Message from Provost Christine Siegel, PhD, to Graduate Students

July 2025

"Fairfield University invites you to engage in a shared intellectual experience to spark conversation and reflection across disciplines. This summer, we ask graduate students to read I, Human: AI, Automation, and the Quest to Reclaim What Makes Us Unique by Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic—and join us in exploring what it means to be authentically human in a world increasingly shaped by artificial intelligence (AI). Focusing on this shared theme provides a foundation for community, dialogue, and discovery at Fairfield. Through this shared experience, we hope to foster curiosity, critical thinking, and a deeper understanding of how we can thrive—ethically, emotionally, intellectually, and professionally—in our rapidly changing world."

The Provost of Fairfield University invites all graduate students to join the Fairfield community as we explore the common theme: Authentically Human: Who Are We in the Digital Age?

Have you used ChatGPT to create an image or help highlight parts of your resume? Have you asked Google Gemini to help you create a recipe with limited options from your refrigerator? Perhaps you have tried NotebookLM to generate a summary of a document or create a podcast to make a document more interesting.

We invite you to explore the many ways AI has become part of our lives and to consider what continues to differentiate us as humans from increasingly engaging forms of AI, through any of the three options outlined below:

1.  Read I, Human (2023) by Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic and offer your comments here. Complimentary ebook or audiobook access is linked below on this page. In addition to raising important questions (Will we use artificial intelligence to improve the way we work and live, or will we allow it to alienate us?), psychologist Chamorro-Premuzic concludes each chapter with a humorous, reflective self-quiz (“Are You Patient?” / “Are You a Narcissist?” / “Are You Predictable?” / “Are You Curious?”) to help each of us consider how we live and work together with AI, often without our knowledge.

2.  Complete our brief 5-minute anonymous survey here to let us know how you currently use AI and what you would to learn to better understand and use it effectively and ethically.

3.  Consider various science fiction films and television series that show us a world with advanced AI that sometimes outpaces and challenges humanity [2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick 1968); The Terminator (Cameron 1984); The Matrix (The Wachowskis 1999); Ex Machina (Garland 2015); Upgrade (Whannell 2018); and M3gan (Johnstone 2023)] and sometimes asks us to consider how “human” technology – including robots and androids – could become [Star Wars (Lucas 1977); Star Trek: The Next Generation (series and films); Murderbot (series based on the novel); Terminator 2: Judgement Day (Cameron, 1991); M3gan 2.0 (Johnstone 2025); and Companion (Hancock, 2025)]. Tell us which future you envision here. 

Fairfield University's DiMenna-Nyselius Library provides access to the Common Read in audiobook and ebook format. A University NetID and password is necessary to gain access to the texts via the links below. Students may also choose to purchase a copy from the Fairfield University Spirit Shop (on the North Benson campus) or the Fairfield University Store (downtown location).

Genres: Non-fiction; Psychology; Technology

Author & Awards: Featured on the Thinkers50 Best New Management Booklist in 2023. Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic is the Chief Innovation Officer at ManpowerGroup, Professor of Business Psychology at University College London and at Columbia University, cofounder of Deeper Signals, and an associate at Harvard's Entrepreneurial Finance Lab. He is the author of Why Do So Many Incompetent Men Become Leaders? (and How to Fix It), upon which his TEDx talk was based. Learn more about Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic.

Click the hyperlinked book title above and choose to read as an ebook (through the Library's 'EBook Central' platform) OR access the audiobook (through the Library's Overdrive (Libby) platform OR through the library database, O'Reilly Online Learning). 

To read on Overdrive (Libby), download the Libby App, from the App Store through your mobile device, and add "Fairfield University Library" as your "library card." You will be prompted to login with your Fairfield NetID and password to authenticate your access. If you already have the Libby App through your public library, you can also connect to our titles by adding a new library card to your existing account.  

A Fairfield University NetID and password required to access the Common Read Padlet and the Library's resources. Here is a list of contacts, if you need troubleshooting support. 

NetID and password: Email academiccomputing@fairfield.edu

Accessing Library resources: Email research@fairfield.edu or use the Library's 24/7 chat box below (staffed by real people - not AI)

Instructions for logging into Padlet on the University Wiki.

Accessibility Accommodations: Email the Office of Accessibility at ooa@fairfield.edu

View information about Artificial Intelligence (AI) at Fairfield

Attend workshops and other AI events at Fairfield  - please continue to check back, more will be added throughout the semester!

The Library provides digital subscriptions (at no cost to you) to the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Chronicle of Higher Education, and America: The Jesuit Review for Fairfield faculty, staff, and students. Click here for instructions on how to sign-up!