AI makes the humanities more important, but also weirder

Writing recently in The New Yorker, the historian of science D. Graham Burnett described how he has been thinking about AI:

In one department on campus, a recently drafted anti-A.I. policy, read literally, would actually have barred faculty from giving assignments to students that centered on A.I. (It was ultimately revised.) Last year, when some distinguished alums and other worthies conducted an external review of the history department, a top recommendation was that we urgently address the looming A.I. disruptions to our teaching and research. This suggestion got a notably cool reception. But the idea that we can just keep going about our business won’t do, either.

On the contrary, staggering transformations are in full swing. And yet, on campus, we’re in a bizarre interlude: everyon…