Saving Academics from Themselves—Asterisk

The university will survive AI. That doesn’t mean we’ll like what it turns into.

Kevin Munger The university will survive AI. That doesn’t mean we’ll like what it turns into. The received wisdom among a certain class of Bay Area/rationalist/AI-pilled thinkers is that universities are a hopelessly broken epistemic technology, especially now that AI is widespread. Some academics believe that they might just as well be replaced by recorded lectures1 or that the university’s only value comes from networking or costly social signalling. This essay does not speculate about blue-sky AI-powered epistemic institutions — you can use your imagination. But just remember that no…

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• Nicklaus Tran

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