Human Needs STEM From the Humanities

When I first read Ian Bogost’s article in The Atlantic, Universities Have a Computer-Science Problem, I felt a familiar chord struck. Bogost critiques the growing trend of treating computer science (CS) as an isolated technical discipline, divorced from the broader contexts that give meaning and consequence to technology. He argues—rightly—that when CS is taught as a skillset without the ethical, philosophical, and historical grounding that the humanities provide, we risk creating coders who can build powerful systems but lack the perspective to understand their social impacts.

This isn’t just a computer science problem. It’s a modern human problem.

From the Clinic to the Zoo

Recently, I’ve been working on an essay that uses the metaphor of the Human Zoo to describe the context of human suffering in our modern world. The idea is that, much like animals taken from their native habitats and placed into the confines of a zoo—where their basic needs are accommodated, but their instincts are suppressed—humans today live in environments wildly mismatched to the conditions we evolved for. We suffer in ways that feel individual but are, in fact, deeply systemic.

This isn’t a new concept in psychiatry. We’ve long understood that environment shapes mental health. But what I’ve come to realize is that understanding this mismatch takes more than neuroscience and diagnostic manuals. It takes history, anthropology, and critical reflection. We need to trace the trajectory that brought us here—from the dawn of agriculture, through the Industrial Revolution, into today’s hyper-connected yet paradoxically hyper-lonely digital age.

The Human Zoo metaphor helps me make sense of my patients’ struggles. It frames their anxiety, depression, and burnout not as isolated malfunctions of the brain, but as adaptive responses to an environment that no longer fits their fundamental needs for connection, autonomy, and purpose. This isn’t something you’ll find in the DSM or a neuroscience text book. It’s something you find at the intersection of biology and history, science and story.

The Humanities as Survival Tools

This is why Bogost’s warning about the siloing of CS resonates so deeply. It’s the same pattern I see in mental health care. When we isolate the technical (whether coding or diagnosing) from the humanistic (history, ethics, meaning), we reduce complex systems to mechanical problems. We miss the bigger picture.

Time Magazine’s piece, Humanities, All Too Humanities!, echoes this concern. It laments the decline of the humanities as STEM fields take center stage, arguing that critical thinking, creativity, and ethical reasoning—core to the humanities—are not luxuries but necessities for navigating modern life.

As a psychiatrist, I’ve felt this firsthand. My medical training taught me how to understand the brain. But it was my readings in history, religion, and philosophy that taught me how to understand suffering. The human zoo metaphor, the insights from evolutionary mismatch, the social forces shaping mental illness—these didn’t come from textbooks. They came from stepping outside the clinic and into the broader landscape of human experience.

The Digital Cage

Consider the digital age, one of the most profound shifts in the human zoo. Our brains evolved for small groups, face-to-face connection, and a balance between activity and rest. Now we live in a 24/7 world of notifications, algorithms, and social comparison on a global scale. This environment hijacks our social and emotional circuitry in ways that neuroscience alone can’t explain. But when we bring in history—considering the rise of mass media, consumer culture, and the commodification of attention—the picture sharpens.

This is why computer science education needs the humanities. Algorithms don’t just shape code; they shape lives. The software engineers behind the tweaks to a social media platform’s feed have just as much influence over human connection today as parents, teachers, or therapists. If that engineer doesn’t understand the history of propaganda, the psychology of addiction, or the ethics of design, they may unintentionally build invisible digital cages as confining as any physical zoo.

Psychiatry, Too, Is a STEM Field

Psychiatry has its roots in STEM. We talk about neurotransmitters and brain circuits. We prescribe medications based on biochemistry. But to truly help people, we need to think like humanists. We need to ask: What world are we asking people to adapt to? Is the problem in the person—or in the zoo?

In that sense, the human zoo metaphor has become a tool I use in therapy. It helps patients step back from self-blame and see their suffering in context. It invites them to reflect on how modern life asks more of us than we were designed to handle. And it gives me a framework for understanding that’s richer and more compassionate than any diagnostic label.

Human Needs STEM from the Humanities

Bogost’s plea for integrating CS with the liberal arts isn’t about watering down technical rigor—it’s about making sure that rigor serves human needs. The same applies to psychiatry. We need to integrate, not isolate. We need to be as skilled in listening to stories as we are in analyzing data.

The human zoo is a perfect example of what happens when you bring history and science together. It’s a story about suffering, but it’s also a story about hope. Because if we can understand how we got here—through agriculture, industry, capitalism, and now the digital world—we can begin to imagine a different path forward. One where we redesign the zoo, or maybe even find our way back to something wilder, freer, more human.

In fact, this integration of STEM and the humanities is already visible in the evolution of actual zoos. Historically, zoos were designed as spectacles—places of entertainment where animals were confined in cramped, barren enclosures that often prioritized human amusement over animal welfare. But as zoologists, veterinarians, ecologists, and animal behaviorists deepened their scientific understanding of the animals under their care, and as historians, ethicists, and activists called attention to the ethical failures of such institutions, a new model began to emerge. Today, many modern zoos strive to create environments that better replicate natural habitats, support species conservation, and educate the public about ecological interdependence. This shift didn’t happen through science alone. It required a compassionate lens informed by the humanities: an acknowledgment of past mistakes, a reflection on ethics, and a commitment to doing better.

This serves as a powerful reminder for us today, especially as we stand on the cusp of another profound technological shift: the AI revolution. Just as the unintended consequences of agriculture transformed human societies—moving us from relationship-based living to role-based hierarchies, from stewardship of shared resources to systems of ownership and inequality—we face similar risks with AI. Without thoughtful integration of history, ethics, and critical reflection, we risk designing systems that reshape human life in ways we don’t intend or fully understand. The stakes are no longer just about human and animal welfare in captivity, but about the present and future environment in which human connection, agency, and meaning will develop.

The humanities aren’t just for English majors. They’re for technologists, psychiatrists, engineers—anyone who works with human lives. They help us ask the questions that really matter: What are we building? Why? For whom? And perhaps most importantly: At what cost?

If we want to heal, grow, and thrive—not just as individuals, but as a society—we need both the precision of STEM and the wisdom of the humanities. We need the whole story. Understanding the needs of humanity STEMs from the Humanities.