CINCINNATI — Artificial intelligence is creating a new way for individuals to learn about the Holocaust.
At the Nancy and David Wolf Holocaust & Humanity Center, the “Dimensions in Testimony” exhibit features testimony from Pinchas Gutter, a man now living in Canada but who spent time in six Nazi concentration camps as a young boy.
Visitors can ask him questions about his experience, how he feels about being a hologram, his favorite foods, his message to young people and pretty much anything else they can think of.
Gutter sat for several full days of recording. Artificial intelligence is used to understand the questions and retrieve the most appropriate responses.
Because the algorithm pulls only from the testimony of the survivor, there is no risk for hallucination, which is when an AI model generates false or misleading information, museum representatives said.
Al Miller, a Jewish resident of Hamilton, Ohio, escaped Nazi Germany in 1937. He returned to Germany for the U.S. Army to interrogate suspected war criminals as a Ritchie Boy.
Last year, at the age of 100, Miller recorded his testimony for five full days of recordings. His daughter-in-law, Barbara Miller, who is also on the board of the museum, said this type of technology is a significant development for Holocaust education.
“There’s almost nothing more important we can do than to share these stories,” she said. “Young people, in particular, many of whom know nothing about the Holocaust, need to be educated.”
A December 2023 YouGov poll found 20% of young people strongly agree or tend to agree that the Holocaust is a myth.
Barbara said her father-in-law found it important to share his story, no matter the crowd size: “As long as he could make an impact and talk to them and inspire them, he felt he had done his job.”
The museum said Al Miller’s testimony, along with survivor and retired University of Cincinnati professor Henry Fenichel, will be available in early 2025.
Barbara Miller said that Al's message was always the same: "The Holocaust didn't start with bullets, it started with words."
She said she's worried that something similar could come to fruition in the U.S. The Anti-Defamation League has reported an increase in antisemitic incidents following Hamas' surprise attack in Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
Various artifacts from Al Miller’s experience are featured throughout the museum. Barbara said those items will be enhanced by museum guests getting an opportunity to "speak" with him.
“Al had a tremendous sense of giving back. And he really wanted to ensure that the lessons of the Holocaust would not repeat,” she said.
His efforts will continue.
Kara Driscoll, director of marketing and events at Holocaust & Humanity Center said data shows that students, often digital natives, “feel more comfortable interacting with this technology than they might talking to someone across from them.”
“This technology allows us to interact with their stories, their biographies and keep their memories alive in an interactive way that is really meaningful to the visitors that experience it,” she said.
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