Humanities x Tech, Hunter College, 2026
What might it mean to talk to an ancient thinker like Confucius or Aristotle and have them respond to us? Drawing from ancient philosophical texts, Professor Sarah Levitan (Computer Science) and Alexandra Salem (CUNY Graduate Center) will present an LLM-powered chatbot they developed to represent what ancient thinkers may say about the questions we have. Professor Dhananjay Jagannathan (Philosophy), who collaborated on the project, will present a response on how our intellectual engagement with ancient texts can be both enriched and challenged by generative AI.