I’ve been building The Agora: Learn Philosophy , and something interesting has changed in how I think AI should fit into the product. Originally, a big part of the idea was being able to interact with philosophical perspectives like Aristotle, Socrates, Nietzsche, Jung, etc. But after talking with users and people who work with LLMs, I think the more useful framing is study partner, not philosopher simulator . There’s a huge difference between an AI confidently saying “Aristotle believed X” and an AI helping you understand where an idea actually comes from. What I’m increasingly interested in is making the distinction visible: Directly supported: the philosopher actually argues this in the primary text. Interpretation: this is a reasonable reading of what they wrote. Extrapolation: this is how their framework might apply to something they never encountered. For example, Aristotle obviously never wrote about social media or AI. A model can still ask what concepts like eudaimonia , telos , or phronesis might imply about them, but it shouldn’t present that answer with the same certainty as something directly found in the Nicomachean Ethics . The ideal outcome for me isn’t someone thinking, “Great, now I don’t need to read Aristotle.” It’s someone getting challenged, realizing they don’t understand something as well as they thought, and wanting to go find the actual passage. I think that’s a much more interesting role for AI in education than simply generating answers. Curious whether others building educational AI have reached a similar conclusion. Should the model try to be the expert, or should its job be helping you engage more deeply with the real source? The Agora: Learn Philosophy iOS: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/the-agora-learn-philosophy/id6762416967 Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.bhernaurd.theagora submitted by /u/23Windy1City33
Originally posted by u/23Windy1City33 on r/ArtificialInteligence