{"slug": "why-the-internet-is-joking-that-anthropic-hired-pope-leo", "title": "Why the internet is joking that Anthropic hired Pope Leo", "summary": "The internet is joking that Anthropic hired Pope Leo XIV after the Vatican invited Anthropic co-founder Chris Olah to help unveil the Pope's letter on AI and the Pope publicly thanked him. The memes are not true, but they highlight Anthropic's reputation for hiring high-profile figures and its alignment with the Vatican's view that AI needs to be \"disarmed.", "body_md": "No, Pope Leo XIV — the 267th Bishop of Rome, who leads over 1.4 billion Catholics — isn't joining Anthropic.\n\nAfter the Vatican invited Anthropic co-founder Chris Olah to help unveil the Pope's [big letter warning about AI](https://www.businessinsider.com/pope-leo-ai-encyclical-magnifica-humanitas-takeaways-jobs-developers-2026-5)— and he publicly thanked Olah — the internet started joking that one of Silicon Valley's hottest AI startups had recruited the head of the Catholic Church.\n\nDuring his speech, the Pope thanked Olah — who was sitting a few seats down — for coming, and pledged to work together to \"find a way for humanity in this time of artificial intelligence.\"\n\nThe San Francisco AI startup does have [an in-house philosopher](https://www.businessinsider.com/anthropics-philosopher-weighs-in-on-whether-ai-can-feel-2026-1) tasked with teaching its chatbot to be moral. Anthropic has also gained a reputation for hiring high-profile people, recently bringing on [AI star Andrej Karpathy](https://www.businessinsider.com/anthropic-hires-andrej-karpathy-2026-5) and the chief technical officers of Stripe and [Workday.](https://www.businessinsider.com/workday-cto-trades-title-member-of-technical-staff-anthropic-openai-2026-4)\n\nHowever, the memes are just jokes. (Business Insider did reach out to Anthropic just to make sure, but it didn't immediately respond.)\n\nTech companies, including Amazon, Google, and Meta, are all [lobbying the Vatican](https://www.businessinsider.com/pope-leo-ai-opinion-silicon-valley-meta-amazon-google-openai-2026-5) to work more closely on AI. Anthropic's longtime focus on AI safety brings it closest to the Vatican's view that AI needs to be \"disarmed.\"\n\n## An ominous warning\n\nIn his speech, Olah, the co-founder of Anthropic, said there were three areas where the Vatican's voice was needed.\n\nOne is supporting the poor if AI displaces human labor on a very large scale. Second is making sure that humans who use AI can \"flourish\" — like making sure [chatbots don't ruin kids' minds.](https://www.businessinsider.com/parents-kids-ai-chatbots-apps-danger-benefits-study-how-to-2025-03)\n\nOlah's third point was the most mysterious. He said humanity needs to closely examine what is happening inside AI models, and hinted that [they may be showing signs of consciousness.](https://www.businessinsider.com/anthropic-google-ai-consciousness-model-welfare-research-2025-4)\n\n\"We keep finding things that are mysterious, even unsettling. We find structures that mirror results from human neuroscience. We find evidence of introspection,\" Olah said.\n\n\"I don't know what that means, but I think it warrants ongoing discernment.\"", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/why-the-internet-is-joking-that-anthropic-hired-pope-leo", "canonical_source": "https://www.businessinsider.com/pope-leo-anthropic-chris-olah-vatican-visit-sparks-memes-2026-5", "published_at": "2026-05-25 19:46:00+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-05-25 20:04:36.422604+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["artificial-intelligence", "ai-ethics", "ai-policy", "ai-startups"], "entities": ["Anthropic", "Chris Olah", "Pope Leo XIV", "Vatican", "Andrej Karpathy", "Stripe", "Workday", "Business Insider"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/why-the-internet-is-joking-that-anthropic-hired-pope-leo", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/why-the-internet-is-joking-that-anthropic-hired-pope-leo.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/why-the-internet-is-joking-that-anthropic-hired-pope-leo.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/why-the-internet-is-joking-that-anthropic-hired-pope-leo.jsonld"}}