Generative AI and the necessity of an existential crisis for the liberal arts

The release of ChatGPT at the end of 2022 demonstrated to many educators that writing or, at least, the type of writing often asked of students had been automated. While this rightfully raised a host of practical concerns, mostly around cheating, it should also raise questions about what kind of intellectual life the liberal arts will open once they are no longer centered on writing. In this paper, I argue that the automation of writing and the subsequent decentering of writing within the liberal arts is a threat to the liberal arts' intellectual life. I first argue that technics always participate in the constitution of the intellectual life, and so any transformation in the technical supplement will transform the intellectual life. I then argue that the technical supplement of the liberal arts' intellectual life is writing. Thus, the decentering of writing transforms and threatens the liberal arts' intellectual life. Considering this transformation and threat, those of us involved in the liberal arts need to re-examine what type of intellectual life we want to/can live and pass on. It becomes imperative for those of us in the liberal arts to recognize and to respond creatively to this existential crisis.