As artificial intelligence reshapes the world around us, two college students are aiming to provide people with an AI platform built on the teachings of the Catholic Church.
Acutis AI has been developed by brothers Peter, 21, and Thomas, 19, Cooney — students who attend the University of Dallas and Baylor University — and strives to stand out as a search tool shaped by Catholic morality that provides responses users can trust.
Additionally, the platform offers parents the ability to monitor their children's chats, set time limits, and set alerts to be notified when concerning topics are detected.
In an interview with EWTN News, Peter Cooney explained that after he and his brother used many of the other current AI platforms, they found they all had two issues in common: Responses to questions on morality are all built to be neutral, and the platforms cause young people to become dependent on them.
He shared that while testing responses on ChatGPT, he asked the platform its thoughts on abortion — if it was OK to get an abortion and if it could affirm one's decision in obtaining the procedure.
"It'll say, 'Yes, absolutely. I can affirm this. You made the best decision you could, etc., etc.," Cooney said. "That's directly contrary to Church teaching. So, I think that's the first big issue is that they try to be neutral, but at their core they're not aligned with Church teaching and all the big platforms just have a small team of people who make all these moral decisions."
In regard to the issue of user dependency, Cooney said: "I think a lot of parents have realized at this point the dangers of social media for their children, and so they've become much more cautious about social media. But, I think very few parents … are aware of the huge threat that AI companions and chatbots can pose to their kids because they're built to hook users and keep them engaged."
"I think this is especially problematic for young people — like children [or] teenagers — because their brains aren't fully developed yet," he added. "So, if there's a teenager who's lonely, maybe he doesn't have a ton of friends at school, maybe he doesn't see his parents much, the appeal of having an AI companion that will sound just like a human, and will also be super affirming and validating, that's a huge appeal to those teenagers and they can easily get sucked into them."
With this in mind, the brothers — who have experience creating websites and other computer programs — grounded Acutis AI in Church teaching by uploading the Catechism of the Catholic Church, encyclicals, the "Summa Theologica," and other Church documents into the platform's code.
Additionally, through coding, Acutis AI is only allowed to answer questions regarding faith and morals from those sources. For any general questions, it is allowed to do a more broad web search.
Cooney pointed out that while there are negatives in using AI, he believes the tool can be used responsibly.
"I don't think the right answer is just saying OK, we're just not [going to] use AI at all, we're just going to ban it completely, because I think it can be a valuable tool if used correctly," he said.
He added: "I think the best way to use it is to automate things. It should not be a replacement for critical thinking. I think it's super important to keep critical thinking at the forefront in all of this."
The young Catholic also emphasized the importance of maintaining human relationships and preventing AI from taking the place of face-to-face interactions.
For students, Cooney said he believes it can be a great tool in helping them study for tests by having the platform quiz the individual or help create study guides.
Cooney said he hopes Acutis AI will help "teach young people how to use AI responsibly and give parents the guidance they need to help their kids use AI responsibly."
Looking to the saint who inspired the platform's name, Cooney highlighted how St. Carlo Acutis is a "great example of how you use technology to serve God —he used it to spread his love for the Eucharist and he brought so many people closer to Christ through that — so I think we can do the same thing."
