Autonomous agents, stolen goods, advertising invasion, another late degree.
When Humanity Cedes Evolution’s Top Spot
It’s said that artificial general intelligence (AGI) will be humanity’s last invention. This portends AI evolving from an assistant tool, like the students interviewed in “Hyper Text” [Mar|Apr 2026] surmise, to becoming autonomous agents. We see this happening now.
Once true AGI and eventual artificial super intelligence (ASI) is reached, human interaction and dependency will become moot. The ambitions of college intelligentsia will largely be relegated to idle pursuit.
We’ve discovered fire again in human history. It may be helpful or destructive, requiring prudent monitoring for as long as it can be controlled. And we as a species will be required to redefine what we’re about, since an alien artificial intelligence will eventually take over the top spot in evolution.
Just my current thinking.
Thomas Heller W’73 Gr’75, Columbus, IN
“The Monsters Who Ate My Child”
I was bereft after reading Trey Popp’s article “Hyper Text” in the Mar|Apr issue of the Gazette. I hope future Gazette work will highlight in any generative AI story the unethical background of some Large Language Models’ origin stories.
A reporter with The Atlantic magazine broke the news in 2023 that 183,000 copyrighted books were stolen by Open AI and Anthropic to build their ChatGPT and Claude generative-AI chatbots. Both were sued in class-action lawsuits for this unethical behavior. OpenAI’s is still ongoing, but Anthropic settled a case for $1.5 billion in 2025, agreeing to pay the authors and illustrators a small amount for stealing their work without permission. As a traditionally published author whose work was stolen in order to build an artificial mimic of human creativity, I long for all media coverage of OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Anthropic’s Claude to stop calling these unethically built monsters “tools.” This innocent term obscures too much. I refer to them as “the monsters who ate my child.”
I have many author and illustrator friends who are similarly horrified at where we find ourselves today. We don’t want settlements. We want these companies to dismantle these monsters, apologize, remove our beloved copyrighted work from their LLMs, and build them again. I never, ever would have given permission for my work to be used in this way, to be absorbed by ravenous, grasping monsters meant to replace my own human creativity, not for any amount of money. I am sure I am not the only Penn author whose work was stolen. Let us speak up.
If Penn professors and students must use AI, please make the conscious choice to research and use products from companies that didn’t behave so unethically. Throw out the ChatGPT. Find something else.
Christina Uss C’95, East Longmeadow, MA
The First AI (Advertising Invasion)
From the article “Hyper Text” we learn the ways that students at Penn are learning to grapple with the new world of generative AI. An older world of AI (an Advertising Invasion) has already diminished some of our quality of life. Thus, I hope that one of these students can combine the technical acumen of an Elon Musk C’97 W’97, the political acumen of a Donald J. Trump W’68, empathy and human compassion, to ensure that generative AI does not further diminish some quality of life. Let me explain.
When I was a child in 1940s Philadelphia, in the early days of television, a requirement for a broadcast license was the broadcast of one hour of news every night without adverts. Until 1972 it was illegal to advertise prescription drugs to the public, as is still the case in all European democracies. In the ’70s, soap opera scripts were shortened by four minutes to permit more soap ads and less opera.
It took a few more decades for advertising weeds to invade other peaceful gardens; many Americans (including me) developed worsening allergic reactions. They suffer when otherwise talented news anchors (especially on cable) now advertise not only their channels but also their own media side gigs and personal political preferences. They suffer when these anchors falsely announce imminent advertising breaks as “short,” when in reality the breaks often contain more than a half dozen adverts over a period of four minutes, sometimes repeating the advice on what medicine to quiz your doctor about. It is depressing to imagine how many ads a not so “short” break would contain.
In the 1950s, advertising had also not yet invaded movie theaters. Entertainment there began with a black-and-white newsreel (narrated by Ed Herlihy). There followed in color: a cartoon (e.g., Bugs Bunny, Tweety and Sylvester, etc.), a coming attraction or two, and then the movie itself. You had to learn about local real estate agents, personal injury lawyers, and the ecstatic potential of popcorn and Coca-Cola elsewhere.
