SAN FRANCISCO: Pope Francis wearing a long, white puffer jacket inspired by Balenciaga. Francis rocking aviators and revving a motorcycle down a busy street. Francis turning the tables in a nightclub. Francis preparing to fly a fighter jet. Francis having a beer.
Over the past few weeks, dozens of photos have appeared showing the leader of the world’s Roman Catholics in strange scenarios, sending social media into a tizzy. Apart from the pontiff himself, the images all have something in common: They are fake, made by artificial intelligence tools that create images from short text prompts. Many public figures have popped up in AI-generated pictures recently, but the images with Francis have made the biggest splash. They have earned more views, likes and comments than other AI photos, according to a review by New York Times, prompting arace to depict the 86-year-old in odder and odder situations.
“I had to get involved in the pope thing,” one Reddit user recently wrote alongside AI images of Francis practicing martial arts and playing basketball. Francis’ prevalence in AI-generated images is the result of a perfect storm of factors, experts said. After 10 years as the head of the Catholic Church, he is instantly recognisable around the world. He is viewed as an approachable leader. And when combined with a burst of interest in new AI tools, Francis became the recurring choice of creators to place in the most incongruous scenarios.
The goal, some creators said, was to show that even the pope can have fun. Global religious figures such as the pope are natural subjects of political satire and artistic expression, said Jennifer Herdt, a professor of Christian ethics. But AI images can be dangerous if people believe them to be real and misuse them to spread misinformation. “You lull people into not double checking,” said Subbarao Kambhampati, a computer science professor.
The Vatican did not comment. The image that turned Francis into an AI star shows him in a white puffer jacket in the style of Balenciaga, a haute fashion house. It appeared to have first been posted on March 24 on Reddit for the generative AI tool Midjourney and then shared across social media.
One tweet sharing the image — captioned “The boys in Brooklyn could only hope for this level of drip” — was liked more than 2,29,000 times and viewed 20. 6 million times. In contrast, a tweet sharing AI generated images of former US President Donald Trump’s being arrested got 40,000 likes and 6. 4 million views.
Over the past few weeks, dozens of photos have appeared showing the leader of the world’s Roman Catholics in strange scenarios, sending social media into a tizzy. Apart from the pontiff himself, the images all have something in common: They are fake, made by artificial intelligence tools that create images from short text prompts. Many public figures have popped up in AI-generated pictures recently, but the images with Francis have made the biggest splash. They have earned more views, likes and comments than other AI photos, according to a review by New York Times, prompting arace to depict the 86-year-old in odder and odder situations.
“I had to get involved in the pope thing,” one Reddit user recently wrote alongside AI images of Francis practicing martial arts and playing basketball. Francis’ prevalence in AI-generated images is the result of a perfect storm of factors, experts said. After 10 years as the head of the Catholic Church, he is instantly recognisable around the world. He is viewed as an approachable leader. And when combined with a burst of interest in new AI tools, Francis became the recurring choice of creators to place in the most incongruous scenarios.
The goal, some creators said, was to show that even the pope can have fun. Global religious figures such as the pope are natural subjects of political satire and artistic expression, said Jennifer Herdt, a professor of Christian ethics. But AI images can be dangerous if people believe them to be real and misuse them to spread misinformation. “You lull people into not double checking,” said Subbarao Kambhampati, a computer science professor.
The Vatican did not comment. The image that turned Francis into an AI star shows him in a white puffer jacket in the style of Balenciaga, a haute fashion house. It appeared to have first been posted on March 24 on Reddit for the generative AI tool Midjourney and then shared across social media.
One tweet sharing the image — captioned “The boys in Brooklyn could only hope for this level of drip” — was liked more than 2,29,000 times and viewed 20. 6 million times. In contrast, a tweet sharing AI generated images of former US President Donald Trump’s being arrested got 40,000 likes and 6. 4 million views.