If reading the room is an art, author-journalist Fareed Zakaria pitched it just right on May 23 as he began his commencement speech at Bard College, New York, choosing to speak about HI (Human Intelligence) rather than Artificial Intelligence (AI), to loud cheers from students.
In 2026, there have been multiple instances of college students in the U.S. booing dignitaries who have mentioned ‘AI’ in their commencement speech.
Zakaria addressed the same as he said, “At this point I need to give you a trigger warning…..I am about to utter the two most provocative letters in the English language today….AI…who knew the most charged phrase of 2026 would be AI…but here’s the twist, I actually don’t wanna talk about AI but HI.”
62-year-old Indian-born American journalist Zakaria received loud cheers from parents and students alike, as he explained the anatomy of a human brain, and drew its parallels with AI.
“A human brain weighs about three pounds. It runs on roughly 20 watts of power. Now, training some of the most advanced AI systems requires data centers consuming hundreds of millions of watts of electricity, enough to power entire cities…Meanwhile, your 3lb brain is sitting quietly inside your brain consuming less than a laptop charger,” said Zakaria.
Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt and Gloria Caulfield are some among those who faced booing in 2026 while they spoke about AI while addressing students of University of Arizona, University of Central Florida and Middle Tennessee State University. According to USA Today, Caulfield’s speech was interrupted by a student who yelled, “AI Sucks”.
Political pundits have tried to decipher the reasons behind this rising resentment towards AI in sections of college students, ranging from entry level market impact to economy fears to overall hype around the industry.
Of late, AI companies in the U.S. have faced protests from activists for their hyper AI infrastructure expansion and extensive research on Frontier AI models. In March hundreds of protestors marched towards the offices of Anthropic AI, OpenAI and xAI, demanding that their CEOs commit to a conditional pause on Frontier AI research. From the threats of superintelligence harming humanity to fears of job loss due to automation, multiple reports indicate a rise in “feeling of resentment” towards AI in citizens.
These fears are also not based out of air, multiple reports have emerged of AI playing a key role or at least being blamed behind mass lay offs in Q1 of 2026.
Also Read: “I Helped AI Learn My Work”: Ex Oracle Employees on the Layoff They Never Saw Coming
Striking a chord with the freshly enrolled students, Zakaria said that humans are not computers.
“Human beings are social animals. Aristotle told us 2,000 years ago and the computer scientist Yan LeCun has pointed out that human intelligence is not just computation. It embodied experience, social understanding, emotional cognition layered over millions of years of evolution. So perhaps, we should stop imagining human beings as inferior computers. We are not computers at all,” said Zakaria.
Also Read: “Summoning an Alien Species”: David Krueger on Why Superintelligence Could End Us All
