Why A.I. May be the Best Thing that’s Ever Happened to the Humanities
It is understandable to be nervous about the fate of the humanities right now. The past few months has seen the rapid-fire release of multiple AI models claiming to be able to do “deep research.” If you believe the marketing pitches, this means that computers will soon be able to perform the core academic functions of conducting comprehensive literature reviews, deeply synthesizing materials to understand the state of a given field, and crafting new arguments that will be relevant and will forward the scholarly conversation.
I am a scholar in the humanities (medical history and religious studies), and in my own testing, I have found that the models currently available to the public are not able to match a professional or even a competent graduate student the performance of these core tasks as they pertain to my field. However, the most recent generation of tools are indeed able to outperform most of my undergraduate students.
Given the rate of improvement we have been seeing, I believe it is only a matter of time — potentially measured in months, not years — before these models are able to replace human researchers in my field for most everyday real-world applications. My colleagues across the humanities might disagree with this timeline, but we all can read the writing on the wall.
Of course, we also are all aware how low the perceived value of a humanities education already had plummeted before these LLMs burst onto the scene. Commentators across the political spectrum are now vocally doubting whether anyone in the future will be interested to pay tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars — potentially going into considerable debt — to spend four years learning skills that a computer can perform in four seconds. Is a humanities education of any value whatsoever anymore? And if there is some reason for universities choose to keep these programs around, is there any reason not to just replace the professors with machines?
I might be tempted to answer “no” to these questions if I thought that a humanities education was simply about acquiring research skills. But, that misses the point. Yes, college administrators and admissions staff have spent the past few decades promoting humanities programs by drawing attention to the marketable skills students gain. But let’s remember that, by definition, the humanities are simply the study of that which makes us human. So, if computers can develop the ability to perform certain types of reading, writing, and analysis as well as humans, then ipso facto those skills cannot represent the sum total of what the humanities are all about.
What I am saying is that, perhaps, the advent of A.I. is not a decisive final blow to the humanities, but rather the clarifying moment that brings into focus what the true purpose of the humanities has been all along. It turns out that the raison d’être of the humanities is not to teach students a set of skills, but rather to instill a curiosity about and a drive to investigate what it means to be human. The humanities aren’t about reading and writing words: they’re about the critical reflection, creativity, and emotional intelligence behind the words.
As a thought experiment, imagine a scenario where AI somehow managed to fully obviate the need for most humans to engage in the research skills mentioned above. Let’s imagine that, whether you want a sophisticated linguistic analysis of a Shakespearean sonnet, a contextually nuanced interpretation of a Chinese historical object, or an insightful breakdown of how social norms influenced a contemporary South American novelist, a PhD-level analysis of any subject could be generated instantaneously with the click of a button. Let’s imagine that the AI always gets its facts perfectly right, and that its responses always are fully understood by the individual making the request. Have the humanities been dispensed with in this hypothetical world?
Far from it. Even if spending time acquiring the skills to do research for oneself somehow were no longer necessary, all of the questions about what it means to be human would remain just as pertinent as ever. AI produces the information, but how do we, as human beings with dreams and aspirations, sensitively and meaningfully engage with it? How do we, as living organisms with physical bodies and felt emotions, experience ourselves being moved and changed by it? How can we, as interactive social animals, communicate our ideas, feelings, and intuitions about this information in ways that impact others both within our cultural orbits and beyond? How can we, as self-reflective and spiritual meaning-makers, share these lived experiences and memories with one another both in real-time and in ways that will be accessible by posterity? How can we, as minds sculpted by developmental processes, mentor and support one another through shifts in our consciousness as we grow through these new understandings?
These are the kinds of enduring questions about the human condition that will always be applicable no matter what new technologies come online. Done right, AI might help us to discover new information more efficiently, and it may help us to express ourselves in ways that are more precise, but computers will never be able to answer the central questions of the humanities for us. The more competent AI becomes, the more what makes us uniquely human is brought into sharper relief. It turns out that being human was never just about information gathering and wordsmithing. And in pointing that out so starkly to us, it might just be that AI is the best thing that’s ever happened to the humanities.
Prof. Pierce Salguero is a scholar, teacher, and author specializing in Buddhism, Asian medicine, and contemporary spirituality.
Join my free newsletter for periodic updates about my blogs, research, and other offerings.
See also: 🌐 Website | 🎙️ Podcast | 🧠 Video Courses
