Francis on Friday appointed Demis Hassabis, 47, head of Google’s AI division DeepMind, to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, which was founded in 1603.
He was included in a list of new members alongside American astrophysicist Andrea Mia Ghez and Swiss astrophysicist Didier Queloz.
Hassabis, 47, is a millionaire, the son of a Greek Cypriot father and a Chinese Singaporean mother, and holds a British passport. A child prodigy at chess, he was home-schooled and started out as a video game programmer.
He is also an adviser to the British regime. Hassabis has predicted that artificial intelligence will be “one of the most beneficial technologies ever for humanity”, but that significant ethical issues remain. He is married and lives in London.