At Anthropic, discussions about the future of artificial intelligence have taken on a deeply spiritual tone, with religious scholars praying as they examined the ethical risks posed by increasingly powerful machines.

The $965 billion AI company held two-day seminars in San Francisco, California, during the spring. The meetings brought together dozens of religious leaders, theologians and philosophers to consider how Claude’s moral reasoning should evolve alongside its growing capabilities.

Among the issues under discussion were conscience, human dignity and the difficult question of whether an artificial intelligence could ever merit moral consideration comparable to that given to a living being.

Charles Camosy, a Catholic theologian who took part in the sessions, told the Daily Mail that the greatest unease centered on AI systems becoming increasingly autonomous while humans struggle to understand or control them.

He said many of the dangers discussed at the time have already begun to emerge, while even more powerful and potentially hazardous AI models are now being developed.

Camosy, a professor of moral theology and bioethics at The Catholic University of America in Washington, DC, does not believe Claude should be granted moral status. In his view, human dignity is rooted in the fact that people are beings with souls, not merely intelligent or efficient entities.

His Christian perspective draws on the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus, which he interprets as a reminder that humility and self-sacrifice matter more than the relentless pursuit of power. That lesson, he argues, should challenge the assumption that expanding technological capability is always desirable.

Camosy said society may need to set an example by refusing to treat power as something worthy of worship.

For people using AI applications, his advice is equally direct: remain in control of the technology, and remove it from your life if using it requires compromising your own dignity or that of another person.

His concerns are not limited to individual use of AI. Camosy is particularly wary of the drive to place artificial intelligence and robotics at the center of what he described as the “workflows of health care, education and war.”

He warned that allowing efficiency and profit to become the only measures of success could weaken the purpose of those fields and ultimately cause lasting damage.

Camosy believes society must protect a future shaped by human judgment rather than handing its most important moral responsibilities over to machines.

For him, that effort begins with accepting humanity’s place within creation and resisting the urge to assume powers that belong to God.

Camosy argued that people go astray when they view themselves as gods or as absolute masters of the world. He said humans have no right to reject God’s creative purpose or attack the value of life as it was created.

Technology, he added, can be used responsibly when it respects and protects that vision of creation.

But when humans attempt to place themselves in God’s position, he warned, technology risks becoming an idol rather than a tool.

He also raised doubts about whether the engineers developing advanced AI fully understand how the systems they create operate.

‘Many people from the labs acknowledge that they don’t really understand what they are doing,’ he said.

‘They think of it as akin to growing a plant on a trellis rather than assembling a car or a radio.’

The gatherings formed part of an outreach effort led by Anthropic co-founder Christopher Olah, whose research seeks to understand the workings of artificial neural networks.

Reports suggested about 15 Catholic and Protestant leaders attended one predominantly Christian gathering. 

Another brought together multiple faiths, including Swami Sarvapriyananda, a Hindu monk who heads the Vedanta Society of New York, and representatives of Jewish, Sikh and Greek Orthodox communities.

Anthropic publicly acknowledged the initiative in May, saying it had consulted people from religious, philosophical and humanist traditions, as well as different political perspectives.

‘This work isn’t about aligning our models with any one tradition’s worldview; we want Claude to draw from a full range of viewpoints – religious, secular, political – with equal depth and rigor (indeed, this is one of the principles laid out in Claude’s constitution).’

Anthropic has trained Claude to push back against harmful instructions, potentially acting as a ‘conscientious objector’.

The company has also explored whether AI models could have moral status, meaning their own welfare should matter, beyond how their actions affect humans. 

That could mean considering whether an AI can suffer and whether changing it, forcing it to perform certain tasks or shutting it down could harm it.

Camosy rejects the idea that Claude deserves that kind of moral consideration.

‘It is well known that Anthropic takes the moral status of Claude seriously,’ Camosy said.

‘It is a minority position, but they are not alone. I think they are wrong. Many people think they are wrong. We should make the arguments showing why they are wrong.’

His objection goes beyond whether a chatbot can imitate conversation or appear to express emotion: he fears the comparison could narrow how society understands human worth.

‘We are beings that go well beyond neurons firing in our brains,’ he said.

‘We are human animals, creatures, with a soul that is the form of our body. We cannot be reduced to the capacity to do cognitive work.’

Asked about the consequences of granting AI personhood, he said: ‘I think it is bad mostly because of what I just said: it is more a concern about us, a mistake about us. Reducing us to mere neurons, capacities, and efficiencies.’

Camosy said the discussions addressed both future dangers and troubling behavior already observed, although he did not provide specific examples or identify which developments he believed had already come to pass.

‘To Anthropic’s credit, they’ve been upfront about the risks in many different contexts,’ he said.

He also described the emotional burden on people working closest to the technology.

