In an article in the Wall Street Journal called, “The scrolls were illegible for 2,000 years. A college student read one with AI.” by Kyle Melnick, Melnick writes about how Luke Farritor, a college student, helped identify letters and decode them within ancient scrolls without opening them. The scrolls dated back to ancient Rome but were covered in mud because of a volcanic eruption. They could not be opened because they would crumble. Farritor used AI to recognize charred or blurry Greek letters in an image of document. The AI was more efficient than a person looking at the photograph would be. 

I think that it is amazing that people were not only able to find out what was in the burnt scrolls without opening them, but also decode them with AI. The potential that AI offers in decoding ancient languages is exciting because it could allow us to translate other ancient texts and provide a window into extinct civilizations. It can help resolve mysteries of extinct civilizations, giving us insight into their rituals and what was important to them. It would allow us to examine so much more historical data and learn. 

This technology, if further developed, may be able to decode alien languages that we have never seen or heard of. The AI could use algorithms to help decode the meaning behind certain words faster than a human could. It could also speed up the translation process. 

Overall, the ability to decode an ancient scroll represents an opportunity to connect the past with the present and the possibilities to communicate in the future with new cultures and beings. 

Washington Post Article: The scrolls were illegible for 2,000 years. A college student read one with AI. 

Author: Kyle Melnick

URL: https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2023/10/17/herculaneum-scrolls-contest-translated-deciphered/