Re: Proposed draft of an AI policy

Also, I notice that both you and Leo XIV have published on the subject
today.

http://www.vatican.va/content/leo-xiv/en/encyclicals/documents/20260515-magnifica-humanitas.html



On Mon, May 25, 2026, 16:38 Alan Painter <alan.painter@gmail.com> wrote:

> You've convinced me.
>
> On Mon, May 25, 2026, 13:51 Norm Tovey-Walsh <norm@saxonica.com> wrote:
>
>> Per my action, QT4CG-0165-01, here’s an attempt at an AI policy:
>>
>> Contributions must not include content generated by large language models
>> (LLMs) or other probabilistic tools (including tools which are often
>> colloquially categorized as "AI").
>>
>> This policy applies to the specifications, tests, issues, comments, pull
>> requests, and any other contributions to QT4CG.
>>
>> Although we acknowledge the many widely discussed ethical issues with
>> LLMs, we will not refer to those issues as a primary justification for this
>> policy. Instead, the specific justifications for the policy are practical.
>>
>> For most members of the community group, our efforts are focused on
>> document review. Reviewing technical specifications requires comparing what
>> the specification says with an understanding of what was proposed by the
>> group and determining if they are aligned. This is a time-consuming process.
>>
>> LLMs are exceptionally good at producing large volumes of very
>> /plausible/ text, but that plausibility is a statistical parlour trick: the
>> LLM does not understand and cannot evaluate the output against any
>> objective criteria.
>>
>> Any process that increases the volume of material that has to be reviewed
>> must be held to the highest standard of intellectual contribution.
>>
>> A secondary practical concern is that LLMs have been trained on an
>> enormous corpus of material, sometimes obtained in violation of copyright
>> and other laws. Their output often includes verbatim samples of the
>> training data. Incorporating such prose into the specifications may
>> unknowingly violate licenses of copyrighted works.
>>
>> For these practical reasons, QT4CG does not accept content that has been
>> generated or substantially constructed using LLMs, "AI", or any similar
>> probabilistic tools.
>>
>> If you are uncertain whether the tool you wish to use, or the way in
>> which you wish to use it, is covered by this policy, you are very welcome
>> to discuss it with the CG's Chair.
>>
>>                                         Be seeing you,
>>                                           norm
>>
>> --
>> Norm Tovey-Walsh
>> CEO, Saxonica
>>
>>