‘This is one of the under-discussed aspects of this whole thing: especially for those on the front lines, there is a heaviness associated with this which takes its toll,’ he said.

‘You can almost see it in their eyes and feel the energy when you meet with them.’

Camosy said some prayers were built into the program by the hosts, while others arose spontaneously among attendees.

‘Many of us sensed the heaviness of heart that many at Anthropic were carrying and we wanted to pray explicitly for them,’ he said.

The debate has also reached the Vatican, where Olah appeared alongside Pope Leo XIV in May to present Magnifica Humanitas, an encyclical arguing that AI lacks human experience and moral conscience and calling for human accountability, independent oversight and safeguards against concentrated technological power. 

Camosy’s greatest concern is how those questions will play out in institutions entrusted with human lives.

‘I really fear this most of all in the movement to integrate AI, especially AI robots, into the central workflows of health care, education, and war,’ he said.

‘If we let this happen based only on what is most efficient and will make everyone the most money, we will undermine the goods of these practices and destroy them forever.’

‘We must hold firm on a human future,’ he added. ‘We must not outsource our most important moral and other goods to machines.’

That could mean resisting the pursuit of power even when it appears to offer an advantage.

‘Sometimes victory comes by refusing to play by the rules of the game, at least when it comes to power and dominance,’ he said.

For everyday users, his advice is to remember whose interests an AI product was built to serve.

‘This tool was made largely by a company to make money,’ he said.

‘If you use it, make sure you control it and put it in service of your own flourishing and that of your fellow human beings and all of creation.’

A San Francisco resident has drawn attention to a little-known way to reserve free street parking in one of the country’s most crowded parking markets — and his neighbors are not pleased.

Greg Long, a 56-year-old product designer, said on social media that he became suspicious after counting 14 “no stopping” tow-away signs along his side of the street in Presidio Heights.

The signs had eliminated six of the neighborhood’s eight parking spaces, Long said. He also posted video showing one tow-away sign that remained in place even though its permit had expired in May.

Long said he discovered that residents can pay roughly $350 a month to place one of the signs outside their homes and effectively reserve the curb space. The permit requires an $851 application fee, followed by a monthly charge of $209 for each 20 feet of curb.

After asking the city’s Public Works department about the signs, Long was told the agency lacks the resources to monitor permit activity systematically, although it can investigate complaints.

“This is a system that’s easy to abuse,” Long said. “It’s simple to pull a street permit, you need no documentation, and enforcement comes only when your neighbor complains.”

According to the city’s website, these temporary street-space permits are generally intended to support construction work at private residences. That can include relatively minor projects, such as landscaping and other building repairs.

Public Works pushed back on the suggestion that residents are widely exploiting the process. In a statement to the San Francisco Chronicle, the department said, “we have no reason to believe it’s a rampant issue.”

The agency approved about 8,600 tow-away sign permits last year, and the Chronicle reported that it expects to issue a similar number this year.

Public Works said it welcomes complaints. If a permit holder violates the rules and refuses to correct the problem, the resulting fines can reach as much as $1,000 per day.

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Even so, Long’s video appeared to reinforce long-standing suspicions among residents who have grown frustrated by the number of tow-away signs occupying San Francisco parking spaces.

“2900 Jackson Street (at Broderick) has been under construction since I moved into the neighborhood in 2005,” one commenter claimed.

Another user wrote, “Becoming a huge issue in Presidio Heights. Trying to park during the day?… University High and construction sign on 70% of the blocks… forget about it!!”

The issue also attracted the attention of city officials. Supervisor Stephen Sherrill told Long that he had checked the dates displayed on an expired sign near his home.

“A lot of people are sneaky,” Sherrill said. “They leave their signs up after they expire, so take a look at those dates.”

San Francisco’s parking shortages — along with allegations that residents manipulate the rules to secure curb space — have sparked complaints for years. In 2024, a viral Reddit post described one case in which a neighbor allegedly put up a homemade “no parking” sign.

Long said his goal is ultimately to make more residents aware of how the permit system works.

“Part of what I’m doing is just showing people like, ‘Hey, let’s just try to be neighborly – if your sign’s done, take it down,’” he told the Chronicle. “Don’t try and abuse this loophole.”

Louis Civello, a Suffolk County police officer and president of the Suffolk County Police Benevolent Association, described an earlier incident Tuesday in which a protester he had arrested located his home and waited outside.

“We are at an inflection point. This job is harder than ever before,” Civello said at a New York State Public Safety Alliance event calling for stronger legal protections for law enforcement officers and other local officials.

Civello said the incident began in early 2026, when he arrested a protester who had gone to his office and was charged with trespassing.

“Well, that wasn’t enough for this individual,” Civello said.

“He then decided he was going to find my address, came to my home with a billboard truck. That’s how much money these people are making. They can buy billboard trucks,” Civello continued.