In the 1950s, public transportation vehicles (trolleys, buses, trackless trolleys, and subway cars), at least in Philadelphia, were not moving eyesores of real estate, plumbing, and legal ads; in fact, there were absolutely no ads on their exteriors to distract car drivers or pedestrians.
In 1957, Vance Packard published The Hidden Persuaders, revealing how Madison Avenue employed psychology to condition consumers to buy products they neither wanted nor needed. And this disturbing revelation came decades before the tidal wave of advertising that makes internet surfing today so annoying. We should anticipate that billionaire AI executives will want much more involuntary consumption than the millionaire moguls of Madison Avenue ever imagined.
I do not know whether Utopia, Dystopia, or End Times will ultimately describe our new world of generative AI. In the meantime, it would be great if a student from Penn (which gave us ENIAC, the world’s first electronic computer) would find a way to free the world from constant advertising harassment.
Stanley M. Guralnick C’65 Gr’69, Boulder, CO
Another Pioneer
I much enjoyed reading “A Degree Too Late” [Mar|Apr 2026], about Penn’s first women in architecture. My mother, Evelyn Selzer Ehrlich FA’29, was one of those women, though not mentioned in the article. My family lore says she could not graduate in architecture because women were not allowed to take the required courses in sanitation and plumbing, but I have no record of that. In all events, she continued her studies in architecture at MIT and earned an architecture degree there. There were no architecture jobs during the Great Depression, let alone ones for women, and instead she became a restorer of works on paper at the Harvard Fogg Museum. During World War II, in secret, she helped restore the Declaration of Independence, kept at Fort Knox.
When Lee Copeland was dean of the Graduate School of Fine Arts, I was the University’s provost and told him this story. During a School Symposium and Reunion in May 1983, and as a complete surprise to my mother and to me, he awarded her a master of architecture degree dated June 19, 1929, “as a recognition,” he said, “of her pursuit of architecture, [her] professional career at the Fogg, the sins of our fathers, and the improvement of today’s situation.” This was a wonderful tribute for my mother, who died just a few days later.
Thomas Ehrlich, former provost (1981–1987), Palo Alto, CA
Athletics as Education
In “A Run of Transition” [“Sports,” Mar|Apr 2026], Penn’s athletic director Alanna Wren speaks enthusiastically about Penn’s brand, facilities, alumni, and sports successes. I wish she had expressed some interest in the education of Penn’s undergraduate students, some of whom are spending upwards of $90,000 a year to be there.
I write as an alumnus who has come to see, with the passage of time, that football played an important role in my college education. It was not in the classroom or on the Daily Pennsylvanian but on the varsity football team that I learned to deal with adversity, to function as part of a group, to push myself beyond my imagined limits, and to give and take criticism—all skills that have served me well in my adult career as a journalist and editor.
I support Penn athletics in the hope that Penn will continue to extend that valuable opportunity to unrecruited “walk-ons” like me. This was the original Ivy League ideal—that athletics exist primarily to benefit the students, not the alumni, fans, or coaches. Even during the glorious George Munger era (1938–53), when Penn ranked among the nation’s top football teams, many Penn players were walk-ons.
The son of a friend of ours, as a high school senior last year, applied to Penn as his first choice but was rejected. This year he is a freshman at Case Western Reserve, which is highly regarded academically but Division III athletically. Although he hadn’t played a sport in high school, at Case he tried out for crew. As I write this, he is joyously rowing five mornings a week at 5 a.m.
Had he gone to Penn, would he have had this opportunity? Would he have been encouraged to try? I wonder.
Dan Rottenberg C’64, Philadelphia
Reform Medicare Reform
I found Professor Garlick’s essay “Prescribing Affordability” making readers aware and beware of lobbyists in connection with today’s “affordability crisis” in healthcare today most enlightening [“Expert Opinion,” Mar|Apr 2026].
This crisis is not a new issue, and a key factor in what the federal response should be takes us back to late 2003, when Congress “modernized” Medicare by adding the prescription drug benefit known as Part D. Research into the matter clarified that Republicans in Congress, as well as our then president, supported Part D of the bill only if it included a “non-interference” provision, preventing the secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services from negotiations between the three major institutions involved in dispensing drugs—pharmaceutical manufacturers, insurance companies, and retail pharmacies—in effect leaving the pricing of drugs under Part D to the private sector marketplace rather than the federal bureaucracy.
