this, whether it's next week, next month or next year.
Not likely to go on forever.
We've had these conflicts before in the Middle East.
We'll have them again.
We will indeed.
I suppose the question is whether or not it's going to tip the economy into the red.
Before that happens though, isn't it?
No, it doesn't look too bad.
I mean, there's nothing economically we see here from corporate earnings, which are rising rapidly.
Now, some of that is tech-driven, but not all of it.
So, if you look at the fundamentals of the market, price earnings multiples are coming down as earnings are coming up and that'll help drive prices higher.
It looks like a bull market for a while yet.
George Conboy, Chairman of Brighton Securities, thank you very much indeed.
You're with World Business Report from the BBC World Service.
Now nine years ago, one of the most remote and underdeveloped communities in one of Africa's poorest economies, Sierra Leone, received an unexpected windfall.
Villages in Koriadu in West Africa unearthed one of the biggest rough diamonds that had ever been discovered.
It was the third largest in West Africa.
I was there just after it happened in 2017 and I've been back to find out how the proceeds have affected all of those involved.
This was the scene on the day, in early 2018, that Koyardu learnt its so-called peace diamond had sold at auction for some 65 million.
We be feel joy, now we act.
We dance, we dance, we jubilate, we laugh, we gladiate too much.
Kombo John Bull was the 15-year-old boy who discovered the stone in a local open-cast pit.
You're suddenly a rich man, right?
It must have felt exciting.
Yes, sir.
Comber and other diggers each received over $100,000 for their find.
He recalls now how he used the money to try to emigrate to Canada.
The application and months of waiting cost him most of his earnings.
We are spending a lot of money on feeding.
We're also going out to bars and enjoying ourselves.
So we indeed spent a lot of money.
It was party, party, party for you, was it?
No, no, not party.
If now, now, that blessing come away.
Looking back, I think that I could have done better, much better.
And all we thought was that whatever we could make twice as much as we got from the diamond.
But it didn't turn out to be that way.
The Canadian visa was rejected.
Gomba now works as a welder in Sierra Leone's capital Freetown, regretting much of his youthful ignorance.
But for the wider community in Coriado, it's perhaps a different story.
I told the government that where we found this dam on, There is no good school, no facility for education, no good road.
There is no pure water.
This is Pastor Emmanuel Momo, the owner of the pit where the diamond was found.
He did a deal with the government.
In return for him declaring it to them, they would provide the village with much needed development.
They promised all of those things.
A school, a clinic, water and a road.
So, did that happen?
That's Abubaka Amara, the headteacher at the large new primary school he now runs in the village.
With multiple classrooms and solar power.
It does feel like a world away from the husk of a building that I saw nine years ago.
A shiny zinc roof on the new maternity clinic also speaks of progress.
Can I come in?
The village midwife, Judith Sia Lameen, introduces me to Koriadu's most recent arrival a newborn infant.
So this is a little baby boy.
Little baby boy, two days old.
Very handsome.
Judith tells me that some 6 of expectant mothers used to die on the roads trying to reach the main hospital in town.
They haven't had a single maternal death here since the clinic was built.
Pastor Momo is proud of what's been achieved, although he says the government has done the bare minimum to fund the running of these new facilities, which is now paid for by foreign aid money.
They know that what they promise, they have never met the promise.
The Minister of Mines declined to speak to me about this story, but some do defend the government's record.
Martin Rappaport is a philanthropist and campaigner whose charitable support helps maintain the Diamond Peace Project now.
We were providing rice, and now the government is providing the food for the children, which is an amazing thing.
So what happened is we hooked them into the development cycle and environment.
And you got to understand how difficult that process is when you're dealing in a place like Koyardu, when you're dealing with absolutely starting from scratch.
Tell me then, what would you say the legacy of the Peace Diamond has been?
It's created a shift in thinking and it's showing that resources like diamonds can have a real impact on the local communities.
You have to have patience to do development properly and you have to let the people do their own development.
The legacy of the Peace Diamond is, in fact, the people.
The words of the philanthropist and diamond transparency campaigner, Martin Rappaport.