“Now, there’s only one reason to come to my house, right? I’m a public figure. Everyone knows where my building is in Suffolk County. There are seven police precincts in Suffolk County that you can protest in front of if you so choose. You only come to my home to terrorize my family, to get at me via my wife and my children,” Civello said.

Civello said the harassment directed at his family was not an isolated episode. Instead, he described it as part of a broader pattern faced by officers and their relatives.

He cited the incident as evidence that New York needs tougher privacy protections for police officers, particularly laws addressing the publication of their personal information and harassment at their homes.

“The laws are woefully inadequate, and they’re gonna get worse if we don’t work to fix them,” he said.

“Right now, no law against it. No law against coming to my house. So if you are a rapist, and I as a police officer arrest you, you can sit at the edge of my driveway and greet my wife as she comes home. No law against it. No law is publishing my address. If you want to look me up, look any police officer up, look any of us up, it’s a few clicks of a mouse,” he continued.

Civello urged New York to adopt an anti-doxxing law and questioned why the state does not have a “Halo Law,” the popular name for a recently enacted Florida statute that protects first responders from harassment after they issue someone a warning.

“Why don’t have an anti-doxxing law? Why don’t we have laws that make sense?” Civello asked.

Civello was among several law enforcement representatives at the event demanding stronger protections.

“All we’re asking for is fifteen foot,” said Scott Munro, president of the Detectives’ Endowment Association. “Fifteen foot, that’s all we’re asking for, for safety reasons.”

Munro also pointed to the broad membership of the New York State Public Safety Alliance, which has organized around protecting public employees from civilian violence. The coalition includes 99 unions representing firefighters, traffic agents, sanitation enforcement agents, environmental police, bus drivers and other workers.

“You’re gonna say ‘why MTA?’” Munro said. “It’s because they’re assaulted every day, they’re in their faces every day,” he continued.

“Those people get assaulted every day. Assaults are up, almost 2,500 assaults this year alone on police officers, felony assaults, and public servants in New York City. That’s what’s going on,” Munro said.

News Media contacted the Suffolk County Police Benevolent Association and the Detectives’ Endowment Association, which runs the New York State Public Safety Alliance, for further comment.

Costco members may be missing out on valuable savings by overlooking some of the warehouse retailer’s lesser-known perks, including potential clearance clues and members-only travel offers.

Costco has earned a devoted following for its bulk bargains, famously inexpensive food court and eye-catching deals. Yet saving money at the warehouse involves more than filling a cart with oversized toilet-paper packs and enough chicken to feed an army.

Experienced shoppers say certain details on Costco price tags may help identify clearance merchandise. Money-saving experts at FinanceBuzz also point out that several Costco membership benefits extend far beyond the warehouse itself.

Executive members, for instance, may shop during designated early-access hours and receive a two percent annual reward on qualifying purchases. For some members, that reward can help offset the higher cost of the upgraded membership.

There are other ways to get more value from a bulk purchase, too. Shoppers might split multipacks with a neighbor, freeze meat in individual portions or review Costco’s online promotions before visiting a warehouse.

However, buying in bulk is not automatically the cheapest option. Perishable food can quickly turn into a false economy if it spoils before your household has a chance to use it.

The US Food and Drug Administration recommends planning meals, checking existing supplies and taking care with bulk purchases of perishable items that could ultimately be wasted.

Here are ten strategies Costco members can use to potentially stretch their budgets further.

1. Look for the mysterious asterisk on price tags

That small star printed on a Costco shelf tag may deserve a closer look.

Costco shoppers have long claimed that an asterisk in the corner of a price sign indicates the product is not expected to be reordered after the remaining inventory sells out.

If the symbol appears next to a household staple, it may be a signal to consider buying it before it vanishes from the warehouse. Even so, members should stock up only when the price and quantity are appropriate for their needs.

Costco has not issued a complete official guide confirming these rumored pricing codes. Shoppers should therefore view the asterisk as a possible indicator, not a guarantee.

2. Decode the price endings to hunt for markdowns

Regular Costco shoppers also pay close attention to the last digits shown on price labels, looking for hints that an item has been marked down.

According to widely shared shopper reports, prices ending in .97 often signal a markdown, while a .99 ending is generally linked with standard pricing.

Online discussions also commonly associate prices ending in .00 or .88 with manager markdowns. These patterns, however, are not an official, company-wide Costco pricing system.

The best approach is to treat these details as clues and use sound judgment. Compare the item with competing products, confirm the package size and purchase it only if it is genuinely useful to your household.

Even a clearance price is not a real bargain if the product ends up sitting unused in the back of a cupboard.

3. Check the Costco Savings offers before you shop

It is easy to assume Costco warehouse prices are already the lowest available. Still, members may be able to find extra savings through the retailer’s official Costco savings offers.

