Opinion | A.I. Is Shedding Enlightenment Values - The New York Times

Will artificial intelligence bring about an intellectual revolution as profound as the Enlightenment? Enthusiasts like to make this claim, and even use the term “second Enlightenment” to describe what A.I. may ultimately generate. As a historian of the original Enlightenment, I’m intrigued by the idea — and I see some similarities. But what a close comparison in fact illuminates is not just how pernicious A.I. can be to intellectual life, but also how it can undermine the very principles of the Enlightenment itself. The parallels are, admittedly, striking. The Enlightenment — the name historians give to the intellectual upheaval that swept across the European world in the 18th century — not only filled supporters with the hope that an Age of Reason was dawning but also led them to see their historical moment as part of an evolution toward a very different, and better, future. Like the proponents of A.I., with their ceaseless talk of an imminent revolution (“the greatest reshuffling of

Will artificial intelligence bring about an intellectual revolution as profound as the Enlightenment? Enthusiasts like to make this claim, and even use the term “second Enlightenment” to describe what A.I. may ultimately generate. As a historian of the original Enlightenment, I’m intrigued by the idea — and I see some similarities. But what a close comparison in fact illuminates is not just how pernicious A.I. can be to intellectual life, but also how it can undermine the very principles of the Enlightenment itself. The parallels are, admittedly, striking. The Enlightenment — the name historia