Emotional Intelligence Back in Fashion? -- Tom Sullivan

[erronis]

https://digbysblog.net/2026/05/16/emotional-intelligence-back-in-fashion/

The jury is out

With apologies. I almost never read Maureen Dowd. But as a guy with degrees in philosophy and engineering, the headline grabbed me: "What A.I. Kant Do."

Dowd explores the notion that the spread of A.I. may be the death of STEM's dominance in education and the rediscovery that the humanities still have value:

Daniela Amodei, a founder of Anthropic, told ABC News that "the things that make us human will become much more important instead of much less important." She said that at Anthropic, the company is looking to hire people who are "compassionate and curious" about other people.

Amodei, who majored in literature at the University of California, Santa Cruz, said that "studying the humanities is going to be more important than ever. A lot of these models are actually very good at STEM. But I think this idea that there are things that make us uniquely human -- understanding ourselves, understanding history, understanding what makes us tick -- I think that will always be really, really important."

With A.I. ascendant, computer science majors now worry about their futures. The advice Ben Braddock received in the 1960s was "plastics." A generation or two later it was STEM. Some of Dowd's friends still doubt liberal arts is mounting a comeback.

"Some people are beginning to realize you have to avoid sautéing your brain in A.I. slop if you want to keep it fit," Dowd writes. Among them, tech giants and billionaires who claim they see a need for "emotional intelligence and storytelling in a world dominated by A.I."

. . .

[lapfog_1]

1. sooo... it's "A.I. Slop"... but that's ok, we can turn over all STEM

to AI and leaves humanities to humans...

because we don't need imagination or "artistry" in science, technology, or engineering or math.

let me know about all those 6 figure humanities jobs begging for recent college graduates...

[gulliver]

2. It could be a boon to the humanities

Intellectual talent has been badly brain drained from the humanities, largely for monetary reasons. We may see some much needed competition in the humanities if the caliber of people currently forced into STEM (to make a living) start to return to philosophy, the social sciences, and art.

I wouldn't count on it though. AI is pretty good at the humanities. There's going to be a need to find a balance point with AI. We were already out of the frying pan and into the fire anyway. Just look around. Natural intelligence magnified by the Internet is no walk in the park. AI can neutralize a whole lot of "dumbness waves" and cray cray. But we don't want to compete with it.

[GenThePerservering]

4. I would contest that AI is 'pretty good at the humanities'

it's pretty good at regurgitating what it has ingested concerning the humanities. That's it.

[gulliver]

5. (Some) humans are still better, luckily

Ask an AI to compose a poem in the style of Edgar Allan Poe on any subject you can think of. It's going to be a treat. And I'm struggling to see exactly why I should feel guilty about that. I do, but I'm not sure why!

But if you chat with AI and have any familiarity with some region of the humanities, you'll definitely see gaps and blind spots. Even if those are limited and are eventually overcome, people will still want the output of other people, imo. We like things that are handcrafted, and we like beating each other at chess even though a computer can now beat all of us easily.

[highplainsdem]

3. The AI bros "care about the humanities" because they want a credible AI imitation of humanity, the

better to enable AI to addict humans and replace humans.