I was in Sierra Leone a couple of months ago and you can hear much more of my journey, that story.
What happened to the other diggers who unearthed the piece diamond on the documentary?
Wherever you get your BBC podcasts.
Now, when you think of a sports car, you may quite possibly think of a throaty sound a bit like this
What a noise, the roar.
That is surely the most famous sports car engine sound of them all.
It is of the Ferrari, of course, but in something of a change of gear, you might say.
The Italian sports car giant has launched its first ever fully electric vehicle today.
It's called Luce, with a price tag of almost $640,000.
So what does this mean for Ferrari?
In fact, what does it mean for electric cars more generally?
Let's speak to Felipe Munoz.
He's a car industry analyst based in Turin in northern Italy.
Hi, Felipe.
Thank you for being with us.
So we've heard what a classic Ferrari sounds like.
For those who didn't already know, what does the new one sound like?
Do we know that?
Well, look, the car has just been revealed some minutes ago in Rome.
So we are still digesting the information from it because, as you just said, it's a big step for the brand in the way that it has been making sales petrol cars for 70 years.
So to see this new car without an engine, but let's say without a combustion engine, It's something that we are not used to.
So we're still digesting the information from it.
I don't know what the sound is, but of course it's going to be definitely different from what we're used to.
Yeah, exactly.
I mean a lot of it's going to be different from what we're used to, because I think so many people associate the glamour, the luxury, the history of Ferrari the prancing horse, as it's known with luxury.
That amazing sound with that sort of visceral noise and indeed just the raw power.
I mean, will the new EV match that?
Look, every time we talk about Ferrari, we are talking of one of the industry's innovators.
Ferrari is well known, not only because of its combustion engine cars and supercars, but from a technological point of view, it is a reference.
So I'm sure that with this car, the Luce, we will see something new in terms of performance, in terms of efficiency.
The preliminary data indicates that It has a real amazing aerodynamics.
And actually, it partly explains its weird design, let's call it like that for now.
So I don't think that, because of this being an electric car, Ferrari is not going to be unique or innovating here.
So we still need to wait for more information, but I'm sure it's a big step for the brand.
Yes.
I mean, you talk about the design.
It was designed by the man who gave us the iPod, wasn't it?
Yeah.
The great Apple promoter, kind of Don Johnny Ives.
So, I mean, tell us about how it looks from your viewpoint.
I mean, some have called it just an SUV.
I mean, obviously, it's a lot more than that, but...
Does it match up to the requirements of that very high bar that the classic Ferrari look requires?
It's totally different from what we are used to in terms of design.
Actually, it's neither an SUV nor a sports car.
It is more likely like a sedan, but a weird sedan because the proportions are different.
Basically, they develop...
I mean, the design of the car is following the efficiency.
So you don't find the usual shapes of a sedan, even though it's four doors and five seats.
It's the first ever Ferrari with five seats.
But this is just more a subjective issue.
Of course, the looks of a car are going to divide the opinion.
This one in particular so far over the last hour since the car was presented, has found a lot of negative comments on social media.
Because as I said, it's nothing that we, I mean, we're used to these amazing, beautiful Ferraris.
This is something different. that it is also exploring the EVs.
Yeah, $640,000 each.
I mean, perhaps the price tag is not surprising, but it is true, isn't it, that Lamborghini and Porsche, two of the great sports car models that rival Ferrari or attempt to, they've abandoned plans to roll out their own electric model, citing a lack of customer interest.
Ferrari wants to be an innovator but fundamentally Ferrari may not have the market to buy into or to sell into.
That's correct, yes.
Actually, Ferrari does not need an electric model and the success for this product, the Luce, won't be measured in units.
But the world at the same time wants to see how Its most iconic brand, which is Ferrari, handles the technology.
So basically, the Luce is not going to change big things from Ferrari, but it's just a declaration of intent from Ferrari.
Felipe Munoz, a car industry analyst based in Turin in northern Italy.
My thanks to you.
And that's it for us here on World Business Report.
We'll be back same time tomorrow.
That's the Global News Podcast, wherever you get your BBC podcasts.
