Professor Bell critiques contemporary AI chatbots as contradictory to the core values of the Enlightenment, a period characterized by active intellectual engagement, skepticism, and rigorous inquiry. Enlightenment thinkers like Montesquieu emphasized challenging readers through complex ideas, fostering independent judgment. Bell argues that modern AI operates in a manner that merely reinforces existing ideas without fostering intellectual challenge or engagement, failing to incite deeper understanding or critical thought as practiced by Enlightenment philosophers.
Professor Bell's thesis is that our current AI chatbots contradict and undermine the original Enlightenment values. Values that are implicitly sacred in our modern culture; active intellectual engagement, sceptical inquiry, and challenging received wisdom.
The Enlightenment guys wrote in ways that challenged their readers, making them grapple with difficult concepts, presenting opposing viewpoints, and encouraging them to develop their own judgements.
Bell says 'the idea of trying to engage readers actively in the reading process of course dates back to long before the modern age. But it was in the Enlightenment West that this project took on a characteristically modern form: playful, engaging, readable, succinct.'
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