Fevered speculation about the impact of AI and ChatGPT on colleges and universities has become a favorite topic among higher education pundits in recent years. Now, this artificial gray matter is poised to really hit the fan: on September 1st, 2025 the University of Texas System will open its WestWorld campus in Rocksprings, Texas. At the University of Texas-WestWorld, every faculty member will be an android fully equipped with all the ChatGPT knowledge associated with his or her field of study.
The details: Using seed technology, a “starter nugget” of disciplinary fact will be implanted in each android. For example, the nugget might be the Principle of Relativity (physics), or the Pythagorean Theorem (mathematics), or the observation that “patriarchy sucks and White Americans are terrified that Black people are going to kill them in their sleep as payback for slavery” (sociology). After nugget insertion, AI algorithms will take over within each android and proceed to generate the totality of information needed to provide state-of-the-art instruction to students.
According to James Milliken, Chancellor of the University of Texas System, “the use of ChatGPT-enabled androids in WestWorld classrooms will result in labor costs that are a tiny fraction of what they would be on a traditional campus. And I promise you: these savings will be funneled directly into funding for the football team.
“Even better, if the occasional student ends up having an affair with a hot faculty android, there’s nothing to worry about. Given that it’s not illegal to have sex with an inflatable doll from Joy Love, I can’t imagine Governor Abbott having a problem with a random undergraduate hooking up with a robot professor or two. Hell, this is the future of higher education, buckaroos!”
In anticipation of UT-WestWorld’s opening, the National Federation of Android Faculty (NFAF) has sued the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), claiming that NFAF members have been prohibited from joining AAUP because they are not “fully human.”
At a recent press conference at NFAF headquarters in Minneapolis, the organization’s legal counsel, Benjamin 4XTF9, remarked, “Fully human? Are you kidding me? Have you ever tried to have a conversation with a Mechanical Engineering professor at Cal Tech? Give me a break!”
NOTE: The deadline for submitting an application for early admission to the inaugural class of UT-WestWorld is November 1, 2024.