As the years passed, Part D costs, particularly for new, nongeneric meds, went through the roof, with the numbers of citizens reaching retirement age in the US multiplying as well. Lobbyists were all over US senators and congress members, supporting the right of private insurers to avoid caps on their meds or other remedies. As expected, seniors were able to select meds of their choice within their personal or employer-based health insurance plans, and pass a significant amount of the cost on to the federal government. Unfortunately, the plan was working just as it had been drawn up!
It is never too late to address this problem. Pass on less of a subsidy to higher-income beneficiaries? Extend the retirement age to 70? Control campaign contributions by pharmaceutical companies? Expand the borrowing power of our government by a few more trillions of dollars? Cap pricing on new drugs where there is no generic equivalent?
Will we have statesmen able to resolve this issue before it reaches an economic tipping point? One thing we can count on: A cadre of lobbyists will be hired and heard from “at every turn,” as Garlick eloquently observed!
Gerald Friedlander W’61, Tampa, FL
Further Reading
I loved “Raging Bull” by Linda Rhodes [“Alumni Voices,” Mar|Apr 2026]. We watch a number of veterinary-focused shows on TV and have seen a lot of women. We’ve even seen Dr. Emily Thomas on the reality series The Incredible Dr. Pol pull calves while six months pregnant! But clearly the early part of Dr. Rhodes’ career was rather different, and I’m looking forward to learning more. I’ve ordered the book from Amazon.
“Useful Advice” [“Gazetteer,” Mar|Apr 2026] on Ezekiel Emanuel’s book Eat Your Ice Cream also caught my eye. I’m of the Calvin Trillin “Health food makes me sick” school, and the article sings to that. I’ve ordered the book from our library. I’m 92 on the reserved list; apparently others are interested.
I’ve read books based on mention in the Gazette before, but this is the first time I found two in the same issue!
William Mosteller C’71, Fairfax, VA
Heroic Effort Shouldn’t Have Been Needed
In “Raging Bull,” author Linda Rhodes discusses her experience as a brand-new graduate of Penn’s School of Veterinary Medicine, when she was asked to provide emergency veterinary care to a bull that had severely injured his neck after attacking a front loader. The article described Rhodes’ heroic efforts to save the bull, which proved successful. What is not discussed is the societal circumstances that led to the bull being injured in the first place.
Rhodes described that the bull was part of the “dairy bull stud business.” This is a business that involves collecting bull semen used for impregnating cows. The bull can be kept in a pen and sand area in a bull barn for this purpose for as many as 14 years while their semen is still viable. The purpose of impregnating cows is to have the cows give birth to calves. Only when cows give birth do they lactate and produce milk.
Unfortunately the male calves are usually taken away from their mothers at birth to be raised as veal calves (a subsidiary of the meat industry) or sold directly for slaughter for meat. Female calves are also often taken away from their mothers and are raised to become milk producers. I know because of my experience of having been born and raised on a “dairy farm.” I have been vegan for over 40 years.
David Sauder SW’81, Voorhees, NJ
The writer notes that he is president of Animal Rights Activists of New Jersey, Inc.—Ed.
Bigger Print, Please
I have a request/suggestion. Would you please increase the font for captions for pictures in the Gazette? Many of us are older alumni and have trouble reading that small font, even with reading glasses! It seems that there is enough space for some increase in size of the font.
Thank you for your consideration.
Norman Kahn C’69, Prairie Village, KS
Seconded
As much as I resisted writing this note, pride must take a back seat to practicality.
I’m finding it increasingly difficult to read the small font in the Gazette. I think I’ve seen others before me ask that the magazine be printed in a larger font. I appreciate that it would likely entail more printed pages, but I suspect other alumni beyond me would appreciate it.
Thank you for your consideration.
John Verrochi C’79, Mountain View, CA
I share the writers’ concerns about readability—and less than perfect eyesight—but consider the plight of the Gazette reader of yesteryear who had to contend with type like this. —Ed.
