Historian Reacts to AI Images of the Seven Wonders

Artificial Intelligence... it's everywhere. But what stage are we truly at? To find out, we asked an AI programme to generate the '7 Wonders of the World' and showed them to ancient historian Tristan Hughes.

How accurate are the images? Watch this video to find out!

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#historyhit #artificialintelligence #sevenwonders

00:00 Introduction
01:32 Hanging Gardens of Babylon
05:55 Lighthouse of Alexandria
10:23 Mausoleum at Halicarnassus
15:02 Temple of Artemis at Ephesus
19:01 Colossus of Rhodes
25:13 Great Pyramid of Giza, Egypt
27:22 Statue of Zeus at Olympia
32:55 Conclusion

[Beth]

Would love see your take on the historical setting of Assassins Creed games and how accurate the team at Ubisoft got, specifically Origins (Egypt), Odyssey (Greece) and Mirage (Iraq)

[lemon_j]

He doesn't look that ancient to me.

[jeffrey.a.hanson]

“What were they thinking?!” … I hope ‘they’ aren’t thinking anything.

[catherinerw]

The Hanging Gardens looks like a brutalist car-park overtaken by the jungle...

[ClassicalNumismatics]

So glad to see you wearing one of my TShirts! The Ptolemy is a personal favourite as well :)

[saidtoshimaru]

21:13 - He was known as Demetrius "the besieger" but not the "conqueror" for a reason.

[Valenskytoporsky]

I pray to god history hit will bring back the 48 minute session of the ditch guy

[gipkucq]

My favorite wonder is the Great Pyramid, because it's still around after 5, 000 years! Human ingenuity and construction at their finest!

[whiteumbrella]

Proof artists and historians still have jobs and do not have to fear AI. Loved the video. Definitely do more!

[garymaidman]

It's important to make the distinction of these as the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, as opposed to the Seven Wonders of the Modern World, which are still incredible in their own right. Also, the case of Herostratus, this is one of the first cases of Damnatio Memoriae, a Latin term literally meaning condemnation of memory.

[evanhughes]

20:28 [I nod, smile, and retire to a safe distance]

32:20 It's clearly a statue of Zeus Polydactylos.

[leonmarkrodziewicz]

Where's all the limestone cladding on the Great Pyramid gone together with it's gold capstone?

[DrTarrandProfessorFether]

The light house of Alexandra is just in 20 feet of water off the Coast of Alexandra, Egypt. Recent dives you see still pristine statues of Queen Cleopatra. They were taken out, scanned and placed back in water.

[alwina]

What strikes me is how all the AI images took so colourless, so drab. There is a kind of depressing similarity between them. The way the places are depicted gives a kind of downbeat vibe, one does not feel inclined to visit these places on the basis of the depictions. They are supremely uninviting. Kind of creepy actually. A

[DrTarrandProfessorFether]

To rebuild the lighthouse (all stones still there from, not used for cement as I Rome) would be interesting. Web says: Destruction. The lighthouse was partially cracked and damaged by earthquakes in 796 and 951, followed by structural collapse in the earthquake of 956, and then again in 1303 and 1323.

[gipkucq]

Oh no, Tristian, we completely understand why the depiction of the Mausoleum made you angry, swear away!

[PLuMUK]

It would have been interesting to see the sort of information that was used to create at least one image. I'd like to know how closely the images matched the data.

I also wonder why the image of the pyramid was not a recreation of its original appearance.

[stephen]

I'd be curious to read the prompts that were used to instruct the AI in these drawings. Was it something vague, along the lines of "create an image of the hanging gardens of Babylon", or was the AI was given a more a detailed description based off of the historic texts to work with.

[georginaturner]

Do some ai images of different period costumes, I suspect that would be hilarious! An ai interpretation of a cod piece or a corset? Yes please! 😂

[lynnedelacy]

I’ve been to the Temple of Artemis- sadly underwhelming as shown by the modern photo - there were more sheep on my visit ! Loved Ephesus itself