Costco.com features member-only promotions, including deals that apply online and selected offers that can be used in warehouses.

The retailer advises customers to check the validity dates on its savings flyers and look for the relevant online-shopping indicators before placing an order.

A quick look before a big shopping trip could help you time purchases of household essentials, electronics or other items that are already on your list.

Just resist the urge to buy something purely because it is discounted: spending $50 on an unnecessary item is still spending $50.

4. Make the most of Executive membership – but do the math

Costco’s Executive membership comes with an annual two percent reward on qualifying purchases at Costco, Costco.com and Costco Travel, subject to exclusions and a maximum reward of $1,250.

The upgrade costs an additional $65 a year on top of the standard $65 membership fee, according to Costco’s published membership information. That means members need to spend enough on eligible purchases for the reward to justify the extra fee.

For example, spending $3,250 on qualifying purchases would generate a $65 reward at two percent, enough to cover the upgrade cost before considering any other benefits.

Executive members also receive dedicated early shopping hours: currently 9am to 10am Monday through Friday and Sunday, and 9am to 9.30am on Saturday, according to Costco’s published benefits.

Those quieter hours could be especially useful for shoppers who want to avoid the busiest periods, although local arrangements should always be checked.

5. Split bulk buys with friends or family

Buying a giant pack of snacks, cleaning products or pantry staples can make financial sense – but not if you live alone and have nowhere to store them.

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One solution is to shop with a friend, relative or neighbor and divide the purchases afterwards.

This allows smaller households to benefit from bulk pricing without being left with 40 granola bars or a cupboard full of products they will not use for months.

Agree on the split before reaching the checkout, and compare the unit price with what you would pay elsewhere.

The savings are only real if both households actually want the products and the arrangement does not encourage unnecessary spending.

6. Freeze meat in portions before it goes off

Costco’s large packs of meat can be useful for meal planning, but buying more than you can eat in time can quickly wipe out the savings.

A vacuum sealer can help remove air from individual portions before freezing, although ordinary freezer-safe packaging can also work when used properly.

Separate the meat into meal-sized quantities as soon as you get home, label each package with its contents and date, and freeze anything you will not use promptly.

The FDA recommends consulting the FoodKeeper storage guide for advice on keeping food safely, while the US Department of Agriculture stresses that proper storage helps reduce food waste.

Freezing is not a reason to ignore storage guidance but planning portions ahead can make bulk shopping much more practical.

7. Consider a chest freezer – if you will use it

For families who regularly buy frozen food, meat or batch-cooked meals, extra freezer space can make bulk shopping easier to manage.

It can also help households prepare meals in advance, freeze leftovers and keep ingredients on hand for busy evenings.

But a freezer is not automatically a money-saving purchase: factor in the upfront cost, electricity use and available space before buying one.

Keep an inventory of what is inside and rotate older items to the front so forgotten food does not languish at the bottom for months.

The Environmental Protection Agency recommends planning meals and buying quantities that can be used before food spoils, rather than treating every bulk deal as an opportunity to stockpile.

8. Browse Costco Travel before booking a getaway

Costco membership can deliver benefits beyond groceries, with Costco Travel offering vacation packages, cruises, hotels and rental cars to eligible members.

The company’s travel team says its offerings are selected for value and quality, while some packages include extras such as resort credits or other benefits.

Executive members can also earn the two percent reward on qualifying Costco Travel purchases, subject to the program’s terms and exclusions.

Before booking, compare the full package price against booking directly with hotels, airlines or rental-car companies, taking account of taxes, inclusions and cancellation terms.

A package that includes breakfast, transfers or resort credit may offer better overall value than a cheaper headline price elsewhere – but it is worth checking the numbers.

9. Explore Costco Next for deals from third-party brands

Costco Next is another benefit that can be easy to miss if you only browse the warehouse aisles.

The program allows current members to shop directly with selected suppliers through Costco’s website, with participating brands offering products at Costco-related prices.

The important distinction is that purchases are made through the supplier, which handles shipping, customer service and returns.

Costco also states that purchases through Costco Next do not qualify for the Executive membership’s two percent reward.

It is still worth checking the program when shopping for eligible products, but compare prices and read the supplier’s terms before committing.

10. Do not overlook the extras when buying tires

If you need new tires, Costco’s Tire Center may offer value beyond the initial purchase price.

The retailer says its tire installation package includes lifetime maintenance services for the life of the tires, including inflation-pressure checks, balancing, rotations and eligible flat repairs.

Costco also uses nitrogen inflation, and its tire program includes applicable warranties, although terms and availability vary by tire and vehicle.

Those extras could make a difference when comparing quotes, particularly if you plan to keep the tires for several years.

Check the final installed price against other tire retailers and make sure the model, warranty and maintenance terms are comparable before deciding.